The question seemed to trouble her considerably. "If I tell you all about it, will you help us?"
"I don't suppose I can do anything, but I'll try."
"You may be able to find out the truth; and that will help, for we should know how to get to work. I think I know it, though, and I believe it's all the fault of a man who pesters her incessantly. He's a horrid beast, named Count von Erstein;" and she told me he was a wealthy Jew who had great influence with the Government; had tried and was still trying to get Nessa denounced as a spy and sent to one of the concentration camps; dogged her everywhere and set spies to watch her; had spread all manner of lying reports about her; and was intriguing in every possible way against her for his own infamous ends.
My blood boiled as I listened to all this, but I had to smother my rage sufficiently to assume just a conventional amount of indignation in keeping with Lassen's character. "An ugly story," I muttered.
"It doesn't seem to have roused you very much," she replied, her eyes flashing indignantly. "I should have thought it would have fired the blood of any ordinary man. It makes me feel that I could kill him; but then I'm only a woman."
It was clear that my manner was Lassenly enough, so I let it pass. "I'm curious to see the man."
"If he had his deserts, you'd see him in prison; but he's probably with Nessa and Lottchen now. He always hangs about near the house at this time, when they go for their walk. That was the meaning of the child's coming in just now. I generally go with them. Do you feel well enough to come out and see?"
After a little sham hesitation I agreed, and she went off to get ready, leaving me able to work off some of my rage alone. It was in all truth an ugly story, and, what was worse, threatened to make it very difficult to get Nessa away. No doubt it was abominably stupid of me, but until that moment I had never considered the practical means of getting her out of Berlin.
I had rushed off with the idea of finding out the truth about her in order to relieve her mother's anxiety, and somewhere at the back of my head was the idea that Jimmy's friend at the American Embassy would help me to do the rest.
But that was knocked on the head if this beast of a Jew had sufficient influence with his Government to block the way. And that he had considerable influence, Rosa's story left no doubt. She certainly could not get away openly, without permission from the authorities and a passport and all the rest of it; and it looked like a thousand to one chance against any such things being forthcoming.