Page:In Maremma, by Ouida (vol 3).djvu/50

 'If you loved me, then I would count the sunsets!' he murmured.

A blush went over her face; she was silent. With her other hand she loosened his fingers.

'Why are you so harsh?' he said angrily. 'We who are so poor, we might be rich in love. Why are you so cold?'

'You promised that I should be sacred to you,' she said with a timid protest, scarcely daring to recall to him the first hours of his asylum there, lest in so doing she should seem to make of his shelter a debt.

'What is more sacred than what we love?' he murmured, with the music in his voice which stole all the strength out of her and lulled to drowsy gladness all her vague unrest.

Then with a sudden pang of memory she said to him:

'And what is it that you love? Not me. If you were free to-morrow, would you stay, of your own will?'

He was silent.

'We would go away together,' he said, after a pause. 'Go away as the swallows