"God be praised! I knew that you could do anything with him you liked. We have both done the lad wrong in thinking he had no feeling. I had no idea he would lay the affair so to heart."
"Neither had I," said the doctor, with a sigh whose import Herr Witold did not understand.
Waldemar found his brother awaiting him. The young prince, who upon his arrival had been greatly surprised at sight of the old, low-roofed house and dilapidated outbuildings of Altenhof, was still more astonished at the plainness and bareness of the room into which he was shown. He had all his life been accustomed to lofty and elegant apartments, and could not understand why his brother, while possessed of such vast wealth, could be content to live in so humble a manner. The parlor of that hired villa at C----, which seemed so inferior to himself and his mother, was luxurious in comparison with the reception-room at Altenhof.
He was musing over these strange discrepancies of fortune, and asking himself why luxurious tastes were given to him without means to gratify them, while his brother, who was possessed of unbounded wealth, cared little for those advantages wealth offers, when Waldemar entered the room. Leo advanced to meet him, and said hastily, as if he would discharge an unpleasant duty as quickly as possible,--
"You are surprised at my coming; but as you have neither visited us nor answered my mother's letter, no alternative remained but for me to come to you."
It was easy to see that the young man did not make the visit of his own accord. His greeting and manner were evidently forced; he seemed to feel in duty bound to offer his hand, but failed in the attempt to do so.
Waldemar did not or would not notice his embarrassment. "Do you come at your mother's bidding?" he asked.
Leo flushed deeply at the thought of his aversion to an interview, which his mother had secured only by the exercise of her whole maternal authority.
"I do," he finally replied.
"I am sorry, Leo, that you have been compelled to do what you must feel to be a humiliation. I certainly would have spared you this visit if I had been consulted."