Page:Saxe Holm's Stories, Series Two.djvu/272

262 They were right! God rest their souls! They died within one week of each other, in less than a year from the day of Ally's marriage.

Mrs. Allen died first. The Dominie died apparently of the same disease, but we who knew, knew that he died of her death.

Our first Christmas day was spent in Vienna. We lodged there with a queer old Professor whom Jim had met on a trip in the Austrian Tyrol. He was not poor, but spent all his money in making botanical and geological collections, to the displeasure of his wife, who had at last resolved to take lodgers as an offset for her husband's scientific extravagances.

"He will us ruin, mine Franz," she said, shrugging her shoulders. "He will, to sell the clothes off his back for one small stone; and it is not that one can eat and drink from stones!" But for all that Frau Scherkle was very fond of her Professor, and told us always when he was asked to dine at great houses, "because that he so much do know, they do not care for his so shabby coat."

As we were sitting at dinner on Christmas day, Professor Franz burst into the room unannounced, in a state of great excitement.

"Come, come all," he exclaimed. "Come this minute to the Museum. There are stones from your country, like the stones the beautiful madame wears at her belt. They are unpacking the casket now. Come, come! The dinner is no matter."