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Not the words, but the tone, touched all that was generous and noble in his nature. He left his place and knelt beside her, and opened to her his whole heart.

“Am I not unworthy of you?” he asked, when it was over.

She pressed his hand in silence.

“I should be the most ungrateful wretch living,” he said, “if I did not think of you, and you only, now that my confession is made. We will leave Munich to-morrow, and, if resolution can help me, I will only remember the sweetest woman my eyes ever looked on as the creature of a dream.”

She hid her face on his breast, and reminded him of that letter of her writing which had decided the course of their lives.

“When I thought you might meet the happy woman in my lifetime I said to you, ‘Tell me of it, and I promise to tell her that she has only to wait.’ Time must pass, Ernest, before it can be needful to perform my promise, but you might let me see her. If you find her in the gallery to-morrow you might bring her here.”

Mrs. Lismore’s request met with no refusal. Ernest was only at a loss to know how to grant it.

“You tell me she is a copyist of pictures,” his wife reminded him. “She will be interested in hearing of the portfolio of drawings by the great French artists which I bought for you in Paris. Ask her to come and see them, and to tell you if she can make some copies; and say, if you like, that I shall be glad to become acquainted with her.”

He felt her breath beating fast on his bosom. In the fear that she might lose all control over herself, he tried to relieve her by speaking lightly.

“What an invention yours is!” he said. “If my wife ever tries to deceive me, I shall be a mere child in her hands.”

She rose abruptly from the sofa, kissed him on the forehead, and said wildly, “I shall be better in bed!” Before he could move or speak she had left him.

The next morning he knocked at the door of his wife’s room, and asked how she had passed the night.

“I have slept badly,” she answered, “and I must beg you to excuse my absence at breakfast-time.” She called him back as he was about to withdraw. “Remember,” she said, “when you return from the gallery to-day I expect that you will not return alone.”

Three hours later he was at home again. The young lady’s services as a copyist were at his disposal; she had returned with him to look at the drawings.

The sitting-room was empty when they entered it. He rang for his wife’s maid, and was informed that Mrs. Lismore had gone out. Refusing to believe the woman, he went to his wife’s apartments. She was not to be found.

When he returned to the sitting-room the young lady was not unnaturally offended. He could make allowances for her being a little out of temper at the slight that had been put on her; but he was inexpressibly disconcerted by the manner–almost the coarse manner–in which she expressed herself.

“I have been talking to your wife’s maid while you have been away,” she said. “I find you have married an old lady for her money. She is jealous of me, of course?”

“Let me beg you to alter your opinion,” he answered. “You are wronging my wife; she is incapable of any such feeling as you attribute to her.”

The young lady laughed. “At any rate, you are a good husband,” she said, satirically. “Suppose you own the truth: wouldn’t you like her better if she was young and pretty like me ?”

He was not merely surprised, he was disgusted. Her beauty had so completely fascinated him when he first saw her that the idea of associating any want of refinement and good breeding with such a charming creature never entered his mind. The disenchantment to him was already so complete that he was even disagreeably affected by the tone of her voice; it was almost as repellent to him as this exhibition of unrestrained bad temper which she seemed perfectly careless to conceal.