"Leave the girl alone!" said Therese shortly, in a severe tone. "What do you want now?"

"There, there--don't turn me out of the house before I have got in. Is it not permissible to embrace my little bride? Noemi won't break if I look at her? What are you so afraid of me for?"

"We have good reason," said Therese, sullenly.

"Don't be angry, little mother. This time I have not come to get anything from you: I bring you something--a great, great deal of money.

Ho! ho! a heap of money! So much that you could buy back your fine house that you once had, and the fields and gardens on the Ostrova Island--in short, all that you have lost. You shall have it all again. I know that I, as a son, owe you the duty of making good all that you lost by my poor father's fault."

By this time Theodor had become so sentimental that he was shedding tears, but it left the spectators unmoved: they believed as little in his tears as in his laughter.

"Let us go in, into the room," said he, "for what I have to say is not for every ear."

"Don't talk such nonsense," Frau Therese said, angrily. "What do you mean by 'every ear' here on this lonely island? You can say anything before Timar: he is an old friend--but go on. I know you are hungry, and that's what it all means."

"Ah, you dear good mother! how well you know your Theodor's little weakness of always having a splendid appet.i.te. And you do so thoroughly understand the exquisite Greek _cuisine_, at sight of which one would wish to be all stomach. There is no such housekeeper in the world as you are. I have dined with the Sultan of Turkey, but he has no cook who can compare with you."

Frau Therese had the weakness of being sensitive to praise of her housekeeping. She never grudged good things to any guest, and even her deadly enemy she could not send away empty.

Theodor wore a so-called Figaro hat, which was then in fashion, and managed that the low door-way of the little cottage should knock it off his head, in order to be able to say, "Oh, these confounded new-fangled hats! but that's sure to happen when one is used to high door-ways. In my new house they are all folding-doors, and such a splendid view over the sea from my rooms."

"Have you then really a home anywhere?" asked Therese as she laid the table.

"I should think so! At Trieste, and in the finest palace in the town. I am agent to the princ.i.p.al shipbuilder."

"At Trieste?" interrupted Timar. "What's his name?"

"He turns out sea-going vessels," said Theodor, casting a contemptuous look at Timar. "He is not merely a barge-builder--and for that matter his name is Signor Scaramelli."

Timar was silent. He did not care to let out that he himself was having a large vessel built for the ocean trade by Scaramelli.

"I am just rolling in money!" bragged Theodor. "Millions and millions pa.s.s through my hands. If I were not such an honest man, I could save thousands for myself. I have bought something for my dear little Noemi, which I once promised her. What did I promise? A ring. What sort of a stone? A ruby, an emerald? Well, it is a brilliant, a four-carat brilliant: it shall be our betrothal ring. Here it is." Theodor felt in his breeches-pocket, fumbled a long time, made at last a terrible grimace, and stared on the ground. "It is lost!" groaned he, turning his pocket out, and showing the treacherous hole through which the valuable engagement-ring with the four-carat diamond had escaped. Noemi broke into a hearty laugh. She had such a lovely ringing voice when she laughed, and one seldom had a chance of hearing it.

"But it is not lost!" cried Theodor; "you may spare your laughter, fair lady!" and he began to draw off his boot--and there really was the ring, which fell out of the turned-over top of the boot on to the tray.

"There it is! A good horse does not run away. My little Noemi's engagement-ring has never left me. Look now, Mamma Therese--your future son-in-law has brought this for his bride; there, what do you say to that? And you, Mr. Underwriter, if you understand these things, what do you value this diamond at?"

Timar looked at the stone and said, "Paste. In the trade it is worth about five groschen."

"Hold your tongue, Supercargo! What do you know about it? You understand hay and maize, and perhaps never saw a diamond in your life."

And so saying, he placed the despised ring, which Noemi would on no account wear, on his little finger, and was busy all through the meal in showing it off. The young gentleman had a fine appet.i.te. During dinner he talked very big about what a gigantic establishment this shipbuilder's was, and how many million square feet of wood were required every year. There were hardly any trees left in the neighborhood fit for building ships. They had to be brought from America. There were only a few left in Sclavonia. Only after he had dined well, he came out with the princ.i.p.al affair.

"And now, my dear lady, I will tell you what I have come about."

Therese looked at him with anxious distrust.

"Now I will make you all happy--you, as well as Noemi and myself. And besides, I can do Signor Scaramelli a good turn. That's enough for me.

Says Scaramelli to me one day, 'Friend Krisstyan, I say, you will have to go off to Brazil.'"

"If only you were there now!" sighed Therese.

