put it, all warm
with herself, into Amaldi's arms. He shivered as he felt the warmth of
the folds under his hands. Murmuring some civil commonplace, he stood
aside to let her pass. She went up the little pathway followed by Luigi.

As she entered the doorway in the terrace-wall, the clock in the
Campanile of San Maurizio, on the hill above, began slowly striking
midnight. Amaldi stood until it had finished, then started the
_Fretta_'s engine. He sat with one hand upon the wheel, the other
grasping the folds of the grey cloak. Suddenly he bent and pressed his
face upon it. It was still warm, and this warmth gave forth a fresh,
faint scent of citron....

XXXV

That day at Le Vigne was the beginning of a very happy period for Sophy.
Not only was she infatuated with Italy, but her pleasure in it was
doubled by the fact that she had two such charming friends to share it
with her, to reveal it to her from within as it were. The Marchesa had
perforce to accept Sophy's invitation to lunch with her at Villa
Bianca--Amaldi was of course asked, too. His mother was much reassured
by the perfect composure of his manner on this occasion and on others
that followed in natural sequence. But what gave her the greatest
feeling of security was Sophy herself. No woman in the least _eprise_
with a man could show such perfect, cordial liking for him in his
mother's presence. Such was the Marchesa's opinion.

And she began to think that she might have been mistaken also about
Marco. His manner, the evening that she had spoken to him on this
subject, might very well have resulted from his intense dislike of
personal discussions. He had always been astringently reserved, even in
childhood. Altogether the Marchesa felt immensely relieved, though she
did not relax a whit of her precaution. She was always one of the party
on the pleasant trips they took to different points of interest on the
lake, that Samuel Butler justly calls "so far the most beautiful of all
even the Italian lakes."

Sophy could scarcely realise now those ghastly days at Dynehurst when
the never ceasing rain had made misery more miserable. Only when Anne
Harding's letters came, as they did about once a week, and when she
wrote herself to Cecil, was she plucked for a moment from her joyous
illusion of a new existence that might go sparkling on indefinitely. And
she began to take a quiet delight in her growing knowledge of Amaldi's
character. They spoke to each ot