leaning back in her chair, watched her uncle dispose of his correspondence with a visible air of amusement. He had a thin nervous face traced with fine lines, a sharply cut jaw, and a mouth which twitched easily into a smile. To-night, however, as he ripped open envelope after envelope, he frowned oftener than he smiled; and presently, as he unfolded one letter, he suppressed a quick exclamation of anger.
‘Read that,’ he said shortly, tossing it to the other man.
Sybert perused it with no visible change of expression, and leaning over, he dropped it into the open grate.
Marcia laughed outright. ‘Your mail doesn’t seem to afford you much satisfaction, Uncle Howard.’
‘A large share of it’s anonymous, and not all of it’s polite.’
‘That is what you must expect if you will hound those poor old beggars to death.’
The two men shot each other a look of rather grim amusement. The letter in question had nothing to do with beggars, but Mr. Copley had no intention of discussing its contents with his niece.
‘I find that the usual reward of virtue in this world is an anonymous letter,’ he remarked, shrugging the matter from his mind and settling himself comfortably to his tea.
The guest refused the cup proffered him.
‘I haven’t the courage,’ he declared, ‘after Gerald’s revelations.’
‘By the way, Sybert,’ said Copley, ‘I have been hearing some bad stories about you to-day. My niece doesn’t like to have me associate with you.’
Marcia looked at her uncle helplessly; when he once commenced teasing there was no telling where he would stop.
‘I am sorry,’ said Sybert humbly. ‘What is the trouble?’
‘She has found out that you are an anarchist.’
Both men laughed, and Marcia flushed slightly.
‘Please, Miss Marcia,’ Sybert begged, ‘give me time to get out of the country before you expose me to the police.’
‘There’s no cause for fear,’ she returned. ‘I didn’t believe the story when I heard it, for I knew that you haven’t energy enough to run away from a bomb, much less throw one. That’s why it surprised me that other people should believe it.’
‘But most people have a better opinion of me than you have,’ he expostulated.
‘No, indeed, Mr. Sybert; I have a better opinion of you than most people. I really consider you harmless.’
The young man laughed and bowed his thanks, while he turned his attention to Mrs. Copley.
‘I hope that Villa Vivalanti will prove more successful than the one in Naples.’
Mrs. Copley looked at him reproachfully. ‘That horrible man! I never think of him without wishing we were safely back in America.’
‘Then please don’t think of him,’ her husband returned. ‘He is where he won’t trouble you any more.’
‘What man?’ asked Marcia, emerging from a dignified silence.
‘Is it possible Miss Marcia has never heard of the tattooed man?’ Sybert inquired gravely.
‘The tattooed man! What are you talking about?’
‘It has a somewhat theatrical ring,’ Mr. Copley admitted.
‘It is nothing to make light of,’ said his wife. ‘It’s a wonder to me that we escaped with our lives. Three years ago, while we were in Naples,’ she added to her niece, ‘your uncle, with his usual recklessness, got mixed up with one of the secret societies. Our villa was out toward Posilipo, and one afternoon I was driving home at about dusk—I had been shopping in the city—and just as we reached a lonely place in the road, between two high walls——’
Mr. Copley broke in: ‘A masked man armed to the teeth sprang up in the path, with a horrible oath.’
‘Not really!’ Marcia cried, leaning forward delightedly. ‘Aunt Katherine, did a masked man——’
‘He wasn’t masked, but I wish he had been; he would have looked less ferocious. He came straight to the side of the carriage, and taking off his hat with a very polite bow, he said that unless we left Naples in three days your uncle’s life would no longer be safe. His shirt was open at the throat, and there was a crucifix tattooed upside down on his breast. You can imagine what a desperate character he must have been—here in Italy of all places, where the people are so religious.’
The two men laughed at the climax.
‘What did you do?’ Marcia asked.
‘I was too shocked to speak, and Gerald, poor child, screamed all the way home.’
‘And did you leave the city?’
‘As it happened, we were leaving anyway,’ her uncle put in; ‘but we postponed our departure long enough for me to hunt the fellow down and put him in jail.’
‘You may be thankful that they had the decency to warn you,’ Sybert remarked.
‘It’s like a dime novel!’ Marcia sighed. ‘To be mixed up with murders and warnings and tattooed men and secret societies——Why didn’t you send for me, Uncle Howard?’
‘Well, you see, I didn’t know that you had grown up into such a charming person—though I am not sure that it would have made any difference. I had all that I could do to take care of one woman.’
‘That’s the way,’ she complained. ‘Just because one’s a girl one is always shut up in the house while there’s anything exciting going on.’
‘If you are so fond of bloodshed,’ Sybert suggested, ‘you may possibly have a chance of seeing some this spring.’
‘This spring? Is the Camorra making trouble again?’
‘Oh, no; not the Camorra. But unless all signs fail, there is a prospect of some fairly exciting riots.’
‘Really? Here in Rome?’
‘Well, no; probably not in Rome—there are too many soldiers. More likely in the Neapolitan provinces. I am sorry,’ he added, ‘since you seem to find them so entertaining, that we can’t promise you a riot on your own door-step; but I dare say, when it comes to the point, you’ll find Naples near enough.’
‘I give you fair warning, Uncle Howard,’ she said, ‘if there are any riots in Naples, I’m going down to see them. What is the trouble? What are they rioting about?’
‘If there are any riots,’ said her uncle, ‘you, my dear young lady, will amuse yourself at Villa Vivalanti until they are over,’ and he abruptly changed the subject.
The talk drifted back to the villa again. Mrs. Copley afforded their
