She hesitated for a moment.
'Very well, I will come.'
'Thank you so much! I love you.'
'And I love you.'
They parted.
Donna Maria went on across the piazza and into the avenue. Over her head, the languid breath of the sirocco sent a broken murmur through the green trees. Subtle waves of perfume rose and fell upon the warm, damp breeze. The clouds seemed lower; the swallows skimmed close to the ground; and in the languorous heaviness of the air there was something that melted the passionate heart of the Siennese.
Ever since she had yielded to Andrea's persuasions, her heart had been filled with a happiness that was deeply fraught with fear. All her Christian blood was on fire with the hitherto undreamed-of raptures of her passion, and froze with terror at her sin. Her passion was all-conquering, supreme, immense, so despotic that for hours sometimes it obliterated all thought of her child. She went so far as to forget, to neglect Delfina! And afterwards, she would have a sudden access of remorse, of repentance, of tenderness, in which she covered the astonished little girl's face with tears and kisses, sobbing in horrible despair as over a corpse.
Her whole being quickened at this flame, grew keener, more acute, acquired a marvellous sensibility, a sort of clairvoyance, a faculty of divination which caused her endless torture. Hardly a deception of Andrea's but seemed to send a shadow across her spirit; she felt an indefinite sense of disquietude which sometimes condensed itself into a suspicion. And this suspicion would gnaw at her heart, embittering kisses and caresses, till it was dissipated by the transports and ardent passion of her incomprehensible lover.
She was jealous. Jealousy was her implacable tormentor; not jealousy of the present but of the past. With the cruelty that jealous people exercise against themselves, she would have wished to read the secrets of Andrea's memory, to find the traces left there by former mistresses, to know—to know—. The question that most often rose to her lips if Andrea seemed moody and silent was, 'What are you thinking about?' And yet, at the very moment of asking the question, a shadow would cross her eyes and her spirit, an inevitable rush of sadness would rise out of her heart.
To-day again, when he turned up so unexpectedly in the street, had she not had an instinctive movement of suspicion? With a flash of lucidity, the idea had leapt into her mind that Andrea was coming from the Palazzo Barberini, from Lady Heathfield.