essed it to my lips, I felt her fingers close upon my hand with a
sudden convulsive tremor. I do not know how I managed to reach my
uncle's chamber, and still less how I got into the ball-room. There was
a certain Gascon who was afraid to go into battle since he was all
heart, and every wound would be fatal to him. I might be compared to
him; and so might everybody else who is in the same mood that I
was in; every touch was then fatal. The Baroness's hand--her tremulous
fingers--had affected me like a poisoned arrow; my blood was burning in
my veins.

On the following morning my old uncle, without asking any direct
questions, had soon drawn from me a full account of the hour I had
spent in the Baroness's society, and I was not a little abashed when
the smile vanished from his lips and the jocular note from his words,
and he grew serious all at once, saying, "Cousin, I beg you will resist
this folly which is taking such a powerful hold upon you. Let me tell
you that your present conduct, as harmless as it now appears, may lead
to the most terrible consequences. In your thoughtless fatuity you are
standing on a thin crust of ice, which may break under you ere you are
aware of it, and let you in with a plunge. I shall take good care not
to hold you fast by the coat-tails, for I know you will scramble out
again pretty quick, and then, when you are lying sick unto death, you
will say, 'I got this little bit of a cold in a dream.' But I warn you
that a malignant fever will gnaw at your vitals, and years will pass
before you recover yourself, and are a man again. The deuce take your
music if you can put it to no better use than to cozen sentimental
young women out of their quiet peace of mind." "But," I began,
interrupting the old gentleman, "but have I ever thought of insinuating
myself as the Baroness's lover?" "You puppy!" cried the old gentleman,
"if I thought so I would pitch you out of this window." At this
juncture the Baron entered, and put an end to the painful conversation;
and the business to which I now had to turn my attention brought me
back from my love-sick reveries, in which I saw and thought of nothing
but Seraphina.

In general society the Baroness only occasionally interchanged a few
friendly words with me; but hardly an evening passed in which a secret
message was not brought to me from Lady Adelheid, summoning me to
Seraphina. It soon came to pass that our music alternated with
conversations on divers t