Be it a spell--be it obstinacy, I question thee no
further, but leave thee to do thine errand after thine own
fashion. I also can be mute."
The disguised knight made an action as if at once lamenting his
own condition and deprecating her displeasure, while at the same
time he presented to her, wrapped, as usual, in fine silk and
cloth of gold, the letter of the Soldan. She took it, surveyed
it carelessly, then laid it aside, and bending her eyes once more
on the knight, she said in a low tone, "Not even a word to do
thine errand to me?"
He pressed both his hands to his brow, as if to intimate the pain
which he felt at being unable to obey her; but she turned from
him in anger.
"Begone!" she said. "I have spoken enough--too much--to one who
will not waste on me a word in reply. Begone!--and say, if I have
wronged thee, I have done penance; for if I have been the unhappy
means of dragging thee down from a station of honour, I have, in
this interview, forgotten my own worth, and lowered myself in thy
eyes and in my own.
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