Seeing the Countess so generous, she had treated as calumny the slander of the world relative to a person capable of such touching kindness of heart.

And it was at that moment that the false woman took Boleslas from her! A thousand details recurred to her which at the time she had not understood; the sails of the two lovers in the gondola, which she had not even thought of suspecting; a visit which Boleslas had made to Piove and from which he only returned the following day, giving as a pretext a missed train; words uttered aside on the balcony of the Palais Steno at night, while she talked with Alba.

Yes, it was at Venice that their adultery began, before her who had divined nothing, her whose heart was filled with inconsolable regret for her lost darling! Ah, how could he?
she moaned again, and the visions multiplied.
In her mind were then opened all the windows which Gorka's perfidity and the Countess's as well, had sealed with such care.

She saw again the months which followed their return to Rome, and that mode of life so convenient for both.

How often had she walked out with Alba, thus freeing the mother and the husband from the only surveillance annoying to them.