Emilie had an important air; she was about to make a good marriage.  Armelline was meek, smiling, and affectionate, and reminded me of the promise I had given her.  I replied by ardent kisses which reassured her, while they warned her that I would fain increase the responsibility I had already contracted towards her.  However, she seemed resigned, and I sat down to table in a happy frame of mind.

As Emilie was on the eve of her wedding, she no doubt put down my neglect of her to my respect for the sacrament of matrimony.

When supper was over I got on the sofa with Armelline, and spent three hours which might have been delicious if I had not obstinately endeavoured to obtain the utmost favour.  She would not give in; all my supplications and entreaties could not move her; she was sweet, but firm.  She lay between my arms, but would not grant what I wanted, though she gave me no harsh or positive refusal.

It seems a puzzle, but in reality it is quite simple.

She left my arms a virgin, sorry, perhaps, that her sense of duty had not allowed her to make me completely happy.

At last nature bade me cease, in spite of my love, and I begged her to forgive me.  My instinct told me that this was the only way by which I might obtain her consent another time.

Half merry and half sad, we awoke Emilie who was in a deep sleep, and then we started.  I went home and got into bed, not troubling myself about the storm of abuse with which Margarita greeted me.

The Florentine gave me a delicious dinner, overwhelmed me with protestations of friendship, and offered me his purse if I needed it.

He had seen Armelline, and had been pleased with her.  I had answered him sharply when he questioned me about her, and ever since he had never mentioned her name.

I felt grateful to him, and as if I must make him some return.

I asked him to dinner, and had Margarita to dine with us.  Not caring for her I should have been glad if he had fallen in love with her; there would have been no difficulty, I believe, on her part, and certainly not on mine; but nothing came of it.  She admired a trinket which hung from his watch-chain, and he begged my permission to give it her.  I told him to do so by all means, and that should have been enough; but the affair went no farther.

In a week all the arrangements for Emilie’s marriage had been made.  I gave her her grant, and the same day she was married and went away with her husband to Civita Vecchia.  Menicuccio, whose name I have not mentioned for some time, was well pleased with my relations with his sister, foreseeing advantages for himself, and still better pleased with the turn his own affairs were taking, for three days after Emilie’s wedding he married his mistress, and set up in a satisfactory manner.  When Emilie was gone the superioress gave Armelline a new companion.  She was only a few years older than my sweetheart, and very pretty; but she did not arouse a strong interest in my breast.  When violently in love no other woman has ever had much power over me.