Fritz shrugged his shoulders. "I really have none; the poor things will have to shift for themselves," and his voice trembled.
"Of course you mean then to give them a good education, to enable them to earn their own living," continued the Conte. "That is all right, but allow me to ask how you mean to do this?"
Fritz passed his hand--the white, transparent hand of consumption--wearily across his forehead. "I hope to send my little girl to Hernals," he began, "where she can be educated for a governess."
"Ah--!" the Conte looked disapproval--"a very unpractical scheme, it seems to me, very unpractical. She will become very pretentious in her ideas at Hernals, and will gain but little that can be of real service to her. Remember your circumstances, my dear fellow, remember your circumstances,--we will discuss them by-and-by. And what do you think of doing with your son?"
"Oh Franzi is still so little," said Fritz in hopes of cutting short the conversation, the Conte's arrogant, domineering tone was most irritating, it stung him like nettles.
"All the more reason for providing for his future," the Conte insisted, "in consideration of the chance of your being suddenly taken from him."
"True, true," sighed Fritz. "Well then, I hope to live long enough to place him in a government school for Cadets, after which through the influence of my relatives, he can obtain a commission."
The Conte laughed contemptuously. "Just like you!" he exclaimed, "the same haughty, aristocratic idler as ever! You'll learn sense after a while, my dear fellow. I have thought of something for Franzi; your wife is quite agreed to it." Charlotte who had seemed to be absorbed in her sewing, nodded.
"The Countess always takes a sensible view of affairs, she looks things in the face," continued the Conte; "begging your pardon, my dear fellow, there is more common-sense in her little finger than in your whole body. We will find Franzi a place in a dry-goods establishment. The business is neither unhealthy, nor confining, and if it goes against your grain to put him in such a situation here in Austria (to speak frankly I think any such objection very petty,--my views in this respect are more enlightened) why I will see that he gets one in Paris at the Louvre or at the Printemps; a clerk in one of those great houses often gets a yearly salary of from fifteen to twenty thousand francs!"
Fritz started to his feet and made several attempts to interrupt the Conte, but his voice failed. A singing was in his ears, his blood was coursing hotly, wildly through his veins. "My son!" he gasped hoarsely, "my son, clerk in a dry-goods shop! I'd rather kill him myself!"