‘I need help.’ She was silent for a moment, and then looked down. ‘Do you write to my husband?’ she asked timidly.
‘Sometimes. I have little time for writing letters. Should you like to send him any message?’
‘Oh, no!’ she cried in a startled tone. ‘But oh, if you write to him, don’t urge him to come back! Don’t make him think it is his duty. It cannot be his duty to make any one so unhappy as I should be!’
‘I shall not give him any advice whatever unless he asks for it,’ replied Don Ippolito, ‘and if he does, I shall answer that I think he should write to you directly, for I would rather not try to act as his adviser. I told you that he did not take my advice the first time.’
‘Yes—but—you have been so kind! Would you tell me what you wished him to do then?’
The priest thought a moment.
‘I cannot tell you that,’ he said presently.
Maria looked surprised, and shrank back a little, suspecting that he had suggested some course which might have offended or hurt her. He understood intuitively.
‘It would be a betrayal of confidence to Montalto,’ he added, ‘to tell you what I advised him, and what he did not do. But I still think it would have been better for both of you if he had done it.’