“I trust you were not offended at my remark concerning Nina Romani’s marriage with you? I fear I was too hasty?”
“Not so, madame,” I answered, with all the earnestness I felt. “Nothing is more pleasant to me than a frank opinion frankly spoken. I have been so accustomed to deception—” Here I broke off and added hastily, “Pray do not think me capable of judging you wrongly.”
She seemed relieved, and smiling that shadowy, flitting smile of hers, she said:
“No doubt you are impatient, signor; Nina shall come to you directly,” and with a slight salutation she left me.
Surely she was a good woman, I thought, and vaguely wondered about her past history—that past which she had buried forever under a mountain of prayers. What had she been like when young—before she had shut herself within the convent walls—before she had set the crucifix like a seal on her heart? Had she ever trapped a man’s soul and strangled it with lies? I fancied not—her look was too pure and candid; yet who could tell? Were not Nina’s eyes trained to appear as though they held the very soul of truth? A few minutes passed. I heard the fresh voices of children singing in the next room:
“D’ou vient le petit Gesù?
Ce joli bouton de rose
Qui fleurit, enfant cheri
Sur le cœur de notre mère Marie.”
Then came a soft rustle of silken garments, the door opened, and my wife entered.
CHAPTER XXVII.
She approached with her usual panther-like grace and supple movement, her red lips parted in a charming smile.
“So good of you to come!” she began, holding out her two hands as though she invited an embrace; “and on Christmas morning too!” She paused, and seeing that I did not move or speak, she regarded me with some alarm. “What is the matter?” she asked, in fainter tones; “has anything happened?”