"And I couldn't give him up," Marie went on. "It was too much even for God to expect. It was such a beautiful romance—the first true romance in my life. It seemed to be recreating me. I almost felt as if his love would make me worthy if I could only take and keep it. It was a dreadful risk, but—I dared it, and I'd do it again, if I had it to do, even if I paid by losing my soul. I used to think at first that perhaps when we'd been married a long time, and I was sure of his love, I might tell him—a little, not everything. But now I know that I never, never can. It would be a thousand times worse than before, if he found out. It would mean my death, that's all. I couldn't look into his eyes, his dear, beautiful eyes that adore me, that I adore. You haven't seen him yet. But you know Vanno's eyes, and what it would be to see them turn cold after they have been—stars of love. That expresses them."
"Yes, that expresses them," Mary almost whispered. She closed her eyelids for an instant and Vanno's eyes looked into hers, as they had looked in the curé's garden, after the first kiss. Nothing that Marie could have said would have made her understand as clearly. If she were as Marie was, she felt that she could not tell Vanno, now that his eyes had worshipped her. She would not marry him and not tell, if there were things that ought to be told; but she would go away, far away, where the dear eyes might never look at her again.
"You don't know yet what it is to love," Marie went on; and Mary answered, as if she were speaking to herself, "I almost think I do know—now."
"If you do, you can understand me."
"I am beginning to understand," Mary said.
"You swear that you've said nothing to Vanno, to make him suspect? When he told you about his brother and sister-in-law, did he mention my name as—as a girl?"
"He said your name was Marie Gaunt——"
"Oh! And then?"
"I believe I talked about having a friend once with a name rather like yours, but not quite. That's all, truly. I had no idea that Marie Gaunt——"
"Did you speak about the convent?"