Page:The Father Confessor, Stories of Danger and Death.djvu/326

316 heads: 'Look how they sit with their breaths indrawn with suspense! Give them their sensation—miss this time,' And I—whom no one loves, who has no hope, no happiness—I do not miss."

"Whom no one loves?" The man's voice rang eager and broken."

"Whom no one has a right to love." She spoke hastily and coldly, seeming to answer the question in his voice. The man turned away his face from her.

"What a handsome couple of gymnasts!" some one said from the audience. "I wonder if they are married?"

The man's hand clenched. The woman drew her scarf more tightly round her.

"It is cold here," she said, as if she had not heard. "I wish I could go home." And again she repeated softly, full of yearning, "O God! I wish I could go home."

"Home!" the man echoed. "The trees are well in leaf there now, and the little birds are quarrelling over the placing of their nests; there is peace in the valley, and the great hills are yellow with golden furze."

The woman laid her hand upon his arm