"A little strength—Heaven send me a little strength," she prayed inwardly.
Then she set forth stealthily across the room. In the middle of it, seized by a sudden audacious impulse, she called her sister's name, in a whisper, "Laura, Laura," listening intensely.
No answer. She went on, past the door, through the sitting-room, the drawing-room, feeling her way amidst the chairs and tables. She struck her shoulder against the frame of the door between the sitting-room and the drawing-room, and halted for a moment, with a beating heart.
"Madonna mia! Madonna mia!" she murmured in an agony of terror.
Then she had to pass before the room of her governess, Stella Martini; but the poor, good lady was a sound sleeper, and Anna knew it.
When she reached the dining-room, it seemed to her that she must have traversed a hundred separate chambers, a hundred entire apartments, an endless chain of chambers and apartments.
At last she opened the door that gave upon the terrace, and ran out into the night, the cold, the blackness. She crossed the terrace to the low dividing-wall between it and the next.
"Giustino—Giustino," she called.
Suddenly the shadow of a man appeared on the other terrace, very near, very close to the wall of division.
A voice answered: "Here I am, Anna."