"MY DEAR ONE,--

"The children claim me, I cannot go,--if I were false to them I should be false to myself and to you. We were wrong to-day when we imagined that we could cut a path for ourselves in spite of circ.u.mstance. So we must part. I shall never see you again, but remember that as I was yours to-day, so shall I be throughout the years to come. Your love has set me free, the material world exists for me now but as a dream--I have achieved through you the ultimate emanc.i.p.ation, not death, but freedom from the material circ.u.mstances of life. What matters the fate of that charnel house, my body? My spirit is yours, nothing can prevent that. Good-bye, my soul, my life.

"RAGNA."

The envelope was addressed to Count Angelescu, Grand Hotel, Citta.

Ferrati, taking the letter, glanced at the superscription; his instinct divined the truth, but like the wise man he was, he gave no sign. Only, he lifted Ragna's hand and pressed his lips upon it with the reverence he would have accorded a saint.

As he left the room he turned on the threshold, and the picture he saw: Ragna very pale but consummately calm, leaning on the foot of one of the cots, gazing down at the children, a faint smile parting her lips, her dark-circled eyes shaded by the long lashes, remained with him to the end of his life.