The abbess’s parlour was preceded by a handsome antechamber, where Odo was bidden to wait.  It was doubtless the Reverend Mother’s hour for receiving company, for through the door beyond he heard laughter and music and the sound of lively talk.  Presently this door opened and Mary of the Crucifix entered.  In her monastic habit she looked coarse and overblown:  the severe lines and sober tints of the dress did not become her.  Odo felt an insurmountable repugnance at seeing her.  He could not conceive why Fulvia had chosen such an intermediary, and for the first time a stealing doubt tainted his thoughts of her.

Sister Mary seemed to read his mind.  “You bear me a grudge,” said she gaily; “but I think you will live to own that I do not return it.  Come with me if you wish to speak with Sister Veronica.”

Odo flushed with surprise.  “She is not too unwell to receive me?”

Sister Mary raised her eyebrows in astonishment.  “To receive her cousin?  Her nearest male relative, come from Treviso purposely to visit her?  The saints forbid!” she cried.  “The poor child is indeed dying—­but only to see her cousin!” And with that she seized his hand and hurried him down the corridor to a door on which she tapped three times.  It opened at once, and catching Odo by the shoulder she pushed him laughingly over the threshold and cried out as she vanished:  “Be careful not to agitate the sufferer!”

Odo found himself in a neat plain cell; but he had no eyes for his surroundings.  All that he saw was Fulvia, dressed in her nun’s habit and seated near the window, through which the afternoon light fell softly on her white coif and the austere folds of her dress.  She rose and greeted him with a smile.

“You are not ill, then?” he cried, stupidly, and the colour rose to her pale face.

“No,” she said, “I am not ill, and at first I was reluctant to make use of such a subterfuge; but to feign an indisposition was the only way of speaking with you privately, and, alas, in this school one soon becomes a proficient in deceit.”  She paused a moment and then added with an effort:  “Even this favour I could not have obtained save through Sister Mary of the Crucifix; but she now understands that you are an old friend of my father’s, and that my motive for wishing to see you is not what she at first supposed.”

This was said with such noble simplicity and so direct a glance, that Odo, confused by the sense of his own doubts, could only murmur as he bent over her hand:  “Fuoco di quest’ incendio non v’ assale.”

She drew back gently and signed him to a seat.  “I trust not,” she said, answering his citation; “but I think the flame through which Beatrice walked must have been less contaminating than this morass in which I flounder.”