"I shouldn't be surprised," she added, "if he hadn't made you the same proposals, and suggested that I should look after you."
And it came back to Lilly's remembrance how in that hour of fate, when she had become engaged to him, he had walked round her, eager but irresolute, and spoken of a worthy and distinguished lady under whose fostering care she was to develop on his estate into a woman of the world.
Fräulein von Schwertfeger had not done. She went on to say that the bitter consciousness of her shameful position ate into her soul like a canker, and finally took such possession of her that her one thought was to be revenged. His marriage was to be the instrument. She would continue to be blind and deaf as he had once demanded she should be. That was all. Matters should take their natural course. Such had been the state of affairs till to-day. To-day the catastrophe must have been unavoidable, and would have fallen on the colonel if at the last decisive moment her strength of character had not failed her. She found that the young, good-hearted, guilelessly guilty wife had won her affection too deeply to be sacrificed to her plans of vengeance.
"But I thought you said just now," Lilly ventured to interpose, "that you had not done it for my sake."
Fräulein von Schwertfeger fixed her with a stony and awful stare.
"My child," she answered, "if you were not quite such a stupid young thing, whom sin alone can mature, you might understand the conflict that is perpetually going on in anyone like myself. For the present, be satisfied that you are out of danger."
In a burst of gratitude Lilly flew at Fräulein von Schwertfeger and kissed her face and hands. Anna no longer repulsed her; she caressed her hair and talked to her in a tone of friendly patronage. Then Lilly, crouching at her feet, confessed how the affair with Walter had arisen, how their friendship had originated, and how he in reality had been the author of her happiness.
"Happiness!" echoed Fräulein von Schwertfeger, and she made a sound through her tight lips like a whistle of disdain.
Lilly stopped short, looked at her inquiringly, and then understood. The question burned in her brain, "Am I any better, really, than if he had dragged me here as his mistress?"
It was eleven months since that night of courtship. What had they made of her? She threw her arms round Fräulein von Schwertfeger's neck and cried, cried, cried. It did her such a lot of good to have a sisterly, or rather a motherly, bosom on which to pillow her head. It reminded her of the days which had ended with the flourish of a knife.