A linen cloth, trimmed with lace, covered the face.

The delicate hands, still unwrinkled, were folded, and lightly clasped a well-worn rosary.

The lifeless form was concealed beneath a costly coverlid, in the centre of which lay an exquisitely-carved ivory crucifix.
The visitors bowed mutely before the corpse.

Belotti approached it and, as he saw the padrona's well-known hands, a convulsive sob shook the old man's breast.

Then he knelt beside the coffin, pressed his lips, to the cold, slender fingers, and a warm tear, the only one shed for this dead form, fell on the hands now clasped forever.
The burgomaster and his companion did not interrupt him, even when he laid his forehead upon the wood of the coffin and uttered a brief, silent prayer.