While Albert talked of his old flame, on the evening in question, Clara listened intently, looking all the time straight into his eyes. At length he asked her why she studied his eyes so earnestly.
“Do you not like me to study them?”
“What a question! But I wish to know what you are thinking. You told me once you were afraid of my eyes.”
“That is what I am thinking to-night, Albert. They are surely the brightest eyes in the world, as you know they are the dearest to me. I can find no fault with them; and yet I have an indefinable fear sometimes, when I look into them, as if they could be cold and cruel. I reproach myself, but I tell you every thought. Ought I to tell you this?”
“Yes, for I would hear all the voices of the sea, darling mine; but this voice is a delusion. Albert can never be cold to you. You are his very soul. He could die for you, and count it no sacrifice; and he only cares for life that he may make yours beautiful.”
“Forgive me, beautiful eyes!” Clara said, tenderly caressing their lids. “Can you forgive me, Albert?”
“There is no such thing as forgiveness between lovers, for they can do each other no wrong.”
“I dare not think how perfect my happiness is,” said Clara, fervently, “and yet I can think of nothing else. I am constantly studying love. It seems to me that all married people lose their illusions. Papa and mamma were once romantic lovers. I have lately found a number of his old letters. I could not resist reading some of them. They are the most fervent and tender letters I ever read in my life—except yours, dearest—and yet they are flung away
‘amid the old lumber of the garret,’
like the oaken chest where Ginevra found a grave. It is strange! After all that divine passion, they could be separated for weeks and months without any suffering for the need of each other!”