'Good-morning, my kind sweet girl.' I took up the book--Walter Scott's
novels were at the height of their fame in those days--the reading of
Ivanhoe has left a particularly vivid recollection in my mind.... I
could not help my voice thrilling and quivering as I gave utterance to
Rebecca's speeches. I, too, had Jewish blood, and was not my lot like
hers? Was I not, like Rebecca, waiting on a sick man, dear to me? Every
time I removed my eyes from the page and lifted them to him, I met his
eyes with the same soft, bright smile over all his face. We talked very
little; the door into the drawing-room was invariably open and some one
was always sitting there; but whenever it was quiet there, I used, I
don't know why, to cease reading and look intently at Michel, and he
looked at me, and we both felt happy then and, as it were, glad and
shamefaced, and everything, everything we told each other then without a
gesture or a word! Alas! our hearts came together, ran to meet each
other, as underground streams flow together, unseen, unheard... and
irresistibly.

'Can you play chess or draughts?' he asked me one day.

'I can play chess a little,' I answered.

'That's good. Tell them to bring a chess-board and push up the table.'

I sat down beside the sofa, my heart was throbbing, I did not dare
glance at Michel,... Yet from the window, across the room, how freely I
had gazed at him!

I began to set the chessmen... My fingers shook.

'I suggested it... not for the game,'... Michel said in an undertone,