was she, in hers, encouraging him to do so. She was
angry at the thought that the Sicilian should know anything of their
correspondence, as it seemed evident that he must. It was true that her
own friend, Bianca, knew something about it. She could forgive
Gianluca, if he had confided too much in Taquisara, but she could not
forgive Taquisara for having been the recipient of the confidence, and
she would neither forgive nor forget the way in which he had shown her
how much he knew.

For the first time in her life, Veronica longed to be a man, that she
might not only resent the insult, but have satisfaction of the man who
had insulted her. She felt that she was emphatically not playing with
Gianluca, as Taquisara had expressed it. She had told him frankly,
several months earlier, that she could not love him,--she had shaken her
head and had said that she was sorry,--and neither he nor any one else
had a right to suppose that she was now changing her mind. Since
Gianluca was apparently willing to accept the position and to be her
friend, it was nobody's affair but his and hers. She felt that she had
been fully justified in what she had said to Taquisara. At the same time
she was half conscious of being disappointed in the man, and of being
wounded by the disappointment.

She left Bianca's house early, and as she drove away to the railway
station alone with Elettra, she felt that her life was only now really
beginning. The months of independence she had enjoyed had prepared her
for this final move. In the course of setting her affairs in order, she
had been brought face to face with a side of the world which few women
ever see or understand, and her character had hardened singularly to
meet the difficulties she had found in her path. She probably
overestimated the strength she had now acquired; for more than once, on
the way to the station, she felt a momentary reaction of timidity and a
longing to go back and stay a few days more with Bianca. She laughed
bravely at herself for her weakness, and told herself that she was going
to her own place, to be surrounded by her own people, that she was
two-and-twenty years of age and had been through troubles during the
past months which had proved her strength. Nevertheless, the fact
remained that she was a very young, unmarried woman, that she was going
to live alone, and that she was breaking through the whole hard shell of
fossilized social tradition. Even Elettra, born a peasa