Mr. h.e.l.linger muttered something to himself, and busied himself with his long pipe.

"It looks as if something were brewing again in that quarter," she began anew; "he has altogether been so peculiar lately; come slinking round me without a word to say for himself. It seems to me there is some debt hanging over him again that he can't satisfy."

"Poor fellow," said the old man, and smacked his lips, perhaps to get rid of the unpleasant idea by this means.

"Poor fellow, indeed!" she mocked him; "I suppose you pity him into the bargain; perhaps even you have been helping him on the sly?"

He raised up his white, well-kept hands in protest and defence of himself, but he had not the courage to look her in the face.

"Adalbert," she said, threateningly, "I make it a condition that such a thing does not happen again. Whatever you give him, you take from us and from our other children. And if at least he deserved it! but he that will not hear advice must suffer. If he is ruined, with his obstinacy and stubbornness----"

"Allow me, Henrietta," he interrupted her timidly.

"I allow nothing, Adalbert, my dear," replied she. "'He that will not hearken to advice must suffer!' say I; and if through his abominable ingrat.i.tude his poor mother, who is only anxious for his welfare, and who bothers and worries herself whole nights through, thinking----"

With the many-coloured border of her ap.r.o.n she rubbed her eyes as if there were tears there to be wiped away.

"But, Henrietta," he began again.

"Adalbert, do not contradict me! You know I close an eye to all your follies. I allow you to sit as long as ever you like at the 'Black Eagle'; I let you drink as much as ever you can do with of that bad, expensive claret. I even put your supper ready for you when you come home late though it is hardly necessary that you should on such occasions upset three chairs, as you did yesterday. I consider altogether that you have very little regard for the feelings of your old and faithful wife. But--yes, what I was going to say is--that, once for all, I will not have you meddle with my plans: as it is you understand nothing of such matters. Have you, altogether, any idea of all I have done already for that good-for-nothing Robert? I have run about, and driven about, made calls, and written letters, and Heaven knows what else. Five or six well-to-do--nay, very wealthy girls I have, so to say, brought ready to his hand, any of whom he could have had for the taking. But what did he do? Well, I should think you still remember how I was seized with convulsions when, four years ago, he arrived with that miserable, delicate creature, Martha? My whole illness dates from then."

"But, Henrietta!"

"My dear Adalbert, I beg of you, do not again harp upon the same old string about her being my own flesh and blood! If she wished to be a loving and grateful niece to me, why did she not bring the necessary dowry with her? She had nothing--of course she had nothing! My departed brother died as poor as a church mouse. Is that fitting for one of my family? But after all--he had a right to do as he liked with his own--what business is it of mine? Only he need not have saddled us with his daughter."

"Well, but she is dead now," remarked Herr h.e.l.linger.

"Yes, she is dead," replied she, and folded her hands. "It were a sin to say, thank G.o.d for that. But as our Lord has so ordained it, I will at least profit by the circ.u.mstance, and endeavour to rectify his folly of then. While you were sitting in the 'Black Eagle,' drinking your claret, I was once more toiling and moiling and inquiring round, so that he has but to pick and choose. There is Gertrude Leuzmann; will get fifty thousand cash down and as much more when the old man dies.

There is that little von Versen; very young yet certainly--only just confirmed--but she will get even more! And besides these, at least three or four others! But what do you imagine he will say to it all?

'Mother,' he will say, 'if you start that theme again, you will never more set sight on me.' Was ever such a thing heard of? He has only to marry the second sister now in place of the other one, to bring his good old mother to her grave! By the by where can the young lady be to-day? It is nearly nine o'clock, and she has not yet appeared. In my brother's Bohemian home it may very probably have been the fashion to lie a-bed till noon; but in my well-ordered household, I beg to say, most emphatically and politely, I will not have it, Adalbert."

"I cannot conceive, dear Henrietta," he said, "why you heap reproaches upon me which are meant for your niece!"

"If only for once you would not take her part, Adalbert. But, of course, there is nothing left for me to say. I am duped and betrayed in my own house! However, I shall very soon put an end to the matter. I have kept her here now for a whole year; now she begins to be very much _de trop_."

