Romola

by George Eliot

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

  A FLORENTINE JOKE.

  Early the next morning Tito was returning from Bratti's shop in thenarrow thoroughfare of the Ferravecchi. The Genoese stranger hadcarried away the onyx ring, and Tito was carrying away fifty florins.It did just cross his mind that if, after all, Fortune, by one of herable devices, saved him from the necessity of quitting Florence, itwould be better for him not to have parted with his ring, since he hadbeen understood to wear it for the sake of peculiar memories andpredilections; still, it was a slight matter, not worth dwelling on withany emphasis, and in those moments he had lost his confidence infortune. The feverish excitement of the first alarm which had impelledhis mind to travel into the future had given place to a dull, regretfullassitude. He cared so much for the pleasures that could only come tohim through the good opinion of his fellow-men, that he wished now hehad never risked ignominy by shrinking from what his fellow-men calledobligations.

  But our deeds are like children that are born to us; they live and actapart from our own will. Nay, children may be strangled, but deedsnever: they have an indestructible life both in and out of ourconsciousness; and that dreadful vitality of deeds was pressing hard onTito for the first time.

  He was going back to his lodgings in the Piazza di San Giovanni, but heavoided passing through the Mercato Vecchio, which was his nearest way,lest he should see Tessa. He was not in the humour to seek anything; hecould only await the first sign of his altering lot.

  The piazza with its sights of beauty was lit up by that warm morningsunlight under which the autumn dew still lingers, and which invites toan idlesse undulled by fatigue. It was a festival morning, too, whenthe soft warmth seems to steal over one with a special invitation tolounge and gaze. Here, too, the signs of the fair were present; in thespaces round the octagonal baptistery, stalls were being spread withfruit and flowers, and here and there laden mules were standing quietlyabsorbed in their nose-bags, while their drivers were perhaps gonethrough the hospitable sacred doors to kneel before the blessed Virginon this morning of her Nativity. On the broad marble steps of the Duomothere were scattered groups of beggars and gossiping talkers: here anold crone with white hair and hard sunburnt face encouraging around-capped baby to try its tiny bare feet on the warmed marble, whilea dog sitting near snuffed at the performance suspiciously; there acouple of shaggy-headed boys leaning to watch a small pale cripple whowas cutting a face on a cherry-stone; and above them on the wideplatform men were making changing knots in laughing desultory chat, orelse were standing in close couples gesticulating eagerly.

  But the largest and most important company of loungers was that towardswhich Tito had to direct his steps. It was the busiest time of the daywith Nello, and in this warm season and at an hour when clients werenumerous, most men preferred being shaved under the pretty red and whiteawning in front of the shop rather than within narrow walls. It is nota sublime attitude for a man, to sit with lathered chin thrown backward,and have his nose made a handle of; but to be shaved was a fashion ofFlorentine respectability, and it is astonishing how gravely men look ateach other when they are all in the fashion. It was the hour of theday, too, when yesterday's crop of gossip was freshest, and the barber'stongue was always in its glory when his razor was busy; the deftactivity of those two instruments seemed to be set going by a commonspring. Tito foresaw that it would be impossible for him to escapebeing drawn into the circle; he must smile and retort, and lookperfectly at his ease. Well! it was but the ordeal of swallowing breadand cheese pills after all. The man who let the mere anticipation ofdiscovery choke him was simply a man of weak nerves.

  But just at that time Tito felt a hand laid on his shoulder, and noamount of previous resolution could prevent the very unpleasantsensation with which that sudden touch jarred him. His face, as heturned it round, betrayed the inward shock; but the owner of the handthat seemed to have such evil magic in it broke into a light laugh. Hewas a young man about Tito's own age, with keen features, smallclose-clipped head, and close-shaven lip and chin, giving the idea of amind as little encumbered as possible with material that was notnervous. The keen eyes were bright with hope and friendliness, as somany other young eyes have been that have afterwards closed on the worldin bitterness and disappointment; for at that time there were none butpleasant predictions about Niccolo Macchiavelli, as a young man ofpromise, who was expected to mend the broken fortunes of his ancientfamily.

