"Don't let's bother the Countess, Prince, her thoughts are wandering."
"I hope," he said, "that the Countess was not annoyed at having to come with us."
And he was distinctly taken aback when Imma Spoelmann answered casually: "To tell the truth, she very likely was."
"Oh, the sums? They're not so urgent, only a way of passing the time--although I hope to get a good lot of useful information out of them. But I don't mind telling you, Prince, that the Countess is not enthusiastic on the subject of yourself. She has expressed herself to that effect to me. She said you were hard and stern and affected her like a cold douche."
"I know well," he said quietly, looking down at his reins, "that I don't act as a cordial, Miss Spoelmann, or, at any rate, only at a distance.... That, too, is inseparable from my kind of existence, as I said. But I am not conscious of having shown myself hard and stern to the Countess."
"Probably not in words," she replied, "but you did not allow her to let herself go, you did not do her the kindness of letting her tongue run a little, that's why she's vexed with you--and I know quite well what you did, how you embarrassed the poor thing and gave her a cold douche--quite well," she repeated, and turned her head away.
Klaus Heinrich did not answer. He kept his left hand planted on his hip, and his eyes were tired. Then he said:
"You know quite well? So I act like a cold douche on you too, Miss Spoelmann, do I?"
"I warn you," she answered at once in her broken voice, and wagging her head from side to side, "on no account to overrate the effect you have upon me, Prince." And she suddenly set Fatma off at a gallop and flew at such a pace over the fields towards the dark mass of the distant pine-woods that neither the Countess nor Klaus Heinrich could keep up with her. Not till she reached the edge of the wood through which the high-road ran did she halt and turn her horse to look mockingly at her followers.
Countess Löwenjoul on her cream was the first to come up with the runaway. Then came Florian, foaming and much exhausted by his unusual exertion. They all laughed and their breath came fast as they entered the echoing wood. The Countess had awakened and chatted merrily, making lively, graceful gestures and showing her white teeth. She poked fun at Percival, whose temper had again been excited by the gallop, and who was careering wildly among the trunks in front of the horses.