"I am betrothed to my cousin Zdena."
"Indeed?--to Zdena?" the Baron says, with well-feigned indignation. "Have you forgotten that in that case I shall disinherit you?"
"You will do as you choose about that," Harry replies, dryly. "I should be glad to assure my wife a pleasant and easy lot in life; but if you fancy that I have come here to sue for your favour, you are mistaken. It was my duty to inform you of my betrothal. I have done so; and that is all."
"Indeed? That is all?" thunders old Leskjewitsch. "It shall be all! Wait, you scoundrel, you good-for-naught, and we'll see if you go on carrying your head so high! I will turn the leaf: I will make Zdena my heiress,--but only upon condition that she sends you about your business. She shall choose between you--that is, between poverty--and me!"
"It will not take her long. Good-morning." With which Harry turns on his heel and leaves the room.
The old Baron sits motionless for a while. The mild spring breeze blows in through the open windows; there is a sound in the air of cooing doves, of water dripping on the stones of the paved court-yard from the roof, of the impatient pawing and neighing of a horse, and then the clatter of spurs and sabre.
The old man smiles broadly. "He shows race: the boy is a genuine Leskjewitsch," he mutters to himself,--"a good mate for the girl!" Then he goes to the window. Harry is just about to mount, when his uncle roars down to him, "Harry! Harry! The deuce take you! are you deaf? Can't you hear?"
Meanwhile, the major and his niece are walking in the garden at Zirkow. It was the major who had insisted that Harry should immediately inform his uncle of his betrothal.
Zdena has shown very little interest in the discussion as to how the cross-grained, eccentric old man would receive the news. And when her uncle suddenly looks her full in the face to ask how she can adapt herself to straitened means, she calmly lays her band on the arm of her betrothed, and whispers, tenderly, "You shall see." Then her eyes fill with tears as she adds, "But how will you bear it, Harry?"
He kisses both her hands and replies, "Never mind, Zdena; I assure you that at this moment Conte Capriani is a beggar compared with myself."