of her face and the lines of pain that had
come into it in these weeks of such sore trial.

"I must remove the barrier that stands between us. I must seek out
Cosimo and kill him."

I said it without anger, without heat of any sort: a calm, cold
statement of a step that it was necessary to take. It was a just
measure, the only measure that could mend an unjust situation. And so,
I think, she too viewed it. For she did not start, or cry out in horror,
or manifest the slightest surprise at my proposal. But she shook her
head, and smiled very wistfully.

"What a folly would not that be!" she said. "How would it amend what is?
You would be taken, and justice would be done upon you summarily. Would
that make it any easier or any better for me? I should be alone in the
world and entirely undefended."

"Ah, but you go too fast," I cried. "By justice I could not suffer, I
need but to state the case, the motive of my quarrel, the iniquitous
wrong that was attempted against you, the odious traffic of this
marriage, and all men would applaud my act. None would dare do me a
hurt."

"You are too generous in your faith in man," she said. "Who would
believe your claims?"

"The courts," I said.

"The courts of a State in which Pier Luigi governs?"

"But I have witnesses of the facts."

"Those witnesses would never be allowed to testify. Your protests would
be smothered. And how would your case really look?" she cried. "The
world would conceive that the lover of Bianca de' Cavalcanti had killed
her husband that he might take her for his own. What could you hope for,
against such a charge as that? Men might even remember that other affair
of Fifanti's and even the populace, which may be said to have saved you
erstwhile, might veer round and change from the opinion which it has
ever held. They would say that one who has done such a thing once may do
it twice; that..."

"O, for pity's sake, stop! Have mercy!" I cried, flinging out my arms
towards her. And mercifully she ceased, perceiving that she had said
enough.

I turned to the window again, and pressed my brow against the cool
glass. She was right. That acute mind of hers had pierced straight to
the very core of this matter. To do the thing that had been in my mind
would be not only to destroy myself, but to defile her; for upon her
would recoil a portion of the odium that must be flung at me. And--as
she said--what then must be her position? They would even have a case