She wished to see her other children. It was
ridiculous to expect that she and her husband should relieve each other
as sentries of propriety in Veronica's castle, the one not daring to go
till the other came back. Why should Veronica not send for the syndic
and have the formalities fulfilled? Once legally, as well as
christianly, man and wife, the two could stay in Muro as long as they
pleased.
But Veronica would not. Gianluca was improving, and before long he would
walk. She had set her heart upon it, that he should be strong again. She
would not have her people think that he was a cripple. The people were
peasants, the Duchessa answered, peasants like any others. Why should
the Princess of Acireale care what such creatures thought? But
Veronica's eyes gleamed, and she said that they were her own people and
a part of her life, and she told the Duchessa all that was in her mind,
very frankly, and so innocently, yet with such unbending determination
to have her way, that the Duchessa did not know what to do. Thereupon,
after the manner of futile people, she repeated herself, and the
struggle began again.
It was a tragedy that had begun. Veronica had escaped with her life from
Matilde Macomer to find out in the consequence of her own free deeds
what tragedy really meant, and how bitter the fruit of good could be.
Nor in the slightest degree had her affection for Gianluca diminished,
nor did it change in itself, as days followed days to full weeks, and
week choked week, cramming whole months back into time's sack, for time
to bear away and cast into the abyss of the useless and irrevocable
past.
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