"Oh, you are a declared foe to matrimony, as we all know," said Reinsfeld, with a fleeting smile. "If Wolfgang is out of sorts,--and the responsibilities of his position may well make him so,--his betrothed is, in looks and temper, all that could be desired."
"Yes, she is the gayest of all," Gronau assented. "That cure of yours is almost a miracle, Herr Doctor. What a poor, pining little plant she was, and now she is as fresh and blooming as a rose! Baroness Thurgau has grown grave and silent; and as for the two men,--one of them is always at the boiling-point, and is as jealous as a Turk, while the other is a perfect icicle, and they look at each other as if they would like to fly at each other's throats. What affectionate relatives they will be!"
Benno suppressed a sigh; the mute hostility between Wolfgang and Waltenberg, which was barely concealed beneath the forms of conventional courtesy, had not escaped him, but he said nothing.
"I am really sorry for Herr Waltenberg," Veit began again. "He cannot live without a sight of his betrothed every twenty-four hours, and he drives over from Heilborn daily. She, on the contrary, seems to have taken the famous mountain divinity for her model: she sits enthroned like the Alpine Sprite, and allows herself to be worshipped, while she remains entirely unmoved. Absolutely, doctor, you are the only sensible being among them all. You have no thoughts of matrimony,--hold fast to that!"
"I certainly am not thinking of it, but of something else, which will be scarcely less of a surprise to you,--of going away. Very unexpectedly a lucrative position has been offered me."
"Bravo! Accept it at once!"
"I certainly must."
Gronau burst into a laugh: "With what a long face you say that! I verily believe it goes to your heart to leave these honest Obersteiners who have been wearing you out for five years, to requite you with only a 'God reward you!' Just like my dear old Benno! He never would have died a poor man if he had understood the world and human nature. There he sat for years bothering over an idea which ought to have made his fortune, but he never knew how to push his claims, and timid requests and modest applications do no good with great capitalists and lords of finance. Finally others got before him with his invention, which was in the air, as it were, when they began to build mountain-railways, but nevertheless he was the first to devise the system of mountain-locomotives; all the later inventions are based upon his principle."
"My father?" Benno asked, with a puzzled air. "You are mistaken; it is the Nordheim system upon which the locomotives of to-day are constructed."
"I beg pardon: 'tis the Reinsfeld method," Gronau maintained.