“Do you think me lacking in manners?”
“At least you smiled at him?”
“No—that is, I do not know.”
“You are not nice, Sofia. And yesterday evening Roberto spoke to me about you.”
“Telling you that I was not nice?”
“No, but asking me the cause of your reserved character, so different from mine. Then I recited a fine panegyric to him; I told him that you were better, more amiable, more loving than I, that your only fault was in concealing all these good qualities. Only fancy, he listened to me with the greatest interest; finally, he asked me about your aversion to him—”
“Aversion!”
“That is what he said, and, do you know, he is not so entirely wrong; you treat him with so little cordiality. But even on this point I defended you; I told a fib, for I said that you liked him very much indeed, and that you esteemed him greatly—”
“Lulu!”
“I know that it is not true, but Roberto is so fond of you, is it not ungrateful of you to treat him like a stranger?”