“There now; if your Magdalene could hear him she would be converted,” said the Countess. “Do stay at home to-night; you will hear him. He is a wonderful man.”
“It does not interest me, ma tante.”
“But I tell you that it is interesting, and you must come home. Now you may go. What else do you want of me? Videz votre sac.”
“The next is in the fortress.”
“In the fortress? I can give you a note for that to the Baron Kriegsmuth. Cest un tres brave homme. Oh, but you know him; he was a comrade of your father’s. Il donne dans le spiritisme. But that does not matter, he is a good fellow. What do you want there?”
“I want to get leave for a mother to visit her son who is imprisoned there. But I was told that this did not depend on Kriegsmuth but on Tcherviansky.”
“I do not like Tcherviansky, but he is Mariette’s husband; we might ask her. She will do it for me. Elle est tres gentille.”
“I have also to petition for a woman who is imprisoned there without knowing what for.”
“No fear; she knows well enough. They all know it very well, and it serves them right, those short-haired [many advanced women wear their hair short, like men] ones.”
“We do not know whether it serves them right or not. But they suffer. You are a Christian and believe in the Gospel teaching and yet you are so pitiless.”