“For a dozen reasons! Principally, because your husband so decidedly set his face against it, and then because I--I, who am your greatest and truest friend, Hannah, think it is beneath you, and degrades you.” “But I must live!” persisted the woman. “Are there not other ways? If your money will not suffice to keep you comfortably for a year or two----” “And what after that?” she exclaimed. The Baron hesitated. Should he make the fatal plunge? “My purse is always open to you, Hannah,” he faltered. “I have already told you, Baron, that I cannot consent to be a pensioner upon your charity,” she replied. “You speak of what the world will say! The world would talk a great deal more of your paying my bills, than it would of my giving séances to keep myself! It can never be! That is decided!” “Then give me the right to empty the contents of my purse at your feet, Hannah,” cried Von Steinberg, losing control of himself. “Come to me as my wife, and the mistress of all I possess! Marry me--be the Baronne von Steinberg, and let us pass the rest of our lives together.” “I could not give up my title of Marchesa for that of Baronne,” remarked Hannah, coolly. “You may call yourself what you choose, so long as you will be my wife!” repeated the Baron. “Hannah! I have longed to ask you this ever since you were free. Crown my happiness by giving me your promise now!” “It is too soon to think of such a thing,” argued Hannah--“only three months after my husband’s death!” But her reluctance only urged him on to fresh entreaties. Perhaps she was clever enough to know it would! “What does that signify?” he said, “what is Time to dear Ricardo now, and whose opinion do we care for, but his? He is happy, I am sure, and would wish to see you happy, and well provided for, too. Come! Hannah, do not let any absurd scruples stand in the way of my proposal. No one need even know when the ceremony takes place. We are both almost strangers in London! “Who is to be the wiser what we do, or leave undone! Let me marry you quietly some morning, as poor Ricardo did, and carry you off at once to the Continent. There, we can stay a month, or a year, as pleases us best, and when we return, I will instal you as mistress of my house in Portland Place, and all I have. Come! is it a bargain?” As Von Steinberg mentioned his property, Hannah’s eyes glistened with pleasurable anticipation. _This_ was what she had been working for--what she had known she would gain at the last. She turned her voluptuous orbs upon him, and languidly held out her large hand. The Baron seized it and kissed it with rapture. It would have signified nothing to him at that moment, had it been twice as large. The woman had magnetised his every sense, and he was a tool in her hands. “And when shall it be, Hannah?” he asked, as soon as he had recovered his powers of speech. “To-day?--to-morrow?--it cannot be too soon.”