"Yes; I would save you from misery."
For some seconds the girl looked at the woman's face steadily, then she said, simply and quietly:
"And are you, who seek to save me, content to be the woman you say you are? You are very, very beautiful—are you content to be evil?"
She spoke just as a child might speak; but there was something in the tones of her voice which caused the other to be afraid.
"You seem to have a kind heart," went on Beatrice; "you would save me from pain, and—and evil. Have you no thought for yourself?"
"I do not matter," replied the woman sullenly.
"You think only of me?"
"I think only of you."
"Then look at me," and the eyes of the two met. "Is what you have told me true?"
"True!"