You are
beautiful, they tell me; and I desired to look at you."
He took the one lamp that showed the discomfort and sordidness of his
abode, and approaching Zenobia held it up, so as to gain the more
perfect view of her, from top to toe. So obscure was the chamber,
that you could see the reflection of her diamonds thrown upon the
dingy wall, and flickering with the rise and fall of Zenobia's breath.
It was the splendor of those jewels on her neck, like lamps that
burn before some fair temple, and the jewelled flower in her hair,
more than the murky, yellow light, that helped him to see her beauty.
But he beheld it, and grew proud at heart; his own figure, in spite
of his mean habiliments, assumed an air of state and grandeur.
"It is well," cried old Moodie. "Keep your wealth. You are right
worthy of it. Keep it, therefore, but with one condition only."
Zenobia thought the old man beside himself, and was moved with pity.
"Have you none to care for you?" asked she. "No daughter?--no
kind-hearted neighbor?--no means of procuring the attendance which
you need? Tell me once again, can I do nothing for you?"
"Nothing," he replied. "I have beheld what I wished. Now leave me.
Linger not a moment longer, or I may be tempted to say what would
bring a cloud over that queenly brow. Keep all your wealth, but with
only this one condition: Be kind--be no less kind than sisters
are--to my poor Priscilla!"
And, it may be, after Zenobia withdrew, Fauntleroy paced his gloomy
chamber, and communed with himself as follows,--or, at all events, it
is the only solution which I can offer of the enigma presented in his
character:--"I am unchanged,--the same man as of yore!" said he.
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