“Nobody loves me like you, Pipa—­nobody—­dear Pipa!”

Enrica threw her soft arms around Pipa as she said this.  She felt so lonely the tears came into her eyes, already swollen with excessive weeping.

“Who knows?” was Pipa’s grave reply.  “It is a strange world.  You must not judge a man always by what he does.”

Enrica gave a deep sigh.  She had hurried out of her room into the sala with a headlong impulse to rush to her aunt.  Now she dreaded what her aunt might have to say to her.  The little strength she had suddenly left her.  The warm blood that had mounted to her head chilled within her veins.  For a few moments she leaned against Pipa, who watched her with anxious eyes.  Then, disengaging herself from her, she trod feebly across the floor.  The sala was in darkness.  Enrica stretched out her hands before her to feel for the door.  When she had found it she stopped terrified.  What was she about to hear?  The deep voice of Fra Pacifico was audible from within.  Enrica placed her hand upon the handle of the door—­then she withdrew it.  Without the autumn wind moaned round the corners of the house.  How it must roar in the abyss under the cliffs!  Enrica thought.  How dark it must be down there in the blackness of the night!  Like letters written in fire, Nobili’s words rose up before her—­“I am gone from you forever!” Oh! why was she not dead?—­Why was she not lying deep below, buried among the cold rocks?—­Enrica felt very faint.  A groan escaped her.

Fra Pacifico, accustomed to listen to the almost inaudible sounds of the sick and the dying, heard it.

The door opened.  Enrica found herself within the room.

“Enrica,” said the marchesa, addressing her blandly (did not all now depend upon her?)—­“Enrica, you look very pale.”

She made no reply, but looked round vacantly.  The light of the lamp, coming suddenly out of the darkness, the finding herself face to face with the marchesa, dazzled and alarmed her.

Fra Pacifico took both Enrica’s hands in his, drew an arm-chair forward, and placed her in it.

“Enrica, I have sent for you to ask you a question,” the marchesa spoke.

At the sound of her aunt’s voice, Enrica shuddered visibly.  Was it not, after all, the marchesa’s fault that Nobili had left her?  Why had the marchesa thrown her into Count Marescotti’s company?  Why had the marchesa offered her in marriage to Count Marescotti without telling her?  At this moment Enrica loathed her.  Something of all this passed over her pallid face as she turned her eyes beseechingly toward Fra Pacifico.  The marchesa watched her with secret rage.

Was this silly, love-sick child about to annihilate the labors of her life?  Was this daughter of her husband’s cousin, Antonio—­a collateral branch—­about to consign the Guinigi name to the tomb?  She could have lifted up her voice and cursed her where she stood.

“Enrica, I have sent for you to ask you a question.”  Spite of her efforts to be calm, there was a strange ring in her voice that made Enrica look up at her.  “Enrica, do you still love Count Nobili?”