She had sunk down again on her bench; she felt her legs turning to cotton-wool. “Yes,” she muttered. “Yes, I am attending——”
“You must say,” he commanded, “that you always received the money from your nephew. That since the war you have had none. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes,” she murmured—“quite clear, Herr Head.”
“If you do not say that, if you bring me into this dirty business, then I, too, will say what I know about you.”
She looked at him uncomprehendingly. What did he mean?
“Ah, you do not know perhaps what I can tell about you!”
He came nearer to her, and in a hissing whisper went on: “I can tell how it was through you that a certain factory in Flanders was shelled, and eighty Englishmen were killed. And if I tell that, they will hang you!”
“But that is not true,” said Anna stoutly. “So you could not say that!”
“It is true.” He spoke with a kind of ferocious energy that carried conviction, even to her. “It is absolutely true, and easily proved. You showed a letter—a letter from Mr. Jervis Blake. In that letter was information which led directly to the killing of those eighty English soldiers, and to the injury to Mr. Jervis Blake which lost him his foot.”
“What is that you say?” Anna’s voice rose to a scream of horror—of incredulous, protesting horror. “Unsay, do unsay what you have just said, kind Mr. Head!”