  "Why, Melema, what evil dream did you have last night, that you took mylight grasp for that of a _sbirro_ or something worse?"

  "Ah, Messer Niccolo!" said Tito, recovering himself immediately; "itmust have been an extra amount of dulness in my veins this morning thatshuddered at the approach of your wit. But the fact is, I have had abad night."

  "That is unlucky, because you will be expected to shine without anyobstructing fog to-day in the Rucellai Gardens. I take it for grantedyou are to be there."

  "Messer Bernardo did me the honour to invite me," said Tito; "but Ishall be engaged elsewhere."

  "Ah! I remember, you are in love," said Macchiavelli, with a shrug,"else you would never have such inconvenient engagements. Why, we areto eat a peacock and ortolans under the loggia among Bernardo Rucellai'srare trees; there are to be the choicest spirits in Florence and thechoicest wines. Only, as Piero de' Medici is to be there, the choicespirits may happen to be swamped in the capping of impromptu verses. Ihate that game; it is a device for the triumph of small wits, who arealways inspired the most by the smallest occasions."

  "What is that you are saying about Piero de' Medici and small wits,Messer Niccolo?" said Nello, whose light figure was at that momentpredominating over the Herculean frame of Niccolo Caparra.

  That famous worker in iron, whom we saw last with bared muscular armsand leathern apron in the Mercato Vecchio, was this morning dressed inholiday suit, and as he sat submissively while Nello skipped round him,lathered him, seized him by the nose, and scraped him with magicalquickness, he looked much as a lion might if it had donned linen andtunic and was preparing to go into society.

  "A private secretary will never rise in the world if he couples greatand small in that way," continued Nello. "When great men are notallowed to marry their sons and daughters as they like, small men mustnot expect to marry their words as they like. Have you heard the newsDomenico Cennini, here, has been telling us?--that Pagolantonio Soderinihas given Ser Piero da Bibbiena a box on the ear for setting on Pierode' Medici to interfere with the marriage between young Tommaso Soderiniand Fiammetta Strozzi, and is to be sent ambassador to Venice as apunishment?"

  "I don't know which I envy him most," said Macchiavelli, "the offence orthe punishment. The offence will make him the most popular man in allFlorence, and the punishment will take him among the only people inItaly who have known how to manage their own affairs."

  "Yes, if Soderini stays long enough at Venice," said Cennini, "he maychance to learn the Venetian fashion, and bring it home with him. TheSoderini have been fast friends of the Medici, but what has happened islikely to open Pagolantonio's eyes to the good of our old Florentinetrick of choosing a new harness when the old one galls us; if we havenot quite lost the trick in these last fifty years."

  "Not we," said Niccolo Caparra, who was rejoicing in the free use of hislips again. "Eat eggs in Lent and the snow will melt. That's what Isay to our people when they get noisy over their cups at San Gallo, andtalk of raising a _romor_ (insurrection): I say, never do you plan a_romor_; you may as well try to fill Arno with buckets. When there'swater enough Arno will be full, and that will not be till the torrent isready."

  "Caparra, that oracular speech of yours is due to my excellent shaving,"said Nello. "You could never have made it with that dark rust on yourchin. Ecco, Messer Domenico, I am ready for you now. By the way, mybel erudito," continued Nello, as he saw Tito moving towards the door,"here has been old Maso seeking for you, but your nest was empty. Hewill come again presently. The old man look
ed mournful, and seemed inhaste. I hope there is nothing wrong in the Via de' Bardi."

  "Doubtless Messer Tito knows that Bardo's son is dead," said Cronaca,who had just come up.

  Tito's heart gave a leap--had the death happened before Romola saw him?

