I noticed, however, that he cast a
sudden, sharp glance at me, when I was presented to the company as
an American.
The man's neighborhood disturbed me. I was obliged to let the
conversation run in the channels already selected, and stupid
enough I found them. I was considering whether I should not give
a signal to my friend and withdraw, when the Baron stretched his
hand across the table for a bottle of Affenthaler, and I caught
sight of a massive gold ring on his middle finger. Instantly I
remembered the ring which "B. V. H." had given to Otto
Lindenschmidt, and I said to myself, "That is it!" The inference
followed like lightning that it was "Johann Helm" who sat beside
me, and not a Baron von Herisau!
That evening my friend and I had a long, absorbing conversation in
my room. I told him the whole story, which came back vividly to
memory, and learned, in return, that the reputed Baron was supposed
to be wealthy, that the old gentleman was a Bremen merchant or
banker, known to be rich, that neither was considered by those who
had met them to be particularly intelligent or refined, and that
the wooing of the daughter had already become so marked as to be a
general subject of gossip.
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