“You are not yet satisfied?  You find new ways of forcing me to say that I love you.  Seem to distrust me, that I may say it over and over; make me believe you really doubt if I can be constant, just that I may hear what my heart says in its distress, and repeat it all to you.  Be a little unkind to me, that I may show how your unkindness would wound me, and may entreat you back into your own true self.  You can do nothing, say nothing, but I will make it afford new proofs of hew I love you.”

“I had rather you made yourself less dear to me.  The time will be so long.  How can I live through it?”

“Will it not help you a little to help me?  To know that you are unhappy would make it so much longer to me, my love.”

“It will be hell to live away from you!  I cannot make myself another man.  If you knew what I have suffered only in these two days!”

“There was uncertainty.”

“Uncertainty?  Then what certainty could I ever have?  Every hour spent at a distance from you will be full of hideous misgivings.  Remember that every one will he doing the utmost to part us.”

“Let them do the utmost twice over!  You must have faith in me.  Look into my eyes.  Is there no assurance, no strength for you?  Do they look too happy?  That is because you are still here; time enough for sadness when you are gone.  Oh, you think too humbly of yourself!  Having loved you, and known your love, what else can the world offer me to live for?”

“Wherever you are, I must come often.”

“Indeed you must, or for me too the burden will be heavier than I can bear.”

As the Denyers were coming home, it surprised them to pass, at a little distance from the house, Clifford Marsh in conversation with the gentleman who had called upon Miss Doran.  Madeline, exercising her new privilege of perfect sang-froid, took an opportunity not long after to speak to Clifford in the drawing-room.

“Who was the gentleman we saw you with?”

“I met him at Pompeii, but didn’t know his name till today.  He’s asked me to dine with him.”

“He is a friend of Miss Doran’s, I believe?”

“I believe so.”

“You accepted his invitation?”

“Yes; I am always willing to make a new acquaintance.”

“A liberal frame of mind.  Did he give you news of Miss Doran’s health?”

“No.”

He smiled mysteriously, only to appear at his ease; and Madeline, smiling also, turned away.

Cecily reappeared this evening at the dinner-table.  She was changed; Mrs. Gluck and her guests were not again to behold the vision to which their eyes had become accustomed; that supremacy of simple charm which some of them had recognized as English girlhood at its best, had given place to something less intelligible, less instant in its attractiveness.  Perhaps the climate of Naples was proving not well suited to her.

After dinner, she and Mrs. Lessingham at once went to their private room.  Cecily sat down to write a letter.  When she moved, as if the letter were finished, her aunt looked up from a newspaper.