Let
her forget."
She had been growing stronger, they said, doing quite passively the
things they asked of her toward her restoration; she recognized them
all, but she expressed neither wish nor emotion, lying chiefly with
closed eyes in the cavernous depths of the great invalid chair where
they laid her each day, yet responding by some movement if they called
her name--rarely with any words; nothing roused her from that mood of
unbroken brooding.
"She will not forget," the great Santorio said in despair. "We must try
to rouse her. Let her child be brought."
The ghost of a smile flitted for an instant about her pale lips and over
the shadowy horror in her eyes, as Marcantonio leaned over her with
their boy in his arms. "Carina," he cried imploringly, "our little one
needeth thee!"
She half-opened her arms, but this wraith of the mother, he remembered,
frightened the child, who clung sobbing to his father.
Marina fell back with a cry of grief, struggling for the words which
came slowly--her first connected speech since her illness.
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