Having done so, he left the villa on foot, though it was raining hard, and walked quickly past San Pietro in Montorio and down the hill towards Trastevere.  The southwest wind blew the rain under his umbrella; it was chilly as well as wet, and a few big leaves were beginning to fall from the plane-trees.

He was not going to the little house, where Regina sat by the window looking at the rain and wishing that he would come soon.  When he was down in the streets he hailed the first cab he saw, gave the man an address in the Forum of Trajan, and climbed in under the hood, behind the dripping leathern apron, taking his umbrella with him and getting thoroughly wet, as is inevitable when one takes a Roman cab in the rain.

The Contessa was out, in spite of the weather, but Marcello asked if Aurora would see him, and presently he was admitted to the drawing-room, where she was sitting beside a rather dreary little fire, cutting a new book.  She threw it down and rose to meet him, as little outwardly disturbed as if they had seen each other constantly during the past two years.  She gave him her hand quietly, and they sat down and looked at the fire.

“It won’t burn,” Aurora said, rather disconsolately.  “It never did burn very well, but those horrid people who have had the apartment for two years have spoilt the fireplace altogether.”

“I remember that it used to smoke,” Marcello answered, going down on his knees and beginning to move the little logs into a better position.

“Thank you,” Aurora said, watching him.  “You won’t succeed, but it’s good of you to try.”

Marcello said nothing, and presently he took the queer little Roman bellows, and set to work to blow upon the smouldering spots where the logs touched each other.  In a few seconds a small flame appeared, and soon the fire was burning tolerably.

“How clever you are!” Aurora laughed quietly.

Marcello rose and sat upon a low chair, instead of on the sofa beside her.  For a while neither spoke, and he looked about him rather awkwardly, while Aurora watched the flames.  It was long since he had been in the room, and it looked shabby after the rather excessive magnificence of the villa on the Janiculum, for which Corbario’s taste had been largely responsible.  It was just a little shabby, too, compared with the dainty simplicity of the small house in Trastevere.  The furniture, the carpets, and the curtains were two years older than when he had seen them last, and had been unkindly used by the tenants to whom the Contessa had sub-let the apartment in order to save the rent.  Marcello missed certain pretty things that he had been used to see formerly, some bits of old Saxe, a little panel by an early master, a chiselled silver cup in which there always used to be flowers.  He wondered where these things were, and felt that the room looked rather bare without them.

“It burns very well now,” said Aurora, still watching the fire.