"The Countess flung herself at his feet. His face, working with the
last emotions of life, was almost hideous to see.

"'Mercy! mercy!' she cried aloud, shedding a torrent of tears.

"'Have you shown me any pity?' he asked. 'I allowed you to squander
your own money, and now do you mean to squander my fortune, too, and
ruin my son?'

"'Ah! well, yes, have no pity for me, be merciless to me!' she cried.
'But the children? Condemn your widow to live in a convent; I will
obey you; I will do anything, anything that you bid me, to expiate the
wrong I have done you, if that so the children may be happy! The
children! Oh, the children!'

"'I have only one child,' said the Count, stretching out a wasted
arm, in his despair, towards his son.

"'Pardon a penitent woman, a penitent woman! . . .' wailed the
Countess, her arms about her husband's damp feet. She could not speak
for sobbing; vague, incoherent sounds broke from her parched throat.

"'You dare to talk of penitence after all that you said to Ernest!'
exclaimed the dying man, shaking off the Countess, who lay groveling
over his feet.--'You turn me to ice!' he added, and there was
something appalling in the indifference with which he uttered the
words. 'You have been a bad daughter; you have been a bad wife; you
will be a bad mother.'