"I thought, however, that you might have gone down into the yard during that moment that I was asleep, and that, to punish me or to make sport of me, you played that joke on me. If that is the case, Mila, you must agree that the punishment was too light, and you ought to have poured water on my face instead of keeping it for my flowers. But take your ring, I don't want to keep it any longer. It wouldn't be a suitable thing for me to wear, and I should be afraid of losing it." "I swear to you that that ring was never given to me, that I did not go into the yard while you were asleep; and I will not take what belongs to you." "As it is impossible that Princess Agatha should have come here this morning----" "Oh! to be sure, that is impossible!" said Mila, with mischievous gravity. "And yet she did come here!" said Magnani, thinking that he could read the truth in her gleaming eyes. "Yes, yes, Mila, she came here this morning! You are impregnated with the perfume that her clothes exhale; either you touched her cape, or she kissed you, not more than an hour ago." "Great heaven!" thought the girl, "how well he knows everything that has any connection with Princess Agatha! how shrewdly he guesses, when she is in question! Suppose it were she with whom he is in love? Well! God grant that it may be, for she will help me to cure him; she loves me so dearly!" "You don't answer me, Mila," continued Magnani. "Since you are found out, confess." "I do not even know what you said," she replied; "I was thinking about something else--about going away!" "I will help you; but first I will beg you to put this ring on your finger so that you may return it to Princess Agatha; for she surely lost it when she passed me." "And supposing that she did come here, which is absurd, my dear neighbor, why should she not have made you this present?" "Because she must know me well enough to be sure that I would not accept it." "You are proud!" "Very proud, you have said it, my dear Mila! It is not in the power of any person to put a material price on the devotion which my heart gives joyfully. I can conceive that a great nobleman may present a gold chain or a diamond to the artist who has delighted him for an hour by his genius, but I could never understand why he should want to pay the man of the people from whom he feels justified in asking a proof of affection. Moreover, that would not be the case here. In notifying me that your brother was in some danger, Princess Agatha simply pointed out to me a duty, which I should have performed as zealously if anyone else had given me the same warning. It seems to me that I am sufficiently her friend and your father's, and I might also venture to say yours, to be ready to stand guard, to fight, and to go to prison for one of you, without being hired to do so by anyone. Don't you believe it, Mila?"