"But the announcement of her death would have seriously influenced your step-daughter's destiny," Doctor Herbegg observed.
"My wife considered me the guardian of her child," Strachinsky declared, with pathos. "Another man might have refused to accept a burden entailing upon him sacrifice of every kind. But I am not like other men. My wife evidently supposed that her child would be best cared for under my protection; and I was not the man to betray her confidence. You look surprised, Doctor. Yes, no doubt you think it strange for a man nowadays to vindicate his chivalry and disinterestedness, to his own ruin. But such a man am I,--a Marquis Posa, a Don Quixote, an Egmont----"
"Pardon me, Herr Baron, I shall be late for the train," said the Doctor, and, with a bow to Erika, he left the room.
Strachinsky ran after him with astonishing celerity, expatiating upon his chivalrous disinterestedness. Shortly afterwards a carriage was heard driving out of the courtyard; and Strachinsky returned to the bare drawing-room, which his step-daughter had not yet left.
His face beamed with satisfaction; rubbing his hands, he cried out, "Now we shall lack for nothing!" Then, turning to Erika, he continued, "I shall see to it that your German relatives do not squander your property. This lawyer-fellow seems to me a schemer, a sly dog. But I shall do my best to watch over your interests. In fact, it is my duty as your guardian to administer your affairs. Moreover, in three years you will be of age, and then we can avail ourselves of your money to free Luzano from its weight of debt."
This delightful scheme made him extremely cheerful. After pacing the apartment for a while, lost in contemplation of its feasibility, he went to the table, and, taking up the Doctor's untouched second glass of Tokay, he poured its contents back into the bottle. This he called economy. Then with the bottle in his hand, apparently with a view of re-sealing it, he went towards the door, saying, "The affair has greatly agitated me. I am so very sensitive. But when one has had to wait upon fortune so long---!"
He had settled it with himself that he was the person principally interested; his step-daughter was quite a secondary consideration, at most the means to an end. But circumstances shaped themselves after what was to him a most unexpected and undesirable fashion. Erika received a brief and rather formal letter from Countess Lenzdorff, in which the old lady requested her to repair as soon as possible to Berlin, but upon no account to allow Strachinsky to accompany her; in short, the old Countess refused to have any personal intercourse with him whatever.
By the same post came a letter from Doctor Herbegg to Strachinsky, formally advising him to resign his guardianship voluntarily. Should he comply, the Countess would refrain from closer examination of his administration of the property of her daughter-in-law and of her grandchild. But if, on the other hand, he made the slightest attempt to interfere in the management of his step-daughter's German estate, she would, as the guardian appointed by the late Count, resort to legal means for relieving herself of such interference.
Had Strachinsky's conscience been perfectly clear he would probably have set himself in opposition, but as it was he contented himself with gnashing his teeth and raging for two days, indulging freely in vituperation of old Countess Lenzdorff. Then he made a final tender attempt to work upon Erika's feelings and to induce her to espouse his cause with her grandmother. When this failed, he wrapped himself in his martyr's cloak and submitted with much grumbling. Dulled as his nature was, he bore his disappointment with comparative ease. At first he assumed an air of magnanimous renunciation towards his step-daughter, but after a while he overwhelmed her with good advice, and groaned for her whenever she lifted any weight or stooped in her packing. Erika herself, meanwhile, was in a state of tremendous excitement.
On the morning of her departure, when her trunks were all packed she took a walk. She first visited her mother's grave for the last time, and then went into the garden, pausing in all her favourite haunts, and avoiding with a shudder even a glance towards the spot by the low garden wall whence she had seen her mother hurrying across the fields towards the river.