"Who?" shouted Habermann, as if a wasp had stung him.
"Why, the purchaser of Gurlitz, of whom we were speaking," said the Kammerrath, and stared at him as if he could not interpret his behavior.
"And he is a Pomeranian, from the region on the Peene, short and stout, with a full face?"
"Yes," said the Kammerrath.
"And he is going to be our neighbor? And you would enter into business relations with him? No, no, Herr Kammerrath, I beg, I implore you, don't allow yourself to get involved with that man! you most bear me witness that I have never made mention, for good or for evil, of the man who has ruined me; but now that you are in danger, now I hold it my duty,--this man is the cause of my misfortunes," and with that he had sprung up, and from his usually tranquil, friendly eyes shot such a flash of hatred, that even the Kammerrath, absorbed as he was in his own affairs, was terrified.
"Yes," cried the inspector, "yes! that man has driven me out of house and home, that man has heaped all sorts of tormenting anxieties upon me and my poor wife, and she has gone to her grave in consequence! No, no! Have nothing to do with that man!"
The warning was too impressive to be disregarded by the Kammerrath. "But who will help me?" asked he.
"Moses," said Habermann, quickly and decidedly. The Kammerrath would make objections, but Habermann placed himself before him, and said still more impressively, "Herr Kammerrath, Moses. After dinner we will ride over there, and if I know him, you will have no reason to repent."
The Kammerrath stood up, and took Habermann's arm; he leaned not merely upon that--no, evidently he was also sustained by the resolute advice of the inspector. For a quiet man, when he is once aroused from his repose, exercises a great influence upon another human being, even if he be not so ill and in such perplexity as the Kammerrath; and difference in rank goes down at the double-quick, in such an emergency, before personal merit.
The conversation at dinner was but feebly sustained,--every one was occupied with his own affairs; Habermann thought of his new, suspicious neighbor, the Kammerrath of his money affairs, and the lieutenant of cuirassiers looked as if he had lost himself in a calculation of compound interest, and could not find the way out; and if the gracious mama had not mounted her high horse a little, and talked of the visits she must make to people of rank in the neighborhood, and the young ladies had not revelled in the prospect of country delights and unlimited grass and flowers, it would have been as silent as a funeral.