“I saw you yesterday,” she began again, “and I thought of what you had told me, Don Ippolito.”
“Yes, I thought of it, too,” answered the priest; “I have thought of it ever since.”
“But haven’t you thought of any hope for yourself? Must you still go on as before? How can you go back now to those things, and pretend to think them holy, and all the time have no heart or faith in them? It’s terrible!”
“What would you, madamigella?” demanded Don Ippolito, with a moody shrug. “It is my profession, my trade, you know. You might say to the prisoner,” he added bitterly, “‘It is terrible to see you chained here.’ Yes, it is terrible. Oh, I don’t reject your compassion! But what can I do?”
“Sit down with me here,” said Florida in her blunt, child-like way, and sank upon the stone seat beside the walk. She clasped her hands together in her lap with some strong, bashful emotion, while Don Ippolito, obeying her command, waited for her to speak. Her voice was scarcely more than a hoarse whisper when she began.
“I don’t know how to begin what I want to say. I am not fit to advise any one. I am so young, and so very ignorant of the world.”
“I too know little of the world,” said the priest, as much to himself as to her.
“It may be all wrong, all wrong. Besides,” she said abruptly, “how do I know that you are a good man, Don Ippolito? How do I know that you’ve been telling me the truth? It may be all a kind of trap”—
He looked blankly at her.
“This is in Venice; and you may be leading me on to say things to you that will make trouble for my mother and me. You may be a spy”—