"By Jove! Deuce take the fellow! A pretty household this! and in broad daylight, too!"
The speaker was an elderly gentleman, dressed with extreme elegance, who had been contemplating the embrace from the staircase-landing, his fine Panama hat on his head, and his hands resting upon his gold-headed cane. He continued to observe the couple with a good-humoured smile, as they stood as if spell-bound in dismay.
When, however, Wilhelm had sufficiently recovered himself to recognize the elderly spectator, he looked much relieved. "Don't be frightened, Nanette," he whispered; "'tis only our Fräulein's Uncle Balthasar. You won't tell of us, Herr Schommer? 'An honest kiss ne'er comes amiss.'"
Herr Balthasar took the request in very good part, made though it was rather familiarly than respectfully. He nodded good-humouredly to Wilhelm, pinched Nanette's blooming cheek, and smiled broadly. "A kiss," he said,--"a kiss, to be sure, is all very well, but you took a dozen, you deuce of a fellow. If I should tell my wife or my niece you're both done for."
Wilhelm seemed little disturbed by the threat. "You wouldn't be so hard on us, Herr Schommer," he said; and his security was fully justified by the good nature that characterized this uncle of his mistress.
Herr Balthasar Schommer was a personification of good humour. It beamed pure and unadulterated from his small gray eyes, it was distinctly stamped on the broad smile of his large mouth. Whoever had once seen Herr Balthasar knew that he could rely with certainty upon his thorough goodness of heart. There was no guile in the man; his round face was the mirror of his character. Try as the old gentleman would by twirling the ends of his gray moustache straight into the air to give himself a stern, martial air, no one was ever deceived by it.
"I'll let you off this once, deuce take you!" he said, vainly endeavouring to make his words sound stern and dignified; "but another time take care. And you too, you little minx," he went on, turning to Nanette; "for I can tell you that if my niece had seen you--ah, by Jove!"
Again he pinched the girl's cheek, then laughed heartily, and tapped Wilhelm on the shoulder with his cane. Then with a farewell nod he went into the drawing-room to find his niece.
"Won't he tell?" Nanette whispered anxiously as the door closed behind him.
"Never!" Wilhelm replied in a tone of firm conviction. "Herr Balthasar wouldn't for the world do an unkind thing by any one. Oh, he's a splendid old gentleman!"