lly
curious and though he felt that it would be very interesting to know
Maria Consuelo's story, the chief result of the Count's half
confidential utterances was to recall the lady herself very vividly to
his recollection.

At first his memory merely brought back the endless details of his
acquaintance with her, which had formed the central feature of the first
season he had spent without interruption in Rome and in society. He was
surprised at the extreme precision of the pictures evoked, and took
pleasure in calling them up when he was alone and unoccupied. The events
themselves had not, perhaps, been all agreeable, yet there was not one
which it did not give him some pleasant sensation to remember. There was
a little sadness in some of them, and more than once the sadness was
mingled with something of humiliation. Yet even this last was bearable.
Though he did not realise it, he was quite unable to think of Maria
Consuelo without feeling some passing touch of happiness at the thought,
for happiness can live with sadness when it is the greater of the two.
He had no desire to analyse these sensations. Indeed the idea did not
enter his mind that they were worth analysing. His intelligence was
better employed with his work, and his reflexions concerning Maria
Consuelo chiefly occupied his hours of rest.

The days passed quickly at first and then, as September came they seemed
longer, instead of shorter. He was beginning to wish that the winter
would come, that he might again see the woman of whom he was continually
thinking. More than once he thought of writing to her, for he had the
address which the maid had given him--an address in Paris which said
nothing, a mere number with the name of a street. He wondered whether
she would answer him, and when he had reached the self-satisfying
conviction that she would, he at last wrote a letter, such as any person
might write to another. He told her of the weather, of the dulness of
Rome, of his hope that she would return early in the season, and of his
own daily occupations. It was a simply expressed, natural and not at all
emotional epistle, not at all like that of a man in the least degree in
love with his correspondent, but Orsino felt an odd sensation of
pleasure in writing it and was surprised by a little thrill of happiness
as he posted it with his own hand.

He did not forget the letter when he had sent it, either, as one forgets
the uninteresting letters one is oblig