"You are right," she replied, and a proud flash shone in her eyes without dispersing the melancholy that veiled them, "you are right. I ought not to touch upon that past, but there is a nearer past of which I must speak, which leads me hither." "But--" said von Stielow. Without heeding him she continued: "Before you, I had no longer pride, no longer a will, it is true; but you coldly and cruelly forsook me"--she placed her hand upon her heart, and pressed her lips together. "You humiliated me, and my pride again arose. I wished to hate you, to forget you," she added in a hoarse voice: "but all the nobler feelings of my heart rebelled against it. I could not do it," she said in trembling tones; "and my pride said, 'Though he no longer loves, he shall not despise!'" Herr von Stielow's face had grown calm. He looked at her coldly, a scarcely perceptible smile upon his lips. "You had a right," she added, "it is true, to think me false, and to believe yourself the toy of a coquettish whim, perhaps even worse; you shall believe it no more, the memory of me shall not be mingled with contempt." "Let us leave the past," said he; "I assure you--" "No," she cried vehemently, "you shall hear me,--if the past gives me no other right, it gives me this, to demand a hearing!" He was silent. "You know," she proceeded, "what my life was; with a heart full of love, with a spirit that craved and strove for higher things, I was in early life fettered to the husband with whom you are acquainted. He himself encouraged a crowd of young men around me. Count Rivero came near me, I found in him the richest genius,--the satisfying of all my wishes, I believed I loved him," she added, casting down her eyes, "at least he brought light and interest to my life. Is that a crime?" Without waiting for an answer she went on passionately:--