Penurot was ready to attempt his difficult task at once, and took leave of Heideck, promising to meet him soon after midnight at the same tavern.  Heideck left the restaurant soon after him, and walked along the quay Van Dyck, to cool his heated brow.  In time of war the town presented a strangely altered appearance.  There was a swarm of German soldiers in the streets; the usual busy traffic at the harbour had entirely ceased.  There had been no trade since the German warships, like floating citadels, had been lying in the Schelde.  And yet it was almost incomprehensible, how the change had come about so rapidly.  Antwerp was an almost impregnable fortress, if the flooding of the surrounding country was undertaken in time.  But the Belgian Government had not even made an attempt at defence, when the vanguard of the seventh and eighth army corps had appeared in the neighbourhood of the town.  It had surrendered the fortress at once, with all its strong outer forts, to the German military commanders and had withdrawn its own army.  The Imperial Chancellor was certainly right in attaching such importance to the possession of Antwerp by Germany.  The population was almost exclusively Flemish, and Antwerp was thus in nationality a German town.

From the general political situation Heideck’s thoughts returned to Edith and her letter, and at last he decided to write to her that very evening.

To carry out his intention, he went back to the restaurant where he had met Penurot, and called for ink and paper.  When he had finished his letter, he looked over the words he had written, in which, contrary to his usual practice, he had given utterance to his real feelings:—­

“My dear Edith,—­In the exercise of my duty, I accidentally came into possession of your letter to Frau Amelungen.  I was looking for something quite different at the time, and you can imagine how great was my surprise at the unexpected discovery.

“From the hour when we were obliged to separate and you, possibly not without resentment and reproach, held out your hand at parting, I have felt more and more how indispensable you are to me.  I treasure every word you have said to me, every look you have bestowed upon me, and your image is before my mind, ever brighter, ever more beautiful.  I have never met a woman whose mind was so beautiful, so refined, so keen as yours.  I must confess that your ideas at first sometimes terrified me.  Your views are often so far removed from the commonplace, so far above the ordinary, that it needs time to estimate them correctly.  If I now recall to mind what formerly seemed strange to me, it is only with feelings of admiration.  From day to day the impression you made upon me at our first conversation has sunk deeper into my mind, and the comforting certainty, that love for you will fill my entire life in the future, grows more and more unshakable.