  "No, I had not heard it," he said, with no more discomposure than theoccasion seemed to warrant, turning and leaning against the doorpost, asif he had given up his intention of going away. "I knew that his sisterhad gone to see him. Did he die before she arrived?"

  "No," said Cronaca; "I was in San Marco at the time, and saw her comeout from the chapter-house with Fra Girolamo, who told us that the dyingman's breath had been preserved as by a miracle, that he might make adisclosure to his sister."

  Tito felt that his fate was decided. Again his mind rushed over all thecircumstances of his departure from Florence, and he conceived a plan ofgetting back his money from Cennini before the disclosure had becomepublic. If he once had his money he need not stay long in endurance ofscorching looks and biting words. He would wait now, and go away withCennini and get the money from him at once. With that project in hismind he stood motionless--his hands in his belt, his eyes fixed absentlyon the ground. Nello, glancing at him, felt sure that he was absorbedin anxiety about Romola, and thought him such a pretty image ofself-forgetful sadness, that he just perceptibly pointed his razor athim, and gave a challenging look at Piero di Cosimo, whom he had neverforgiven for his refusal to see any prognostics of character in hisfavourite's handsome face. Piero, who was leaning against the otherdoorpost, close to Tito, shrugged his shoulders: the frequent recurrenceof such challenges from Nello had changed the painter's firstdeclaration of neutrality into a positive inclination to believe ill ofthe much-praised Greek.

  "So you have got your Fra Girolamo back again, Cronaca? I suppose weshall have him preaching again this next Advent," said Nello.

  "And not before there is need," said Cronaca, gravely. "We have had thebest testimony to his words since the last Quaresima; for even to thewicked wickedness has become a plague; and the ripeness of vice isturning to rottenness in the nostrils even of the vicious. There hasnot been a change since the Quaresima, either in Rome or at Florence,but has put a new seal on the Frate's words--that the harvest of sin isripe, and that God will reap it with a sword."

  "I hope he has had a new vision, however," said Francesco Cei,sneeringly. "The old ones are somewhat stale. Can't your Frate get apoet to help out his imagination for him?"

  "He has no lack of poets about him," said Cronaca, with quiet contempt,"but they are great poets and not little ones; so they are contented tobe taught by him, and no more think the truth stale which God has givenhim to utter, than they think the light of the moon is stale. Butperhaps certain high prelates and princes who dislike the Frate'sdenunciations might be pleased to hear that, though Giovanni Pico, andPoliziano, and Marsilio Ficino, and most other men of mark in Florence,reverence Fra Girolamo, Messer Francesco Cei despises him."

  "Poliziano?" said Cei, with a scornful laugh. "Yes, doubtless hebelieves in your new Jonah; witness the fine orations he wrote for theenvoys of Sienna, to tell Alexander the Sixth that the world and theChurch were never so well off as since he became Pope."

  "Nay, Francesco," said Macchiavelli, smiling, "a various scholar musthave various opinions. And as for the Frate, whatever we may think ofhis saintliness, you judge his preaching too narrowly. The secret oforatory lies, not in saying new things, but in saying things with acertain power that moves the hearers--without which, as old Filelfo hassaid, your speaker deserves to be called, `non oratorem, sed aratorem.'And, according to that test, Fra Girolamo is a great orator."

  "That is true, Niccolo," said Cennini, speaking from the shaving-chair,"but part of the secret lies in the prophetic visions. Our people--nooffence to you, Cronaca--will run after anything in the shape of aprophet, especially if he prophesies terrors and tribulations."

  "Rather say, Cennini," answered Cronaca, "that the chief secret lies inthe Frate's pure life and strong faith, which stamp him as a messengerof God."

  "I admit it--I admit it," said Cennini, opening his palms, as he rosefrom the chair. "His life is spotless: no man has impeached it."

