It's
all over now. It was all over directly I saw you here, but it had
been so near that I shudder yet."
She must have been very startled because for a time she couldn't
speak. Then in a faint voice:
"For me! For me!" she faltered out twice.
"For you--or for myself? Yet it couldn't have been selfish. What
would it have been to me that you remained in the world? I never
expected to see you again. I even composed a most beautiful letter
of farewell. Such a letter as no woman had ever received."
Instantly she shot out a hand towards me. The edges of the fur
cloak fell apart. A wave of the faintest possible scent floated
into my nostrils.
"Let me have it," she said imperiously.
"You can't have it. It's all in my head. No woman will read it.
I suspect it was something that could never have been written. But
what a farewell! And now I suppose we shall say good-bye without
even a handshake. But you are safe! Only I must ask you not to
come out of this room till I tell you you may."
I was extremely anxious that Senor Ortega should never even catch a
glimpse of Dona Rita, never guess how near he had been to her. I
was extremely anxious the fellow should depart for Tolosa and get
shot in a ravine; or go to the Devil in his own way, as long as he
lost the track of Dona Rita completely.
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