You are strong and
well, and it would not be much for you to make that short journey,
considering Gianluca's condition.
"I shall not tell him that I have written to you, and I leave to you to
let him know of my writing, or not, as you think fit."
Here followed the little final phrase and the signature. Veronica let
the sheet fall upon her table, and gazed long and steadily at the
tapestry on the wall opposite her. Her hands clasped each other suddenly
and then fell apart loosely and lay idle before her. Her head sank
forward a little, but her eyes still held the point on which they were
looking.
In the first shock of knowing that Gianluca was to die, she felt as
though she had lost a part of him already, and something she dearly
valued seemed to go out of her life. Her instinct was not to go to him
and see him while she could, but to look forward to the blankness that
would be before her when he should be gone. Something of him was an
integral part of her life. But there was something of him for which she
felt that she hardly cared at all.
She was probably selfish in the common sense of that ill-used word. It
is generally applied to persons who do not love those that love them,
but are glad of their existence, as it were, for the sake of something
they receive and perhaps return--as Veronica did. But she did not ask
herself questions, for she had never had the smallest inclination to
analysis or introspection. It was as clear to her as ever that she did
not love Gianluca in the least, but that she should find it hard to be
happy without him.
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