Presently she said—'You were very happy two years ago.'
And he, persisting in his tone of reverie—'I do not know—I do not remember.'
In the green twilight, the path was mysterious. The trunks and branches of the trees were coiled and interlaced like serpents; here and there a leaf gleamed through the shade like an emerald green eye.
After an interval of silence, she began again—'Who was that Elena?'
'I do not know, I have forgotten. I remember nothing but that I love you. I love none but you. I think only of you. I live for you alone. I know nothing, I wish for nothing but your love. Every fetter that binds me to my former life is broken. Now I am far from the world, utterly lost in you. I live in your heart and in your soul; I feel myself in every throb of your pulse; I do not touch you, and yet I am as close to you as if I held you in my arms, pressed to my lips, to my heart. I love you and you love me; and that has been for ages and will last for ages, to all eternity. At your side, thinking of you, living in you, I am conscious of the infinite—the eternal—I love you and you love me. I know nothing else—I remember nothing else.'
On all her sadness, all her suspicions, he poured out a flood of warm fond eloquence. And she listened, standing straight and slender in front of the balustrade that runs round the wide terrace.
'Is it true? is it true?' she repeated, in a faint voice like the echo of a moan out of the depth of her soul—'is that true?'
'Yes, it is true—and that alone is true. All the rest is a dream. I love you and you love me. I am yours as you are mine. I know you to be so absolutely mine that I ask for no caress; I ask for no proof of your love. I can wait. My dearest delight is to obey you. I ask for no caresses, but I can feel them in your voice, in your eyes, your attitudes, your slightest movement. All that comes to me from you intoxicates me like a kiss, and when I touch your hand I know not which is greater, the rapture of my senses or the exaltation of my soul.'
He lightly laid his hand on hers. She trembled, drawn by a wild desire to throw herself upon his breast to offer him, at last, her lips, her kiss, herself. It seemed to her—for she believed blindly in Andrea's words—that by so doing, she would bind him to her finally with an indissoluble bond. She felt that she was going to swoon, to die. It was as if the tumults of passion from which she had already suffered swelled her heart and increased the present storm; as if, into this one moment of time were gathered all the varying emotions she had experienced since she first knew this man. The roses of Schifanoja bloomed again among the shrubs and laurels of the Villa Medici.
'I shall wait, Maria. I shall be true to my promises. I ask nothing of you. I wait and look forward to the supreme moment. That moment will come, I know it, for the power of love is invincible. And all your fears, all your terrors will vanish; and the communion of the body will seem to you as pure as the communion of the soul; for all flames are alike in purity.'