“You see,” said Maria, smiling, “that my sufferings are already ended.”
“Would you like, Maria, that I read these verses to you?”
“Be it so.”
The duke read his sonnet in honor of the Diva.
“Your verses are very beautiful, duke,” remarked Maria with more than animation. “Will you have them published in the Heraldo?”
“Do you wish it?”
“I think they merit it.”
The duke at this reply let his head fall on his hands. When he raised it again, he saw as it were a light pass in the look which Maria fixed on the glass door of her alcove. He turned his head to that side, but saw nothing.
He had, in his abstraction, rolled the paper on which the verses were written, and which the singer had not taken into her possession. She asked him if he intended to make a cigarette of her sonnet.
“Then, at least,” said the duke, “it would serve for something.”