"Not only that, but she has now been three months away from Eichhof. It was all very well for her to go to the baths, but to visit my sister afterward and stay there so long,--I cannot understand it. Mountain air is good for the child, she says. Possibly; but Eichhof air would be equally good for him. And we so seldom see anything of Bernhard----"
"Bernhard has a great deal to do at present."
"Ah, my dear, I can easily see that you do not believe that to be the only reason. I often lie awake thinking of it all. I cannot comprehend it."
"Wait until Thea comes home. She is a clever woman, and she loves Bernhard; she will make matters all right again. You remember how she behaved about his agricultural interests. At all events, we must know nothing until we are told. Not even a parent should interfere between man and wife."
Frau von Rosen assented. "But yet it is hard," she rejoined; "and if anything has estranged them from each other, be sure it is the result of the grand state in which they are obliged to live. Love is more likely to nourish amid simple, comfortable surroundings."
The next day the family and their guests were taking their coffee when the post-bag was brought in. There was a general distribution of letters and newspapers, and among the former was a thick envelope for Alma from Adela Hohenstein.
There had been a brisk correspondence carried on of late between the two girls, and Alma was as familiar with Adela's quiet life in her country home as was Adela with Alma's walks and rides with her guests, and even with the conversations carried on among them.
"It is very charming here," Adela wrote. "My plants and my animals flourish finely. Papa is contented, and we love each other dearly. But--you see there is a but--it is very quiet. The people about us are strangers to us, and those whom we know are far away. I go to walk just when you do, but I am quite alone. Since my Fidèle died I have not even a dog, for the one I have now is too stupid to care to go with me. While I walk, papa writes his book, which, however, between ourselves, will not come to anything, because poor papa has forgotten so much. But it gives him pleasure, and so I let him believe that it will be good, and go to walk alone. And sometimes I am quite low in my mind and could envy you your guests. Not Walter, of course, but Dr. Nordstedt is so nice; and even Walter is a human being, and an old acquaintance besides. Papa, too, thinks--but then he had better write you himself what he thinks. I only want to tell you that I am no longer so seriously angry with Walter as I told you I was in Berlin. I have been thinking about it since I have been so much alone, and I have reflected that it is folly to be angry with any one for as long as I have been vexed with Walter. To be sure, you do not know the cause I had for anger, and I certainly had good cause; but nevertheless I am angry with him no longer, and he need not refuse papa's invitation on my account. You may tell him so."
Alma read this strange letter twice, and just as she finished it Herr von Rosen said, "Baron Hohenstein has written to me, Dr. Nordstedt, asking whether you and Walter will not stop and pay him a little visit on your way home. He says he has received so much hospitality in your house that he should like to requite it. You will go directly past his retreat, and----"
"Don't decide against this plan; I have something to tell you from Adela," Alma whispered to Walter, who was just opening his lips to declare that the visit would be impossible.