“Ah!” she answered hurriedly. “Is there one who would not? I do not know why. One does not reason of such things. One feels. I know I have cared—ever since that morning in the wood, when you found the book, when I gave you the prayer!”
He started, releasing her hands. “Intercede and obtain for me of thy Son, our Lord, this grace!” It seemed to come to him from the air, a demoniac echo to his desire. His breath choked him. She had prayed for him, purely, unselfishly. How should he requite? To-night, for his sake she had risked reputation. How did he purpose to repay? Would not the doing of this thing sink him a thousand black leagues below the sky she breathed? No matter how much she might come to love, could it recompense for what he would take away? Between those two lay a gulf as deep as that which stretched between cool water and a tortured Dives. What had he, George Gordon, dragging the chain and ball of a life sentence of despair, to do with her in her purity? He yearned for her because she was an immaculate thing; because she reincarnated for him all the white, unspotted ideals that he had thrown away, that he longed to touch again. It was the devil tempting in the plea of an angel!
The mist fell from his eyes.
“Child!” he said. “What you have done to-night I can never repay. I shall remember it until I die. But I am not worthy of your thought—not worthy of a single throb of that heart of yours!”
She shook her head protesting.
“That cannot be true,” she contended. “But if it were, Signore, one cannot say ‘I will,’ or ‘I will not care’ when one chooses.” Her tone was naïve, and arch with a smiling, shy rebellion.
“Listen,” he went on. “Do not think me jesting. What I say now I say because I must. I want you to promise me you will do something—something only for your good, I swear that!”
The smile faded from her lips, chilled by his earnestness.
“When you go from here you must forget that day at La Mira, forget that you came to-night—that we have ever met! Will you promise this?”
Her whole mind was a puzzled question now. Did he mean she should see him no more? Was he quitting Venice? The thought came like a pang. But to forget! Could she if she would? Why did he say it was for her good? A fear, formless and vague, ran through her.