"Just another compliment for you, my Kläre. Only happy couples try to bring about other marriages."
A short time afterwards, without any prompting from the Güntzes, Reimers said to his stout friend: "Güntz, doesn't it strike you that Mariechen Falkenhein is a very nice girl?"
Güntz leant back in his chair reflectively, and answered: "A nice girl? how do you mean? Certainly she has a pretty face, her eyes are especially sweet, and she has a good figure. Just a little too slight. For my taste, of course I mean."
"No," replied Reimers, "I don't mean that so much. Certainly she is pretty. But, after all, that's a secondary matter. I mean more the effect of her personality. There seems to be something so sure, so comfortable, so restful about her. Don't you think so?"
"Well, you know, I have not made such detailed observations. But I daresay you are right. And I should say that she will make a splendid wife some day. Quick and accurate, without a trace of superficiality, with a strong instinct for housewifely order; a simple, clear, shrewd intellect--the man who wins her for his wife will be a lucky fellow!"
Reimers unconsciously drew himself up a little, and he said doubtfully:
"But surely she is still much too young."
"Not a bit," replied Güntz. "She will be eighteen in the autumn, and she is not even engaged yet. And after that there would be the betrothal time of the educated European--not less than six months. Well, that would bring her nearly up to twenty, and at twenty a woman in our geographical area is quite eligible for marriage."
Reimers appeared to meditate upon this. Finally, however, he only replied by a prolonged "H'm," and dropped the subject.
But the ladies of the regiment had soon a fresh subject for gossip. Lieutenant Reimers was paying his addresses to Marie Falkenhein. There was no doubt that his intentions were serious. Well, he had no rivals to fear. Falkenhein was poor every one knew that. He could have very little income beyond his pay. And his daughter? Oh, yes, she was a pretty, graceful creature; but she was not brilliantly beautiful, and therefore could not have any very great expectations. No question of anything beyond just a suitable and satisfactory marriage in the service.