At Easter, in order to keep the promise I had made to the Countess of Mont-Real, and longing to see again my beautiful Lucie, I went to Pasean.

I found the guests entirely different to the set I had met the previous autumn.

Count Daniel, the eldest of the family, had married a Countess Gozzi, and a young and wealthy government official, who had married a god-daughter of the old countess, was there with his wife and his sister-in-law.

I thought the supper very long.

The same room had been given to me, and I was burning to see Lucie, whom I did not intend to treat any more like a child.