Always
apprehensive of spies, although the Gott commandeered by the Kaiser
seemed to have adjusted blinders to eyes strained west, east, and
south, she leapt to the conclusion that she was under surveillance at
last, and her heart beat thickly. She who had believed that the long
strain, the constant danger, the incessant demand for resource and ever
more resource, had transformed her nerves to pure steel, realized
angrily that on this last night when she had permitted herself an hour's
idle retrospect before commanding sleep, her nerves more nearly
resembled the strings of a violin.
Her apartment was on the ground floor. She stood up, revealing herself
disdainfully in the moonlight that now lay full on her window, then went
out quickly into the vestibule and unlocked the house door. Her only
fear was that the man would have gone, but if he were still there she
was determined to walk boldly over to his skulking-place and pretend she
believed him to be a burglar or a foreign spy. In these days she carried
a small pistol and a dagger.
When she had stepped out on the pavement she glanced quickly up and down
the street. Not even a _polizeidiener_ was in sight, for this
aristocratic quarter was, in peace and war, the quietest part of an
always orderly town. It was evident that the man spied alone.
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