"I never intended that you should see me again, and yet, against my better judgment, I have bared my face to you upon a simple request. I am not without some vanity. Men have called me beautiful. But, oh! it is a sinister beauty; it has brought good to no one, least of all to its owner. You met Mrs. Sandford in Naples. Tell me what she said."
He sought refuge in silence.
"Did she not earnestly warn you against me?"
"Yes," reluctantly.
"And yet you would not heed her warning?" sadly.
"I have told you that I am mad."
"I am coming to believe it. There are two of us. That dinner! And out of an innocent prank comes this! Folly, always folly!" And as she remembered the piece of folly she was about to start out upon, she laughed. "Mad? Yes. Only, to your madness there is some reason; to mine, none."
"So you sometimes recollect that night? You have not forgotten?"
"No. The pleasure I derived has frequently returned to my mind."
"Ah, if only you would tell me what prevents friendship between us."