Part 28 (2/2)
”The forced position was mine,” returned Hartmut, just as sharply. ”I will not a.s.sert that you consider me an intruder here, for you, best of all, know that I have a right to this intercourse.”
”_Hartmut von Falkenried_ would have had a right, of course; but that has changed.”
”Herr von Wallmoden!”
”Not so loud, if you please,” interrupted the Amba.s.sador. ”We might be overheard, and it would surely not be desirable to you that the name I just now uttered should be heard by outsiders.”
”It is true that at present I carry my mother's name, to which I surely have a right. If I laid aside the other, it happened out of consideration----”
”For your father,” finished Wallmoden, with heavy emphasis.
Hartmut started. This was an allusion which he could not bear yet.
”Yes,” he replied, curtly. ”I confess that it would be painful to me if I were forced to break this consideration.”
”And why? Your role here would be played out, anyway.”
Rojanow stepped close to the Amba.s.sador with a pa.s.sionate gesture.
”You are the friend of my father, Herr von Wallmoden, and I have called you uncle in my boyhood; but you forget that I am no longer the boy whom you could lecture and master at that time. The grown man looks at it as an insult.”
”I intend neither to offend you nor to renew old connections, which neither of us consider as existing,” said Wallmoden, coldly. ”If I desired this conversation, it was to declare to you that it will not be possible to me, in my official position, to see you in intercourse with the Court, and be silent when it would be my duty to enlighten the Duke.”
”Enlighten the Duke! About what?”
”About several things which are not known here and which have probably remained unknown to Prince Adelsberg. Please do not fly into a pa.s.sion, Herr Rojanow. I would do this only in an extreme case, for I have to spare a friend. I know how a certain incident hurt him ten years ago, which is now forgotten and buried in our country, and, if all this should come up again and be brought into publicity, Colonel Falkenried would die of it.”
Hartmut blanched. The defiant reply did not cross his lips. ”He would die of it.” The awful word, the truth of which he felt only too well, forced aside for the moment even the insult of the remark.
”I owe my father alone an account of that occasion,” he replied in a painfully suppressed voice; ”only him and n.o.body else.”
”He will hardly ask for it. His son is dead to him; but let that rest.
I speak especially now of later years; of your stay at Rome and Paris, where you lived with your mother in lavish style, although the estates in Roumania had had to be sacrificed at a forced sale.”
”You seem to be all-knowing, Your Excellency!” hissed Rojanow in great anger. ”We had no idea that we were under such conscientious surveillance. We lived upon the balance of our fortune which had been rescued from the wreck.”
”Nothing was rescued; the money was entirely lost--to the last penny.”
”That is not true,” interrupted Hartmut, stormily.
”It is true. Am I really better informed about it than you?” The voice of the Amba.s.sador sounded cuttingly sharp. ”It is possible that Frau Rojanow did not want her son informed of the source from which she derived her means, and left him in error about it intentionally. I know the circ.u.mstances. If they have remained unknown to you--so much the better for you.”
”Take care not to insult my mother,” the young man burst forth; ”or I shall forget that your hair is gray, and demand satisfaction.”
”For what? For a statement for which I can produce the proofs? Lay aside such foolishness, of which I shall take no notice. She was your mother, and is dead now; therefore we will go no deeper into this point. I should only like to put this question to you: Do you intend, even after this conversation, to remain here and appear in the circle into which Prince Adelsberg has introduced you?”
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