Holding it up to the fading light (for there was already dimness among the trees), he appeared to examine it closely, as if to discover the imaginary blood-stain with which he taunted her.

He smiled as he let it go.

"It looks very white," said he; "but I have known hands as white, which all the water in the ocean would not have washed clean." "It had no stain," retorted Miriam bitterly, "until you grasped it in your own." The wind has blown away whatever else they may have spoken.
They went together towards the town, and, on their way, continued to make reference, no doubt, to some strange and dreadful history of their former life, belonging equally to this dark man and to the fair and youthful woman whom he persecuted.

In their words, or in the breath that uttered them, there seemed to be an odor of guilt, and a scent of blood.
Yet, how can we imagine that a stain of ensanguined crime should attach to Miriam! Or how, on the other hand, should spotless innocence be subjected to a thraldom like that which she endured from the spectre, whom she herself had evoked out of the darkness! Be this as it might, Miriam, we have reason to believe, still continued to beseech him, humbly, passionately, wildly, only to go his way, and leave her free to follow her own sad path.
Thus they strayed onward through the green wilderness of the Borghese grounds, and soon came near the city wall, where, had Miriam raised her eyes, she might have seen Hilda and the sculptor leaning on the parapet.
But she walked in a mist of trouble, and could distinguish little beyond its limits.

As they came within public observation, her persecutor fell behind, throwing off the imperious manner which he had assumed during their solitary interview.