“I can hardly believe it,” she added; “but, if it be so, speak to me in the voice of poetry.  Tell me your thoughts.”

“Yes,” exclaimed the count, clasping his hands; “I have been longing to do so ever since I first saw you.  Will you permit it?  If so, give me paper and pencil, that I may write.”

Enrica had neither.  Rising from the ground, she crossed over to where Trenta sat, apparently absorbed in the contemplation of the roofs of his native city.  Fortunately, after diving into various pockets, he found a pencil and the fly-leaf of a letter.  Marescotti took them and retreated to the farther end of the tower; Enrica leaned against the wall beside the cavaliere.

In a few minutes the count joined them; he returned the pencil with a bow to the cavaliere.  The sonnet was already written on the fly-leaf of the letter.

“Oh!” cried Enrica, “give me that paper, I know it will tell me my fate.  Give it to me.  Count, do not refuse me.”  Her look, her manner, was eager—­imploring.  As the count drew back, she endeavored to seize the paper from his hand.  But Marescotti, holding the paper above his head, in one moment had crushed it in his fingers, and, rushing forward, he flung it over the battlements.

“It is not worthy of you!” he exclaimed, with excitement; “it is worthy neither of you nor of me!  No, no,” and he leaned over the tower, and watched the paper as it floated downward in the still air.  “Let it perish.”

“Oh! why have you destroyed it?” cried Enrica, greatly distressed.  “That paper would have told me all I want to know.  How cruel! how unkind!”

But there was no help for it.  No lamentation could bring the paper back again.  The sonnet was gone.  Marescotti had sacrificed the man to the poet.  His artistic sense had conquered.

“Excuse me, dear signorina,” he pleaded, “the composition was imperfect.  It was too hurried.  With your permission, on my return, I will address some other verses to you, more appropriate—­more polished.”

“Ah! they will not be like those.  They will not tell me what I want to know.  They cannot come from your very soul like those.  The power to divine is gone from you.”  Enrica could hardly restrain her tears.

“I am very sorry,” answered the count, “but I could not help it; I did it unconsciously.”

“Indeed, count, you did very wrong,” put in the cavaliere; “one understands you wrote in furore—­so much the better,” and Trenta gave a sly wink, which was entirely lost on Marescotti.  “But time is getting on.  When are we to have that oration on the history and beauties of Lucca that we came up to hear?  Had you not better begin?”

The count was engaged at that moment in plucking a sprig of bay for himself and for the cavaliere to wear, as he said, “in memoriam.”  “I am ready,” he replied.  “It is a subject that I love.”

“Let us begin with the mountains; they are the nearest to God.”  As he pronounced that name, the count raised his eyes reverently, and uncovered his head.  Enrica had placed herself on his right hand, but all interest had died out of her face.  She only listened mechanically.