to which his hopes had grown. But there was something more than this in
the despondency which seized upon him so quickly and would not be
thrown off.

'Does Hilda know this?' he asked, at length giving expression to his
thoughts.

Greifenstein did not answer at once.

'I do not think her mother would have told her,' he said after a time.
'But her mother knows.'

'And my mother does not?'

'No, nor never shall, if I can help it.'

If the two men spoke little on their homeward walk it was not for lack
of sympathy between them. On the contrary, if anything could strengthen
the strong bond that united them, it was the knowledge that they had a
secret in common which they must keep together.




CHAPTER II


To suppose that Hilda, at eighteen years of age, was like the majority
of young girls as old as she, would be to imagine that human character
is not influenced by its surroundings. She was neither a village