with a shrug at his own
resolution, leaned against a pillar, took off his cap, rubbed his hair
backward, and wondered where Romola was now, and what she was thinking
of him. Poor little Tessa had disappeared behind the curtain among the
crowd of peasants; but the love which formed one web with all his
worldly hopes, with the ambitions and pleasures that must make the solid
part of his days--the love that was identified with his larger self--was
not to be banished from his consciousness. Even to the man who presents
the most elastic resistance to whatever is unpleasant, there will come
moments when the pressure from without is too strong for him, and he
must feel the smart and the bruise in spite of himself. Such a moment
had come to Tito. There was no possible attitude of mind, no scheme of
action by which the uprooting of all his newly-planted hopes could be
made otherwise than painful.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

THE DYING MESSAGE.

When Romola arrived at the entrance of San Marco she found one of the
Frati waiting there in expectation of her arrival. Monna Brigida
retired into the adjoining church, and Romola was conducted to the door
of the chapter-house in the outer cloister, whither the invalid had been
conveyed; no woman being allowed admission beyond this precinct.

When the door opened, the subdued external light blending with that of
two tapers placed behind a truckle-bed, showed the emaciated face of Fra
Luca, with the tonsured crown of golden hair above it, and with
deep-sunken hazel eyes fixed on a small crucifix which he held before
him. He was propped up into nearly a sitting posture; and Romola was
just conscious, as she threw aside her veil, that there was another monk
standing by the bed, with the black cowl drawn over his head, and that
he moved towards the door as she entered; just conscious that in the
background there was a crucified form rising high and pale on the
frescoed wall, and pale faces of sorrow looking out from it below.

The next moment her eyes met Fra Luca's as they looked up at her from
the crucifix, and she was absorbed in that pang of recognition which
identified this monkish emaciated form with the image of her fair young
brother.

"Dino!" she said, in a voice like a low cry of pain. But she did not
bend towards him; she held herself erect, and paused at two yards'
distance from him. There was an unconquerable repulsion for her in that
monkish aspect; it seemed to her t