“You?  Marry Bosio Macomer?  Oh! no—­Veronica—­no!”

Bianca’s voice expressed the greatest apprehension, for Veronica was almost her only intimate friend.  Veronica seemed surprised.

“Why not?” she asked.  “That is, if I wished to.  Why do you speak in that way?  Do you know anything about him which I do not know?  You must have some reason.”

Bianca’s exquisite face grew calm and grave, and she looked away, and waited some seconds before she spoke.  The sins of the earth were familiar to her before her time, and suffering and the payment.  But Veronica was a child.

“It seems unfitting,” she said quietly.  “He is almost like your uncle.  Of course, one may marry one’s uncle—­but he is too old for you, dear.  And, after all, with your name, and all you have—­”

“But I like Bosio,” answered Veronica, simply.  “He is always good to me.  I talk with him a great deal.  And he is really not old, though his hair is a little grey.  I think I would perhaps rather have him just for a friend, instead of a husband.  But then, he would be both.  I do not know what to do, so I came to you for advice.”

“Why do you not marry Gianluca della Spina?” asked Bianca, suddenly.

“Don Gianluca?” repeated Veronica, rather blankly.  “Why him, particularly?  I have only seen him three or four times.”

“He is dying of love for you, my dear,” said Bianca.  “At least, every one says so.  I have heard it from Taquisara and from Signor Ghisleri, who are friends of his.”

“Dying of love for me?” Veronica broke out in a girlish laugh.  “How absurd!  Why does he not ask for me, if that is true?  Not that I would ever marry him!  He is like a Perugino angel, with his yellow hair and blue eyes.”

She laughed again.  Bianca knew from Ghisleri that Gianluca’s father had done his best to bring about the marriage.  She was amazed to find that Veronica knew nothing of the negotiations.

“It is very strange,” she said thoughtfully, and hesitating as to how much she should tell of what she had heard.

“What is strange?” asked the young girl.

“That you should not have known about Gianluca.  They go to see him every day.  He is really madly in love with you, and is positively ill about it.  That is why I say that you should marry him, if you marry at all—­but not your uncle Bosio.”

“He is not my uncle,” said Veronica.  “He is my aunt’s brother-in-law.”

“It is the same thing—­”

“No.  It is not the same.  Tell me all about Don Gianluca.  It is interesting—­I feel like a heroine in a book—­a man dying for love of me, whom I scarcely know!  It is too ridiculous!  He must be in love with my fortune, as my aunt says that so many people are.”

“No, dear,” said Bianca, gravely, “do not say that.  It is for yourself, and he does not need your fortune.”

“I did not mean to say anything unkind,” answered Veronica.  “But I scarcely know him—­and I have heard nothing about it.  Have they spoken of the marriage?”