He dipped his pen in the ink. Suddenly his eyes fell upon a beautiful little open box upon the table in the midst of the books and writing-materials; it had probably been received but a few hours previously, for the wrapping-paper still lay beside it.
Never had the Frau President seen the face of her "cherished friend" express such blank dismay as at this moment; the pen fell from his hand.
"Good heavens! that is the order of the royal household of D——!" he said, tapping the box with a respectful finger. "How comes it in this house, sent to this obscure address?"
"Strange!" the Frau President murmured, in a startled tone, her delicate white features flushed with a disagreeable surprise. She put up her eyeglass to examine the contents of the little box. "I do not know the order, or its value——"
"No wonder: it is very rarely bestowed," the councillor of medicine interrupted her.
"Or I might suppose its reception dated from his last campaign;" she completed her remark.
"No possibility of that!" he ejaculated, harshly,—he must have been much agitated to adopt such a tone. "In the first place, the order is only bestowed as a reward for services rendered to the royal family; and then I should like to see the man who could possess such a decoration for more than a year without the world’s knowing it. If I only knew why,—knew why!" He rubbed his forehead absently with a hand upon which three marks of princely favour glittered in sparkling diamonds; but of what value were they to him at this moment? They were all presents from his own royal family,—not distinctions awarded by a foreign court.
"This same order is the goal of the hopes of so many," he continued; "many a person of distinction has sighed for it in vain; and here it lies, as if carelessly thrown aside, on this miserable painted table!—thrown around the neck of a man, an ignoramus, disgraced by his repeated failures,—pardon me, dear madame, I cannot help saying so,—thrown around his neck, I repeat, and no one has an idea of the why or the wherefore!"
He had arisen, and was pacing to and fro in the room. The haughty old lady, who so seldom lost her self-possession, looked at him the while with a strange air of scrutiny. "I cannot believe," she observed, in an uncertain tone, "that the decoration has anything to do with his medical services. When was he ever at the D—— court?"