Fear, sure enough, was reflected in her eyes as she recalled the last months of her life in Barcelona.
"The doctor is my enemy…. She who protected me so in other times abandons me now like an old shoe that it is necessary to get rid of. I am positive that her superior officers have condemned me…."
She shuddered on remembering the doctor's wrath when on her return from one of her trips she learned of the death of her faithful Karl. To her, Captain Ferragut was a species of invulnerable and victorious demon who was escaping all dangers and murdering the servants of a good cause. First von Kramer; now Karl…. As it was necessary for her to vent her wrath on somebody, she had made Freya responsible for all her misfortunes. Through her she had known the captain, and had mixed him up in the affairs of the "service."
Thirst for vengeance made the imposing dame smile with a ferocious expression. The Spanish sailor was doomed by the Highest Command. Precise orders had been given out against him. "As to his accomplices!…" Freya was figuring undoubtedly among these accomplices for having dared to defend Ferragut, for remembering the tragic event of his son, for having refused to join the chorus desiring his extermination.
Weeks afterwards the doctor again became as smiling and as amiable as in other times. "My dear girl, it is agreed that you should take a trip to France. We need there an agent who will keep us informed of the traffic of the ports, of the goings and comings of the vessels in order that our submersibles may know where to await them. The naval officials are very gallant, and a beautiful woman will be able to gain their affection."
She had tried to disobey. To go to France!… where her pre-war work was already known!… To go back to danger when she had already become accustomed to the safe life of a neutral country!… But her attempts at resistance were ineffectual. She lacked sufficient will-power; the "service" had converted her into an automaton.
"And here I am, suspecting that probably I am going to my death, but fulfilling the commissions given to me, struggling to be accommodating and retard in this way the fulfillment of their vengeance…. I am like a condemned criminal who knows that he is going to die, and tries to make himself so necessary that his sentence will be delayed for a few months."
"How did you get into France?" he demanded, paying no attention to her doleful tones.
"Freya shrugged her shoulders. In her business a change of nationality was easily accomplished. At present she was passing for a citizen of a South American republic. The doctor had arranged all the papers necessary to enable her to cross the frontier.
"But here," she continued, "my accomplices have me more securely than as though I were in prison. They have given me the means of coming here and they only can arrange my departure. I am absolutely in their power. I wonder what they are going to do with me!…"