ook coldly.

"Let us leave the saints out of the discussion," she said, "unless we
speak of Marcello's mother. She was one, if any one ever was. I believe
you loved her, and I know that I did, and I do still, for she is very
real to me, even now. Don't you owe something to her memory? Don't you
know how she would have felt if she could have met her son the other
night, as I met him, looking as he looked? Don't you know that it would
have hurt her as nothing else could? Think a moment!"

She paused, waiting for his answer and watching his impenetrable face,
that did not change even when he laughed, that could not change, she
thought; but she had not seen him by Marcello's bedside at the hospital,
when the mask had been gone for a few seconds. It was there now, in all
its calm stillness.

"You may be right," he answered, almost meekly, after a little pause.
"I had not looked at it in that light. You see, I am not a very
sensitive man, and I was brought up rather roughly. My dear wife went to
the other extreme, of course. No one could really be what she wished to
make Marcello. He felt that himself, though I honestly did all I could
to make him act according to his mother's wishes. But now that she is
gone--" he broke off, and was silent a moment. "You may be right," he
repeated, shaking his head thoughtfully. "You are a very good woman, and
you ought to know."

She leaned back in her chair, and looked at him in silence, wondering
whether she was not perhaps doing him a great injustice; yet his voice
rang false to her ear, and the old conviction that he had never loved
his wife came back with increased force and with the certainty that he
had been playing a part for years without once breaking down.

"I will join Marcello, and see what I can do," he said.

"Do you know where he is?"

"Oh, yes! He keeps me informed of his movements; he is very good about
writing. You know how fond of each other we are, too, and I am sure he
will be glad to see me. He is back in Italy by this time. He was going
to Siena. We were to have met in Rome in about a month, to go down to
San Domenico together, but I will join him at once."

"If you find that--that young person with him, what shall you do?"

"Send her about her business, of course," answered Folco promptly.

"Suppose that she will not go, what then?"

"It can only be a question of money, my dear lady. Leave that to me.
Marcello is not the first young fellow who has been i