"
Natalie asked neither whether he was a magician, a millionaire, or a
nabob; she only thought she was to see him, and be allowed to thank
him--nothing further.
"Will he come now?" she constantly asked of the humble and slavishly
devoted Joseph Ribas; "will he come now that his house is prepared for
his reception?"
"It is adorned only for you, princess," humbly replied Ribas. "The
count, my master, wishes for nothing but to see you in a habitation
worthy of you!"
But what was this luxury, what cared she for these treasures the value
of which she was incapable of estimating, and which were indifferent to
her? She who had no conception of wealth or of money?--she, who knew
not that there was poverty in the world, and who, raised in an Eden
separated from the world, had no idea that hunger had ever made its
appearance within it--she knew only the sorrows of the happy, the
deprivations of the rich; she had never had either to struggle against
real misfortune or to experience real want and deprivation.
Now, indeed, a deeper sorrow had entered into her life; she had lost
her beloved paternal friend, Count Paulo; and Carlo, also, had been torn
from her! That was certainly a more profound sorrow, and she had wept
much for both of them,--but yet that was no real misfortune.
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