Luisa raised her face from Maria's neck. "Perhaps she may yield!" said she. The Professor did not understand, and giving way to the evil genius that invariably suggested to him the worst word at the worst moment, he persisted instead of breaking off. "Perhaps, if she could see Maria!" Luisa pressed the little girl to her breast, and looked at him so fiercely that he was confused, and stammered, "I beg your pardon!" Maria, in this close embrace, raised her eyes to her mother's strange face, grew very red, pressed her lips tight together, cried two great tears, and began to sob.
"No, no, dear!" Luisa murmured tenderly to her, "be quiet, be quiet! You shall never see her, never!"
As soon as the child was comforted the Professor, distressed at the mistake he had made, at having offended this Luisa, who seemed to him a superhuman being, wished to explain, to justify himself, but Luisa would not allow him to speak. "Pardon me, but that will do," said she, rising. "Let us go and watch the game."
But, as a matter of fact, she did not go near the players. She sent Maria to amuse herself in the church-grounds with her little nurse, Veronica, and herself went to carry a piece of pudding to an old villager who had a voracious appetite and a small voice, with which he would every day promise his benefactress the same precious recompense, "Before I die, I will give you a kiss."
Meanwhile the Professor was filled with scruples and remorse for the unfortunate step he had taken. Not knowing whether to go or to remain, whether the lady would or would not return, whether it would or would not be indiscreet to go in search of her, after having looked out towards the lake as if seeking advice from the fishes, towards the hills to see if she or some one of whom he could inquire about her happened to be at one of the windows, he finally went to watch the game.
Each one of the players kept his eyes fixed on the four cards he held in his left hand, placed one upon the other in such a way that the second and third projected above the others just enough to be recognisable, while the fourth remained carefully hidden.
The Professor reflected that he also held a secret card, a trump, and he was undecided whether to play it or not. He held old Maironi's will. A few days after Signora Teresa's death, Franco had told him to destroy it, and never breathe a word about it to Luisa. He had obeyed only so far as keeping silence was concerned. The document still existed, though of this Franco was ignorant, because its custodian had determined to await the development of events, to see if Cressogno and Oria would come to terms, or if, in consequence of prolonged hostilities, Franco and his family would be reduced to want, in which case he himself intended to do something. What he should do, he did not really know. He was nurturing the germs of several foolish plans in his head, and trusted that one or other of them would have ripened before the time for action arrived. Now, as he watched Franco play, he wondered how that man, so engrossed in his desire to win a pasteboard king, could ever have refused that other precious card, not even wishing to inform his wife of its existence. He attributed this silence to modesty, to a desire to hide a generous action, and although he had suffered more than one sharp rebuff from him, and felt that Franco esteemed him lightly, still he looked upon him with a respect full of humble devotion.
"Give me the cards! Give me the cards!" the priest exclaimed, and he shuffled them eagerly. Then the game, symbol of the universal struggle between the blacks and the reds, began once more.
The lake now lay sleeping, covered and encircled by shadows. Only on the east the great, distant mountains of the Lario were still in a glory of purple and rich, yellow gold. The first breath of the evening breeze out of the north, moved the tender branches of the passion-flowers, ruffled, in spots, the surface of the grey waters towards the upper lake, and wafted a perfume of cool woods.