“And what did you learn?”

“At first, only what we already knew, that Zalika had taken her son to Roumania.  You knew that her step-father, our cousin Wallmoden, had died some time before, and after her divorce from Falkenried she always lived with her mother.  From that time we heard nothing of her until she came to Germany to capture her son, but just before she came, as I learned, she inherited a large fortune by the death of her brother.”

“Her brother?  I never knew she had one.”

“Yes, he was ten years her senior, and on attaining his majority had become master of a large estate.  His mother’s second marriage was childless and he never married.  When he met with a sudden death while hunting, Zalika, being next of kin, fell heir to his large possessions.  As soon as she entered into possession, she began at once to plan how she could get her son.  You know that part of the story.  Then they passed a few years in a wild, erratic life upon her Roumania estate, and they fairly flung money away in their extravagance.  After that they became bankrupt, and mother and son went out into the world like gypsies.”

Wallmoden told all this in the same cold, contemptuous tone as that in which he had spoken to Hartmut and in Regine’s face, too, was a look of abhorrence for the wife and mother who had fulfilled so ill the duties of her station.  But she could not restrain the anxiety she felt for the son, as she asked: 

“And since then?  Have you heard nothing further?”

“Yes, on several occasions.  Once when I was with the embassy at Florence, I heard her name mentioned incidentally.  She was at Rome; then a year after that she was back in Paris again; and sometime later I heard that Frau Zalika Rojanow was dead.”

“So she is dead,” said Regine, softly.  “How did they live all these years?”

Wallmoden shrugged his shoulders.  “How do all adventurers live?  Perhaps they had saved something from the shipwreck, perhaps they hadn’t.  At any rate she was to be found in the saloons of Rome and Paris.  A woman like Zalika could always find assistance and protection.  As a Bojar’s daughter she had her title of nobility, and even the forced sale of her Roumanian estate, about which many knew, may have aided her to play her role.  Society opens its arms only too willingly to such as she, especially when they have talent, and that Zalika undoubtedly had.  By what means she lived is another question.”

“But Hartmut, upon whom she forced such a life, what of him?”

“He’s an adventurer.  What else could you expect?” said the ambassador in his curtest tone.  “He inherited her temperament, and his life with her has developed the dormant tendency.  Since his mother’s death, three years ago, I have heard nothing of him.”

“And why did you keep all this from me?” said Regine, reprovingly.

“I wanted to spare you all I could.  You had always given the boy too warm a place in your heart, and I thought it better to let you imagine him dead.  Have you ever told Falkenried any of your idle speculations concerning him?”