"Behold," he cried, with inexpressible bitterness and grief, "my mother's gift, her sacred bridal gift,--desecrated, polluted, lost,--worse than lost! I will not upbraid you. I would spare you the pang I myself endure,--but think of the agonies in which a spirit like mine must writhe, to know that _your_ name, that the name of my _wife_ is blazoned to the world, associated with that of a vile forger, an abandoned villain, whose crimes are even now blackening the newspapers, and glutting the greedy appetite of slander! O rash, misguided girl! what demon tempted you to such fatal imprudence?" I sat immovable, frozen, my eyes fixed upon the carpet, my hands as cold as ice, and my lips, as they touched each other, chill as icicles. In moments of sudden anguish I never lost consciousness, as many do, but while my physical powers were crushed, my mind seemed to acquire preternatural sensibility. I suffered as we do in dreams, intensely, exquisitely, when every nerve is unsheathed, and the spirit naked to the dagger's stroke. He stopped as he uttered this impassioned adjuration, and his countenance changed instantaneously as he gazed on mine. "Cruel, cruel that I am!" he cried, sitting down by me, and wrapping his arms around me; "I did not know what I was saying. I meant to be gentle and forbearing, but strong passion rushed over me like a whirlwind. Forgive me, Gabriella, my darling, forgive me. Let the world say what it will, I know that you are pure and true. I care not for the money,--I care not for the jewels,--but an unspotted name. Oh! where now are the 'liveried angels' that will guard it from pollution?" As he folded me in his arms, and pressed his cheek to mine, as if striving to infuse into it vital warmth, I felt the electric fluid flowing into my benumbed system. Whatever had occurred, he had not cast me off; and with him to sustain me, I was strong to meet the exigencies of the moment. I looked up in his face, and he read the expression of my soul,--I know he did, for he clasped me closer to him, and the fire of his eyes grew dim,--dim, through glistening tears. And then he told me all my beseeching glances sought. More than a week before, even before that, he had learned that a forgery had been committed in his name, involving a very large sum of money. Liberal rewards had been offered for the discovery of the villain, and that day he had been brought to the city. My diamonds, on whose setting Mrs. Linwood had had my name engraven, were found in his possession. He had not spoken to me of the forgery, not wishing to trouble me, he said, on a subject of such minor importance. It was the publicity given to my name, in association with his, that caused the bitterness of his anguish. And I,--I knew that my father had robbed my husband in the vilest, most insidious manner; that he had drawn upon himself the awful doom of a forger, a dungeon home, a living death.