"'Oh, Stürmer, such a hot-head as you Klaus has never been, certainly, and I know that you owe to your vivacity my brother's love, which preferred you before his own son. You may be convinced that just that passionate, changeable nature of my brother has made the children so earnest, so deliberate.'
"'Klaus is the best, the noblest of men; he is my friend!' cried Stürmer, with warmth. 'Do I say, then, that I reproach him? But he has not learned to know life; he has never come from mere fidelity to duty and deliberation, to call his a moment of inspiration which is able to carry one quite out of himself; he has ever kept to the golden mean, blameless; he has always done enough, but not too much. In short—in short, such men are model men. But what life means, Aunt Rosamond, that he does not know, and only he could trust himself——'
"He broke off suddenly. 'I should like to know how I came to deliver such a lecture to you,' he added, jokingly.
"It was almost dark in the room now. I could scarcely distinguish Stürmer's profile. He twisted his beard rapidly and nervously.
"'You may say what you will, Stürmer, but cold my two children are not,' I declared, and just at that moment Anna Maria entered.
"'A light will be brought directly,' she said, cheerfully, stepping over to her chair. 'Pardon me, baron, for staying away so long; I was kept by domestic duties, which occupy me more closely than when Klaus is at home.'
"He made no reply; I only saw him bow. Anna Maria could have said nothing more pedantic, I thought. Conversation would not flow, the light did not come. Anna Maria was just on the point of ringing for it when the bell in the church-tower began to ring in quick, broken strokes.
"'Fire!' cried Anna Maria, in alarm, hurrying to the window. Already there was a commotion in the court-yard; Stürmer had also thrown open a window. 'Where is the fire?' he called down.
"With beating heart I sat upright in bed. 'Where?' called Anna Maria, 'where is the fire, people?' Then the words were lost in the tumult.
"'In Dambitz,' at last came up the reply, amid all the tramping of horses and noise of the people. 'Sacre Dieu!' murmured Stürmer, overturning a chair in the darkness; 'Dambitz!'