“Marietta, you are very rude,” said the young girl, highly incensed now.  In the same moment her friend had thrown her arms around her neck, and said coaxingly:  “Do not be angry, Toni.  I did not mean to be disagreeable, and do indeed rejoice in my heart if you are happy; only you see—­every one to his taste; my husband must be different from yours.”

“Well, what must he be, pray?” asked Toni, resentful yet, but mollified by her friend’s coaxing tone.

“In the first place he must be under my rule and not under his mother’s; second, he must be an honest, upright man, of whose protection I can feel assured—­that’s not inconsistent with petticoat government, so long as I do the governing.  He need not be much of a talker.  I’ll attend to that part myself.  But he must love me, love me better than father and mother or houses or lands, better than his threshing-machine, even—­I must be first in his thoughts, ever and always.”

Toni shrugged her shoulders contemptuously.  “You have very childish ideas at times, Marietta; but let us decide about the gowns.”

“Yes, we’d better do that at once, for your dearly beloved will come back soon and plant himself down like a sentinel between us.  He certainly has a talent for standing sentry.  Now as to this blue silk—­”

Even now the pros and cons of dress could not go on smoothly, for Frau von Eschenhagen opened the door at this moment, and called Toni to give her advice concerning some household matter.  Toni rose at once and left the room, but, instead of following her, her aunt remained and sank down in a chair by the window.  Frau von Eschenhagen wished to see for herself.  Will had not satisfied her; he had grown red and embarrassed when called upon to repeat the girlish gossip which had taken place between the two maidens, and his mother, who believed all this light chatter but a cloak for something worse, determined to take the matter into her own hands.

Marietta had risen respectfully at the entrance of the elder woman, whom she had met but once before, and whose inimical bearing toward herself she had not perceived in the joy of her first meeting again with her friends.  She only noticed that Toni’s future mother-in-law was not a cordial woman.  This morning Frau Regine looked her over from head to foot with a critical eye.  Marietta seemed to her like all other girls, but she was pretty, very pretty—­and that was bad.  She had short curly hair all over her head—­and that was worse.

There was no mistaking Frau Regine’s attitude toward the young singer, whom she now begun to question.  “You are a friend of my son’s betrothed, I believe?”

“Yes, my lady,” was the unconcerned reply.

“A friend since childhood, I understand.  You were brought up and educated by Dr Volkmar?”

“Yes, I lost my parents when I was very young.”

“So my brother-in-law was telling me.  And what was your father’s calling?”