Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/124

Rh the ways of a woman who loved. And yet an agony of passion was on him; he only felt, lived, thought, breathed, for her; and the purity of the sea-temple in which he had looked upon her face in the past day shed on her its own sanctity, its own exaltation. Nothing loftier, purer, more superb, ever rose in a poet's vision of idealised love than he had incarnated in his worship of her—worship whose grandest element was faith sublime in its very blindness.

At her villa that night there were a score of guests; all men, and all unknown to him; amongst them the Italian, Carlo of Viana, whose subjugation to her sway had been so proud a triumph. Men of the world though they might be» there was not one of them, not even the brave, bright, cordial southern Prince, who could wholly conceal the surprise and the dislike, almost the offence, with which they saw a stranger; their glances ranged over him curiously in a jealous challenge, and he felt as little amity to them.

"Count Phaulcon is not here?" asked the Prince of Viana of her.

"No. I regret to have to make his apologies; he is unhappily prevented the honour of meeting your Highness," she answered him, as they passed into the dining-chamber.