"Well, then, farewell, my little wife! farewell, till I claim thee!" said the cavalier, as he kissed her hand, and vaulted over the wall.
"How strange that I cannot make him understand!" said Agnes, when he was gone. "I must have sinned, I must have done wrong; but I have been trying all the while to do right. Why would he stay so and look at me so with those deep eyes? I was very hard with him,—very! I trembled for him, I was so severe; and yet it has not discouraged him enough. How strange that he would call me so, after all, when I explained to him I never could marry!—Must I tell all this to Father Francesco? How dreadful! How he looked at me before! How he trembled and turned away from me! What will he think now? Ah, me! why must I tell him? If I could only confess to my mother Theresa, that would be easier. We have a mother in heaven to hear us; why should we not have a mother on earth? Father Francesco frightens me so! His eyes burn me! They seem to burn into my soul, and he seems angry with me sometimes, and sometimes looks at me so strangely! Dear, blessed Mother," she said, kneeling at the shrine, "help thy little child! I do not want to do wrong: I want to do right. Oh that I could come and live with thee!"
Poor Agnes! a new experience had opened in her heretofore tranquil life, and her day was one of conflict. Do what she would, the words that had been spoken to her in the morning would return to her mind, and sometimes she awoke with a shock of guilty surprise at finding she had been dreaming over what the cavalier said to her of living with him alone, in some clear, high, purple solitude of those beautiful mountains which she remembered as an enchanted dream of her childhood. Would he really always love her, then, always go with her to prayers and mass and sacrament, and be reconciled to the Church, and should she indeed have the joy of feeling that this noble soul was led back to heavenly peace through her? Was not this better than a barren life of hymns and prayers in a cold convent? Then the very voice that said these words, that voice of veiled strength and manly daring, that spoke with such a gentle pleading, and yet such an undertone of authority, as if he had a right to claim her for himself,—she seemed to feel the tones of that voice in every nerve;—and then the strange thrilling pleasure of thinking that he loved her so. Why should he, this strange, beautiful knight? Doubtless he had seen splendid high-born ladies,—he had seen even queens and princesses,—and what could he find to like in her, a poor little peasant? Nobody ever thought so much of her before, and he was so unhappy without her;—it was strange he should be; but he said so, and it must be true. After all, Father Francesco might be mistaken about his being wicked. On the whole, she felt sure he was mistaken, at least in part. Uncle Antonio did not seem to be so much shocked at what she told him; he knew the temptations of men better, perhaps, because he did not stay shut up in one convent, but travelled all about, preaching and teaching. If only he could see him, and talk with him, and make him a good Christian,—why, then, there would be no further need of her;—and Agnes was surprised to find what a dreadful, dreary blank appeared before her when she thought of this. Why should she wish him to remember her, since she never could be his?—and yet nothing seemed so dreadful as that he should forget her. So the poor little innocent fly beat and fluttered in the mazes of that enchanted web, where thousands of her frail sex have beat and fluttered before her.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE MONK AND THE CAVALIER.
Father Antonio had been down through the streets of the old town of Sorrento, searching for the young stonecutter, and, finding him, had spent some time in enlightening him as to the details of the work he wished him to execute.
He found him not so easily kindled into devotional fervors as he had fondly imagined, nor could all his most devout exhortations produce one-quarter of the effect upon him that resulted from the discovery that it was the fair Agnes who originated the design and was interested in its execution. Then did the large black eyes of the youth kindle into something of sympathetic fervor, and he willingly promised to do his very best at the carving.
"I used to know the fair Agnes well, years ago," he said, "but of late she will not even look at me; yet I worship her none the less. Who can help it that sees her? I don't think she is so hard-hearted as she seems; but her grandmother and the priests won't so much as allow her to lift up her eyes when one of us young fellows goes by. Twice these five years past have I seen her eyes, and then it was when I contrived to get near the holy water when there was a press round it of a saint's day, and I reached some to her on my finger, and then she smiled upon me and thanked me. Those two smiles are all I have had to live on for all this time. Perhaps, if I work very well, she will give me another, and perhaps she will say, 'Thank you, my good Pietro!' as she used to, when I brought her birds' eggs or helped her across the ravine, years ago."
"Well, my brave boy, do your best," said the monk, "and let the shrine be of the fairest white marble. I will be answerable for the expense; I will beg it of those who have substance."
"So please you, holy father," said Pietro, "I know of a spot, a little below here on the coast, where was a heathen temple in the old days; and one can dig therefrom long pieces of fair white marble, all covered with heathen images. I know not whether your Reverence would think them fit for Christian purposes."