"And do you suppose my mother wouldn't care just as much?" interrupted Antonio, piqued.
"No doubt she would. But it's for you to consider your mother, I mine! However, it shows you that even at Rome one must heed the clatter of tongues. If it were only you and I in face of that clawing animal, the world, I'd laugh at it. But, my dear, we aren't alone! Caterina will grow up. And if she were to know——"
At this he gave a cry almost wild.
"If she were to know! But has it been my fault?"
Again Regina felt as if a stone had struck her full in the face. Yes; if there was fault, it came home to herself! She was the mother of the evil which was stifling them. Antonio's cry was one not of defence, but of accusation.
She rebelled against it.
"I admit," she said, "the fault is not entirely yours. But neither is it all mine."
"Who's saying the fault is yours?"
"I have said it to myself a thousand times. Antonio, there is no reproach that I have not made to myself. How often have I not groaned, 'If I had not been guilty of that lightness of which I was guilty, Antonio would not have forced himself to change our position. He would not have become that woman's servant, not——'"
"You said it to yourself a thousand times?" he interrupted. "Do you mean you have been thinking of this for a long while? Why did you not first speak to me? Why? Why? That's what I require to know!"