glance with a look of something like astonishment,
wondering how in a few sentences she had got herself into a position to
threaten him with vengeance if he were unfaithful to Veronica.

"We will not speak of that," she exclaimed before he said anything in
answer or protest. "We have harder things to do than to imagine evil in
the future. Since we are decided--since it is to be the end--let it be
now, quickly! You shall not have it on your mind that you belong to me
in any way, from now. No--you are right--you must feel free. You must
feel free, besides really being free. You must feel, when you speak to
Veronica to-night or to-morrow, as she expects you to speak, that all
our life together is utterly past and swept away, and that I only exist
henceforth as a relative--as--as your wife's aunt, Bosio!"

She laughed, half-bitterly, half-nervously, at the idea, and turning
away her face she held out her hand to him.

He took it, and held it, pressing it between both his own.

"Do you mean this, Matilde?" he asked in a low voice.

"Yes, I mean it," she answered, speaking away from him with averted
face.

He could not see, but she was biting her lip till it almost bled. In her
own strange way she loved him with all her evil nature, and if she were
breaking with him now, it was to save herself from something worse than
death. It was the hardest thing she had ever done. He hesitated: there
was the mean prompting of the spirit, to take her at her word and to set
himself free, since she offered him freedom, caring not whether she
might repent to-morrow; and there was the instinct of fidelity which in
so much dishonour had remained with him through so many years.

"Besides," she said hoarsely, "I do not love you any more. I would not
keep you longer, if I could. Oh--we shall be friends! But the other--no!
Good bye, Bosio--good bye."

Something moved him, as she had not meant that anything should.

"I do not believe you," he said. "You love me still--I will not leave
you!"

"No, no! I do not--but if you still care at all, save me. Say good bye,
but do the rest also. You are free now. You are an honourable man again.
Bosio, look at my hair. You used to love it. Would you have it cut off
and cropped by the convict's shears? My hands that you are
holding--dear--would you love them galled by the irons, riveted upon
them for years? Save me, Bosio! You are free now--save me, for the dear
sake of all that has been!"

Still s