"Xenie, Xenie, my love and lost darling, why will you wrong me so? Oh, my God! how little I weighed that filthy lucre against your love! I swear to you here, under this blue heaven, and in this hour when I never expect to behold your beautiful face again, that I broke our troth alone because I loved with too dear a passion to doom you to the ills of poverty for my sake. I love you, Xenie, deeply, fondly, devotedly, and I gloried in the thought of lavishing wealth upon you; and when my uncle bade me resign you I gave up my hope--not because I was afraid to brave poverty _for_ you, but because I dared not face it _with_ you. Darling, how could I bear to doom you, my tender flower, to the ills of poverty and want? But, there, I have told you all this before, and you would not believe it. Why should I weary you again? It is only because I am leaving you forever that I have yielded to the weakness. Farewell, Xenie, and may God bless you!" He ceased, and in the solitude and stillness of the odorous rose garden it seemed to him as if she must hear his heart beating, so loud and fast were its throbs of anguish. But she was silent, and he turned to go. "Howard, stay," she murmured, faintly. He retraced his steps to her side. "Xenie, what are you doing?" he cried in horror; for she had taken the millionaire's will between her white and jeweled fingers and was tearing it swiftly into the smallest fragments. The tiny white bits were flying from her hands like a miniature snow-storm. She laughed lightly at his look of horror. "John St. John never meant me to have all his money," she answered. "I coerced him into making this will, and he hid it then, hoping, no doubt, that it would never be found. There is an end of it. Let all remain as it was before. You have your share and I mine." "And your revenge?" he asked, looking at her as if he doubted his own sanity. "Never speak of it again," she answered, turning from him, while the crimson blush of shame overspread her face. A wild hope, undreamed of before, darted into his mind. He caught her hand in his. "Xenie, why have you done this thing?" he asked. Her dark eyes lifted to his, full of a noble repentance. "Because I love you," she answered, "and I cannot war against you any longer. Forgive me, Howard; it was never hatred that wrought my sin; it was the cruel madness of love." He caught her in his arms with a low cry of passionate thanksgiving, and the little birds, listening in the nests above their heads, heard the sound of kisses and passionate words, mixed with a woman's happy sobs. "Xenie," he said, presently, when her sobs grew calmer, "they told me that Lord Dudley had sued for your hand, and that you had promised to return to England with him as his bride. You cannot imagine what I suffered when I heard it. Even while I thought you hated me I could never feel indifferent to you, though I tried hard to put you out of my heart."