A sleepy afternoon quiet broods over Erlach Court. Anastasia is sitting in the shade of an arbour, embroidering a strip of fine canvas with yellow sunflowers and red chrysanthemums. At a little distance the Baroness Meineck, who has volunteered to superintend Freddy's education during her stay at Erlach Court, is giving the boy a lesson in mathematics, making such stupendous demands upon his seven-year-old capacity that, ambitious and intelligent though the young student be, he is beginning to grow confused with his ineffectual attempts to follow the lofty flight of his teacher's intellect. Stella, with whom mental excitement is always combined with musical thirst, is all alone in the drawing-room, playing from the 'Kreisleriana.' Her fingers glide languidly over the keys. "A love-affair! What is the real meaning of a love-affair?" The question presents itself repeatedly to her mind, and her veins thrill with a mixture of curiosity, desire, and dread. Lacking all intimacy with girls of her own age or older than herself, who might have enlightened her on such points, she has the vaguest ideas as to much that goes on in the world. A love-affair is for her something connected with rope ladders and peril to life, like the interviews of Romeo and Juliet, something that she cannot fancy to herself without moonlight and a balcony. Her innocent curiosity flutters to and fro, spellbound, about the Baden-Baden episode in Rohritz's youth, as a butterfly flutters above a dull pool the pitiful muddiness of which is disguised by brilliant sunshine, the blue reflection of the skies, and a net-work of pale water-lilies.
She could not tear her thoughts from Baden-Baden, which she knew partly from Tourganief's 'Smoke,' partly in its present shorn condition from her own experience,--Baden-Baden, which when the Föhren and Rohritz were together there might have been described as a bit of Paradise rented to the devil.
"I wonder if she called him Edgar when they were alone?" the girl asked herself.
Her heart beat fast. It was as if she had by chance read a page of some forbidden book negligently left lying open. Not for the world would she have turned the leaf to read on, for, in common with every pure, young girl, when she approached the great mystery of love she was possessed by a sacred timidity almost amounting to awe.
"I wonder if he was very unhappy?" she asks herself. "Yes, he must have been;" Katrine had told her that he grew gray with suffering. A great wave of sympathy and pity wells up in her innocent heart. "Yes, she was very beautiful!" she says to herself.
She perfectly remembers her at the Giovanelli ball, leaning rather heavily on her partner's arm, her eyes half closed, her head inclined towards his shoulder, and again in a solitary little anteroom before a marble chimney-piece, below which a fire glowed and sparkled, lifting both hands to her head, an attitude that brought into strong relief the magnificent outline of her shoulders and bust. While thus busied with arranging her hair, she smiled over her shoulder at a young man who was leaning back in an arm-chair near, his legs crossed, holding his crush-hat in both hands, regarding her with languid looks of admiration.
This was Stella's friend, black-eyed Prince Zino Capito. All Venice was then talking of the Prince's adoration of the beautiful Livonian.
"What is it about her that makes every man fall in love with her?" Stella asks herself. And a sudden pang of something like envy assails her innocent heart. Ah, she would like just one taste of the wondrous poison of which all the poets sing. "Will any one ever be in love with me?" she asks herself. "Ah, it must be delicious,--delicious as music and the fragrance of flowers in spring; and I should so like to be happy for once in my life, even were it for only a single hour. But----" Her eyes fill with tears: what has she to do with happiness? it is not for her; of that she has been convinced from the moment when on that last melancholy journey with her father she found she had lost her little amulet. Poor papa! he would gladly have bestowed happiness upon her from heaven, and instead he had taken her happiness down with him into the grave. Poor, dear papa!
The breath of the roses outside steals in through the closed blinds, sweet and oppressive. Among the flowers below awakened to fresh beauty, the bees hum loudly, plunging into the honeysuckles, and gently as if with reverence touching the pale refined beauty of the Malmaison roses, while above the acacias and lindens they are swarming.
