"Monsieur, it is of my sister that you speak!" "You know where to find me, Monsieur de St. Valier!" At Dick's first words to Catherine, the Landgrave, with a sudden ejaculation and frown, had turned and walked precipitately from the room. The Landgravine, seeing Gerard's movement, had instantly hastened out by another door, that her eyes might not be outraged by a scene. It was the duty of all the guests to follow, and so, as if by magic, while the two young men stood gazing at each other, with Catherine looking on as if turned to marble, the three found themselves alone in the assembly rooms. Gerard was the first to perceive this fact. His face suddenly lost its look of wrathful challenge, and took on one of deep sorrow and concern. "_Mon Dieu!_" he moaned. "We are lost! Oh, Dick, why did you come here? Why didn't you understand?" "What do you mean? Understand what?" asked Dick, with a sudden fear of having made a terrible false step. "That it was for your own sake and ours we pretended not to know you," replied Gerard, despairingly. "The Landgrave attributed my sister's repulses to the fact that she loved another. We have tried to conceal who that other was, lest the Landgrave should destroy you; we thought best to keep even our acquaintance with you unknown at court, so lynx-eyed is that evil old lieutenant of police, Rothenstein. But now all is out, and your chance of making your fortune is ruined! Even your life is in peril if you stay in Cassel another hour!" "Let me understand!" cried Dick. "Repulses, you said?" He turned to Catherine. "Then it is only in the Landgrave's evil hopes, not in fact, that you are his--that you--" "How can you ask?" said Catherine, with a world of patient reproach in her voice and eyes. Dick knelt at her feet. "Forgive me!" he said, in a broken voice that could utter no more. She held out her hand. He pressed it to his lips. "And what are we to do now?" he asked, rising. "You must leave Cassel," said Gerard. "We must all leave Cassel," said Dick. "It is impossible for us to do so, at present," replied Gerard, in despair. "We have no other resource,--no way of living." "But the bequest you came from America to receive?" "We were disappointed of that. Our right has been disputed, and the matter is in the courts." "Your relations in Quebec, and the estate concerning which you were in Philadelphia?" "We quarrelled with our uncle in Quebec, and we would die before we would go back to his charity. Our share of the Philadelphia estate was a trifle, and was spent long ago." "But you must leave Cassel! I shall find a way to provide for us all!" "You forget," put in Catherine, "that my brother dare not leave without a discharge from the military service. He would be taken as a deserter, and shot. Trust me, Wetheral! I can hold the Landgrave aloof. His caprice will soon pass. You alone are in danger. It is best for us to stay till all can be properly arranged for our future somewhere else."