Sassi was sure that they all three hated him or despised him, or both;
yet they could not spare him. For different reasons, they all needed
money, and they had long been used to believing that no one but Sassi
could get it for them, since no one else knew how deeply the family
was involved. He always made difficulties, he protested, he wrung his
hands, he warned, he implored; but caprice, vice and devotion always
overcame his objections, and year after year the exhausted estate was
squeezed and pressed and mortgaged and sold, till it had yielded the
uttermost farthing.
Then, one day, the whole organization of Casa Conti stood still; the
unpaid servants fled, the unpaid tradesmen refused to trust any
longer, the unpaid holders of mortgages foreclosed, the Princess
departed to Poland, the Prince slunk away to live on what was left of
his wife's small estate, Donna Clementina buried herself in a convent
to which she had given immense sums, the Conti palace was for sale,
and Pompeo Sassi sat alone in his office, tearing his hair, while the
old porter sat in his lodge downstairs peeling potatoes.
It was not for himself that the old steward of the estate was in
danger of being totally bald. He had done for himself what others
would not allow him to do for them, a proceeding which affords some
virtuous people boundless satisfaction, though it procured him none at
all.
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