Moreover, he wished to warn Helen to keep newspapers away from her sister and grandmother, and on this account it was absolutely necessary to take her into his confidence. She anticipated his wishes, for scarcely had the general left him, when some one knocked softly at his door, such a knock as might have proceeded from a cat or a bird. He knew Helen's gentle manner of announcing herself.
"Come in, little sister, come in!" he cried, and Helen entered on tip-toe.
The baron was lying on his bed in his dressing-gown, lying on his left side, his wounded arm extended along his body.
"Ah! you good-for-nothing," said she, folding her arms and gazing at him, "so you have been and gone and done it, have you?"
"How? done what?" enquired Frederic, laughing.
"Well, now I have got you alone, we can talk."
"Exactly, dear Helen, now we are alone as you say. You are the strong-minded person of this house, although no one else knows it, not even yourself. So I want to discuss important matters with you—and they are not a few."
"So do I, and I shall begin by taking the bull by the horns. Your arm is not dislocated nor even sprained. You have fought a duel, like the hothead you are, and your arm is wounded by either a sabre or sword-cut."
"Well, my little sister, that is exactly what I wanted to tell you. I did fight a duel—for political reasons. And I did get a sabre cut in my arm, but it was a friendly sabre, very neatly and prettily applied. It is not dangerous, no artery or nerve severed. But the story will be in all the papers; it has made noise enough already. Now we must prevent both grandmamma and Emma from seeing the newspapers."
"The only paper taken here is the 'Kreuz Zeitung.'"