Besides, he had not the habit of writing
to the Signora Malipieri, except such brief acknowledgments of her
regular letters to him as were necessary and kind. For years she had
been to him little more than a recollection of his youth, a figure
that had crossed his life like a shadow in a dream, taking with it a
promise which he had never found it hard to keep. He remembered her as
she had been then, and it had not even occurred to him to consider how
she looked now. She sometimes sent him photographs of the pretty
little girl, and Malipieri kept them, and occasionally looked at them,
because they reminded him of his friend, of whom he had no portrait.
He found it very hard to tell this half-mythical woman and wholly
mythical wife of all that had happened, while scrupulously avoiding
the main fact, which was that he and Sabina loved each other. To have
told that, too, would have seemed like a reproach, or still worse,
like a request to be set at liberty.
He wrote carefully, reading over his sentences, now and then
correcting one, and even entertaining a vague idea of copying the
whole when he had finished it. The important point was that she should
fully understand the necessity of announcing his engagement to marry
Donna Sabina Conti, together with his firm intention of breaking it
off as soon as the story should be so far forgotten as to make it safe
to do so, having due regard for Donna Sabina's reputation and good
name.
Pages:
363
364
365
366
367
368
369
370
371
372
373
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387