Moths by Ouida — page 124: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

™~ a0 MOTHS. There is no pleasure in doing what one pleases unless there is’ some opposition to the doingit. If you would say you hated snow and ice, now, I would swear to you that snow and ice were paradise beside these sickly palms and tawdry flowers. 4s there nothing you like? Who sent you that strange necklace of the moth?” <‘T do not know.” «“ But you imagine?” She was silent. ‘¢ What is the meaning of it?” ‘‘T think the meaning is that one may rise to great ends, o7 mink to base ones.” ‘‘ Has it no love-token, then? no message?” ‘6 No.” ; The red color rose over her pale face, but she looked at him with uuflinching gaze. He was but half satisfied. : ‘¢And do you mean to rise or sink?” he said, in a tone o banter. ‘‘ Pray tell me.” ‘¢T have sunk.” : The words stung him, and his pride, which was arrogant and ‘vain, smarted under them. ‘By God!” he said, with hisshort, hard laugh. ‘‘ Did it never occur to you, my beautiful Vera, that you would do wiser not to. insult me if you want to enjoy your life? I am your master, and I can be a bad master.” She looked at him without flinching, very coldly, very wearily. ‘Why will you ask me questions? The truth displeases you, and I will not tell you other than the truth. I meant no insult, —unless it were to insult myself.” He was silent. He walked to and fro a while, pulling the roses from their stems and flinging them into the gulf below. Then he spoke abruptly, changing the subject. | ‘‘We will go to Russia. You shall see a hall in the Selle des Palmiers. The world is best. Solitude issweet for lovers, but not when one of them is a statue—or an angel. Besides, that sort of thing never lasts a week. The world is best. You would make me hate you—or adore you—if we stayed on alone; and I wish to do neither. If you were not my wife it might be worth while; but as it is——” ) He threw another rose into the sea, as if in a metaphor of in- difference. ‘*Come to breakfast,” he said, carelessly. ‘‘ We will leave for Russia to-night.” As they passed down the terrace and entered the house, she moved wearily beside him, with her face averted and her lips very pale. _ The Salle des Palmiers had no charm for her. ~ She was think- ing of the nightingale that was then singing in the Russian SnOWS. If she saw Correze. what could she say? The truth she could not tell him, and he must be left to think the moth had dropped into the earthly fires of venal ambitions and of base desires. ¥ “ €omicbooks é ’ . - y 4 . % ”* : 7 7 tt F : ‘ ‘ ~ Tal i i Pir a : 7 - ny ; €O