  "He is satisfied with the pleasant lust of arrogance," Cei burst out,bitterly. "I can see it in that proud lip and satisfied eye of his. Hehears the air filled with his own name--Fra Girolamo Savonarola, ofFerrara; the prophet, the saint, the mighty preacher, who frightens thevery babies of Florence into laying down their wicked baubles."

  "Come, come, Francesco, you are out of humour with waiting," said theconciliatory Nello. "Let me stop your mouth with a little lather. Imust not have my friend Cronaca made angry: I have a regard for hischin; and his chin is in no respect altered since he became a Piagnone.And for my own part, I confess, when the Frate was preaching in theDuomo last Advent, I got into such a trick of slipping in to listen tohim that I might have turned Piagnone too, if I had not been hindered bythe liberal nature of my art; and also by the length of the sermons,which are sometimes a good while before they get to the moving point.But, as Messer Niccolo here says, the Frate lays hold of the people bysome power over and above his prophetic visions. Monks and nuns whoprophesy are not of that rareness. For what says Luigi Pulci?`Dombruno's sharp-cutting scimitar had the fame of being enchanted;but,' says Luigi, `I am rather of opinion that it cut sharp because itwas of strongly-tempered steel.' Yes, yes; Paternosters may shaveclean, but they must be said over a good razor."

  "See, Nello!" said Macchiavelli, "what doctor is this advancing on hisBucephalus? I thought your piazza was free from those furred andscarlet-robed lackeys of death. This man looks as if he had had somesuch night adventure as Boccaccio's Maestro Simone, and had his bonnetand mantle pickled a little in the gutter; though he himself is as sleekas a miller's rat."

  "A-ah!" said Nello, with a low long-drawn intonation, as he looked uptowards the advancing figure--a round-headed, round-bodied personage,seated on a raw young horse, which held its nose out with an air ofthreatening obstinacy, and by a constant effort to back and go off in anoblique line showed free views about authority very much in advance ofthe age.

  "And I have a few more adventures in pickle for him," continued Nello,in an undertone, "which I hope will drive his inquiring nostrils toanother quarter of the city. He's a doctor from Padua; they say he hasbeen at Prato for three months, and now he's come to Florence to seewhat he can net. But his great trick is making rounds among thecontadini. And do you note those great saddle-bags he carries? Theyare to hold the fat capons and eggs and meal he levies on silly clownswith whom coin is scarce. He vends his own secret medicines, so hekeeps away from the doors of the druggists; and for this last week hehas taken to sitting in my piazza for two or three hours every day, andmaking it a resort for asthmas and squalling bambini. It stirs my gallto see the toad-faced quack fingering the greasy quattrini, or bagging apigeon in exchange for his pills and powders. But I'll put a few thornsin his saddle, else I'm no Florentine. Laudamus! he is coming to beshaved; that's what I've waited for. Messer Domenico, go not away:wait; you shall see a rare bit of fooling, which I devised two days ago.Here, Sandro!"

  Nello whispered in the ear of Sandro, who rolled his solemn eyes,nodded, and, following up these signs of understanding with a slowsmile, took to his heels with surprising rapidity.

  "How is it with you, Maestro Tacco?" said Nello, as the doctor, withdifficulty, brought his horse's head round towards the barber's shop."That is a fine young horse of yours, but something raw in the mouth,eh?"

  "He is an accursed beast, the _vermocane_ seize him!" said MaestroTacco, with a burst of irritation, descending from his saddle andfastening the old bridle, mended with string, to an iron staple in thewall. "Nevertheless," he added, recollecting himself, "a sound beastand a valuable, for one who wanted to purchase, and get a profit bytraining him. I had him cheap."

  "Rather too hard riding for a man who carries y
our weight of learning:eh, Maestro?" said Nello. "You seem hot."

