"I cannot forsake that bad man, for I always hated him, and never would listen to him," cried Viola. "And if the Signora thinks I am only fit to marry such a little, idle, impertinent coxcomb, then the Signora thinks very ill of me."
"But then the conscience of the thing, Viola! To renounce your religion just to gratify a mere freak of fancy which you will outgrow in less than a month! Really, when I think of it, I feel that I ought to use the authority given me by your poor mother on her death-bed, and absolutely refuse my consent to this crime."
"Renounce my religion! Our holy mother forbid!" cried Viola. "Olaf will surely embrace it so soon as he comes under my influence. He already says I can wind him round my finger."
"It is very silly in you to repeat such nonsense. Ah! if you but knew men as I do. The winding is all on the other side, I assure you."
"It was silly," replied Viola; "I hope the Signora will pardon me. But it is so long since any one was so good as to love me! It is so lonely, so sad to be an orphan in this great world, so full of fathers and mothers."
"None can be so sad or so lonely as they who peril their souls as you are about to risk yours," returned her mistress, severely.
Viola became very pale, but was silent, and at that time no further conversation took place. At her next interview with Olaf she related to him all that had passed, and begged to know if in marrying him she should be forced to renounce the religion in which she had been brought up.
"Nay," said Olaf, smiling, "I do not intend to be so hard a master, little one."
Viola was satisfied. "I shall soon convert him," she said to herself.
"I will not frighten her," was Olaf's secret thought. "The little thing loves me dearly; I shall soon hear no more of her beads and mummeries. We shall go to church every Sunday; by and by we shall have children; they shall have dark eyes and dark hair, and be Lutherans, every one of them."