He was extremely well dressed in civilian clothes. His face was drawn and pallid with emotion. He said gravely in French:
"I thank you, madame!"
Then he looked at Lucienne, and in his unsmiling blue eyes there was a gleam of proud joy.
The young girl smiled.
Madame Oberlé felt a shudder of aversion, which she tried to repress. She looked straight into the steel-blue eyes of Wilhelm von Farnow, who stood motionless in the same attitude he would have taken under arms and before some great chief.
"You must not thank me. I play no part in what is happening. My husband and my daughter have decided everything."
He bowed again.
"If I were free I should refuse your race, your religion, your army—which are not mine. You see I speak to you frankly. I am determined to tell you that you owe me nothing, but also that I harbour no unjust animosity against you. I even believe that you are a very good soldier and an estimable man. I am so convinced of it that I am going to confide to you an anxiety which tortures me."
She hesitated a moment and continued:
"We had at Alsheim a terrible scene when Count Kassewitz came to the house."