“Then I beg to wish you a very good morning.”
A slight nod from the Resident, who still kept his seat at his desk, was the only reply to his greeting.
The next moment Verstork was walking down the steps of the mansion muttering to himself as he went, “Poor mother, poor sisters!”
“Stupid ass,” said van Gulpendam to himself. “Yes, an arrant fool indeed! Now that that booby won’t come to terms the business will require a little more piloting. Never mind, I have friends in Batavia who know how to get such questions safe into harbour; men who knew how to make General van der Heijden disappear, and who will not think much of this little job. Forward! is the word—at the end of it all there is the ‘Virtus Nobilitat.’ ”
A short time after, Verstork sat down to dinner with his friend van Nerekool. The latter was the only one at home since van Rheijn had sent word that pressing business would keep him at the office and that he could therefore not be in to dinner. The two friends were discussing the events of the former day and the result also of the morning’s interview with the Resident. The Controller was so utterly downcast and disheartened, that van Nerekool, who himself was not in the best of spirits, yet felt that he must try and cheer him up and put some courage into him.
“Come, William, old fellow,” he said, “don’t hang your head so sadly. You would almost make me think that you repent of the course of action you have taken.”
“Repent, Charles,” cried the other, very sadly and yet without a sign of hesitation. “Repent? no never, if it were all to do again I would, in every respect, act as I have done. But, my poor mother, my poor sisters!”
“Don’t look at things so darkly,” said van Nerekool.
“So darkly did you say? Why—the very best thing that can happen is that I shall be transferred to some other place—that I shall be torn out of the sphere of work to which here I have become accustomed.”
“Well,” said Charles, “and suppose that should happen?”