"I loved him so!" Nora sobbed wildly. "I loved him so—and I have made him unhappy. I have killed him! Oh, Hildegarde, why did I come into his life? You would have made him happy. You loved him, and there was nothing to divide you. Why did you not keep him? Why did you give him back his freedom?" "I could not have made him happy, Nora," Hildegarde answered. "I think there are some natures which must come together though the world stands between, and even if it be to their own ruin. Wolff belongs to you. He will belong to you to the very end." Nora lifted her face. She had become suddenly calm. She held herself with the dignity of resolution. "And I to him," she said. "I belong to him and to no one else in the world. And whatever separates us, I shall find my way back. There must be—there is a bridge across. And when I have crossed it I shall atone as no woman ever atoned before. I shall blot out the past. Take me with you, Hildegarde; take me back to him—now, this hour!" Hildegarde kissed her. She could have said that there is a "too late" in life, and that that "too late" had come. But there was something in Nora’s face—a hope, a confidence, a strange look of clarified happiness which held her silent. Without a word, Nora turned and left her. She seemed guided by a sure instinct, for she went straight to her brother’s bedroom. As she entered he was hurriedly cramming some clothes into a portmanteau, and his white, foolish face was blank with fear. "Well?" he asked. She came towards him, and he knew that no explanation was needed. "Give me the papers you stole from my husband!" she said quietly. "Give them to me at once." A sullen, defiant answer trembled on his lips, but she stopped him with a single gesture. "I do not ask you to explain or excuse yourself," she said. "I know what you are, Miles, and I should not believe you. Nor do I appeal to your better feelings. I appeal to your common sense. The papers are useless to you. They might only bring you into trouble. Give them to me!" He gave them to her without a word of protest. Her paralysed him; and only when she had reached the door he stammered a single question. "Where are you going, Nora?" "I am going home—to my husband," she answered, "and I pray with all my heart that I may never see your face again!" *CHAPTER IV* *THE BRIDGE ACROSS* The Selenecks’ little drawing-room was almost in darkness. Only the pale, flickering reflection from the lights in the street beneath fell on the farther wall and threw into ghostly prominence the figures of the silent occupants. Frau von Seleneck was seated at the table, still bent over a letter which she had ceased to write long before the dusk had crept in upon them. Her husband knelt beside her, and his hand held hers in a strong, tender clasp.