Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/170



E stood mute and motionless awhile. Then, as the truth was borne in on him, tears gushed from his eyes like rain, and he laughed long and laughed loud, as madmen do.

He never doubted her.

He sprang up the stone steps, and leapt into the open air: into that light of day which he had been forbidden to see so long.

To stand erect there, to look over the plains, to breathe, and move, and gaze, and stretch his arms out to the infinite spaces of the sea and sky—this alone was so intense a joy that he felt mad with it.

Never again to hide with the snake and the fox; never again to tremble as his