"Madame, for heaven's sake, look there!" he whispered. "You told me that Lieutenant von Alven----"
"Was to take Molly to supper; and in accordance with your express wish Herr Gersdorf----"
Frau von Lasberg stopped in the middle of her sentence and also became petrified as she perceived the couple just taking their seats near the other end of the table.
"Beside him!" The councillor darted an annihilating glance down the long table, past thirty seated guests, at the lawyer.
"I cannot understand this; I arranged the places at table myself."
"Perhaps some mistake of the servants----"
"No, it is a plot of the Baroness's," Frau von Lasberg interposed, indignantly. "But pray let us have no scene. When supper is over----"
"I shall take Molly directly home!" Ernsthausen concluded the sentence, opening his napkin with an energy that boded no good to his disobedient daughter.
The supper began and followed its course with all the splendour to be expected from an entertainment in the Nordheim mansion. The tables were almost overloaded with heavy silver and glittering glass, among which bloomed the rarest flowers. There was an endless variety of food, with the finest kinds of wine. The usual toasts to the betrothed couple were offered, the usual speeches made, and over it all brooded the weariness inseparable from such displays of princely wealth.
Nevertheless certain of the younger folk enjoyed themselves excessively; notably Baroness Molly, who, quite unaffected by her approaching doom, laughed and talked with her neighbour at table, while Gersdorf would have been no lover had he not forgotten all else and quaffed full draughts of the unexpected happiness of this interview.