"Do you know anything about the Count Salvi-Scarabelli?"
The landlord looked down at his boots, then slowly raised his shoulders,
with a melancholy smile. "I have many regrets, dear sir--"
"You don't know the name?"
"I know the name, assuredly. But I don't know the gentleman."
I saw that my question had attracted the attention of the young
Englishman, who looked at me with a good deal of earnestness. He was
apparently satisfied with what he saw, for he presently decided to speak.
"The Count Scarabelli is dead," he said, very gravely.
I looked at him a moment; he was a pleasing young fellow. "And his widow
lives," I observed, "in Via Ghibellina?"
"I daresay that is the name of the street." He was a handsome young
Englishman, but he was also an awkward one; he wondered who I was and
what I wanted, and he did me the honour to perceive that, as regards
these points, my appearance was reassuring. But he hesitated, very
properly, to talk with a perfect stranger about a lady whom he knew, and
he had not the art to conceal his hesitation. I instantly felt it to be
singular that though he regarded me as a perfect stranger, I had not the
same feeling about him. Whether it was that I had seen him before, or
simply that I was struck with his agreeable young face--at any rate, I
felt myself, as they say here, in sympathy with him.
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