I
went and sat near to her, so as to study her. My tones had been so
searching that she read my thought; her eyes fell, and I scrutinized
her face. It was so pure and frank that I fancied I could see as
clearly into her heart as into my own.
"'Do you love me?' I asked.
"'A little,--passionately--not a bit!' she cried.
"Then she did not love me. Her jesting tones, and a little gleeful
movement that escaped her, expressed nothing beyond a girlish, blithe
goodwill. I told her about my distress and the predicament in which I
found myself, and asked her to help me.
"'You do not wish to go to the pawnbroker's yourself, M. Raphael,'
she answered, 'and yet you would send me!'
"I blushed in confusion at the child's reasoning. She took my hand in
hers as if she wanted to compensate for this home-truth by her light
touch upon it.
"'Oh, I would willingly go,' she said, 'but it is not necessary. I
found two five-franc pieces at the back of the piano, that had slipped
without your knowledge between the frame and the keyboard, and I laid
them on your table.'
"'You will soon be coming into some money, M. Raphael,' said the kind
mother, showing her face between the curtains, 'and I can easily lend
you a few crowns meanwhile.
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