Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/179

 'The boat is there; you can find the shore without me; I—am—tired.'

'I will go, then, and I will return by nightfall, by midnight at the latest. Ah, dear, forgive me if I speak like a drunken man—I feel drunk—drunk with joy! Sweet one, kiss me and farewell; farewell for a few hours! Dear, you have been to me what no living man could merit in any living woman! Often have I felt ashamed'

'Hush!' said Musa, and she strove to smile. It might be that never more would she behold him; she would not let him hear one accent of reproach as her farewell.

He took her tenderly in his arms and kissed her tenderly; feeling indeed that all the life he had to live on earth could never be long enough to repay her all that she had given to him, all that she had done for him here in these twilit chambers of the Etruscan dead. He kissed her again and yet again; then went.

He ascended again into the light and air, and walked a few steps across the ground.

It was so strange, so beautiful, so delicious, this mere sense of utter liberty: