ceptibly, and changed his
position a little.

"Heaven forbid," he said, "that any accident should befall your son!"

"Heaven forbid it!" replied the Signora. "He is very strong," she
continued, in the tone people use who are anxious to convince themselves
of something doubtful. "Yet I wish my husband to know that, after my
son, he should have the first right."

"Shall you inform him of the nature of your will, Signora?" inquired the
lawyer.

"I have already informed him of what I mean to do," replied Signora
Corbario.

Again the lawyer's eyebrow moved a little nervously, but he said
nothing. It was not his place to express any doubt as to the wisdom of
the disposition. He was not an old family adviser, who might have taken
such a liberty. There had been such a man, indeed, but he was dead. It
was the duty of the rich woman's legal adviser to hinder her from
committing any positive legal mistake, but it was not his place to
criticise her judgment of the man she had chosen to marry. The lawyer
made a few notes without offering any comment, and on the following day
he brought the will for the Signora to sign. By it, at her death,
Marcello, her son, was to inherit her great fortune. Her husband, Folco
Corbario, was constituted Marcello's sole guardian, and was to enjoy a
life-interest in one-third of the inheritance. If Marcello died, the
whole fortune was to go to Corbario, without any condition or
reservation whatsoever.

When the will was executed, the Signora told her husband that she had
done what she intended.

"My dear," said Corbario, gently, "I thank you for the true meaning of
it. But as for the will itself, shall we talk of it thirty years hence,
when Marcello's children's children are at your knee?"

He kissed her hand tenderly.

CHAPTER II

Marcello stood at an open window listening to the musical spring rain
and watching the changing lights on the city below him, as the
dove-coloured cloud that floated over Rome like thin gauze was drawn up
into the sunshine. Then there were sudden reflections from distant
windows and wet domes, that blazed like white fires for a little while,
till the raindrops dried and the waves of changing hues that had surged
up under the rain, rising, breaking, falling, and spreading, subsided
into a restful sea of harmonious colour.

After that, the sweet smell of the wet earth came up to Marcello's
nostrils. A light breeze stirred the dripping emerald leaves, and