"Yes; to bribe me to give you up. Aunt Sophie does not relish the idea of having a Jew for her nephew."
"Aunt Sophie! — but I will never call her Aunt Sophie again. Do you mean that they offered you money?"
"They offered me property, my dear, which is the same. But they did it economically, for they only offered me my own. They were kind enough to suggest that if I would merely break my word to you, they would tell me how I could get the title-deeds of the houses, and thus have the power of turning your father out into the street."
"You have the power. He would go at once if you bade him."
"I do not wish him to go. As I have told you often, he is welcome to the use of the house. He shall have it for his life, as far as I am concerned. But I should like to have what is my own."
"And what did you say?" Nina, as she asked the question, was very careful not to tighten her hold upon his arm by the weight of a single ounce.
"What did I say? I said that I had many things that I valued greatly, but that I had one thing that I valued more than gold or houses — more even than my right."
"And what is that?" said Nina, stopping suddenly, so that she might hear clearly every syllable of the words which were to come. "What is that?" She did not even yet add an ounce to the pressure; but her fingers were ready.
"A poor thing," said Anton; "just the heart of a Christian girl."
Then the hand was tightened, or rather the two hands, for they were closed together upon his arm; and his other arm was wound round her waist; and then, in the gloom of the dark colonnade, he pressed her to his bosom, and kissed her lips and her forehead, and then her lips again. "No," he said, "they have not bribed high enough yet to get from me my treasure — my treasure."