Page:H.M. The Patrioteer.djvu/330

322

He snapped: "My honour—" but stopped suddenly. Her expression, which had never seemed to him so eloquent, seemed to accuse and to mock him at the same time. In confusion he went to the door. Here it dawned on him what he ought to have done.

"At all events, as your brother and a man of honour, I will, of course, do my duty. Meanwhile I expect you to impose upon yourself the utmost reserve." With a glance at the wash-jug, from which there was still a smell:

"Your word of honour!"

"Leave me alone," said Emma. Then Diederich came back.

"You do not seem to be aware of the seriousness of the situation. If what I fear is true, you have—"

"It is true," said Emma.

"Then you have not only risked your own existence, at least socially, but you have covered a whole family with shame."

"That is also possible," said Emma.

He was startled and was preparing to express his loathing of such cynicism, but it was too plain from Emma's face all that she had been through and had left behind her as useless.

Diederich shuddered at the superiority of her desperation. He felt as if certain artificial springs had snapped inside him. His legs trembled, he sat down, and managed to say: "Can't you just tell me—I will also—" He looked at Emma's appearance and the word pardon stuck in his throat. "I will help you," he said. "How can you make that right?" she answered wearily, as she leant against the wall.

He looked down in front of him. "Of course, you must give me some information, I mean, about certain details. I presume this has gone on since your riding-lessons?"

She allowed him to make further suppositions, which she neither confirmed nor denied. But when he raised his eyes to her, her lips were softly parted and she was gazing at him in wonder. He understood that she was wondering how he was relieving her of so much she had borne alone, merely