As I closed the door behind me, old Frederica, who, since my mother's death, had been housekeeper for my father, came suddenly out of the small room on the right. By the light of a lamp burning dimly on the hall-table I saw the good old woman throw up her hands and stare at me with wide, frightened eyes. "Has anything happened to my father?" I stammered, seizing the table to support myself What with the warm atmosphere of the house after the fresh night-air, and my alarm at Frederica's terrified looks, my breath failed me, the blood seemed to rush to my head, and the room began to go round.
"Wretched boy, what have you done?" piteously exclaimed the old woman.
"In heaven's name, what has happened?" I cried, seizing her by both hands.
Here my father opened the door of his room and appeared upon the threshold. Being a large man and the door small, he nearly filled up the doorway.
"Thank God!" I murmured to myself.
At this moment I experienced no other feeling than that of joyful relief from the anxiety which seemed on the point of suffocating me; in the next, this natural emotion gave way to another, and we glared at each other like two foes who suddenly meet, after one has long been seeking the other, and the other nerves himself for the result, be it what it may, from which he now sees there is no escape.
"Come in," said my father, making way for me to pass into his room.
I obeyed: there was a humming noise in my ears, but my step was firm; and if my heart beat violently in my breast, it was certainly not with fear.
As I entered, a tall black figure slowly rose from my father's large study-chair---my father allowed no sofa in his house--it was Professor Lederer. I stood near the door, my father to the right, by the stove, the professor at the writing-table in front of the lamp, so that his shadow reached from the ceiling to the floor, and fell directly upon me. No one moved or spoke; the professor wished to leave the first word to my father, and my father was under too much excitement to speak. In this way we stood for about half a minute, which seemed to me an eternity, and during which the certainty flashed into my mind that if the professor did not immediately leave the room and the house, all possible chance of an explanation between my father and myself was cut off.
"Misguided young man," at last began the professor.