carriage, shouting to the coachman--

'To the Pincio--quick!'

He was filled with a frenzied longing to reach Maria Ferres' side, to
enjoy the delights which he had refused before. The rapid pace of his
horses was not quick enough for him. He looked out anxiously for the
Trinita de' Monti, the avenue--the gates.

The carriage flashed through the gates. He ordered the coachman to
moderate his pace and to drive through each of the avenues. His heart
gave a bound every time the figure of a woman appeared in the distance
through the trees. He got out and, on foot, explored the paths forbidden
to vehicles. He searched every nook and corner--in vain.

The Villa Borghese being open to the public, the Pincio lay deserted and
silent under the languid smile of the February sun. Few carriages or
foot-passengers disturbed the peaceful solitude of the place. The
grayish-white trees, tinged here and there with violet, spread their
leafless branches against a diaphanous sky, and the air was full of
delicate spider-webs which the breeze shook and tore asunder. The pines
and cypresses--all the evergreen trees--took on something of this
colourless pallor, seemed to fade and melt into the all-prevailing
monotone.

Surely something of Donna Maria's sadness still lingered in the
atmosphere. Andrea stood for several minutes leaning against the
railings of the Villa Medici, crushed beneath a load of melancholy too
heavy to be borne.

CHAPTER IV

In the days that followed, the double pursuit continued with the same
tortures, or worse, and with the same odious mendacity. By a phenomenon
which is of frequent occurrence in the moral degradation of men of keen
intellect, he now had a terrible lucidity of conscience, a lucidity
without interruptions, without a moment of dimness or eclipse. He knew
what he was doing and criticised what he had done. With him self-scorn
went hand in hand with feebleness of will.

But his variable humour, his incertitude, his unaccountable silences and
equally unaccountable effusions, in short, all the peculiarities of
manner which such a condition of mind inevitably brings along with it,
only increased and excited the passionate commiseration of Donna Maria.
She saw him suffer, and it filled her with grief and tenderness. 'By
slow degrees I shall cure him,' she thought. But slowly and surely,
without being aware of it, she was losing her strength of purpose and
was bending to the sick man's will.