"I am not sure," he said, and there was a quiet intensity in his tones—"no, I am not sure. Sometimes I think I am. But what then, signorina? We have our little lives to live, our little part to play on the world's stage."
Again she was reminded of Leicester, and as she thought of him a kind of shiver passed through her. This was Leicester over again; but another Leicester—a Leicester with a difference.
"But why play it, if it is so bad?"
"Ah, signorina, do you not think I have asked that question a thousand times? But then I have lived in the East. What can a man do against fate? The Arabians have got hold of a great truth: Kismet. Is not all philosophy centred in that?"
"No," she said, "I do not think so. If that is true, then every bad deed done would be the expression of God's will. Every murder, outrage, and abomination has His sanction, His benediction."
"Signorina has never lived in the East?"
"I do not see that that matters."
Signor Ricordo laughed quietly.
"It is refreshing to hear you," he said. "I can see into your mind now. You are thinking that the fatalistic doctrine destroys all virtue, all responsibility."
"Exactly."