The Ring by Danielle Steel Read Free Book Online Page A

after a moment, But we will.
    I find it difficult to believe that things could ever get so out of hand.
    He looked at her with urgency as she stood up to leave the room. Will you do what I asked you, Kassandra? She wanted to promise him, to assure him that she would, but something had changed subtly between them. He knew the truth, and it was better that way. She didn't have to lie him anymore.
    I don't know.
    You have no choice. His voice was angry then. Kassandra, I forbid you But she had quietly slipped out of the room.

Chapter 4

    Six weeks later one of Dolff's writer friends disappeared. He was far less well-known than Dolff, but he, too, had had trouble publishing his most recent work. His girl friend called Dolff in hysterics at two o'clock in the morning. She had driven home from visiting her mother in Munich that night, and the apartment had been broken into, Helmut was gone, and there was blood on the floor. The manuscript he'd been working on was scattered around the room. The neighbors had heard shouting and then screaming, but that was all she knew. Dolff had met her near Helmut's apartment and then driven her back to his place. The next day she sought refuge with her sister.
    When Kassandra arrived later that morning, she found him in the depths of depression, and insane with grief over Helmut's disappearance.
    I don't understand it, Kassandra, Little by little, the whole country's going mad. It's like a slow-moving poison traveling in this country's veins. Eventually it will reach our heart and kill us. Not that I'll have to worry about that. He stared at her gloomily and she frowned.
    What's that supposed to mean?
    What do you think it means? How long do you think it will be before they come for me? A month? Six months? A year?
    Don't be crazy, Helmut wasn't a novelist He was a hightly political nonfiction writer who has openly criticized Hitler since he came to power. Don't you see the difference? What do you think they'd be angry about in your case? A novel like Der Kuss?
    You know, I'm not sure I do see the difference, Kassandra. He glanced around the room with displeasure. He didn't even feel secure in his house anymore; it was as though he expected them to come for him any day.
    Dolff ' darling, please ' be reasonable. It was an awful thing to have happened, but it can't happen to you. Everyone knows you. They're not simply going to make you disappear overnight.
    Why not? Who's going to stop them? Will you? Will anyone? Of course not What did I do for Helmut last night? Nothing. Absolutely goddamn nothing.
    All right, then leave for God's sake. Go to Switzerland now You can publish there. And you'll be safe.
    But he only looked at her bleakly. Kassandra, I'm a German. This is my country, too. I have as much right to be here as anyone else does. Why the hell should I go?
    Then what are you telling me, dammit? It was the first fight they had had in a year.
    I'm telling you that my country is destroying itself and its people and it's making me sick.
    But you can't stop that. If that's what you believe, then get out before it destroys you.
    And what about you, Kassandra? You stay here pretending none of it will ever touch you? You think it won't?
    I don't know ' I don't know ' I don't know anything anymore. I don't understand any of it. The golden woman had been looking tired for weeks. She was getting it from both of them now, and she felt helpless in the face of their fears. She looked to them for reassurance, for the confirmation that everything she believed in would never change, and they were both telling her that everything was changing; yet all Walmar wanted to do about it was for her to stop seeing Dolff, and all Dolff wanted to do was rail at something that none of them had the power to change. He went on talking in disjointed circles for another half hour, and suddenly she jumped to her feet in a rage. What the hell do you want from me? What can I do?
    Nothing, dammit ' nothing ' And then as tears