“It snows,” says Signora Evelina, glancing upward.

“Oh, it was sure to come.”

“Well—­I must go and look after my household.  Au revoir—­shall I see you later?”

“I hope to have the pleasure—­”

“Au revoir, then.”

Signora Evelina closes the window, nods and smiles once more through the pane, and disappears.

Signor Odoardo turns back to his study, and perceiving how cold it has grown, throws some wood on the fire, and, kneeling before the door of the stove, tries to blow the embers into a blaze.  The flames leap up with a merry noise, sending bright flashes along the walls of the room.

Outside, the flakes continue to descend at intervals.  Perhaps, after all, it is not going to be a snowstorm.

Signor Odoardo paces up and down the room, with bent head and hands thrust in his pockets.  He is disturbed, profoundly disturbed.  He feels that he has reached a crisis in his life; that in a few days, perhaps in a few hours, his future will be decided.  Is he seriously in love with Signora Evelina?  How long has he known her?  Will she be sweet and good like the other?  Will she know how to be a mother to Doretta?

There is a sound of steps in the hall; Signor Odoardo pauses in the middle of the room.  The door re-opens, and Doretta rushes up to her father, her cheeks flushed, her hood falling over her forehead, her warm coat buttoned up to her chin, her hands thrust into her muff.

“It is snowing and the teacher has sent us home.”

She tosses off her hood and coat and goes up to the stove.

“There is a good fire, but the room is cold,” she exclaims.

As a matter of fact, the window having stood open for half an hour, the thermometer indicates but fifty degrees.

“Papa,” Doretta goes on, “I want to stay with you all day long to-day.”

“And suppose your poor daddy has affairs of his own to attend to?”

“No, no, you must give them up for to-day.”

And Doretta, without waiting for an answer, runs to fetch her books, her doll, and her work.  The books are spread out on the desk, the doll is comfortably seated on the sofa, and the work is laid out upon a low stool.

“Ah,” she cries, with an air of importance, “what a mercy that there is no school to-day!  I shall have time to go over my lesson.  Oh, look how it snows!”

It snows indeed.  First a white powder, fine but thick, and whirled in circles by the wind, beats with a dry metallic sound against the window-panes; then the wind drops, and the flakes, growing larger, descend silently, monotonously, incessantly.  The snow covers the streets like a downy carpet, spreads itself like a sheet over the roofs, fills up the cracks in the walls, heaps itself upon the window-sills, envelops the iron window-bars, and hangs in festoons from the gutters and eaves.

Out of doors it must be as cold as ever, but the room is growing rapidly warmer, and Doretta, climbing on a chair, has the satisfaction of announcing that the mercury has risen eleven degrees.