“But you cannot consent—­” I began.

“Consent!” she interrupted with a bitter laugh.  “I will die rather than consent.”

“I mean, you cannot consent to be shut up in this valley for ever.”

“If need be, I will,” she said, in a low voice.

“There is no need,” I whispered.

“You do not know my father.  He is a man of iron,” she answered, sorrowfully.

“You do not know my boy.  He is a man of his word,” I replied.

We were both silent, for we both knew very well what our words meant.  From such a situation there could be but one escape.

“I think you ought to go now,” she said, at last.  “If I were missed it would all be over.  But I am sorry to let you go, you are so kind.  How can you let me know—­” She stopped, with a blush, and stooped to raise the lamp from the floor.

“Can you not meet here to-morrow night, when they are asleep?” I suggested, knowing what her question would have been.

“I will send the same man to you to-morrow evening, and let you know what is possible,” she said.  “And now I will show you the way out of my house,” she added, with the first faint shadow of a smile.  With the slight gilt lamp in her hand she went out of the little rock chamber, listened a moment, and began to descend the steps.

“But the key?” I asked, following her light footsteps with my heavier tread.

“It is in the door,” she answered, and went on.

When we reached the bottom we found it as she had said.  The servant had left the key on the inside, and with some difficulty I turned the bolts.  We stood for one moment in the narrow space, where the lowest step was set close against the door.  Her eyes flashed strangely in the lamplight.

“How easy it would be!” I said, understanding her glance.  She nodded, and pushed me gently out into the street; and I closed the door, and leaned against it as she locked it.

“Good-night,” she said from the other side, and I put my mouth to the key-hole.  “Good-night.  Courage!” I answered.  I could hear her lightly mounting the stone steps.  It seemed wonderful to me that she should not be afraid to go back alone.  But love makes people brave.

The moon had risen higher during the time I had been within, and I strolled round the base of the rock, lighting a cigar as I went.  The terrible adventure I had dreaded was now over, and I felt myself again.  In truth, it was a curious thing to happen to a man of my years and my habits; but the things I had heard had so much absorbed my attention that, while the interview lasted, I had forgotten the strange manner of the meeting.  I was horrified at the extent of the girl’s misery, more felt than understood from her brief description and passionate outbreaks.  There is no mistaking the strength of a suffering that wastes and consumes the mortal part of us as wax melts at the fire.

And Benoni—­the villain!  He had written to ask Hedwig in marriage before he came to see me in Rome.  There was something fiendish in his almost inviting me to see his triumph, and I cursed him as I kicked the loose stones in the road with my heavy shoes.  So he was a banker, as well as a musician and a wanderer.  Who would have thought it?