"Is that meant for my son?" Countess Ammiani asked slowly, with
incredulous emphasis.

Agostino and Laura, laughing in their hearts at the mother's mysterious
veneration for Carlo, had to explain that 'gossamer' was a poetic,
generic term, to embrace the lighter qualities of masculine youth.

A woman's figure passed swiftly by the window, which led Laura to suppose
that the couple outside had parted. She ran forth, calling to one of
them, but they came hand in hand, declaring that they had seen neither
woman nor man. "And I am happy," Vittoria whispered. She looked happy,
pale though she was.

"It is only my dreadful longing for rest which makes me pale," she said
to Laura, when they were alone. "Carlo has proved to me that he is wiser
than I am."

"A proof that you love Carlo, perhaps," Laura rejoined.

"Dearest, he speaks more gently of the king."

"It may be cunning, or it may be carelessness."

"Will nothing satisfy you, wilful sceptic? He is quite alive to the
Countess d'Isorella's character. He told me how she dazzled him once."

"Not how she has entangled him now?"

"It is not true. He told me what I should like to dream over without
talking any more to anybody. Ah, what a delight! to have known him, as