Wilfrid, the weakest of human beings where women were involved with him, did one of the hardest things which can task a young man's fortitude: he looked his superior in the face, and neither blenched, nor frowned, nor spoke.
Ammiani spoke for him. “There is no pay given in our ranks.”
“The licence to rob is supposed to be an equivalent,” said the count.
Countess d'Isorella herself came downstairs, with profuse apologies for the absence of all her male domestics, and many delicate dimples about her mouth in uttering them. Her look at Ammiani struck Wilfrid as having a peculiar burden either of meaning or of passion in it. The count grimaced angrily when he heard that his sister Lena was not yet able to bear the fatigue of a walk to the citadel. “I fear you must all be my guests, for an hour at least,” said the countess.
Wilfrid was left pacing the hall. He thought he had never beheld so splendid a person, or one so subjugatingly gracious. Her speech and manner poured oil on the uncivil Austrian nobleman. What perchance had stricken Lena?
He guessed; and guessed it rightly. A folded scrap of paper signed by the Countess of Lenkenstein was brought to him.
It said:—“Are you making common cause with the rebels? Reply. One asks who should be told.”
He wrote:—“I am an outcast of the army. I fight as a volunteer with the K. K. troops. Could I abandon them in their peril?”
The touch of sentiment he appended for Lena's comfort. He was too strongly impressed by the new vision of beauty in the house for his imagination to be flushed by the romantic posture of his devotion to a trailing flag.
No other message was delivered. Ammiani presently descended and obtained a guard from the barricade; word was sent on to the barricades in advance toward the citadel. Wilfrid stood aside as Count Lenkenstein led the ladies to the door, bearing Lena on his arm. She passed her lover veiled. The count said, “You follow.” He used the menial second person plural of German, and repeated it peremptorily.