'What is it to me?' she answered. 'He says so. He must be, no doubt, for he does no work—only makes pictures, such as they put over the altars in Santa Tarsilla and Telamone. Let us say no more of him. I only told you because I thought it best that you should know.'
'You will think more of him,' said Este, with sullen insistence. 'He will tell you of Paris till you will want to go; you will learn to forget Maremma, and to forget me.'
'You speak foolishly. Even the birds do not forget; year after year they build in the same place. Am I less worthy than they?'
'He will talk to you till he makes you go,' persisted Este; 'and why should you not? You are not made to stay by me in the twilight, here, for ever. I am but a felon, and this is but a grave. Elsewhere there are worlds full of light, of sound, of stir, of colour; you will go to them and look at them with your mysterious eyes that have all the night in them—the night that means silence, and dreams, and love—and they will not understand you because you come from the depths of the forest and are not as they are; but they will adore you,
