is in the
feelings that I know for you."

Valerie lifted on him her large and radiant eyes, and made no answer.

Maltravers went on. "Chide me, scorn me, hate me if you will. Valerie, I
love you."

Valerie drew away her hand, and still remained silent.

"Speak to me," said Ernest, leaning forward; "one word, I implore
you--speak to me!"

He paused,--still no reply; he listened breathlessly--he heard her
sob. Yes; that proud, that wise, that lofty woman of the world, in that
moment, was as weak as the simplest girl that ever listened to a lover.
But how different the feelings that made her weak!--what soft and what
stern emotions were blent together!

"Mr. Maltravers," she said, recovering her voice, though it sounded
hollow, yet almost unnaturally firm and clear"--the die is cast, and I
have lost for ever the friend for whose happiness I cannot live, but for
whose welfare I would have died; I should have foreseen this, but I was
blind. No more--no more; see me to-morrow, and leave me now!"

"But, Valerie--"

"Ernest Maltravers," said she, laying her hand lightly on his own;
"_there is no anguish, like an error of which we feel ashamed_!"

Before he could reply to this citation from his own aphorism, Valerie
had glided away; and was already seated at the card-table, by the side
of the Italian princess.

Maltravers also joined the group. He fixed his eyes on Madame
de Ventadour, but her face was calm--not a trace of emotion was
discernible. Her voice, her smile, her charming and courtly manner, all
were as when he first beheld her.

"These women--what hypocrites they are!" muttered Maltravers to himself;
and his lip writhed into a sneer, which had of late often forced away
the serene and gracious expression of his earlier years, ere he knew
what it was to despise. But Maltravers mistook the woman he dared to
scorn.

He soon withdrew from the palazzo, and sought his hotel. There, while
yet musing in his dressing-room, he was joined by Ferrers. The time had
passed when Ferrers had exercised an influence over Maltravers; the
boy had grown up to be the equal of the man, in the exercise of that
two-edged sword--the reason. And Maltravers now felt, unalloyed, the
calm consciousness of his superior genius. He could not confide to
Ferrers what had passed between him and Valerie. Lumley was too _hard_
for a confidant in matters where the heart was at all concerned. In
fact, in high spirits, and in the midst of fri