'And Hedwig--does she return the feeling? Does she love you?'
'I have said that no word of explanation has passed between us.'
'Words are not needed. You know, must know, if she cares for you, or not. That is felt in every glance, in every pulse. I have felt, I have known that she did not give me her whole wealth of love, that something stood between us, dividing us. Were you that barrier? Speak; I will have certainty, be the cost to me what it may.'
Oswald cast down his eyes.
'Hedwig will hold her promise sacred, as I do,' he replied, in a low voice.
The answer was unequivocal, and to it there was no rejoinder. For the next few minutes a terrible silence reigned. No sound was heard but that of the young Count's short, quick breathing.
'So this drop is added,' he said at length. Oswald looked at him anxiously. He had been prepared for a stormy scene, for passionate reproach and fierce anger. This stony resignation, so utterly at variance with Edmund's character, roused in him amazement and alarm.
'We shall conquer and live it down,' he said, taking up the thread again. 'We have never either of us thought of any further possibility. Were Hedwig free, I could entertain no hopes. I have always felt a contempt for adventurers who owe all to their wives, having themselves nothing to offer in return. Such a position would weigh me to the ground. I could not accept it, even at the hands of the woman I love. And my career is only just beginning. For years I must go on working for myself alone, whereas you have it in your power to confer in marriage the most brilliant advantages.'
The words were spoken innocently enough. They were intended to soothe, but how contrary was the effect produced! Edmund bounded, as it were, beneath the lash. His whole manner, his voice even was changed, as he burst forth, with scathing bitterness, with fierce, scornful rage:
'You mean to envy me, perhaps, to envy me my brilliant lot in life! I am a favourite of Fortune, am I not? All the good things of this world fall to my share? You were mistaken in your prophecy, Oswald. Fortune is fickle, and we two have changed rôles. Hedwig's love, at least, I still believed to be mine; of that one possession I thought myself sure. That, too, has been taken from me, taken from me by you. Oh, the measure is full, full to overflowing!'