“Ah, Captain!...  How much she loves you!...  Do not disappoint her; obey her in every respect....  She adores you.”

Frequently she returned from her trips in evident bad humor.  Ulysses surmised that she had been in Rome.  At other times she would appear very gay, with an ironic and tedious gayety.  “The mandolin-strummers appear to be coming to their senses.  Germany is constantly receiving more support from their ranks.  In Rome the ‘German propaganda’ is distributed among millions.”

One night emotion overcame her rugged sensibilities.  She had brought back from her trip a portrait which she pressed lovingly against her vast bosom before showing it.

“Look at it,” she said to the two.  “It is the hero whose name brings tears of enthusiasm to all Germans....  What an honor for our family!”

Pride made her hasty, snatching the photograph from Freya’s hand in order to pass it on to Ulysses.  He saw a naval official rather mature, surrounded by a numerous family.  Two children with long blonde hair were seated on his knees.  Five youngsters, chubby and tow-headed, appeared at his feet with crossed legs, lined up in the order of their ages.  Near his shoulder extended a double line of brawny young girls with coronal braids imitating the coiffures of empresses and grand duchesses....  Behind these, proudly erect, was his virtuous and prolific companion, aged by too continuous maternity.

Ferragut contemplated this patriotic warrior very deliberately.  He had the face of a kindly person with clear eyes and grayish, pointed beard.  He almost inspired a tender compassion by his overwhelming duties as a father.

Meanwhile the doctor’s voice was chanting the glories of her relative.

“A hero!...  Our gracious Kaiser has decorated him with the Iron Cross.  They have given him honorary citizenship in various capitals....  May God punish England!”

And she extolled this patriarch’s unheard-of exploit.  He was the commandant of the submarine that had torpedoed one of the greatest English transatlantic steamers.  Out of the twelve hundred passengers from New York more than eight hundred were drowned....  Women and children had gone down in the general destruction.

Freya, more quick-witted than the doctor, read Ulysses’ thoughts in his eyes....  He was now surveying with astonishment the photograph of this official surrounded with his biblical progeny, like a good-natured burgher.  And a man who appeared so complacent had committed such butchery without encountering any danger whatever!—­hidden in the water with his eye glued to the periscope, he had coldly ordered the sending of a torpedo against this floating and defenseless city?...

“Such is war,” said Freya.

“Of course it is war!” retorted the doctor as if offended at the propitiatory tone of her friend.  “And it is our right also.  They blockade us, and they wish our women and children to die of hunger, and so we kill theirs.”