After considerable hesitation, Hildegard had the day before yesterday communicated to him her suspicions that no one but Bertram was standing in the way of the alliance upon which she had set her heart. She wisely refrained from mentioning the impure source from which she had drawn her suspicions--though it was not of a suspicion that she spoke to her husband, but of a fact. Poor Otto naturally had to express the utmost horror, though at heart he was anything but dissatisfied. He would certainly have liked Erna to have a younger husband, but he himself loved and admired the friend of his youth sincerely, and if Erna loved him in her own way, why she had always had a taste of her own; he had never comprehended her; she would herself know best how it stood with her heart; and then if Bertram, as friend, would gladly have helped him, as son-in-law he would very surely have done so, and in that case, he too would get over the shrinking which he felt now. But it was not to be. Hildegard would never sanction it, and yet, how strange, just as he was returning to the house after seeing the Baron off, here was Hildegard coming to explain that she had been absolutely mistaken about Bertram, that Bertram was completely innocent, that she had to crave his forgiveness for much, and that she would be truly disconsolate if Bertram were to go away after all, as she concluded from some hints of Konski's. Would Otto please go up to him at once and make sure of his staying? She would do so herself, but she really had not a moment to spare, for, he could judge for himself, the Princess did not leave her alone for a minute.