PAOLO. I should say not! All the more as we are--are we not going to amuse ourselves? The place, the trip, the hotels,--yes, it is better. But the company! To run away there should be few of us. MARIO. What are you saying? PAOLO [_putting his two hands on Mario's shoulders and facing him._] To run away--do you understand? We must be a few. To run away as Anna and I did last year. MARIO. I do not understand. PAOLO. You did not tell me that Luciano had been here last year, nor the day that he was here. MARIO. I don't know. I do not remember.... PAOLO. There you are--there--there--I knew it! And you knew that Anna went away from here to avoid him. And I went with her all unconscious. You saw the husband take a train and run away before the other could arrive! MARIO. And if it is true. It does not tell you more or less than the letters did. PAOLO. No, a little more. Everything tells a little more. One grain of sand piles up upon another, then another until it makes the mill-stone which crushes you. It tells a little more. It is one thing to keep away and another to run away. One can keep away a trouble without begging it to keep its distance. But one runs away for fear. MARIO. Uh-h! PAOLO. And look here--look--look, let us examine the case. Let us see. It is improbable that he wrote her he was coming. It is sure he did not or she would have responded: "You write me that you are coming.... I love my husband--I beg you to remain away." MARIO. Oh! PAOLO. So she, foreseeing his intentions, felt that he would come ... by that divination.... MARIO. You are the first husband to get angry because a wife did her duty. PAOLO. Uhm! Duty--the ugly word! MARIO. If there ever was a virtuous woman! PAOLO. Woman or wife? MARIO. It is the same. PAOLO. No, no. A woman is for all; a wife for myself alone. Do you believe one marries a woman because she is virtuous? Never! I marry her because I love her and because I believe she loves me. There are a thousand virtuous women, there is one that I love, one alone who loves me ... if there is one.... MARIO. Paolo! PAOLO. And if she loved him? Tell me--and if she loved him? And if she repulsed him for virtue's sake, for duty's sake? Tell me. What remains for me? If he was alive I could fight, I might win out. But he is dead--and has killed himself for love of her. If she loved him no force can tear him from her heart. MARIO. You think--?