“Peste!” returned Albert, “I compliment you on it; I have its fellow”—he took his watch from his waistcoat pocket—“and it cost me 3,000 francs.”
“Let us hear the history,” said Franz, motioning Signor Pastrini to seat himself.
“Your excellencies permit it?” asked the host.
“Pardieu!” cried Albert, “you are not a preacher, to remain standing!”
The host sat down, after having made each of them a respectful bow, which meant that he was ready to tell them all they wished to know concerning Luigi Vampa. “You tell me,” said Franz, at the moment Signor Pastrini was about to open his mouth, “that you knew Luigi Vampa when he was a child—he is still a young man, then?”
“A young man? he is only two and twenty;—he will gain himself a reputation.”
“What do you think of that, Albert?—at two and t
