If only he could die and release her.

_Release her from what ?_ From her duty to speak and set him free?
Those were the words which she never permitted the rebel voice within to say.

Still, they were there, silenced for the time, but always waiting to be said.

Their gagged whisper reached her in spite of herself.
Oh! if only Michael were dead and out of his suffering, then she would never be tortured by them any more.

Then, too, her husband's words would lose their poisoned point, and she could thrust them forth from her mind for ever.
"Francesca, how much longer will you keep your cousin Michael in prison ?" Oh! Cruel, cruel Andrea, vindictive to the very gates of death.
Down the empty, whispering gallery of ghostly fears in which her life crouched, Michael's voice spoke to her also.