"Then, that was the reason I could not go home. But you allowed me to write, and gave me your word of honor you would send the letter. Your word of honor, Count Agenor Baranowski!"
"Consider my position, Judith. You had hardly recovered. The doctor warned me to avoid any fresh excitement. You cannot, you must not, despise me for that."
"But has this been your only lie? Get up. Look me in the face. Am I your wife--am I a Christian?"
His blood rushed to his heart. "Remember--"
"Yes, I know. But the ground is shaking under my feet. It seems as if I must doubt my very eyes and ears. Besides, what do I know of your usages? Perhaps it was only a blind to keep me alive. It is possible, for your friend and counsellor was a scoundrel. If it was a trick, confess it now. I promise you, I will not kill myself, for then my child would have no father, and he must not be left motherless. But I must know the truth. For if I am not a Christian, I shall be able to pray again, and mourn for my father after the manner of my nation. Agenor, you will be the vilest of men if you can lie to me now. Answer! I ask you again--am I a Christian, and am I your wife?"
He felt his knees giving way, and he seized the bedpost to keep himself steady. There was a roaring in his ears, and his heart almost stopped beating. Though he hesitated but a second, it seemed an eternity. When at last he spoke, it was as though he heard some other voice saying, "You are a Christian, and you are my wife!"
CHAPTER IX.
Three weeks had slipped by, and Christmas was close at hand. Day after day the same glowing sunshine flooded lake and mountain. Every one said it was the loveliest December ever known on Lake Garda. And yet in the midst of this beauty of nature, the two in the palazzo by the Porta San Michele walked in the dull, uncertain twilight life.
Judith had recovered quickly. She came to table as formerly, and neither sigh nor reproach passed her lips. The count, too, adapting himself to the new conditions, never spoke of the past. But both felt acutely that a wide, wide gulf had opened between them. They lived as in a cloud, seeing each other dimly, and neither stretched out a hand to the other in compassion or in love.
Only twice during this week had they spoken of anything more than was necessary. The Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung at that time the only large newspaper permitted in Austria, contained one day a lengthy leader concerning the new civil marriage law of the grand duchy of Saxe-Weimar. It was the first of those laws in Europe allowing marriage between Christians and Jews, without a change of faith on the part of the Jews. Judith had just finished reading it as Agenor entered the room. She asked if he knew of it.