“‘You shall know me,’ she said, ’but not at present.  We are older and better friends than, perhaps, you suspect.  I cannot yet declare myself.  I shall in three weeks pass your beautiful schloss, about which I have been making enquiries.  I shall then look in upon you for an hour or two, and renew a friendship which I never think of without a thousand pleasant recollections.  This moment a piece of news has reached me like a thunderbolt.  I must set out now, and travel by a devious route, nearly a hundred miles, with all the dispatch I can possibly make.  My perplexities multiply.  I am only deterred by the compulsory reserve I practice as to my name from making a very singular request of you.  My poor child has not quite recovered her strength.  Her horse fell with her, at a hunt which she had ridden out to witness, her nerves have not yet recovered the shock, and our physician says that she must on no account exert herself for some time to come.  We came here, in consequence, by very easy stages—­hardly six leagues a day.  I must now travel day and night, on a mission of life and death—­a mission the critical and momentous nature of which I shall be able to explain to you when we meet, as I hope we shall, in a few weeks, without the necessity of any concealment.’

“She went on to make her petition, and it was in the tone of a person from whom such a request amounted to conferring, rather than seeking a favor.

“This was only in manner, and, as it seemed, quite unconsciously.  Than the terms in which it was expressed, nothing could be more deprecatory.  It was simply that I would consent to take charge of her daughter during her absence.

“This was, all things considered, a strange, not to say, an audacious request.  She in some sort disarmed me, by stating and admitting everything that could be urged against it, and throwing herself entirely upon my chivalry.  At the same moment, by a fatality that seems to have predetermined all that happened, my poor child came to my side, and, in an undertone, besought me to invite her new friend, Millarca, to pay us a visit.  She had just been sounding her, and thought, if her mamma would allow her, she would like it extremely.

“At another time I should have told her to wait a little, until, at least, we knew who they were.  But I had not a moment to think in.  The two ladies assailed me together, and I must confess the refined and beautiful face of the young lady, about which there was something extremely engaging, as well as the elegance and fire of high birth, determined me; and, quite overpowered, I submitted, and undertook, too easily, the care of the young lady, whom her mother called Millarca.

“The Countess beckoned to her daughter, who listened with grave attention while she told her, in general terms, how suddenly and peremptorily she had been summoned, and also of the arrangement she had made for her under my care, adding that I was one of her earliest and most valued friends.