‘For further advice. The doctors at Cannes told us the specialists whom we ought to consult here, so we have obediently come, and consulted them. Of course they don’t tell him--nor even me--but they know perfectly well what it is. It will not kill him yet--at least, it is not likely to do so. If he were a poor man, and unable to get proper attention, he might die very soon. But he is a rich man, who can command everything that he wants, and he may live for--a--great--many--years,’ said Fulvia, in quiet, clear tones, with little pauses between the words, as she reached the end of her sentence. ‘It may get worse. He might die of something quite different; or he might have a stroke, and die of it; but he will never be better. It is a very unpleasant thing for him, but, as one of the doctors told him a little while ago, it is the result entirely of the life he chose to live as a young man. It was quite too hard a life for his constitution, and he may be thankful that it is not something much more horrible.’ Minna was silent, feeling a horror in her heart. Fulvia sat beside her, with her little firm, delicately gloved hands folded lightly on her knee. Her face was like the face of Fulvia Dietrich, with startling yet indefinable differences. The girlish indecision of outline had entirely disappeared, and left an exquisitely modelled face, with firm, statuesque curves of cheek and lip, pure aquiline line of nose, and a broad, rather low forehead--that is, a forehead on which the hair grew low, the same thick, glistening hair which the girl Fulvia had had. The slim figure of the young maiden had bloomed out into the full strength and magnificent outlines of early womanhood. She had grown taller, Minna was convinced, as well as having taken on this perfect outline with its larger, firmer curves and commanding beauty. The expression on Fulvia’s face was one of the utmost calm and placidity. Did she, or did she not, feel anything? Minna speculated. In speaking of her husband, not a ray of feeling of any kind had betrayed itself. Whether she were glad or sorry, bored, disgusted, satisfied, it would have been utterly impossible to tell. Minna maintained an anxious, uneasy silence. Presently Fulvia resumed: