There was a long struggle in her mind. Could she forgive the injury which seemed greater than man had ever inflicted on woman? She was very proud, and her pride was all in arms. How could she pardon a traitor? She had loved him better than her life, and with the first sight of his handsome, beloved face all the glamour of her love was over her again.
How could she forgive him? Yet the proud figure was bent so humbly before her, the proud head so low.
"What am I to say?" she cried. "I was a good and innocent girl—now it seems to me that the evil spirits of passion and unrest have taken possession of me. What am I to say or to do? Heaven help and teach me."
"Forgive me," he repeated. "Your refusal will send me away a madman, ready for any reckless action. Your consent will humble me, but it will make me happier. Oh, my darling, forgive me."
"Suppose that harm follows my forgiveness—we are better enemies than friends, Lord Chandos."
"We will never be enemies, and no harm can come except that I shall be happier for it. Say you will forgive me, Leone. See, I ask your pardon on my knees. For Heaven's sake, for my great love's sake, say you forgive me!"
He knelt before her humbly as a child, he bowed his handsome head until his face rested on her knees; he sobbed aloud in his sorrow and his deep regret. She stood for a few minutes quite uncertain; her clear reason and common sense told her that it would be better if she would refuse him pardon, and that they should part for all time; but love and pity pleaded, and of course love and pity won. She laid her hand on the dark head of the man whom she had once believed her husband; her beautiful face quivered with emotion.
"I forgive you," she said, "freely, frankly, fully, as I hope Heaven will forgive me all my sins. Nay, you must not kiss me, not even my hand. Your kisses belong to some one else now—not to me. I forgive you, but we must part again. Come what may—we must part, we must not meet again."
"I can never part with you," he said, in a hoarse voice. "You have been life of my life, heart of my heart too long for that."
She held up her hand with a superb gesture of warning and silence.