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Rh ed so much overpowered by conflicting emotions, that I was almost afraid to speak to her, but, at last, when I ventured to express my anxious wish to know what had happened above stairs, she said, ‘your curiosity must so far be gratified—at least I can explain to you part of this mystery—but not without making one explicit condition, to which, in the first place, you must agree solemnly. In short, you must swear to be satisfied with that which I disclose to you—not to misuse your influence over my heart, in order to bring out farther discoveries—nor even to express a desire of knowing that which I am bound to conceal from you!’—‘Well, then,—I do swear!’—‘And now, dearest Florentine,’ she continued, ‘forgive me, that, for the first time in my life, I should thus have thoughts in which you cannot share, and, for the first time, too, have looked on your mere promise as insufficient—but my father has compelled me to this course, and it was to this he alluded in that anxious tone, when we parted to-night.’—I only begged that she would come to an explanation within the prescribed limits, and at last she began:—