Rohritz has been occupied in writing his usual quarterly duty-letter to his married brother. As with all men of his stamp, a letter is for him a great undertaking, accomplished wearily from a strict sense of duty.
Seated at the writing-desk of carved rosewood bestowed upon him long since by an aunt and provided with many secret drawers and with all kinds of silver-gilt and ivory utensils of mysterious uselessness, he covers four pages of English writing-paper with his formal, regular handwriting, and then looks for his seal wherewith to seal his epistle. Rummaging in the various drawers and receptacles of the desk, he comes across a small bracelet,--a delicate circlet to which is suspended a crystal locket containing a four-leaved clover.
For a moment he cannot recall how he became possessed of the trifle. Could it have been the gift of some sentimental female friend? In vain he taxes his memory: no, it certainly is no memento of the kind. He swings it to and fro upon his finger, letting the sunshine play upon it, and then first perceives a cipher graven on the crystal, a Roman S, surmounting a star. Involuntarily he murmurs below his breath, "Stella!" and suddenly remembers where he found the bracelet,--on the red velvet seat of a first-class coupé, three years before, towards the end of April.
He had advertised it in the Viennese and Grätz newspapers, doing his best to restore theporte-bonheurto its owner, but in vain.
"In fact----" In an instant he recalls what Leskjewitsch had told him of Stella's sad journey with her father. He smiles, leaves his letter unsealed, goes to the window, looks down, into the garden, sees Stasy busy with her chrysanthemums, hears, proceeding from a garden-tent at a little distance, decorated with red tassels, the contralto tones of the Baroness Meineck and the depressed and weeping replies of her pupil.
Through the languid summer air glide the harsh, forced modulations of the 'Kreisleriana.'
"Ah!" He wends his way to the drawing-room. There, in the romantic half-light that prevails, all the blinds and shades being closed to shut out the hot July sun, he sees a light figure seated at the piano. At his entrance she turns her golden head.
"Are you looking for any one?" she asks, in the midst of No. 6 of the 'Kreisleriana,' rather confused by his entrance, and trying furtively to brush away the tears that still show upon her cheeks.
"Yes; I was looking for you, Baroness Stella."
"For me?" she asks, in surprise.
"Yes; I wanted to ask you something."
"Well?" She takes her hand from the keys and turns round towards him, without rising.
"Three years ago I found a bracelet in a railway-coupé. Coming across it by chance to-day, I perceive that it is marked with your cipher. Does it belong----"
But Stella does not allow him to finish; deadly pale, and trembling in every limb, she has sprung up and taken the bracelet from his hand.
"Oh, you cannot tell all you restore to me with this bracelet!" she exclaims, and in her inexpressible delight she holds out to him both her hands.
Are they so absorbed in each other as not to observe the apparition which presents itself for an instant at the drawing-room door, only to glide away immediately?
Meanwhile, in the garden a thrilling drama is being enacted. So thoroughly bewildered at last by the Baroness's system of instruction that his brain refuses to respond to even the small demands which her growing contempt for his capacity permits her to make upon it, poor Freddy feels so thoroughly ashamed of his inability that he lifts up his voice and weeps aloud. When his mother hastens to him to learn what has so distressed her son, he throws his arms around her waist and cries out, in a tone of heart-breaking despair, "Mamma, mamma, what will become of me? I am so stupid,--so very stupid!"
Katrine finds this beyond a jest. "I must entreat you not to trouble yourself further with my boy's education, if this is the only result you achieve, Lina," she says, provoked, whereupon the Baroness replies, angrily,--
"I certainly shall not insist upon continuing my lessons, especially as never in my life have I found any one so obtuse of comprehension in the simplest matters as your son."
"Ah, you insinuate that my boy is a blockhead. Let me assure you, however----"
In what mutual amenities the conversation of the sisters-in-law would have culminated must remain a subject of conjecture; for at this moment Stasy comes tripping along, saying, with an affected smile,--
"How wonderfully one can be mistaken as to character in others! Yes, yes, still waters--still waters. Ha! ha!"
