The intensity of their bliss is sharpened by the
black cloud of danger in which they move: for if the Three, husband,
father, and brother of the lady become aware of this secret liaison,
there can be only one end to it--a tragedy of blood. The lighted
taper held in the window by the trusted maid shows that they are
"safe," and for the last time they play again their little comedy of
formality. She pretends to be the formal _grande dame_, the lady
with the colder breast than snow: he is the bashful gallant, who
hardly dares touch the tips of her fingers. In this laughing moment,
the dagger of the husband is driven deep into his back. Like all of
Browning's lovers, he gives, even on the edge of the eternal darkness,
no thought to himself, but only to her. Gathering his dying energies,
he speaks in a loud tone, so that the conspirators, invisible in the
Venetian night, may hear him:
Care not for the cowards! Care
Only to put aside thy beauteous hair
My blood will hurt!
And in the last agony, he comforts her with the thought that all this,
the joy of love and the separation by murder, have been ordained.
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