"My sudden arrival does not appear to surprise you. Perhaps you know why
I am come!"

"Yes father, I imagine why!"

"That is well; then we need waste no time with explanatory words. You
have learned that your mother still lives, she has seen you and spoken
with you. I know that already. When did you see her first?"

"Five days ago."

"And have you seen her daily since then?"

"Yes, at the Burgsdorf fish pond?"

Questions and answers were alike short and precise. Hartmut was
accustomed to the abrupt, military manner of his father, for in all his
intercourse with him, no superfluous word, no hesitancy or evasion of an
answer, was permitted.

To-day Falkenried was especially abrupt, in order that he might conceal
his intense excitement from his son's unpracticed eye. But Hartmut saw
only the earnest, unmoved countenance, and heard only the cold, severe
accents as his father continued:

"I have nothing for which to reprove you, for in this matter I have
given you no commands and no word has ever been spoken on the subject
between us. But now I am forced to break the silence. You have always
believed your mother dead, and I have tacitly encouraged this belief,