Bianca looked at her doubtfully. She was loath to part with even a scrap of paper that had come from Silvio. But time pressed, and if she did not return an immediate reply to his missive, Silvio would think it had been intercepted. She sat down and wrote a few lines hurriedly, and, folding up her half-sheet of paper, confided it to Concetta's keeping.
"You will tell Don Agostino that I shall send another letter to-morrow by you," she said, "and you will thank him for all he is doing, Concetta, from me. And tell him also that I shall write to him myself, because—"
She hesitated for a moment, then, drawing herself up, she looked Concetta full in the face. "Because my future husband wishes me to do so," she concluded, quietly.
Concetta Fontana took her hand, and, raising it to her lips, kissed it. "I will go to Don Agostino at seven o'clock this morning, before he says his mass, and I will give him the letter. Ah, signorina, if the Signorino Rossano is Don Agostino's friend, it is proof enough that, speaking with respect, you have chosen your husband wisely. Sicuro! Don Agostino is a good man. There are many at Montefiano who distrust the priests; but there is nobody who does not trust Don Agostino. It is I, Concetta, who say it to you—and I know. But look, signorina, the dawn will soon be here. Let me go now—for who knows that her excellency might not awake. You will not be frightened if you see the picture move again? It will only be Concetta looking into the room to make sure that you are alone."
Bianca turned to her quickly. "Ah, Concetta," she exclaimed, "I am so happy—you do not know how happy! And I shall not forget what you have done for me—you will see that I shall not forget. Yes—go—go! I am not alone any longer now."
Concetta lifted up a chair and placed it under the picture. Then, standing upon it, she pressed the spring concealed behind the heavy, carved frame, and slowly, noiselessly, the portrait of Cardinal Acorari slid back into the wall. Another moment, and Concetta was standing in the aperture where the painted panel had been. "Sleep well now, signorina," she whispered to Bianca, "and do not be afraid. There are those watching that no harm shall come to you at Montefiano."
She drew back into the passage as she spoke, pressing the corresponding spring on the other side of the wall as she did so; and once more the cardinal looked down on Bianca from the spot where Concetta had been standing but an instant before.
Bianca gazed at the picture for a few moments, and listened for any faint echo of Concetta's footsteps. Not the slightest sound was audible from the passage. Only the twittering of waking birds came through the open window; and Bianca, turning away, went again to it and leaned out. A faint breeze was stirring the trees in the macchia below the terrace, and the drooping tops of the cypresses were swaying softly. The moon was sinking behind the lofty ridges of Soracte, and away in the east the violet sky of night was already streaked with the first pale messengers heralding the coming of the dawn.
And Bianca leaned from the window and watched till the pearly whiteness in the eastern sky deepened into rose red; till the wreaths of mist floating away from the valley of the Tiber rose, and, clinging to the mountain-sides, glided slowly upward till they caught the first golden rays of the yet hidden sun.
From the woodland below came the distant notes of a reed-pipe, and then a boy's voice singing one of the strange minor cadences learned, probably, centuries ago of slaves from the East, and sung still by the peasants and shepherds of the Latin province. In the present instance, Bianca knew that the lad was no shepherd—for the sheep had not yet been brought down from the higher pastures—but that he was engaged in the less poetical occupation of tending pigs.