THE FIFTH STRING
the darkness greater when I descended to earth again. I ask you to do a simple thing and you refuse; you refuse because another has commanded you."
"Mildred, Mildred; if you love me do not speak thus!"
And she, with imagination greater than reasoning power, at once saw a Tuscan beauty and Diotti mutually pledging their love with their lives.
"Go," she said, pointing to the door, "go to the one who owns you, body and soul; then say that a foolish woman threw her heart at your feet and that you scorned it!" She sank to the sofa.
He went toward the door, and in a voice that sounded like the echo of despair, protested: "Mildred, I love you; love you a thousand times more than I do my life. If I should destroy the string, as you ask, love and hope would leave me forevermore. Death would
117
