would
sometimes descend to the saying of tender little words, and would
administer things agreeable to the palate which might at the same
time be profitable to the health. So thus there had been moments in
which Linda had felt that it would be comfortable to be always ill.
But now, during the whole of this week, Madame Staubach had been very
doubtful as to her conduct. At first it had seemed to her that all
tenderness must be misplaced in circumstances so terrible, till there
had been an actual resolution of repentance, till the spirit had been
made to pass seven times through the fire, till the heart had lost
all its human cords and fibres. But gradually, and that before the
second day had elapsed, there came upon her a conviction that she had
in some way mistaken the meaning of Linda's words, and that matters
were not as she had supposed. She did not now in the least doubt
Linda's truth. She was convinced that Linda had intentionally told
no falsehood, and that she would tell none. But there were questions
which she would not ask, which she could not ask at any rate except
by slow degrees. Something, however, she learned from Tetchen,
something from Linda herself, and thus there came upon her a
conviction that there might be no frightful story to tell to
Peter,--that in all probability there was no such story to be told.
What she believed at this time was in fact about the truth.

But if it were as she believed, then was it the more incumbent on
her to see that this marriage did not slip through her fingers. She
became very busy, and in her eagerness she went to Herr Molk. Herr
Molk had learned something further about Ludovic, and promised that
he would himself come down and see "the child." He would see "the
child," ill as she was, in bed, and perhaps say a word or two that
might assist. Madame Staubach found that the burgomaster was quite
prepared to advocate the Steinmarc marriage, being instigated thereto
apparently by his civic horror at Valcarm's crimes. He would shake
his head, and swing his whole body, and blow out the breath from
behind his cheeks, knitting his eyebrows and assuming a look of
terror when it was suggested to him that the daughter of his old
friend, the undoubted owner of a house in Nuremberg, was anxious to
give herself and her property to Ludovic Valcarm. "No, no, Madame
Staubach, that mustn't be;--that must not be, my dear Madame. A
rebel! a traitor! I don't know what the young man hasn't d