"To be sure! I remember you thought of it last year. You said you had enough money."
"So I have still. I can't spend it here, and my uncle in Paris keeps writing 'Come! Come!'"
Regina was not listening. She was caught up in a pleasure, expected indeed, which yet took her by surprise, soothing her sick heart as a balsam soothes a wound. For there, in the hollow behind the row of black trees bordering the viassolin (lane), was the little white house, a lamp shining from its window! Already she heard the scraping voice of the frogs, which croaked in the ditch beside the lane. Shadows of two persons were spread across the road, and a soprano voice resounded in a prolonged call, like the shout of a would-be passenger to the ferryman on the opposite bank of the river—
"Regina—a—a——"
"It's that fool Adamo," said Gigi; "he's always calling you like that. He says you ought to hear him in Rome. She shouts, too," he added, pinching Toscana's knee.
"And so do you," said Toscana.
The voice rang out again, sent back by the water, echoing to the farther shore. Regina jumped from the carriage, and ran towards the two dear shadows. One of them separated itself from the other and rushed madly. It was the boy, and he fell upon Regina like a thunderbolt, hugging her, squeezing her tightly, even pretending to roll her into the river.
"Adamo! Are you gone mad?" she cried, resisting him. "Do you want to break my bones?"
Then Adamo, whose great dark eyes were brilliant in the moonlight, remembered Regina had written something about being ill, and he too became suddenly shy of her.
"How you've grown!" she exclaimed. "Why, you're two inches taller than I am!"