ember
the name of the order, but she knew where they lived. Should she send
him one? He thanked her again, and the room turned itself upside down
before his eyes and then whirled back again at the next throb. Still he
tried to smile.

She coughed a little and looked at her perfectly fitting gloves, wishing
that he would ask after Cecilia. If he had been suffering less he would
have known that he was expected to do so, but it was all he could do
just then to keep his face from twitching.

Then she suddenly said that she had something on her mind to say to him,
but that, of course, as he was so very ill, she would not say it now,
but as soon as he was quite well they would have a long talk together.

Guido was a man more nervous than sanguine, and probably more phlegmatic
than either, and his nervous strength asserted itself now, just when he
began to believe that he was on the verge of delirium. He felt suddenly
much quieter and the pain in his head diminished, or he noticed it less.
He said that he was quite able to talk now, and wished to know at once
what she had to say to him.

She needed no second invitation to pour out her heart about Cecilia, and
in a long string of involved and often disjointed sentences she told him
just what she felt. Cecilia had done her best to love him, after having
really believed that she did love him, but it was of no use, and it was
much better that Guido should know the truth now, than find it out by
degrees. Cecilia was dreadfully sorry to have made such a mistake, and
both Cecilia and she herself would always be the best friends he had in
the world; but the engagement had better be broken off at once, and of
course, as it would injure Cecilia if everything were known, it would be
very generous of him to let it be thought that it had been broken by
mutual agreement, and without any quarrel. She stopped at last, rather
frightened at having said so much, but quite sure that she had done
right, and believing that she knew the whole truth and had told it all.
She waited for his answer in some trepidation.

"My dear lady," he said at last, "I am very glad you have been so frank.
Ever since your daughter wrote me that letter I have felt that it must
end in this way. As she does not wish to marry me, I quite agree that
our engagement should end at once, so that the agreement is really
mutual and friendly, and I shall say so."

"How good you are!" cried the Countess, delighted.

"There