He was dressed as a Frenchman, with a polished silk hat and a big bow carelessly tied. For the rest, his disguise was of the slightest, yet so skilfully done that a friend would have passed him in the street. But he gave her no opportunity to express surprise at his presence there, nor at his new appearance.
“Let us go where there are not so many interesting people,” he said. “I have much to say to you.”
She was dizzy still, and pale and trembling. He called a waiter from a café and ordered a little glass of brandy. When she had drunk it, he began to lead her away from the cathedral towards the Rue de Kehl. Her curiosity amused him.
“You see, I have no business in Strasburg,” he said lightly. “People might misunderstand me as they misunderstood that poor fellow yonder. It would be quite wrong of them—but then, I have a regard for my bones.”
She shuddered.
“They would kill you, Brandon!” she exclaimed.
“Exactly; they would kill me. It is one of the follies of war. You beat out a man’s brains because he might be a spy. Afterwards you are sorry, but you cannot put his brains back again. Forgive me, I am only talking in general terms. We had better not particularise until we are in safer quarters.”
She stopped suddenly. The peril in which he stood, and which she must in some measure share, was not to be overlooked. Many, both civilians and soldiers, were passing on their way to the Minster square. A regiment of Gardes Mobiles went by with swinging step and merry music. She knew that a word whispered to them, a word that a Prussian dragoon had entered Strasburg, would bring instant death to the man who had come into the city because of his promise to her.
“You were wrong to come; I was wrong to ask you,” she said quickly. “They would never understand—never.”