"And is your aunt alone now?"
"Oh, no; Olimpia is sitting there."
On my side I hesitated. "Shall we then step in there?"
And I nodded at the parlor; I wanted more and more to be
on the spot.
"We can't talk there--she will hear us."
I was on the point of replying that in that case we would
sit silent, but I was too conscious that this would not do,
as there was something I desired immensely to ask her.
So I proposed that we should walk a little in the sala, keeping
more at the other end, where we should not disturb the old lady.
Miss Tita assented unconditionally; the doctor was coming again,
she said, and she would be there to meet him at the door.
We strolled through the fine superfluous hall, where on
the marble floor--particularly as at first we said nothing--
our footsteps were more audible than I had expected.
When we reached the other end--the wide window, inveterately closed,
connecting with the balcony that overhung the canal--
I suggested that we should remain there, as she would see
the doctor arrive still better. I opened the window and we passed
out on the balcony. The air of the canal seemed even heavier,
hotter than that of the sala. The place was hushed and void;
the quiet neighborhood had gone to sleep. A lamp, here and there,
over the narrow black water, glimmered in double; the voice
of a man going homeward singing, with his jacket on his
shoulder and his hat on his ear, came to us from a distance.
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