Giovanna had found a temporary home in one of those boardinghouses which abound in the neighbourhood of the west-central squares. But already she had begun to meditate a change. The demands on her purse were too many and, as it seemed to her, too exorbitant. Should she decide to stay in London, she must find cheaper rooms and make up her mind to live more economically in many ways. But just then she could not make up her mind to anything. She was a very lonely and a very miserable woman; indeed, the loneliness of her life sometimes appalled her. There were a number of other boarders in the house, and in the general drawing-room of an evening there was no lack of company of both sexes and of nearly all ages. But Giovanna, who had always been of a reserved and retiring disposition, had an utter distaste for associating with a mixed lot of people, with not one of whom she had anything in common, and, as soon as dinner was over, invariably went upstairs to her own sitting-room on the third floor. In the forenoons, when the weather was fine, she took long, solitary walks, sometimes in the Regents Park, sometimes through the miles of West End shops, but rarely pausing to glance into a window. Invariably dressed in black, and with the upper half of her face closely veiled, but leaving visible the firm and beautiful contours of the mouth and chin, her tall and stately form drew many eyes to it as she slowly threaded her way through the crowd of promenaders, so obviously indifferent to everyone and everything around her. There was about her, or so it seemed, an air of mystery, of romance even, which many of those who turned to gaze after her would have given something to be able to penetrate. On a certain morning, just as Giovanna was getting ready to go for her usual walk, a message was brought her that there was a gentleman below who was desirous of seeing her. In the belief that it must be either her uncle or Luigi, they being the only visitors she had, she requested the servant to show him upstairs. A minute later John Clare walked into the room.