be under water. She struggled to rise, feeling
suffocated--feeling as though she, too, were drowning. She heard Morelli
take a breath as of relief. Tilda had put down her face upon the
bedclothes.

"How is he?... How is my husband?" she managed to stammer.

She felt the girl sobbing against her feet.

"_Coraggio, signora_.... _Coraggio_...." murmured the doctor. Then she
knew. He was dead. She sank again into merciful depths of
unconsciousness.

* * * * *

This time, when she recovered, it was into the tender, lustrous eyes of
the Marchesa Amaldi that she looked up. As soon as Peppin had brought
the news to Le Vigne, the Marchesa had set out for Ghiffa. Amaldi was
away on a walking tour in the Carpathians. He had left very suddenly.
The Marchesa divined that it was his feeling for Sophy that had caused
him to leave so abruptly. She applauded him in her heart while she
ached, mother-like, for his unhappiness. Now came this horrible
disaster. She was glad that Marco was away. Sheer pity might have
stripped him too bare before her, in spite of his powerful reserve. And
with the sense of his hopeless, unfortunate love adding to her own
passion of pity for this young creature widowed in so horrible a way,
the Marchesa gathered Sophy as it were into the very shrine of
mother-tenderness. Never again after that were things quite the same
between them. Never again could the Marchesa look on Sophy only as a
charming woman whom her son unfortunately loved; never again could Sophy
forget, that on the heart of Marco's mother she had lain in that tragic
hour.

"Can't you cry, my poor darling?... Can't you cry?" the Marchesa kept
murmuring, her beautiful large hand folding Sophy's head to her breast,
as it had been the head of a child that she was suckling. But no tears
would come. It was as though she were bleeding tears inwardly.

When she was strong enough to rise, she said, whispering:

"I want to go to him."

The Marchesa assisted her to her feet without a word. In silence she led
her to the communicating door behind which her husband lay, then
stepped aside for her to enter.

Sophy closed the door softly as she went in. It was late at night.
Candles burned by the bed, on either side. He lay there immensely,
majestically long under the white sheet. Sophy went forward
unfalteringly, and kneeling down beside him, lifted back the sheet. Awe
filled her at the icy splendour of that face. Sh