Nera trembled.  She rose hastily from her chair, and raised Nobili up also.

“I—­I—­” (she hesitated, and avoided his passionate glance)—­“I have given you good advice.  To-morrow I will tell you more about myself.”

“To-morrow, Nera!  Why not to-night?”

Spite of himself Nobili was shocked at her reserve.  She was so self-possessed.  He had flung his all upon the die.

“You have advised me,” he answered, stung by her coldness.  “You have convinced me, I shall obey you.  Now I must go, unless you bid me stay.”

Again his eyes pleaded with hers; again found no response.  Nera held out her hand to him.

“To-morrow,” the full, ripe lips uttered—­“to-morrow.”

Seeing that he hesitated, Nera pointed with a gesture toward the door, and Nobili departed.

When the door had closed, and the sound of his retreating footsteps along the empty rooms had ceased, Nera raised her hand, then let it fall heavily upon the table.

“I have done it!” she exclaimed, triumphantly.  “Now I can bear to think of that Orsetti ball.  Poor Nobili! if he had spoken then!  But he did not.  It is his own fault.”

After standing a minute or two thinking, Nora uncovered the lamp.  Then she took it up in both her hands, stepped to a mirror that hung near, and, turning the light hither and thither, looked at her blooming face, in full and in profile.  Then she replaced the lamp upon the table, yawned, and left the room.

Next morning a note was put into Count Nobili’s hand at breakfast.  It bore the Boccarini arms and the initials of the marchesa.  The contents were these: 

MOST ESTEEMED COUNT:  As a friend of our family, I have the honor of informing you that the marriage of my dear daughter Nera with Prince Ruspoli is arranged, and will take place in a week.  I hope you will be present.  I have the honor to assure you of my most sincere and distinguished sentiments.

“MARCHESA AGNESA BOCCARINI.”

In the night train from Lucca that evening, Count Nobili was seated.  “He was about to travel,” he had informed his household.  “Later he would send them his address.”  Before he left, he wrote a letter to Enrica, and sent it to Corellia.

PART IV.

CHAPTER I.

WAITING AND LONGING.

It was the morning of the fourth day since Count Nobili had left Corellia.  All had been very quiet about the house.  The marchesa herself took little heed of any thing.  She sat much in her own room.  She was silent and preoccupied; but she was not displeased.  The one dominant passion of her soul—­the triumph of the Guinigi name—­was now attained.  Now she could bear to think of the grand old palace at Lucca, the seigneurial throne, the nuptial-chamber; now she could gaze in peace on the countenance of the great Castruccio.  No spoiler would dare to tread these sacred floors.  No irreverent hand would presume to handle her ancestral treasures; no vulgar eye would rest on the effigies of her race gathered on these walls.  All would now be safe—­safe under the protection of wealth, enormous wealth—­wealth to guard, to preserve, to possess.