"He was always considered one of the keenest and most gifted officers in the army," says Rohritz.
"And with justice," Katrine confirms his words. "You have no idea of the energy with which he devoted himself to the service. Were you ever in Hungary?"
"Yes, madame, I served as captain for two years in W----."
"Then you are familiar with the fearful heat of the Hungarian summers. To order dinner and to sit upright at table exhausted my capacity; whilst he, although he rose at four that he might get through riding-school before the terrible heat of the day, scarcely ever lay down for half an hour. He continually had something to arrange, to decide, to command; he occupied himself with the individual concerns of every soldier in his squadron; he never took a moment's rest from morning until night; while now--now he does nothing, nothing but sleigh, mend a toy for the boy now and then, and read silly novels."
Rohritz is spared the necessity of replying, for at this moment the quiet drawing-room where this conversation is going on is invaded by the sharp clear tinkle of large sleigh-bells. Katrine turns her head hastily and walks to the window.
"So soon again!" she exclaims, as a fair, stout, pretty woman, wrapped in furs, allows herself, with much loud talking, to be helped out of the sleigh by the captain. Whilst Katrine, with a very gloomy face, takes her seat in an arm-chair to await the stranger's appearance, Rohritz withdraws, under the pretext of an obligation to answer immediately an important letter.
But he writes no letter; he does not even sit down at his writing-desk, but stands at his window looking out at the snow. In town he had quite forgotten how pure and white snow originally is. He gazes at it as at some curiosity which he is beholding for the first time. On the rose-beds, the bushes, the old linden,--everywhere it lies thick,--thick!
Here and there some branch thrusts forth a black point from the white covering, and the trunks of the trees are all divided in halves, a black half and a white one.
He reflects upon the domestic drama about to be enacted close at hand.
He is sorry for Katrine, although he lays at her door the blame for all the annoyances of which she has spoken to him, petty, provoking annoyances, which under certain circumstances may be the forerunners of actual misfortune.