She put her arms about him and drew him to her. She whispered:
"We have no one but you, my boy, and our little Berengar. And ... papa therefore thinks that you ought to marry. We want an hereditary prince, a Count of Lycilia...."
His eyes became moist; he laid his head against her:
"Two to become emperor? Berengar, if I should be gone before him: is not that enough, mamma?"
She smilingly shook her head in denial. No, that was not certainty enough for the house of Czyrkiski-Xanantria.
"Mamma," he said, gently, "when sociologists speak of the social question, they deplore that so many children are born among the proletariate and they even hold the poor parents, who have nothing else but their love, responsible for the greater social misery which they cause through those children. Does not this reproach really affect us also? Or do you think an emperor so happy?"
Her brow became overcast.
"You are in one of your gloomy moods, Othomar. For God's sake, my boy, do not give way to them. Do not philosophize so much; accept life as it has been given to you. That is the only way in which to bear it. Do not reflect whether you will be happy, when you are emperor, but accept the fact that you must become emperor in your turn."
"Very well, for myself: but why children, mamma?"
"What sovereign allows his house to die out, Othomar? Do not be foolish. Cling to tradition: that is all in all to us. Don't have such strange ideas upon this question. They are not those of a future—I had almost said—autocrat; they are not those of a monarch. You understand, Othomar, do you not? You must, you must marry...."