"Of bilious fever, probably," put in Mrs. Fabian.
"Gretchen!" remonstrated her husband, in a tone between entreaty and reproof.
"Well, he was of a very bilious temperament. He went just as much into that extreme as you do into the other with your mildness and forbearance. Just fancy, papa, directly after his nomination to J----, Emile wrote to the Professor, and assured him that he was quite innocent of all the disputes which had taken place at the University. As a matter of course, the letter was never acknowledged, notwithstanding which, my lord and husband feels himself called upon, now that this disagreeable but distinguished person has betaken himself to a better world, to write a grandiloquent article on him, deploring the loss to science, just as if the deceased had been his dearest friend."
"I did it from conviction, my dear," said Fabian, in his gentle, earnest way. "The Professor's ungenial temper too often acted as a hindrance to that full recognition of his talents which was due to them. I felt it incumbent on me to recall to the mind of the public what a loss science has sustained in him. Whatever may have been his defects of manner, he was a man of rare merit."
Gretchen's lip curled contemptuously.
"Well, he may have been; I'm sure I don't mind. But now to a more important matter. So Herr Nordeck is not in Wilicza?"
"No," replied the steward, laconically. "He has gone on a journey."
"Yes, we know that. He wrote to my husband not long ago, and said he was thinking of going over to Altenhof, and that he should probably spend a few weeks there. Just now, when he has his hands so full of business at Wilicza!--it seems strange!"
"Waldemar has always looked on Altenhof as his real home," said the Professor. "For that reason, he never could make up his mind to sell the estate which Herr Witold bequeathed to him by his will. It is natural he should wish to revisit the place where all his youth was passed."
Gretchen looked highly incredulous. "You ought to know your former pupil better. He is not likely to be troubled by any sentimental reminiscences of his youth at a time when he is engaged in the tremendous task of Germanising his Slavonian estates. No, there is something in the background, his attachment to Countess Morynska, probably. Perhaps he has resolved to put all thoughts of her out of his head--it would be the wisest thing he could do! These Polish women sometimes get quite absurd and irrational with their national fanaticism, and Countess Wanda is to the full as great a fanatic as any of them. Not to give her hand to the man she loves, just because he is a German! I would have taken my Emile, if he had been a Hottentot! and now he is always fretting over the supposed unhappiness of his dear Waldemar. He seriously believes that that personage has a heart like other human beings, which I, for one, emphatically deny."