To a man just not indifferent to her, to a man--"
Maria Consuelo raised herself and looked full at Orsino. Her face was
extremely pale and her eyes were suddenly dark and gleamed.
"Don Orsino, you have no right to talk to me in that way. I loved
him--no one knows how I loved him!"
There was no mistaking the tone and the look. Orsino felt again and more
strongly, the chill and the pain he had felt before. He was silent for
a moment. Maria Consuelo looked at him a second longer, and then let her
head fall back upon the cushion. But the expression which had come into
her face did not change at once.
"Forgive me," said Orsino after a pause. "I had not quite understood.
The only imaginable reason which could make our marriage impossible
would be that. If you loved him so well--if you loved him in such a way
as to prevent you from loving me as I love you--why then, you may be
right after all."
In the silence which followed, he turned his face away and gazed at the
window. He had spoken quietly enough and his expression, strange to say,
was calm and thoughtful.
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