I could not endure to be reproached by my past, because among all the loves into which I had flung myself innocently and blindly none appeared so culpable as the one I was trying to maintain in spite of myself Oh, my friend, what things I could tell! But you are still too young and you would not understand”

“Speak! Speak!” cried Salvator who had grown deeply thoughtful. Still clasping her hand he said, “Let me learn to know you well, so that I can continue to love you as if you were my sister – or inspire me with the courage to love you otherwise. See, I am calm, because I am listening to you.”

“Love me like a sister and not otherwise,” she said to him, “for I can only look upon you as a brother. That is how I loved Vandoni, for years. I had known him at the theatre where he did not shine on account of his talent, but where he made himself useful with his activity, his devotion and his kindness. One night – in the country near Milan, it was a beautiful summer night like this one – he made me tell him the story of my break with the singer Tealdo Soavi, the father of my darling little Beatrice. I had loved that man passionately, but his was a cowardly and depraved soul. He kept telling me that he wished to marry me, and he was already married! I did not value marriage as such, but I was horrified when I realised that he could lie to me so long and so cunningly. I was bitter and furious in my reproaches. He left me at the moment when I was about to become a mother. I would not have had the courage to send him away, but I had sufficient not to ask him to return.

“Beatrice was only a year old when poor Vandoni who had become my servant, my squire, my instrument, and who had loved me for a long time without daring to tell me so, heard my sad story and when I had finished he threw himself at my feet and said ‘Love me and I shall console you for everything. I shall heal and obliterate all the wrong that has been done to you. I know full well that you have no passion for me; but yield to mine and maybe the love which is consuming me will spread to your heart Moreover having your friendship and your trust I shall be the happiest and most grateful of men.’

“I resisted for a long time. I liked him so much that it was impossible for me to love him. I wished to send him away, but he spoke seriously about suicide. I tried to live chastely with him. He became like one demented. I yielded; and I thought I was committing incest when instead of feeling the intoxication of passion, I lay in his arms, ashamed, sorrowful and weeping.

“However, his rapture moved me to pity, and for some time life with him was fairly pleasant But he had expected that his heightened emotion would be requited ultimately. When he saw that he was mistaken and that I still remained nothing but a gentle companion to him, he did not have the modesty to tell himself that I knew him too well to be ecstatic over him, and that the more I knew him the less likely it was for the ecstasy to come. He was young and handsome and a man of feeling he lacked neither intelligence nor education – but he could not imagine that he would never influence me by the charm of his personality. (And you would not, either, Salvator…) I shall tell you why he could not influence me.

“We must not measure the power of the love we experience by the merit of the beloved one. For some time love feeds on its own flame and is even kindled in us without consulting our experience and reason. What I have said is commonplace, and every day one sees noble natures meeting nothing but ingratitude and treachery, whilst depraved, wretched souls inspire violent and lasting passions.

“We see it, we note it and are constantly astonished by it, because we do not inquire into its cause, love being a sentiment of a mysterious nature which everybody experiences without understanding it This subject is so profound that it is terrifying to think of and yet, couldn’t one make a serious effort to examine something which hitherto has only been vaguely glimpsed? Couldn’t one study, analyse, understand and get to know something of this delightful, yet terrible emotion, the greatest which the human species feels, the one that no one can escape and which, however, assumes as many forms and varied aspects as there are individualities on this earth? Couldn’t one at least grasp its metaphysical essence, discover the law of its ideal, and then find out, by questioning oneself, if it is a noble and sincere love one is harbouring in oneself or a baleful, destructive emotion?”

“These are weighty matters, Lucrezia,” said Salvator. “From the fact that you have given this subject so much thought I see quite clearly that you are no longer under the sway of passion.”

“That would hardly follow,” she retorted. “One can experience great emotions, yet consider them critically. Perhaps that is a misfortune, but I possess that faculty and I have always possessed it In the midst of the greatest storms of my youth, my thoughts used to consume themselves in the attempt to make sense of the storm which was causing this confusion. I fail to understand how, when it is a matter of love, the mind can have any other application than this. I am fully aware that it achieves nothing, that the more one tries to see clearly into oneself, the more one’s vision becomes blurred, but that is because, as I have already said, the law of love is not known, and the catechism of our affections is still to be made.”

“So,” said Salvator, “you have striven, yet have not solved the riddle?”

“No, but I have a presentiment that it lies in the Gospel.”

“My poor friend, the love we are speaking of is not in the Gospel. Jesus forbade it; He knew nothing of it The love He teaches us extends to humanity as a whole and does not concentrate on one individual being.”

“I know nothing about that But it seems to me that not everything that Jesus said and thought is sufficiently understood. And I could swear that He was not as ignorant about love as we are led to believe.