  "Truly, I am likely to be hot," said the doctor, taking off his bonnet,and giving to full view a bald low head and flat broad face, with highears, wide lipless mouth, round eyes, and deep arched lines above theprojecting eyebrows, which altogether made Nello's epithet "toad-faced"dubiously complimentary to the blameless batrachian. "Riding fromPeretola, when the sun is high, is not the same thing as kicking yourheels on a bench in the shade, like your Florence doctors. Moreover, Ihave had not a little pulling to get through the carts and mules intothe Mercato, to find out the husband of a certain Monna Ghita, who hadhad a fatal seizure before I was called in; and if it had not been thatI had to demand my fees--"

  "Monna Ghita!" said Nello, as the perspiring doctor interrupted himselfto rub his head and face. "Peace be with her angry soul! The Mercatowill want a whip the more if her tongue is laid to rest."

  Tito, who had roused himself from his abstraction, and was listening tothe dialogue, felt a new rush of the vague half-formed ideas aboutTessa, which had passed through his mind the evening before: if MonnaGhita were really taken out of the way, it would be easier for him tosee Tessa again--whenever he wanted to see her.

  "_Gnaffe_, Maestro," Nello went on, in a sympathising tone, "you are theslave of rude mortals, who, but for you, would die like brutes, withouthelp of pill or powder. It is pitiful to see your learned lymph oozingfrom your pores as if it were mere vulgar moisture. You think myshaving will cool and disencumber you? One moment and I have done withMesser Francesco here. It seems to me a thousand years till I wait upona man who carries all the science of Arabia in his head and saddle-bags.Ecco!"

  Nello held up the shaving-cloth with an air of invitation, and MaestroTacco advanced and seated himself under a preoccupation with his heatand his self-importance, which made him quite deaf to the irony conveyedin Nello's officiously polite speech.

  "It is but fitting that a great medicus like you," said Nello, adjustingthe cloth, "should be shaved by the same razor that has shaved theillustrious Antonio Benevieni, the greatest master of the chirurgicart."

  "The chirurgic art!" interrupted the doctor, with an air of contemptuousdisgust. "Is it your Florentine fashion to put the masters of thescience of medicine on a level with men who do carpentry on brokenlimbs, and sew up wounds like tailors, and carve away excrescences as abutcher trims meat? _Via_! A manual art, such as any artificer mightlearn, and which has been practised by simple barbers like yourself--ona level with the noble science of Hippocrates, Galen, and Avicenna,which penetrates into the occult influences of the stars and plants andgems!--a science locked up from the vulgar!"

  "No, in truth, Maestro," said Nello, using his lather very deliberately,as if he wanted to prolong the operation to the utmost, "I never thoughtof placing them on a level: I know your science comes next to themiracles of Holy Church for mystery. But there, you see, is the pity ofit,"--here Nello fell into a tone of regretful sympathy--"your highscience is sealed from the profane and the vulgar, and so you become anobject of envy and slander. I grieve to say it, but there are lowfellows in this city--mere _sgherri_, who go about in nightcaps and longbeards, and make it their business to sprinkle gall in every man's brothwho is prospering. Let me tell you--for you are a stranger--this is acity where every man had need carry a large nail ready to fasten on thewheel of Fortune when his side happens to be uppermost. Already thereare stories--mere fables doubtless--beginning to be buzzed aboutconcerning you, that make me wish I could hear of your being well onyour way to Arezzo. I would not have a man of your metal stoned, forthough San Stefano was stoned, he was not great in medicine like SanCosmo and San Damiano..."

  "What stories? what fables?" stammered Maestro Tacco. "What do youmean?"

  "_Lasso_! I fear me you are come into the trap for your cheese,Maestro. The fact is, there is a company of evil youths who go prowlingabout the houses of our citizens carrying sharp tools in theirpockets;--no sort of door, or window, or shutter, but they will pierceit. They are possessed with a diabolical patience to watch the doingsof people who fancy themselves private. It must be they who have doneit--it must be they who have spread the stories about you and yourmedicines. Have you by chance detected any small aperture in your door,or window-shutter? No? Well, I advise you to look; for it is nowcommonly talked of that you have been seen in your dwelling at the Cantodi Paglia, making your secret specifics by night: pounding dried toadsin a mortar, compounding a salve out of mashed worms, and making yourpills from the dried livers of rats which you mix with saliva emittedduring the utterance of a blasphemous incantation--which indeed thesewitnesses profess to repeat."

