Whether the last-named advantage appeared as great in Herr Wilberg's eyes must remain undecided; in delight at obtaining the first he forgot everything else, and rushed up to embrace his new father-in-law, who made short work of the ceremony.
"There, don't let us have a scene," said he decidedly. "I can't stand it, and we have not time for it now. Come along to Mélanie. You two have plotted the whole matter together behind my back, but I tell you, if ever I find you at your verse-making and my girl unhappy and with red eyes, may the Lord help you!"
While the chief-engineer thus resigned himself to an inevitable fate, Arthur Berkow and Conrad von Windeg were standing together on the terrace before the château, waiting for the latter's horse to be brought round.
The thorough metamorphosis which Arthur's inner man had undergone was partly discernible in his outward appearance. He was no longer the slender pale young dandy, the strength and bloom of whose youth had nearly been destroyed by the life of the great city, but was now in all respects such as one would picture the head and administrator of so vast an undertaking. The lines, which long ago had been graven on his brow, and which years of care and hard work had furrowed there more deeply, could not be effaced by the present prosperous security. Such marks, once made, do not again disappear, but they did not ill become the manliness of his features.
Conrad was still the high-spirited young officer whose bright eyes and rosy lips had lost none of their gaiety and freshness, and for whom life was enjoyable and charming as ever.
"And I tell you, Arthur," he was asserting vehemently, "you do my father injustice if you suppose he still feels any prejudice against you. I wish you could have heard how he answered old Prince Waldstein when he said that the gentlemen up in the hill-districts could not have a very enviable time of it in the present troubled state of the working-classes.
"'That does not apply to my son-in-law, your Highness,' said my father with great aplomb. 'His position is too well assured and the authority he possesses over his people too complete for that; they are quite enthusiastic in their devotion to him, and, besides, my son-in-law is equal to any emergency.' But he has never forgiven you yet for refusing that peerage; he can't forget that his grandson will be only plain Berkow."
Arthur smiled rather ironically.
"Well, I trust the name will be no disgrace to him when he has to bear it before the world, and it is to be hoped your father may live long enough to see a Windeg at his side. How about your engagement, Conrad?"
The young officer drew a wry face. "Well, it will be coming off soon," he replied, rather slowly, "when we go back to Rabenau, probably. Count Berning's estates join ours and the Countess Alma was eighteen last spring. My father is of opinion that, as heir to the family, it is time I should be seriously thinking of getting married. I am under orders to make a declaration to the Countess this summer."