“Who then? your sweetheart?”
“Oh, que nenni. My sweetheart is not on earth now: and to think I have not an ecu to buy masses for his soul;” and in this shallow nature the grief seemed now to be all turned in another direction.
“Come, come,” said Denys, “shalt have money to buy masses for thy dead lad; I swear it. Meantime tell me why you weep.”
“For you.”
“For me? Art mad?”
“No; I am not mad. 'Tis you that were mad to open your purse before him.”
The mystery seemed to thicken, and Denys, wearied of stirring up the mud by questions, held his peace to see if it would not clear of itself. Then the girl, finding herself no longer questioned, seemed to go through some internal combat. At last she said, doggedly and aloud, “I will. The Virgin give me courage? What matters it if they kill me, since he is dead? Soldier, the landlord is out.”
“Oh, is he?”
“What, do landlords leave their taverns at this time of night? also see what a tempest! We are sheltered here, but t'other side it blows a hurricane.”
Denys said nothing.