“Ah, this is hard!  Ah, this is terrible!” murmured Miriam, dropping her forehead in her hands.  In a moment or two she looked up again, as pale as death, but with a composed countenance:  “I always said, Hilda, that you were merciless; for I had a perception of it, even while you loved me best.  You have no sin, nor any conception of what it is; and therefore you are so terribly severe!  As an angel, you are not amiss; but, as a human creature, and a woman among earthly men and women, you need a sin to soften you.”

“God forgive me,” said Hilda, “if I have said a needlessly cruel word!”

“Let it pass,” answered Miriam; “I, whose heart it has smitten upon, forgive you.  And tell me, before we part forever, what have you seen or known of me, since we last met?”

“A terrible thing, Miriam,” said Hilda, growing paler than before.

“Do you see it written in my face, or painted in my eyes?” inquired Miriam, her trouble seeking relief in a half-frenzied raillery.  “I would fain know how it is that Providence, or fate, brings eye-witnesses to watch us, when we fancy ourselves acting in the remotest privacy.  Did all Rome see it, then?  Or, at least, our merry company of artists?  Or is it some blood-stain on me, or death-scent in my garments?  They say that monstrous deformities sprout out of fiends, who once were lovely angels.  Do you perceive such in me already?  Tell me, by our past friendship, Hilda, all you know.”

Thus adjured, and frightened by the wild emotion which Miriam could not suppress, Hilda strove to tell what she had witnessed.

“After the rest of the party had passed on, I went back to speak to you,” she said; “for there seemed to be a trouble on your mind, and I wished to share it with you, if you could permit me.  The door of the little courtyard was partly shut; but I pushed it open, and saw you within, and Donatello, and a third person, whom I had before noticed in the shadow of a niche.  He approached you, Miriam.  You knelt to him!  I saw Donatello spring upon him!  I would have shrieked, but my throat was dry.  I would have rushed forward, but my limbs seemed rooted to the earth.  It was like a flash of lightning.  A look passed from your eyes to Donatello’s—­a look.”—­“Yes, Hilda, yes!” exclaimed Miriam, with intense eagerness.  “Do not pause now!  That look?”

“It revealed all your heart, Miriam,” continued Hilda, covering her eyes as if to shut out the recollection; “a look of hatred, triumph, vengeance, and, as it were, joy at some unhoped-for relief.”

“Ah!  Donatello was right, then,” murmured Miriam, who shook throughout all her frame.  “My eyes bade him do it!  Go on, Hilda.”

“It all passed so quickly, all like a glare of lightning,” said Hilda, “and yet it seemed to me that Donatello had paused, while one might draw a breath.  But that look!  Ah, Miriam, spare me.  Need I tell more?”

“No more; there needs no more, Hilda,” replied Miriam, bowing her head, as if listening to a sentence of condemnation from a supreme tribunal.  “It is enough!  You have satisfied my mind on a point where it was greatly disturbed.  Henceforward I shall be quiet.  Thank you, Hilda.”