"Colonel Falkenried was a near friend of my father's and visited our house frequently, although I had never heard of his son. I had considered the Colonel childless until that awful hour at Rodeck, the day my husband died. Then I learned the truth, and was a witness of a meeting between father and son."
The Prince breathed a sigh of relief at this explanation, which dispelled the disastrous thought just dawning upon him.
"I understand your concern, then," he replied. "Colonel Falkenried is, indeed, to be pitied."
"He only?" asked Adelaide, struck by the harsh tone of the last words. "And your friend?"
"I have no friend--I have lost him!" cried Egon, with passionate pain. "What he confessed to me two days ago opened an abyss between us, and what I know now parts us forever."
"You judge the misdemeanor of a seventeen-year-old lad very severely. He must have been only a boy then."
A deep reproach lay in the words of the young widow; but the Prince shook his head vehemently.
"I do not speak of that flight and that breaking of his word, although they weigh heavily with the son of an officer. But what I heard yesterday--I see you do not yet know the worst, gracious lady, and how should you? Spare me this report."
Adelaide had turned pale, and her eyes, full of fear, hung fixed upon the speaker.