To see her standing there on the sidewalk in the full, unshadowed
morning light, silent, dishevelled, scarcely clothed, seemed to him
part of the ghastly unreality of this sombre and menacing vision, from
which he ought to rouse himself.
She turned her head slowly; her haggard eyes met his without
expression; and he found his tongue with the effort of a man who
strives for utterance through a threatening dream:
"We can't stay here," he said. The sound of his own voice steadied and
cleared his senses. He glanced down at his own attire, blood-stained,
and ragged; felt for the loose end of his collar, rebuttoned it, and
knotted the draggled white tie with the unconscious indifference of
habit.
"What a nightmare!" he muttered to himself. "The world has been turned
upside down over night." He looked up at her: "We can't stay here," he
repeated. "Where do you live?"
She did not appear to hear him. She had already started to move toward
the rue Vilna, where the troopers barring that street still sat their
restive horses. They were watching her and her dishevelled companion
with the sophisticated amusement of men who, by clean daylight,
encounter fagged-out revellers of a riotous night.
Neeland spoke to her again, then followed her and took her arm.
"Where are you going?" he repeated, uneasily.
"I shall give myself up," she replied in a dull voice.
"To whom?"
"To the Municipals over there."
"Give yourself up!" he repeated. "Why?"
She passed a slender hand over her eyes as though unutterably weary:
"Neeland," she said, "I am lost already.... And I am very tired."
"What do you mean?" he demanded, drawing her back under a
porte-cochère. "You live somewhere, don't you? If it's safe for you
to go back to your lodgings, I'll take you there. Is it?"
"No."
"Well, then, I'll take you somewhere else. I'll find somewhere to take
you----"
She shook her head: "It is useless, Neeland. There is no chance of my leaving the city
now--no chance left--no hope. It is simpler for me to end the matter
this way----"
"Can't you go to the Turkish Embassy!"
She looked up at him in a surprised, hopeless way:
"Do you suppose that any Embassy ever receives a spy in trouble? Do
you really imagine that any government ever admits employing secret
agents, or stirs a finger to aid them when they are in need?"