And it is indeed a noble quality so long as it is locked close within the treasury of the soul, and so long as one good woman, and one only, holds the key. But of all the unutterable baseness in this world, there is none more despicable than that of the man who makes one woman after another believe that he loves her to distraction, as he never loved any one else, well knowing, the while, that if the furies spare him to an unhonoured old age, it is out of sheer contempt for the blear-eyed Adonis, shambling weak-kneed to his grave with a flower in his button-hole and a ghastly leer at the last woman he meets before death overtakes him.
Leonora was a woman who was probably incapable of a second passion, and the wholeness of the first might lend it some dignity, some simple loftiness of disregard for lesser things, making it seem nobler for being a single sin, sinned bravely for true love's sake. There were such loves in the world long before Launcelot loved Guinevere, or Héloise was laid in the grave with Abelard. But the world has no lack of men like Julius Batiscombe, men in no way worthy of the women who love them, nor ever able to be worthy.
Leonora had chosen, and she would not have given him up for all the joys of paradise, any more than she would have believed a word against his faithfulness and loyalty to herself. He had sworn--how could he deceive her?
When Leonora met her husband at dinner an hour later, her face was set, for her mind was made up, and every moment hardened her determination.
Julius had said to her "come," and she would go to the very end of the world if need be. He had stated the case with a show of fairness. She must fully understand the step, he said, and that there was no return possible from such an exile as they undertook together. She must abandon everything, and not only her husband, but her mother, her father, her position before the world, her whole luxurious, aristocratic existence. She must rely on his arm alone to support her, and on his love to be her only comfort and compensation. They must live an isolated life, whether wandering, or resting in some quiet place where society never came. She must also take the chance of his being killed by Marcantonio, who would certainly make an effort to destroy him, and the chance was not small, considering the provocation. If it happened that he fell, she would certainly be left alone in the world. This was probably the strongest argument with her against flight, but it had not weight enough to hold her back, for she had the pride of a woman who had found a man ready to fight for her, in these latter days when fighting is so terribly out of fashion; and she felt in her heart that she should always be able to prevent an encounter.