"But this good fellow is telling the truth then?"
"I assure you that I have good reasons, the best of reasons, for believing, for being certain, that the swimmer who crossed the Seine was not your brother!"
"Great Heaven! Who was it then?"
Fandor hesitated a moment.... Should he divulge his secret? All he said was:
"It was not your brother—I know that!"
So decisive was his tone, so great the sympathy vibrating through his words, that Elizabeth Dollon, once more convinced that Fandor was not speaking at random, bent her head and shed tears of deepest grief and bitter disappointment.
Fandor allowed the sorrow-stricken girl to give way to her grief for a few minutes; then he gently asked her:
"Mademoiselle Elizabeth, shall we have a little talk?... You see I simply cannot tell you everything, yet I would gladly help you!... But first and foremost, I beg of you to put quite out of your mind this hope that your brother is still alive!..."
Sadly Elizabeth wiped away her tears, and in a voice which she tried to steady, said:
"Oh, what is to become of me! I thought I had found in you a support, a help, and now you abandon me! And I had put my faith in your goodness of heart!... There are your articles on the one hand, and your attitude on the other—what am I to make of it? It is driving me to despair! And if you only knew how much I need to be supported, encouraged; I feel as if I should go out of my senses—out of my mind ... and I am alone, so terribly alone!"