  "It is a pack of lies!" exclaimed the doctor, struggling to getutterance, and then desisting in alarm at the approaching razor.

  "It is not to me, or any of this respectable company, that you need tosay that, doctor. _We_ are not the heads to plant such carrots as thosein. But what of that? What are a handful of reasonable men against acrowd with stones in their hands? There are those among us who thinkCecco d'Ascoli was an innocent sage--and we all know how he was burntalive for being wiser than his fellows. Ah, doctor, it is not by livingat Padua that you can learn to know Florentines. My belief is, theywould stone the Holy Father himself, if they could find a good excusefor it; and they are persuaded that you are a necromancer, who is tryingto raise the pestilence by selling secret medicines--and I am told yourspecifics have in truth an evil smell."

  "It is false!" burst out the doctor, as Nello moved away his razor; "itis false! I will show the pills and the powders to these honourablesignori--and the salve--it has an excellent odour--an odour of--ofsalve." He started up with the lather on his chin, and the cloth roundhis neck, to search in his saddle-bag for the belied medicines, andNello in an instant adroitly shifted the shaving-chair till it was inthe close vicinity of the horse's head, while Sandro, who had nowreturned, at a sign from his master placed himself near the bridle.

  "Behold, Messeri!" said the doctor, bringing a small box of medicinesand opening it before them.

  "Let any signor apply this box to his nostrils and he will find anhonest odour of medicaments--not indeed of pounded gems, or rarevegetables from the East, or stones found in the bodies of birds; for Ipractise on the diseases of the vulgar, for whom heaven has providedcheaper and less powerful remedies according to their degree: and thereare even remedies known to our science which are entirely free of cost--as the new _tussis_ may be counteracted in the poor, who can pay for nospecifics, by a resolute holding of the breath. And here is a pastewhich is even of savoury odour, and is infallible against melancholia,being concocted under the conjunction of Jupiter and Venus; and I haveseen it allay spasms."

  "Stay, Maestro," said Nello, while the doctor had his lathered faceturned towards the group near the door, eagerly holding out his box, andlifting out one specific after another; "here comes a crying contadinawith her baby. Doubtless she is in search of you; it is perhaps anopportunity for you to show this honourable company a proof of yourskill. Here, buona donna! here is the famous doctor. Why, what is thematter with the sweet _bimbo_?"

  This question was addressed to a sturdy-looking, broad-shoulderedcontadina, with her head-drapery folded about her face so that littlewas to be seen but a bronzed nose and a pair of dark eyes and eyebrows.She carried her child packed up in the stiff mummy-shaped case in whichItalian babies have been from time immemorial introduced into society,turning its face a little towards her bosom, and making those sorrowfulgrimaces which women are in the habit of using as a sort of pulleys todraw down reluctant tears.

  "Oh, for the love of the Holy Madonna!" said the woman, in a wailingvoice; "will you look at my poor bimbo? I know I can't pay you for it,but I took it into the Nunziata last night, and it's turned a worsecolour than before; it's the convulsions. But when I was holding itbefore the Santissima Nunziata, I remembered they said there was a newdoctor come who cured everything; and so I thought it mi
ght be the willof the Holy Madonna that I should bring it to you."

  "Sit down, Maestro, sit down," said Nello. "Here is an opportunity foryou; here are honourable witnesses who will declare before theMagnificent Eight that they have seen you practising honestly andrelieving a poor woman's child. And then if your life is in danger, theMagnificent Eight will put you in prison a little while just to insureyour safety, and after that, their sbirri will conduct you out ofFlorence by night, as they did the zealous Frate Minore who preachedagainst the Jews. What! our people are given to stone-throwing; but wehave magistrates."

