The heir of Withington Chase lingered on week after week in the little Italian town till a couple of months had gone by, without caring to ask himself why he did so.
At length the time came when he had neither the power nor the will to tear himself away. Self-deception was a species of weakness in which he had never indulged; he had always dealt frankly with himself, and he did so now. He was in love with the innkeeper’s daughter, and he admitted it. More than once, in years gone by, his fancy had been taken captive, but in every case the day had come, and that after no long time, when he had snapped the silken thread that loosely held him, and had gone on his way again, heart whole and fancy free.
But it was no frail silken chain that held him now: he was a helpless captive bound hand and foot in Love’s golden fetters.
When, however, he asked himself what prospect there was of his passion being reciprocated, he could but reply that he had no grounds whatever for answering the question in his own favour. That Vanna sought his society and that she derived a certain amount of pleasure from it, could not be doubted; but, on the other hand, every one of those signs was wanting which are supposed to foreshadow the dawn of love in a young girl’s heart. She was as easy and unembarrassed in his company as in that of her father, which, of itself; seemed to indicate the absence of any special regard for him. And yet there were times when an inscrutable something glanced at him for a moment out of the depths of her magnificent eyes and kindled a sudden flame of hope in his heart, which, if it quickly died down again, left behind it a certain glow less evanescent than itself.
At length a time arrived when it became clear to Alec that matters between himself and Vanna could not go on much longer as they were. The state of uncertainty in which he lived was fast becoming intolerable to him. Not much longer could he keep silent. He would give words to the passion that was consuming him and win all or lose all by the result.
On more than one occasion in the course of their many talks together, Giovanna had so far opened her mind as to confide to Alec the longing which beset her to get away from the dull and narrow routine of her life in her native town. She wanted to see something of the world, to live a larger and freer existence in some country beyond the sea.
Probably it was owing to the influence of these talks that the inception of the scheme was due which, a few weeks later, Alec embodied in his letter to his father.
Should the latter prove willing to give him the sum he had specified, he would ask Giovanna to become his wife, and if she consented, he would seek with her a home in the New World, where his six thousand pounds would, he confidently hoped, prove the corner-stone from which to build up one of those colossal fortunes in comparison with which the revenues of Withington Chase would seem insignificant indeed. In any case, as he truthfully stated in his letter, he was heartily sick of the idle, purposeless existence he had been leading for a couple of years. For aught he knew to the contrary, his father might never revoke the promise extracted from him not to return to England till leave should be given him to do so.
Meanwhile his life was slowly rusting away.