wards her and taking her hand,
he said, in a softened voice, 'Emily, can you bear that we should
part--can you resolve to give up an heart, that loves you like mine--an
heart, which, though it has erred--widely erred, is not irretrievable
from error, as, you well know, it never can be retrievable from love?'
Emily made no reply, but with her tears. 'Can you,' continued he, 'can
you forget all our former days of happiness and confidence--when I had
not a thought, that I might wish to conceal from you--when I had no
taste--no pleasures, in which you did not participate?'

'O do not lead me to the remembrance of those days,' said Emily, 'unless
you can teach me to forget the present; I do not mean to reproach you;
if I did, I should be spared these tears; but why will you render your
present sufferings more conspicuous, by contrasting them with your
former virtues?'

'Those virtues,' said Valancourt, 'might, perhaps, again be mine, if
your affection, which nurtured them, was unchanged;--but I fear, indeed,
I see, that you can no longer love me; else the happy hours, which we
have passed together, would plead for me, and you could not look
back upon them unmoved. Yet, why should I torture myself with the
remembrance--why do I linger here? Am I not ruined--would it not be
madness to involve you in my misfortunes, even if your heart was still
my own? I will not distress you further. Yet, before I go,' added he,
in a solemn voice, 'let me repeat, that, whatever may be my
destiny--whatever I may be doomed to suffer, I must always love
you--most fondly love you! I am going, Emily, I am going to leave
you--to leave you, forever!' As he spoke the last words, his voice
trembled, and he threw himself again into the chair, from which he had
risen. Emily was utterly unable to leave the room, or to say farewell.
All impression of his criminal conduct and almost of his follies was
obliterated from her mind, and she was sensible only of pity and grief.

'My fortitude is gone,' said Valancourt at length; 'I can no longer
even struggle to recall it. I cannot now leave you--I cannot bid you
an eternal farewell; say, at least, that you will see me once again.'
Emily's heart was somewhat relieved by the request, and she endeavoured
to believe, that she ought not to refuse it. Yet she was embarrassed
by recollecting, that she was a visitor in the house of the Count, who
could not be pleased by the return of Valancourt. Other considerations,