“Last Thursday Don Orsino asked me to be his wife.  I had known for some time that he loved me and I knew that he would speak of it before long.  The day was sultry at first and then there was a thunderstorm.  My nerves were unstrung and I lost my head.  I told him that I loved him.  That does not concern you.  I told him, also, however, that I had given a solemn promise to my dying husband, and I had still the strength to say that I would not marry again.  I meant to gain time, I longed to be alone, I knew that I should yield, but I would not yield blindly.  Thank God, I was strong.  I am like you in that, though happily not in any other way.  You ask me why I should even think of yielding.  I answer that I love Don Orsino better than I loved the man you murdered.  There is nothing humiliating in that, and I make the confession without reserve.  I love him better, and therefore, being human, I would have broken my promise and married him, had marriage been possible.  But it is not, as you know.  It is one thing to turn to the priest as he stands by a dying man and to say, Pronounce us man and wife, and give us a blessing, for the sake of this man’s rest.  The priest knew that we were both free, and took the responsibility upon himself, knowing also that the act could have no consequences in fact, whatever it might prove to be in theory.  It is quite another matter to be legally married to Don Orsino Saracinesca, in the face of a strong opposition.  But I went home that evening, believing that it could be done and that the opposition would vanish.  I believed because I loved.  I love still, but what I learned that night has killed my belief in an impossible happiness.

“I need not tell you all that passed between me and Lucrezia Ferris.  How she knew of what had happened I cannot tell.  She must have followed us to the apartment I was furnishing, and she must have overheard what we said, or seen enough to convince her.  She is a spy.  I suppose that is the reason why she is imposed upon me, and always has been, since I can remember—­since I was born, she says.  I found her waiting to dress me as usual, and as usual I did not speak to her.  She spoke first.  ’You will not marry Don Orsino Saracinesca,’ she said, facing me with her bad eyes.  I could have struck her, but I would not.  I asked her what she meant.  She told me that she knew what I was doing, and asked me whether I was aware that I needed documents in order to be married to a beggar in Rome, and whether I supposed that the Saracinesca would be inclined to overlook the absence of such papers, or could pass a law of their own abolishing the necessity for them, or, finally, whether they would accept such certificates of my origin as she could produce.  She showed me a package.  She had nothing better to offer me, she said, but such as she had, she heartily placed at my disposal.  I took the papers.  I was prepared for a shock, but not for the blow I received.