"I am prepared for that," replied Bertram. "To be quite frank, I care infinitely more for your welfare than for your wife's favour. Otto, these is no time for long debating. A plain yes from you, and the thing is settled--now or never--do you hear me?"
From the great courtyard there came the sound of merry military music; many voices, too, were heard. Otto was still standing by the door irresolute.
He suddenly seized Bertram's other hand and exclaimed-- "Then marry Erna at least! Hildegard will get reconciled to it, once she knows all. Erna is fond of you--let me talk to her!"
"One word from you, and--I shall not alter my resolve, it is fixed for good; but you and I will never meet again."
Bertram had torn himself away and was striding along the chamber. Now he came back to Otto who was standing there in utter helplessness, laid his hand on his shoulder, and said to him--
"Otto, remember what we vowed to each other in the dear old student days in Bonn: to be and to remain friends in gladness or sadness, friends to the death! This surely is sufficient. Let us not speak of Erna, or, at least, let us not connect her name with this business; such a connection is an insult to me, because it is casting doubt upon the purity of my motives. I can tell you something else, in reference to which I must, in the meantime, request your discreet silence. I have good reasons for assuming that Erna has already disposed of her heart, and this may explain certain oddities in her demeanour which have struck us both. I believe I shall soon know if I am right. In warning you, and your wife against Lotter, I gave you a proof of my careful observation and of my faithful friendship. Confide in me further: you will not repent of it. And now, old boy, go with a lighter heart than you came, and receive your guests, or else the great event will come off without you, and for that Hildegard would never forgive you, and she would be right."
He was almost pushing poor helpless Otto out of the door, when Konski came hurrying up with an impatient message from My Lady.
"Would Otto come at once? The military were just marching up the courtyard."
Otto hurried away. Bertram was still standing near the door, his eye rigidly fixed upon it.
He was murmuring to himself: "That was the first step. I should not have thought, after all I have already endured, that it would prove so hard. But it had to be done!"