Massimo Alberti’s arrival at Montanina turns an unwanted lodging arrangement into an intimate first encounter with Lelia Camin. The sequence moves from his irritation at being sent without warning, through Marcello Trento’s deeply emotional welcome, to a meeting in which Lelia’s restrained gestures expose a disturbance she will not admit aloud. The room prepared for Massimo also carries the memory of Andrea Trento, giving the encounter a history before the two newcomers have exchanged a word.

An Arrival He Had Not Chosen

Massimo learns from his guide that Don Aurelio has ordered him to be taken to Montanina. He is frustrated that this was not explained earlier. His annoyance is not a rejection of Marcello: he venerates him. Rather, the arrangement confronts Massimo with the prospect of accepting hospitality he was not personally offered, encountering other guests, and losing the quiet and freedom he had hoped to find after leaving Milano. He also resents having had no chance to postpone the visit. The episode therefore begins with a conflict between his wish for independence and the obligations created by another person’s kindness.

That irritation gives way to a different emotional register when Massimo meets his host. Near the villa’s open ground, in the fading light, Marcello is descending with a bent posture and unsteady steps. Massimo hurries to him and is embraced closely and silently. He begins to apologize for intruding and attributes the visit to Don Aurelio’s arrangement, but Marcello repeats how joyful it is to see and embrace him. The warmth is immediate, physical, and far greater than Massimo’s embarrassed explanation can contain.

The Room and Its Buried Association

Marcello takes Massimo through the dining room into the salon, leaning on his guest’s arm. He insists that Massimo be shown to his room at once, promising that they will spend time together later and saying he will wait to have coffee with him. Massimo would rather stay with Marcello for a while, since he expects the older man will soon go to bed; Marcello, however, is intent on having his guest see what has been prepared. Teresina recognizes that eagerness and joins in urging Massimo to accept the invitation.

The room is not a neutral accommodation. Teresina leads Massimo to the quarters where Andrea had once imagined a future with Lelia. The little room opens northward onto the terrace, and the association makes the prepared hospitality brush against an earlier, unrealized future. Teresina sees the work Marcello has done and murmurs pity for him. Before withdrawing, she asks Massimo to let Marcello know that he has seen the preparations, but not to speak about them. Her caution turns a welcoming gesture into something fragile: Marcello’s effort is meant to be seen, yet the feeling behind it must be handled gently.

Lelia’s First Appearance

When Massimo is told that Marcello is in the salon with the young woman, he wonders which of the two women he is about to see and goes downstairs. Lelia is seated at a writing desk placed diagonally between a large window and the hooded fireplace, her back to the staircase. She feels her heart beating hard. She does not want to acknowledge her intense curiosity about the man coming down the stairs, and resolves not to turn toward him unless she can do so without appearing absurdly discourteous.

Marcello addresses her gently. She puts down her pen, opens a drawer, searches in it, and only then rises and turns around. Her careful delay gives the first meeting a strikingly bodily form: before she speaks or looks at Massimo, the scene registers anticipation through her racing heart and her efforts to contain it. Her reaction is not the same as open welcome; curiosity and self-command occupy the same small interval.

The Threshold and the Encounter’s Tension

Marcello notices an almost imperceptible movement suggesting that Lelia is about to leave, and tries to hold her by speaking of her sacrifice for his late wife and himself. The remark has the opposite effect. Lelia reproaches him for bringing it up and rushes toward the dining room; Marcello calls after her, sorrowfully. She stops on the threshold, turns back with her hands on the doorposts, and Massimo sees the face he had feared: a marble sphinx with lowered eyes. The vision lasts less than three seconds. Lelia raises her eyes and gives him a forced smile.

She then says she must go if Marcello wants to have breakfast. Her practical excuse ends the encounter before it can become a conversation, while Marcello’s displeasure shows that he had hoped to keep her there. The scene establishes the meeting’s defining contrast: Massimo has arrived seeking quiet but is drawn into a household shaped by affection and loss; Lelia’s concealed curiosity appears alongside withdrawal, and the room itself recalls the future Andrea once imagined with her. The first encounter is brief, but its gestures make clear that neither the hospitality nor the welcome is emotionally simple.