In the latter case, however,
your brother will be sent to a reformatory and an action will be
commenced against your accomplice. It is for you to choose. You have two
whole hours to turn the matter over in your mind. In the meantime I
shall send for my lawyer and, according to your decision, I shall get
him to draw up a marriage contract or a summons to the criminal court.
It all depends upon you. And now put back those documents beneath my
head. Remember that you will only receive them back from me as a bridal
gift. Go now to your own room and reflect. For two hours nobody shall
disturb you."
The girl mechanically complied with his commands. She put back the
ominous documents in their receptacle and withdrew to her room. There
she stood in front of a vase of flowers and regarded their green leaves
for an hour without moving. In the vase was a fine specimen of one of
those wondrous tropical plants whose leaves never fall off, one of those
plants which the seasons leave unchanged and which, therefore, is such a
beautiful emblem of constancy. This beautiful plant has a peculiar
property. If one of its compact shining leaves be planted in the earth
it takes root and grows into a shrub whose fragrant wax-like flowers
diffuse an enchanting perfume. Three years before at a jurists' ball,
when Henrietta and Szilard met for the first time, he had given her a
bouquet, among the flowers of which was one of these green-gold leaves,
and when she got home she had planted it in a jar and it had taken root,
spread its shoots abroad and grown larger and larger every year.
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