the noise and the voices
continued till after daylight and filled me with unutterable
sadness!--Poor roses! But they will always live and bloom in my heart.
There are certain memories that can perfume a soul for ever--Do you
love me very much, Andrea?'

She hesitated for a moment, and then--'Do you love only me? Have you
forgotten all the rest? Do all your thoughts belong to me?'

Her breath came fast and she was trembling.

'I suffer--at the thought of your former life,--the past of which I know
nothing--of your memories, of all the marks left upon your soul, of that
in you which I shall never understand never possess. Oh, if I could but
wipe it all out for you! Incessantly, Andrea, I hear your first, your
very first words. I believe I shall hear them at the moment of my
death----'

She panted and trembled, shaken by the force of all-conquering passion.

'Every day I love you more, every day more!'

He intoxicated her with words of honied sweetness; he was more fervent
than herself; he told her of his visions in the night of snow and of his
despairing desire and some plausible story of the roses and a thousand
other lyric fancies. He judged her to be on the point of yielding--he
saw her eyes swim in melting languor, and on her plaintive mouth that
nameless contraction which seems like an instinctive dissimulation of
the physical desire to kiss; he looked at her hands, so delicate and yet
so strong, the hands of an archangel, and saw them trembling like the
strings of an instrument expressing all the anguish of her soul. 'If,
to-day, I could succeed in stealing even the most fleeting kiss from
her,' he thought, 'I should find myself considerably nearer the goal of
my desires.'

But, conscious of her peril, she rose hastily with an apology and,
ringing the bell, ordered tea and sent to ask Miss Dorothy to bring
Delfina to the drawing-room.

'It is better so,' she said, turning to Andrea with the traces of her
agitation still visible in her face; 'forgive me!'

And from that day she avoided receiving him except on Tuesday and
Saturday when she was at home to every one.

Nevertheless, she allowed Andrea to conduct her on long peregrinations
through the Rome of the Emperors and the Rome of the Popes, through the
villas, the museums, the churches, the ruins. Where Elena Muti had
passed, there Maria Ferres passed also. Often enough, the sights they
visited suggested to the poet the same eloquent effusions which E