"Here he is already!" cried a voice from the garden.
A shadow fell athwart the bright sunshine that poured in through the open window, in which there suddenly appeared a youthful form, which swung itself through from the outside.
"Boy, are you out of your senses that you enter through the window?" exclaimed Frau von Eschenhagen indignantly. "What are the doors for?"
"For Willy and other well-raised people," laughed the intruder mirthfully. "I always take the shortest route, and this time it led through this window."
With one jump he landed in the middle of the room from the high sill.
Hartmut Falkenried, like the future lord of Burgsdorf, stood at the border between boyhood and manhood, but beyond that likeness it required but a glance to see the superiority of Hartmut in every respect.
He wore the cadet uniform, which became him wonderfully, but there was something in his whole appearance indicative of a revolt against the strict military cut.
The tall, slender boy was a true picture of youth and beauty, but this beauty had something strange and foreign about it; the movement and whole appearance had a wild, unruled element; and not a feature reminded one of the powerful, soldierly figure and grave composure of the father. The thick, curly hair of a blue-black color, falling over the high brow, denoted a son of the South, rather than a German; the eyes also, which glowed in the youthful face, did not belong to the cold, calm North; they were mysterious eyes, dark as night, yet full of hot, passionate fire. Beautiful as they were, there was something uncanny about them.
And now the laugh, with which Hartmut looked from one to another of the assembly, had more of the supercilious about it than of a boy's hearty mirth.
"You introduce yourself in a very unconventional manner," said Wallmoden sharply; "you seem to think that no etiquette is to be observed at Burgsdorf. I hardly think your father would have permitted such an entrance into a dining-room."