Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/26

Rh His voice was very low, and his words had a greater intensity because their passion was restrained in obedience to her: there was grandeur in their very simplicity. She raised her bead with her old stag-like gesture—looking to the sea, and not to him. "Sir, you have no title to speak such words. You cannot say that I have ever given you the faintest."

"Have I ever said it? No! you have given me no title, but I claim one."

"Claim!" "I claim one. The title that every man has to love, though be go unloved—to love better than life, and only less than honour."

He spoke steadily, undauntedly, as became bis own self-respect and dignity, but his voice had an accent which told her that world-wide as the love bad been that she had roused, none ever bad loved her as this man did. For a moment she turned and looked at him, a look fleeting, and veiled from him by the flickering shadows. The look was soon banished, and her eyes strayed backward to the sea; her face was very palé, but she moved away with her proud and languid grace: