“Is he a prince?” asked her father, ironically, in a tone of voice which made the mother quail.
“No, father,” she said, gently, “he is a young man without fortune.”
“Is he very handsome?”
“He is very unfortunate.”
“What is he?”
“Labedoyere’s comrade; he was proscribed, without a refuge; Servin concealed him, and—”
“Servin is a good fellow, who has done well,” cried Piombo; “but you, my daughter, you do wrong to love any man, except your father.”
“It does not depend on me to love, or not to love,” replied Ginevra, still gently.
“I flattered myself,” continued her father, “that my Ginevra would be faithful to me until I died; and that my love and that of her mother would suffice her till then; I did not expect that our tenderness would find a rival in her soul, and—”
“Did I ever reproach you for your fanaticism for Napoleon?” said Ginevra. “Have you never loved any one but me? Did you not leave me for months together when you went on missions. I bore your absence courageously. Life has necessities to which we must all submit.”