"I wish we had, dear Ernestine; for much anxiety would then have been spared me. Ere this, I would have known—my—my fate, perhaps."
"Philip—fate!"
"Ernestine, listen to me. You do not love the Count of Kœningheim—he whom your father has chosen?"
"Oh, no! poor Kœningheim. Though merry and lively at times, he is subject to the most frightful fits of sorrow and depression, as if some terrible and untellable secret preyed upon his soul. Besides, with all his assumed air of gallantry, he has in reality an aversion to women."
"An aversion!"
"At times unconquerable, when his dark hour, as he calls it, is upon him. Would you have thought this?"
"Never; and scarcely would I have believed it from other lips than yours."
"Love Kœningheim!" she continued; "oh, no!—I can love no one but my father and little Gabrielle—and you, for you have been so kind to her and to me."
"Thank you, Ernestine; my heart would have burst if you had omitted me in that small circle. Ah! if you knew—if you only knew——"
"What!" said she, timidly glancing at me.