A sensation
of curiosity and of ghastly horror ran through her hair, more than once,
like a cool breeze, and with it came the infinite desire for some one
word of truth out of the black beyond, from the one being whom she had
loved so fiercely.
But in such things she was sceptical, and she sought to make some theory
which should explain the writer of the letter into a common impostor.
She could find none. She remembered the act and the words that had gone
with it. Only she and Bosio had known, and he was dead--he had died
four-and-twenty hours after she had touched his hair and had said: 'It
is to save me.' And she knew him well. He was not, under any
circumstances, a man to speak of such things to a third person. Then,
how did this Giuditta Astarita know what Matilde had said and done? It
was not natural, and not natural meant supernatural--supernatural meant
the possibility of communication, and she had loved the dead man with
all her big, sinful soul.
It would be long before the time came for the deed, in the late
afternoon, and the terrible day must be disposed of in some way or
other. She was not afraid of going mad, nor of losing her nerve, nor of
making a mistake at the last moment, but even to her courage and
strength the hours before her were hours of fear.
She planned her day. The doctor would come, in the first place, at about
ten o'clock. He would recommend her to be quiet, to take a little broth
for luncheon, and a little more broth for dinner.
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