It succeeded very well at the moment, but its ultimate success would have been surer if it had reached no ears but Beatrice's.

Neither she nor San Miniato were aware that a few feet below them a man was lying on his back, with white face and clenched hands, staring at the pale moonlit sky above him, and listening in stony despair to every word that was spoken.
The sight would have disturbed them, had they seen it, though they both were fearless by nature and not easily startled.

Had Beatrice seen Ruggiero at that moment, she would have learned once and for ever the difference between real passion and its counterfeit.

But Ruggiero knew where he was and had no intention of betraying himself by voice or movement.

He suffered almost all that a man can suffer by the heart alone, but he was strong and could bear torture.
The hardest of all was that he understood the real truth, partly by instinct and partly through what he knew of his master.