I was not yet dressed in the morning, when I received a note from Cardinal S.C.
inviting me to dinner, saying that he had just been bled, and that he wanted to speak to me: he concluded by entreating me to come to him early, even if I did not feel well.
The invitation was pressing; I could not guess what had caused it, but the tone of the letter did not forebode anything unpleasant.

I went to church, where I was sure that Cardinal Acquaviva would see me, and he did.

After mass, his eminence beckoned to me.
"Are you truly ill ?" he enquired.
"No, monsignor, I was only sleepy." "I am very glad to hear it; but you are wrong, for you are loved.
Cardinal S.C.has been bled this morning." "I know it, monsignor.

The cardinal tells me so in this note, in which he invites me to dine with him, with your excellency's permission." "Certainly.

But this is amusing! I did not know that he wanted a third person." "Will there be a third person ?" "I do not know, and I have no curiosity about it." The cardinal left me, and everybody imagined that his eminence had spoken to me of state affairs.
I went to my new Maecenas, whom I found in bed.
"I am compelled to observe strict diet," he said to me; "I shall have to let you dine alone, but you will not lose by it as my cook does not know it.