Meanwhile she
would show her indifference. Nothing was easier than to put on an
inscrutable expression which betrayed nothing, but which, as she knew,
sometimes irritated her father beyond endurance.
He had always promised that she should not be married against her will,
as many girls were. Then why should she marry Contarini, any more than
any other man except the one she had chosen? She need only say that
Contarini did not please her, and her father would certainly not try to
use force. There was therefore nothing to fear, and since her first
surprise was over, she felt sure of appearing quite indifferent. She
would put the thought out of her mind and begin the day with the perfect
certainty that the marriage was altogether impossible.
She looked out over her flowers. The door of the glass-house was open
now, and the burly porter was sweeping; she could hear the cypress broom
on the flagstones inside, and presently it appeared in sight while the
porter was still invisible, and it whisked out a mixture of black dust
and bread crumbs and bits of green salad leaves, and the old man came
out and swept everything across the footway into the canal. As he turned
to go back, the workmen came trooping across the bridge to the
furnaces--pale men with intent faces, very different from ordinary
working people.
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