e?" quoth I.

"What difficulty does it present?" she questioned back. "The Governor
of Cesena has rendered very possible what I propose. We may look on him
to-morrow as our best friend."

"But Ramiro knows," I reminded her.

"True, but do you think that he will dare to tell the world what he
knows? He might be asked to say how he comes by his knowledge, and that
should prove a difficult question to answer. Tell me, Lazzaro," she
continued, "if he had succeeded in carrying me away, what think you
would have been said in Pesaro to-morrow when the coffin was found
empty?"

"They would assume that your body had been stolen by some wizard or some
daring student of anatomy."

"Ah! And if we were quietly to quit the church and be clear of Pesaro
before morning, would not the same be said?"

"Probably," answered I.

"Then why hesitate? Is it that you do not love me enough, Lazzaro?"

I smiled, and my eyes must have told her more than any protestation
could. Then I sighed. "I hesitate, Madonna, because I would not have you
do now what you might come, hereafter, bitterly to repent. I would
not let you be misled by the impulse of a moment into an act whose
consequences must endure as long as life itself."

"Is that the reasoning of a lover?" she asked me, very quietly. "Is
this cold argument, this weighing of issues, consistent with the stormy
passion you professed so lately?"

"It is," I answered stoutly. "It is because I love you more than I love
myself that I would have you reflect ere you adventure your life upon
such a broken raft as mine. You are Paola Sforza di Santafior, and I--"

"Enough of that," she interrupted me, rising. She swept towards me, and
before I knew it her hands were on my shoulders, her face upturned, and
her blue eyes on mine, depriving me of all will and all resistance.

"Lazzaro," said she, and there was an intensity almost fierce in her
low tones, "moments are flying and you stand here reasoning with me,
and bidding me weigh what is already weighed for all time. Will you wait
until escape is rendered impossible, until we are discovered, before you
will decide to save me, and to grasp with both hands this happiness of
ours that is not twice offered in a lifetime?"

She was so close to me that I could almost feel the beating of her
heart. Some subtle perfume reaching me and combining with the
dominion that her eyes seemed to have established over me completed
my subjugation. I was as warm