ng to those who whisper
that I am bad to you. Sir, I fear they have been right when they told
me that a Jew's nature would surely shock me at last."

The dark frowning cloud, which she had so often observed with fear,
came upon his brow; but she did not fear him now. "And do you too taunt
me with my religion?" he said.

"No, not so--not with your religion, Anton; but with your nature."

"And how can I help my nature?"

"I suppose you cannot help it, and I am wrong to taunt you. I should
not have taunted you. I should only have said that I will not endure
the suspicion either of a Christian or of a Jew."

He came up to her now, and put out his arm as though he were about to
embrace her. "No," she said; "not again, till you have asked my pardon
for distrusting me, and have given me your solemn word that you
distrust me no longer."

He paused a moment in doubt, then put his hat on his head and prepared
to leave her. She had behaved very well, but still he would not be weak
enough to yield to her in everything at once. As to opening her desk,
or going up-stairs into her room, that he felt to be quite impossible.
Even his nature did not admit of that. But neither did his nature allow
him to ask her pardon and to own that he had been wrong. She had said
that he must implore her forgiveness at her feet. One word, however,
one look, would have sufficed. But that word and that look were, at the
present moment, out of his power. "Good-bye, Nina," he said. "It is
best that I should leave you now."

"By far the best; and you will take the necklace with you, if you
please."

"No; I will leave that. I cannot keep a trinket that was your
mother's."

"Take it, then, to the jeweller's, and get back your money. It shall
not be left here. I will have nothing from your hands." He was so far
cowed by her manner that he took up the necklace and left the house,
and Nina was once more alone.

What they had told her of her lover was after all true. That was the
first idea that occurred to her as she sat in her chair, stunned by
the sorrow that had come upon her. They had dinned into her ears their
accusations, not against the man himself, but against the tribe to
which he belonged, telling her that a Jew was, of his very nature,
suspicious, greedy, and false. She had perceived early in her
acquaintance with Anton Trendellsohn that he was clever, ambitious,
gifted with the power of thinking as none others whom she knew could
think;