On the morning of the third day, Steven, invited to inspect the view from the battlements in an exceptionally clear light, found himself alone with Burgravine Betty on the topmost turret of the Burg. The Burgrave had sent them forward; his laugh was echoing up to them from the inner recesses of the winding stairs.
Steven turned. The cry was tragic; and it answered acutely to his own sensations. The Burgravine’s eyes were dry, but there was real terror on her pretty face.
"Why did you come?" she whispered. "In the name of mercy! was it not evident that it was a trap?"
"Yes, yes! Oh, do you not feel it? He is watching us like a cat, a cat going to spring; and I am the wretched mouse waiting—waiting. O, I can stand it no longer! I shall go mad. If only you had not come! What did I tell him? There was nothing to tell, say you; we had done no harm. That is just it! I told him a lie, of course, and he found out it was a lie—that is of course, too. A man who has spies all about his place! And now we are doing nothing but lie, you and I. He knows we are lying, and he is waiting to pounce on us in his own time. O, sir, you might have known! A man who shuts up his wife for jealousy is not seized with such effusive hospitality towards a handsome young stranger without reasons of his own."
The warm olive crept back to her cheek as she spoke. Her eyes beamed. She seemed to sway towards him.
"Then, madam," he cried, quickly stepping back—if there were indeed danger for him between the Burgrave and the Burgravine, he would rather choose to battle with the man—"you are right, I ought not to be here. I will go now. To-day ... this hour!"
"Go?" she echoed in scorn. "Aye, go if you can," she proceeded with a change of tone. "He has got you well in his meshes; you are clogged, sir, and bound. And if you think he will let you go before he has carried out his purpose with us, you little know the Burgrave."
Carried out his purpose with us!—The very vagueness of the suggestion added to its unpleasantness. Steven jerked his head indignantly.
She glanced at him a second, uplifting lip and eyebrow. To a lady who had graduated in the Court of Vienna, this big young man, with his English stolid simplicity, was a trifle irritating.