"Are you not the same man who said to me, with a voice that trembled with pity, in that dark, empty room at the inn in Pompeii, while I felt that I was dying—are you not the same man who said, My poor child, my poor child?
"You pitied me. You do pity me. You will pity me. I know it, I know it. And that is the 'then' of my love.
"Don't write to me. I should be afraid to read what you might write.
"Ah, how I love you! How I love you!
"Anna Acquaviva."
Cesare Dias was very thoughtful after he had read this letter. His vanity, the vanity of a man of forty, was flattered by it. And Anna's love, for the present, at any rate, seemed to be entirely obedient and submissive. But would it remain so? Cesare Dias had had a good deal of experience. Anna's he knew to be a proud and self-willed character; would it always remain on its knees, like this? Some day she would not be content only to love, she would demand to be loved in return.
He did not answer the letter. He was an enemy to letter writing in general, to the writing of love letters in particular; and, anyhow, what could he say?
For two days he did not call upon her. On the third day, he arrived as usual, at two o'clock.
Anna, during these days, had lived in a state of miserable suspense and nervousness.
"What is the matter with her?" Stella Martini asked of Laura.