Angelescu's face took on an undefinable expression, part constraint, part displeasure, part pity. In spite of himself, a vague jealousy of these children, the living proofs of Ragna's past, the concrete, undeniable evidence of her relations with other men. He had even felt a sort of elation, when she had told him, in relating the scene of the morning, of Egidio's threat to keep Mimmo, should she leave her home, thus taking advantage of the rights the law conferred on him. Now that he had found Ragna again, he wanted her all to himself; the past could not be helped and he was ready to accept it in the abstract, and to put it away from them both. But a sense of shame came over him, he seemed to be matching himself against the slender strength of a child. Still somebody must suffer, and after all it was Valentini's fault and not his as he was ready to accept the child as part of the burden he assumed, and do his conscientious best by it. Ragna's manner when she had talked to him of Beppino had showed him how evidently she considered the child a part of his father as distinct from herself, and he had been glad of it, for while he could bring himself to accept Mimmo, the other, the child of the hated oppressor of the woman he loved would be a burden beyond his endurance. Beppino had thus been eliminated from the question from the very beginning, and as it seemed, he was to be spared the presence of Mimmo also; Ragna and he were to be free to begin their life on a new basis, unencumbered by the evidences of past bondage. He let his thoughts dwell on these considerations, but was not able to still entirely the pricking of his conscience. It was, perhaps, more to ease this than for any other reason that he gave his consent to Ragna's returning to her home for this one last night. "Certainly you must see the children again," he assented gravely.