Old Merckel withdrew a few steps. His benevolent smile died on his lips; his fleshy fingers fumbled nervously with the Moor's-head keeper.
"Can I speak to you alone?"
"Oh! Herr Baron--of course, Herr Baron--is the Herr Baron going to stay?"
He flung wide a side door, which opened into the little best parlour reserved for gentry. A sofa, covered with slippery oil-cloth, and a few velvet, bulky arm-chairs, were ready for the reception of distinguished customers. Over a cabinet containing tobacco hung a placard with the inscription, "Only wine drunk here."
Before the host closed the door behind Boleslav, he made a reassuring sign to his fellow-burghers as if to allay their anxiety. Then from under his drooping lids he took a rapid survey of the newly-returned young aristocrat's person, which seemed to fill him with satisfaction, for again his smug, slimy smile played about his fat lips.
"How the Herr Junker has grown, to be sure!" he began. "Wonderful!"
Boleslav fixed his eyes on him silently.
"And the Herr Junker--pardon, I ought to say Herr Baron--has come home to find the old Herr Baron no longer alive. A pity he was not in time to close the eyes of the sainted dead----"
He broke off, and caught violently at his amber heart, for Boleslav's piercing, threatening gaze began to make him feel uneasy. What if this was a desperado, who would think nothing of taking him by the throat?
"At any rate I have come in time," Boleslav burst forth at last, "to repair the shameful scandal that has been perpetrated here in refusing my father the last honour due to his position."