Ulric turned to Eugénie.
"I can go now, my lady?"
She bowed her head in silent assent. She saw but too plainly what constraint the man had to put on himself in order to remain quiet. With one slight movement of the head directed to the master and his son, a salutation evidently bestowed with much reluctance, he left the room.
"Well, I must confess that your protégé has not very good manners," remarked Berkow, with a sneer. "He takes leave in rather an off-hand way, and does not wait to be dismissed. But there, how can such people learn the proper way to behave! Arthur, you seem to find something remarkably interesting in this Hartmann. I hope you have looked after him long enough?"
Arthur's eyes had indeed followed the miner with an intent gaze, and they were still fixed on the door he had closed behind him. The young man's eyebrows were drawn together slightly, and his lips firmly set. At his father's remark, he turned round.
The latter went up to his daughter-in-law, with a great show of politeness.
"I regret, Eugénie, that your complete ignorance of the state of things here should have led you to an act of excessive condescension. You, naturally, could have no idea of the part that fellow plays among his comrades, but he should, on no account, have been permitted to come to this house, much less to enter your boudoir, even under the pretext of returning thanks for a present."
The lady had seated herself, but there was a look on her face which made it seem advisable to her father-in-law to remain standing, instead of taking a place at her side as he at first intended. She compelled him too "to admire her only from a distance."
"I see they have only told you half the story," she answered, coolly. "May I ask when you last spoke to the Director?"
"This morning, when I learned from him that he had been commissioned to hand over to Hartmann a sum, which I, by the way, consider much too large. It is quite a fortune to such people! But I do not wish to lay any restrictions on you and Arthur, if you think it right to show your gratitude in this exaggerated way."