If you knew him as well as I do, you would like him still
better."
Veronica thought this probable, but refrained from saying so, and
remained silent. Bianca was touching gentle chords at the piano. Now and
then a few words, sung in deep, soft notes, sad as the south wind,
floated through the room, and then she and Ghisleri talked about the
song, paying no attention whatever to the pair on the sofa.
Gianluca sighed and caught his breath. Veronica glanced quickly at him,
and then looked again at the top of Ghisleri's head, as the latter bent
down. She had not thought that she had expected so much of the meeting.
She certainly had not the slightest personal feeling for the man beside
her. And yet, somehow, she was dismally disappointed. If this was the
man who was dying of love, she infinitely preferred Bosio Macomer.
Gianluca was evidently in bad health. He looked as though he might be in
a decline, and he was clearly very nervous and ill at ease. But he did
not speak at all as she supposed that a man would who was deeply in
love. Taquisara had spoken far better. He had seemed so much in earnest
that if he had suddenly substituted himself for Gianluca as the subject
of his phrases, Veronica could have believed him easily enough.
"Then I may hope that you will forgive me for coming here, thinking that
I might meet you?" said the young man, with a question in his voice.
"Why should you not come?" asked Veronica, not unkindly, but with the
least possible inflexion of impatience.
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