"Nora! Nora! what have you done?"
Nora recovered herself with an effort. Usually strong of nerve, there was something in the voice, in the words, which terrified her.
"Hildegarde, what do you mean? What is the matter?"
"Oh, Nora, Nora, what have you done?"
The voice had sunk to a moan so piteous, so wretched, that Nora forgot the cold fear which for a moment held her paralysed. She tried to press the frail figure gently back among the pillows.
"Dear, I don't know what you mean. But you must lie quiet. To-morrow you can tell me everything——"
Hildegarde pushed her back and put her hand wildly to her head.
"Of course, you can't help it. You don't even know. How should you? A cripple—you would never even think of it. Nobody would—they would laugh at me or pity me. Wolff pities me now—but not then. Oh, Wolff! Wolff!"
The name burst from the dry lips in a low cry of pain. Hitherto she had spoken in English; she went on in German, but so clearly and with such vivid meaning in tone and gesture that Nora, cowering at the foot of the bed, felt that she would have understood had it been in some dead, unknown language.
"Wolff, how good you are to me! Shall we gallop over there to the bridge? How splendid it is to be alive, isn't it? Yes, of course I shall keep the supper waltz for you, if you really want it. We always have such fun together. Look! There is the Kaiser on the brown horse! And Wolff is leading the battery with Seleneck! How splendid he looks! Oh, Wolff! Wolff!"