'And your manner was not kind to Würben—a nice man, I like him!' said her brother in an almost ecstatic tone.
'How fortunate!' she called after Friedrich's retreating figure, as he strode across the room with such pompous haste that the affairs of the whole Empire might have waited his directions.
The two ladies smiled at one another wearily when he had gone; then, without honouring this self-sufficient person with a word of comment, they fell to discussing Würben. This Bohemian nobleman was not an altogether unpleasing personality. Of middle height, he had a stoop which caused him to appear short; it was not the stoop of the scholar, but that bend which ill-health, caused by debauch, often gives to a comparatively young man. His face was sallow, hollow beneath the eyes, emaciated between chin and cheek-bone. The brown eyes were feverishly bright and a trifle blood-shot. The well-shaven mouth had loose, sensual lips, and the teeth were large and discoloured. And yet one knew that this man, repulsive though he had become, must have been a youth of promise and some personal beauty; and his manner betokened the man of breeding, and one with knowledge of the great world. His sneer at the unholy bargain he was about to make told Madame de Ruth that he was fully aware of the degradation of it. An admirably adapted person for the purpose, she reflected; for, being ashamed of his bargain, he would hide in Vienna, content so long as he had sufficient money to risk at l'hombre and faro. This she and Wilhelmine discussed while Schütz and Würben were upstairs removing their dusty garments.
Suddenly Friedrich Grävenitz burst into the room. 'His Highness has just ridden up to the door! This is really most inconvenient, most difficult for me.' He spoke loudly.
'Hush! be careful! Würben must not hear,' implored Madame de Ruth, while Wilhelmine sprang up. She breathed in laboured gasps, her eyes fixed wildly on her brother.
'His Highness? You are mad, Friedrich! or is this some absurd plot against me?' She turned on her brother fiercely. 'Is this some foolishness you have arranged?'
'It has nothing to do with me. I am never consulted,' he began; but his further utterance was cut short, for Eberhard Ludwig entered unannounced.
'Leave us together,' he said shortly. 'For God's sake, Madame de Ruth, manage that I may speak with her undisturbed.' Madame de Ruth hurried Friedrich Grävenitz away with scant ceremony.
'My beloved! oh, to see you again!' Serenissimus clasped her to him. 'Tell me you are mine, as you were at Urach! Am I in time to hinder this terrible sacrilege?'
She told him that the marriage had not yet taken place, that it was for the morrow.
