As he held forth thus, his short figure seemed to grow. His eyes flashed fire. The demon of fanaticism that so strongly resembles inspiration, its angelic sister, enveloped him in its red-hot, glowing mantle.
Boleslav shrank away, trembling. He felt keenly, how completely every tie between him and this man was now severed.
"Let them whisper, and nudge each other as I pass," he continued, "and make faces; what the devil do I care? They daren't do it so long as the Corsican lion held them in his claws. And after all, who is to prove it against me? If it hadn't been for that fool Regina, who let her father hunt her down in the Bockshorn, every one would naturally have supposed that General Latour, with his inventive brain, had found out the way over the river and through the wood of his own accord. As it is, the wretches are all at my throat.... The peasants are no longer to be brought to heel with the knout. They've always been so fond of me, you see. If what the papers say is true, and the king is willing to let the mutiny continue, they'll lynch me, as sure as fate. You will have good cause to congratulate yourself on your succession, my boy!"
Those were the last words his father had ever spoken to him, for the conversation which had taken place in his own study, was interrupted at this point by the entrance of his aunt.
The aristocratic old lady recoiled from the touch of the Baron's red muscular hand as from that of some poisonous reptile. But mastering her repugnance, she asked for a few minutes' private talk with him.
What decision they came to over his future he was never to know, for even before the short interview had elapsed, his former life already lay behind him like a nightmare, and he stood in the street and reflected through which of the city-gates he should wander out into the wide world. Finally, the goal of his travels proved to be a small property in a remote corner of Lithuania, where he found rest in hard work, and an opportunity of fitting himself for the duties of a landed proprietor.
Years went by. For him they meant unremitting labour for his daily bread--a struggle for existence full of hardships, which, however, could be engaged in without shame, or any wounding of his amour propre. For now he no longer bore the abhorred name of his fathers. If at the same time he only could have cast off, like a soiled garment, the host of bitter recollections with which it was associated, he would have been happier. But consciousness of the infamy that clung to the discarded name remained ever present. Love for his country, which hitherto had only slumbered in his heart, now bounded into full life. The passion of patriotism grew and grew, till it became a tormenting demon which scourged him with scorpions, drove the blood from his face, the sleep from his eyes, and heaped the guilt of Prussia's misfortunes on his shoulders.
Only once during this time did news of his home reach him. That was when he read in a Königsberg news-sheet that Schranden Castle, which had enjoyed such an unenviable notoriety in the winter of 1807, had been burned down with all its outlying buildings. Then he had folded his hands, and a sound had escaped his lips like a prayer of thanksgiving.
Expiation! expiation! must be the watchword of his soul.
But as yet nothing could be expiated. Still the unhappy Fatherland lay crushed beneath the heel of the dictator. Then came the downfall of the Great Army on the snow-covered plains of Eastern Europe, and the rising of Prussia quickly followed.