Bosio, seated at a little distance, looked on, his brain still disturbed by what had gone before, and wondering at Matilde's power of seeming at her ease in such a desperate situation; wondering, too, at his brother's hard, cold face--the mask that had so well hidden the passion of the gambler, and perhaps many other passions as well, of which even Bosio knew nothing, nor cared to know anything, having secrets of his own to keep.
All at once, and without warning, after the short pause, the old man broke out in tremulous entreaty.
"Oh! my friends!" he cried.

"Do not say no! I shall not have the courage to take such a message to my poor son! Eh, they say that nowadays old-fashioned love is not to be found.

But look at Gianluca--he consumes himself, he wastes away before my eyes, and one day follows another, and I can do nothing.

You do not believe?
Go and see! One day follows another--he is always in his room, consuming himself for love! He is pale--paler than a sheet.

He does not eat, he does not drink, he does not smoke--he, who smoked thirty cigarettes a day! As for the theatre, or going out, he will not hear of it.