She descended to the saloon.
“Ah! he yet despises me—he even hates me,” ejaculated Matilda. “An irresistible antipathy—irresistible, I fear, as my love for him is ardent, has taken possession of his soul towards me. Ah! miserable, hapless being that I am! doomed to have my fondest hope, my brightest prospect, blighted.”
Alive alike to the tortures of despair and the illusions of hope, Matilda, now in an agony of desperation, impatiently paced the saloon.
Her mind was inflamed by a more violent emotion of hate towards Julia, as she recollected Verezzi’s fond expressions: she determined, however, that were Verezzi not to be hers, he should never be Julia’s.
Whilst thus she thought, Zastrozzi entered.
The conversation was concerning Verezzi.
“How shall I gain his love, Zastrozzi?” exclaimed Matilda. “Oh! I will renew every tender office—I will watch by him day and night, and, by unremitting attentions, I will try to soften his flinty soul. But, alas! it was but now that he started from my arms in horror, and, in accents of desperation, accused me of perfidy—of murder. Could I be perfidious to Verezzi, my heart, which burns with so fervent a fire, declares I could not, and murder——”
Matilda paused.
“Would thou could say thou wert guilty, or even accessary to that,” exclaimed Zastrozzi, his eye gleaming with disappointed ferocity. “Would Julia of Strobazzo’s heart was reeking on my dagger!”
“Fervently do I join in that wish, my best Zastrozzi,” returned Matilda: “but, alas! what avail wishes—what avail useless protestations of revenge, whilst Julia yet lives?—yet lives, perhaps, again to obtain Verezzi—to clasp him constant to her bosom—and perhaps—oh, horror! perhaps to——”