ill not refuse to gratify an old
man's whim, I am,

"Yours for the time being,

"CESARE OLIVA."

This epistle finished and written in the crabbed disguised penmanship
it was part of my business to effect, I folded, sealed and addressed
it, and summoning Vincenzo, bade him post it immediately. As soon as he
had gone on this errand, I sat down to my as yet untasted breakfast and
made some effort to eat as usual. But my thoughts were too active for
appetite--I counted on my fingers the days--there were four, only four,
between me and--what? One thing was certain--I must see my wife, or
rather I should say my BETROTHED--I must see her that very day. I then
began to consider how my courtship had progressed since that evening
when she had declared she loved me. I had seen her frequently, though
not daily--her behavior had been by turns affectionate, adoring, timid,
gracious and once or twice passionately loving, though the latter
impulse in her I had always coldly checked. For though I could bear a
great deal, any outburst of sham sentiment on her part sickened and
filled me with such utter loathing that often when she was more than
usually tender I dreaded lest my pent-up wrath should break loose and
impel me to kill her swiftly and suddenly as one crushes the head of a
poisonous adder--an all-too-merciful death for such as she. I preferred
to woo her by gifts alone--and her hands were always ready to take
whatever I or others chose to offer her. From a rare jewel to a common
flower she never refused anything--her strongest passions were vanity
and avarice. Sparkling gems from the pilfered store of Carmelo
Neri-trinkets which I had especially designed for her--lace, rich
embroideries, bouquets of hot-house blossoms, gilded boxes of costly
sweets--nothing came amiss to her--she accepted all with a certain
covetous glee which she was at no pains to hide from me--nay, she made
it rather evident that she expected such things as her right.

And after all, what did it matter to me--I thought--of what value was
anything I possessed save to assist me in carrying out the punishment I
had destined for her? I studied her nature with critical coldness--I
saw its inbred vice artfully concealed beneath the affectation of
virtue--every day she sunk lower in my eyes, and I wondered vaguely how
I could ever have loved so coarse and common a thing! Lovely she
certainly was--lovely too are many of the wretched outcasts who sell
themselv