“If she should go, her mother will not feel any anxiety about her,” returned Fräulein Hirsch.
“If, then, some young man she meets in the street makes love to her and they run away together, she will not be pursued by her relatives.”
Fräulein Hirsch’s flat mouth looked rather malicious.
“Her mother is too busy to pursue her, and there is no one else—unless it were Lord Coombe, who is said to want her himself.”
Von Hillern shrugged his fine shoulders.
“At his age! After the mother! That is like an Englishman!”
Upon this, Fräulein Hirsch drew a step nearer and fixed her eyes upon his, as she had never had the joy of fixing them before in her life. She dared it now because she had an interesting story to tell him which he would like to hear. It was like an Englishman. Lord Coombe had the character of being one of the worst among them, but was too subtle and clever to openly offend people. It was actually said that he was educating the girl and keeping her in seclusion and that it was probably his colossal intention to marry her when she was old enough. He had no heir of his own—and he must have beauty and innocence. Innocence and beauty his viciousness would have.
“Pah!” exclaimed von Hillern. “It is youth which requires such things—and takes them. That is all imbecile London gossip. No, he would not run after her if she ran away. He is a proud man and he knows he would be laughed at. And he could not get her back from a young man—who was her lover.”
Her lover! How it thrilled the burning heart her poor, flat chest panted above. With what triumphant knowledge of such things he said it.
“No, he could not,” she answered, her eyes still on his. “No one could.”