Nora waited a moment. There was something more that she had to tell—the story of a letter written in a fervour of self-sacrifice, and of another letter written two weeks later, a pitiful letter containing a confession and a plea for forgiveness. But she recognised the signs of exhaustion, and crept softly back to the fire. After all, it would do another day. Another day! That most pitiful of all excuses had haunted her from the moment that she had felt Wolff von Arnim’s arms about her, and she was honest enough to despise it and herself. But she was afraid. She was convinced that Wolff would not understand either her old friendship with Robert Arnold or her subsequent folly in accepting a man she did not love. Nor could she explain, for the one explanation possible was the sacred secret of Hildegarde’s heart. She was equally convinced that her mother would disapprove of her silence and demand that she should deal honestly with the man she was to marry. She knew that her mother would be right, and indeed she meant to tell the truth—but not now. The new happiness was too insecure. And then, the episode, foolish and even disloyal as it had been, was closed and done with. Robert Arnold had obviously accepted her final acknowledgment of the truth, and had silently gone his way. He had not answered either letter, and probably they would not meet again, or, at any rate, not until the wound had healed and been forgotten. Was it not wiser, therefore, to keep silence also—for the present? Thus Nora argued with her own conscience, and, torn between a natural rectitude and a headstrong love, came to no conclusion, but let the matter drift until that well-known "some time" which, had she been wiser, she would have recognised as an equivalent for "never." But at least the great battle for her liberty had been fought and won. An invitation was promptly sent to Karlsburg and as promptly accepted, and the day dawned which was to see Wolff’s triumphal entry into the enemy’s stronghold. Even Miles, though the permission to "keep out of the way" would have been willingly granted him as far as Nora was concerned, insisted on making his future brother-in-law’s arrival an excuse for returning on leave. "The sooner I get the blow over the better," he said, and gratuitously undertook to accompany Nora and her father to the station when the unloved guest was expected.