  The doctor, unable to refuse, seated himself in the shaving-chair,trembling, half with fear and half with rage, and by this time quiteunconscious of the lather which Nello had laid on with such profuseness.He deposited his medicine-case on his knees, took out his preciousspectacles (wondrous Florentine device!) from his wallet, lodged themcarefully above his flat nose and high ears, and lifting up his brows,turned towards the applicant.

  "O Santiddio! look at him," said the woman, with a more piteous wailthan ever, as she held out the small mummy, which had its headcompletely concealed by dingy drapery wound round the head of theportable cradle, but seemed to be struggling and crying in a demoniacalfashion under this imprisonment. "The fit is on him! _Ohime_! I knowwhat colour he is; it's the evil eye--oh!"

  The doctor, anxiously holding his knees together to support his box,bent his spectacles towards the baby, and said cautiously, "It may be anew disease; unwind these rags, Monna!"

  The contadina, with sudden energy, snatched off the encircling linen,when out struggled--scratching, grinning, and screaming--what the doctorin his fright fully believed to be a demon, but what Tito recognised asVaiano's monkey, made more formidable by an artificial blackness, suchas might have come from a hasty rubbing up the chimney.

  Up started the unfortunate doctor, letting his medicine-box fall, andaway jumped the no less terrified and indignant monkey, finding thefirst resting-place for his claws on the horse's mane, which he used asa sort of rope-ladder till he had fairly found his equilibrium, when hecontinued to clutch it as a bridle. The horse wanted no spur under sucha rider, and, the already loosened bridle offering no resistance, dartedoff across the piazza, with the monkey, clutching, grinning, andblinking, on his neck.

  "_Il cavallo! Il Diavolo_!" was now shouted on all sides by the idlerascals who gathered from all quarters of the piazza, and was echoed intones of alarm by the stall-keepers, whose vested interests seemed insome danger; while the doctor, out of his wits with confused terror atthe Devil, the possible stoning, and the escape of his horse, took tohis heels with spectacles on nose, lathered face, and the shaving-clothabout his neck, crying--"Stop him! stop him! for a powder--a florin--stop him for a florin!" while the lads, outstripping him, clapped theirhands and shouted encouragement to the runaway.

  The _cerretano_, who had not bargained for the flight of his monkeyalong with the horse, had caught up his petticoats with much celerity,and showed a pair of parti-coloured hose above his contadina's shoes,far in advance of the doctor. And away went the grotesque race up theCorso degli Adimari--the horse with the singular jockey, the contadinawith the remarkable hose, and the doctor in lather and spectacles, withfurred mantle outflying.

  It was a scene such as Florentines loved, from the potent and reverendsignor going to council in his lucco, down to the grinning youngster,who felt himself master of all situations when his bag was filled withsmooth stones from the convenient dry bed of the torrent. Thegrey-headed Domenico Cennini laughed no less heartily than the youngermen, and Nello was triumphantly secure of the general admiration.

  "Aha!" he exclaimed, snapping his fingers when the first burst oflaughter was subsiding. "I have cleared my piazza of that unsavouryfly-trap, _mi pare_. Maestro Tacco will no more come here again to sitfor patients than he will take to licking marble for his dinner."

  "You are going towards the Piazza della Signoria, Messer Domenico," saidMacchiavelli. "I will go with you, and we shall perhaps see who hasdeserved the _palio_ among these racers. Come, Melema, will you gotoo?"

  It had been precisely Tito's intention to accompany Cennini, but beforehe had gone many steps, he was called back by Nello, who saw Masoapproaching.

  Maso's message was from Romola. She wished Tito to go to the Via de'Bardi as soon as possible. She would see him under the loggia, at thetop of the house, as she wished to speak to him alone.