President Nordheim was seated in his office in the capital, in consultation with Herr Gersdorf, for the consignment of the railway to the stockholders was now decided upon. Nordheim's resolve to withdraw from the company after the completion of the undertaking was regretted, but caused no surprise, for the man's restless activity was well known, and it was natural that he should have new schemes wherewith to employ his capital. The glory was his of having devised and executed a bold project which had opened a new highway for the world.

The engineer-in-chief had promised that all building operations should be concluded before the beginning of winter, and as soon as they were finished the transfer was to be made. It would then be the business of the new management to effect the final preparations for the opening of the road, which was to take place the ensuing spring. All this had been settled for months, and Gersdorf, in his capacity of legal representative of the railway company, had had many consultations with the president.

"The engineer-in-chief does in fact achieve almost the impossible," he said, "but yet I cannot understand how he can have all finished by the end of October. The month has begun, and four weeks seems a very short time for the completion of what remains to be done."

"If Wolfgang has said the work shall be done, he will keep his word," Nordheim rejoined, in a tone of calm conviction. "In such cases he spares neither himself nor his subordinates, and in this instance he is also driven by necessity. November brings the snowstorms which are most dangerous in the Wolkenstein district; it is very important to have the work finished."

"Hitherto autumn has brought us only late summer weather," the lawyer observed, as he gathered together some papers scattered on the table. "I cannot wonder that your daughter lingers in the mountains and seems to have no idea of returning."

"She, with Frau von Lasberg, will probably remain there for some weeks yet. The mountain-air has worked miracles for Alice; she is almost entirely well, and Dr. Reinsfeld advises her to extend her stay until the weather changes. I owe a debt of gratitude to your cousin, and I greatly regret that he is to leave Oberstein. I hear he has another medical position in prospect in--what is the name of the place?"

"Neuenfeld."

"Right,--Neuenfeld. The name had escaped me. I cannot wonder at the young physician for desiring a wider sphere of action; but, as I said, we all regret that he is going so far away. Wolfgang in especial will miss him much."

The words sounded kindly, as though the president were really grateful to his daughter's physician and regretted losing him. Gersdorf, who had no reason to suspect his sincerity, was quite impressed.

"Benno writes me that he shall not leave for his new post before the end of a couple of weeks," he said. "He stipulated for this delay that he might install his successor at Oberstein. Therefore we shall have an opportunity of seeing each other again, for I must go to Heilborn next week. The suit of the parishes of Oberstein and Unterstein against the railway for damage done to their forests in its construction is to be decided, and I represent the company of course."

"Then we shall meet there," said Nordheim. "I am going to take a short holiday, and then return to town with my family. I have been overweighted with business of late, and am sadly in need of rest. I shall hope to see you at our villa; you will not forgot to come?"

"Certainly not," said Gersdorf, rising to take leave.

When he had gone the president rang for lights, for it was growing dark, and then, seating himself at his writing-table, he became absorbed in the papers lying there,--they must have been of a very important nature, for he examined them with the greatest care, his face expressing intense satisfaction as he did so, until it finally broke into a smile.

"Everything arranged," he murmured. "It will be a brilliant transaction. The figures are rather boldly combined, it is true, but they will do their duty, and as soon as Wolfgang has approved them, and affixed his name to the entire estimate, it will be accepted without demur. And that man Reinsfeld is fortunately disposed of. I thought he could not refuse the bait of such a position. Neuenfeld is far enough away, and he can live there comfortably to the end of his days.--What is it? I do not wish to be disturbed again this evening."

The last words were spoken to a servant who entered at the moment, and who now announced, "Herr Elmhorst has arrived."

"The engineer-in-chief?" Nordheim asked, surprised.

"Arrived a moment ago, Herr President."

Nordheim rose quickly, and was about to go to meet the new-comer, but Wolfgang appeared at that moment on the threshold in his travelling-dress.

"Have I startled you, sir, by my unexpected arrival?" he asked.

