Valeria did not quickly fall asleep; there was a faint
and languid fever in her blood and a slight ringing
in her ears ... from that strange wine, as she supposed,
and perhaps too from Muzzio’s stories, from his
playing on the violin ... towards morning she did
at last fall asleep, and she had an extraordinary
dream.
She dreamt that she was going into a large room with
a low ceiling.... Such a room she had never seen
in her life. All the walls were covered with tiny
blue tiles with gold lines on them; slender carved
pillars of alabaster supported the marble ceiling;
the ceiling itself and the pillars seemed half transparent
... a pale rosy light penetrated from all sides into
the room, throwing a mysterious and uniform light
on all the objects in it; brocaded cushions lay on
a narrow rug in the very middle of the floor, which
was smooth as a mirror. In the corners almost
unseen were smoking lofty censers, of the shape of
monstrous beasts; there was no window anywhere; a
door hung with a velvet curtain stood dark and silent
in a recess in the wall. And suddenly this curtain
slowly glided, moved aside ... and in came Muzzio.
He bowed, opened his arms, laughed.... His fierce
arms enfolded Valeria’s waist; his parched lips
burned her all over.... She fell backwards on
the cushions.
* * * *
*
Moaning with horror, after long struggles, Valeria
awaked. Still not realising where she was and
what was happening to her, she raised herself on her
bed, looked round.... A tremor ran over her whole
body ... Fabio was lying beside her. He
was asleep; but his face in the light of the brilliant
full moon looking in at the window was pale as a corpse’s
... it was sadder than a dead face. Valeria waked
her husband, and directly he looked at her. ‘What
is the matter?’ he cried. ‘I had—I
had a fearful dream,’ she whispered, still shuddering
all over.
But at that instant from the direction of the pavilion
came floating powerful sounds, and both Fabio and
Valeria recognised the melody Muzzio had played to
them, calling it the song of blissful triumphant love.
Fabio looked in perplexity at Valeria ... she closed
her eyes, turned away, and both holding their breath,
heard the song out to the end. As the last note
died away, the moon passed behind a cloud, it was suddenly
dark in the room.... Both the young people let
their heads sink on their pillows without exchanging
a word, and neither of them noticed when the other
fell asleep.
The next morning Muzzio came in to breakfast; he seemed
happy and greeted Valeria cheerfully. She answered
him in confusion—stole a glance at him—and
felt frightened at the sight of that serene happy face,
those piercing and inquisitive eyes. Muzzio was
beginning again to tell some story ... but Fabio interrupted
him at the first word.
