In the solitude of her dressing-room she wondered what would be the next development of her devotion to Otto’s memory, and chid herself for the ungracious thought. Then she went down to luncheon, expecting to find her guest in a corner of the library turning over picture-books. That was the only pose in which his former visit had left him photographed on her brain.
To her astonishment, she heard him in earnest discussion with Aunt Louisa. “My dear Ursula,” cried the latter lady, running forward, “your cousin Van Helmont is a most interesting young man. I have been telling him about European manners, and he most sagaciously remarks that the best of manners is to have none. How delightfully true!”
The subject of this outspoken eulogy did not seem at all abashed by it; probably he was accustomed to his mother’s estimation of her only son.
“Pardon me,” he calmly protested; “I was saying that I had read that observation somewhere. I am not prepared to maintain that it is absolutely correct.”
“Oh, what does it matter whose it is,” cried the Freule. “Everything we say must have had its origin with some one, so everything is really original. Now that never struck me before. How new!”
“Yes,” replied Ursula. “Will you have a rissole?”
“Thank you, my dear. One more, please. Thank you. Personally, what I most reprobate is the walking in line, like ducks. ‘Do as others do.’ The Bible says, ‘Do as you would be done by’—a very different thing. I hope, Mynheer Helmont, that you are unconventional, as I know your father was.”
“I do not remember my father well,” answered Theodore, pondering whether he could not get away that night.
“Oh, I never met him,” said Louisa, just as the old Baroness entered. The poor old lady, who would have said ‘J’ai failli attendre’ in palmier days, now accorded all precedence to her literary labors.