ew her
mother had run away.--But that was mere childish love, a child's
thought---there is something, however, in the heart which is awakened
earlier, and dies later than passion, that is a feeling of honor, and I
had as much of that as Lorand: let us see whose was the stronger.

"Lorand, I don't know what enchantment it was, with which this woman
could lure you after her. But I know that I too have a magic word, which
will tear you from her."

"Your magic word?--Do you wish to speak of mother? Do you wish to stand
in my way with her name?--Do so.--The only effect you will produce, by
worrying me very much, will be that I shall blow my brains out here
before you: but from that woman you can never tear me."

"I have no intention to speak of poor mother. It is a different subject
I have in mind."

"Something, or someone else."

"It is Balnokhazy, for whose sake you are going to leave this woman."

Lorand shrugged his shoulders.

"Do you think I am afraid of Balnokhazy's prosecution?"

"He has no intention of prosecuting you. He has been very considerate to
his wife in similar cases. Well, don't knit your eyebrows so; I am not
saying a word about his wife. I have no business with women. Balnokhazy
will not prosecute you, he will merely tell the world what has happened
to him."

Lorand, with a bitter smile of scorn, asked me:

"What will he relate to the world?"

"That his wife broke open his safe, stole his jewels, and his ready
money, and eloped with a young man."

Lorand turned abruptly to me like one whom a snake has bitten,

"What did he say?"

"That his faithless wife in company with a young man, whom he had
treated like his own child, has stolen his money, and then run away,
like a thief--with her companion in theft!"

Lorand clutched at the table for support.

"Don't, don't say any more."

"I shall. I have seen the safes, empty, in which the family treasures
were wont to be piled. I heard from the cabman, who handed in her
travelling bag after her that 'it must have been full of gold, it was so
heavy.'"

Lorand's face was burning now like the clouds of a storm-swept sky at
sunset.

"Did you have the bag in your hands?" I asked him.

"Not a word more!" Lorand cried, pressing my arm so that it pained me.
"That woman shall never see me again."

Then he sank upon the table and sobbed.

How glad I felt that I had been able to move him.

Soon he raised his tear-stained face, stood up, came t