"I am no practiced diplomat like you, Herbert. I have not learned to be still when one whom I thought dead or ruined suddenly appears before me."
"Dead? that was hardly to be expected at his age. Ruined, corrupted? that might be nearer it. His life up to the present moment has lain in that direction."
"Do you know about it?" Frau von Eschenhagen started with surprise. "Do you know of his life?"
"Partly. Falkenried was too much my friend for me not to investigate what became of his son. Of course, I was silent to him as well as you concerning it; but as soon as I had returned to my office that time, I used our diplomatic relations, which reach everywhere, to inquire about it."
"Well, what did you learn?"
"Principally only that which was to be expected. Zalika had turned her steps directly homeward with her son. You know that her stepfather--our cousin Wallmoden--was already dead when she returned to her mother after the divorce. The connections on our side were thereby broken off, but I learned that shortly before Zalika's reappearance in Germany she had come into the possession of the Rojanow estates."
"Zalika? Did she not have a brother?"
"Yes, he had charge of the estates for ten years, but died, unmarried, from an accident while hunting, and, since his mother's second marriage had resulted in no descendant, Zalika entered now upon the inheritance--at least in name--for through the reckless management of the Bojar, the most of it belonged to the Jews. Nevertheless, she now felt herself master, and planned the coup of getting possession of her son. The old, wild life was then continued upon the estates for a few years, with senseless management, until everything was gone. Then mother and son, like a couple of gypsies, went out into the wide world."
Wallmoden narrated this with the same cold contempt which he had shown to Hartmut, and the same horror and aversion were pictured in the face of his sister--that strictly duteous and moral lady. Nevertheless, a certain degree of sympathy was in her voice as she asked: "And you have not heard anything of them since?"
"Yes, several times. A casual mention of the name led me to the track. While I was at the embassy at Florence, they were in Rome; a few years later they appeared in Paris, and there I heard of the death of Frau Zalika Rojanow."