"Well," replied Mr. Schmenckel, "perhaps it is not so very little I know about her. When one has had somebody thirteen years in the company----" "But I have met the gypsy only this summer at--never mind, not very far from here, and quite alone." "That may very well be," replied the cunning director; "it is not the first time to-night that Xenobia has run away, but she has always come back again." "Thirteen years!" said Oswald, who did not think for a moment of doubting the fable; "how old was the child, then, when she came to join you?" "How old?" said Mr. Schmenckel. "Why, your excellency, when she came to us, she had no child. I know that, as a matter of course, ha, ha, ha!" "You?" said Oswald, and he shuddered. "You?" "Well! why not? Do I look to your excellency's eye as if a pretty young woman could not possibly fall in love with me; and did not this girl, moreover, take wages from me? I can tell your excellency that I have made very different conquests in my time. Has your excellency ever been in St. Petersburg? There is the Princess--but, after all, I am not at liberty to speak as freely of such a great lady as----" "In one word," said Oswald, scarcely able to restrain himself, "the Czika is your child?" "I couldn't swear to that," said Mr. Schmenckel, smiling, "but I can take my oath that she might be my child, and that I have always looked upon her in that light." "And you think the gypsy will come back again?" "Oh, your excellency may rely upon that; she is never as well off as when she stays with me." "But why does she run away so often, then?" "Yes, just think of it, your excellency; women are a strange kind of people," said Mr. Schmenckel, philosophizing, "and the kinder you are to them, the sooner they will play you some trick or other. There is no truth and no faith among them, and especially these gypsies----" "Very well," said Oswald, who was overcome with disgust, "we will talk about that some other time." And he went away quickly. Director Schmenckel followed him with his eye for awhile, shook his head, put the dollar, which he was still holding in his hand, in his pocket, laughed and returned into the public room, feeling very happy in the pleasant conviction that he had cheated a greenhorn. Within peace had in the meantime recovered its sway, and the whole company had joined in singing the favorite ballad: "Blue blooms a blossom."