The indignity of the blows had awakened her to a
new life, in which scorn was the ruling passion — a
scorn not only of her former persecutors, but of
herself, of her mother, of everything in the world but
Domenico. There were days in which all the stories
she told him were tinged with bitterness, and tfie
child's observation had been so keen that it seemed
as if the experience of a long and wretched life had fur-
nished the materials of her contemptuous mirth. Then
the childish face wore a weird look of precocious age,
and the slight and graceful form somehow suggested
decrepitude. At such times her chief delight was to
portray her own future, not in any bright or joyous
hues, but in the darkest colours. There was scarcely
a sin, a folly, or a weakness of which she would not
be guilty when she grew up, scarcely a degrading
situation in which she would not be placed. And she
was not content with merely sketching these; she
painted them out, down to the smallest detail, and,
springing up, she would mimic herself as a woman,
pausing every now and then to interrupt the perform-
ance by an outburst of impish laughter; and then
suddenly she would burst into a fit of crying, and,
throwing her arms round her brother's neck, she



DOMENICO 247

would sob — " But you will love me still ; you will love
me, in spite of all/' Once she clasped both his wrists
with her small, bony hands, fixed her eyes almost
fiercely on his, and said — ^ Domenico, if I vex you,
you must beat me. It is right that men should beat
the women that belong to them. You may do what
you like with me, but you must never leave me." At
other times, however, her whole look and talk were
those of a child of seven, though she was now twelve
years old.
