Page:Maurice Hewlett--Little novels of Italy.djvu/101



from a late troubled sleep, Ippolita found her little room possessed by three noble ladies—Emilia Malaspina, Euforbia di Ponterotto, and Domenica di Campodarsego—dressed all in saffron and white (her sacred colours, they told her), who announced themselves, with much kneeling and folding of arms over breasts, as her handmaids. "Sagro cuor di Gesù!" thought poor Ippolita, "what a way to undo me!" But aloud she only murmured, "Tante grazie, gentildonne," and got out of bed.

They had prepared for her a scented bath, into which, in her dazed condition, she entered without overmuch persuasion. True, she thought to find her death in so much water, and crossed herself vehemently when first it touched her back; but there might be worse deaths (she supposed) than drowning for a poor girl bought and sold, and not so very long ago a Jew had been baptized in Santa Giustina in water up to his neck. Nothing, however, would induce her to sit down. They dressed her then in silk, tied and garlanded her hair, put a gold chain round her neck, silken shoes on her feet—talking in quick whispers to each other all the time; and so announced with 89