Elsa and Andor had both remained quite still after Klara left them; yet Elsa—like all simple creatures who feel acutely—was longing to run and let the far horizon, the distant unknown land, wrap and enfold her while she thought things out for herself, for indeed this real world—the world of men and women, of passions and hatred and love—was nothing but a huge and cruel puzzle. She longed for solitude—the solitude which the plains can offer in such absolute completeness—because her heart was heavy and she felt that if she were all alone she might ease the weight on her heart in a comforting flow of tears.
But this would not have been kind to Andor. She could not leave him now, when he looked so broken down with sorrow and misery and doubt. So, after a little while, when she felt that if she spoke her voice would be quite steady, she said gently:
"It is not all true, is it, Andor?"
She could not—she would not believe it all true—not in the way that Klara had put it before her, with all its horrible details of callousness and cowardice. For more years than she could remember she had loved and trusted Andor—she had known his simple, loyal nature, his kind and gentle ways—a few spiteful words from a jealous woman were not likely to tear down in a moment the solid edifice of her affection and her confidence. True! his silence had told her something that was a bitter truth; his passionate rage against Klara had been like a cruel stab right into her heart—but even then she wanted the confirmation which could only come from his own lips—and for this she waited when she asked him, quite simply, altogether trustingly:
"It is not true, is it?"
Nor did it occur to Andor to lie to her about it all; the thought of denial never for one moment entered his head. The fatalism peculiar to this Oriental race made the man scorn to shield himself behind a lie. Béla was now for ever silent; the young Count would scorn to speak! His own protestations in the ear of this loving, simple-minded girl, against the accusations of a woman of the despised race—jealous, bitter, avowedly half-crazy—needed only to be uttered in order to be whole-heartedly believed. But even the temptation to pursue such a course never assailed his soul. With the limitless sky above him, the vast immensity of the plains stretching out unbroken far away, with the land under his feet and the scent of the maize-stubble in his nostrils, he was too proud of himself as a man to stoop to such a lie.
So when Elsa spoke to him and asked him that one straight and firm question, he raised his head and looked straight into her tear-dimmed eyes.
"What, Elsa?" he asked quietly.
"That you let Béla go to his death—just like that—as Klara said . . . that is not all true, is it?"
And as she returned his look—fearlessly and trustfully—she knew that the question which she had thus put to him was really an affirmation of what she felt must be the truth. But already Andor had raised his voice in hot and passionate protest.