he lessons were going on, Pina had left the two
together, and Ortensia had silently accepted the nurse's conduct without
understanding its cause; she was too proud to speak of it when they were
together, or too shy, but she was sure from the first that Pina would
stand by her, though it was the woman's sole business never to let her
be out of her sight for a moment.

'And what shall I tell him?' Pina asked. 'What message shall he have
from you? I will faithfully deliver your words.'

Ortensia covered her eyes with one hand, leaning on the other behind
her, to steady herself as she sat up.

'Tell him that--that we must wait--and hope----'

'For what?' asked Pina bluntly. 'For the end of the world?'

Ortensia uncovered her eyes and looked up, surprised at the change of
tone.

'Will you wait till you are the Senator's wife?' Pina asked, her grey
eyes hardening suddenly. 'Will you hope that by that time the broken
glass on the wall will have softened in the rain till it will not cut
his hands? Or that you will be more free when you are married? You will
not be. That is not the way in Venice. I am a serving-woman, and,
besides, I am neither young nor pretty--I was once!--so I may go and
come on your business and walk alone from the Piazza to Santa Maria
dell' Orto. But you noble ladies, you are born in a cage, you live in
bondage, and you die in prison! Will you wait? Will you hope? What for?'

'What do you mean?' asked Ortensia in a frightened voice. 'Am I never to
see him again? Is my message to him to be a good-bye?'

'Good-bye is easily said,' Pina answered, shaking her head
enigmatically.

The young girl let herself sink back on her pillow, and turned her face
against her bare arm, so that at least her eyes were hidden from the
nurse.

'I cannot!' she whispered to herself, drawing a breath that almost
choked her.

'Yes,' Pina repeated harshly, 'it is easy to say farewell; and as for
any hope after that, the devil lends it us at usury, and if we cannot
pay on the day of reckoning he takes possession!'

'What cruel things you say!' Ortensia cried in a half-broken tone,
turning her head slowly from side to side, with her face hidden in the
soft hollow of her elbow.

'What hope will there be for you, child, when you are your uncle's wife?
The hope of dying young--that is all the hope you will have left!'

The woman laughed bitterly, and Ortensia felt that she was going to cry,
or wished that she could, she