“Do you think I would break my pledged word?” asked Helga indignantly.
“I have no doubt you would endeavour to keep it. But it is a risk I should not feel entitled to take. I repeat I cannot provide an escort for any prisoner for such a distance.”
“I would escort her,” I broke in quickly.
He turned and looked at me coldly and steadily, as he replied deliberately:
“You are not her husband yet, monsieur. And if you were,” he added, after pausing, “what greater security should I have for her return?”
“You want no more than these papers, I suppose, if she did not return?”
“If she can persuade her father to return, that will be better still. We are ready to bury the past.”
“Your objection then is not to mademoiselle’s going to find him, but only lest, having found him, she should still use these documents?”
“You have stated it precisely. We must be absolutely secured on that point.”
“Leave me to find the way then. Give me an hour and either return here or I will see you at the palace.”