Taquisara had never touched him so tenderly before, though he was always as gentle as a woman with him.  He lifted him, carried him from his bedroom and laid him in his accustomed chair.  The pale head rested with a sigh upon the brown silk cushion.

“Thank you,” he said faintly.  “That was better than ever.  But I am better to-day, too.”

The Sicilian said nothing, but proceeded to arrange all the invalid’s small belongings near him,—­his books, his cigarettes,—­for he sometimes smoked a little,—­and the stimulant he took, and a few wild flowers which Elettra renewed every morning.  Gianluca drew a breath of satisfaction when all was done.  He really felt a little better, and by Taquisara’s care had suffered less than usual in the moving.  His father and mother had been in to see him as usual, before he was up, and before they went out for their daily walk.  Veronica would not come yet, but he had the true invalid’s pleasure in anticipating the coming of a well-loved woman.  As often happens in such cases he seemed quite unconscious of his approaching danger.

He was not surprised when Don Teodoro came in, a little later, and the two very soon fell into conversation together.  Taquisara presently went away and left them, as he often did when they began to talk of books.  Half an hour had not passed since his meeting with Veronica, but as he again entered the room where they had met, he found her standing before the window, looking out, and twisting her handkerchief slowly with both her hands.  She started when she heard him come in, and she turned her head to see who it was that had opened the door.  To go on, he had to pass near her, and she kept her eyes on his face as he approached her.

“How is he?” she asked in a voice hardly recognizable as her own.

She had an agonized look, and she raised her handkerchief to her mouth quickly, and held it, almost biting it, while he answered her.

“He says that he feels better.  Don Teodoro is there.  He has just come.  Is there anything that I can do?”

She shook her head, still holding the handkerchief to her lips, and again looked out of the window.  He waited a moment longer and then passed on, leaving her alone.  He saw that she was half mad with anxiety, and he neither trusted himself to speak, nor believed that speaking could be of any use.  He went down to the lower bastion, where he could be alone, and for a long time he walked steadily up and down, trying hard to think of nothing, and sometimes counting his steps as he walked, in order to keep his mind from itself.