There was a silence. The man looked at him, sober enough now, in amazement. The girl's hands were clasped together. She was watching the man—her man. She crept to his side, her arm was around his neck.
"Dear Paul," she whispered, "think! Think how sweet life might be. There is so much truth in all this. I know little of politics, but think of the hard times we have lived through. Think how glorious to have you ride in your automobile to the offices of your newspaper, to see you pass into the editor's sanctum instead of waiting outside, to have me call for you, perhaps, and take you out to lunch—no, never at Drevel's any more—at the Café de Paris, or Henry's, or Paillard's, or out in the Bois! And the excursions, dear Paul. Think of them! The country—how we both love the country! You remember when we first went out together to the little town on the river, where no one ever seemed to have come from Paris before? How sleepy and quiet the long afternoon, when we lay in the grass and heard the birds sing, and the murmur of the river, and we had only a few francs for our dinner, and we had to leave the train and walk that last four miles because you had drunk one more bock. Dear Paul, think what life might be if one were really rich!"
The man's eyes flashed.
"It is true," he muttered. "All my life I have been a straggler."
"You have done your genius an ill turn, my friend," Herr Freudenberg said slowly. "No man can be at his best who knows care. I, Prince Falkenberg, I promise you that it is the truth which I have spoken, the truth which I shall show you. You lose no shadow of honor or self-respect. There will come a day when the millions of readers whom you shall influence will say to themselves—'Paul Jesen, he is the man who saw the truth. It is he who has saved France.' You accept?"
"Monsieur le Prince," Susanne cried, "he accepts!"
Jesen rose to his feet. He had become a little unsteady again. He struck the table with his fist.
"I accept!" he declared.