A look was her only answer.
"This is but a gloomy place," continued he, glancing round. "You must be wretched here?"
"Wretched! I can sometimes see you ride past in the distance."
The emperor gazed on the soft dark eyes, which filled with large bright tears as they gazed upon his own.
"Why should we not be happy?" said he; "it is of no use dwelling on what has been. Why should we part?"
"We have never parted, my lord," replied Nourmahal. "Do you think your image could pass from the heart where it had once been shrined?"
The next day saw Nourmahal on a throne; Jehanghire at her side; the court at her feet. But there was a troubled shadow in the depths of those midnight eyes; and scorn curved the small red lip, if for a moment its settled smile passed away. There was but one thought in her heart, half triumph, half bitterness.
"I have won him, and shall keep him; for to his weak temper habit will be as fetters of iron. I have won him—but how? He remembered not the earnest and devoted love of the young heart, which was his, and his only. Even my beauty failed to influence his selfish carelessness: but he is mine by a more potent spell. Love may be given in vain,
