He seemed in a mood which Corona had never seen.

After a short silence he spoke.
"Corona," he said, "I love you." His wife looked up with a gentle smile, and in her determination to be loyal to him she almost forgot that other man who had said those words but two hours before, so differently.
"Yes," he said, with a sigh, "you have heard it before--it is not new to you.

I think you believe it.

You are good, but you do not love me--no, do not interrupt me, my dear; I know what you would say.

How should you love me?
I am an old man--very old, older than my years." Again he sighed, more bitterly, as he confessed what he had never owned before.
The Duchessa was too much astonished to answer him.
"Corona," he said again, "I shall not live much longer." "Ah, do not speak like that," she cried suddenly.