She still regarded him very earnestly, and in silence.

“When I heard,” she said, at length, in a low voice, “that my Natalie had given her love to a stranger, my heart sunk.  I said, ’More than ever is she away from me now;’ and I wondered what the stranger might be like, and whether he would be kind to her.  Now that I see you, I am not so sad.  There is something in your voice, in your look, that tells me to have confidence in you:  you will be kind to Natalie.”

She seemed to be thinking aloud:  and yet he was not embarrassed by this confession, nor yet by her earnest look; he perceived how all her thoughts were really concentrated on her daughter.

“Her father approves?” said this sad-faced, gray-haired woman.

“Oh no; quite the contrary.”

“But he is kind to her?” she said, quickly, and anxiously.

“Oh yes,” he answered.  “No doubt he is kind to her.  Who could be otherwise?”

She had been so agitated at the beginning of this interview that she had allowed her visitor to remain standing.  She now asked him to be seated, and took a chair opposite to him.  Her nervousness had in a measure disappeared; though at times she clasped the fingers of both hands together, as if to force herself to be composed.

“You will tell me all about it, monsieur; that I may know what to say when I speak to my child at last.  Ah, heavens, if you could understand how full my heart is:  sixteen years of silence!  Think what a mother has to say to her only child after that time!  It was cruel—­cruel—­cruel!”

A little convulsive sob was the only sign of her emotion, and the lingers were clasped together.

“Pardon me, madame,” said he, with some hesitation; “but, you see, I do not know the circumstances—­”

“You do not know why I dared not speak to my own daughter?” she said, looking up in surprise.  “Calabressa did not tell you?”

“No.  There were some hints I did not understand.”

“Nor of the reasons that forced me to comply with such an inhuman demand?  Alas! these reasons exist no longer.  I have done my duty to one whose life was sacred to me; now his death has released me from fear; I come to my daughter now.  Ah, when I fold her to my heart, what shall I say to her—­what but this?—­’Natalushka, if your mother has remained away from you all these years, it was not because she did not love you.’”

He drew his chair nearer, and took her hand.

“I perceive that you have suffered, and deeply.  But your daughter will make amends to you.  She loves you now; you are a saint to her; your portrait is her dearest possession—­”

“My portrait?” she said, looking rather bewildered.  “Her father has not forbidden her that, then?”

“It was Calabressa who gave it to her quite recently.”

She gently withdrew her hand, and glanced at the table, on which two books lay, and sighed.