to gain your love; I have now made you mine. Why should I have
done this had my affections been another's? Talk not of separation,
Adelaide." She burst into a passionate fit of weeping. "Adelaide," he
whispered, as he fondly clasped her to his heart, "believe that I love
you; believe that you have no rival, and that I will give you none. I
have made you my wife--the wife of my bosom: you are, and ever shall be,
my only love."

Sweet words! And the Lady Adelaide suffered her disturbed mind to yield
to them, resolutely thrusting away the dreadful thought that the heart
of her attractive husband could ever have been given to another.

V.

Months elapsed, and the Lady Adelaide was the happiest of the happy,
although now and again the remembrance of that anonymous letter would
dart before her mind, like a dream. That most rare felicity was, indeed,
hers, of passionately idolizing one from whom she need never be
separated by night or by day. But how was it with him? Love is almost
the only passion which cannot be called forth or turned aside at will,
and though the Count di Visinara treated his wife in all respects, and
ever would, with the most cautious attention, his heart was still true
to Gina Montani. But now the Count had to leave home; business called
him forth; and to remain away fifteen days. In those earlier times women
could not accompany their lords every where, as they may in these; and
when Giovanni rode away from his castle gates, the Lady Adelaide sank
in solitude upon the arm of one of her costly sofas, all rich with
brocaded velvet; and though not a tear dimmed her eye, or a line of pain
marked her forehead, to tell of suppressed feelings, it seemed to her
that her heart was breaking. It was on the morrow, news was brought to
the countess that one craved admission to her--a maiden, young and
beautiful, the servitor said; and the Lady Adelaide ordered her to be
admitted. Young and beautiful indeed, and so she looked, as, with
downcast eyes, the visitor was ushered in--_you_ know her, reader,
though the Lady Adelaide did not. She began to stammer out an incoherent
explanation; that news had reached her of the retirement of one of the
Lady Adelaide's attendants, and of her wish to fill the vacant place.
"What is your name?" inquired the countess, already taken, as the young
are apt to be, with the prepossessing manners and appearance of her
visitor.

"Signora, it is Gina Montani."

"And in whose househ