"Are you very tired, my lady?"
"Yes—but don't talk!"
The two sat silent, clinging to each other.
A step on the cobble-stones disturbed them. Blanche looked up, and saw a gentleman issuing from a lane which connected the narrow quay whereon stood the old Albergo San Zeno with one of the main streets of Verona.
There was a cry from Kitty. The stranger paused—looked—advanced. The little maid rose, half fierce, half frightened.
"Go, Blanche, go!" said Kitty, panting; "go back into the hotel."
"Not unless your ladyship wishes me to leave you," said the girl, firmly.
"Go at once!" Kitty repeated, with a peremptory gesture. She herself rose from her seat, and with one hand resting on the table awaited the new-comer. Blanche looked at her—hesitated—and went.
Geoffrey Cliffe came to Kitty's side. As he approached her his eyes fastened on the loveliness of her attitude, her fair head. In his own expression there was a visionary, fantastic joy; it was the look of the dreamer who, for once, finds in circumstance and the real, poetry adequate and overflowing.
"Kitty!—why did you do this?" he said to her, passionately, as he caught her hand.