The fact was, however, that the Marchese was much oftener in the Strada di Porta Sisi than anybody guessed.  Besides the morning visits, which were patent to all the world, who chose to take heed of them, the Marchese very frequently spent those evenings there, when the “Diva” did not sing; slinking out of the Palazzo Castelmare, and taking all sorts of precautions to prevent any human being—­nephew, servants, friends, or strangers—­from guessing the secret of these nocturnal walks.

Such precautions were very needless; if anybody had noticed the Marchese Lamberto passing under the shadow of the eaves in any part of the city after nightfall, it would only have been supposed that he was bound on some mission of beneficence, or good work of some sort!  And if even it had become known to a few persons given to prying into what did not concern them, that the Marchese Lamberto di Castelmare was not more immaculate in his conduct than his neighbours, the only result would have been a few jests which he would have never heard, and a few sly smiles which be would have never seen.

But the Marchese could not look at the matter in this light.  He felt as if his fall from the social eminence on which he stood would have been as a moral earthquake in Ravenna.  The idea that such jests and such smiles could exist, however unseen and unheard, would have been intolerable to him.  And the Marchese was, accordingly, a miserable man.

A miserable man, and he could not help himself!  Each time that he quitted the siren, the chain that bound him was drawn more tightly around him.  At each visit he drank deep draughts of the philtre, that was poisoning the fountains of his life.  Again and again he had made a violent struggle to throw off the enchantment and be free.  And again and again the effort had been too great for his strength, and he had returned like the scorched moth, which comes back again and again to the fatal brightness, till it perishes in it.

In his hours of solitary self-examination he loathed and mocked himself to scorn!  He, Lamberto di Castelmare, to risk and to feel humiliation, and to suffer for the love of a woman, whose light affections had been given to so many!  He, who had been smiled on by many a high-born beauty in vain!  Love! did he love her?  Again and again he told himself that what he felt for her was far more akin to hate.  He marvelled; he could not comprehend himself!  He was often inclined to believe that the old tales of philtres and of witchery were not all false, and that he was in truth bewitched; and he struggled angrily against the spell, and at such times hated the beauty that had tangled him in it!

And in all this time Bianca had not yet ventured to show clearly her real game.  Nor had it yet occurred to the Marchese that such a preposterous thought as that he could marry her could have entered into her mind.  Yet it was clear to him that he made no progress towards making her his own upon any other terms.  The alternations between beckoning him on and warding him off had been managed with such skill, that they appeared to be the result of the Diva’s internal struggle with her own inclinations.  What was he to understand by it?  If she had been,—­had always been—­of unblemished character!  But it was not so; he knew better!