"What do you mean with your still waters?" Katrine asks, contemptuously.
"Hush!" And Stasy archly lays her finger on her lip with a significant glance towards the boy, who with his arms still about his mother's waist is drying his tears upon her sleeve.
"Run into the house, Freddy, and bathe your eyes, and then we will take a walk," Katrine says to her little son. "What is the matter?" she then asks, coldly, turning to Stasy.
"Rohritz--aha!--we all thought him an extinct volcano. I, notoriously reserved as I am, permitted myself to tease him slightly now and then, thinking him entirely harmless. And now, now I find him in the yellow drawing-room,tête-à-têtewith Stella, both her hands in his, gazing into her lifted eyes, deep in a flirtation,--a flirtationà l'Américaine,--quite beyond what is permissible. Really perilous!"
"If you thought the situation perilous for Stella, I really do not understand why you did not interrupt thetête-à-tête," says Katrine, severely.
"It was no affair of mine," Stasy replies. "How was I to know that so sentimental an interview would not end in an offer of marriage? Improbable, to be sure, for Rohritz is too cautious for that,--even although he allows himself on a summer afternoon to be so far carried away as to kiss the hand of a pretty girl in atête-à-têtewith her."
Her eyes sparkling with anger, the Baroness hurries into the castle and up-stairs to the drawing-room.
"Stella, what are you about here? Have you nothing to do? Come with me!"
In terror Stella follows her mother as she strides on to their apartments. There the Baroness closes the door behind her, and, seizing her daughter by the arm, says,--
"Must I endure the disgrace of having my child conduct herself so shamelessly in a strange house that strangers inform me that she is flirtingà l'Américainewith young men?"
"I, mother! I----" exclaims Stella, her eyes riveted upon her mother's angry face. "But I assure you---- Mother, mother, how can you say such dreadful things to me?" And the girl bursts out sobbing. "It is Stasy that has accused me. How can you attach any importance to what she says?"
"No matter what Stasy says. Your conduct is extraordinary."
"But, mother, mother----"
"What have you to do withtête-à-têteswith young men?" the Baroness asks, with dramatic effect, the same Baroness who sent her child to a singing-teacher three times a week without an escort. "It is improper,--very improper. What must Rohritz think of you? You will come to be like your aunt Eugenie!"
It is not to be denied that Stella's behaviour is always unconventional and sometimes very thoughtless. On the whole, however, her little indiscretions do not detract from her great natural charm. The Baroness, not having taken any pains with her education, never of herself notices these little indiscretions. But if a stranger alludes to them her maternal ambition is profoundly outraged, and the inevitable result is the bursting of a thunder-storm above Stella's innocent head, a storm always sure to culminate in the fearful words, "You will come to be like your aunt Eugenie!"
The real meaning of these words Stella never understands, since no one has ever told her what has become of her aunt Eugenie, but she knows that their significance must be terrible. Cowed and unhappy, she glides about after every such explosion as if guilty of some crime, until her bright animal spirits gain the upper hand and she begins afresh to talk and to be thoughtless.
Her mother's last indignant remonstrance puts an end to all the kindly freedom of her intercourse with Rohritz. She avoids him so evidently, is so stiff and monosyllabic with him, that he at last questions the captain as to the cause of this change, and receives from his friend a distinct explanation.
"It is indeed no great bliss to be my sister's daughter," the captain concludes. "Beneath her mother's intermittent care Stella seems to me like a noble, sensitive horse beneath a very bad rider. I hate to look on at such cruelty to animals, and I should be heartily glad to find a good husband for her before her mother entirely ruins her. He will have to be a good, noble-hearted fellow, clever and gentle at once, with a firm, light hand, and plenty of money, for the child has nothing,--more's the pity."
