But rather than making herself beautiful, Caterina knelt down and prayed for guidance. Then she prayed to her dead sister, too. The memories loomed up, sad and confused, like faraway voices without echoes, like the smell of wilted roses. She thought that time passes quickly; it passes quickly and always seems the same. And people rush about, too. And someone stops for something beautiful and falls, overtaken by others who move on without looking back. And the dead, oh, how the dead are forgotten! And yet everyone thinks that life will go on forever. Even Marietta had dreamed and waited. And she, Caterina, had sworn that she would never forget her, but over the past few months for the frivolous company of an outsider, she had all but distanced herself from the memory of that poor creature.

But her sister was smiling at her now, sweetly and without rancor. She saw her again through a veil of tears and murmured. “Do you really forgive me?”

She recalled the face of the stranger who had looked at her sister, as he paused under the archway.

Without a doubt, if she had lived …

Now she was answering her with a sad smile: “Live, you who are still alive. Maybe it’s the love …”

Caterina raised herself from prayer without ever having prayed.

Till tonight, she thought. Her face reddened at her naked thoughts. What a longing for sun and fresh air! Tonight!

Handsome or ugly? Blond or dark haired?

It was someone. Someone who wanted her, who had also looked at Marietta one evening long ago.

It was love, mysterious and powerful, that would call her.

• • •

Aunt Fifi combed the young girl’s hair. Then she went to get her good dress, the one they had made for her to wear during the mourning period for her mother.

The skirt was a bit full, the sleeves too short, and the bodice so wide that it made two creases at her shoulders.

“It’s not bad,” concluded Aunt Vanna.

A hat? Going out for the first time in a hat? She bundled up in her shawl and waited for the clock to strike eight. Her father, with his new overcoat, walked slowly through the hallway. Her aunts spoke in hushed voices.

They were waiting, like someone waiting to leave for a strange, faraway place. Caterina shivered. In that sad hour she regretted having said yes. She heard the voice of her father. “Let’s go.”

Her aunts got up slowly, too, so they could accompany them to the door.

• • •

“Come in! Right this way.”

“Professor Pavonetti, my wife, my daughter. My brother Gaetano Fàvara, my niece, Caterina Fàvara.”

They all sat down in a circle, a bit embarrassed. Don Tano looked at his brother as if to say, “Well, you start.”