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MARIA FELICIA

justified in thinking and feeling as I do, or whether I was overloaded with wealth and luxury, as you say, willful or over-sensitive, as I so often think, or worn out by that neverceasing storm within me where boisterous joy and painful longing so quickly alternate. But I did not succeed in having a confidential conversation with him. Oh, papa, will you ever come to me again with something besides a reprimand for my ungratefulness?”

“I am beginning to-day.”

“Really?”

“I have said that I wish to convince myself whether you love me as well as you sometimes assure me—as a daughter should love her father.”

“How can I prove it to you? Speak!”

“By getting ready, without the usual opposition, for a trip.”

“Where do you intend to take me so suddenly?”

“I will take you to your godmother.”

“Papa, you are forgetting that I have begged you many times not to take me there.”