.
But our father was deeply hurt; and it would be even worse with me, for
he makes it no secret that I'm his favourite son. I believe I'm more
like my mother than Angelo is. She was an Irish-American girl, and my
father adored her: though sometimes I wonder if he knew how to show his
love. Anyhow, she died young, and he's been almost a recluse ever since.
I'll write him at once--and I may even go to see him, though I can
hardly bear to think of leaving you long enough for that. Still, it
needn't be for more than three or four days and nights. I could go and
come back in that time. I'll see! But if I do go, it must be to tell him
we're to be married at once, from my brother's house."

"Your brother's house?" Mary repeated.

"Yes. Angelo has taken a villa at Cap Martin for the season. Perhaps
you've seen it. He and my new sister-in-law went to Ireland to visit
relatives of my mother, and to England afterward. They've been married
more than two months; but I saw my sister-in-law for the first time on
New Year's eve, the day they arrived. She's English, though she has
lived mostly in southern Germany, I believe. She's an artist--does
portraits beautifully, I hear, and was much admired in Rome, where she
had come to paint, when my brother met her. I know very little of her
except that she's pretty and charming--if any woman who is not _you_ can
be either. I'm sorry for all the men in the world, poor wretches,
because there's only one you, and I've got you for mine, and I shall let
them see as little of you as possible."

"That really _is_ old-fashioned!" Mary laughed.

"Do you mind? Do you want to see them?"

"Not particularly. Because you have begun to make me feel the others
aren't worth seeing."

"Angel!"

They both laughed, and Vanno was entranced when her heel slipped on a
stone, and he could clasp her so tightly as to feel the yielding of her
body against his arm. He would have liked to sing, the night was so
wonderful, and all nature seemed to be singing. Distant bells chimed,
silver sweet; frogs in hidden garden pools harped like bands of fairy
musicians; and from everywhere came the whisper and gurgle of running
water: springs from the mountains, pouring through underground canals to
houses of peasants, who bought water rights by the hour.

As the two walked down the many windings of the mule path they met
labourers coming up from the day's work in the country of the rich, far
below. Some of the young men,