him to leave Rome, where the heat was beginning to be
unpleasant, and to become a little more seriously ill at Montecatini
or Salsomaggiore, where he would be left in peace. Don Clemente had not
again appeared. Giovanni had sought him out at Santa Scolastica, where
the monk had signified to him, with tears in his eyes, that their
friendship must be buried like a treasure in times of war. Upon Don
Paolo Fare, who had been giving a course of religious instruction for
adults at Pavia, silence had been enjoined. Young di Leyni had been
reached through his family. His excellent and pious mother had besought
him with tears and in the name of his dead father, to break with those
dangerous acquaintances, the Selvas; and he believed that this step had
been suggested by her confessor. He had resisted, but at the cost of
his domestic peace. Finally, a clerical periodical had published three
articles on Giovanni's complete works, summing up some partial and
grudging praise, and some equally partial and biting censure in a very
severe judgment on the character of the works themselves, which the
critic pronounced rationalistic, and on the intolerable audacity of the
author, who, equipped solely with worldly learning, had dared to publish
writings in which the lack of theological knowledge was painfully
evident. In substance these three articles were a terrible and
prohibitive condemnation of the very book Giovanni was then engaged
upon, dealing with the rational foundations of Christian morality, and,
in the opinion of the initiated, it predicted the Index for his other
works.

"Are you in doubt concerning your own views?" Maria asked.

The question was insincere. Notwithstanding her great love for him, she
had a deep and clear knowledge of her husband's soul. She believed he
was, in his heart, suffering from the presentiment of an ecclesiastical
condemnation. Giovanni might speak lightly of certain sentences passed
by the Congregation of the Index, but his conscience, more respectful
towards the authorities than he himself realised, was troubled, so Maria
thought, more deeply than he wished it to be by the threatened blow.
And Maria, fearing to wound him by the question, "Are you afraid?"
had insinuated this other doubt, in order to prepare the way for a
spontaneous confession of the truth. Giovanni's answer astonished her.

"Yes," said he. "I doubt myself. Not, however, in the way you suppose.
I fear I am a purely intellectual b