smile, that she did not know how to
weep. But now her heart was melting, and for a moment she remained
overcome, leaning on the mossy, crumbling sarcophagus, whilst the clear
water falling from the gaping mouth of the tragic mask still sounded its
flutelike note. And a sudden thought of death came to the priest as he
saw her, so young and so radiant with beauty, half fainting beside that
marble resting-place where fauns were rushing upon nymphs in a frantic
bacchanal which proclaimed the omnipotence of love--that omnipotence
which the ancients were fond of symbolising on their tombs as a token of
life's eternity. And meantime a faint, warm breeze passed through the
sunlit, silent garden, wafting hither and thither the penetrating scent
of box and orange.

"One has so much strength when one loves," Pierre at last murmured.

"Yes, yes, you are right," she replied, already smiling again. "I am
childish. But it is the fault of your book. It is only when I suffer that
I properly understand it. But all the same I am making progress, am I
not? Since you desire it, let all the poor, all those who suffer, as I
do, be my brothers and sisters."

Then for a while they resumed their chat.

On these occasions Benedetta was usually the first to return to the
house, and Pierre would linger alone under the laurels, vaguely dreaming
of sweet, sad things. Often did he think how hard life proved for poor
creatures whose only thirst was for happiness!

One Monday evening, at a quarter-past ten, only the young folks remained
in Donna Serafina's reception-room. Monsignor Nani had merely put in an
appearance that night, and Cardinal Sarno had just gone off.

Even Donna Serafina, in her usual seat by the fireplace, seemed to have
withdrawn from the others, absorbed as she was in contemplation of the
chair which the absent Morano still stubbornly left unoccupied. Chatting
and laughing in front of the sofa on which sat Benedetta and Celia were
Dario, Pierre, and Narcisse Habert, the last of whom had begun to twit
the young Prince, having met him, so he asserted, a few days previously,
in the company of a very pretty girl.

"Oh! don't deny it, my dear fellow," continued Narcisse, "for she was
really superb. She was walking beside you, and you turned into a lane
together--the Borgo Angelico, I think."

Dario listened smiling, quite at his ease and incapable of denying his
passionate predilection for beauty. "No doubt, no doubt; it was I, I