The general shook his head. "I have no time for tears, and they belong only to the beloved dead. That he could so wound me---- But enough; let him rest in peace."
He turned away and went into the antechamber, where the officers were assembled, and where he was received with the silent respect accorded to affliction. One of the group then stepped forward, and, in the name of all present, expressed to their leader the sympathy felt for him in the heavy loss which he had sustained. Steinrück listened calmly, apparently unmoved; he merely bowed in acknowledgment.
"I thank you, gentlemen. The blow which soon must strike thousands has fallen first upon me, but heaven has already sent me consolation, for here,"--and with the words a flash of his former energy broke through his forced composure, and the old soldier stood erect and vigorous,--"here beside me stands the son of my dead daughter, my grandson, Michael Rodenberg!"
A year had passed, a year full of terrible conflict and of tremendous results, full of shouts of victory and of wailing for the dead, and when summer again greeted the earth it greeted a newly-arisen kingdom.
Upon the mountain road leading from Tannberg to Castle Steinrück was rolling an open carriage in which were two officers. The captain, who sat on the right, would easily have been recognized as a soldier, even in civilian's dress; but his companion, who wore the uniform of a lieutenant of reserves, had an artistic rather than a military air, in spite of being tanned very brown by exposure to the sun and wind.
"The luck is all yours, Michael," he said, with all his old gayety. "You are returning crowned with laurels to your betrothed, while I still have a hard battle to fight. My little Dornröschen has indeed been faithful and brave, but the tall thorny hedge still confronts me in all the toughness of the tenth century. This uniform of mine is very uncomfortable in travelling, but I hope to impress my father-in-law with it. Perhaps it may move him to be confronted by the nineteenth century in all its warlike pomp."
"As usual, you regard the matter in its ludicrous aspect," rejoined Michael; "but indeed you ought to reflect that not only the old Freiherr, but your father also, refuses his consent."
"Yes, fathers are undoubtedly very difficult to deal with," Hans assented. "By dint of reading Gerlinda's letters to my father I have at last convinced him that she is sane, but he obstinately insists that lunacy is hereditary in the Eberstein family, and admonishes me to have regard for future generations. The Freiherr, on the other hand, maintains that godless irreverence is hereditary. Moreover, he must have an inkling that since the troops are dismissed I shall shortly come to the surface, for he has forbidden Gerlinda to drive to Steinrück. As if there were any use in that! I shall as the Knight of Forschungstein attack the Ebersburg, and as a preliminary climb the castle wall, and find my Dornröschen waiting for me on the terrace."
Michael listened rather absently, gazing the while towards Castle Steinrück, which had been visible for some time and was now close at hand. He remarked, casually, "You seem to be in constant correspondence with her,--was not an interchange of letters forbidden?"