ropose it. All I do is to report to you a thought which
occurred to me. If I cannot tell you what my heart feels and what passes
through my mind, whom shall I tell it to, Julia _mia_?"

"This is the last thing that you ought to have conceived!"

"I have thought so much that it is not strange if it were the last thing
that I did conceive. The project would be very audacious, violent, and
repugnant to you, but not a piece of folly as you say; it is a certain,
infallible means of attaining what we desire."

"Well, then, even if it is certain and infallible, I will not hear to
it, do you understand?"

Don Alfonso did not give up conquered. He continued to argue the point,
not losing his calmness, adducing reasons, mentioning various examples
which he had already prepared, and in a thousand skilful ways overcoming
Julia's scruples. But even when the girl found herself cornered,
captured in the net of her lover's sophistries, she suddenly grew angry
and exclaimed, "Well, even if it be as you say, still I don't like it, I
don't like it, and that is sufficient!"

Julia, though endowed with a rash and impetuous nature, had an
undisturbed conscience; she was a good girl and that was the very reason
why this scheme deeply wounded her sense of propriety. Nevertheless,
Saavedra kept constantly tormenting her with the hope of shaking her.

The afternoon was now declining; the boudoir began to fill with shadows.
Don Alfonso had at last exhausted all the powers at his command, and was
still far from attaining his end.

"Very well," said he after a long silence, doing his best to hide his
scorn and giving his words a peculiarly melancholy intonation, "I have
eagerly tried to find some way of escaping from the painful situation in
which we are. I propose to you the only practicable and certain method.
You yourself have seen that it was so and you have comprehended the
necessity of adopting some energetic plan. And yet you refuse to accept
it. I respect the scruples which you entertain in regard to it, but you
will permit me to tell you that the woman who really and truly loves
will rise above them. If the love that you had for me were as great as
you say...."

"Alfonso!"

"I know well that you love me--don't go to protesting.... But the fact
is, that though we love each other very much, we are very unhappy and we
find no way of escaping from it. What is left for us to do? Nothing but
to part and never see each other again."