As I was about to wish them my usual quiet good-bye, the two women rushed after me to the door and embraced me passionately, Minna as well as her daughter bursting into tears. I was alarmed, and asked the meaning of this excitement, but could get no answer from them, and I was obliged to leave them and ponder alone over their peculiar conduct, of the reason for which I had not even the faintest idea.
I arrived home late in the afternoon, worn out by my exertions and worries, dead-tired, pale and hungry, and was surprised to find the table not laid and Minna not at home, the maid telling me that she had not yet returned from her walk with Nathalie.
I waited patiently, sinking down exhausted at the work-table, which I absent-mindedly opened. To my intense astonishment it was empty. Horror-struck, I sprang up and went to the wardrobe, and realised at once that Minna had left the house; her departure had been so cunningly planned that even the maid was unaware of it.
With death in my soul I dashed out of the house to investigate the cause of Minna’s disappearance.
Old Möller, by his practical sagacity, very soon found out that Dietrich, his personal enemy, had left Königsberg in the direction of Berlin by the special coach in the morning.
This horrible fact stood staring me in the face.
I had now to try and overtake the fugitives. With the lavish use of money this might have been possible, but funds were lacking, and had, in part, to be laboriously collected.
On Möller’s advice I took the silver wedding presents with me in case of emergency, and after the lapse of a few terrible hours went off, also by special coach, with my distressed old friend. We hoped to overtake the ordinary mail-coach, which had started a short time before, as it was probable that Minna would also continue her journey in this, at a safe distance from Königsberg.
This proved impossible, and when next morning at break of day we arrived in Elbing, we found our money exhausted by the lavish use of the express coach, and were compelled to return; we discovered, moreover, that even by using the ordinary coach we should be obliged to pawn the sugar-basin and cake-dish.
This return journey to Königsberg rightly remains one of the saddest memories of my youth. Of course, I did not for a moment entertain the idea of remaining in the place; my one thought was how I could best get away. Hemmed in between the law-suits of my Magdeburg creditors and the Königsberg tradesmen, who had claims on me for the payment by instalment of my domestic accounts, my departure could only be carried out in secrecy. For this very reason, too, it was necessary for me to raise money, particularly for the long journey from Königsberg to Dresden, whither I determined to go in quest of my wife, and these matters detained me for two long and terrible days.