“You could shoot off a cannon, bum! bum!  Outside her window, and she wouldn’t wake up,” she said.  Then holding out a newspaper, she asked whether the gentlemen had heard of the sinking of the Roland and the few survivors.  When Willy, with his dilating nostrils and his characteristic half-serious, half-comic expression, introduced Frederick as one of those survivors, she burst into a noisy laugh, which vastly amused two of the three Silesians.  When convinced that Willy was not teasing, she stared at Frederick speechlessly, burst into tears, and kissed his hands.  Then she ran out.

Soon after, Lobkowitz entered, a tall, quiet man.  He had heard of Frederick’s recent experience, and greeted him with simple cordiality.

“Ritter has just come in his cart,” he said.

They looked out of the window.  Frederick saw an elegant two-wheeled dog-cart with a handsome coachman in black livery preparing to drive off, while a thoroughbred grey, feeling the tightening of the reins, was rearing and plunging in the shafts.

“The coachman,” said Willy, whose lack of reserve and extreme indiscretion his friends accepted good-naturedly, “is a ruined officer of the Austrian army.  He ran away from his gambling debts.  I don’t know whether he got out of the army or was put out.  At any rate he is of invaluable service to Ritter.  He tells him to the dot how he must dress for luncheons and dinners, for tennis and golf and riding and driving; how to manage a four-in-hand, when to wear a black chimney-pot or a grey one, what colour gloves to wear, what sort of necktie, what sort of cuff links, what sort of stockings.  In short, he tells him all the things a man has to pay attention to in order to succeed here in high life.”

At this point Bonifacius Ritter, whom fortune had favoured in America beyond his most extravagant expectations, now entered, young, brisk, handsome, amiable as Alcibiades.  Frederick was instantly carried away by his manner, radiating bonhomie, naivete, joy in life, and simple heartiness.  The atmosphere of the New World had imparted ease and fire to the flabby amiability of the Austrian.

Dinner was served, and over genuine Italian soup, conversation was soon in full swing.  Willy Snyders, as commissary, poured the wine.  It was evident how proud he was of Bonifacius Ritter and what satisfaction it gave him to present his quondam teacher to such friends and such a home in this foreign land.  The company thawed; and by the time the maid in white cap and apron had finished serving, the four had all touched glasses with Frederick on his and his protegee’s rescue.  A short pause of embarrassment followed, which Frederick interpreted as a demand for a statement regarding himself.  His pale scholarly face still showed deep traces of the hardships he had undergone.

“I came over,” he said, “to continue some studies with a friend which he and I began years ago.  You know him, Willy.  He is Peter Schmidt, the physician, in Springfield, Massachusetts.”