t
was over--of the night both must pass, wondering what would happen
to-morrow, what he would do, what she would do.

"It is well to pray over such matters, is it not?" said Maria.

"Yes, dear, it is. Let us pray that she may learn to give her love and
her sorrow to God," the husband answered.

Hand in hand they entered their bedroom, which was divided in two by a
heavy curtain. They went to the window and looked up at the sky, praying
silently. A breath of the north wind soughed like a lament through the
oak overhanging the tiny chapel of Santa Maria della Febbre.

"Poor creature!" said Maria. It seemed to her and to her husband that
their affection for one another was more tender than ever to-night, but
nevertheless--though neither said so--both felt that there was something
deterring them from the kiss of love.

Jeanne, as soon as Noemi had closed the door of their room behind them,
fell upon her neck in a paroxysm of uncontrollable sobbing. Poor Noemi
had concluded, from the effect produced on her friend when the monk
hastened past her, that he was Maironi, and she was now overcome with
pity. She spoke most loving, tender, and sweet words to her, in the
voice of one soothing a suffering child. Jeanne did not answer, but her
sobbing continued.

"Perhaps it is better so, dear," Noemi ventured to say. "Perhaps it is
better for you to know, that you may no longer cherish a false hope;
better for you to have seen him in that habit."

This time an answer came between the sobs, "No, no!" Jeanne repeated
passionately and vehemently many times, and the tone, though hardly
sorrowful, was so strange that Noemi was greatly puzzled. She resumed
her soothing, but more timidly now.

"Yes, dear! yes, dear! because knowing there is no help---"

Jeanne raised her tear-stained face, "Do you not understand? It is not
he!" she said.

Noemi drew away from her embrace, amazed,

"What do you mean? Not he--! All this scene because it is not he?"

Jeanne again fell upon her neck.

"The monk who passed me, is not he," she said sobbing; "it is the other
man!"

"What other man?"

"The one who was following him, who went away with him!"

Noemi had not even noticed this person. With a convulsive laugh Jeanne
nearly suffocated her in a close embrace.

CHAPTER III. A NIGHT OF STORMS

On his way down from the villa to the gate, Don Clemente asked himself
with secret anxiety: "Did he recognise her, or not? And if he did,