At that moment all the University prerogatives and privileges did not concern me in the least. Selim's question illuminated, as with a lightning flash, those sides of my heart which to me were still dark. A thousand thoughts, like a thousand birds, flew through my head all at once. To marry my dear, beloved orphan! Yes; that was the lightning flash, the new flash of thought and feelings. It seemed to me that suddenly into the darkness of my heart some one had brought light. Love, deep, but brotherly hitherto, had grown rosy on a sudden from that light and was heated through it by an unknown warmth. To marry Hania, that bright-haired angel, my dearest, most beloved Hania. With a weak voice now and lower, I repeated like an echo,—
"Selim, art mad?"
"I would lay a wager that thou art in love with her already," said Selim.
I made no answer; I quenched the light, then seized a corner of the pillow and began to kiss it.
Yes; I loved her already.
CHAPTER III.
ON the second or third day after the funeral, my father came, summoned by a telegram. I trembled lest he should recall my dispositions touching Hania, and my forebodings were real to a certain degree. My father praised me and embraced me for my zeal and conscientiousness in fulfilling duties; that pleased him evidently. He repeated even a number of times, "Our blood!" which he did only when he was much pleased with me. He did not divine to what extent that zeal was interested, but my dispositions had not pleased him overmuch. It may be that the exaggerated statements of Pani d'Yves moved him toward this a little, though really in the days following that night in which my feelings rose to consciousness I made Hania the first person in the house.
He was not pleased by my project to educate her in the same way as my sisters.
"I recall and withdraw nothing," said he. "That is the affair of thy mother. She will determine what she likes; that is her department. But it is worth while to think over this: What is best for the girl herself."