Several minutes passed thus, then Hartmut disengaged himself from the embrace which would have detained him.
"Why have you never been with me, mamma?" he asked vehemently. "Why did they tell me that you were dead?"
Zalika drew back. In a moment all the tenderness vanished from her face; a light kindled there of wild, deadly hatred, and the answer came hissing from her lips:
"Because your father hates me, my son, and because he did not wish to leave me even the love of my only child when he thrust me from him."
Hartmut was silent with consternation. He knew well that no one dared mention his mother's name in his father's presence--that his father had once silenced him with the greatest harshness when he had ventured to ask for her, but he had been too young to muse over the why.
Zalika did not give him time for it now. She stroked the dark, curly hair back from the high forehead, and a shadow rested on her face.
"You have his brow," she said slowly, "but that is the only thing to remind of him; everything else belongs to me--to me alone. Every feature tells that you are wholly mine. I knew it would be so."
Again she embraced him, overwhelming him with caresses, which Hartmut returned as passionately. It was an intoxication of happiness to him--like one of the fairy tales of which he had so often dreamed, and he gave himself up to the charm unquestioningly and unreservedly.
But now Willy made himself heard on the opposite bank, calling loudly for his friend, and reminding him that it was time to return home.
Zalika started.