ot always be charging me with spite
and obstinacy," pouted the younger.

"But, my dear child, it is perfectly true--"

"Don't be always contradicting!" cried Mrs. Jenny, energetically,
stamping her foot and taking out her handkerchief, ready to cry at a
moment's notice. He knew this man[oe]uvre of old and drew his hand
hastily through his hair.

"Very well then, what am I to do about it?" he asked. "What do you want
of me?"

"Your advice, Arthur," groaned the mother-in-law.

"My advice? Well then--say yes."

"But he is so entirely without means, as I heard the other day,"
interposed Mrs. Baumhagen.

He shrugged his shoulders. "Bah! Gertrude can afford to marry a poor
man. Besides--I don't know much about Niendorf, but I should think
something might be made of it under good management. He seems to be the
man for the place, and Wolff was telling me the other day that Linden
was going to raise sheep on a large scale."

"That last bit of information of course settles the matter," remarked
Jenny, ironically.

"No, no," cried the mother, sobbing again, "you none of you take it
seriously enough. I cannot bring myself to consent, I have hardly
exchanged half a dozen words with this Linden. Oh, what unheard-of
presumption!" She rose from her chair, and crimson with excitement
threw herself on the lounge.

"Now look out for hysterics," whispered Arthur, indifferently, taking
out a cigar.

Jenny answered only by a look, but that was blighting. She took her
train in her hand and swept past her astonished husband.

"Take me with you," he said, gayly.

"Jenny, stay with me," cried her mother, "don't leave me now."

And the young wife turned back, met her husband at the door, and passed
him with her nose in the air to sit down beside her mother.

Oh, he had a long account to settle with her; she would have her
revenge yet for his disagreeable remarks at the breakfast-table when
she quite innocently praised Colonel von Brelow. He was not expecting
anything pleasant either; she could see that at once, but only let him
wait a little!

"How, mamma?" she inquired, "did you think I had anything to say to
Arthur? Bah! He is an Othello--a blind one--they are always the worst."

"Ah, Jenny, that unhappy child--Gertrude."

"Oh, yes, to be sure," assented the young wife, "that stupid nonsense
of Gertrude's--"

In the meantime the young girl was standing before her father's
picture, her whole being in a tumult between ha