She brought all the skill
she could command to her assistance; she talked to him, she told him of
herself, she sought his confidence, she consulted him on every matter,
she attempted to fascinate his imagination with tales of a life which
even he could never have seen; she even sang to him old songs and
snatches of wonderful melodies which, in her childhood, had still
survived the advancing wave of silence that has overwhelmed the Bohemian
people within the memory of living man, bringing a change into the daily
life and temperament of a whole nation which is perhaps unparalleled in
any history. He listened, he smiled, he showed a faint pleasure and a
great understanding in all these things, and he came back day after
day to talk and listen again. But that was all. She felt that she could
amuse him without charming him.
And Unorna suffered terribly. Her cheek grew thinner and her eyes
gleamed with sudden fires. She was restless, and her beautiful hands,
from seeming to be carved in white marble, began to look as though they
were chiselled out of delicate transparent alabaster. She slept little
and thought much, and if she did not shed tears, it was because she
was too strong to weep for pain and too proud to weep from anger and
disappointment. And yet her resolution remained firm, for it was part
and parcel of her inmost self, and was guarded by pride on the one hand
and an unalterable belief in fate on the other.
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