She longed to make clear to him exactly what it was
that women admired in men--romance and daring and splendid strength. It
might suit Gheta, who had wrinkles, to encourage such men as Cesare
Orsi; their wealth might appeal to cold and material minds, but they
could never hope to inspire passion; no one would ever cherish for them
a hopeless lifelong love.
"Do you know," Orsi declared with firm conviction, "you are even
handsomer than your sister!"
"Fool! fool! fool!" But she could not, of course, say a word of what
was in her thoughts. She met his admiring gaze with a blank face,
conscious of how utterly her exterior belied and hid the actual Lavinia
Sanviano. She felt wearily old, sophisticated. In her room, dressing
for the evening, she made up her mind that she must have a black dinner
gown--later she would wear no other shade.
IV
Anna Mantegazza knocked and entered just as Lavinia had finished with
her hair and was slipping into the familiar white dress. There had
been, within the last few hours, a perceptible change in the former's
attitude toward her. Lavinia realized that Anna Mantegazza regarded her
with a new interest, a greater and more personal friendliness.
"My dear Lavinia!" she exclaimed, critically overlooking the other's
preparations. "You look very appealing--like a snowdrop; exactly. I
should say the toilet for Sunday at the convent; but no longer
appropriate outside. Really, I must speak to the marchesa--parents are
so slow to see the differences in their own family.
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