The sun was sinking when Maria descended the long flight of steps from the door of the Capuchin church to the level of the street, and under the grey veil she wore her cheeks were wet with undried tears. But she held her head up proudly, and her small feet stepped firmly and lightly on the stones.

She was not in a state of grace by any means, and the tears had not been shed in repentance for her sins. She hardly ever cried, and when she did it was generally from anger and bitter disappointment. The moisture that had risen in her eyes that morning when Castiglione had offered to go away for her sake had not overflowed; but now, when she had left the confessional without the expected absolution, and had seen the hard-faced old monk in brown come out of his box and stalk stiffly away to the sacristy as if he had done something very virtuous, she had sat down in a chair in a corner of the empty church and the burning drops had streamed over her cheeks like fire till they reached the small handkerchief she held to her mouth under her veil; and she had bitten hard at the hem, and it was salt with her tears.

She had been misunderstood, she had been misjudged, she had been rebuked. She had been told that she was a very great sinner; that so long as she was willing to love a man who was not her husband, and who had been her lover, God would not forgive her; that absolution came from God and not from priests, and that it was out of any priest’s power to pronounce it while she was in her present state of mind; that she might come again when she was sure that she wished never to think of that evil man; that if she felt that she owed him reparation for having been unjust to him she should write to him to say so, asking him to destroy the letter, and bidding him never to come near her again; and that to see him again, even once, since she still loved him, would be not only a deadly risk but actually a mortal sin. After this she had been sternly told to go away, to pray for grace, and to be particularly careful to observe days of abstinence and fasting, as the devil was everywhere and never slept.

Now the monk who had heard her confession was a good man and meant well, and believed that he was speaking for the good of her soul. He knew well enough from the penitent’s language and manner of speaking about her life that she was a lady of Rome, and perhaps one of the great ones who sometimes came to him because they did not like to go to their regular confessors. But this, in his estimation, was the best of reasons why Maria should be treated with the same severity as the poorest and most ignorant woman of the people. If she had come to him with a religious doubt or a scruple concerning dogma he would have treated her very differently, for he was something of a theologian and had a monk’s love of controversy. But she came to him simply as a woman, with a perfectly evident mortal sin on her conscience, and what he considered a perfectly evident desire to compromise things by pretending that her lover could be her friend. In such matters he was a ruthless democrat, as many confessors are. She might be a great lady, she might have been royal, for all he cared; what was just to one woman’s soul and conscience was just to another woman’s, all the world over, and where the deadly sins were concerned there was not to be any distinction between the poor and the rich, the educated and the ignorant. On the contrary, educated people should get less mercy, because they ought to know better than their inferiors, and because they had been brought up in surroundings where the baser sins of humanity are supposed to be less common; and finally and generally, because we are told that the salvation of the rich is to be regarded as a much more difficult matter than that of the poor. It was certainly not the business of a Capuchin monk to reverse matters and make it easier.

But the delicately nurtured, sorely tried woman who had come to unburden her conscience of a sin she had only fully understood within the last few days, felt as if the well-meaning monk had thrust out his bony hand from the shadow of the confessional and had deliberately slapped her cheek.

Therefore Maria Montalto was not in a state of grace, and in her mortification she called the austere and democratic Capuchin several hard names; she said to herself that he was ignorant, that he was a common person, and that it was a scandal that such a prejudiced man should be a licensed confessor. She bit her handkerchief hard, tasting the salt of her tears in the hem of it, because she knew in her heart that there was a little truth in some of the hard things she had been told.

Her pride and nervous energy came to the rescue after a while, and she left the church to walk home through quiet streets where no one was likely to meet her. The evening breeze would dry her face under her veil, and her anger would help the drying process too, for it kept her cheeks hot. That morning she had felt very ill and tired and had vaguely expected to break down, but the afternoon in the Campagna had done her good, and her temper did the rest. Castiglione would find her looking wonderfully well when he came the next day at half-past two.

The sun had set, but it was still broad daylight when she reached the top of the Via San Basilio. She turned to the right presently, and almost ran into Teresa Crescenzi, who was walking very fast and also wore a veil, but was always an unmistakable figure anywhere.

‘Maria!’ cried the lively lady at once. ‘Where in the world are you going alone on foot at this hour?’

‘I have been to confession and I’m going home,’ answered Maria without hesitation, and smiling at the other’s quickness in asking a question which might certainly have been asked of her with equal reason.

‘So have I,’ answered Teresa with alacrity. ‘What a coincidence!’

But she had not been to confession.

