Hildegarde seemed greatly embarrassed. “If you would only promise not to say anything to make——”
“I really do not understand you,” cried Hamilton, impatiently.
“When he has been here for a minute or two,” she said, quickly, “go for Crescenz and Madame Lustig, say they must come here—must remain——” Her cousin entered the room while she was speaking.
“I am sorry to interrupt you, my dear Hildegarde,” he said, with a stiff and evidently forced smile, “but I come to take leave——”
“Take leave! what do you mean?”
“I am to be executed to-morrow, you know.”
“Ah!—so——”
“It is particularly kind of you and Crescenz to put on mourning for me beforehand,” he continued, glancing gravely at her black dress.
“Oscar, how can you talk so?” said Hildegarde, reproachfully; “such jesting is, to-day, particularly ill-timed.”
“By heaven, I am not jesting. I never was less disposed to mirth than at this moment,” he answered, falling heavily into a chair, and drawing his handkerchief across his forehead.