"No, Fräulein, I'm sorry I was too late for that. I only caught a few notes on the piano."
"Baron Wergenthin," said Anna, as though she were introducing. "But of course you know each other?"
"Oh yes," answered George, and held out his hand to Berthold.
"The Doctor has come to pay us a farewell visit," said Frau Rosner.
"What?" exclaimed Anna in astonishment.
"I'm going on a journey, you see," said Berthold, and looked Anna in the face with a serious, impenetrable expression. "I'm giving up my political career ... or rather," he added jestingly, "I'm interrupting it for a while."
George leant on the window with his arms crossed over his breast and looked sideways at Anna. She had sat down and was looking quietly at Berthold, who was standing up with his hand resting on the back of the sofa, as though he were going to make a speech.
"And where are you going?" asked Anna.
"Paris. I'm going to work in the Pasteur Institute. I'm going back to my old love, bacteriology. It's a cleaner life than politics."
It had grown darker. The faces became vague, only Berthold's forehead, which was directly opposite the window, was still bathed in light. His brows were twitching. He really has his peculiar kind of beauty, thought George, who was leaning motionless in the window-niche and felt himself bathed in a pleasant sense of peace.