“Ha! What did she say?”
“She has not spoken by word of mouth. Ah, no. A woman has other ways of revealing such a secret. Take the word of a woman of experience who knows how to look into the heart of her sex.”
“Have you looked into my wife’s heart?”
“Yes.”
“And did you see there, for example, Mario Forza?”
Donna Beatrice emitted a low, gurgling titter. “Oh, my dear friend! How little you understand womankind.”
“Did you hear what she said before the picture of Heribert?”
“Every syllable.”
“Couldn’t you see that it was Forza talking?”
She gave him a depreciatory glance. “How interesting! That one so keen in all else should be in an affair like this so—so—well, so short-sighted! To be sure, the Forza fever lingers,” she explained, “but it is merely running its course.”