"No, no; don't leave me. For pity's sake stay a little longer. Let us talk—listen to me. You ask me not to be jealous; I'll not be jealous. At least, you'll not see my jealousy. Do you wish me to visit the woman you're in love with, or have been in love with, or the woman who's in love with you? Do you wish me to receive the women who are your friends? I'll do it—I'll do everything. Put me to the most dreadful trial—I'll endure it. Ask me to go to the furthest pass a soul and body can reach—I'll do it for you."
"I wish to be free, heart-free, that is all," he said, firmly.
"As you are to-day, so you will always be—free in heart," she responded.
"Listen to me, Anna, and understand me clearly. For a moment try to escape from your own personality, forget that you are you, and that you love me. For a moment consider calmly and carefully the present and the future. Anna, I am old, and you are young; and the discrepancy of our ages which now seems trifling to you, in ten years' time will seem terrible, for I can only decline, while you will grow to maturity. In your imagination you have conceived an ideal of me which doesn't correspond to the truth, and which the future will certainly correct, to your sorrow. Between our characters and our temperaments there is a profound gulf; we have no reason to believe that the future can close it up. If I am making a sacrifice, as I confess I am, in speaking to you thus, it is certain that you would make a more painful and a more lasting one in living with me. Think of it, think of it. Think of my age, of your illusions which must inevitably be destroyed, of our mutual sacrifice. Anna, there is still time."
She looked at him, surprised to hear him speak in this earnest way, the man who was accustomed to dominate all his own emotions. He was really moved; his brow was knitted; and on it, for the first time, Anna could read a secret distress. There was something almost like shyness in his eyes; he seemed less distant, less strong perhaps, than he had ever seemed to her before, but more human, more like other people, who suffer and weep.
"Anna, Anna," he went on, "put aside all selfishness, and be yourself the judge. Judge whether I ought to consent to what you wish. I have told you cruelly, brutally, what I shall expect from you in return from my sacrifice. I have repeated to you again and again what a grave step it is that you propose. Now, my dear child be calm, and judge for yourself."
She was leaning with her two hands on the parapet of the terrace, and kept her eyes cast down.
"But why," she asked slowly, in a low voice, "why are you willing—you who are so wise, so cold, who despise all passion, as you do—why are you willing to make this sacrifice? Who has persuaded you? Who has won you?"
"I am willing because you have told me that there is no other way of saving you; because Stella Martini has written to me saying that I ought to save you; because I myself feel that I ought to save you."