Instantly, the memory of my home and my family awoke in me with a violent throb. I forgot that young man's strange behavior towards me, the terrible power that he wielded over Leoni, his former love, which I had welcomed so coldly, and the detestation I had felt for him afterward. I thought only of my father and mother, and eagerly offering him my hand, I overwhelmed him with questions. He was in no hurry to reply, although he seemed touched by my emotion and my eagerness.
"Are you alone here?" he said to me; "can I talk to you without exposing you to any danger?"
"I am alone; no one here knows me or pays any attention to me. Let us sit down on this stone bench, for I am not well; and, for the love of heaven, tell me about my parents! It is a whole year since I have heard their names."
"Your parents!" said Henryet sadly; "there is one of them who no longer weeps for you."
"My father is dead!" I cried, rising. Henryet did not reply. I fell back, utterly crushed, on the bench, and said under my breath: "My God, who wilt soon reunite us, bid him forgive me!"
"Your mother," said Henryet, "was ill a long while. Then she tried to find relief in society; but she had lost her beauty with much weeping, and could find no consolation there."
"My father dead," I said, clasping my nerveless hands, "my mother aged and heart-broken! What of my aunt?"
"Your aunt tries to console your mother by proving that you do not deserve her regrets; but your mother will not listen to her and fades more and more every day in solitude and weariness. And you, madame?"
Henryet uttered these last three words in a chilling tone, in which, however, I could detect compassion beneath the apparent contempt.
"I, as you see, am dying."