Seghe is a small but consequential point of passage in the novel: a railway stop, a waiting room, and a crossing place between public travel and private grief. On July 4, Donna Fedele meets Massimo there before they go to San Giorgio Cemetery; afterward, its bridge and shaded path provide the privacy they need to discuss Lelia. The place turns a practical journey into a meeting at which mourning gives way to decisions about the living.

The Station and Its Connections

Massimo first imagines visiting the cemetery from Seghe between trains. He changes his mind about how to respond to Donna Fedele, tears up his initial letter, and writes instead to announce that he will come down to Seghe on July 4 at noon, hoping she will accompany him. The plan makes the station a hinge between his life in Milan and the recent death that has drawn him back toward Velo.

Donna Fedele arrives at 12:45 in her usual little carriage, pulled by the same small horse. She waits in the station’s waiting room, talking with an old herdsman, then steps out into the heat when she hears the train from San Giorgio. Before the small train has stopped, she sees Massimo at the window of its last carriage. Their meeting is immediate, but neither speaks at first: their shared sense of the recent bereavement precedes conversation.

The Journey to San Giorgio

The station is also the point from which the pair can reach San Giorgio Cemetery within the two hours before Massimo’s next train. Donna Fedele invites him into her carriage, and they travel beside the Astico, swollen and loud after heavy rain the previous night. On the way, she recalls signs and details from the last evening: the storm, flowers taken outdoors, money left on a desk, a lamp found burning, and the appearance of the dead man’s body. The route beside the river gives their journey a soundscape of its own, while her calm account keeps the loss present without turning the ride into a public exchange.

At the cemetery, the custodian points out a patch of freshly turned black earth. Donna Fedele has brought two roses and gives one to Massimo; they kneel in the grass, lay the flowers on the soil without removing their petals, and pray silently. Curious children have slipped inside the gate, and she gently but firmly orders them to kneel and keep quiet. Afterward, Massimo senses that her feeling for the dead man is stronger than his own, though he knows nothing of her past. The visit thus deepens his attention to Donna Fedele even as it is meant to honor the dead.

From Public Meeting to Private Counsel

Before they return to the carriage, Donna Fedele says she has delicate matters to discuss, but neither the carriage, with its driver present, nor the station waiting room seems suitable. They leave the carriage near the post office at Seghe, cross the little wooden bridge linking the station to the houses known as the Schiri, and take a shaded path descending beside the left bank of the Astico. The movement away from the station’s public space gives their conversation a more private setting.

There, Donna Fedele explains that she needs to speak about Lelia, and asks Massimo for counsel not only about the young woman but about herself in relation to him. Seghe therefore marks a transition in the encounter: the cemetery visit has joined them in grief, while the walk beyond the bridge makes room for a difficult discussion about care, attachment, and what should happen next. The station is not merely a backdrop to their meeting; its routes and adjacent paths shape the passage from mourning into deliberation.