She did not love him at all; but she liked
him very much, and admired him, and since it was time for her to be
married, she was strongly inclined to choose for her husband the only
man of her acquaintance whom she both admired and liked.
These long and tedious explanations are necessary in order to explain
how it came about that Veronica Serra, with her great position and vast
estates, seriously thought of uniting herself with such a comparatively
obscure personage as Count Bosio Macomer. Taquisara had very fairly
described the latter's position to her that morning as that of an
insignificant poor gentleman, in no point of name or fortune the
superior of five hundred others, and who might naturally be supposed to
covet the dignities and the wealth which Veronica could confer upon
him. But Veronica had resented both the description and the suggestions
which had accompanied it, which showed well enough, how strong her
inclination really was.
On the other side, there remained the impression made upon her by what
Taquisara had said for Gianluca, and last of all the impression made
upon her by Taquisara himself, as a man, and as a standard by which to
measure other men in the future.
With regard to Gianluca, Veronica was indeed curious, but she was also
somewhat sceptical. She could not, of course, say surely that a young
man might not die of love for a girl whom he scarcely knew; and among
the acquaintances of her family she remembered at least one case in
converse, where a morbid maiden of eighteen years had died because she
was not allowed to marry the man she loved.
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