Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/294

 her, in some great circle of some dazzling amphitheatre?

All in a moment he saw her as she would look—Penthesilea in chains of gold; the nymphæa alba of the forest waters in a hot-house; the pilgrim falcon hooded and jessed with silk for sport.

'If he be rich, why should you not go where he asks?' he said, without raising his eyes from their work.

The question hurt her, though in her own simplicity and integrity of purpose she saw no insult in it.

'I would never leave Maremma,' she said, as she had said to Sanctis.

'Never is a word; you are a woman. Your "never" will be as long as a summer day—no longer. Maremma is accurst, your home is but a tomb; you will go.'

'I shall not go,' she answered, while melancholy and impatience came upon her face. Did he understand her so little? Did he so little believe?

She clung to her own old land as the fire-fly clings to its field of corn, knowing of, and wishing for, no other share of earth.

'Is he rich—rich indeed?' he asked again.