Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 2).djvu/72

 His face flushed; a deep discomfiture and mortification filled him as he heard. He tore a leaf out of his note-book, wrote on it and laid it down beside her.

'That is where I live,' he said to her; 'if ever you want me, send there; I will be here as soon as steam can bring me.'

'Why should I want you?' said Musa, with unconscious cruelty of wonder. 'I thank you for your thought of me; but I need nothing.'

'You may, some day.'

She shook her head.

'What I cannot get myself, I go without. The sun will be soon setting. You will lose your way on the moors, if you do not set out at once.'

'You are hard of heart, Musa.'

'I am the Musoncella,' she said with a little smile.

'Will you not say a kinder word at parting? I came out of goodwill.'

'Of that I am sure. God speed you.'

Then she turned away from him, and began to walk back towards the tombs.

He looked after her while the clematis vitalba, that made a thick screen all around the place as it clung to the shrubs and trees,