Such a communication would need no acknowledgment beyond a spoken word of thanks, which she would bestow upon him the next time they met.

It should contain nothing warmer than the assurance of his anxiety to be of service to her, in anything she undertook, and a protestation of respectful friendship at the end.
He wrote that first letter over twice and read it carefully before he sent it.

It referred to an historical question connected with the house of Anjou, from which her castle of Muro had come to the Serra by a marriage, several centuries ago, and by which marriage Veronica traced her descent on one side to the kings of France.

The castle itself had been twice the scene of royal murders, and there were many strange traditions connected with it.

Gianluca got the information he needed from the library downstairs, and he found ample material for a letter of some length.
But it was not dry and uninteresting, a mere copy of notes taken from histories and chronicles.