And as he regarded attentively her pale profile, clear-cut against the light, and saw a tear glistening in her eye, a passionate emotion, largely pity for this suffering creature by his side, so pathetic in her dumb resignation, took hold of him, and he drew her into his arms.
Then she murmured:
“Take me along, George!”
In amazement Borgert stared at her.
“For heaven’s sake, how did you get such thoughts? How can I do that?”
“Oh, George, you do not know. I cannot bear my life here any longer. Let me go with you, I beseech you.”
“But that is not to be dreamt of. Will there not be scandal enough when I disappear? And then take you along? Impossible.”
“In that case I shall go alone. I must leave here—I must.”
“But why all this so suddenly? What has come to you?”
Frau Leimann gave vent to her suppressed feelings by a violent fit of sobbing. “My husband has beaten me with his clenched fist—see, here are the marks!—because the bailiff had called on me. His treatment of me has become worse and worse of late, and now my hatred, my dislike of him has reached a point where I can no longer see him around me, breathe the same air he breathes; and then,—another thing,” and here she broke into weeping again, “I have no money—there is nothing with which I can pay my debts; something—some great misfortune will come—I’m sure of it, George, if I do not leave him peaceably.”