“Good morning, Herr Judge Schwarz,” he said, taking his hat off low to the ladies, and turned to pass on his way.
But he had reckoned without his host. In a paroxysm of rage the judge darted after him.
“Sir, what does this mean? How do you know my name and title?” he cried, panting with indignation, while Helen vainly tried to appease him.
Karl shook off her hand impatiently.
“How can you have the effrontery to address me by my name?” he repeated in a tone of thunder.
“My dear sir,” replied the stranger, laughing, “if your name is to be kept secret, allow me to call your attention to the fact that it would be the part of wisdom not to wear it plainly upon your back!”
Karl gazed upon the stranger in speechless astonishment. Helen turned her husband dexterously around. Ah, here was the solution of the riddle! That benighted furrier had forgotten, in the press of business, to remove the slip of paper from the judge’s great-coat, by which that valuable garment had been distinguished from others entrusted to his keeping, and poor Karl had been walking about for an hour in Berlin with an enormous placard on his back bearing the inscription, “Herr Judge Schwarz!”
While Helen and Anna were occupied in removing this enemy of the much-desired incognito from the back of their liege lord and master, Annchen found time to whisper to her sister, “That was Kurt!”
“Nonsense!” cried Helen in surprise, now giving Karl’s tormentor a scrutinising glance, while the latter was vainly endeavouring to pacify the enraged Karl—more likely, I regret to say, for the sake of the pretty damsel than for brotherly love. But Karl was obstinate, and would have nothing to do with forgiveness, and even the kind offer of the unknown to show him the way had no further effect than to extract a surly reply, “You may, for all I care!”
