"You see, my poor Pilar," said Wilhelm sadly, "your excuse is the bitterest criticism upon our relations. You yourself feel how ugly the naked truth would look, and try to dress it up before the eyes of the world. That kind of life cannot go on. We are doomed to destruction in such an atmosphere of lies. We must return somehow to truth and order." At his last words she let go of him and turned very pale. "Ah, then it is only a pretext," she cried; "you want to get up a quarrel with me as an excuse for breaking with me. That is unmanly of you, that is cowardly. Be frank, tell me straight out what you want. I have a right to demand absolute candor of you." Her words stabbed him like a knife. There was some truth in her accusation. It was neither honest nor manly to make so much of her fibs when he had something very different in his mind. She appealed to his candor--she should not do so in vain. "It was not a pretext," he said, and forced himself to look into her face that seemed turning to stone, "but a prompting cause. You ask for the truth, and you shall have it, for I owe it you. Well then, things cannot remain as they are. I cannot go on living as a hanger-on in this house. I--" He sought painfully for words, but could find none. Pilar breathed hard. "Well--in short--" The words came out as if she were being strangled. "In short, Pilar--I must--we shall have--" "I will not help you. Finish--you shall say the word." "We shall have to part, Pilar." "Wretch!" The cry wrenched itself from her breast. Wilhelm rose and prepared to leave the room. But at the same instant she had rushed to him, and clinging wildly to him, she cried, beside herself with anguish: "Don't go, Wilhelm, don't be angry with me. You don't know what I feel--you are torturing me to death." Her sobs were so violent that she could not keep upon her feet, and sank on the floor in front of him. He lifted her up and set her on a chair, and his own eyes were wet as he said: "I am not suffering less than you, Pilar, but the cup of bitterness must be drunk." "You do not love me," she moaned. "You have never loved me." "Do not say that, Pilar. I have loved you, but it is our ill-luck--" "You have loved me, you say. So you do not love me now? Wilhelm, speak--do you not love me any more?" He tried to evade the question. "You know, from the first, I did not want to come here. My weak compliance is revenging itself upon me now. You yourself only spoke of it as a trial; if I could not accustom myself to it you would not insist on my remaining." "You do not love me any more! So that is your boasted German constancy of which you are so proud! These are your vows which I took for gospel truth!" "I have no recollection of having made any vows," he retorted. He was sorry for it the moment the words had left his mouth.