Then the thought of again seeing Margherita, of kissing her and immersing himself in love as in a perfumed bath, gave him a felicity which took his breath away. He almost wanted to flee from this devouring joy; but, driven out of his mind, it still ran in his blood, vibrated with his nerves, and swelled his heart in delicious pain. As he was starting. Aunt Varvara brought him a small wax candle which he was to carry to the Basilica of the Martyrs at Fonni, and Signora Obinu gave him a medal blessed by the Holy Father. "If you don't value it yourself, unbeliever, give it to your mother," she said smiling, and a little moved. "Good-bye, have a good journey and come back safe. I'll keep the room for you. Get on well, and send me a postcard at once." "Good-bye!" said Anania, taking the medal; "commend me to the Holy Souls in Purgatory." "Of course I will," she said, shaking her finger at him, "they will protect you from temptation." "Amen; and to our happy reunion." "Good-bye!" he called again from the bottom of the stair, and Maria, leaning over the bannister, saluted him with her hand. When he had reached the street he thought of going back to see if she were in tears, stopped for a moment, but went on followed by Aunt Varvara almost crying herself. "Son of my little heart," said the old woman, "greet for me the first person you shall meet on Sardinian ground. And don't forget the wax candle." She went with him to the tram, notwithstanding her fear of the monster, and kissed him on his cheek. Anania remembered the kiss of poor Nanna before his departure from Nuoro, but this time he was touched, and he embraced Aunt Varvara asking forgiveness for all the times he had teased her. Then all was left behind; the old woman who in parting from the young man wept her own exile; the dreary street where lived Maria Obinu; the Piazza at that hour scorching and deserted; the Pantheon sad as a cyclopean tomb; the cats dreaming among the great ruins. Anania, his face brushed by a light breeze, felt happy as if freed from an incubus. [Footnote 18: A court or platform round the _nuraghe_.] VI Before coming down to supper in his home, Anania stood at the window of his little room, struck by the deep silence of the courtyard, of the vicinity, of the whole country as far as to the horizon. He seemed to have become deaf. It was almost oppressive. But the voice of Aunt Tatàna resounded from the courtyard. "Nania, my son, come down!"