“That’s too much for me! I can’t solve the problem. Probably because they were so much in love with each other.”
“True—I suppose.”
“But I’m sorry for the old man. I shouldn’t be a bit surprised if the grief killed him.”
“Poor fellow!”
“And the unfortunate scandal—”
During the time conversation like this was common in the little village, Carl and his beautiful young aunt, had met in Pesth. While their carriage was on the way to the hotel, another carriage started from there.
“Oh!” screamed Madame Anna, in terror.
“I hope he’ll lose his eyesight,” thought Carl von Csornay to himself, throwing a hasty glance in the direction of the other carriage. They both wrapped themselves up in their cloaks as well as they could. The man who saw them was a merchant from their home town.
“He did not recognize us,” declared Carl reassuringly, when they entered their room in the hotel. “If he had, he would have spoken to us.”
“Thank heaven for that!”
“Now you belong to me, Anna,—wholly—wholly! To me belong the beautiful brown hair, the red, sweet lips, the glowing, black eyes, the proud, swan-like neck—”
“Yes—yes—I belong to you Carl!”
And they were happy—for a little while. But the love of the senses is an intoxication from which one
