"Nothing that you would say can offend me."
"Then," replied she, "had you not deserted your youthful standard of female perfection—" She paused, and feared to go on. Louis completed the sentence.
"You would say, I should not have been disappointed in the Countess Altheim!"—A heightened colour was on his cheek as he spoke.
"Forgive me!" cried his cousin; "I was indelicate and cruel in making the reference." "Not cruel," returned he; "for she is no more to me than the recollection of a hideous dream. My imagination, not my heart, was the victim of her delusions."
"Ah, Louis!" cried Cornelia, again forgetting herself in the earnestness of her remarks; "It was something like your infatuation for Duke Wharton. My uncle always called him a splendid mischief; and, happily, the outlawry against him has banished him this country for ever. But you have long been convinced of his worthlessness; and, I thank Heaven for your second escape from similar delusions!"
Louis did not answer, but gratefully put his cousin's hand to his lips. She resumed.
"Indeed, when you wrote of her to my uncle, and under your best impressions too you dwelt so much on her beauty and accomplishments only, and her preference for you, that we could no way make ourselves esteem her, or believe her capable of making you finally happy. Dare I venture to go on, Louis?"
"Yes; you are a gentle physician!" replied he, with a forced smile; "and man's vanity needs a probe!"
"Now, the Lady Marcella!" continued Cornelia. Louis prevented himself from starting. "You wrote little of her, and you have said less; but it was always of her virtues; and in such few words, we saw her fairer, than the proud beauty of Vienna." Again Cornelia paused, and looked on her cousin, whose face was now bent on his hand. She rather hesitatingly proceeded. "We wished and thought, that had it not been for the vow anticipated by Ferdinand, you might have found her nearer to your first ideas of female excellence, and repaid her goodness to you with your love."
Louis did not speak, but still kept his head in its reclining position. She saw the struggle of a suppressed sigh, which would have been a sufficient response; and, grieved at the pain she had unconsciously excited, she tenderly pressed his hand.