Page:Idalia, by 'Ouida' volume 3.djvu/362

Rh seemed to strain upward to the sun that glanced through the high bars of their prison-room; there was fire in her eyes, light on her lips, the glow of liberty on all her face and form. She was the living symbol of Italy unchained.

"Do you hear? Do you hear?" she cried to him. "She is free!"

Before her own freedom—even before his—the liberation of the nation, so long enslaved, came to her heart first; then, while the great tears coursed down her cheeks, she clung to him, trembling with a terror that had never touched her—the terror less for him, as for the land for which she had so long endured and suffered, this hope only dawned again to die out in endless night.

"Ah, God! give them strength—courage—victory!" she prayed, as she lifted her face to the sun. "My love—my love! listen for me, listen! I cannot hear. Hope kills me—hope for you!"

They stood there, barred in, in the shadows which that ray of wandering sunlight on high alone parted, whilst beneath them unseen raged the struggle on which their lives hung. Confused, broken, indistinct, the echoes of the contest came strangely through the hushed prison-chamber. The bitter riot of war tossed to and fro the fate of their