There was no lack of topics for conversation in those days of great excitement, when feverish restlessness had seized on all minds, because all felt, more or less, the shadow of the coming events. Franz was not a politician, properly speaking. His fondness for the Fine Arts, which at first threatened to divide his strength, and then the study of his great science which gave him finally peace and satisfaction, had left him little time for politics. But he was liberal in all respects, and besides, his profession had given him frequent opportunities to become acquainted with the wants of the people themselves, and an insight which had convinced him of the necessity of an entire change of social relations. He was not quite as clear about the doctrine that this could not be done without first changing the political forms of the state, especially because his eye was more busy with details than with the whole. "I am at heart a Republican," he was wont to say, "but I have no desire to hear a Republic proclaimed, because I do not believe that that would help us essentially as long as the evil is not taken hold of at the root. But I see the root of the evil in the dark superstitions which reverse nature and change men from free citizens of this earth into helots of a supernatural world."
Franz expressed himself in this sense to-night also to Oldenburg, but he found him a decided adversary.
"I believe, doctor," said the latter, "that you attach too little importance to the results obtained by a well-ordered commonwealth--res publica, ladies, the Romans used to call it--and to the difference between a sensible and an unwise form of government. I wish you could have heard the discussions I have had with Professor Berger, speaking of the sad character of a time which produces hardly anything else but problematic characters."
"Where is the professor?" asked Bemperlein. "I had half promised Mrs. Braun that she should meet her father's old friend."
"I cannot tell you," said Melitta; "do you know, Oldenburg?"
"No; I lost him at the meeting at the Booths from my arm, and could not find him again in the crowd. I am quite sure, however, that he will yet come."
"Problematic characters!" repeated Franz, who had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he had not heard the last words. "Do you know, baron, that when I heard that expression of Goethe's the first time it was in connection with your name, and from the lips of a man who was once very dear to me, and in whom you also, as far as I know, once took a very lively interest? You need not beat the devil's tattoo on the table, Bemperlein; I know that you, who are generally as gentle as a lamb, have talked yourself into a most unchristian hatred against Oswald Stein, and I only mention our former friend because he, as well as his teacher, Berger, appeared to me always as a type of such problematic characters."
As Franz had not the least suspicion of Oswald's former relations to Melitta, to Oldenburg, and to Bemperlein, he did not notice the blush which suddenly spread over Melitta's cheeks so that she bent low over her work in order to conceal it; and the vehemence with which Bemperlein exclaimed: "I should think, Franz, that man does not deserve being mentioned here," only excited his opposition.
"Do you too think so, baron?" he said, turning to Oldenburg; "would you relentlessly condemn a man whose greatest misfortune it probably was to have been born in these days?"
"No," said Oldenburg, calmly and solemnly; "I have not yet forgotten the old word, that we must not judge if we do not wish to be judged. I have always sincerely admired the brilliant talents which nature has lavished upon that man, and I have as sincerely regretted that a mind so richly endowed should, like a luxuriant tree, bear only sterile blossoms, which can produce no fruit whatever."