"So she is dead," said Frau von Eschenhagen, in a low voice. "What do you think they have lived on all these years?"
Wallmoden shrugged his shoulders.
"What do all adventurers who wander homeless over the world live on? They may perhaps have saved something from the wreck, perhaps not. At any rate, they visited all the salons in Paris and Rome. A woman like Zalika finds help and protection everywhere. She had the title of nobility as daughter of a Bojar, and the forced sale of the Roumania property was probably not known, so it played a prominent part in their success. Society opens its doors only too quickly to this element if it knows how to keep up appearances, which seems to have been the case here. By what means, that, of course, is another question."
"But Hartmut, whom she forcibly carried into such a life--what of him?"
"An adventurer--what else?" said the Ambassador, with intense harshness. "He always had an inclination that way; he will have developed finely in such a school. I have not heard anything of him since the death of his mother, three years ago."
"And you kept it a secret from me?" said Regine, reproachfully.
"I wished to spare you. You had taken this scoundrel--this Hartmut--too much into your heart. I was afraid you might be carried away in a hint to Falkenried."
"You took unnecessary pains. I have ventured but once to speak of the past to Falkenried. He looked at me--I shall never forget that look--and said, with an awful expression: 'My son is dead--you know that, Regine. Let the dead rest!' I shall certainly not mention that name to him again."
"Then I do not need to caution you when you return home," replied Wallmoden. "But you ought not to speak of it to Willibald, either. His good nature might play him a trick when he learns that his once great friend lives in the neighborhood. It is best for him to hear nothing of it. I shall certainly ignore this gentleman at a possible second meeting, and Adelaide does not know him at all. She does not even know that Falkenried had a son."
He broke off and arose, for his young wife now appeared in the door of the tower.