Theodor understood and smiled. "You must know that from there comes the best wood for shipbuilding. The makaya and the murmuru tree, used for the keel; the poripont and patanova, from which the ribs are made; the royoc and grasgal-trees, which do not decay in water; the 'mort-aux-rats'-tree, the iron-wood for rudder shafts, and sour-gum-tree for paddle-floats; also the teak and mahogany for ship's fittings, and--"

"Pray, stop with your ridiculous Indian names," interrupted Therese; "you think you will turn my head by reeling out a whole botanical catalogue, so that I sha'n't see the wood for the trees. Tell me why--if there are such incomparable trees in Brazil--why you are not there already?"

"Yes, but that's just where my grand idea comes in. Why, said I to Signor Scaramelli, should I travel to Brazil when we have plenty of wood close by even better than that of Brazil? I know an island in the middle of the Danube which is provided with a virgin forest, and where grow splendid trees, which can compete with those of South America."

"I thought so," murmured Therese to herself.

"The poplars take the place of the patanovas; the nut-trees far surpa.s.s mahogany, and those we have in hundreds on our island."

"My nut-trees!"

"The wood of the apple-tree is much better than that of the jaskarilla-tree."

"Indeed; so you have already disposed of my apple-trees!"

"Plum-tree wood need not fear comparison with the best teak."

"And those too you would cut down and sell to Signor Scaramelli?" asked Frau Therese, quietly.

"We shall get a mint of money for them; at least ten gulden for each tree. Signor Scaramelli has given me _carte blanche_. He has left me free to make a contract with you. I have it in my pocket; you have only to sign and our fortune is made. And when once the useless trees here are cut down, we will not stay here, but go and live in Trieste. We will plant the whole island with 'Prunus mehaleb'--you know they make Turkish pipe-stems from it. This tree requires no care; we need only keep one man here; he would sell the yearly crop of tubular stems to the merchants, and we should receive five hundred ducats for every rood--for ten roods five thousand ducats."

Timar could not suppress a smile. Speculations of such rashness had not occurred even to him.

"Well, what is there to laugh at?" Theodor said, in a lordly manner. "I know all about these things."

"And I understand, too," said Therese, "what you want. As often as my unlucky star brings you here, you appear like a bird of prey, and I may be sure you have some malicious scheme against me. You know that you will not find any money with me, but you help yourself. Once before you came with a boat and carried off what we had saved for our own use, and turned it into money. Now you are no longer satisfied with the fruit of which you took t.i.thes more jealously than any usurious pasha. You want to sell the trees, too, over my head--those trees, my treasures, my only friends in the world, which I have planted and nurtured, which keep me, and under which I can rest. Fy! for shame! to tell me such stories of getting money for these trees, to build ships of them. For certain, you would only cut them down to sell them for a trifle to the nearest charcoal-burner--that is your splendid plan. Who are you going to take in? Not me, who know your cunning. I tell you, have done with your foolish tricks, or you may yet learn what is the use of Turkish pipe-stems!"

"No, no, Mamma Therese, I am not thinking of joking; you may be sure I did not come here for nothing: remember what day it is. It is my _fete_-day, and the day of my little darling Noemi's birth. You know my poor father and hers betrothed us to each other when we were little; they settled that as soon as Noemi was seventeen we should be united. I should have come from the ends of the earth for such a day as this. Here I am, with all the warmth of my loving heart; but people can not live on love alone. It is true I get good pay from Signor Scaramelli, but that goes to the splendid furniture of my house in Trieste. You must give me something with Noemi, so that she may make an appearance consistent with her rank. The bride can not enter the bridegroom's house with empty hands; she is your only daughter, and has a right to require of you that you should provide for her handsomely."

Noemi had sat down sulkily in a corner of the room, and remained with her back to the company and her head against the wall.

"Yes," continued Theodor. "You must give Noemi a dowry. Do not be so selfish. Keep half your trees, for all I care, and leave the other half to me; where and how I sell them is my affair. Give Noemi the nut-trees for a dowry: for those I have, really, a certain purchaser."

Therese had come to the end of her patience. "Listen, Theodor. I do not know whether to-day is your _fete_ or not, but one thing I do know, that it is not Noemi's birthday. And yet more surely I know that Noemi will not marry you, if you were the only man on G.o.d's earth."

"Ha! ha! leave that to me--I am not afraid."

"Just as you like; but now, once for all, you shall never have my splendid nut-trees, if Noah's ark was to be built of them. One single tree I will give you, and that you can use for the end you will come to sooner or later. You say to-day is your _fete_-day, and that would be a good day to do it."

At these words Theodor rose, but not to go on his way--only to turn the chair he had been sitting on, and place himself astride on it, with his elbows on its back, and looking into Therese's eyes he said with provoking coolness--

"I must say you are very kind, Mamma Therese; you seem to have forgotten that if I say one word--"

"Say it then! You can speak freely before this gentleman: he knows everything."

"And that this island does not belong to you?"