For the first time since they had come together again, the two young people were alone, and could talk freely and undisturbed, and tell each other how they had passed the three long years since they parted. And they chattered away happily under the starry heavens, never thinking of sleep in their joy at being together.
Towards morning they reached the lake, and arrived in Peschiera at the same hour as Rico had before arrived, and walked along the road to the lake-side. But Rico did not wish his companion to see the lake until she had reached the spot he called his own; so he led her through the trees until they came to the little stone bridge in the open.
There lay the lake in the light of the setting sun; and the children sat side by side on the little mound, and gazed across the water.
There it was, just as Rico had described it, but more, much more lovely; for such colors Stineli had never seen before.
She looked about her towards the purple mountains, across the golden waters, and she cried out with all her heart, "Yes, it is finer than the Lake of Sils."
But Rico felt that it had never yet been so exquisitely beautiful as on this evening when he and Stineli saw it together.
Rico had another secret joy that he cherished in his heart. How surprised Silvio and his mother would be to see them! Nobody had expected them back so soon. Nobody would look for them before the end of the week, and now there they sat by the lake-side.
They did not quit the little mound until the sun had fairly disappeared.
Rico pointed out to his companion the spot where his mother stood washing something in the lake, and how he used to sit waiting until she had finished; and then he told how they walked back together, hand in hand, over the little bridge.
"But where did you go when you went back?" asked Stineli. "Have you never found the house that you returned to?"