For years her husband had heard nothing from her, until now when she suddenly and unexpectedly appeared in the neighborhood of the German capital, where Major von Falkenried had assumed control of a large military school.
It was the eighth day since Hartmut's arrival at Burgsdorf. Frau von Eschenhagen was in her sitting-room, and opposite her sat the Major, who had arrived but fifteen minutes before.
Her conversation must have been as disagreeable as it was earnest, for Falkenried listened with a face which grew darker at every word, as she went on with her account.
"Hartmut seemed to me greatly altered after the third or fourth day he was here. The first few days nothing could check his overflow of spirits, and indeed one morning I had to threaten to send him home. But, all of a sudden, he became silent and quite downcast. He attempted no more of his mad pranks, spent hours by himself in wandering through our woods, and when he returned from his solitary rambles, just sat and dreamed with open eyes, so that we often had to arouse him as if from a sound slumber. 'He's beginning to think of the future,' Herbert said, but I said: 'There's something more than that wrong; there's something back of all this.' So I took Will to task and questioned him closely; he astonished me with what I extorted from him. He was in the conspiracy. He had surprised the mother and the son one day at their tryst, and Hartmut had pledged him to secrecy, and my boy had really kept silence towards me, me, his own mother! He finally confessed the little he knew, after I had talked to him seriously. Well, it won't happen a second time. I'll look after my Will more sharply for the future."
"And Hartmut, what does he say?" interrupted the father hastily.
"Nothing at all, for I haven't spoken a syllable to him on the subject. He would probably have asked why he had never been allowed to see, or speak to his mother, and that question can only be answered--by his father."
"He has heard it all from the other side, by this time," answered the father bitterly. "Though, of course, he has not heard the truth."
"That is what I feared, so I didn't lose a moment in communicating with you after I discovered the thing. And what will you do?"