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Page 85
M. Ferraud heard the stir of a single chair and knew that the
great-grandson was leaving. The wall might have been transparent, so
sure was he of the smile upon Picard's face, a sinister speculating
smile. But his imagination did not pursue Breitmann, whose lips also
wore a smile, one of irony and bitterness. Neither did he hear Picard
murmur "Dupe!" nor Breitmann mutter "Fools!"
When Breitmann saw Hildegarde in the hotel gardens he did not avoid her
but stopped by her chair. She rose. She had been waiting all day for
this moment. She must speak out or suffocate with anxiety.
"Karl, what are you going to do?"
"Nothing," unsmilingly.
"You will let the admiral find and keep this money which is yours?"
Breitmann shrugged.
"You are killing me with suspense!"
"Nonsense!" briskly.
"You are contemplating violence of some order. I know it, I feel it!"
"Not so loud!" impatiently.
"You are!" she repeated, crushing her hands together.
"Well, all there remains to do is to tell the admiral. He will,
perhaps, divide with me."
"How can you be so cruel to me? It is your safety; that is all I wish
to be assured of. Oh, I am pitifully weak! I should despise you.
Take this chest of money; it is yours. Go to England, to America, and
be happy."
"Happy? Do you wish me to be happy?"
"God knows!"
"And you?" curiously.
"I have no time to ask you to consider me," with a clear pride. "I do
not wish to see you hurt. You are courting death, Karl, death."
"Who cares?"
"I care!" with a sob.
The bitterness in his face died for a space. "Hildegarde, I'm not
worth it. Forget me as some bad dream; for that is all I am or ever
shall be. Marry Cathewe; I'm not blind. He will make you happy. I
have made my bed, or rather certain statesmen have, and I must lie in
it. If I had known what I know now," with regret, "this would not have
been. But I distrusted every one, myself, too."
She understood. "Karl, had you told me all in the first place, I
should have given you that diagram without question, gladly."
"Well, I am sorry. I have been a beast. Have we not always been such,
from the first of us, down to me? Forget me!"
And with that he left her standing by the side of her chair and walked
swiftly toward the hotel. When next she realized or sensed anything
she was lying on her bed, her eyes dry and wide open. And she did not
go down to dinner, nor did she answer the various calls on her door.
Night rolled over the world, with a cool breeze driving under her
million planets. The lights in the hotel flickered out one by one, and
in the third corridor, where the adventurers were housed, only a wick,
floating in a tumbler of oil, burned dimly.
Fitzgerald had waited in the shadow for nearly an hour, and he was
growing restless and tired. All day long he had been obsessed with the
conviction that if Breitmann ever made a start it would be some time
that night. Distinctly he heard the light rattle of a carriage. It
stopped outside the gardens. He pressed closer against the wall. The
door to Breitmann's room opened gently and the man himself stepped out
cautiously.
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