Pepita fell weeping into his arms, her slender form convulsed with emotion.
"Why must you? Can you not fly with me? What prevents you from being mine? Let us go and be united in the little church where I saw you first."
"Because I could not do you such injustice. You have your father far away in America. You might offend him."
"I mean--he would allow me to do any thing I liked, and glory in it, because I did it. He would chuckle over it for a month."
"Pepita, do you love him better than me?"
"No, but if I leave him so it would break his heart. He will think I am ruined. He will declare a vendetta against you, and follow you to the end of the world."
"Not now? And when will there be? Can it be possible that you would give me up? Then I would not give you up! If you do not love me I must love you."
"Forgive," said Dick, penitently. "Perhaps I am too sudden. If I come back again in two or three months will you be as hardhearted as you are now?"
"Hard-hearted!" sighed Pepita, tearfully. "You should not reproach me. My troubles are more than I can bear. It is no slight thing that you ask."
"Will waiting soften you? Will it make any difference? If I came for you--"
"You must not leave me so," said Pepita, reproachfully. "I will tell you all. You will understand me better. Listen. My family is noble."
"Noble!" cried Dick, thunderstruck. He had certainly always thought her astonishingly lady--like for a peasant girl, but attributed this to the superior refinement of the Italian race.
"Yes, noble," said Pepita, proudly. "We seem now only poor peasants. Yet once we were rich and powerful. My grandfather lost all in the wars in the time of Napoleon, and only left his descendants an honorable name. Alas! honor and titles are worth but little when one is poor. My brother Luigi is the Count di Gianti."
"Yes," said Pepita, smiling at last, and happy at the change that showed itself in Dick. "I am the Countess Pepita di Gianti. Can you understand now my dear Luigi's high sense of honor and the fury that he felt when he thought that you intended an insult? Our poverty, which we can not escape, chafes him sorely. If I were to desert him thus suddenly it would kill him."
"Oh, Pepita! if waiting will win you I will wait for years. Is there any hope?"