"What have you done with Gottlieb, sir?"
"Your friend, Gottlieb, is in safety behind a bundle of fagots, where he can sleep soundly. He will not leave it until he is able to follow you."
"Karl will be informed of all?"
"Unless I wish to have him hung," said the adjutant, with a diabolical expression, as Consuelo thought. "I do not wish to leave him behind us. Are you satisfied, signora?"
"I cannot prove my gratitude now, sir," said Consuelo, with a coldness, in which he sought in vain to conceal disdain; "but I hope ere long to discharge all my obligations to you honorably."
"Pardieu! you can discharge them at once," (Consuelo shrunk back with horror.) "By exhibiting something of friendship to me," added Mayer, with a tone of brutal and coarse cajolery. "You see, were I not passionately fond of music, and were you not a pretty woman, I would not violate my duty by thus enabling you to escape. Do you think I have been led to this by avarice?—Bah! I am rich enough to do without all this, and Prince Henry is not powerful enough to save me from the rope or solitary confinement, if I should be discovered. All this requires some consolation. Well, do not be proud; you know I love you; my heart is susceptible, but you need not on that account abuse my tenderness. You are not bigoted or religious; not you. You are an actress, and I venture to say, you have succeeded by having granted your favors to the managers. Pardieu! if, as they say, you sang before Marie Theresa, you know Prince Kaunitz and his boudoir. Now you have a less splendid room, but your liberty is in my hands, and that is a more precious boon than an empress's favor."
"Is this a threat, sir?" said Consuelo, pale with indignation and disgust.
"No; but it is a prayer, signora."
"I hope you don't make it a condition?"
"Not so. No, no! by no means," said Mayer with impudent irony, approaching Consuelo with open arms as he spoke.