He descended instead to his study, lighted his
reading-lamp, and then, opening a bureau, took from one of the
drawers in it the letter which Nanina had written to him. This
was not the first time that a sudden sense of his solitude had
connected itself inexplicably with the remembrance of the
work-girl's letter.
He read it through slowly, and when he had done, kept it open in
his hand. "I have youth, titles, wealth," he thought to himself,
sadly; "everything that is sought after in this world. And yet if
I try to think of any human being who really and truly loves me,
I can remember but one--the poor, faithful girl who wrote these
lines!"
Old recollections of the first day when he met with Nanina, of
the first sitting she had given him in Luca Lomi's studio, of the
first visit to the neat little room in the by-street, began to
rise more and more vividly in his mind. Entirely absorbed by
them, he sat absently drawing with pen and ink, on some sheets of
letter-paper lying under his hand, lines and circles, and
fragments of decorations, and vague remembrances of old ideas for
statues, until the sudden sinking of the flame of his lamp awoke
his attention abruptly to present things.
He looked at his watch. It was close on midnight.
This discovery at last aroused him to the necessity of immediate
departure. In a few minutes he had put on his domino and mask,
and was on his way to the ball.
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