"No; the heart is eaten out of you both by excitement," said the duchess.

Her tender parting, "Love me," in the ear of Vittoria, melted one heart
of the two.

Count Serabiglione continued to be buoyed up by his own and his
daughter's recent display of a superior intellectual dexterity until the
carriage was at the door and Laura presented her cheek to him. He said,
"You will know me a wise man when I am off the table." His
gesticulations expressed "Ruin, headlong ruin!" He asked her how she
could expect him to be for ever repairing her follies. He was going to
Vienna; how could he dare to mention her name there? Not even in a
trifle would she consent to be subordinate to authority. Laura checked
her replies--the surrendering, of a noble Italian life to the Austrians
was such a trifle! She begged only that a poor wanderer might depart
with a father's blessing. The count refused to give it; he waved her off
in a fury of reproof; and so got smoothly over the fatal moment when
money, or the promise of money, is commonly extracted from parental
sources, as Laura explained his odd behaviour to her companion. The
carriage-door being closed, he regained his courtly composure; his fury
was displaced by a chiding finger, which he presently kissed. Father.
Bernardus was on the steps beside the duchess, and his blessing had not
been withheld from Vittoria, though he half confessed to her that she was
a mystery in his mind, and would always be one.

"He can understand robust hostility," Laura said, when Vittoria recalled
the look of his benevolent forehead and drooping eyelids; "but robust
ductility does astonish him. He has not meddled with me; yet I am the
one of the two who would be fair prey for an enterprising spiritual
father, as the destined roan of heaven will find out some day."