_Sebald._ He gave me Life, nothing else; what if he did reproach My perfidy, and threaten, and do more-- Had he no right? What was to wonder at? He sat by us at table quietly-- Why must you lean across till our cheeks touched? 150 Could he do less than make pretense to strike? 'Tis not the crime's sake--I'd commit ten crimes Greater, to have this crime wiped out, undone! And you--oh, how feel you? Feel you for me? _Ottima._ Well then, I love you better now than ever, 155 And best (look at me while I speak to you)-- Best for the crime; nor do I grieve, in truth, This mask, this simulated ignorance, This affectation of simplicity, Falls off our crime; this naked crime of ours 160 May not now be looked over--look it down! Great? Let it be great; but the joys it brought, Pay they or no its price? Come: they or it Speak not! The past, would you give up the past Such as it is, pleasure and crime together? 165 Give up that noon I owned my love for you? The garden's silence! even the single bee Persisting in his toil, suddenly stopped, And where he hid you only could surmise By some campanula chalice set a-swing. 170 Who stammered--"Yes, I love you?" _Sebald._ And I drew Back; put far back your face with both my hands Lest you should grow too full of me--your face So seemed athirst for my whole soul and body! _Ottima._ And when I ventured to receive you here, 175 Made you steal hither in the mornings-- _Sebald._ When I used to look up 'neath the shrub-house here, Till the red fire on its glazed windows spread To a yellow haze? _Ottima._ Ah--my sign was, the sun Inflamed the sear side of yon chestnut-tree 180 Nipped by the first frost. _Sebald._ You would always laugh At my wet boots: I had to stride through grass Over my ankles. _Ottima._ Then our crowning night! _Sebald._ The July night? _Ottima._ The day of it too, Sebald! When heaven's pillars seemed o'erbowed with heat, 185 Its black-blue canopy suffered descend Close on us both, to weigh down each to each, And smother up all life except our life. So lay we till the storm came. _Sebald._ How it came! _Ottima._ Buried in woods we lay, you recollect; 190 Swift ran the searching tempest overhead; And ever and anon some bright white shaft Burned through the pine-tree roof, here burned and there, As if God's messenger through the close wood screen Plunged and replunged his weapon at a venture, 195 Feeling for guilty thee and me; then broke The thunder like a whole sea overhead--