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Fabio had intended to have an explanation with Muzio directly after supper, but his strange guest did not return to supper. Then Fabio decided to defer the interview with Muzio until the following day, and husband and wife withdrew to their bed-chamber. Valeria speedily fell asleep; but Fabio could not get to sleep.
He seemed composed and cheerful but he told them little; he devoted himself rather to questioning Fabio about their common acquaintances, about the German war, and the Emperor Charles: he spoke of his own desire to visit Rome, to see the new Pope.
The difficulty was not to procure the five hundred ducats; a Banker in a neighbouring town had had such a sum in his hands for the last six months at Fabio's disposition. But to travel from the coast of Dalmatia to Venice in four-and-twenty hours, with a broken sea and contrary winds, was a thing beyond all hope. "Let us have the money ready to begin with," said Fabio.
"Signor Fabio," she said, "the next time you forget what is due to your rank and yourself, warn me of it, if you please, beforehand, and I will take care to leave the room." While speaking the last words, she passed through the doorway.
After seeing Muzzio off on his way to Ferrara, he turned into his studio, where Valeria was usually waiting for him; but he did not find her there; he called her, she did not respond. Fabio was overcome by a secret uneasiness; he began looking for her. She was nowhere in the house; Fabio ran into the garden, and there in one of the more secluded walks he caught sight of Valeria.
At these words my wife's face suddenly assumed an expression of wistful sadness and appealing gentleness. "Ah, poor unfortunate Fabio," she sighed. "How terrible it seems that he is not here to greet you! How gladly he would have welcomed any friend of his father's he adored his father, poor fellow! I cannot realize that he is dead. It was too sudden, too dreadful!
I suppose my nerves are hardly in a fit state yet for masked balls and adventures; the sight of her seems to chill me. Who can she be?" "If she followed me a fourth time," said Finello, "I should insist on her unmasking." "And suppose she refused?" asked his friend "Then I should take her mask off for her." "It is impossible to do that with a woman," said Fabio.
He ordered a halt, and prepared to mount his horse; but Prospera Colonna, seeing the state he was in, advanced to his bedside alone: he came, against expectation, to offer him an escort, fearing an ambuscade on the part of Fabio Orsino, who had loudly sworn that he would lose his honour or avenge the death of Paolo Orsina, his father.
While he was engrossed in painful meditations, with his head propped on his hand and restraining his hot breathing, the moon again rose in the cloudless sky; and together with its rays, through the semi-transparent window-panes, in the direction of the pavilion, there began to stream in or did Fabio merely imagine it? there began to stream in a breath resembling a faint, perfumed current of air....
And see, you have given me such lovely jewels, so many of them too, that I scarcely dare offer you such a trifle as this; but as it really belonged to Fabio, and to Fabio's father, whom you knew, I think you ought to have it. Will you take it and wear it to please me?" and she slipped on my finger the diamond signet my own ring!
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