ometimes too much.'

'She is not like them, Roland; she is like none. When I spoke to her
first, she affected no astonishment; never was there a creature so nobly
sincere. She's a girl in heart, not in mind. Think of her sacrificed to
this man thrice her age!'

'She differs from other girls only on the surface, Nevil. As for the man,
I wish she were going to marry a younger. I wish, yes, my friend,' Roland
squeezed Nevil's hand, 'I wish! I'm afraid it's hopeless. She did not
tell you to hope?'

'Not by one single sign,' said Nevil.

'You see, my friend!'

'For that reason,' Nevil rejoined, with the calm fanaticism of the
passion of love, 'I hope all the more . . . because I will not believe
that she, so pure and good, can be sacrificed. Put me aside--I am
nothing. I hope to save her from that.'

'We have now,' said Roland, 'struck the current of duplicity. You are
really in love, my poor fellow.'

Lover and friend came to no conclusion, except that so lovely a night was
not given for slumber. A small round brilliant moon hung almost globed in
the depths of heaven, and the image of it fell deep between San Giorgio
and the Dogana.

Renee had the scene from her window, like a dream given out of sleep. She
lay with both arms thrown up beneath her head on the pillow, her eyelids
wide open, and her visage set and stern. Her bosom rose and sank
regularly but heavily. The fluctuations of a night stormy for her,
hitherto unknown, had sunk her to this trance, in which she lay like a
creature flung on shore by the waves. She heard her brother's voice and
Nevil's, and the pacing of their feet. She saw the long shaft of
moonlight broken to zigzags of mellow lightning, and wavering back to
steadiness; dark San Giorgio, and the sheen of the Dogana's front. But
the visible beauty belonged to a night that had shivered repose,
humiliated and wounded her, destroyed her confident happy half-infancy of
heart, and she had flown for a refuge to hard feelings. Her predominant
sentiment was anger; an anger that touched all and enveloped none, for it
was quite fictitious, though she felt it, and suffered from it. She
turned it on Nevil, as against an enemy, and became the victim in his
place. Tears for him filled in her eyes, and ran over; she disdained to
notice them, and blinked offendedly to have her sight clear of the
weakness; but these interceding tears would flow; it was dangerous to
blame him, harshly. She let them roll down, f