Page:In a winter city, by Ouida.djvu/306

Rh Well, I've done for the best—I can't help it. She'll be sorry if poor little Chevy should die."

But the boy did not die; so that his father never learned whether that event would have touched the heart of Lady Hilda or not.

All the following day she shut herself up in her rooms. She said she was ill; and, in truth, she felt so. Della Rocca called three times in the day, but she did not see him; he sent up a great bouquet of the pale yellow tea rose of which she was so fond; he had fastened the flowers together with an antique silver zone, on which was the Greek Love in relief; the Love of the early Hellenic poets, without wings and with a mighty sword, the Love of Anacreon, which forges the soul as a smith his iron, and steeps it in icy waters after many blows.

She understood the message of the Love, but she sent no message back.

It was a lovely day; underneath the windows the carriages were rolling; there was the smile of spring on the air as the fleecy clouds went sailing past; she could see the golden reaches of the river and the hyacinth-hued hills