"You do not perhaps feel it so," said Lenore, "but you are sacrificing for us far more than we deserve. We are ungrateful to you; you would be happier elsewhere."
She placed herself at the window, and wept bitterly.
Anton tried to soothe her. "If," said he, "you allude to the hasty expressions of the baron, you need not pity me on that account. You know what we have formerly said on that subject."
"It is not that alone," cried Lenore, weeping.
Anton knew as well as she did that it was not that alone, and felt that a confession lay in the words. "Be it what it may," said he, cheerfully, "why should you grudge me the pleasure of an adventure? Certainly I am an inexperienced soldier, but it seems that our enemies will not give me much opportunity of doing them any harm to-day."
"No one thanks you for all that you bear for our sakes. No one!" cried Lenore.
"No one?" repeated Anton. "Have I not a friend here who is only too much inclined to overrate the little I am able to do? Lenore, you have permitted me to draw nearer to you than would have been possible under ordinary circumstances. Do you reckon it nothing that I should have won some of a brother's privileges with regard to you?"
Lenore fervently seized and pressed his hand. "Even I have been different to you of late to what I should have been. I am very unhappy," cried she, passionately. "I can not tell to any human being what I feel—not to my mother—not to you either. I have lost all confidence and all control." She pressed her handkerchief to her eyes.
"Lenore!" cried her father, impatiently, from his apartment.
"This is no time for explanations," said she, more calmly. "When we have got over this day, I will try hard to be stronger than I am now. Help me in this, Wohlfart."