He said I was his own, and yet I have never encouraged him.

But now! if a danger threatened him or a sorrow, and if by any means I could save him from it, indeed--indeed--though I never could bear pain well, and am afraid of death, I would let them nail me to a cross for him, as Thou wast crucified for us all.
"But then he must know that I had died for him, and if he looked into my dying eyes with his strange, deep gaze, I would tell him that it is to him that I owe a love so great that it is a thing altogether different and higher than any love I have ever before seen.

And a feeling that is so far above all measure of what ordinary mortals experience, it seems to me, must be divine.

Can such love be wrong?
I know not; but Thou knowest, and Thou, whom they name the Good Shepherd, lead Thou us--each apart from the other, if it be best so for him--but yet, if it be possible, unite us once more, if it be only for one single hour.

If only he could know that I am not wicked, and that poor Sirona would willingly belong to him, and to no other, then I would be ready to die.