Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/246

 Sanctis stood baffled and troubled, looking up at the face of the cliff and watching the blue-rocks whirling under the shadows and the martins swaying under the force of the wind as they flew. He could not tell what to think. An irresistible desire to try once more to persuade her, to see once more this sad sunlit land she loved, had driven him here on an impulse altogether against his judgment. A vague jealousy stirred in him, thinking of that hot blush that had come upon her face. Had any found the mystical secret of influence that escaped himself? Had any more akin to her learned the way to tame and move her? It did not seem possible; she was still so bold, so dauntless, so grave, so innocent. Surely Love had not passed by there?

His heart set itself on winning this halcyon from its subterranean home; on bringing this flame-winged flamingo from the loneliness of the marsh and the estuary into the world of men.

It was no wise wish, nor was it one easy of fulfilment, but in its very unwisdom and difficulty it dominated him with the same persistence of possession as that with which the desire of her beauty haunted the SilicianSicilian [sic]