"Everybody is good, according to you," he said. "Then I suppose your husband, Cesare, is good too?"
"Too? He is the best of all. He is absolutely good," she cried, her voice softening as it always did when she spoke of Cesare.
"He who leaves you here alone after a few months of marriage?"
"But I'm not alone," she retorted, simply.
"You're not alone—you're in bad company," he said, nervously.
"Do you think so? I wasn't aware of it."
"You couldn't tell me more politely that I'm a nonentity. But he, he who is away, and who no doubt invents a thousands pretence to explain his absence to you—can you really say that he is good."
"Cesare invents no pretences for me," she replied, turning pale.
"Who says so? He? Do you believe him?"
"He says nothing. I have faith in him," she answered, overwhelmed to hear her own daily fears thus uttered for her.