"I believe you're gone clean mad, Regine," said Herr von Schönau solemnly. He didn't really know what to think. "Control yourself long enough to tell me what the trouble is."
For reply Regine unfolded a newspaper and pointing to a certain paragraph said tragically:
"Read!"
The head forester began to read, and he, too, soon became excited, and grew red and angry as he read on. The paper was a weekly, published in the South-German capital, and the article which excited their joint wrath read as follows:
"We have just learned that a duel with pistols was fought early last Monday morning, in one of the unfrequented suburbs of our city. The opponents were the well-known society gentleman, Count W., and a young North German landlord, W.v.E., who is the nephew and has been for the past few days the guest of a very prominent member of the diplomatic circle. The cause of the quarrel which resulted in the duel was a member of the court theatre company, a young singer who has, until now, enjoyed a good reputation. Count W. was wounded in the shoulder, and Herr v.E., who has left the city since, received a trifling wound in the hand."
"That goes beyond anything I ever heard," cried the head forester, in a towering rage. "My future son-in-law fights a duel on Marietta's account. What was the quarrel about? What do you know about it, Regine? My papers don't mention it."
"But mine do. You'll find it in yours if you look them over well. I caught sight of the article yesterday, and started at once, without even staying over to see Herbert. Evidently he knows nothing about it yet, or he'd have sent me word."
"Herbert'll be here to-day; in an hour or two now," said von Schönau, while glancing hastily over the papers. "He was going to Ostwalden with Adelheid, he wrote me, and would return to town by way of Fürstenstein and spend an hour with me. Perhaps he is coming to tell me about it, but that doesn't change anything. What's the matter with Will, has he gone mad?"
"Yes, that he has," answered Regine, all excitement again. "You sneered at me, Moritz, when I warned you your child would suffer from association with an actress. That such a thing as this could happen never entered my head until the moment when I discovered that Willibald, my own, only son, was in love with this Marietta Volkmar. I tore him from the danger and returned at once to Burgsdorf. That was the reason of our sudden flight. I did not tell you for I thought Will was only dazed for the moment, and would soon recover his reason again. The boy seemed to have done so, or I would never have trusted him to come here without me. I put him in Herbert's charge and felt perfectly sure that all would be well. He could only have been in the city three or four days at most, and well must he have spent his time."
She threw herself back in an easy chair, worn out and anxious as well as angry, while the head forester walked up and down the room angrier than ever now.