Chapter V.


When Toni had arisen from her bed of pain she found the place which
she and her husband had been seeking for months with surprising
rapidity. The "Hotel Germania," the most reputable hotel in the
county-seat itself was for rent. Its owner had recently died. It was
palatial compared to her father's inn. There were fifteen rooms for
guests, a tap-room, a wine-room, a grocery-shop and a livery-stable.

Weigand, intimidated by misfortune, had never even hoped to aspire to
such heights of splendour. Even now he could only grasp the measure of
his happiness by calculating enormous profits. And he did this with
peculiar delight. For, since the business was to be run in the name of
Toni's father, his own creditors could not touch him.

When they had moved in and the business began to be straightened out,
Weigand proved himself in flat contradiction of his slack and careless
character, a tough and circumspect man of business. He knew the
whereabouts of every penny and was not inclined to permit his wife to
make random inroads upon his takings.

Toni, who had expected to be undisputed mistress of the safe saw
herself cheated of her dearest hopes, for the time approached when the
savings made on the purchase of her furniture must necessarily be
exhausted.

And again she planned and wrestled through the long, warm nights while
her husband, whose inevitable proximity she bore calmly, snored with
the heaviness of many professional "treats."