The surroundings of Ault were very pretty.  Emerald-green meadows alternately with a few cornfields decked the gentle billowy uplands, which sloped away abruptly toward the sea.  Trees stood separately or in groups reaching to the edge of the cliff, over which many of them bent their storm-disheveled heads and gazed into the waves below.  Here and there were small inclosed woods, and it was at the edge of one of these, about a quarter of a mile walk from the town, that the countess seated herself on a mossy bank in the shade.  Wilhelm sat down beside her on the gnarled root of a tree; Anne was sent home, to return in two hours’ time, but Fido was allowed to remain.  He was a silvery-white sheepdog with a sharp muzzle, stiff little pointed ears, and a bushy tail curling tightly over his back.  He had attached himself to Wilhelm from the first moment, and gave vent to his delight when caressed by having a severe attack of asthmatic coughing, puffing and blowing.

“You live in Paris, do you not?” asked the countess after they had exchanged remarks on the scenery.

“No,” returned Wilhelm, “up till now I have lived in Berlin, but I had to leave for political reasons, and now I am a sort of vagrant without any actual home.”

“Ah—­a political refugee!” cried the countess.  “How charming!  Of course you will take up your abode in Paris now—­that is the sacred tradition with all political exiles.  Yes, yes—­you must; beside, how horrid it would have been to part after a few weeks and go our separate ways—­you to the right, I to the left—­and with only the consoling prospect of meeting again some day beyond the stars!  So you will come to Paris, and if you have any intention of getting up a revolution in Germany, I beg that you will count me among your confederates.  You need not laugh—­Paris is swarming with Spanish refugees of all parties, and I have had plenty of opportunity of gaining experience in the planning of conspiracies.”

“I have no such ambition,” answered Wilhelm, smiling, “and am, in any case, no politician, although I enjoy the distinction of being an exile.”

“Shall you take up any profession in Paris?  I have connections—­”

“You are very good, Madame la Comtesse.  You will perhaps think less of me, but I have no actual profession.”

“Think less of you.  On the contrary, to have no profession is to be free—­to be one’s own master.  Any one who is forced to earn his living must, of course, have a profession.  But it is never anything but a necessary evil.  It is only pedantic people who look upon it as an object of life.  At most, it is a means to an end.”

“And what do you consider to be the real object of life?”

“Can you ask?  Why, happiness of course!”

“Happiness—­certainly.  But then each one of us has a different conception of happiness.  To one it is knowledge, to another the fulfilling of duty, to lower natures wealth and worldly honors.  Therefore, it is possible to imagine that some one may find happiness in pursuing a profession.”