"I see that you remember it. You saw them there. They--they didn't
tell me!"
As she said the last words she felt that she was entering the great
darkness. Maurice and Gaspare--she had trusted them with all her
nature. And they--had they failed her? Was that possible?
"They didn't tell me," she repeated, piteously, speaking now only for
herself and to her own soul. "They didn't tell me!"
Maddalena shook her head like one in sympathy or agreement. But
Hermione did not see the movement. She no longer saw Maddalena. She
saw only herself, and those two, whom she had trusted so completely,
and--who had not told her.
What had they not told her?
And then she was in Africa, beside the bed of Artois, ministering to
him in the torrid heat, driving away the flies from his white face.
What had been done in the Garden of Paradise while she had been in
exile?
She turned suddenly sick. Her body felt ashamed, defiled. A shutter
seemed to be sharply drawn across her eyes, blotting out life.
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