Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/134

 your heart white marble, on which no hand had writ any name; and why, I thought, why not write mine—but to you, no doubt, I look mad.'

Then, with those halting words, so inadequate and feeble to utter what he felt, he reached with a stride his little boat, and launched it and plunged his oars into the water.

The jutting wall of the Sasso Scritto in another moment or two hid him from sight.

He was gone over the silent pathway of the sea; while the gold of his necklace hung five fathoms down upon a branch of coral, amongst the gliding incurious fish and the strange foliage of the deep-water weeds.

Neither to the trinket nor to him did she give a regret. She lifted the creel of mussels on her shoulder, and stepped out with wet feet and lightened heart over the sand homeward.