I cannot take her.
Something stronger than my passion opposes an adamantine barrier.
I love her with my soul as well as with my body, and my soul
cries out for the soul that the Almighty forgot when endowing her
with entity.
This evening a letter from the Editor of The Quarterly Review.
It would give him great pleasure if I would contribute a
Renaissance article, taking as my text a German, a Russian, and
an English attempt to whitewash the Borgia family. Six months
ago the compliment would have filled me with gratification. To-
day what to me are the whitewashed Borgias or the solemn denizens
of the Athenaeum reading-room who will slumber over my account of
the blameless poisonings of this amiable family? They are vanity
and vexation of a spirit already sore at ease.
As I write the door creaks. I look up. Behold Carlotta in
hastily slipped on dressing-gown, open in front, her hair
streaming loose to her waist, her bare feet flashing pink beneath
her night-dress.
"Oh, Seer Marcous, darling, I am so frightened!"
She ran forward and caught the lappels of my coat as I rose from
my chair.
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