Joanna recalled the happy oblivion on his face whenever he was busy about his bicycle. That very morning Maddalena and she had gone down as far as the steps at the end of the lane to see him off. They had stood there hatless, trembling a little in the early freshness, but enjoying it, while he got his machine out of the trattoria. He had touched it here and there with loving hands to see that all was right, and had frowned at something which he said would soon want repairing. Then he had kissed Joanna’s hand, started with unusual difficulty, and waved his hat without turning his head. The two women had waited, looking after him till he disappeared round a far corner and only the distant pulsing of the engine came back to them.

And scarcely three hours had passed since then. How many hours were there till his return? Joanna counted on her fingers, and sighed. Yes, he was still her lover. She still looked eagerly for his coming, and in the pleasure of greeting him sought compensation for the empty hours of his absence.

But this evening, she determined she would tell him some of her morning thoughts, persisting till he came to understand her trouble. She would ask him to help her, would show that somehow their love was at stake. She remembered a phrase of her mother’s in a talk they had had during her engagement. “It is easy enough to fall in love, my childie,” Juley had said, “but to love wisely is sometimes very hard.”

The mere thought, repudiated at first, that love was hard, came to Joanna now as a stimulating discovery. Of course it was hard. It needed courage to love. Acquiescence was not the way. And at once she pictured herself walking up the lane with Mario when he got home, persuading him to come with her as far as the stone seat, telling him how she had come there earlier, by herself.

This she must tell him, even if it made him angry. He must not hear of it first through Maddalena. And fearful that Maddalena might at that very moment be looking for her by the well to give her an embroidery lesson, Joanna rose and hastened back towards the house.

As she turned the last corner, coming quickly downhill, she saw two men stood on the road just outside the garden gate.

Immediately she was struck by disquiet. There was some oddness in the way they were talking, turning constantly to look up towards the villa, yet not going in. One of them, a tall man with thick iron-grey hair, carried his hat in his hand, and kept mopping his brow with a blue silk handkerchief. He seemed terribly worried with the sun full in his face. The other, who had his back to Joanna, was small, and spick and span.