Magnani had been living for five years under a self-imposed law of absolute chastity. It was as if he had taken an oath to imitate Agatha's exceptionally austere mode of life, and, engrossed by a fixed idea, had determined to waste away by slow degrees, knowing naught of love or marriage. He had never kissed a woman, not even his sisters, since he had carried in his heart that chimera of a hopeless passion. It may be that he had made a vow to that effect in some moment of painful agitation. But he forgot that grim vow when he felt young Mila's lovely dark head resting trustfully against his breast. He gazed at her for an instant, and those limpid black eyes, in which there was an expression of grief and courage which he could not understand, cast him into a sort of delirium of surprise and passion. His lips did not touch Mila's brow; they turned away trembling from her bright red lips, and rested upon her soft brown neck, perhaps a second or two longer than was absolutely necessary to cement a bond of fraternity. Mila turned pale, her eyes closed, and a sorrowful sigh escaped from her broken heart. Magnani, shocked beyond measure, placed her upon a chair and fled, overwhelmed with dismay, astonishment, and, perhaps, remorse. Mila, being left alone, was very near fainting; she staggered to the door and bolted it; then she knelt on the floor beside her bed, hid her face in her hands, and remained there absorbed by her suffering. But she had ceased to weep, and grief gave place to an excitement instinct with strenuous and ardent aspirations. Pier-Angelo's optimism, that faith in destiny which is a sort of superstition in stout hearts, awoke within her. She rose, rearranged her hair, looked in her mirror, and said aloud, as she resumed her work: "I don't know why, nor when, nor how, but he shall love me; I have a right to desire it, I do desire it, and God will assist me!" When Michel returned, he found her tranquil and lovely, gazing intently at a copy of the _Virgin of the Chair_, which he had made for her with much care, and which she had hung, not in her alcove, but above her mirror. He congratulated himself that he had allowed her to give way freely to her first outburst of grief, and that she had recovered her strength of will in her solitary meditation. He almost reached her side before she heard him; but she saw his face in the glass as he leaned over her to kiss her on the neck. "Kiss me there," she said, offering him her cheek, "but never on my neck!" "Why that prohibition for your brother, little madcap?" "It is a whim of mine," she said. "You are beginning to have a beard and I don't want you to scratch my skin."