“Absolutely nothing, Monsieur Goefle,” replied the young man, laughing. “I had exactly enough to get here, by pinching my own stomach a little, so as to allow my attendant and my ass all they wanted; but I am to receive thirty six dollars this evening for my performance; and after enjoying this capital breakfast in company with yourself and this excellent stove, and in sight of the splendid landscape all set with diamonds, that I see shining out yonder, through the smoke with which our pipes have filled the room, I feel myself the richest and most fortunate of men.”
“You are decidedly an original,” said M. Goefle, rising, and knocking the ashes from his pipe. “You are a singular mixture of the man and the child, the scientist and the adventurer. It even seems to me that you are extravagantly enjoying this last phase of your experience; and that instead of finding it disagreeable, you are making your assumed and rather exaggerated pride an excuse for protracting it.”
“Permit me, Monsieur Goefle,” answered Christian; “in the matter of pride there is no middle course; it must be everything or nothing. I have tried poverty, and I know how easy it is, in poverty, to become degraded. One who is left to depend entirely upon his own resources, must therefore accustom himself not to fear poverty; he must even know how to make it a source of amusement. I have told you how it distressed me to be poor in a great city. There, among temptations of every kind, such a position is very dangerous to a man who is young and vigorous, and who has known what it is to be carried away by passion. Here, on the contrary, on my travels, that is to say, at liberty, and protected by an incognito which will allow me to-morrow to assume a respectable position in society, I feel as gay as a school-boy in vacation; and I confess that I am in no haste to assume again the chains of constraint and the annoyances of conventionality.”
“After all, I understand it,” said the doctor. “My imagination is not duller than other people’s; and I can easily conceive that there is a romantic pleasure in such a wandering, careless life. Yet you are fond of society. It was not for the sake of investigating the frozen mountains at midnight that you borrowed my dress suit.”
At this moment the door opened, and Ulphilas, to whom M. Goefle had no doubt given orders, came to say that the horse and sleigh were ready. Ulph seemed quite sober.
“What!” cried the doctor with surprise, “what time is it? Noon? It is impossible! That old clock has gone crazy! But no,” he continued, looking at his watch, “it is noon, really; and I must go and consult with the baron over the great lawsuit, on account of which I have come here. It surprises me, by the way, since he knows I am here, that he should not have thought fit to send before now and inquire after me!”
“But his lordship, the baron, did send,” said Ulph; “did I not tell you, M. Goefle?”
“Not at all.”
“He sent an hour ago, to say that he was ill last night, or that he would have come himself—”
“Here? You exaggerate the baron’s politeness, my dear Ulph. The baron never comes to Stollborg!”