"And the mother shall, in the meanwhile, despair here?" asked his wife, passionately. "Take me with you! I am not weak--you know it. You need fear no tears or fainting from me when action is required, and I can bear all, only not the fearful uncertainty and inactivity, only not the anxious waiting for news, which may not arrive for days. I shall accompany you!"
"Eleonore, for God's sake!" interposed Erlau, horrified. "What an idea! It would be your death."
Reinhold looked at his wife silently for a few seconds, as if he would examine how far her strength went.
"Can you be ready in ten minutes?" asked he, quietly. "The carriage waits below."
"In half the time."
She hurried into the adjoining room. The Consul wanted to forbid, beg, entreat once more, but Reinhold cut him short.
"Leave her alone, as I do," said he, energetically. "We cannot give way now to cold consideration. I do not see my brother here, and I have not time to seek him. Tell him what has happened, what I have discovered. He must take the necessary steps here at once to ensure us help, which we may perhaps require, and then follow us. We shall first take the direct route to A----. There Hugo will find farther information about us."
He turned, without waiting for a reply, to the door, where Ella already appeared in hat and cloak. The young wife threw herself, with a short tempestuous farewell greeting, on to her adopted father's breast, to whose protest she would not listen; then she followed her husband. Erlau looked out of the window as Reinhold lifted her into the carriage, entered it himself, shut the door, and the horses started off in full gallop. This was too much for the shaken nerves of the old gentleman, especially after the alarm and excitement of the last few hours; almost unconscious, he sank into an arm-chair.
Hardly ten minutes later Hugo entered; he had already heard from one of the servants of his brother's sudden arrival and equally sudden departure with Ella. At his first hasty questions, Erlau recovered a little. He was beside himself at his daughter's decision, still more at the independence of her husband, who had borne her away without any more ado. Arrival, explanation and departure, all had taken place as in a hurricane; this mode of action resembled a regular elopement, and what could the poor wife do on such a journey? What might not occur, what happen, if they really overtook this dreadful Italian? The Consul was nearly in despair at the thought of all the possibilities to which his favourite was exposed.
Hugo listened silently to the report, without betraying especial surprise or horror. He appeared to have expected something of the sort, and when Erlau had ended, laid his hand soothingly on the latter's arm, and said quietly, but yet with a slight tremor in his voice--