”that I am not already the heir of more than Alresca’s goods?”

I imagined, after achieving this piece of audacity, that I was perfectly calm, but within me there must have raged such a tumult of love and dark foreboding that in reality I could scarcely have known what I was about.

Rosa’s eyes fixed themselves upon me, but I sustained that gaze. She stretched forth a hand as if to take the packet.

“You shall decide,” I said. “Am I to open it, or am I not to open it?”

“Open it,” she whispered. “He will forgive us.”

I began to break the seal.

“No, no!” she screamed, standing up again with clenched hands.