With that, she, too, left the room.

What now?

Lilly stared into s.p.a.ce. The remnants of the precipitate meal littered the table; the dark carved furniture cast black-edged rays from out of the room's wintry twilight; the bra.s.s chandeliers gleamed palely. All was as usual, and yet nothing was there, nothing but an awful, all-devouring void, an abyss which drew her into its bosom with the enticements of grappling hooks and huge tongs.

She stepped to the window and looked out apathetically.

The bare branches swayed in the wind, the ivy on the railing fluttered, even the arched stalks of the rose bushes, the heads of which the gardener had secured under heaps of earth, trembled and quivered this way and that. The world was writhing in the clutch of winter. The only still things were the leaves lying on the thin coating of snow which covered the ground; but the leaves were dead already.

What now?

If _that_ could happen, then the very earth beneath her feet gave way; then there was no hope, no rising to loftier heights, no strength, and no fidelity; then you might as well throw yourself down beside the leaves out there and die.

But before that--what?

Dishes rattled behind her. No one had rung for the maid, but she had come of her own accord and was helping Ferdinand clear the table.

Lilly thought of Katie and that other creature in whose arms he had made mock of her and her faith in him.

She dragged her torpid legs up the steps to the rooms where she felt at home. In pa.s.sing the colonel's door, she caught the sound of his tread as he fairly ran to and fro.

She experienced not the faintest fear of him.

"Let him run, if he wants to," she thought.

When in her own room, she heard him give orders to have the carriage brought around immediately.

"For all I care, he may stay here."

She stepped out on the balcony.

The iciness benumbing her neck crept into her arms and spread down to her very finger tips.

There sat Walter, as always in his free time after dinner, completely absorbed in the great encyclopedia of agriculture, so full of zeal for study that every now and then he would pa.s.s his hand through his hair in a preoccupied way and without looking up--he hadn't so much time to spare, Heavens! no!--he would flick the ashes from his cigarette into a flower pot.

In the face of this infamous game, which he played for the sole purpose of deceiving her, Lilly was seized by a wild, infuriated desire to denounce him, which completely robbed her of her senses. A stinging and p.r.i.c.king lifted her paralysed arms. The iciness gave way to a painful fever, which throbbed in her temples, and hung a red curtain before her eyes.

She saw nothing, heard nothing.

She rushed down the staircase, tore open the garden door, leapt down the stone steps, and ran at full speed straight across the lawn to the lodge.

Whether someone spied her or not she did not care.

The door to his room banged against the wall.

She had not stopped to knock.

A rank, pungent smell, as in a menagerie, a.s.sailed her nostrils.

There he was, sitting at the window. He jumped to his feet. The grey daylight glided over his head.

"He's had his hair cut brush fashion again," thought Lilly. "The dissolute life he's living demands it; the elegance of the dives demands it."

"Good Lord!" he said, crumbling his burning cigarette between his fingers, "a pretty howdy-do!"

"Why--? Why did you--?" she screamed at him. "You're a blackguard! Your word's not to be trusted! You're a liar!"

"Confound it!" he said, and looked about helplessly. "_How_ will my lady get out of this mess?"

"You broke your promise--the most sacred bond uniting us.

You--you--threw it away on a barmaid--a barmaid, a creature who would hang herself on anybody's neck for a couple of pennies. You're a vulgar profligate! You're not worth a woman's having tried to save you--you don't _want_ to be saved--you _want_ to go to the bad--"

"All very good and fine," he said, "and probably very saddening and incontrovertible truths; but will my lady please explain how she expects to get out of here?"

"I don't know anything I am more indifferent about," she cried. "I came for you to give me an account of yourself. I am asking you to answer me--immediately--here--now--on the spot."

"Certainly, my lady, I will without fail. But first--d.a.m.n it! h.e.l.l! Get away from the window!"

He cast a sharp, all-embracing glance at the castle. Nothing suspicious to be detected at that moment, at least.

Alarmed by his snarling at her in that way, Lilly fled into the interior of the room, which was low, dark, and ill furnished. Here the vile animal smell was still stronger. From where it came was made clear to her the next instant. As she approached the rear wall, something suddenly snapped at her foot, and two little circular torches gleamed up at her wickedly.

"Down, Tommy!" called Von Prell, while Lilly recoiled with an exclamation of fright.

So that was Tommy, the other member of the triple alliance.

Lilly leaned against the arm of the old spindle-legged sofa. Its worn springs squeaked under her pressure and p.r.i.c.ked her thumbs, and the thought flashed into her mind:

"What am I doing here? What is it all to me?"

Von Prell the while stepped from door to door listening.

"If that old Leichtweg had happened to be in the next room," he said, "we should be dying a dog's death. But if you go this instant, the front way, into the courtyard, they might suppose you had come to ask something, and perhaps we can patch it up still."

All Lilly perceived in his words was a sly attempt at evasion, and a fresh flood of indignation overwhelmed her.

"First justify yourself," she cried. "Until you do, I won't go this way, or that way, or the other way."

To enforce her resolve she dropped down on the screeching sofa, which was covered with a dirty grey horseblanket folded into several thicknesses for protection against the sharp points of the springs.

He was compelled to yield.

"Very well, then, look here--a fellow's a human being, isn't he? And if he's given the go-by in that common way--"

"Common way?" faltered Lilly. "What was common in my letter? Didn't I tear my heart out and throw it at your feet, and didn't Miss von Schwertfeger--?"

She could not continue. Wrath and despair choked her utterance.