mas Eve she announced the return of her lover, and she told him
that on St. Stephen's Day she would go with him to the opera, and that
they would afterwards spend the night together.

"I shall expect you, my beloved one," she added, "on the last day of the
year, and here is a letter which I beg you not to read till you get
home."

As I had to move in order to make room for her lover, I packed my things
early in the morning, and, bidding farewell to a place in which during
ten days I had enjoyed so many delights, I returned to the Bragadin
Palace, where I read the following letter:

"You have somewhat offended me, my own darling, by telling me, respecting
the mystery which I am bound to keep on the subject of my lover, that,
satisfied to possess my heart, you left me mistress of my mind. That
division of the heart and of the mind appears to me a pure sophism, and
if it does not strike you as such you must admit that you do not love me
wholly, for I cannot exist without mind, and you cannot cherish my heart
if it does not agree with my mind. If your love cannot accept a different
state of things it does not excel in delicacy. However, as some
circumstance might occur in which you might accuse me of not having acted
towards you with all the sincerity that true love inspires, and that it
has a right to demand, I have made up my mind to confide to you a secret
which concerns my friend, although I am aware that he relies entirely
upon my discretion. I shall certainly be guilty of a breach of
confidence, but you will not love me less for it, because, compelled to
choose between you two, and to deceive either one or the other, love has
conquered friendship; do not punish me for it, for it has not been done
blindly, and you will, I trust, consider the reasons which have caused
the scale to weigh down in your favour.

"When I found myself incapable of resisting my wish to know you and to
become intimate with you, I could not gratify that wish without taking my
friend into my confidence, and I had no doubt of his compliance. He
conceived a very favourable opinion of your character from your first
letter, not only because you had chosen the parlour of the convent for
our first interview, but also because you appointed his casino at Muran
instead of your own. But he likewise begged of me to allow him to be
present at our first meeting-place, in a small closet--a true
hiding-place, from which one can see and hear everything withou