“It is here that he gets me. His pitifulness has dug deep into my heart. To cast him away would be like refusing to suckle a starving baby when one’s breast was swollen with milk.”
She suddenly raised her hands to her face and Torrigiani saw that she was weeping. He cried out in dismay.
“Anne, Anne, don’t cry like that, carissima! Why, I’ve never seen you cry before! If I have offended, please forgive me. I will go away. I will do anything in the world if only you will stop crying!”
Tears trickling through the slim, white fingers, she nodded her head.
“Yes, go, Vittorio, dear Vittorio. You can do nothing to change me now, and I cannot bear to hurt you so. Perhaps it would be better if we should never see each other again.”
Her voice broke. She turned away her head. He put his arms about her trembling shoulders and pressed her to his heart.
“No, Anne, that could never be. It is meant that I should love you forever. I will go away—but I shall return. If everything has become too much for you, let me know, and I will come. No matter if it is from Africa. And never forget Anna mia, that my offer holds good forever!”
Her head against his shoulder, she stirred uneasily. “Forever? But you forget, Vittorio, that—that I—that things will not be the same?”
He trembled as the copper tendrils of her hair swept against his cheek.
“I forget—nothing. In the things of the body, it is only the spirit which counts.”