At the mention of the name, she started and would have drawn away from me had I let her.
“From him? But you have been a prisoner?”
“No, never in any real danger of being one.”
“You are free now?” she cried, looking at me curiously.
“Yes, of course.”
She laughed then, and backed out of my arms.
“Then my sympathy was wasted; and my remorse——”
“It was a very sweet remorse, Helga,” I said, as she left the sentence unfinished.
“I thought you had been arrested, and charged with Vastic’s murder; that I had brought you to ruin and shame. Oh, it was unendurable.”
“And if you had known?” I asked, with a glance she read. “Was it only remorse?”