"Anna, Anna, where should we find refuge? Without means, without friends, having committed a great fault, our life would be most unhappy."
"No, no, no! Take me away. We'll have a little time of poverty, after which I shall get possession of my fortune. Take me away."
"And I shall be accused of having made a good speculation. No, no, Anna, it's impossible. I couldn't bear such a shame."
She started away from him, pushing him back with a movement of horror.
"What?" she cried. "What? You would be ashamed? It's your shame that preoccupies you? And mine? Honoured, esteemed, loved, I care nothing for this honour, this love, and am willing to lose all, the respect of people, the affection of my relations—and you think of yourself! I could have chosen any one of a multitude of young men of my own rank, my own set, and I have chosen you because you were good and honest and clever. And you are ashamed of what bad people and stupid people may say of you! I—I brave everything. I lie, I deceive. I leave my bed at the dead of night, steal out during my sister's sleep—out of my room, out of my house, like a guilty servant, so that they might call me the lowest of the low. I do all this to come to you; and you are thinking of speculations, of what the world will say about you. Oh, how strong you are, you men! How well you know your way; how straight you march, never listening to the voices that call to you, never feeling the hands that try to stop you—nothing, nothing, nothing! You are men, and have your honour to look after, your dignity to preserve, your delicate reputation to safeguard. You are right, you are reasonable. And so we are fools; we are mad, who step out of the path of honour and dignity for the love of you—we poor silly creatures of our hearts!"
Giustino had not attempted to protest against this outburst of violent language; but every word of it, hot with wrath, vibrant with sorrowful anger, stirred him to the quick, held him silenced, frightened, shaken by her voice, by the tumult of her passion. Now the fire which he had rashly kindled burnt up the whole beautiful, simple, stable edifice of his planning, and all he could see left of it was a smoking ruin. He loved her—she loved him; and though he knew it was wild and unreasonable. "Forgive me," he said; "let us go away."
She put her hand upon his head, and he heard her murmur, under her voice, "O God!"
They both felt that their life was decided, that they had played the grand stake of their existence.
There was a long pause; she was the first to break it.