“Have you never seen that face before? It is that of Rudolf, my misguided son, of whom you must have heard. Poor boy! Ten years have rolled by since his death.”
Admirably cool this mother; she at least was not to be “squeezed” offhand. But my watched-for chance had come.
“My dear Mrs. Hartmann, he is alive, and you know it. Two days ago he was in this very house.” I had drawn my bow at a venture, but the shaft served me well. The coup was decisive. The old lady’s face betrayed complete discomfiture mingled with obvious signs of alarm. She made no attempt to contradict me. “What!” she stammered out at length. “Are you also in the secret? Are you, too, one of——”
“No,” I replied bluntly, anticipating her meaning. “I have never met your son, though I know something perhaps of his movements. But believe me you may trust me as you would yourself. He was a dynamitard, but he is your son, and that is enough for me. Rest assured of my silence.”
Her distress visibly abated.
“Thanks, many thanks. I feel I can rely on you—even to lend him a helping hand should the time ever come. Ah! he is a changed man, an entirely changed man. A bright future may await him even now across the sea. But this visit to me—so sudden, so brief—I fear lest it may cost him dear. You, a private man, have found it out; why may not the lynx-eyed police also? It is terrible, this suspense. How can I be sure that he is safe at this moment?”
“Oh, as to that, happily I can reassure you. Your son is safe enough—nay, as safe as the most anxious mother could desire. How or where I cannot say, but I have it on the best possible authority. In fact, only last night I heard as much from the lips of one who should surely know—Michael Schwartz himself!”
“That evil genius! Is he too in London? Ah! if he is content, all is well. No tigress ever watched better over her cub than Schwartz over my son. Would his likings had blown elsewhere! That man was my son’s tutor in vice. But for him Rudolf might have been an honour to his country. And what is he now? An outlaw, in the shadow of the gallows,”—and she hid her face in her handkerchief and wept bitterly. I waited patiently till the tempest was over, putting in a soothing phrase here and there and painting black white with the zeal of a skilful casuist. One need not be too scrupulous when sufferers such as this are concerned.
“He has told you nothing of his movements?” I remarked cautiously.
“Nothing, except that he was leaving shortly for Hamburg, whence he was to proceed immediately to New York. Some months later on I may join him there, but for the present all is uncertain.” One more deception of Hartmann’s, but a kindly one; obviously it was better not to disturb the illusions which the old lady thus fondly cherished—her reformed son, his prospective honourable life, the vision of a lasting reunion abroad. Were she to suspect that mischief was again being plotted by the anarchist, what a cruel scattering of her hopes would follow!