But to you they were spoken; you heard them; you fled before them--' 'Basil! Basil!' She had hidden her face with her hands.

Basil threw himself upon his knees beside her.
'Though I spoke in madness, can you ever forget?
God Himself, I know, will sooner blot out my sin of murder than this wound I inflicted upon your pure and gentle heart!' Veranilda caught his hand and pressed her lips upon it, whilst her tears fell softly.
'Listen, dearest Basil,' she said.

'To think that I guard this in my memory against you would be to do me wrong.

Remember how first I spoke to you about it, when we first knew that we loved each other.

Did I not tell you that this was a thing which could never be quite forgotten?
Did I not know that, if ever I sinned, or seemed to sin, _this_ would be the first rebuke upon the lips of those I angered?
Believing me faithless--nay, not you, beloved, but your fevered brain--how could you but think that thought?
And, even had you not spoken it, must I not have read it in your face?
Never ask me to forgive what you could not help.