Constance was pacing up and down the room, with a face which showed her entire conviction of the truth, and wringing her hands in anguish. Suddenly she threw herself upon her knees in a corner of the room, and seemed to pour forth her heart in agonized prayer. I observed that where she knelt a small ivory crucifix was attached to the wall, and that from time to time she separated her hands to make the sign of the Cross, and then clasped them again in fervent prayer. Later I learned, by chance, that Constance, when in Italy, had returned to the Catholic church, the faith of her mother. Whatever spiritual peace she may have afterwards found, after confession and long penance, as the abbess of a Roman convent, at this moment her prayers seemed to be unavailing. She arose from the crucifix only to fall at my feet, to clasp my knees, and to beg me to avert the frightful consequences of what she had done. I raised her, saying that I had already done all that was in my power, and that I had come to her to learn if she could do nothing.
"There is but one means," she said; "and that is to prevail if possible upon Herr Lenz to quit the field--to leave here immediately."
"How can we do that? The man is evidently your tool, the tool of your revenge; and it is no longer in your control--or do you think it is?"
"It may be, it may be," she said, in a low hurried tone. "He knows that I do not love him; he knows about Carl, and that has made him furious; but I know that he loves me, and that for the prize of my hand, which I have always refused him, he would consent to anything--to anything! Am I not fair enough, George, for a man to consent to anything for my sake?"
She threw back with trembling hands the dark lustrous masses of hair from either side of her face, and smiled upon me. I have only once in my life seen such a face, and that was when, in the Glyptothek at Munich, I saw the Rondanini Medusa, and then the world-celebrated mask seemed to me but a weak copy.
"Come!" I said. She was about to start just as she was: I wrapped her in a cloak of furs which she had probably worn from the theatre, and which was lying on the floor. We left the house and drove to the lodging of Herr von Sommer. The house was closed. Some minutes passed before our repeated knocking brought the porter to the door.
"Herr von Sommer set out half an hour ago."
"Do you know where he was going?"
"He did not say, further than that he would not be back for several days."
"Is no one in the house that can give further information?"