Filippo had loved many women in the only way possible to him, and they had been won by his brutality and his insolence, and by the glamour of his name. The annals of mediæval Italy were stained with blood and tears because of the Tor di Rocca, and their loves that ended always in cruelty and horror, and Filippo had all the instincts of his decadent race. In love he was pitiless; no impulses of tenderness or of chivalry restrained him, and his methods were primeval and violent. Probably the Rape of the Sabines was his ideal of courtship, but the subsequent domesticity, the settling down of the Romans with their stolen wives, would have been less to his taste.
“Filippo!” Gemma cried again, and this time he let her go.
“You may breathe for one minute,” he said, looking at his watch. “There is not much time.”
He drew the chair towards the table and sat down. “Come!” he said imperatively, but she shook her head.
“Ah, Filippo, I love you, but you must listen. Did you see my fidanzato in our box at the theatre last night?”
“Yes, and I am glad he is so ugly. I shall not be jealous. You must give me your address in Lucca,” he said coolly.
Her face fell. “You will let me marry him? You—you do not mind?”
He made a grimace. “I do not like it, but I cannot help it.”
“But he makes me sick,” she said tremulously. “I hate him to touch me.”
It seemed that her words lit some fire in him. His hot eyes sparkled as he stretched out his arms to her. “Ah, come to me now then.”