"I will go and tell Sister Gabrielle before dinner," said Corona to
Giovanni.
So they left her at the door of her apartment, and she went in. She found the Sister in an inner room, with a book of devotions in her hand.
"Pray for me, my Sister," she said, quietly. "I have resolved upon a great step. I am going to be married again."
Sister Gabrielle looked up, and a quiet smile stole over her thin face.
"It is soon, my friend," she said. "It is soon to think of that. But perhaps you are right—is it the young Prince?"
"Yes," answered Corona, and sank into a deep tapestried chair. "It is soon I know well. But it has been long—have struggled hard—I love him very much—so much, you do not know!"
The Sister sighed faintly, and came and took her hand.
"It is right that you should marry," she said, gently. "You are too young, too famously beautiful, too richly endowed, to lead the life you have led at Astrardente these many months."
"It is not that," said Corona, an expression of strange beauty illuminating her lovely face. "Not that I am young, beautiful as you say, if it is so, or endowed with riches—those reasons are nothing. It is this that tells me," she whispered, pressing her left hand to her heart. "When one loves as I love, it is right."
"Indeed it is," assented the good Sister. "And I think you have chosen wisely. When will you be married?"