Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/33

 tears into his eyes as he stooped towards her and leaned his lips upon her shining curls.

She drew herself from him with the same fear which at his touch, before, had stirred and trembled in her dauntless nature; a fear, vague, unintelligible to her, oppressive, cruel.

'Why are you so afraid?' he murmured. 'Since we love each other'

She put him away almost angrily. Her eyes had perplexity and terror in them.

'I do not know why we should talk of it. I have loved you—always, I suppose. I have only thought of you, only of you, since that first night I found you in the tombs. But you—you have loved her. That cannot change. If you were dead I should but love you more.'

He shuddered as she spoke; the ghost of that woman slain in Mantua seemed to him to glide in between this living thing and him.

'I think you would but love me better,' he murmured, with some sense in himself of shallowness, of littleness, of guilt. 'But I am not like you; I am not great or strong in any way, and she—well, she is dead, and