We arrived at the good priest’s house two hours before mid-day, and soon after our arrival, Christine came in with an air of great ease, expressing all her pleasure at seeing me.  She only bowed to Charles, enquiring from me whether he was likewise a clerk.

Charles answered that he was clerk at Ragionato.

She pretended to understand, in order not to appear ignorant.

“I want you to look at my writing,” she said to me, “and afterwards we will go and see my mother.”

Delighted at the praise bestowed upon her writing by Charles, when he heard that she had learned only one month, she invited us to follow her.  Charles asked her why she had waited until the age of nineteen to study writing.

“Well, sir, what does it matter to you?  Besides, I must tell you that I am seventeen, and not nineteen years of age.”

Charles entreated her to excuse him, smiling at the quickness of her answer.

She was dressed like a simple country girl, yet very neatly, and she wore her handsome gold chains round her neck and on her arms.  I told her to take my arm and that of Charles, which she did, casting towards me a look of loving obedience.  We went to her mother’s house; the good woman was compelled to keep her bed owing to sciatica.  As we entered the room, a respectable-looking man, who was seated near the patient, rose at the sight of Charles, and embraced him affectionately.  I heard that he was the family physician, and the circumstance pleased me much.

After we had paid our compliments to the good woman, the doctor enquired after Charles’s aunt and sister; and alluding to the sister who was suffering from a secret disease, Charles desired to say a few words to him in private; they left the room together.  Being alone with the mother and Christine, I praised Charles, his excellent conduct, his high character, his business abilities, and extolled the happiness of the woman who would be his wife.  They both confirmed my praises by saying that everything I said of him could be read on his features.  I had no time to lose, so I told Christine to be on her guard during dinner, as Charles might possibly be the husband whom God had intended for her.

“For me?”

“Yes, for you.  Charles is one of a thousand; you would be much happier with him than you could be with me; the doctor knows him, and you could ascertain from him everything which I cannot find time to tell you now about my friend.”

The reader can imagine all I suffered in making this declaration, and my surprise when I saw the young girl calm and perfectly composed!  Her composure dried the tears already gathering in my eyes.  After a short silence, she asked me whether I was certain that such a handsome young man would have her.  That question gave me an insight into Christine’s heart and feelings, and quieted all my sorrow, for I saw that I had not known her well.  I answered that, beautiful as she was, there was no doubt of her being loved by everybody.