"Or maybe," mused Fiammetta, "it is because I have been ill that things perplex me, and sometimes startle me by an effect of strangeness. There are moments when even the stars look odd to me, and when the countryside, viewed from the tower above us, is bewildering. In one direction I see woods where I should have expected meadows; in another direction, fields where I should have expected woods. But then, I now view the countryside from a tower other than my own, and see in a new aspect that landscape with which I thought myself so well acquainted. Does that explain it?" How touching, how pitiable, was her expression, half arch, half pleading, and so beautiful! "Oh, lovely and terrible prodigy!" I thought, "draw back; banish those thoughts; or, rather, no longer think at all--for you are on the edge of the abyss!" Antonio spoke with difficulty: "Dearest one, do not pain me by mentioning that illness of yours. Do not pain yourself by dwelling on it in your mind. The past with all its misfortunes is gone forever. Let us live in the present and contemplate a future full of bliss." A quivering sigh of assent and relief went round the supper-table. But Fiammetta protested: "I should not care to forget the past. It contained too much happiness. The hours at twilight, when I waited on the platform of the Castle of Foscone, and you clambered up the wall, are not for oblivion! Do you remember, Antonio, how you once brought with you a bunch of little damask roses, which you tossed up to me while clinging to the masonry? Those roses became my treasure. The sweetest one of them I locked in a tiny silver box which I kept always by me. That box came with me from the Castle of Foscone. The key is lost; but you shall open it with your dagger, and learn how I have cherished an emblem of that past which you ask me to forget." With a rare smile, she drew from the bosom of her gown a very small coffer of silver, its chiseling worn smooth by innumerable caresses. Poor soul! it was in her bosom that she had cherished this pretty little box, more cruelly fatal than a viper. Antonio, his jaws sagging, rose half-way out of his chair, then sank back, speechless and livid. Unaware, eager, and imperious, Fiammetta demanded: "A dagger!" Too late Antonio managed to put out a shaking hand in protest. Already a fool of a servant had presented his dirk to her. In a twinkling--before we could stop her--Fiammetta had pried back the lid. The silver box, its oxidized interior as black as ink, contained, in place of the damask rose that had bloomed in the year fifteen hundred, only a few grains of dust. * * * * * There was no sound except from the wind, which yelled its devilish glee round the castle and in the chimney of the fireplace. She had risen to her feet. In her eyes, peering at the little coffer, bewilderment gave place to dismay. But in our faces she found a consternation far surpassing hers. "Only dust?"