Chapter 7 - Page 2

face was also invisible, but who, as Rowland stood there, gave a toss
of his clustering locks which was equivalent to the signature--Roderick
Hudson. A moment's reflection, hereupon, satisfied him of the identity
of the lady. He had been unjust to poor Assunta, sitting patient in the
gloomy arena; she had not come on her own errand. Rowland's discoveries
made him hesitate. Should he retire as noiselessly as possible, or
should he call out a friendly good morning? While he was debating the
question, he found himself distinctly hearing his friends' words. They
were of such a nature as to make him unwilling to retreat, and yet
to make it awkward to be discovered in a position where it would be
apparent that he had heard them.

"If what you say is true," said Christina, with her usual soft
deliberateness--it made her words rise with peculiar distinctness to
Rowland's ear--"you are simply weak. I am sorry! I hoped--I really
believed--you were not."

"No, I am not weak," answered Roderick, with vehemence; "I maintain that
I am not weak! I am incomplete, perhaps; but I can't help that. Weakness
is a man's own fault!"

"Incomplete, then!" said Christina, with a laugh. "It 's the same thing,
so long as it keeps you from splendid achievement. Is it written, then,
that I shall really never know what I have so often dreamed of?"

"What have you dreamed of?"

"A man whom I can perfectly respect!" cried the young girl, with a
sudden flame. "A man, at least, whom I can unrestrictedly admire. I meet
one, as I have met more than one before, whom I fondly believe to be
cast in a larger mould than most of the vile human breed, to be large
in character, great in talent, strong in will! In such a man as that,
I say, one's weary imagination at last may rest; or it may wander if it
will, yet never need to wander far from the deeps where one's heart is
anchored. When I first knew you, I gave no sign, but you had struck
me. I observed you, as women observe, and I fancied you had the sacred
fire."

"Before heaven, I believe I have!" cried Roderick.

"Ah, but so little! It flickers and trembles and sputters; it goes out,
you tell me, for whole weeks together. From your own account, it 's ten
to one that in the long run you 're a failure."

"I say those things sometimes myself, but when I hear you say them they
make me feel as if I could work twenty years at a sitting, on purpose to
refute you!"

"Ah, the man who is strong with what I call strength," Christina
replied, "would neither rise nor fall by anything I could say! I am a
poor, weak woman; I have no