She called and clapped her hands, and her serving-woman entered from the outer room in which she slept.

She brought a great painted earthenware dish, on which fruit was arranged, half of a small yellow melon fresh from the cool storeroom, a little heap of dark red cherries and a handful of ripe plums.

There was white wheaten bread, too, and honey from Aquileia, in a little glass jar, and there was a goblet of cold water.

The maid set the big dish on the table, beside the glass that held Zorzi's rose, and began to make ready her mistress's clothes.
Marietta tasted the melon, and it was cool and aromatic, and she stood eating a slice of it, just where she could look through the flowers on the window-sill at the door of the glass-house, so that if Zorzi passed again she should see him.

He did not come, and she was a little disappointed; but the melon was very good, and afterwards she ate a few cherries and spread a spoonful of honey on a piece of bread, and nibbled at it; and she drank some of the water, looking out of the window over the glass.
"Was it always so beautiful ?" she asked, speaking to herself, in a sort of wonder at what she felt, as she set the glass upon the table.
Nella, the maid, turned quickly to her with a look of inquiry.
"What ?" she asked.