She had thought Léon was strong. He wasn’t strong, but in the rush of her passionate reasoning she carried this feather-weight of disadvantage into the fathomless sea of her love and left it safely there. No, he wasn’t strong--but he was Léon--he was hers. It was she who should have realized his weakness. She remembered now that once or twice lately he had turned back from his excursions with Madame to suggest that Rose should join them, but she had refused in her foolish pride because she had wanted to prove to him how magnanimous she was. She shouldn’t have done that at all, she shouldn’t have had any pride--and it didn’t matter in the least whether she was magnanimous or not! She should have held him to her by whatever could have kept him there. Tears, if tears were necessary; pity, duty, pleading--anything and everything that would have helped him. She had been thinking of what he would think of her--not of what he needed in her! She saw now it only mattered what he thought of her in so far as it helped her to save him. Her magnanimity hadn’t saved him. Something less beautiful but more practical might have saved him, her just being, for instance, a little more there. But he hadn’t lied to her, she came back to that as if it was something on which her heart might rest. Ah! if he had done that she would have known that he no longer loved her! But he had given her no reason--no excuse; he had flung his sin before her because he was ashamed, because he wanted his soul to be naked in her sight--because he knew that she would never fail him. In the dark she caught sight of the hovering Peppina. “Signora,” Peppina pleaded, “will you not dine?” Rose stood up. “Yes,” she said in a voice that sounded strange. “Yes, please, I will dine.” The Pinsents always dined. “Tell the Padrona,” Rose said steadily, “that the Signore has had to go to Naples on business. He will not return to-night.” Peppina still hovered. “Si Signora,” she said, “and the black cat, the one I brought to the Signora earlier in the evening, he has found for himself the room of the Signora. Behold, he lies there curled-up on her bed. He is there now--a miracle! The Signora remembers that I told her ‘a black cat means good fortune’?” Rose hurried into the room, and found him. He was not quite so good as her fox terrier at home, but he was a comfort. She buried her cheek against the round black ball of the fortunate kitten, and wept with easier tears. Then she went down and had her dinner in the garden. CHAPTER XIII