“To the vanquished, of course. The mischief is that our French friends never know when they are vanquished. Edmond will be like the others. He will give his word—and break it.”
“I don’t believe it,” she exclaimed emphatically; “when he comes to the Place Kleber he will listen to me. I shall make it a point of honour between us. He may break his word to you, but he never will to me.”
“Then write the letter now. It shall go to Ulm to-morrow. I don’t hunger for the sights of Strasburg, you may be sure. To-night will see me on the other side of the river and thankful to be there.”
“Brandon,” she exclaimed, “how much I owe to you!”
He laughed.
“I should be a poor man if all my ledger accounts were like yours, Beatrix.”
He began to pace the room that she might write uninterruptedly. For a long while she sat contemplating the white paper before her. Though she had combated his assertions, she knew in her heart that he spoke the truth, and that the letter which brought her husband back to Strasburg might also be his death-warrant. Edmond would never resist the spirit then prevailing in the city. He would go to the fortifications, and the Prussians would take him there. They would shoot him as one who had broken his parole, and hers would be the word which called him back to his doom. She could not write that word; she must leave it to his judgment, she thought. Nor could she tell him why she hesitated. Impossible to say “I fear that you will break your oath.” Rather, she wrote words of love and sympathy, narrating all that had happened at Strasburg—her meeting with her old friend, Brandon North, on the evening of the battle, the strange companion she had found upon the road, the anticipations of a siege, the news that the Prussians were at Schiltigheim. But she did not say, “Come back to me,” and there were tears in her eyes when she sealed the letter.
“Well,” said Brandon, who had watched her closely, “you have finished it.”
She turned away sadly.