n the cottage of the widow I have dried the tears of
despair; I have delivered my enemies from a living grave, and I have
saved their wives and children from the misfortune of being widows and
orphans. My name is spoken of with admiration all over the globe, and
yet I have hid myself _here_, not to be troubled with their praises; I
do not care for praise. The most lovely of women has smiled on me and
loved me, but she was not of _my_ world. She is dead, and the key of
her coffin is a perpetual reminder to me that her world has passed
away. My world is within me, and into that inner world of mine no one
has ever entered, no one _will_ ever enter, _but you_! Speak, Evila;
answer me. Will you try to love me?"

The girl's eyes sank before the ardent gaze of her lover. Many men had
made love to her, but none like this man, whose face shone like
Jupiter's when, with a look, he killed Semele.

"Oh, sir," she murmured, "if I do not die I shall love you always; but
my mind misgives me that I shall die."

As she spoke she fell back fainting, her brilliant color faded to a
waxen pallor, the flashing eyes closed; her body, which a moment
before was like a blooming rose, was now as lifeless as a withered
leaf.

Ivan held her motionless form in his arms. The woman whom he had so
loved, for whom he had suffered so much, was his, just as her pulse
ceased to beat, just as she had said, "I shall love you always, but I
know that I shall die."

* * * * *

But she did not die.

CHAPTER XLIII

THE DIAMOND REMAINED ALWAYS A DIAMOND

THE END

UNIFORM WITH THIS VOLUME

_DONA PERFECTA._ _By B. Perez Galdos. $1 00._

_PARISIAN POINTS OF VIEW._ _By Ludovic Halevy. $1 00._

_DAME CARE._ _By Hermann Sudermann. $1 00._

_TALES OF TWO COUNTRIES._ _By Alexander Kielland. $1 00._

_TEN TALES BY FRANCOIS COPPEE._ _With 50 Illustrations by Albert E.
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_MODERN GHOSTS._ _Selected from the Works of Guy de Maupassant, Pedro
Antonio de Alarcon, Alexander Kielland, and Others. $1 00._

_THE HOUSE BY THE MEDLAR-TREE._ _By Giovanni Verga. $1 00._

_PASTELS IN PROSE._ (From the French.) _With 150 Illustrations by
H. W. McVickar. $1 25._

_MARIA: A SOUTH AMERICAN ROMANCE._ _By Jorge Isaacs. $1 00._

_THE ODD NUMBER: THIRTEEN TALES._ _By Guy de Maupassant. $1 00._

Published by Harper & Brothers, New York.

Transcriber's Note: The following typographical err