"Comfort yourself, my friend, for I will teach you how to understand me. Does not that show that I have more confidence in you than you have in yourself? If I am willing to tell you all, does it not prove that you are the only person whose good opinion I care for? So if I desire to explain to you the apparent singularity of my life, which has been so misunderstood, it is because I wish, I hope, in the future to be able to give utterance to every thought in your hearing. This avowal requires some knowledge of the past; listen to me, then, my story will be short because it is true. "I was a very rich heiress, free to choose whom I wished, spoiled by the homage that was paid as much to my fortune as to myself. At eighteen I had never loved any one. On a voyage I made to Italy, with M. and Madame de Blémur, I met M. de Pënâfiel. Though he was still young, he was the Spanish ambassador to Naples at a time when political troubles were very complicated; this will show you what a superior man he was. When, in addition, he was handsome,"--here she showed me the portrait,--"with charming manners, high principles, an extremely noble character, perfect taste, superior education, appreciative sense of all the arts, an illustrious name and a large fortune, you will be able to know his worth. I met him, I appreciated him, I loved him. The incidents of our marriage were very simple, for all interests were united. Only, soon after our first interview, he begged me to tell him if I authorised him to ask for my hand, as, knowing that I was entirely free in my choice, he wished to spare me any advances that my uncle might have to make in his name. I told him very innocently the great joy his proposal was to me, but I besought him to give up a career that would necessarily keep him always at a distance from France, and to promise not to live in Spain. His answer was noble and prompt. 'I will sacrifice cheerfully my dreams of ambition,' he said, 'but not the interests of my country. When my mission here is accomplished, I will return to Spain to thank the king for his confidence in me, and render him an account of what I hope to be a successful negotiation; then I will belong entirely to you and do as you think best.' It was thus that he acted. He obtained all that his government had wished, went to Madrid to make his adieux to the king, returned, and we were married. I shall not speak again of our happiness, but I will now tell you that it was perfect and mutual. However, as in the eyes of the world the arrangements had been so suitable, the world would never admit that it had been a love match, but insisted that it was simply a marriage of convenience." "That is true, at least it is what I have always been given to understand; indeed, it is generally believed that, while you and M. de Pënâfiel were always the best of friends, your existence was, as often happens, quite apart from his."