"An idea is nothing? Do you think so? One may be wretched or happy for an
idea; one may live and one may die for an idea. Well, I am thinking."

"Of what are you thinking?"

"Why do you ask? You know very well I am thinking of what I heard last
night, which you had concealed from me. I am thinking of your meeting at
the station, which was not due to chance, but which a letter had caused,
a letter dropped--remember!--in the postbox of San Michele. Oh, I do not
reproach you for it. I have not the right. But why did you give yourself
to me if you were not free?"

She thought she must tell an untruth.

"You mean some one whom I met at the station yesterday? I assure you it
was the most ordinary meeting in the world."

He was painfully impressed with the fact that she did not dare to name
the one she spoke of. He, too, avoided pronouncing that name.

"Therese, he had not come for you? You did not know he was in Florence?
He is nothing more to you than a man whom you meet socially? He is not
the one who, when absent, made you say to me, 'I can not?' He is nothing
to you?"

She replied resolutely:

"He comes to my house at times. He was introduced to me by General
Lariviere. I have nothing more to say to you about him. I assure you he
is of no interest to me, and I can not conceive what may be in your mind
about him."

She felt a sort of satisfaction at repudiating the man who had insisted
against her; with so much harshness and violence, upon his rights of
ownership. But she was in haste to get out of her tortuous path. She rose
and looked at her lover, with beautiful, tender, and grave eyes.

"Listen to me: the day when I gave my heart to you, my life was yours
wholly. If a doubt or a suspicion comes to you, question me. The present
is yours, and you know well there is only you, you alone, in it. As for
my past, if you knew what nothingness it was you would be glad. I do not
think another woman made as I was, to love, would have brought to you a
mind newer to love than is mine. That I swear to you. The years that were
spent without you--I did not live! Let us not talk of them. There is
nothing in them of which I should be ashamed. To regret them is another
thing. I regret to have known you so late. Why did you not come sooner?
You could have known me five years ago as easily as to-day. But, believe
me, we should not tire ourselves with speaking of time that has gone.
Remember Lohengrin. If you love me, I am for