As for Orsino, indeed, his inexperience was relative. He was anxious to
believe that he was only her friend, and pretended to his own conscience
that he could not explain the frequency with which the words "I love
you" presented themselves. The desire to speak them was neither a
permanent impulse of which he was always conscious nor a sudden strong
emotion like a temptation, giving warning of itself by a few heart-beats
before it reached its strength. The words came to his lips so naturally
and unexpectedly that he often wondered how he saved himself from
pronouncing them. It was impossible for him to foresee when they would
crave utterance. At last he began to fancy that they rang in his mind
without a reason and without a wish on his part to speak them, as a
perfectly indifferent tune will ring in the ear for days so that one
cannot get rid of it.
Maria Consuelo had not intended to spend September and October
altogether in Rome. She had supposed that it would be enough to choose
her apartment and give orders to some person about the furnishing of it
to her taste, and that after that she might go to the seaside until the
heat should be over, coming up to the city from time to time as occasion
required.
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