Chapter XII

When three of the clock chimed from the belfries of St. Mark she awaited him, alone in her favourite room, clothed in white with a knot of tea-roses at her breast; she was full of gladness; she looked at herself in the many mirrors and saw that she was as fair as the fair June day.

“How beautiful our lives will be!” she thought. “Poor little dead child! It was his little hands joined ours. Perhaps he is an angel of God now, and will be always with us!”

She heard the swish of oars at the water-stairs below; she heard steps ascending those stairs; she heard the voice of her head servant speaking. It was he! She put her hand to her heart; it beat so wildly that the leaves of the roses fell; she crossed herself and murmured a prayer; such happiness seemed to merit gratitude.

Through the vista of the antechambers came the figure of a man. But it was not that of Adrianis.

Damer came up to her with his calm, expressionless face, his intent eyes, his air of authority and of indifference.

“You expected the Prince Adrianis,” he said to her. “I regret to tell you, madame, that he is unable to keep his appointment with you. He has taken the disease of which that child on the barge died this morning. He has what the vulgar call diphtheria.”