“We will not speak of that,” she exclaimed before he said anything in answer or protest.  “We have harder things to do than to imagine evil in the future.  Since we are decided—­since it is to be the end—­let it be now, quickly!  You shall not have it on your mind that you belong to me in any way, from now.  No—­you are right—­you must feel free.  You must feel free, besides really being free.  You must feel, when you speak to Veronica to-night or to-morrow, as she expects you to speak, that all our life together is utterly past and swept away, and that I only exist henceforth as a relative—­as—­as your wife’s aunt, Bosio!”

She laughed, half-bitterly, half-nervously, at the idea, and turning away her face she held out her hand to him.

He took it, and held it, pressing it between both his own.

“Do you mean this, Matilde?” he asked in a low voice.

“Yes, I mean it,” she answered, speaking away from him with averted face.

He could not see, but she was biting her lip till it almost bled.  In her own strange way she loved him with all her evil nature, and if she were breaking with him now, it was to save herself from something worse than death.  It was the hardest thing she had ever done.  He hesitated:  there was the mean prompting of the spirit, to take her at her word and to set himself free, since she offered him freedom, caring not whether she might repent to-morrow; and there was the instinct of fidelity which in so much dishonour had remained with him through so many years.

“Besides,” she said hoarsely, “I do not love you any more.  I would not keep you longer, if I could.  Oh—­we shall be friends!  But the other—­no!  Good bye, Bosio—­good bye.”

Something moved him, as she had not meant that anything should.

“I do not believe you,” he said.  “You love me still—­I will not leave you!”

“No, no!  I do not—­but if you still care at all, save me.  Say good bye, but do the rest also.  You are free now.  You are an honourable man again.  Bosio, look at my hair.  You used to love it.  Would you have it cut off and cropped by the convict’s shears?  My hands that you are holding—­dear—­would you love them galled by the irons, riveted upon them for years?  Save me, Bosio!  You are free now—­save me, for the dear sake of all that has been!”

Still she turned her face away, and as Bosio saw the waving richness of her brown hair and heard her words, he felt a desperate thrust of pain in his heart.  It was all so fearfully true and possible.

“But do not say that you do not love me,” he pleaded, in low tones, bending to her ear.

There was a moment’s silence, and he thought he saw a convulsive movement of her throat—­he guessed it rather than saw it.

“It is true!” she cried, with an effort, drawing her hands from him and turning her pale face fiercely.  “If I loved you still, do you think I would give you to Veronica Serra, or to any living woman?  Was that the way I loved you?  Was that how you loved me?”