"Come into the house," whispers Zdena. But walking is not so easy as she thinks. She is so dizzy that she can hardly put one foot before the other, and, whether she will or not, she must depend upon Harry to support her.
"Fool that I am!" he mutters. "Lean upon me, you poor angel! You are trembling like an aspen-leaf."
"I can hardly walk,--I was so terribly afraid," she confesses.
"On my account?" he asks.
"No, not on your account alone, but on my own, too," she replies, laughing, "for, entirely between ourselves, I am a wretched coward."
"Really? Oh, Zdena--" He presses the hand that rests on his arm.
"But, Harry," she says, very gravely this time, "I am not giddy now. I can walk very well." And she takes her hand from his arm.
He only laughs, and says, "As you please, my queen, but you need not fear me. If a man ever deserved Paradise, I did just then." He points to the spot beneath the old walnuts, where the moon had been disappointed.
A few seconds later they enter the dining-room, where are the three ladies, and the Countess Zriny advances to meet Harry with a large bottle of eau de Lourdes, a tablespoonful of which Heda is trying to heat over the flame of the lamp, while Fräulein Laut pauses in her account of a wonderful remedy for hydrophobia.
Harry impatiently cuts short all the inquiries with which he is besieged, with "The dog is dead; I shot him!" He does not relate how the deed was done. At first he had been disposed to extol Zdena's heroism, but he has thought better of it. He resolves to keep for himself alone the memory of the last few moments, to guard it in his heart like a sacred secret. As Vips is still proclaiming his presence in the next room by pounding upon the door, Harry takes the key from his pocket and smilingly releases the prisoner. The lad rushes at his brother. "Did he not bite you? Really not?" And when Harry answers, "No," he entreats, "Show me your hands, Harry,--both of them!" and then he throws his arms about the young man and clasps him close.