"Rather; you sent me no telegram," the president replied, motioning to the servant to withdraw. As soon as the door closed behind him he asked, hastily, and evidently disturbed, "What has happened? Anything the matter with the railway?"

"No; I left everything in perfect order."

"And Alice is well, I hope?" This last question was far more composedly put than had been its predecessor.

"Quite well; you have no cause for anxiety."

"Thank heaven! I was afraid something unfortunate had occurred to account for your sudden appearance. What brings you here so unexpectedly?"

"A matter of business, which I could not explain in writing," said Wolfgang, laying aside his hat. "I preferred to see you personally, although I could ill be spared from the railway."

"Well, then, let us talk over your business," replied the president, who was always ready to discuss affairs. "We shall be entirely undisturbed this evening. But first take some rest. I will give orders to have your rooms----"

"Thank you, sir," Elmhorst interrupted him, "but I should like to have the business that has brought me here settled at once; it is urgent,--at least for me. We are quite alone here?"

"We are; I generally insure myself privacy in my own apartments. But for security's sake you can close the door of the next room also."

Wolfgang complied, and then returned. As he advanced into the circle of light from the lamp his face looked pale and agitated. His pallor could hardly be the effect of fatigue from the long, unbroken ride; there was a frown on his brow, and his dark eyes had a stern, almost menacing expression.

"Your business must be important," the president observed, as he sat down, "or you would hardly have come yourself. Well, then.--But will you not be seated?"

The young man paid no heed to the request, but remained standing, with his hand resting on the back of a chair, as he began, in an apparently calm tone, "You sent me over the estimates and calculations which are to serve as the basis of the transfer of the railway to the stockholders."

"I did. You remember I told you that I would spare you the details of these calculations. You have enough to do in attending to the technical conduct of the work. All you have to do is to look over and approve the estimates, your word as engineer-in-chief being decisive."

"I am aware of that,--entirely aware of my responsibility in the matter, and therefore I wish to put a question to you: Who made these estimates?"

Nordheim glanced in surprise at his future son-in-law; the question evidently astonished him.

"Who? Why, my clerks and those who understand such matters."

"That is not what I mean, sir. They simply made up the figures from the memoranda and calculations furnished them. What I want to know is, whose were those memoranda?--who put down the sums which are the basis of the estimates? It cannot possibly have been yourself."

"Indeed? And why not, may I ask?"

"Because all the accounts are falsified!" Wolfgang said, coldly but very decidedly.

"Falsified? What do you mean?"

"Is it possible that it escaped you?" Elmhorst asked, never taking his eyes from the president. "I discovered it at a glance. All the buildings are estimated at almost double the cost of their erection, and stations are brought into the calculations which do not exist. The obstacles and catastrophes that impeded us are reckoned up in an incredible fashion, as causing an outlay of hundreds of thousands where not half the amount was expended. In short, the whole sum exceeds by some millions the actual cost of the undertaking."

Nordheim listened in silence, but with a frown, to this agitated explanation, by which, however, he seemed more surprised than offended; at last he said, coldly, "Wolfgang, I really do not understand you."

"Nor did I understand your letter requiring me to approve and sign that estimate. I thought, and I still think, that there is some mistake, and I wanted to ask you personally about it. I trust you can explain it to me."

The president shrugged his shoulders, but maintained the same cool, composed tone, as he replied, "You are a capital engineer, Wolfgang, but that you have no talent for business is quite clear. I hoped we should understand each other in this matter without many words, but, since that does not seem to be the case, we must come to an explanation. Do you suppose that I intend to withdraw from this undertaking with loss?"

"With loss? In any case you receive back your capital with interest."

"A transaction that brings in no more than that is to be reckoned as a losing one," said Nordheim. "I did not imagine you such a novice in business matters as to require to be told this. We have here a chance to make a profit,--a considerable profit. The railway, in fact, belongs to me. I called it into existence, my capital has been principally expended in its construction, the entire risk has been mine. I venture to think that you will not dispute my right to dispose of my property at any price I think fit."

