‘Give it to me,’ he tried to say, and he held out his hand to receive it.
Without another word Hilda drew the sealed envelope from the bosom of her frock and gave it to him, not daring to look at him. Then she rose and would have left him alone, but with one hand he caught hers and held her back.
‘Together, dear,’ he almost whispered.
Greif was stunned and shocked. It seemed as though the dead man had risen from his grave to deliver his message himself, to tell his own story and reveal his own secret. With trembling fingers Greif turned the envelope over and over, scarcely able to read the superscription at first, then glancing curiously at the impress on the seal, doubting, as Hilda had doubted, that it was perhaps not genuine. But his memory told him the truth. He knew the paper well, and as trivial details come before the mind in the most appalling moments of life, so he remembered instantly the whole appearance of the library at Greifenstein, the table with the huge old silver inkstand, the rack that had held that very writing paper, the heavy, clumsy seal that had sealed that envelope, and which always lay beside the blotter and next to the sealing wax. It all came back to him so vividly that, even if the letter had been a forgery, he would have believed it genuine, from the mere force of the associations it evoked. He held it in his hands and hesitated.
Within that narrow bit of folded paper was contained the secret of his father’s death, of his mother’s sudden end, of Rieseneck’s suicide. He had not a doubt of it, though he had not realised it at first. A sort of mist veiled his eyes and darkened the glorious day. It seemed so strange that such a poor scrap of perishable rag should hold the key to so great a mystery, the solution to such a fearful question. Within that cover was a sheet of paper and on it he should see characters traced in a familiar hand. He closed his eyes and fancied that he already saw the writing, for he had often imagined how it would look, during his long search. Again and again in his dreams, he had laid his hand upon that envelope, and had broken the seal and had read those short words of tender farewell which he felt must have been in his father’s heart at the supreme moment. And now he held the reality and yet he shut out the light of day in order to call up the fancy that had so often consoled his imagination. But the reality was not one with the dreamland shadow. In the one there had been only words of love and sad regret, in this real letter was written the secret whose effects had so nearly ruined his life, a secret so terrible, that had Hilda guessed it she would have thrust the cruel message from the dead into the flames, rather than allow it to live and stab Greif to the heart.
Hilda did not understand his hesitation, though she knew as well as he himself that the yet unread words contained the solution of the great problem. But she sat patiently by his side, her white hand resting on his shoulder, her anxious face turned towards his, her lips already parted, as though but awaiting her breath to speak words of consolation for the suffering that had not yet begun.
Greif roused himself, as though ashamed of the emotion he had shown, though indeed he had seemed outwardly calm enough. He pressed his lips together and ran his finger through the upper side of the envelope, so as not to break the seal. His hands did not tremble any longer, and with the action all his dreams vanished in the broad light of the summer morning. Carefully he withdrew the sheet and spread it out.
‘Shall I go, sweetheart? Would you rather be alone?’ Hilda asked once more.
‘No, darling. Read it with me—let us read it together,’ he answered quietly, as though he were speaking in some sacred presence.
Hilda bent her golden head forward until it was close to his, and their cheeks touched as they read together the contents.