in surprise.

"Then let me inform you, my dear Henrietta," he said, "that I am not so
poor as you think; I only wished to find out, whether I could make
myself loved for my own sake, I have done so. I am Count L----, and
though I am a minor and dependent on my parents, yet I have enough to be
able to retain your pretty rooms for you, and to offer you, if not a
luxurious, at any rate a comfortable existence."

On hearing this, Mamma dried her tears immediately. Count L---- became
the girl's acknowledged lover, and they passed the happiest hours
together. Unselfish as the girl was, she was yet such a thoroughly
ingenuous Viennese, that, whenever she saw anything that took her fancy,
whether it was a dress, a cloak or one of those pretty little ornaments
for a side table, she used to express her admiration in such terms, as
forced her lover to make her a present of the object in question. In
this way, Count L---- incurred enormous debts, which his father paid
repeatedly; at last, however, he inquired into the cause of all this
extravagance, and when he discovered it, he gave his son the choice of
giving up his connection with the dancer, or of relinquishing all claims
on the paternal money box.

It was a sorrowful evening, when Count L---- told his mistress of his
father's determination.

"If I do not give you up, I shall be able to do nothing for you," he
said at last, "and I shall not even know how I should manage to live
myself, for my father is just the man to allow me to want, if I defy
him. That, however, is a very secondary consideration; but as a man of
honor, I cannot bind you, who have every right to luxury and enjoyment,
to myself, from the moment when I cannot even keep you from want, and so
I must set you at liberty."

"But I will not give you up," Henrietta said proudly.

The young Count shook his head sadly.

"Do you love me?" the ballet girl said, quickly.

"More than my life."

"Then we will not separate, as long as I have anything," she continued.

And she would not give up her connection with him, and when his father
actually turned Count L---- into the street, she took her lover into her
own lodgings. He obtained a situation as a copyist clerk in a lawyer's
office, and she sold her valuable dresses and jewels, and so they lived
for more than a year.

The young man's father did not appear to trouble his head about them,
but nevertheless he knew everything that went on in their small home,
a