"Silence! silence! You know I can't bear anything of that; I am for ever united to thee."
Whereupon she kissed him with effusion.
"That's a compact, is it not so?"
"It is a compact," he replied, in a tone of decision.
"But do not trouble about leaving her your property in a will, because it would give rise to the suspicion that she is your daughter."
This difficulty absorbed them both for some minutes. Both were busy devising some means of eluding it. The count wanted to leave it to some confidential person in trust; but this idea also bristled with drawbacks, and they thought it would be better for the money to accumulate in his name in some bank until she came of age, and then a father could be invented who had fallen from the skies.
At last Amalia concluded by saying: "We shall talk for ever of this. Leave it to me."
And he was only too pleased to leave it to her, as he had unbounded confidence in her inexhaustible imagination, power of will, and limitless audacity.
When tired of talking of the future, they turned their attention to the present. The child had to be baptised, and the ceremony was fixed for the following day.
"Yes, and we have settled that I am to be the godmother, and you the godfather."