class="normal">"Upon my word, I don't know what you are driving at," Herr von Stolt said, and gazed intently at the toes of his riding-boots.

"Why feign to be ignorant," answered his wife. "You know perfectly well the person I mean, being as intimate with her as your sons."

"I have long since given up meddling in local scandals, my dear," he said, with a snigger; "but if with all these obscure hints it is Felicitas Kletzingk whom you mean, you are decidedly on the wrong scent. There never was a more guileless little woman. We know what Ulrich is. He is always either spending the day in Berlin or sitting lost in a brown study. And his little wife, of course, will amuse herself."

Frau von Stolt broke into a harsh laugh.

"Of course; now let us hear the old category of her perfections. She is an angel--on that point all the men within a circuit of ten miles are agreed. She is so ingenuous and so melancholy; so talented and so good; so gentle, and, in short, a paragon. But we women see deeper, my friend. We are not to be taken in by any wiles, flute-like tones, and smiling fawn-like eyes. Then for us, truly, there lies behind it all no temptation to appropriate what is not our own."

"Malwine, you are becoming insulting," retorted Herr von Stolt, twirling the ends of his grey moustache with an injured air.

"If only there were something in her!" the lady exclaimed, undaunted; "but I assure you she is commonplace to the very core. There is nothing genuine about her. She has her looks, and nothing else. I can't conceive what can have attracted Ulrich with his position and fortune to this person. Rhaden's widow, poor, with a child, and compromised to boot."

"How compromised?"

"Don't be absurd, Alfred," was the reply. "You men have always been of opinion that Rhaden fell in the duel with Sellenthin because there was a case of adultery at the bottom of it."

"Yes, certainly before her second marriage. So much I will admit. But Leo Sellenthin and Ulrich have been friends from childhood, and what friends! Something quite extraordinary, like David and Jonathan. Would Ulrich have married this woman if there had been anything between her and his friend? It stands to reason that there could have been nothing, doesn't it?"

Frau von Stolt relapsed into meditation. Her husband's argument apparently had convinced her.

"But apart from that altogether," she began again, after a pause. "Leo is abroad, and not coming home. What concerns us now is Felicitas Kletzingk's present conduct, and I must say that it almost amounts to a scandal."

Herr von Stolt shrugged his shoulders.

"Here is an example," continued his wife--"just one example. The other morning I had occasion to turn out our sons' pockets."

"So you are in the habit of turning out other people's pockets!" exclaimed Herr Stolt, perceptibly disturbed by the discovery.

"Yes, why not? It is advisable to keep one's self abreast of their little peccadilloes in love as well as professional affairs. And what do you think I found? Letters from Madam Felicitas--small olive-green missives, reeking with that abominable perfume with which she always scents herself."

Herr von Stolt involuntarily sniffed the air, and smiled dreamily as he did so.

"It was my privilege to read through a real--what do you call it?--æsthetic correspondence, as exaggerated as you please, all about noble humanity, moonshine, communion with nature, and other rubbish. Not that there is any question of our good sons being capable of living up to such a silly rôle for though they have an excellent knowledge of horses, this sort of high-falutin is quite beyond their comprehension, thank God. Besides, I talked to them each separately, and put my emphatic veto upon it."

"And has that done any good?" asked Herr von Stolt, with a grin.

"To a certain extent it has. But of course I could not prevent their actual visits to Felicitas. I don't understand how Ulrich can wink at his wife's intercourse with these young men. Not only our two, but Otzen and Neuhaus, and the second Sembritzky, and a lot more of them are constantly there, all young and green."

"Hum! there are older visitors too, I'm thinking," interposed Herr von Stolt, thoughtfully.

"Yes. There is yourself, for instance."

"Really, Malwine!" he ejaculated reproachfully.

"Dear Alfred, we understand each other."

"When I do happen to ride over to Uhlenfelde, it is to see Ulrich."

"Especially when Ulrich is in the Reichstag?"

The matrimonial recriminations ended abruptly, for at this moment a tall spare masculine figure, in a white dust-coat which hung without a fold, glided past the waiting-room window. It rather resembled a walking towel, on which some one had stuck a head.

"Talk of the devil!" exclaimed Frau Malwine, and jumped up to see whither the passing form had betaken itself.

"Who was it?" asked Herr von Stolt, who was sitting with his back to the window.

"Ulrich von Kletzingk."

The door of the vestibule opened, and he who had gone by came in.

He had a pale sickly face of a reflective cast, with sharp small nose and hollow cheeks, set on narrow shoulders and a long freckled neck. It was framed in a light beard, which hung about it like a ragged fringe. The high, rather receding forehead was furrowed with three perpendicular lines denoting mental fatigue, and it ended in a shock of bristly dark-brown hair standing erect. The most remarkable feature of this intellectual head were the dark brilliant eyes, which shone forth from their blue sockets like torches of energy. After emitting luminous flashes, they seemed to slumber wearily again till a new excitement set them aflame once more.

When he was aware who occupied the room, a shadow of nervous uneasiness descended for a moment on the new-corner's face, but passed quickly away. The tone in which he greeted the husband and wife was moderately friendly, if not cold. His voice was not pleasant to hear. It was shrill and high pitched, and however rapidly he spoke, the words seemed to be forced with pain and difficulty from his narrow chest.

Frau Malwine beamed. She was no longer the mother of the Gracchi, in which part she had been just posing to her husband. She exhausted herself in expressions of affection for Frau Felicitas, and added the tender reproach that it was ages since she had seen anything of her. Twice when she had been expected, an extra supply of meringues had been baked, of the kind which was the pride of her modest ménage, but Frau Felicitas had not come. Ulrich Kletzingk allowed this outpouring of gush to pass over him quietly. Only the nervous playing with the buttons of his riding-glove betrayed that he was not quite at ease.

"You put us to shame, madame," he answered. "Your friendship, however, has been too unobtrusive, for I think that it is some months since we saw you at Uhlenfelde."

Frau Malwine, a little disconcerted at the reminder that she owed Uhlenfelde a call, nevertheless, in the same strain of affected naïvété, went so far as to explain that she was sure she had been well represented by her sons.

Kletzingk bowed and smiled politely.

"At any rate," she continued, with animation, "I ought to express my thanks to you, Herr Baron, for the happy influence the atmosphere of your house has exercised on my young scapegraces. My only fear is that I may have abused your hospitality in sending them over to