“Perfectly so,” said Reinhold; “it is my warmest wish and firm resolve to serve my king and country, by land or water, wherever or however I can. Any summons that comes to me will always find me ready; although, indeed, I do not deny that I should most reluctantly leave this place.”
“I can believe that,” said the President. “A man like you puts his whole soul into everything, and is absorbed by his duties, be they small or great; and you have proved that great things can be done in comparatively insignificant positions. But the matter has its social side too, which it would be false heroism to overlook. The thorough appreciation of your services in the highest places will be gratifying to your poor father-in-law, and he would feel himself, besides, terribly lonely in Berlin without his daughter near him.”
“How kind you are!” said Reinhold, much touched. “How you have thought of everything!”
“Have I not!” said the President, responding warmly to the pressure of Reinhold’s hand. “It is wonderful! But I have the honour of being a friend of the family; you yourself acknowledged me in that capacity, when, at the same time with the official report of the events of the flood, you sent me a private account of what had concerned yourself and the family to which you now belong. I feel myself honoured by your confidence; I need not say that it will all remain buried in heart. But you did right; in such complicated affairs it is better not to trust to oneself, but to make use of the experience and judgment of one’s friends. And who could be better placed than I to give advice and assistance in this case? I have thought over everything already, and settled a good deal in my own mind, and have even taken some preliminary steps, which have met with the readiest concurrence on all sides. We will speak of this more at length when you come to see me at Sundin, which you must do shortly. For today, as I must return immediately after the funeral, I will only say this: I am certain that the estates of your aunt the Baroness may be saved, as both Golm and the Company are bankrupt, and must be satisfied with any reasonable conditions. I shall not offer them favourable ones, you may be sure! These men, who have brought such untold misery upon thousands, deserve no mercy! Even so there will remain only the ruins of a magnificent property, for the principal part is lost forever, I fear, with that terrible man Giraldi. Or do you not think so?”
“Indeed I do,” said Reinhold. “I supposed so from the first; and the account given by the man who drove him, and whom I afterwards thoroughly questioned and examined, confirmed my supposition. The influx of the tide between Wissow Head and Faschwitz was so frightfully violent that the waters that first entered the so-formed gulf must have been emptied out by the succeeding waves as out of a basin, with everything that was floating in it. The water thus forced out would join the immense stream running westwards into the open sea between the mainland and the island, and if the corpse should ever, weeks hence, perhaps months hence, be carried to some distant shore—”
“It is a pity, a great pity,” said the President; “such a magnificent property! According to my calculations, and the expressions used by that dreadful man in his last interview with the Baroness, not less than a million. How much good might have been done with it! And in your hands, too. But then it would be a terrible thing to come into such an inheritance. And the Baroness, too; are the dreadful details known to her?”
“She knows that Antonio was the murderer of my poor cousin; and she knows also that the two Italians met in their flight, and were drowned together. I hope the unutterable horror that the man’s account reveals to us will remain forever hidden from her.”
“She does not believe in the son?”
“Not in the least! It is as if God in His mercy had blinded her usually quick eyes on this point. She takes the whole thing for an invention and sheer lie of Giraldi’s. You may suppose that we strengthen her in this idea, and thank the fates on this ground at least for the darkness that has swallowed up what never ought to see the light of day.”
“True, true!” said the President; “that is a comfort, certainly. The unhappy lady has suffered enough already. The fates have not been so merciful to your poor uncle. It is terrible to lose such a daughter—so beautiful and gifted—in such a way; but for a man such as your uncle from all I hear must be, so high-minded and upright, to be haunted by the vision of a son who is pursued whichever way he turns by warrants and detectives; for such sorrow as that I think no greatness of mind, no philosophy can be of any use; it is utterly horrible, without the least hope of consolation. Such grief cannot be alleviated by even time, which cures most troubles; death alone can bring relief; but the man will not let himself die.”
“I do not know,” said Reinhold; “he is one of a family who do not fear death. However differently in some points the poor man may see life, I can easily imagine that even to him the question may present itself in a form which he understands, and that he may then not hesitate for a moment in his decision.”
The faintest glimmer of a sarcastic smile played round the President’s delicately-cut lips; he was about to say, with some courteous periphrases, that he quite understood family pride, even when as in this case it clearly overshot the mark; but a
