Further resistance was useless. And the pulse was indeed galloping feverishly. Then she was asked to show her tongue. This she wouldn't do. "Grandmamma, please don't torment me," she begged, and flung her arms round her neck, bursting into tears. But grandmamma would not allow herself to be trifled with in such important matters. "Show me your tongue," she insisted. But the tongue was still not forthcoming. Then ensued a sharp tussle, in which Hertha was defeated. And this was how she was treated, and her heartache misunderstood. She was ordered to bed; and told she must perspire. XVI On the afternoon of the same day, Leo Sellenthin reined in his mare at the gateway of Uhlenfelde. The heraldic sword amidst the three wide-jawed fish pointed warningly down on him from the escutcheon of the Kletzingks above the entrance. As he wiped the sweat from his brow, a last faint "Turn back," breathed by the rustling leaves, fell on his ear. But he clenched his teeth, and rode on. To the left, on the same side as the stream, lay the house, a white slate-crowned bijou structure, resembling the country seat of a parvenu more than the ancestral castle of a doughty old feudal race. It had been built at her desire, for the former gray castellated pile had not found favour with the fair new mistress. Two female figures in marble, representing peace and hospitality, stretched out their shining arms in welcome to the stranger from the parapet of the ramparts, which were approached by a terraced drive. Groups of widespreading palms, overarched by the ragged plumes of a banana, filled the space made by the curve of the drive. The jagged, fan-like foliage stretched up to the marble figures, which in their snow-whiteness seemed like rare exotic blooms in this wilderness of green. Leo turned away from the house, for, according to the programme, he was not to meet Felicitas until he had seen Ulrich. The spacious courtyard stretched its huge length before his eyes. Ulrich, it would appear, had been building without a pause during the last few years, for more than half the offices and farm-buildings had been rebuilt. Where once the long white clay wall covered with stubbly thatch had stood, there was now a row of brand-new brick palaces, with iron bolts and locks, stone porches, and a system of covered drainage round about.