He looked strangely tall in his new black clothes, and when she had kissed him and had held his face before her a moment between her beautiful thin hands, he gazed at her a long time very thoughtfully.
‘The doctors said you were going to die,’ he observed at last, ‘but the Captain said you wouldn’t. I believed the Captain.’
‘What captain, dear?’
‘Why, Captain Castiglione, of course. He’s my friend now.’
A faint warmth rose in Maria’s wasted cheeks.
‘I thought you had been in Frascati,’ she said.
‘Yes. But the Captain has been out to see me three times a week. Didn’t they tell you? Sundays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. He said he thought you wouldn’t mind, because it was rather lonely for me out there with a man like my tutor, who can’t ride and had a broken arm. He’s given me a dog. We’re great friends. Papa was going to give me a dog, you know.’
The last sentence was spoken in a lower tone, very seriously and with a sort of awe.
‘Yes, dear,’ Maria answered gravely, for she did not know what to say.