"I really do not know what to think of you, Moritz," said Frau von Eschenhagen with a very red face. "You do not seem to have any sense of the impropriety of this acquaintance. When I ask you who this bosom friend of Toni's really is--the one who is expected at Waldhofen--you answer me in the calmest manner possible that she is a singer, and recently engaged at the Court Theatre. An actress! a theatre princess! one of those frivolous creatures----"
"But, Regine, do not get so excited," interrupted von Schonan vexedly. "You act as though the poor thing was already lost body and soul, because she has appeared on the stage."
"So she is," declared Regine; "whoever once enters this Sodom and Gomorrah is not to be saved--they go to their ruin there."
"Very flattering to our Court Theatre," said Schonan drily. "Besides, all of us go there."
"As audience--that is quite different. But I have always been against it. Willy has been allowed to attend the theatre but seldom, and then only in my company; but while I fulfil my maternal duty, conscientiously protecting my son from any touch with those circles, you give his future wife over freely to their poisonous influences. It is worthy of a cry to heaven!"
Her voice had grown very loud, partly through indignation and partly that she might be heard, for the musical performance in the room, whose glass doors stood wide open, was of a rather loud nature.
The young lady had a somewhat hard touch and her performance reminded one of the working of an ax in hard wood. Although her three listeners had strong nerves, a low conversation had become an impossibility.
"Let me explain this matter to you," said the Chief Forester pacifyingly. "I have already told you that this case is an exception. Marietta Volkmar is the granddaughter of our good old physician at Waldhofen. He had the misfortune to lose his son in the prime of life--the young widow followed her husband in the next year, and their child, the little orphan, came to her grandfather. That happened when I was promoted here to Furstenstein, ten years ago. Dr. Volkmar became my house physician; his granddaughter the playmate of my children, and because the school in Waldhofen was very poor, I offered to let the little one participate in the lessons of my children. The friendship dates from then.
"Later on, when Toni was sent to boarding school for two years, and Marietta went to the city for her musical education, this daily intercourse was, of course, broken, but Marietta visits us regularly when she comes to her grandfather during her vacations, and I do not see why I should prohibit it as long as the girl remains good and true."
Frau von Eschenhagen had listened to the explanation without abating her severity in the least, and now she laughed ironically.