His ready wit helped him to string the whole into a singularly plausible story.

So plausible, indeed, that it entirely upset all Donna Tullia's determination to be angry at Del Ferice, and filled her with something of the enthusiasm he showed.

For himself he hoped that there was enough in his story to do some palpable injury to the Saracinesca; but his more immediate object was not to lose Donna Tullia by letting her feel any disappointment at the discovery recently made by the old Prince.

Donna Tullia listened with breathless interest until he had finished.
"What a man you are, Ugo! How you turn defeat into victory! Is it all really true?
Do you think we can do it ?" "If I were to die this instant," Del Ferice asseverated, solemnly raising his hand, "it is all perfectly true, so help me God!" He hoped, for many reasons, that he was not perjuring himself.
"What shall we do, then ?" asked Madame Mayer.
"Let them marry first, and then we shall be sure of humiliating them both," he answered.

Unconsciously he repeated the very determination which Giovanni had formed against him the night before.