The baron hesitated, for he felt he was again touching on forbidden ground.

“To announce the birth of my unhappy boy,” continued the Signor Grimaldi, firmly.

“To announce that much-wished-for event, I have not had news of thee, except in a way so vague, as to whet the desire to know more rather than to appease the longings of love.”

“These doubts are the penalties that friendship pays to separation.  We enlist the affections in youth with the recklessness of hope, and, when called different ways by duties or interest, we first begin to perceive that the world is not the heaven we thought it, but that each enjoyment has its price, as each grief has its solace.  Thou hast carried arms since we were soldiers in company?”

“As a Swiss only.”

The answer drew a gleam of habitual humor from, the keen eye of the Italian, whose countenance was apt to change as rapidly as his thoughts.

“In what service?”

“Nay, a truce to thy old pleasantries, good Grimaldi—­and yet I should scarce love thee, as I do, wert thou other than thou art!  I believe we come at last to prize even the foibles of those we truly esteem!”

“It must be so, young lady, or boyish follies would long since have weaned thy father from me.  I have never spared him on the subjects of snows and money, and yet he beareth with me marvellously.  Well, strong love endureth much.  Hath the baron often spoken to thee of old Grimaldi—­young Grimaldi, I should say—­and of the many freaks of our thoughtless days?”

“So much, Signore,” returned Adelheid, who had wept and smiled by turns during the interrupted dialogue of her father and his friend, “that I can repeat most of your youthful histories.  The castle of Willading is deep among the mountains, and it is rare indeed for the foot of stranger to enter its gates.  During the long evenings of our severe winters, I have listened as a daughter would be apt to listen to the recital of most of your common adventures, and in listening, I have not only learned to know, but to esteem, one that is justly so dear to my parent.”

“I make no doubt, now, thou hast the history of the plunge into the canal, by over-stooping to see the Venetian beauty, at thy finger’s ends?”

“I do remember some such act of humid gallantry,” returned Adelheid, laughing.

“Did thy father tell thee, child, of the manner in which he bore me off in a noble rescue from a deadly charge of the Imperial cavalry?”

“I have heard some light allusion to such an event, too,” returned Adelheid, evidently trying to recall the history of the affair, to her mind “but—­”

“Light does he call it, and of small account?  I wish never to see another as heavy!  This is the impartiality of thy narratives, good Melchior, in which a life preserved, wounds received, and a charge to make the German quail, are set down as matters to be touched with a light hand!”.