I took the paper and rose to leave.
"I will take means to let you know what is done. Here, I suppose?"
I spoke curtly, for I felt strongly.
"I do not wish to hear anything. A letter here will find me, of course, but my name for the future will be Henri Frombe—Hans von Fromberg will have ceased to exist, unless you are he." So indifferent was he to the critical seriousness of the affair that he laughed as he said this, and added: "After all, then, you will not see Angele. I am grieved at that," and he held out his hand.
"I cannot take your hand, M. Frombe," I said sternly. "I remain a German. Your desertion of your family at such a juncture of need makes any friendly feeling toward you impossible on my part. You hold that any man can lightly renounce his family and country. I do not. I take the strongest view of your conduct. France profits little by her newest citizen, and the Fatherland gains by the loss of so self-satisfied a renegade. I trust that we shall not meet again."
He was a coward, and shrank and paled under the lash of my words; but he made no attempt to resent them, and I left him with a feeling of bitter contempt and disgust at his conduct.
During the whole of my long journey back to the castle I sat absorbed in close thought, mapping out my plans, recalling old memories, and rousing my wits and energies for the task which Fate had set me, and from which apparently I could not break away.