`O!' she cried, `I have abominably used him -- I know that; it is not that I mean. But if you admire my husband, I insist that you shall understand me: I can look him in the face without a blush.'
`It may be, madam,' said Sir John; `nor have I presumed to think the contrary.'
`You will not believe me?' she cried. `You think I am a guilty wife? You think he was my lover?'
`Madam,' returned the Baronet, `when I tore up my papers, I promised your good husband to concern myself no more with your affairs; and I assure you for the last time that I have no desire to judge you.'
`But you will not acquit me! Ah!' she cried, `HE will -- he knows me better!'
Sir John smiled.
`You smile at my distress?' asked Seraphina.
`At your woman's coolness,' said Sir John. `A man would scarce have had the courage of that cry, which was, for all that, very natural, and I make no doubt quite true. But remark, madam -- since you do me the honour to consult me gravely -- I have no pity for what you call your distresses.
You have been completely selfish, and now reap the consequence. Had you once thought of your husband, instead of singly thinking of yourself, you would not now have been alone, a fugitive, with blood upon your hands, and hearing from a morose old Englishman truth more bitter than scandal.'
`I thank you,' she said, quivering. `This is very true. Will you stop the carriage?'
`No, child,' said Sir John, `not until I see you mistress of yourself.'
There was a long pause, during which the carriage rolled by rock and woodland.
`And now,' she resumed, with perfect steadiness, `will you consider me composed? I request you, as a gentleman, to let me out.'
`I think you do unwisely,' he replied. `Continue, if you please, to use my carriage.'
`Sir John,' she said, `if death were sitting on that pile of stones, I would alight! I do not blame, I thank you; I now know how I appear to others; but sooner than draw breath beside a man who can so think of me, I would -- O!' she cried, and was silent.
Sir John pulled the string, alighted, and offered her his hand; but she refused the help.
The road had now issued from the valleys in which it had been winding, and come to that part of its course where it runs, like a cornice, along the brow of the steep northward face of Grünewald. The place where they had alighted was at a salient angle; a bold rock and some wind-tortured pine-trees overhung it from above; far below the blue plains lay forth and melted into heaven; and before them the road, by a succession of bold zigzags, was seen mounting to where a tower upon a tall cliff closed the view.
`There,' said the Baronet, pointing to the tower, `you see the Felsenburg, your goal. I wish you a good journey, and regret I cannot be of more assistance.'
He mounted to his place and gave a signal, and the carriage rolled away.
Seraphina stood by the wayside, gazing before her with blind eyes.
Sir John she had dismissed already from her mind: she hated him, that was enough; for whatever Seraphina hated or contemned fell instantly to Lilliputian smallness, and was thenceforward steadily ignored in thought. And now she had matter for concern indeed. Her interview with Otto, which she had never yet forgiven him, began to appear before her in a very different light.
He had come to her, still thrilling under recent insult, and not yet breathed from fighting her own cause; and how that knowledge changed the value of his words! Yes, he must have loved her! this was a brave feeling -- it was no mere weakness of the will. And she, was she incapable of love? It would appear so; and she swallowed her tears, and yearned to see Otto, to explain all, to ask pity upon her knees for her transgressions, and, if all else were now beyond the reach of reparation, to restore at least the liberty of which she had deprived him.
Swiftly she sped along the highway, and, as the road wound out and in about the bluffs and gullies of the mountain, saw and lost by glimpses the tall tower that stood before and above her, purpled by the mountain air.