In a gossip over a can of wine he told of how the Count, although a married man, had been madame's lover for a long time, and that she had married Herr von Heydeck because it was the only way in which to avoid public scandal. And certainly all was not right between madame and the Count and Herr von Heydeck, for the latter's face would grow gloomier than ever when he chanced on his walks to meet his wife with Count Menotti. He avoided them as far as he could; accompanied by a guide only, he explored the loneliest parts of the country, and while madame was making merry with her guests he was collecting all kinds of herbs butterflies ugly worms, and even venomous snakes and vipers, which he would bring home to a room he had had arranged for himself in the castle. This wild life lasted for four weeks, and then every one departed,--leaving however a theme for gossip in Tausens during the whole ensuing winter. Nothing else was talked of in the inn parlour among the gentlemen, or in the common room among the peasants. The postmaster, a young fellow at the time, had to serve the gentlemen who came in the evening to drink their wine at the inn, and he heard all they had to say among themselves. Of all the gentlemen there was only one. Dr. Putzer, who had ever been to the castle while its possessors were there, and he had gone only because one of the ladies had been slightly ill and there was no other physician to be had. Herr von Heydeck had received him very politely, but madame had hardly looked at him, and so he hated her, and had all sorts of bad stories to tell of her. About a year had passed since the gay doings at the castle, when one day Dr. Putzer brought a piece of news to the gentlemen in the inn parlour that excited them greatly. He had just had a letter from his brother, an advocate in Vienna, and he read it aloud. The Vienna man wrote that madame had died in her confinement, and had left an immense fortune, not to her husband, but to her new-born child. Castle Reifenstein belonged to him now, and Herr von Heydeck was only his son's guardian. After the letter had been read, the gentlemen made many malicious remarks,--the worst came from Dr. Putzer, who in his tipsy mood boasted that if he were Herr von Heydeck he would tie a stone about the little bastard's neck and drown him like a kitten, but Herr von Heydeck had no _nous_. As he had shut his eyes for fear of his wife and Count Menotti, and taken no notice of what all the world knew, so now he would patiently acknowledge the Count's son, and live on as the brat's steward. About four days after this conversation Herr von Heydeck arrived at Tausens, this time accompanied by no brilliant company or numerous retinue. Only one servant sat beside the coachman on the box of the carriage inside of which was Herr von Heydeck and opposite him a woman with a child carefully wrapped in shawls and blankets; it was the nurse with his dead wife's child.