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You have torn asunder the ties that bound me to my family, that bound me to life. You know that my honor, that my good name, are more to me than all political calculations. You know that this scene here at night, this secret understanding with one who in my eyes is merely an adventurous stranger, has ruined Wilhelmine's reputation forever.
Shaking his head, he returned to the hotel, and found the servants busily counting their money, occasionally casting covetous looks toward the stairs, as if they hoped the count would again descend. Exactly as Cagliostro had foretold, Minister Herzberg did not return from Sans-Souci until late in the evening, and then found Wilhelmine's letter in his cabinet.
Let me accompany you!" implored de Loubersac.... "I love you so much you must forgive my blundering!" The lovers discussed the question: finally, Wilhelmine's hesitations were overcome: de Loubersac carried the day triumphantly. Mademoiselle Berthe had fallen behind: she had kept a discreet distance between the lovers and herself, but had watched them with the eyes of a lynx.
She adroitly called Wilhelmine's attention to this. Realising that she had been giving orders at random, the absent-minded girl came to a decision. "We have every confidence in your house being able to supply us with a cotillion complete in every detail. You know better than I what is necessary. I will leave it to you, then, to see that everything is done as well as possible."
It only remained for the repentant lover to reinstate himself in Wilhelmine's good graces if that were possible. Now, more ardently than ever before, he desired to make Wilhelmine his wife. See her, be reconciled to her, he must! He arrived at a favourable moment. The poor girl, lonely and alone, was a prey to the most gloomy forebodings. Life had lost all its savour.
His penetrating stare did not falter. Suddenly Wilhelmine's lips began to tremble. She grew deadly pale: she might have been on the verge of a fainting fit. She had realised the incredulity of the man to whom, in her chaste innocence, she had given her heart. In the pure soul of this loving girl an immense void made itself felt.
Desperate after the Saint-Sulpice interview, when, so it had seemed to him, Wilhelmine had avoided a categorical denial of his accusation regarding her liaison with Captain Brocq, the frantic lover had flown to Juve and had poured out his soul to the sympathetic detective. Juve had shown himself no sceptic. He believed Wilhelmine's story and statements.
Wilhelmine's statements were impressing de Loubersac less and less favourably. "Play acting and clumsy play acting at that!" decided Henri: "Done to avert my suspicions, imagined to feed my curiosity!... She thinks herself a capable player at the game! She does not know the person she is playing with!" De Loubersac came to a decision.
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