Now and then we recollected that the time of our separation was near at
hand, our grief was bitter, but we contrived to forget it in the ecstacy
of our amorous enjoyment.

"Ah! why can we not belong for ever to each other?" the charming girl
would exclaim. "It is not my acquaintance with Steffani, it is your loss
which will seal my eternal misery."

But it was necessary to bring our delightful interview to a close, for
the hours were flying with fearful rapidity. I left her happy, her eyes
wet with tears of intense felicity.

At the dinner-table M. Barbaro told me that he had paid a visit to his
relative, Steffani's mother, and that she had not appeared sorry at the
decision taken by her son, although he was her only child.

"He had the choice," she said, "between killing himself and turning
friar, and he took the wiser course."

The woman spoke like a good Christian, and she professed to be one; but
she spoke like an unfeeling mother, and she was truly one, for she was
wealthy, and if she had not been cruelly avaricious her son would not
have been reduced to the fearful alternative of committing suicide or of
becoming a Capuchin friar.

The last and most serious motive which caused the despair of Steffani,
who is still alive, remained a mystery for everybody. My Memoirs will
raise the veil when no one will care anything about it.