Nina caught hold of him, much as Malibran seized hold of Elvino: "Leave me! leave me! No, no; you cannot mean it!"
"I have no strength for it now I see you," said Ernest, looking down into her eyes; and the bold, reckless Lion shivered under the clinging clasp of her little hands. "I need not say I was not the cause of the insult you received the other night. Pauline de Mélusine was the agent, women willing to injure me the actors in it. But there is still much for you to forgive. Tell me, at once, what have you heard of me?"
She silently put the miniature and letter in his hand. The blood rushed to his very temples, and, sinking his head on his arms, his chest rose and fell with uncontrollable sobs. All the pent-up feelings of his vehement and affectionate nature poured out at last.
"And you have not condemned me even on these?" he said at length, in a hoarse whisper.
"Did I not promise?" she murmured.
"But if I told you they were true?"
She looked at him through her tears, and put her hand in his. "Tell me nothing of your past; it can make no difference to my love. Let the world judge you as it may, it cannot alter me."
Ernest strained her to him, kissing her wildly. "God bless you for your trust! would to God I were more worthy of it! I have nothing to give you but a love such as I have never before known; but most would tell you all my love is worthless, and my life has been one of reckless dissipation and of darker errors still, until you awoke me to a deeper love—to thoughts and aspirations that I thought had died out for ever. Painful as it is to confess——"
"Hush!" interrupted Nina, gently. "Confess nothing; with your past life I can have nothing to do, and I wish never to hear anything that it gives you pain to tell. You say that you love me now, and will never love another—that is enough for me."
Ernest kissed the flushed cheeks and eloquent lips, and thanked her with all the fiery passion that was in him; and his heart throbbed fiercely as he put her promise to the test.