Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 2.djvu/87

76 Despite the perfect self-command and the trained immobility of the courtly Churchman, surprise and exultation for once escaped him, uncontrolled and unconcealed; his eyes lightened, his hand grasped the ivory and ebon elbow of his state chair, his lips moved rapidly.

"Here! She has the daring of a Cæsar!" And there was in the words an accent of compelled admiration that was, perhaps, from such an antagonist as this great Priest of Rome, the highest homage that Idalia had ever yet extorted; for it was homage wrung out in unwilling veneration from the hatred and the cunning of an implacable foe. Vane started, as though stung, and turned his face towards the grand dark canvas of the Ecce Homo, away from the fall of the light. When the astute Churchman, who had been his own hated enemy and duped tool so long, and whom he now used as the weapon of his vengeance—when the haughty Catholic, who pursued her with the rancour of his creed, and with the unpardoning bitterness of a mighty and unscrupulous priesthood against those who dare to defy and to disdain it—when, from the unwilling admiration of Giulio Villaflor, this tribute was wrung to the lofty and unconquerable courage of the woman whom he had come hither to betray