ll one--be not so foolish. You do not know how happy I will
make you. You have never seen me except when I was tortured with doubts
and fears. You do not know what our life will be together. There shall
be everything to make you forget--everything that thought and love and
money can give you. The man there in the barred room--"

At that I took his dear hands in mine and held them close as I miserably
tried to make him hear what that small, still voice had told me.

"There! That is it! If he were free, if he were able to stand before
men that his actions might be judged fairly and justly, I should not
hesitate for one single, precious moment. If he could fight for his
rights, or relinquish them, as he saw fit, then this thing would not
be so monstrous. But, Ernst, can't you see? He is there, alone, in that
dreadful place, quite helpless, quite incapable, quite at our mercy. I
should as soon think of hurting a little child, or snatching the pennies
from a blind man's cup. The thing is inhuman! It is monstrous! No state
laws, no red tape can dissolve such a union."

"You still care for him!"

"Ernst!"

His face was very white with the pallor of repressed emotion, and his
eyes were like the blue flame that one sees flashing above a bed of
white-hot coals.

"You do care for him still. But yes! You can stand there, quite
cool--but quite--and tell me that you would not hurt him, not for your
happiness, not for mine. But me you can hurt again and again, without
one twinge of regret."

There was silence for a moment in the little bare dining-room--a
miserable silence on my part, a bitter one for Ernst. Then Von Gerhard
seated himself again at the table opposite and smiled one of the rare
smiles that illumined his face with such sweetness.

"Come, Dawn, almost we are quarreling--we who were to have been so
matter-of-fact and sensible. Let us make an end of this question. You
will think of what I have said, will you not? Perhaps I was too abrupt,
too brutal. Ach, Dawn, you know not how I--Very well, I will not."

With both hands I was clinging to my courage and praying for strength to
endure this until I should be alone in my room again.

"As for that poor creature who is bereft of reason, he shall lack no
care, no attention. The burden you have borne so long I shall take now
upon my shoulders."

He seemed so confident, so sure. I could bear it no longer. "Ernst,
if you have any pity, any love for me, stop! I tell you