The other seemed not exactly to relish this answer. "I am going to leave for home to-morrow," said he; "what word shall I carry to your mother from you?" "Ah, you live in our neighbourhood, do you?" blandly inquired the young hussar officer. At this the polygonal gentleman nearly lost command of himself, while Jenő tried to look as if his attention were elsewhere engaged. "What message, then, do you wish to send?" resumed Richard's interlocutor. "I kiss her hand," answered the young man briefly. "Ah, that commission I will execute with the greatest pleasure, in person," exclaimed the other, with effusive friendliness. "Oh, you needn't feel obliged to convey my respects in such a literal sense as that," returned Richard. "I was speaking figuratively." Jenő meanwhile had opened a conversation with the innocent-looking young lady near him; but he kept one eye on his brother, and as soon as he saw that the angular gentleman had departed, he took leave of the young lady and returned to Richard. "Well, now, you've put your foot in it this time!" he exclaimed. "How so?" asked the other, with much composure. "Didn't you know that man? It was Rideghváry." "Well, he might have been Meleghváry, for all I care." "But he is an intimate friend of the family, and you have often seen him at our house." "As if I could remember all the faces I saw in our house when I was a little boy, before I was sent away to the military academy. I didn't keep an album of them,--the Rideghvárys and all the other várys." Jenő tried to draw his brother aside where they would not be overheard. "You must know," said he, "that Rideghváry is a very influential man." "What is that to me?" asked the other, indifferently. "He is the administrator of our county." "Well, that is the county's affair, not mine." "And, still more, he is likely to be our stepfather." "That is our mother's affair." So saying, Richard turned his back on his brother, who wished to detain him, but the other shook him off. "Don't bother me with your Rideghváry. We didn't come here to see him. Go and court Alfonsine; there's no one with her now but the little secretary with the squeaky voice." The hussar officer danced for awhile and otherwise sought to amuse himself. Cards were never played at the Plankenhorst parties. Young ladies were there in plenty, and Richard enjoyed the reputation of a veritable Don Juan; but the very ease of his conquests destroyed their value in his eyes. A little maid-servant, however, who slapped him and ran away because he pinched her cheek, was something new. No man had ever defeated him in a duel, nor woman triumphed over him in a love affair. Entering the supper-room later with his brother, he saw the little maid-servant presiding over the lemonade, and he pointed her out to Jenő. "You bungler!" exclaimed the latter, under his breath; "you only fall from one blunder into another. She isn't a servant, but Miss Edith Liedenwall, a relative of the family."