Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/213

 supple movements, some pulse of anger might have quickened in him, and with it some smart of sudden appreciation.

But she never spoke of the Sicilian sailor; some vague instinct locked her lips about him, though a little while before she had opened them so carelessly to Maurice Sanctis. So to Este she remained nothing more than a dryad of the lonely woods, who scarcely touched him with any sense of the sea in her; a genius alba who ministered to his dire need and saved him from his hunters, but who came and went without receiving one impulse in him to keep her hand in his, and say to her, 'I am beggared of love: make me once more rich.' So nothing troubled the perilous peace in which she dwelt; and the autumn deepened into winter, and the rainstorms deluged the earth above, and she was still innocent as Nansicaa, he was still sacred to her as Odysseus.

She did not know her own heart.

She did not know why all the ardour of the Sicilian left her hard and scornful; why all the gentleness of Sanctis had left her cold and thankless; and why one languid smile from Este's eyes, one listless word from his mouth, made her grateful and full of joy.