Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/150

Rh burned down in to hers, that, though they should part now and for ever, this longing she had wakened would consume him to his grave. A woman weaker and more pliant would have yielded to that impulse, and have given him tenderness: to the pride and to the truth of Idalia's nature to have stooped so far had not been possible.

"Love is no word for me," she said, with calmness, underneath which a vibration of deeper feeling ran. "I am weary of it; and I have none to give. I have played with it, bribed with it, ruled by it, bought by it, worked on it, and worked through it—evilly. I cannot do that with you. I must give you suffering, I will not also give you danger. Take your promise back; I absolve you from it."

Her eyes were turned towards the sea, and not to him, as she spoke; she could not watch the misery she dealt. She knew as though she saw it the look that came upon his face—darker and deadlier than the physical anguish that had been upon it when she had found him dying in the Carpathian pass. She had stricken him strengthless; she had refused his love; she had refused even his belief in her, even his homage to her; she had condemned herself for the evil that she wrought, and she stood aloof from him, imperial, world-weary, rich in the world's