The question seemed to come upon Princess Alexandra as a great surprise. She had almost risen from her chair, and was staring fixedly at Hildegard with a burning blush on her cheek. But the very next moment mien and colour had resumed their former state, and nestling even more snugly in the recesses of the deep arm-chair, she said slowly--
"This question it is impossible to answer with an unconditional Yes or No. So much would depend upon the individual. Let us speak of the girl first. You are of coarse referring to ..."
The eyes of the Princess were all but closed now; something seemed to flash from beneath the long eyelids.
"Of course," she replied very slowly. "And ... he?"
Hildegard bent her eyes in the direction of the opposite side of the drawing-room, where Bertram was conversing with the forest-ranger.
"Ah!" was all the Princess said, putting up her double eyeglass and surveying Bertram curiously. Then, after a long pause--
"It is so easy to make a mistake in these things."
Hildegard hesitated before she replied. But her heart was too full. The pain--repressed with difficulty--caused her by the merciless condemnation of the Baron, her displeasure in reference to Bertram, her anger against Erna--all these emotions were clamouring for expression, although her pride bade her desist. She bent over the Princess and whispered hurriedly--
"You will not condemn a mother even if, in her despair, she has recourse to desperate remedies, or, at least, allows things to be done on which she could never voluntarily determine. I was positively free from the faintest suspicion, but Lydia--Fräulein von Aschhof--who had reasons of her own for exercising minute control over the gentleman's demeanour, felt sure she had found it out. Indeed, she communicated to me observations she had made--words she had heard, looks she had intercepted--I thought the charge monstrous, incredible, abominable; but my confidence was shaken--I saw with new eyes, heard with new ears--saw and heard what caused me to shudder. And yet I would certainly have shrunk much longer from accepting a conviction which every day and every hour was urging upon me anew; but two days ago Fräulein von Aschhof brought me a letter which my daughter had written to her cousin Agatha, written but not sent--why, I know not. Nor do I know how Lydia--Fräulein Von Aschhof--got hold of the letter. I believe ..."