‘Good-bye, dear!’ she added almost at once, and with a quick and friendly nod she went on down the hill.

Teresa had not gone far when she turned into a deserted side street and saw Baldassare del Castiglione walking at a leisurely pace a little way in front of her. A much less ready gossip than she might well have thought it probable that he and Maria Montalto had just parted, after taking a harmless little walk together in a very quiet part of the town.

It was certainly Castiglione whom she saw. There was no mistaking his square shoulders and back of his strong neck, where the closely cropped brown hair had an incorrigible tendency to be curly. Teresa had often noticed that, for she admired him and wished that he were a more eligible husband; but she was not very rich, and he was distinctly poor. She often saw him in the summer, and it had not occurred to her till his return to Rome that he would refuse her if she suggested that he might marry her. That was the way she put it, for a lack of practical directness was not among her defects. She had supposed that he had really quite forgotten Maria by this time, although her pretty tale about them was founded on the undying and perfectly innocent affection of both.

Now before she overtook Castiglione, as she inevitably must if he did not mend his pace, she hesitated whether she should turn back quietly and take another street. For she had not been to confession. Then it seemed to her that it would be dangerous to avoid him, for he was walking slowly, as if he himself were only keeping out of the way in the side street for a while, and might turn back at any moment; and if he did, he would recognise her. So she decided to overtake him and ask him to walk with her till they could find a closed cab, which was what she wanted.

Having reached this decision a further consideration presented itself to her mind. He would hardly believe that she could be coming up behind him without having met Maria, who had certainly been with him and whom she had just left. He would not like to feel that this had happened, and that she might even have seen them together. It would be more tactful to be frank.

She spoke as soon as she was close to him.

‘Good evening, Balduccio,’ she said pleasantly. ‘Will you help me to find a closed cab?’

He took off his hat without showing any surprise, and smiled as if not at all disturbed by the meeting. But then, thought Teresa, he always had good nerves and was a man of the world.

‘We can get one at the Piazza Barberini,’ he said, lengthening his stride to keep up with her, for he saw that she was in a hurry.

‘Can we? I feel one of my chills coming on, and I must either run to keep warm or get a closed carriage somewhere. Do you mind walking fast?’

‘Not at all.’

‘Because you were walking very slowly when I saw you.’

‘Was I?’ He seemed very vague about it.

‘Yes!’ she laughed. ‘Dear old Balduccio! You are just the same reserved, formal silly old thing you were when we went to the dancing-class at Campodonico’s, ever so long ago!’

‘Am I?’

‘Yes. But as I just happened to meet Maria, you need not pretend to be vague. You know how frank I am, so I’m sure you would rather be sure at once that I know, and that I will not tell any one!’

’Dear friend,’ returned Castiglione blandly, ‘what in the world are you talking about?’

Again Teresa laughed gaily.

‘Always the same! But as I met Maria Montalto only a moment ago, it’s not of the slightest use to tell me that you two have not been for a little walk together! Do you think I blame you? Haven’t you behaved like a couple of saints for more years than I like to remember? No one can find any fault with you, of course, but for Heaven’s sake walk in the Corso, or in the Via Nazionale, where every one can see you, instead of in such a place as this!’

‘But I have not met the Countess at all,’ answered Castiglione with some annoyance, when she paused at last to take breath.

‘Oh! Oh! Oh!’ she cried, shaking her finger at him. ‘It’s very wrong to tell fibs to an old friend who only wishes to help you!’

‘You may think what you please,’ he answered bluntly. ‘I have not met the Countess this afternoon. I have been to see a sculptor who has his studio in this street.’

‘Oh, yes!’ cried Teresa incredulously. ‘And Maria told me she had been to confession.’

‘If she said so, it is true. If we had met we should have stopped to speak. We might have walked a little way together. But we have not met.’

Teresa Crescenzi did not believe him. She had managed to get rid of her veil while walking, and without being noticed by him. Women can do such things easily when a man is very much preoccupied about other matters.

‘As you like,’ she answered, and her tone was anything but complimentary to his truthfulness.

But he did not take up the question after having once told her the truth, and when he opened the door of the cab they found in the Piazza Barberini there was a distinct coolness in their leave-taking. He gave the cabman her address and went away on foot down the crowded Tritone towards the city. When he had walked a quarter of an hour he looked at his watch, stopped a policeman, and asked for the nearest public telephone office.

He called for Maria Montalto’s number and was answered by Agostino, the butler. He inquired whether the Countess would speak with him herself, and presently he heard her voice.

