By-and-by it was I with whom she danced, whose hand she touched, on whom she leaned.  I wondered if there were any man so blest; I listened to her breath, I watched her cheek, our eyes met, and I loved her.  The music grew deeper, more impassioned; we stood and listened to it,—­for she danced then no more,—­our hearts beat time to it, the wind wandering at the casement played in its measure; we said no words, but now and then each sought the other’s glance, and, convicted there, turned in sudden shame away.  When I bade her good-night, which I might never have done but that the revel broke, a great curl of her hair blew across my lips.  I was bold,—­I was heated, too, with this half-secret life of my heart, this warm blood that went leaping so riotously through my veins, and yet so silently,—­I took my dagger from my belt and severed the curl.  See, friend! will you look at it?  It is like the little gold snakes of the Campagna, is it not? each thread, so fine and fair, a separate ray of light:  once it was part of her!  See how it twists round my hand!  Haste! haste! let me put it up, lest I go mad!—­Where was I?

I busied myself again in the work to be done; because of our victory we must not rest; once more all went forward.  I saw the Austrian woman only from a window, or in a church, or as she walked in the gardens, for many days.  Then the times grew hotter; I left the place, and lived with stern alarums; and thither she also came.  I never sought what sent her.  She was with the wounded, with the dying.  Then the need of her was past, and she and all the others took their way.  At length that also came to an end.

We were in Rome,—­and thither, some time previously, she had gone.

One night, our business for the day was over, our plans for the morrow laid, our messages received, our messengers despatched, and those who had been conspirators and now bade fair to be saviours were sleeping.  Sleep seemed to fold the world; each bough and twig was silent in repose; the spectral moonlight itself slept as it bathed the air.  I alone wandered and waked.  With me there were too many cares for rest; work kept me on the alert; to court slumber at once was not easy after the nervous tension of duty.  I was torn, too, with conflicting feelings:  half my soul went one way in devotion to my country, half my soul swerved to the other as I thought of the Austrian woman.  I grew tired of the streets and squares; something that should be fragrant and bowery attracted me.  I mounted on the broken water-god of a dry bath and leaped a garden-wall.

No sooner was I there than I knew why I had come.  This was her garden.

Heart of Heaven! how all things spoke of her!  How the great white roses hung their doubly heavy heads and poured their perfume out to her! how the sprays shivered as T spoke the name she owned! how the nightingales ceased for a breath their warbling as she rustled down a fragrant path and met me!  All her hair was swept back in one great mass and held by an ivory comb; a white cloak wrapped her white array; she was jewel-less and stripped of lustre; she was like pearl, milky as a shell, white as the moonlight that followed in her wake.