Without another word he left the room—left it with an old man's dimmed and misty eyes agaze upon him, full of love and admiration.
Mrs. Vanderlyn rose, too, beside herself with shame and grief and indignation. She turned upon the flute-player.
"Alone!" she cried. "Did you hear that? Oh, the ingratitude, the selfishness, of children!"
"Madame," said Herr Kreutzer gravely, "do you not think he has a right to his own life—his happiness?"
"His happiness!" A rasping scorn was in the voice of the unhappy woman. "Nobody thinks of mine! He is my only son. He knows quite well that I can't live without him—that I could not give him up!"
Kreutzer smiled—not with an air of triumph—the discomfiture of the unhappy woman did not make him feel the least exultant. It was pure happiness that made him smile—joy to think that Anna's wedding would not, after all, be shadowed by her husband's sorrow for the loss of mother-love.
"Then Madame will yield?" he cried. "Madame will make the dear young people happy?"
"Upon one condition. Positively only upon one condition."
"What is that, Madame?"
"Your daughter, really, is charming."