'Heart's dearest!' murmured her mother, gazing at her with a look in
which was concentrated all the tenderness of a soul wholly occupied by
this one absorbing affection. But at those words, that look, that
caress, Andrea felt a sudden stab of jealousy, something like a rebuff,
as if her heart were turning away from him, eluding him, becoming
inaccessible.
The governess asked permission to return to the villa, and the three
turned into a path bordered by orange-trees. Delfina ran on in front
with her hoop, her straight slender little legs in their long black
stockings, moving with rhythmic grace.
'You seem a little out of spirits now,' said Donna Maria to her
companion, 'and only a little while ago, when you came down, you seemed
so bright. Is something troubling you?--do you not feel so well?'
She put these questions in an almost sisterly manner soberly and kindly,
inviting his confidence. A timid desire, a vague temptation assailed the
invalid to slip his arm through hers, and let her lead him in silence
through the flickering shadows and the perfumes, over the flower-strewn
ground, down the pathways measured off at intervals by ancient
moss-grown statues. He seemed, all at once, to have returned to the
first days of his illness, those never-to-be-forgotten days of happy
languor and semi-unconsciousness, and felt as if he had great need of a
friendly support, an affectionate, a familiar arm.
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