ocrite, had that air of apparent nobility and frankness which
inspires you with unlimited confidence, and the melancholy expression on
his features seemed to indicate that he had known sorrow, and had good
cause to rail at destiny. In his whole appearance there was certainly
a mysterious and fatal charm. I afterward learned that this was only a
natural result of the wild life he had led. He was only twenty-six, and
he had already been the commander of a slave ship, and had fought in
Mexico at the head of one of those guerilla bands which make politics an
excuse for pillage and murder. He divined only too well the impression
he had made upon my heart. I met him twice afterward in society. He did
not speak to me; he even pretended to avoid me, but standing a little
on one side, he watched my every movement with burning eyes in which
I fancied I could read a passion as absorbing as my own. At last he
ventured to write to me. The moment a letter addressed to me in an
unknown hand was covertly handed me by my maid, I divined that it came
from him. I was frightened, and my first impulse was to take it, not
to my mother--whom I regarded as my natural enemy--but to my father.
However, he chanced to be absent; I kept the letter, I read it, I
answered it--and he wrote again.

"Alas! from that moment my conduct was inexcusable. I knew that it was
worse than a fault to continue this clandestine correspondence. I knew
my parents would never give my hand in marriage to a man who was not of
noble birth. I knew that I was risking my reputation, the spotless honor
of our house, my happiness, and life! Still I persisted--I was possessed
with a strange madness that made me ready to brave every danger.
Besides, he gave me no time to breathe, or reflect. Everywhere,
constantly, every instant, he compelled me to think of him. By some
miracle of address and audacity, he had discovered a means of intruding
upon my presence, even in my father's house. For instance, every morning
I found the vases in my room full of choice flowers, though I was never
able to discover what hands had placed them there. Ah! how can one help
believing in an omnipresent passion which one inhales with the very air
one breathes! How can one resist it?

"I only discovered Arthur Gordon's object when it was too late. He
had come to Paris with the fixed determination of trapping some rich
heiress, and forcing her family to give her to him with a large
dowry, after one of