Her untiring conscience took up the burden again, to bear
it as it might.
Rex must answer her, and upon his answer would depend everything. It
was not an easy matter to question him, however, and for the present it
was wholly impossible. She must meet Hilda while she herself was yet
undecided, so that it seemed simplest to be roughly frank with the
girl, to tell her plainly what had happened, what was known and the
extent of what no one knew, showing her clearly that if old
Greifenstein should turn out to have been guilty, she must give up all
thought of Greif and submit to her poor lot with the best grace she
could. Greif would go away and travel, perhaps for several years. He
would find interests at last, which might help him to forget his
darkened youth. Hilda and her mother would live as they could, and when
the mother died Sigmundskron must go to the hammer. At all events it
was not encumbered with debts, and its sale would leave the child a
pittance to save her from starvation; possibly she would have more than
before, but Frau von Sigmundskron could not judge of that. Possibly,
too, Hilda's sixty-four quarterings would help her to gain admittance
as a lady-canoness in one of those semi-religious foundations, reserved
exclusively for the old nobility, of which several exist in Germany.
The short winter's day was over when Frau von Sigmundskron reached this
stage in her meditations. Lights were brought to the room where she
was, and a servant came to ask her what she would eat.
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