“Ah, here is another specimen of women’s work,” he thought to himself, as he observed the utter wretchedness of the Marchese’s appearance, and the traces in him of a day spent in misery.  “And he, too, who had escaped for fifty years!  If I had avoided the springes for fifty years, I don’t think I should have been caught at last.  Maybe, it is all the worse for coming to a man so late.  Now here is this man, who had everything the world could give to make his happiness, wrecked, ruined, destroyed, blasted by the sight of a painted piece of woman’s flesh, and the lure of a pair of devil-instructed eyes.  And he knows that it is ruin.  He knows which is the evil, and which the good, and yet is so besotted, that he has not the power to take the one and leave the other.  Is not the sight of the unhappy wretch, as he sits cowering there, afraid, evidently afraid to meet my eye, a warning and a caution?”

And, in truth, the appearance of the Marchese might have been held, to justify these reflections of the lawyer, who was right in supposing that no tidings of what had happened had reached the Marchese since he had parted from him after their interview that morning.  Attributing, therefore, the state of utter moral prostration, mixed with a kind of restless nervous agitation, in which he found him, to the consciousness of the terrible results he was about to bring upon himself by the folly he had decided on committing, the lawyer could not prevent the thought occurring to him that were it not for the dreadful circumstances that seemed to bring home the suspicion of murder to the Marchese Ludovico, the tidings he brought of the death of the unfortunate woman would be, if not a relief at the moment, yet the most fortunate exit for the Marchese from the position he had made for himself.

“Good-evening, Signor Giovacchino.  You have come, of course, to ask whether the representations you made to me this morning have availed to induce me to waver in the purpose I announced to you,” said the Marchese, scarcely looking up so as to meet the eye of the lawyer.

“Signor Marchese,” returned Fortini, “it is my turn this time to communicate to you intelligence which will strike you, I fear, to the full as painfully as I was struck by what you told me this morning.”  The Marchese started; and the lawyer observed that the start seemed to continue and propagate itself, as it were, into a tremor, that ran through all his person, as he said, with chattering teeth:  “What do you mean?  Has anything happened?—­anything—­out of the common way, eb?—­eh?—­what—­what is it?”

“That has happened, Signor Marchese, which makes all further consideration of the step you confided to me your intention of taking this morning unnecessary.  The lady, whom you purposed to make your wife, is no more.”

“No more—­how no more?—­what—­what is it you mean?” said the Marchese, evidently terribly shocked, as was manifested by the tremor and shivering which seized him yet more violently than before; yet still without looking up so as to meet the lawyer’s eye.