“I tremble for you, in whom my whole soul is wrapped up,” answered the banker.  “This man has robbed me of my child’s heart, and you will be happier with him than you are with your poor old father.  I tremble because of your inexperience and his weakness, which may prove a source of trouble to you.”

“If he is weak, all the better; my will can guide him.”

“You are wrong,” replied her father, “as many other women have been before you.  You believe that weak and vacillating dispositions are easily controlled, but I tell you that this is an error.  Only determined characters can be influenced, and it is on substantial foundations that we find support.”

Flavia made no reply, and her father drew her closer to him.

“Listen to me, my child,” said he.  “You will never have a better friend than I am.  You know that I would shed every drop of blood in my veins for you.  He is coming, so search your heart to discover if this is not some mere passing fancy.”

“Father!” cried she.

“Remember that your happiness is in your own hands now, so be careful and conceal your feelings, and do not let him discover how deep your love is for him.  Men’s minds are so formed that while they blame a woman for duplicity, they complain far more if she acts openly and allows her feelings to be seen——­”

He paused, for the door-bell rang.  Flavia’s heart gave a bound of intense joy.

“He has come!” gasped she, and, with a strong effort to retain her composure, she added, “I will obey you, my dear father; I will not come here again until I have entirely regained my composure.  Do not fear, and I will show you that your daughter can act a part as well as any other woman.”

She fled from the room as the door opened, but it was not Paul who made his appearance, but some other guests—­a stout manufacturer and his wife, the latter gorgeously dressed, but with scarcely a word to say for herself.  For this evening the banker had issued invitations to twenty of his friends, and among this number Paul would scarcely be noticed.  He in due time made his appearance with Dr. Hortebise, who had volunteered to introduce him into good society.  Paul felt ill at ease; he had just come from the hands of a fashionable tailor, who, thanks to Mascarin’s influence, had in forty-eight hours prepared an evening suit of such superior cut that the young man hardly knew himself in it.  Paul had suffered a good deal from conflicting emotions after the visit to Van Klopen’s, and more than once regretted the adhesion that he had given to Mascarin’s scheme; but a visit the next day from Hortebise, and the knowledge that the fashionable physician was one of the confederates, had reconciled him to the position he had promised to assume.

He was moreover struck with Flavia’s charms, and dazzled with the accounts of her vast prospective fortune.  To him, Hortebise, gay, rich, and careless, seemed the incarnation of happiness, and contributed greatly to stifle the voice of Paul’s conscience.  He would, however, perhaps have hesitated had he known what the locket contained that dangled so ostentatiously from the doctor’s chain.