'Hush! hush! hush!' said the Doctor, himself very agitated. 'Venetia loves you, only you. Why should she love any one else?'
'Who can help it? I loved him. I saw him. I loved him. His voice was music. He has spoken to her, and she yielded: she yielded in a moment. I stood by her bedside. She would not speak to me; she would not know me; she shrank from me. Her heart is with her father: only with him.'
'Where did she see him? How?'
'His room: his picture. She knows all. I was away with you, and she entered his chamber.'
'Ah!'
'Oh! Doctor, you have influence with her. Speak to her. Make her love me! Tell her she has no father; tell her he is dead.'
'We will do that which is well and wise,' replied Doctor Masham: 'at present let us be calm; if you give way, her life may be the forfeit. Now is the moment for a mother's love.'
'You are right. I should not have left her for an instant. I would not have her wake and find her mother not watching over her. But I was tempted. She slept; I left her for a moment; I went to destroy the spell. She cannot see him again. No one shall see him again. It was my weakness, the weakness of long years; and now I am its victim.'
'Nay, nay, my sweet lady, all will be quite well. Be but calm; Venetia will recover.'
'But will she love me? Oh! no, no, no! She will think only of him. She will not love her mother. She will yearn for her father now. She has seen him, and she will not rest until she is in his arms. She will desert me, I know it.'