Excited by the re-awakened beauty of Rome, all that still remained of
Elena's fascination in his blood and his spirit revived and re-kindled.
He was stirred to his very depths by sudden invincible pain, by
implacable inward tumults, by indefinable languors, almost like some
strange renewal of his adolescence.
Andrea's liaison with Elena Muti had been perfectly well known, as
sooner or later every adventure and every flirtation becomes known in
Roman society, or the society of any other city for the matter of that.
Precautions are useless. To the initiated a look, a gesture, a smile
suffices to betray the secret. Besides which, in every society there are
certain persons who make it their business in life to ferret out and
follow up the traces of a love affair with an assiduity only to be
equalled by the hunter of rare game. They are ever on the watch, though
not apparently so; never, by any chance, miss a murmured word, the
faintest smile, a tremor, a blush, a lightning glance. At balls or any
large gatherings, where there is more probability of imprudence, they
are ubiquitous, with ear stretched to catch a fragment of dialogue, and
eye keenly on the watch to note a stolen hand-clasp, a tremulous sigh,
the nervous pressure of delicate fingers on a partner's shoulder.
One such terrible trapper, for example, was Don Filippo del Monte.
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