allowed him back with her, no matter what the cost or the alternative."
Hester had to ask.
"Would he ever have gone without her - if it were to save his country, to keep Felzburg independent?"
Dagmar looked at her steadily, her face suddenly tense, her eyes very level. "I don't know. I used to think not... but I don't know."
A day went by, and another, and another. Robert's fever was gone now. He was beginning to eat proper meals, and to enjoy them. But he still had no sensation or power of movement below the waist.
Bemd came every evening to sit and talk with his son. Hester naturally did not remain in the room, but she knew from the remarks she overheard, and from Robert's own attitude after his father had left, that Bernd was still, at least outwardly, convinced that complete healing was only a matter of waiting.
Dagmar kept up the same manner on the surface, but when she left Robert's room and was alone with Hester on the landing, or downstairs, she allowed her anxiety to show through.
"It seems as if he is not getting any better," she said tensely on the fourth day after their discussion of German reunification politics. Her eyes were dark with anxiety, her shoulders stiff under her fine woolen day bodice with its white lawn collar. "Am I expecting too much too quickly? I thought he would have been able to move his feet now. He just lies there. I dare not even ask what he is thinking." She was desperate for Hester to reassure her, waiting for the word that would ease her fears, at least for a while.
Was it kinder, or cruder, to say something that was not true? Surely trust also mattered? In the future it might matter even more.
"Perhaps you shouldn't ask," Hester replied. She had seen many men face maiming and loss of limbs, disfigurement of face or body. There were things for which no one could offer help. There was nothing to do but stand and wait for the time or the depth of pain when another person was needed. It might come sooner or later. "He will talk about it when he is ready.
Perhaps a visitor would take his mind from thinking of it. I believe Lady Callandra mentioned a Miss Victoria Stanhope, who has suffered some misfortune herself and might be of encouragement..." She did not know how to finish.
Dagmar looked startled and seemed about to dismiss the idea.
"Someone who is less close, less obviously anxious, may be helpful," Hester urged.
"Yes ..." Dagmar agreed hopefully. "Yes, perhaps she may. I shall ask him."
The following day, Victoria Stanhope, still thin, still pale and moving with slight awkwardness, paid a call upon Hester, who conducted her to Robert.
Dagmar had remained uncertain about the suitability of a young, single woman's visiting in such circumstances, but when she saw Victoria, her shyness and her obvious disability, she changed her mind. And apart from that, the girl's dress immediately proclaimed her lack of means or social position. The fact that she spoke with dignity and intelligence made her otherwise most agreeable. The name Stanhope was familiar to Dagmar, but she did not immediately place it.
Victoria stood on the landing beside Hester. Now that the moment had come, her courage failed her.
"I can't go in," she whispered. "What can I say to him? He won't remember me, and if he does, it will only be that I rebuffed him. Anyway" - she gulped and turned, white-faced, to Hester - "what about my family? He'll remember that, and he won't want to have anything to do with me. I can't - "
"Your family's situation is nothing to do with you," Hester said gently, putting her hand on Victoria's arm. "Robert is far too fair to make such a judgment Go in there thinking of his need, not your own, and I promise you, you will have nothing at the end which you can look back on with regret." The moment she had said it, she realized how bold she had been, but Victoria's smile prevented her from withdrawing it.
Victoria took a deep breath and let it out in a sigh, then knocked on the door again.
"May I come in?"
Robert looked at her with curiosity. Hester had prepared him for the visit, naturally, and had been surprised how clearly he had recalled their one brief encounter over a year before.
"Please do, Miss Stanhope," he said with a slight smile. "I apologize for the hospitality I