"But does she not toll and moil in Robert's household from early morn till late at night? Does a day pa.s.s on which she does not betake herself to the manor farm? Do not be unjust towards her, Henrietta."

She gave him a pitying look.

"If you had not remained such a child, Adalbert, one might talk reason to you. Don't you see that that is just where the danger lies? Don't you imagine that she has her reasons for flaunting about every day at the manor and for behaving herself as mistress there before him and the servants? Ah--she--she is a deep one--is my niece Olga. Be sure she has done her part towards getting him accustomed to the idea that she--and she alone--has a right to the place of her dead sister. What else should she be looking for, day after day, at the manor, if it is not that?"

"I should think Martha's child is sufficient explanation."

"Of course, of course! Any nursery tale is good enough to impose upon you! She knows exactly why she behaves as she does, and why she is almost ready to eat up the poor little mite for very love. She knows exactly how to find the way to its father's heart!"

"But perhaps she does not love him at all," old h.e.l.linger interposed.

She laughed out loud.

"My dear Adalbert, a man who owns an estate just outside the town-gates is always loved by a poor girl, and if I do not make an end now and send her about her business, it may very possibly come to pa.s.s that our dear Robert will take her by the hand one fine day and say to us, 'Here, papa and mamma, now be good enough to give us your blessing.'

And rather than live to see that, Adalbert----"

At this moment the sound of lumbering male steps was audible in the entrance-hall; directly after these came a loud and violent knock at the door.

"Well!" said Mrs. h.e.l.linger, "some one is making a noise as if the bailiffs were outside--we have not got as far as that yet." And very slowly and deliberately she said, "Come in."

The old doctor stepped into the room. His hat sat awry at the back of his head, his necktie hung loose over his shoulders, and his chest heaved as with breathless running. He forgot his "Good-morning"

greeting, and only gave a wild, searching glance around.

"Good heavens, doctor!" cried Mr. h.e.l.linger, senr., hastening towards him, "why, you burst in upon us like a bull into a china-shop."

Mrs. h.e.l.linger once more a.s.sumed her injured air, and muttered something about pot-house manners.

When the old doctor saw the undisturbed breakfast-table and the astonished, every-day faces of his friends, he let himself drop into an armchair with a sigh of relief. Then it had not taken place after all--this terrible thing! But next moment his fears took possession of him anew.

"Where is Olga?" he faltered, and fixed his gaze on the door as if he might see her enter there any moment.

"Olga?" said Mrs. h.e.l.linger, shrugging her shoulders. "My goodness, she probably will be here shortly. Are you in such a hurry?"

"G.o.d be praised!" cried he, folding his hands. "Then she has been down already?"

"No--not so," remarked Mrs. h.e.l.linger, "her ladyship thinks well to sleep somewhat long this morning."

"For G.o.d's sake," he cried, "has no one looked after her? Does no one know anything of her?"

"Doctor, what ails you?" cried old h.e.l.linger, who was now beginning to be alarmed.

The physician may at this moment have recollected the request with which Olga's letter of farewell had closed. He felt that in this way his desire to comply with her request would, from the very first, become impossible, and made a last wretched attempt to preserve the secret.

"What ails me?" he faltered, with a miserable laugh. "Nothing ails me!--What should ail me? Confound it all!" And then, casting aside all dissimulation, he cried out: "My G.o.d! my G.o.d! Thou hast permitted this terrible thing! Thou hast withdrawn Thy hand from her." And he was about to sink down weeping, but he once more gathered up all the energy still remaining in his rickety old body, raised himself bolt upright, and--"Come to Olga," he said, "and do not be terrified--however--you may--find her."

Old h.e.l.linger grew pale, and his wife commenced to scream and sob; she clung to the doctor's arm, and wished to know what had happened; but he spoke no further word.

So they all three climbed up the stairs leading to Olga's gable-room, and in the entrance-hall the servants collected and stared after them with great, inquisitive eyes.

Before Olga's door Mrs. h.e.l.linger was seized with a paroxysm of despair.

"You knock, doctor," she sobbed, "I cannot."

The old man knocked.

All remained quiet.

He knocked again, and put his ear to the keyhole.

As before.

Then Mrs. h.e.l.linger began to scream: