The faint, soft colour rose in the poor girl's waxen cheeks, and there was
an unaccustomed light in her weary blue eyes as they met his.

"I do not say," continued her companion, "that I love you as boys love at
twenty. I am past that. I am not a young man any more, and I have had
misfortunes such as would have broken the hearts of most men, and of the
kind that do not dispose to great love-passion. If my troubles had come to
me through the love of a woman--it might have been otherwise. As it is--do
you think that I have no love for you, Vjera? Do not think that, dear--do
not let me see that you think it, for it would hurt me. There is much for
you, much, very much."

"To-day," answered Vjera, sadly, "but not to-morrow."

"You are cruel, without meaning to be even unkind," said the Count in an
unsteady voice. This time it was Vjera who took his hand in hers and
pressed it.

"God forbid that I should have an unkind thought for you," she said, very
tenderly.

The Count turned to her again and there was a moisture in his eyes of
which he was unconscious.

"Then believe that I do truly love you, Vjera," he answered. "Believe that
all that there is to give you, I give, and that my all is not a little. I
love you, child, in a way--ah, well, you have your girlish dreams of love,
and it is right that you should have them and it would be very wrong to
destroy them. But they shall not be destroyed by me, and surely not by any