"'He will implore you to leave me,' she concluded; 'act as your conscience bids you. And I will tell you something that I refused to tell Count Warnberg; he asked me whether I had another, a more sacred claim upon you. I don't know, Victor, but as I understand our bond in which I live and suffer, that does not affect it; if you will not make me your wife for my own sake, neither could regard for the mother of your child be binding on you!'
"Two hours after I received this letter, my uncle arrived. I was terrified at the sight of him, his face was so dark, and hard, and strange. My father had once said to me shortly before his death: 'Take care never to turn that iron hand against you; it would crush you as it has crushed me.' I had never before understood these words, indeed I had completely forgotten them, but now they came back to me and I understood them before my uncle opened his mouth.
"'Tell your story,' he began, and his voice sounded to me as if I had never heard it before. 'Tell the whole truth. This at least I expect of you. You surely don't wish to sink lower than--than another member of your family. A Sendlingen has at all events never lied! Now tell your story.'
"I obeyed: he was told what you have just been told, though no doubt it sounded different; confused, passionate and scarcely intelligible. But he understood it; he had no single question to ask after I had finished.
"'The same story as before,' he said, 'but uglier, much uglier. The father only sullied his coat of arms, the son his judge's honour as well.'
"I fired up. I tried to defend myself, he would not allow it. 'Tirades serve no good purpose,' he said, coldly. 'You wish to convince me that you were not in criminal collusion with Mirescul? I have never thought so. That he is really guilty and can be convicted in spite of your neglect of duty? I have been through the papers and have just cross-examined the customs superintendent. The police are already on the way to re-arrest him; he will be put in prison. But your fault will be none the less in consequence; if there is no lasting stigma on the administration of justice, there is upon your honour. Your conduct in this man's house, your hesitation,--it would be bad for you if you had to suffer what you have merited! According to justice and the laws, your fate is sealed; it is only a question whether you will prove yourself worthy of pardon and pity!'
"'In anything that you may ask,' I answered, 'except only in one thing: Hermine is to be my wife. A Sendlingen can never be a scoundrel.'
"He drew himself up to his full height and stepped close up to me. 'Now listen to me, Victor, I will be brief and explicit. Whether you stain your honour by marrying this girl, or whether you do so by not marrying her, the all-just God above us knows. We, His creatures, can only judge according to our knowledge and conscience, and in my judgment, the girl is unworthy of you. In this matter there is your conviction against my conviction. But what I do know better than you is, that this marriage would load you with ignominy before the whole world! You will perhaps answer: better the contempt of others than self-contempt, but that is not the question. If you marry this girl, I am as sure as I am of my existence, that you will soon be ashamed of it, not only before others but in your own heart. For pure happiness could not come of such a beginning--it is impossible. The gossip of the world, the ruin of your hopes, would poison your mind and hers,--you would be wretched yourself and make her wretched, and would at length become bad and miserable. The man who forgets his duty to himself and to the world for a matter of weeks and then recovers himself, is worthy of commiseration and help; but he who is guilty of a moral suicide deserves no pity. And therefore listen to me and choose. If you marry this girl your subsequent fate is indifferent to me; you will very likely be stripped of your office; or in the most favourable event, transferred, by way of punishment, to some out of the way place where your father's fate may be repeated in you. If you give her up you may still be saved, for yourself, for our family and for the State: then I will do for you, what my conscience would allow me to do for any subordinate of whose sincere repentance I was convinced, and I will intercede for the Emperor's pardon as if you were my own son. To-morrow I return to Lemberg, whether alone or with you--you must decide by to-morrow.' He went."
Sendlingen paused. "How I struggled with myself," he began again, but his voice failed him, until at length he gasped forth with hollow voice and trembling lips: "Oh! what a night it was! The next morning I wrote a farewell letter to Hermine, and started with Count Warnberg to Lemberg."
Then there followed a long silence. At length Berger asked: "You did not know that she bore your child in her bosom?"