In his present frame of mind Zorzi felt a foolish impulse to take them
down and smash them one by one in the big jar into which the failures
were thrown, to be melted again in the main furnace, for in a
glass-house nothing is thrown away. He knew it was foolish, and he held
his hands behind him as he looked at the things, wishing that he had
never made them, that he had never learned the art he was forbidden by
law to practise, that he had never left Dalmatia as a little boy long
ago, that he had never been born.
The door opened suddenly and Giovanni entered. Zorzi turned and looked
at him in silence. He was surprised, but he supposed that the master's
son had a right to come if he chose, though he never showed himself in
the glass-house when his father was in Murano.
"Are you alone here?" asked Giovanni, looking about him. "Do none of the
workmen come here?"
"The master has left me in charge of his work," answered Zorzi. "I need
no help."
Giovanni seated himself in his father's chair and looked at the table
before the window.
"It is not very hard work, I fancy," he observed, crossing one leg over
the other and pulling up his black hose to make it fit his lean calf
better.
Zorzi suspected at once that he had come in search of information, and
paused before answering.
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