"If that price is to be gained only by the means you have adopted, I do most decidedly dispute the right you speak of. Should the company receive the railway under such conditions, its bankruptcy will be certain. Even if the road be employed to the fullest extent it cannot bring in a sufficient income to indemnify it approximately for the amount of loss sustained; the entire enterprise must either go to ruin, or fall into the hands of some unprincipled schemer."

"And how does that concern us?" Nordheim asked, calmly.

"How does it concern us?" Elmhorst broke forth, indignantly. "To have the work which you devised, to which I have devoted my best energies, at the head of which stand our united names, go miserably to ruin or be an instrument in the hands of swindlers? It concerns me deeply, as I trust I shall be able to show you."

The president arose with an impatient wave of his hand: "Pray spare me such bursts of declamation, Wolfgang. They really are out of place in a business discussion."

The young man drew himself up; all emotion vanished from his face, giving place to an expression of cool contempt, and his voice was every whit as cold as the president's own as he replied, "I shall not content myself with mere declamation, as you will find, sir. Let me ask once for all, calmly and briefly, who furnished the figures upon which the estimates you sent me are based?"

"I, myself," was the quiet reply.

"And you expected me to approve them and put my name to them?"

"I expect every thing of my future son-in-law," Nordheim declared, with sharp emphasis.

"Then you have misunderstood me. I cannot sign the estimates."

"Wolfgang!" There was an evident menace in Nordheim's tone.

"I will not sign them, I say. I never will lend my name to a falsehood."

"You dare to use such language to me?" the president exclaimed, angrily.

"What other language could be used if I should sanction estimates which I know to be false?" Wolfgang asked, with bitterness. "I am the engineer-in-chief, my word is decisive for the company and for the stockholders, who are utterly ignorant in the matter. The responsibility is mine alone."

"Your word could never be questioned," Nordheim interposed. "I had no idea you were such a martinet. You know nothing of business, or you would see that I, in my position, could not possibly venture what I do were there any danger. The figures are so combined that it is impossible to prove an--error from them, and I have explanations prepared for every emergency. No one can blame either you or myself."

At this assertion a smile of infinite scorn hovered upon Elmhorst's lips: "That was certainly the last thing to occur to me! We do indeed misunderstand each other. You fear discovery, I fear the fraud. In short, I will have nothing to do with a lie, and if I refuse my signature it cannot be told."

The president walked close up to him; he was now much agitated, and his voice betrayed extreme irritation: "Your expressions are, to say the least, strong. Do you suppose you can dictate to me? Have a care, Wolfgang. You are not yet my son-in-law; the knot is not yet tied which was to link you to me. I can cut it at the last moment, and you are too clever not to know all that you would lose with my daughter's hand."

"That means that you make it a condition?"

"Yes,--your signature! Either that--or----!"

As Nordheim spoke thus explicitly, Wolfgang's eyes were fixed gloomily on the ground. He pondered all the consequences of the president's 'Either that--or----!' he was indeed 'clever enough' to know that millions would be lost to him with his betrothed,--the wealth, the brilliant future for which he had bartered his happiness. The moment had come in which he was required to barter something more, and suddenly memory recalled that hour on the Wolkenstein in the moonlit midsummer night when this moment had been sadly foretold him: 'The price now is your freedom; in future it may perhaps be your honour!'

Nordheim interpreted the young man's silence after his own fashion; he laid his hand on Wolfgang's shoulder, and said, in a gentler tone, "Be reasonable, Elmhorst. We should both lose by a separation, and it is the last thing that I desire; but I can and must require my son-in-law to go hand in hand with me, and to make my interests his own. You give me your signature, and I will go surety for everything else. We will both forget this conversation, and divide the profit, which will make you a wealthy, independent man."

