Will it always be the same if I remain with you? Why are you always so silent in the house, so cold with your old grandfather? So different—so full of life, like a bird, when you are alone in the woods? Rima, speak to me! Am I no more to you than your old grandfather? Do you not like me to talk to you?"
She appeared strangely disturbed at my words. "Oh, you are not like him," she suddenly replied. "Sitting all day on a log by the fire—all day, all day; Goloso and Susio lying beside him—sleep, sleep. Oh, when I saw you in the wood I followed you, and talked and talked; still no answer. Why will you not come when I call? To me!" Then, mocking my voice, "Rima, Rima! Come here! Do this! Say that! Rima! Rima! It is nothing, nothing—it is not you," pointing to my mouth; and then, as if fearing that her meaning had not been made clear, suddenly touching my lips with her finger. "Why do you not answer me?—speak to me—speak to me, like this!" And turning a little more towards me, and glancing at me with eyes that had all at once changed, losing their clouded expression for one of exquisite tenderness, from her lips came a succession of those mysterious sounds which had first attracted me to her, swift and low and bird-like, yet with something so much higher and more soul-penetrating than any bird music. Ah, what feeling and fancies, what quaint turns of expression, unfamiliar to my mind, were contained in those sweet, wasted symbols! I could never know—never come to her when she called, or respond to her spirit. To me they would always be inarticulate sounds, affecting me like
