Mary blushed, faltered, and became strangely alarmed at finding
herself alone with him. Though he now stood before her in a quality
which she ever believed was his right, the remembrance of what had
passed between them in other circumstances confounded and overwhelmed
her. When Constantine was poor and unfriended, it seemed a sacred
privilege to pity and to love him. When the same Constantine appeared
as a man of rank, invested with a splendid fortune and extensive
fame, she felt lost--annihilated. The cloud which had obscured, not
extinguished, his glory was dispersed. He was that Sobieski whom she
had admired unseen; he was that Constantine whom she had loved
unknown; he was that Sobieski, that Constantine, whom, seen and
known, she now, alas! loved almost to adoration!
Oppressed by the weight of these emotions, she only bowed to what he
said, and gathering her cloak from the winds which blew it around
her, was hurrying with downward eyes to the stairs of the terrace,
when her foot slipped, and she must have fallen, had not Thaddeus
caught her in his ready arm. She rose with a blushing face, and the
color did not recede when she found that he had not relinquished her
hand. Her heart beat violently, her head became giddy, her feet lost
their power. Finding that, after a slight attempt to withdraw her
hand, he still held it fast, though in a trembling grasp, and nearly
overcome by inexplicable distress, she turned away her face to
conceal its confusion.
Pages:
644
645
646
647
648
649
650
651
652
653
654
655
656
657
658
659
660
661
662
663
664
665
666
667
668