but I was faithful to Captain Grandgagnage and accompanied the wild fellow with the Walloons through every land, until he was shot.  Then ten years ago, I joined Zorrillo; he is my friend, he shares my feelings, I am necessary to his existence.  Do not laugh, Ulrich; I well know that youth lies behind me, that I am old, yet Pasquale loves me; since I have had him, I have been more content and, Holy Virgin! now—­I love him in return.  Oh, Heaven!  Oh, Heaven!  Why is it so?  This heart, this miserable heart, still throbs as fast as it did twenty years ago.”

“You will not leave him?”

“No, no, I love him, and I know why.  Every one calls him a brave man, yet they only half know him; no one knows him wholly as I do.  No one else is so good, so generous.  You must let me speak!  Do you suppose I ever forgot you?  Never, never!  But you have always been to me the dear little boy; I never thought of you as a man, and since I could not have you and longed so greatly for you, for a child, I opened my heart to the soldiers’ orphans, the little creature you saw in the tent is one of these poor things, I have often had two or three such babies at the same time.  It would have been an abomination to Grandgagnage, but Zorrillo rejoices in my love for children, and I have given what the Walloon bequeathed me and his own booty to the soldiers’ widows and the little naked babies in the camp.  He was satisfied, for whatever I do pleases him.  I will not, cannot leave him!”

She paused, hiding her face in her hands, but Ulrich paced to and fro, violently agitated.  At last he said firmly:  “Yet you must part from him.  He or I!  I will have nothing to do with the lover of my father’s wife.  I am Adam’s son, and will be constant to him.  Ah, mother, I have been deprived of you so long.  You can tend strangers’ orphaned children, yet you make your own son an orphan.  Will you do this?  No, a thousand times, no, you cannot!  Do not weep so, you must not weep!  Hear me, hear me!  For my sake, leave this Spaniard!  You will not repent it.  I have just been dreaming of the nest I will build for you.  There I will cherish and care for you, and you shall keep as many orphan children as you choose.  Leave him, mother, you must leave him for the sake of your child, your Ulrich!”

“Oh, God! oh, God!” she sobbed.  “I will try, yes, I will try. . . .  My child, my dear child!”

Ulrich clasped her closely in his arms, kissed her hair, and said, softly:  “I know, I know, you need love, and you shall find it with me.”

“With you!” she repeated, sobbing.  Then releasing herself from his embrace she hurried to the feverish woman, at whose summons she had left her tent.

As morning dawned, she returned home and found Zorrillo still awake.  He enquired about her patient, and told her he had given the child something to drink while she was away.

Flora could not help weeping bitterly again, and Zorrillo, noticing it, exclaimed chidingly:  “Each has his own griefs to bear, it is not wise to take strangers’ troubles so deeply to heart.”