“I’m not going back into the prison-house again, if you mean that,” said Michael.
“And will your father cut you off?” asked he.
“Oh, I haven’t the least idea,” said Michael.
“No, I’m sure I’m not,” he said. “I can’t do that. It’s his business. I couldn’t ask about what he had done, or meant to do. It’s a sort of pride, I suppose. He will do as he thinks proper, and when he has thought, perhaps he will tell me what he intends.”
“But, then, how will you live?” asked Falbe.
“Oh, I forgot to tell you that. I’ve got some money, quite a lot, I mean, from my grandmother. In some ways I rather wish I hadn’t. It would have been a proof of sincerity to have become poor. That wouldn’t have made the smallest difference to my resolution.”
“And so you are rich, and yet go second-class,” he said. “If I were rich I would make myself exceedingly comfortable. I like things that are good to eat and soft to touch. But I’m bound to say that I get on quite excellently without them. Being poor does not make the smallest difference to one’s happiness, but only to the number of one’s pleasures.”
Michael paused a moment, and then found courage to say what for the last two days he had been longing to give utterance to.
“I know; but pleasures are very nice things,” he said. “And doesn’t it seem obvious now that you are coming to Munich with me? It’s a purely selfish suggestion on my part. After being with you it will be very stupid to be alone there. But it would be so delightful if you would come.”
Falbe looked at him a moment without speaking, but Michael saw the light in his eyes.
“And what if I have my pride too?” he said. “Then I shall apologise for having made the proposal,” said Michael simply.
For just a second more Falbe hesitated. Then he held out his hand.
“I thank you most awfully,” he said. “I accept with the greatest pleasure.”
“I am glad,” he said. “So that’s settled. It’s really nice of you.”
The heat of the day was passing off, and over the sun-bleached plain the coolness of evening was beginning to steal. Overhead the wind stirred more resonantly in the pines, and in the bushes birds called to each other. Presently after, they rose from where they had lain all the afternoon and strolled along the needled slope to where, through a vista in the trees, they looked down on the lake and the hamlet that clustered near it. Down the road that wound through the trees towards it passed labourers going homeward from their work, with cheerful guttural cries to each other and a herd of cows sauntered by with bells melodiously chiming, taking leisurely mouthfuls from the herbage of the wayside. In the village, lying low in the clear dusk, scattered lights began to appear, the smoke of evening fires to ascend, and the aromatic odour of the burning wood strayed towards them up the wind.