"You're as pink as a strawberry ice!" she said admiringly, and so they made peace. With the coming on of the hot days Regina's nostalgia, nervousness and melancholy increased. At night she tossed and turned, and sometimes groaned softly. At last she confessed to Antonio that her heart troubled her. "Palpitations for hours at a time till I can hardly breathe! It feels as if my chest would burst and let my heart escape. It must be the stairs. I never used to have palpitations!" Much alarmed, her husband wished to take her to a specialist, but this she opposed. "It will go off the moment I get away," she said. They decided she must go at the end of June. Antonio would take his holiday in August and join her, remaining at her mother's for a fortnight. "After that, if we've any money left, we'll spend a few days at Viareggio." Regina said neither yea nor nay. After the first seven months the young couple had only 200 _lire_ in hand. This was barely enough for the journey; Antonio, however, hoped to put by a little while his wife was away. The days passed on; Rome was becoming depopulated, though the first brief spell of heat had been followed by renewal of incessant and tiresome rain. Antonio counted the days. "Another ten--another eight--and you'll be gone. What's to become of me all alone for a month?" Such expressions irritated her. She wished neither to speak nor to think of her departure. "Alone? Why need you be alone? You've got your mother and your brothers!" "A wife is more than brothers, more than a mother." "But if I were to die? Suppose I fell ill and the doctors prescribed a long stay in my home?" "That's impossible." "You talk like a child. Why is it impossible? It's very possible indeed!" she said, still vexed; "whatever I say you think it nonsense--a thing which can't happen. Why can't it happen? It's enough to mention some things----" "But, Regina," he exclaimed, astonished, "what makes you so cross?" "Well, you just explain to me why it's impossible I should get ill? Am I made of iron? The doctor might forbid me to climb stairs for a while, and might tell me to live in the open air, in the country. If he took that line where would you have me go unless to my home? Would you forbid me to go there?" "On the contrary, I should be the first to recommend it. But it's not the state of affairs at present. Oh! your palpitation? that will go off. We must see about an Apartment on a lower floor--though, to say truth, I've got to regard this little nest of ours with the greatest affection. We're so cosy here!" he said, looking round lovingly. She did not reply, but stepped to the window and looked out. Her brow clouded. What was the matter with her? Detestation of the little dwelling where she felt more and more smothered? or irritation at her husband's sentimentality? "This is Friday," she said presently; "I suppose I ought to go and bid your Princess good-bye. When is she going away?"