to inquire for mistress. He did so two or three times in that
week.

What I observed myself, and what la bella Carolina told me, united
to explain to me that master had now set his mind on curing
mistress of her fanciful terror. He was all kindness, but he was
sensible and firm. He reasoned with her, that to encourage such
fancies was to invite melancholy, if not madness. That it rested
with herself to be herself. That if she once resisted her strange
weakness, so successfully as to receive the Signor Dellombra as an
English lady would receive any other guest, it was for ever
conquered. To make an end, the signore came again, and mistress
received him without marked distress (though with constraint and
apprehension still), and the evening passed serenely. Master was
so delighted with this change, and so anxious to confirm it, that
the Signor Dellombra became a constant guest. He was accomplished
in pictures, books, and music; and his society, in any grim
palazzo, would have been welcome.

I used to notice, many times, that mistress was not quite
recovered. She would cast down her eyes and droop her head, before
the Signor Dellombra, or would look at him with a terrified and
fascinated glance, as if his presence had some evil influence or
power upon her. Turning from her to him, I used to see him in the
shaded gardens, or the large half-lighted sala, looking, as I might
say, 'fixedly upon her out of darkness.' But, truly, I had not
forgotten la bella Carolina's words describing the face in the
dream.

After his second visit I heard master say: