"Hoped what?"
"That I could help you to be strong enough to do the only right thing.
And you kill my hope by thinking only of yourself. I would have had you act from the higher motive; but if you will not, the fault is not mine. You force me to say what must be said. Decide as you will, it can make no difference. I can never be to you what you wish: and what, were things other than they are, I would wish with my whole heart. But I could have been your friend--and that you make impossible."
"Christabel!"
"I mean it. I could never be the friend of a man who would set a woman above his duty and his honour, even though that woman were myself. I thought so much better of you."
"You are hard and unjust to me," he cried.
"No no. I am hard to myself, but only just to you. But let it be as you will."
He rose and began to pace the room.
"You had better go. I have failed with you; and failing, must lose all I had wished to win--my own purpose and all. I shall not see you again. You have made it impossible. I shall leave Pesth to-morrow--with all my efforts failed."
"No," he burst out almost violently, stopping close and facing me. "If you go, you know how it will be with me."
I looked at him firmly, and after a pause said in a deliberate tone: "If you cannot rise to the higher life, what matters to your country if you fall to the lower. And as with your country, so with me."
The words cut him till he winced as in pain, and dropped again into a seat.
"Can you say that--to me?"
My heart was wrung at the sight of his anguish, but I would not let him see it. "You had better go--please," I said; for the silence became intolerable.
He paid no heed to my words, but sat on and on in this att.i.tude of dejected despair; and when after the long silence he looked up his face was grey with the struggle, so that I dared not look into his eyes for fear my resolve would be broken and I should yield. For firm as my words had been, my heart was all aching and pleading to do what he wished.
"You need not turn your eyes from me, Christabel," he said, a little unsteady in tone. "You have beaten me. It shall be as you say; although I would rather die than go back to the desert. Pray G.o.d the victory will cost you less than it costs me to yield."
I think he could read in my eyes what the cost was likely to be to me: I am sure my heart was speaking through them in the moment while my tongue could find no words.
"I knew you would be true to yourself," I said at length.
"No, anything but that. No credit to me. I only yield because to resist means your abandonment of what you hold so dear. That must not be in any case."
"Whatever the reason, your decision is right. Your country----"
"No, that has nothing to do with it. Less than nothing, indeed. You and I must at least see the truth clearly. I have no sympathy with the Patriot movement. I have never had. That has always been the cause of dispute with my family. I hold it all to be a huge mistake and folly.
I am doing this for you--and you only. Now, more than ever, I shall hate the cause; for it has helped to rob me of--you."
I had no answer to that--indeed, what answer could I have made except to pour out some of the feelings that filled my heart, and thus have made things harder for us both.
He sat a moment, as if waiting for me to speak, then sighed wearily and rose. "I had better go now, as you said. I suppose now you will let me see you again."
"Of course. To-morrow. Meanwhile, until I do see you, I wish you to go somewhere and not show yourself."
"All places are alike to me--again," he replied, with dreary indifference.
"I wish you to go and stay with Colonel Katona, and stay in his house until I send to you."
"Colonel Katona! Is he here? Why?"
"His daughter is my friend. It was he who came to the window to-night, seeking news of her."
"Has he a daughter? I didn"t know. But why look for her here of all places in the world?"
"I will tell you the story another time. It is mixed up now with mine.
But I do not wish you to speak of her to her father."
"She is nothing to me; I can promise that easily enough."
I touched the bell, and told James Perry to have the carriage brought at once to the door.
"When shall I see you? To-morrow, really? You know the danger."
"That danger is past," I said, firmly.
"You have more confidence in me than I have."
"After to-night I shall never falter in that confidence."
"I thank you for that, Christabel, I shall try;" and he smiled. As he withdrew his eyes they fell upon the wisp of ribbon lying on the table.
He picked it up, gazed at it, then raised it to his lips and laid it again on the table. "You still wish this to be destroyed?" he asked, keeping his gaze averted.
Simple as were the words and the act, I could not find an answer on the instant. "It is best so," I murmured at length.
"Very well," and he turned away. "You are always right. Of course, it"s only--folly and--and weakness."
We heard the carriage drive to the door then. He started and held out his hand; then as if with a sudden thought, he said; "I had forgotten about you. I am so self-wrapped, you see. What are you going to do?"
"I shall stay here to-night."
"Is it safe, do you think?"
"I have my servants here."
"Besides, you are so fearless yourself. Good-night. It is all so strange. I feel as if I should never see you again. And I suppose in a way that"s true. As things are to be in the future, it won"t be you, in one sense. You said there were two Karls--and now there are to be two Christabels. That sounds like a bad joke, but it feels much more like a sorry tragedy;" and he sighed heavily.
He went out then to the carriage, and I to fetch Colonel Katona to join him.
When they had driven off I went back into the room and sat down feeling dreary and anguish-sick. I was tired out, I told myself; but no bodily weariness could account for the ache in my heart. I had succeeded in all far beyond my expectations; had won my victory with Karl; I was almost within sight of the goal which had seemed impossible of attainment only a few days before. I had every reason to rejoice and be glad; and yet I laid my head on my arms on the table feeling more desolate, sorrow-laden, and solitary than ever in all my life before.
My servant roused me.
"What is it, James?"
"Is there anything I can do for you, miss? I knocked five times before you heard me. Can I get you something?"