When Fabio arrived at the palace, the jovial uproar in the Heavy Department was at its height, and several gentlemen, fired by the classical costumes of the shepherdesses, were beginning to speak Latin to them with a thick utterance, and a valorous contempt for all restrictions of gender, number, and case.  As soon as he could escape from the congratulations on his return to his friends, which poured on him from all sides, Fabio withdrew to seek some quieter room.  The heat, noise, and confusion had so bewildered him, after the tranquil life he had been leading for many months past, that it was quite a relief to stroll through the half deserted dancing-rooms, to the opposite extremity of the great suite of apartments, and there to find himself in a second Arcadian bower, which seemed peaceful enough to deserve its name.

A few guests were in this room when he first entered it, but the distant sound of some first notes of dance music drew them all away.  After a careless look at the quaint decorations about him, he sat down alone on a divan near the door, and beginning already to feel the heat and discomfort of his mask, took it off.  He had not removed it more than a moment before he heard a faint cry in the direction of a long refreshment-table, behind which the five waiting-girls were standing.  He started up directly, and could hardly believe his senses, when he found himself standing face to face with Nanina.

Her cheeks had turned perfectly colorless.  Her astonishment at seeing the young nobleman appeared to have some sensation of terror mingled with it.  The waiting-woman who happened to stand by her side instinctively stretched out an arm to support her, observing that she caught at the edge of the table as Fabio hurried round to get behind it and speak to her.  When he drew near, her head drooped on her breast, and she said, faintly:  “I never knew you were at Pisa; I never thought you would be here.  Oh, I am true to what I said in my letter, though I seem so false to it!”

“I want to speak to you about the letter—­to tell you how carefully I have kept it, how often I have read it,” said Fabio.

She turned away her head, and tried hard to repress the tears that would force their way into her eyes “We should never have met,” she said; “never, never have met again!”

Before Fabio could reply, the waiting-woman by Nanina’s side interposed.

“For Heaven’s sake, don’t stop speaking to her here!” she exclaimed, impatiently.  “If the steward or one of the upper servants was to come in, you would get her into dreadful trouble.  Wait till to-morrow, and find some fitter place than this.”