She felt that it would have been easier, after all, to have killed
Veronica Serra, than it had been to part with the one thing she had
loved in her life.

She had not loved him better than herself, perhaps, since it was to save
herself that she had driven him away. But it had not been to save
herself from so small and insignificant a thing as death, though she was
vital and loved life for its own sake. She had not realized, either,
until it had been almost done, how necessary it was. Yesterday she had
been more cynical. Her own wickedness was teaching her the necessity of
some good, and she saw now clearly that Bosio was one degree less base
than herself. She believed that he would now be willing to marry
Veronica, but she understood that until now he would not have done
it--unless she had freed him from the galling remnant of his own
conscience, and had formally given him his liberty. To give him that, in
order that he might save her, she had torn out her heart by the roots.

The bitterest of all was this, that he had scarcely struggled against
her will, when she had left him to himself. He had said a few words,
indeed, but he could hardly have said less, if he had meant nothing. She
knew well enough that at almost any point she could have brought him
back, playing upon the fidelity of habit. At her voice, at her glance,
for one word of her pleading, he would have come back to her feet,
willing to remain. But there was no vital strength of passion in him to
keep him to her against her mere spoken will. Once or twice, in spite of
herself, her voice had softened; she had felt that her face betrayed
her, and had turned it away; she had known that her hands were icy cold
in his, and had hoped that he would not notice it and understand, and
feel, perhaps, that his accursed habit of fidelity would not let him
take the freedom she thrust upon him. He had not seen, he had not felt,
he had noticed nothing; and he was gone, glad to be free from her at
last, willing to marry another woman, ready to forget what had held him
by a thread which he respected, but not by a bond which he could not
break. She had long guessed how it was; she knew it now--she had known
the truth last night, when she had smoothed his soft hair with her hand
and had spoken softly to him, but had not got from him the promise that
meant salvation to her and her husband. Then she had known what she must
do. Once more she had tried to impose her strength upon h