"They have hundreds of authoresses, translators, newspaper correspondents, who make more than 10,000 _lire_ every year, some a great deal more. Mrs. H. W.--do you know how much she gets for each of her books?" Regina did not know. "More than seven or eight thousand pounds." Arduina hastily made the calculation. "More than 200,000 _lire_?" she said, awe-struck. "Dear me! I shouldn't like to make all that!" "Why not?" "Because I should go off my head!" "But in Italy----" began Regina. "In Italy, too, a woman may earn a great deal. Work! work! there's the secret." Regina left the old Senator's dark and melancholy house with a new ray of light in her mind. Work! work! Yes, she also wanted work! She would begin to write. If she was no good for anything else, at least she might make some money. She wanted work; she wanted money; above all she wanted to live. "I'll escape from this narrow circle which is strangling me. I'll look life in the face. I'll lose myself in the great streets of Rome, feel the soul of the crowd, write descriptions of the lives of the poor, of those who are bored, of those who seem happy and are not--life as it is----" When she got home she looked round with pitying eyes. Yes! Signora Anna and the maid, Arduina and the brothers-in-law, the whole environment and the souls set in it, all moved her to pity. And this pity gave her a feeling of soft sweet warmth, of profound well-being. Antonio had not come in, and Regina stayed in her room. She took a book and sat by the closed window. Evening came on. Little by little the warmth which had been the result of the expedition died out. The light failed. Great impalpable veils fell down round her, slowly, one after the other. The book she held in her hand was so futile that she had not been able to read two pages. She shut it up and looked at the sky. But the line of sky above the ugly opposite façade was so ashen and heavy that it gave her the impression of a sheet of metal. Only one little red cloud, a wandering flame, illuminated the ashes of this dead heaven. Suddenly Regina felt a great emptiness, a great cold within herself. That little cloud had reminded her of the distant hearth fire in her home; of all the little, simple, voiceless things which yet were greater and brighter than all glory, all riches. She thought-- "Work! Money-making! Even if it were possible it couldn't give me back my home, my past, my atmosphere! One little reality is worth more than the greatest of ideals." "What is the Ideal?" she thought further, still watching the slow passing of the cloud; and she copied the old Senator's smile, remembering how he also imagined he had such lofty ideals! CHAPTER IV