e, to be
listening to the beat of the waves against the garden wall. Finally
Ismaele returned, drank his punch, and assured them that the lake was
not very rough, and that they could start homewards.

As soon as the Maironis were seated in the boat, and Maria had gone to
sleep, Luisa asked her husband if there was something she did not know,
and which Gilardoni must not tell.

Franco did not answer.

"Enough!" said she. Then her husband threw his arm around her neck and
pressed her to him, protesting against words she had not uttered. "Oh,
Luisa, Luisa!"

Luisa suffered his embrace, but did not return it, and at last, in
despair, her husband promised to tell her every thing, at once. "Do you
think I am curious?" she whispered, in his arms. No, no. He would tell
her at once, tell her everything; he would explain why he had not spoken
before. She did not wish this; she preferred that he should speak at
some other time, and of his own free will.

The wind was in their favour and the light shining in the window of the
loggia served Ismaele well as a guide. Franco's arm still encircled his
wife's shoulders, and his gaze was fixed upon that shining point.
Neither he nor she thought of the loving and prudent hand that had
lighted it. But Ismaele thought of it, and reflected that neither
Veronica nor Cia were capable of such an act of genius, and blessed the
engineer's kind heart.

On leaving the boat Maria woke up, and her parents seemed to have no
thought save for her. When they were in bed Franco put out the light.

"It concerns my grandmother," said he in a broken and agitated voice.
"Poor boy!" Luisa murmured and took his hand affectionately. "I have
never told you in order to avoid accusing my grandmother, and also
because----" He paused, and then it was he who mingled with his words
the most tender caresses, to which Luisa now no longer responded. "I
feared your impressions, your sentiments, the ideas you might
conceive----!" As his words began to express his doubts his voice grew
more tender.

Luisa felt the approach, not of a dispute, but of a far more lasting
disagreement. Now, she no longer wished her husband to speak, and he,
noticing her increasing coldness, did not continue. She rested her
forehead against his shoulder, and said, almost in spite of herself:
"Tell me!"

Then Franco, his lips against her hair, related the story the Professor
had told him on the night of their marriage. In repeating from