Ulrich blanched. "I hope," he said, pronouncing his words with difficulty, "that you don't mean what you say. I offer to sacrifice for you my goal, my ambition, all that I strive and live for, and you give me an answer which is an insult to me and our friendship. I am not sure now whether to treat you as a sick man or a stranger." There was a silence. Leo had risen and stood motionless, with his fists resting on the table. The feeling of impotence and vacillation which so often overcame him was at this moment a positive physical martyrdom. Softer sentiments welled up within him; but all expression of tenderness was repressed by the stern necessity of deceiving his friend, a course to which he was eternally committed. To yield a jot would be half a confession. "You take everything too tragically," he said in a jocular tone. "Idleness doesn't suit me, that is all. I, who am used to all sorts of escapades and a life of adventure and movement, am simply bored now, and can't help it. Inactivity makes my blood sluggish and gives me horrid thoughts. Wait till the spring and I shall be myself again." He grasped Ulrich's hand timidly, and received in return a long and searching pressure. It was as if Ulrich felt to his finger-tips the unaccountable change in his friend. They began to speak of general topics--of agriculture and political affairs. But Leo could not recover his equilibrium. His conversation was a mixture. One moment it lacked confidence, the next it showed an excess of zeal. Cynical jokes alternated with dull platitudes, and Ulrich was more and more perplexed. They parted--Leo with a sensation of relief that the interview had come to an end, Ulrich sad and depressed. He recognised with sorrow that this friendship, which as long as he could remember had been part of his being, which had survived triumphantly Leo's four years of absence and his own marriage with Rhaden's beautiful widow, was now in danger of being dissolved. The future filled him with fears. But he did not dream that on the threshold of his home there awaited him a blow so unexpected and so terrible that it would drive all the gloomy impressions of to-day from his mind. When he arrived at Uhlenfelde he found Felicitas lying on the floor in hysterics, with old Minna tending her, amidst wailing and lamentations. Half an hour before a telegram had come for him from Wiesbaden, and had been opened by his wife. It ran-- "Your son Paul is seriously ill, owing to an unfortunate accident for which the school authorities are in no wise to blame. He ran away on Christmas Eve; probably homesick. Was found to-day in a neighbouring village, where he was being cared for. High fever; and doctor earnestly requests you will come immediately." XXXIII The sad news reached Leo in a note which Ulrich despatched the same night from the station at Münsterberg.