ife's illness had declared
themselves, and that he had thrown it aside, after observing the address
to be in a handwriting unknown to him. In his present state of suspense,
any occupation was better than sitting idle. So he took up the letter
with a sigh, broke the seal, and turned inquiringly to the name signed
at the end.

It was "NANINA."

He started, and changed color. "A letter from her," he whispered to
himself. "Why does it come at such a time as this?"

His face grew paler, and the letter trembled in his fingers. Those
superstitious feelings which he had ascribed to the nursery influences
of his childhood, when Father Rocco charged him with them in the studio,
seemed to be overcoming him now. He hesitated, and listened anxiously
in the direction of his wife's room, before reading the letter. Was its
arrival ominous of good or evil? That was the thought in his heart as he
drew the lamp near to him, and looked at the first lines.

"Am I wrong in writing to you?" (the letter began abruptly). "If I am,
you have but to throw this little leaf of paper into the fire, and to
think no more of it after it is burned up and gone. I can never reproach
you for treating my letter in that way; for we are never likely to meet
again.

"Why did I go away? Only to save you from the consequences of marrying a
poor girl who was not fit to become your wife. It almost broke my
heart to leave you; for I had nothing to keep up my courage but the
remembrance that I was going away for your sake. I had to think of that,
morning and night--to think of it always, or I am afraid I should have
faltered in my resolution, and have gone back to Pisa. I longed so much
at first to see you once more, only to tell you that Nanina was not
heartless and ungrateful, and that you might pity her and think kindly
of her, though you might love her no longer.

"Only to tell you that! If I had been a lady I might have told it to you
in a letter; but I had never learned to write, and I could not prevail
on myself to get others to take the pen for me. All I could do was to
learn secretly how to write with my own hand. It was long, long
work; but the uppermost thought in my heart was always the thought of
justifying myself to you, and that made me patient and persevering. I
learned, at last, to write so as not to be ashamed of myself, or to make
you ashamed of me. I began a letter--my first letter to you--but I heard
of your marriage before it was done, an