'If you would rather keep your secret, tell me if I can help you.' Sister Giovanna looked at her gratefully and tried to speak, but it was hard; not that she was choking, or near to shedding tears, but her lips felt stiff and cold, like a dying man's, and would not form words.

But presently they came at intervals, one by one, though not distinctly, and so low that it was not easy to hear them.
Yet Mother Veronica understood.

Giovanni Severi, the man Angela had loved, the man who had been called dead for five years--he had come back from death--she had seen him with his brother--he had known her.
She was not going to faint again, but she sank forward, bending almost double, her hands on the arms of the chair, her young head bowed with woe.

There was something awful in her suffering, now that she was silent.
The Mother Superior only said three words, but her voice broke as she pronounced the last.
'My poor child----' Her lips were livid, but she ruled the rising storm and sat quite still, her fingers twisted together and straining on her knee.

If Sister Giovanna had looked up, she would have wondered how mere sympathy could be so deep and stirring.