At length the company assembled.
The corner of the sofa where Bella used to sit—it seemed decades ago—was shunned with a kind of superstitious dread. Frau "Lay-Figure" was so extremely fortunate as to have a story to tell about a sofa-corner. There was a physician back in the country, with a very small practice, and the sofa in his parlor had a great hole in it: so, whenever a caller came, the doctor's wife was very affable, and seated herself forthwith upon the torn place in the sofa. It was a good story enough, and Frau Lay-Figure told it well, too: and she laughed, as she generally did; for she laughed at every thing: but nobody else laughed very heartily.
Luckily, a stranger was now introduced; quite a distinguished personage, who now made her first appearance at the grand coffee-party. This was the wife of the Director of the Water-works, who, in the discharge of his duties as Rhine Commissioner, had come to reside for a short time in the little town.
The Frau Directorin of the Water-works seated herself, all unconsciously, in Bella's old place.
And now they could begin.
But who would have guessed that the covetousness of the Cabinetsräthen would be first discussed as a kind of appetizing morsel! This was the way with great people. Of course, one could get clothes from Paris by such machinations. A magnificent system of bribery indeed! Who knew what else she might have got out of Sonnenkamp, and others besides? The ladies were almost ashamed of their own virtuous stupidity.
The English lady spoke with great respect of the Americans who had purchased the villa of the Cabinetsrath.
The Consul's wife in particular, she said, belonged to one of the first families in the Northern States; for there was a decided aristocracy there, distinguished for its noble bearing. The great merchants, the millionaires of the North, were usually called "merchant-princes."
Frau White, or Frau "Coal," as she was called, gazed reverently up at the English lady. Her glance said that she considered the latter a happy woman to have any thing so well worth telling.
The Rhine Commissioner's wife had a very good time. To her they could tell the whole story of the house of Sonnenkamp; and the ladies took turns, and supplemented one another's narratives.