"Quite indifferent?" She looked keenly at him.
"Quite," he answered, with perfect sincerity. "A person is indifferent whom one neither loves nor calls an intimate friend. Yet Lady Herbert is beautiful and good, and is admirable in many ways. But the world knows that I am no more in love with her than with Donna Adele, and I am quite free, therefore, to defend her."
"Of course you are. The only thing that surprises me is your alacrity in doing so. You do not generally like to give yourself trouble for indifferent people. But then, as Arden really is your friend—" She stopped, with a little impatient movement of the shoulders.
"I wish you could bring yourself for once to believe that I am not altogether insincere and calculating in everything I do," said Ghisleri, weary of her perpetual suspicion.
"I wish I could," she answered coldly. "But how can I? There are such extraordinary inconsistencies in your character, such contradictions—it is very hard to believe in you. And yet," she added sadly, "God knows I must—for my own sake."
"Then do!" exclaimed Pietro, with energy. "Make an end of all this doubting. Have I ever lied to you? Have I ever made a promise to you and not kept it? How have I deceived you? And yet you never trust me altogether, and I know it."
"It is not that—it is not that!" repeated Maddalena. "What you say is all true, in its way. It is—how shall I say it—you did not deceive me, but I was deceived in you. You are not what I thought you were. You used to say that you would stand at nothing—that my word was your law—all those fine phrases you used to make to me, and they all seem to come to nothing when reality begins."
"If you would tell me what you expect me to do, you would not find me slow in doing it."
"That is the thing. If you loved me as you say you do, would you need any direction? Your heart would tell you."
"You are angry with me now, because you do not wish me to take care of Arden—"