‘I am Castiglione,’ he said. ‘Is it true that Teresa Crescenzi met you in the Via di San Basilio when you were walking home from confession half an hour ago?’

‘Yes—but how——’

He interrupted her at once.

‘I am in a public office, shut up in the box, but be careful what you say unless you are alone. I met Teresa a moment after she had spoken to you, and she pretended to know that we had been together in one of those quiet streets.’

‘How abominable!’

‘I had been to see Farini, the sculptor, close by San Nicolo. It was natural that Teresa should suppose we had met, but I was angry, and so was she because I denied what she said. I’m afraid she will repeat the story.’

‘Why should I care?’ Maria’s voice was rather sharp.

‘I care, on your account, so I have warned you.’

‘Thank you. You will come to-morrow?’

‘To-morrow, at half-past two, if you will receive me. Good-bye.’

‘You shall have the answer then. Good-bye.’

Maria went back to Leone, who was having his supper. The child was unusually silent, and ate with the steady, solemn appetite of strong boys. When he had finished he got up and gravely examined his armoury before going to bed, to see that his weapons were all clean and neatly hung in their places. There were two toy guns, with a tin revolver, a sword-bayonet, and a sabre. He went through this inspection every evening, and Maria sat by the table watching him while Agostino took away the things.

When the servant was gone the boy came and stood beside his mother’s knee and looked up into her face earnestly.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, after a long time.

‘For what, dear?’

‘You’ve been crying because I asked questions about papa. I’m sorry.’

She leant forward and took him in her arms quietly, and made him sit astride of her knees and look into her eyes while she held him by the wrists.

‘Little man,’ she said gently, ‘if you ever say anything that hurts me I promise to tell you just what it is, because I know you will never mean to hurt me, even when you are grown up. It was nothing you said that made me cry this afternoon, so there’s nothing for you to be sorry for—’ she smiled and shook her head—‘nothing, darling, nothing, nothing!’

Leone smiled too.

‘I’m glad,’ he said, and then his face grew grave and thoughtful again.

Maria wondered what was going on in his small head during the next few seconds. When he spoke at last she started.

‘Then it was the priest?’ he said with conviction. ‘I hate him.’

‘What do you mean, child?’

‘After we came home you put on the grey veil and went out alone. That is always confession, isn’t it? When you came home you put up the veil and kissed me. Your cheeks were just a little wet still. So it was the priest, wasn’t it, who made you cry?’

Maria would not deny the truth.

‘It was something the confessor said to me,’ she answered.

‘I told you so!’ returned the small boy. ‘I hate him!’

He was well aware that if he stayed another moment where he was his mother would tell him that it was very wrong to hate anybody, so he struggled out of her hold, slipped from her knees to the floor, knelt down and began to say his small evening prayer with such amazing alacrity that Maria’s breath was taken away and she could not get in a word of rebuke; in spite of herself she smiled over his bent head and felt very irreverently inclined to laugh at his manoeuvre. But before he had finished her face was very grave, and when he got up from his knees she spoke to him before she kissed his forehead.

‘Listen to me, my boy,’ she said. ‘You know that I always tell you the truth, don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ answered Leone. ‘So do I. It’s cowardly to tell lies. Mario Campodonico is a coward, and he lies like anything.’

‘Never mind Mario. I don’t want you to say that you hate priests.’

‘It’s the truth,’ retorted the terrible child. ‘Shall I say I love them?’

‘No. Listen to me. There are good people and bad people all over the world. So there are good and bad priests, but I think there are many more good ones than bad ones. You would not hate a good priest, would you?’

‘N—no,’ answered Leone, rather doubtfully.

‘Then leave the bad ones to take care of themselves, and don’t think about them. Do you suppose I hate you when you are naughty and break things in a rage and try to beat the servants? It’s the naughtiness I hate. It’s not you.’

‘It feels just the same,’ observed the small boy, with great logic.

‘But it’s not,’ answered his mother, trying to keep from laughing. ‘And when you are bigger you will understand that one should not hate bad men, but the badness in them.’

‘Well, that’s better than nothing! Then I hate the badness in your priest, who made you cry, and I’d like to hammer it out of him!’

Maria was at the end of her arguments.

‘He meant well,’ she said weakly. ‘I’m sure he meant well.’

‘When he made you cry?’ retorted Leone indignantly. ‘You might just as well say I mean well when——’

But at this point Maria closed the discussion abruptly by picking him up with a laugh and a kiss and carrying him off to bed. It was as much as she could do now, for he was very sturdy and heavy for his age.