"At the price of my honour!" Wolfgang exclaimed, in hot indignation. "No, by heaven, it shall never come to that! I ought to have known long ago whither your rule of life, your business principles, would lead, for since my betrothal to your daughter you have thrown off all reserve; but I chose to see and to know nothing, because I was fool enough to imagine that, in spite of it all, I could pursue my own path and do as I chose. Now I see that there is no halting in the downward course, that he who leagues himself with you cannot keep his honour unstained. I have been ambitious and reckless--yes. I reckoned upon our association in this undertaking as you did, and conceded more to it than my conscience could entirely justify, but I never will stoop to deceive. If you believed me ready to be a scoundrel for the sake of your wealth,--if the future of which I have dreamed is to be purchased only at such a price,--let it go. I will have none of it!"

He stood erect, and with flashing eyes hurled his refusal at the president. There was something grand and overwhelming in this stormy outbreak from the man who thus at last threw off all the fetters of petty self-interest which had held him bound so long, whose better nature asserted itself and trampled down the alluring temptation. He knew that he was resigning the wealth which would make him independent of Nordheim's favour; that with it he should be free and unfettered to realize all his golden dreams of the future. There had been an instant of hesitation, and then he thrust the tempter from him and redeemed his honour!

The president stood frowning darkly. He perceived now that he had been mistaken in supposing that he should find in the ambitious young engineer a willing instrument, a nature as unscrupulous as his own, but he had no mind to break entirely with the son-in-law he had chosen. He would lose most by the separation; in the first place, all the profit which Wolfgang's signature would insure him would be destroyed, and moreover, he said to himself, it would be dangerous to make an enemy of one so thoroughly acquainted with his schemes. It could not be; a breach must be avoided, at least for the present.

"Let us drop this matter for to-day," he said, slowly. "It is too important, and we are neither of us in a mood to discuss it calmly. I am going to my mountain-villa in a week, and until then you can take the affair into consideration. I will not accept your present hasty decision."

"You will be obliged to accept it at the end of the week," Wolfgang declared. "My answer will be precisely the same then. Let a true estimate be made of the cost of the railway, at its highest valuation, and I will not refuse to give it my sanction. I never will sign my name to the present one. That is my final word. Farewell!"

"You are going back immediately?" Nordheim asked.

"Certainly; the next express leaves in an hour, and the business that brought me here is concluded. My presence is indispensable at my post."

He bowed and took his leave, not after the familiar fashion of the future son-in-law, but formally, as a stranger, and the president felt the significance of his manner.

When Elmhorst reached the spacious vestibule he found there two servants awaiting him. His rooms had been prepared for him, and the lackeys asked for further orders, but he waved them aside: "Thanks, I am going directly back again, and shall not use the rooms."

The men looked surprised. This was indeed a hurried visit. Would not Herr Elmhorst have the carriage to drive to the station?

"No; I prefer to walk." As he spoke, Elmhorst once more glanced towards the broad staircase leading to the gorgeous apartments in the upper story, and then he left the house where for more than six months he had been regarded as a son, and upon which he was now turning his back forever.

Outside, the October evening was cold and damp; the skies were starless, the air was full of mist, and a keen blast heralded the approach of winter. Involuntarily Wolfgang drew his travelling-cloak closer about his shoulders, as he strode forward at a rapid pace.

It was over! He was perfectly aware of it, and he also clearly perceived Nordheim's desire to avoid a sudden breach for fear lest the man so lately his confidant should expose him by way of revenge. A contemptuous smile curled the young man's lip. Such a fear was quite superfluous; any such act was entirely beneath him. His thoughts wandered to where they had rarely been of late,--to his betrothed. Alice would not suffer if the betrothal were dissolved. She had accepted his suit without opposition in compliance with her father's wish, and she would bend to his will with the same docility should he sever the tie. There had never been any talk of love between them; neither would be conscious of loss.

Wolfgang drew a deep breath. He was free again, free to choose; he could pursue his proud, lonely path, dependent only upon his own courage and capacity, but the voice which had roused him from the stupor of egotism and ambition would never again sound in his ears, the lovely face would never again smile upon him. That prize belonged to another, and, whatever he might achieve in the future, his happiness had been bartered away,--lost forever.