Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/322

 she would never have felt for herself alone. The horror of the past hours clung to her as the spider's web clings to the hand that has touched it. A sense of cowardice and of something shameful was upon her; she could not have explained what she felt. It hurt her that all the courage, all the sacrifice of self, all the risk and peril, should have been allotted to Sanctis, not to her. It was a great debt that would for ever hang like a stone about her neck; she could never again be free to menace him, to brave him, to insult him if she chose, and drive him away with the scourge of her words.

'He has done us a very noble service,' said Este, as he still feasted his eyes on the pistols; 'and he has done us a still greater, yet, by leaving these. Now we need never be taken—alive. He is a generous man. You must think so?'

'No doubt he is generous,' she answered slowly; then with sudden violence she turned on Este.

'Will he stay here, think you, or go away?'

'How can I tell?'

'I think he will go, now that he has seen you.'