"Maria, I love you," said the Chevalier. "How I do love you!" He took her hands from his shoulders and pressed his forehead upon them. She leaned forward, and in a voice so low it seemed [pg 136] her heart was whispering, not her mouth, she made her prayer.
"Say that you have no room in your thoughts except for me. Say that you have no scrap of love—" He dropped her hands and drew away; she caught him to her. "No, no! Say that you have no scrap of love to toss to the woman there in Innspruck!"
"Maria!" he exclaimed.
"Hush!" said she, with a woful smile. "To-morrow you shall love her; to-morrow I will not ask your eyes to dwell on mine or your hand to quiver as it touches mine. But to-night love no one but me."
For answer he kissed her on the lips. She took his head between her hands and gave the kiss back, gently as though her lips feared to bruise his, slowly as though this one moment must content her for all her life. Then she looked at him for a little, and with a childish movement that was infinitely sad she laid his face side by side with hers so that his cheek touched hers.
"Shall I tell you my thought?" she asked. "Shall I dare to tell you it?"
"Tell it me!"
"God has died to-night. Hush! Do not move! Do not speak! Perhaps the world will slip and crumble if we but stay still." And they remained thus cheek to cheek silent in the room, staring forward with eyes wide open and hopeful. The very air seemed to them a-quiver with expectation. [pg 137] They, too, had an expectant smile upon their lips. But there was no crack of thunder overhead, no roar of a slipping world.
"CHEEK TO CHEEK, SILENT IN THE ROOM, STARING FORWARD WITH EYES WIDE OPEN AND HOPEFUL."—Page 136.