"How else could he be a problematic character? I am told you are one of the baron's special friends--one of the few he has on earth. And that is why I speak frankly. I cannot approve it, that a man of such eminent talents should waste his life in idleness--in a kind of busy idleness, the greatest reproach, in my opinion, that can be made against a man in our day, when there is so very much to be done."
"How can the poor baron help it, if the bread and butter of every day's life are not to his taste?"
"Do you think I like it?" said Doctor Braun, and he flushed up and his eyes sparkled; "do you think that the great god Apollo, when he watched the cattle of Admetus, and ate the mean food of a slave in the shade of an oak-tree, did not long for the ambrosia and nectar on the golden tables in the house of Zeus? Nevertheless he bore his fate and endured it, as a greater one did after him. But I have always thought that the true lot of man upon earth is to be subject to all that is human, and yet never to forget the heavenly part within him; to contend until death with the raving wolves of tyranny and falsehood, and to bear the cross of all that is vulgar and mean, for the sake of that which follows after Golgotha."
The doctor had risen; he walked a few times up and down the room with rapid strides; then he stopped before Oswald and said, with heart-winning kindliness: "Pardon me if I have offended you by one or the other word I have spoken; perhaps I have been inconsiderate. But it always excites me to see a superior man remain idle or follow false lights. The former is the sin against the Holy Ghost, the gravest of all our sins; the other is less grave, but almost equal. I absolve you from the former, but I cannot but declare you guilty of the latter. You know what I told you the other day about your position here; now, after having seen you myself in this circle, I consider it still more objectionable. Give it up before it is too late! It may be unwarrantable indiscretion in me to speak to you thus, but you know we physicians have the privilege of being indiscreet. Are you angry?"
"I should be the greatest fool if I were so weak," replied Oswald. "On the contrary, I am very grateful to you for the sympathy you show me, and which I am not deserving, I fear. But I think you look upon things as a little too dark----"
"Only too dark?" said the doctor, laughing; "I do not see them gray nor black; I do not see them at all; I am blind, purblind, in both eyes. Adieu, mon cher, adieu! If after some days you should not feel quite as well as you do at this hour, send for me! You shall see I am not a doctor for the well only, but also for the sick!"
With these words the doctor hastily left the room, and a moment afterwards Oswald heard the grating of the wheels on the gravel before the portal of the château.
CHAPTER II.
We all know that it is the fate of good advice invariably to come too late, or only at the moment when it ought to be followed at once, but for one or the other reason cannot well be followed. The doctor's advice was excellent; even Oswald saw that, especially as he had always thought in the same way about his false position in this high and noble family. But he could not find the way out of this labyrinth; at least not for the moment. It was so natural that of late his love for Melitta should have made him forget everything else, and lead him to consider a measure which might remove him from her as the greatest misfortune. And even now, when Melitta's journey and Baron Berkow's impending death surrounded the present and the future alike with dark mystery, he could not possibly decide on a step which was as important for Melitta as for himself. And then, leaving Melitta out of the question, he had no plausible reason for abandoning a position which he had bound himself to retain for several years, unless he should resort to a violent rupture. Such a coup d'état, however, would always have been painful and repulsive to a Hamlet-like nature, such as Oswald's was; and now, when the baroness evidently made efforts to live in peace and harmony with all the world, he could not even find an adversary to pick up the gauntlet that he might choose to throw down for the purpose.
Besides, he had quite recently shown a most lively interest in the plans of the baroness for the education of the boys, up to the time when they should be ready for the proposed tour through Germany, France, England, and perhaps also Italy. This interest would now appear absurd or worse, if it should turn out that he never meant to carry out these plans. He had also readily acquiesced in the desire of the baroness to resume with Miss Helen several branches of study which she had pursued at the boarding-school, and these lessons, which the baroness proposed to attend for her own improvement, were to begin on the very next day.