At the station quay they changed to a gondola, giving the man the address. He was a regular gondolier in a white-and-blue blouse, not very good-looking, not at all impressive.

`Yes! The Villa Esmeralda! Yes! I know it! I have been the gondolier for a gentleman there. But a fair distance out!'

He seemed a rather childish, impetuous fellow. He rowed with a certain exaggerated impetuosity, through the dark side-canals with the horrible, slimy green walls, the canals that go through the poorer quarters, where the washing hangs high up on ropes, and there is a slight, or strong, odour of sewage.

But at last he came to one of the open canals with pavement on either side, and looping bridges, that run straight, at right-angles to the Grand Canal. The two women sat under the little awning, the man was perched above, behind them.

`Are the signorine staying long at the Villa Esmeralda?' he asked, rowing easy, and `wiping his perspiring face with a white-and-blue handkerchief.

`Some twenty days: we are both married ladies,' said Hilda, in her curious hushed voice, that made her Italian sound so foreign.

`Ah! Twenty days!' said the man. There was a pause. After which he asked: `Do the signore want a gondolier for the twenty days or so that they will stay at the Villa Esmeralda? Or by the day, or by the week?'

Connie and Hilda considered. In Venice, it is always preferable to have one's own gondola, as it is preferable to have one's own car on land.

`What is there at the Villa? what boats?'

`There is a motor-launch, also a gondola. But---' The but meant: they won't be your property.

`How much do you charge?'

It was about thirty shillings a day, or ten pounds a week.

`Is that the regular price?' asked Hilda.

`Less, Signora, less. The regular price---'

The sisters considered.

`Well,' said Hilda, `come tomorrow morning, and we will arrange it. What is your name?'

His name was Giovanni, and he wanted to know at what time he should come, and then for whom should he say he was waiting. Hilda had no card. Connie gave him one of hers. He glanced at it swiftly, with his hot, southern blue eyes, then glanced again.

`Ah!' he said, lighting up. `Milady! Milady, isn't it?'

`Milady Costanza!' said Connie.

He nodded, repeating: `Milady Costanza!' and putting the card carefully away in his blouse.

The Villa Esmeralda was quite a long way out, on the edge of the lagoon looking towards Chioggia. It was not a very old house, and pleasant, with the terraces looking seawards, and below, quite a big garden with dark trees, walled in from the lagoon.