"To hold an interview with this unfortunate creature is what has brought me here with Zuleika and my friends the Morrels," said the Count. "Of course, I wished to see you, Helena, and enjoy once again the pleasure of your society," he added, his agreeable smile accompanying his words.

The Superior bowed gracefully and arose.

"I can understand then your anxiety to see and speak with Annunziata at the earliest possible moment. Therefore, I will immediately summon her to this apartment where the desired interview can take place without delay."

As she uttered these words Mme. de Rancogne hastened from the salon, shortly afterwards returning with the former flower-girl of the Piazza del Popolo in Rome.

Annunziata stood for an instant in the centre of the apartment, gazing inquiringly at the visitors, for Mme. de Rancogne had not informed her of their business, preferring that Monte-Cristo in his wisdom and experience should conduct the interview and develop his wishes in his own peculiar fashion.

The Count and Maximilian gazed at old Pasquale Solara's daughter with considerable interest, but it was an interest altogether masculine. Valentine also looked at her attentively, with that searching, penetrating look one woman invariably casts upon another. As for Zuleika, her eyes literally devoured the peasant girl, flashing with what was not exactly hatred for a rival but rather an instinctive fear and distrust. She was well aware that Giovanni had flirted with this girl, had been enthralled by her physical charms, had almost yielded to her sway, and she felt a peculiar interest in the creature who had temporarily at least stolen the heart of her lover from her.

Annunziata had been greatly benefited by her sojourn in the calm and quiet Refuge. She had by a great and heroic exercise of her strength of mind put aside from her all thoughts of her lamentable history, of her suddenly clouded and terrible past. She had thoroughly abandoned herself to the discipline and duties of the Sisters of the Order of Refuge, and had sought with more or less success even to forget herself. Her unruffled life, passed in the continual doing of good, filled her with peacefulness and satisfaction, and for the first time in a long while she fully realized what it was to be perfectly contented and happy. In consequence her physical condition had improved, promptly responding to her mental ease. She had recovered the beauty she had lost during her confinement in the bandits' hut and her subsequent wanderings as a homeless, starving outcast. Her plumpness had also returned, and her glance had all the brightness and gayety that had formerly distinguished it. Still a general refinement had taken possession of her, and Annunziata was no longer the child of nature she had been when she lived in the romantic cabin in the forest.




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