Bella stood still, seemingly at a loss whether to laugh at her brother or sharply reprove him; but she concluded in favor of the former course, and ridiculed the new convert.
"Ah," she cried, "you are very properly afraid that this Herr Dournay will be pleasing to the glorified Manna, and you suppose the same in regard to me. You have just hit it. The man has something bewitching for us women, provided we are shut up in the bonds of wedlock, or in a convent."
Pranken did not fall in with this tone; he repeated, that every jest, every act of trifling, bordered upon a sin, and jesting was liable to remove imperceptibly the boundary line. He was so zealous, that he took the book out of his breast-pocket, and read aloud to Bella a passage having reference to the subject.
Bella looked with astonishment when Otto exhibited so pious a book: she pointed out to her brother, meanwhile, what impregnable virtue was; she made fun of the young man, who had a truly revolting self-confidence. Moreover, Otto could be wholly at rest, if there was the appearance of an understanding between her and Eric; yes, she would willingly make, so far, a sacrifice for him; her virtue would be secure from every misconstruction, and she would assume this appearance, in order to free Otto from a dangerous rival.
"I am, indeed, in earnest," she concluded. "Are the good to deny to themselves a friendly intercourse, because the bad conceal under this appearance all kinds of baseness? That would be a world turned upside down; that would be the subjection of the good to the evil."
Bella was not aware, or she did not think it worth while to take note of it, that she here set forth a remark of her husband. Pranken looked at her with surprise. Was he, in fact, misled by his newly awakened zeal, or was this only a nicely-woven veil, a mere outside show of virtue? He was in perplexity; he was at a loss what to say in reply to this jesting and playful tone, to these insinuous and flexible evasions of his sister.
CHAPTER IV.
A FRUSTRATED PLAN.
Eric found great difficulty in keeping his pupil steadily at his lessons, so completely was he taken up with the thought of the journey.
The day came for the journey to the convent; it was a bright day of sunshine.