The time never flies faster than in summer: with no hurry, but with graceful celerity, the lovely July days glide past in their rich robes of dark green and sky-blue. The genii of summer play about us, fling roses at our feet, and strew the grass with diamonds. They offer us happiness, show it to us, whisper insinuatingly, "Take it,--ah, take it." And some of us would gladly obey, but their hands are bound, and others, remember how they once, on just such enchanting summer days, stretched out their hands in eager longing for the roses, and at their touch the roses vanished, leaving only the thorns in their grasp, and they turn away with a mistrustful sigh. Others, again, examine the offered joy hesitatingly, critically, refuse to decide, linger and wait, and before they are aware the beneficent genii have vanished; autumnal blasts have driven them away with the roses and the foliage. The sun shines no longer, the skies are gray, and a cold wind sings a shrill song of scorn in their ears.
'Passing!--passing!' One week, two weeks have passed since the Meinecks arrived at Erlach Court. Each day Rohritz has found Stella more charming, each day he has paid her more attention, but his real intimacy with her has increased not one whit.
To-day is Freddy's birthday. Stella has presented him with a gorgeous paint-box; he has received all sorts of gifts and toys from his parents and relatives, and he has, of course, been more than usually petted and caressed by his father and mother. His delight is extreme when he learns that a picnic has been arranged for the day in his honour.
None of the older inmates of the castle take any special pleasure in picnics; least of all has Katrine any liking for these complicated undertakings. But Freddy adores them; and what would Katrine not do to give her darling a delight?
It is Sunday. A gentle wind murmurs melodiously through the dewy grass, and sighs among the thick foliage of the lindens like a dreamy echo of the sweet monotonous tolling of bells that comes from the gleaming white churches and chapels on the mountain-slopes on the other side of the Save. From the open windows of the dining-room can be seen across the low wall of the park the brown peasant-women, with pious, expressionless faces, and huge square white headkerchiefs knotted at the back of the neck, marching along the road to church. Above, in the dark-blue sky myriads of fleecy clouds are flying, and swarms of airy blue and yellow butterflies are fluttering about the Malmaison roses and over the beds of heliotrope and mignonette in front of the castle.
There has been rain during the previous night, but not much, and the whole earth seems decked in fresh and festal array. The sun shines bright and golden, but the barometer is falling,--a depressing fact which Baron Rohritz announces to all present at the birthday-breakfast.
Freddy's face grows long, and Katrine exclaims, hastily, "Your barometer is intolerable!" She has no idea of sacrificing her child's enjoyment to the whims of an impertinent barometer.
"Yes, Edgar, your barometer is a great bore," the captain remarks.
Whoever presumes to express an unpleasant or even inconvenient truth is sure to be regarded as a great bore.
Meanwhile, Katrine has stepped out upon the terrace and convinced herself that the weather is superb. Annihilating by a glance Rohritz and his warning, she orders the servant who has just brought in a plate of hot almond-cakes to have the horses harnessed immediately.
Rohritz placidly twirls his moustache, and remarks, as he rises from table, that he will strap up his mackintosh. A few minutes afterwards the carriages, a light-built drag and a solid landau, are announced. To the drag are harnessed a couple of fiery young nags, while in default of the carriage-horses, which have been ailing for a few days, the landau is drawn by a pair of hacks, by no means spirited or prepossessing in appearance.
The guests stand laughing and talking on the sweep before the castle. Katrine's voice is heard giving orders; Stella is busy helping the captain to pack away in the carriages the plentiful store of provisions.
Swathed in airy clouds of muslin, sweetly suffering, but resisting the united entreaties of all the rest that she will stay at home, Anastasia leans against the vine-wreathed balustrade of the terrace, a vinaigrette held to her nose.
Before Katrine has quite finished issuing her commands, the captain with Stella mounts upon the front seat of the drag, the general taking his place beside Freddy on the back seat. Want of room obliges the captain to act as driver himself. He gathers up the reins, and his steeds start off gaily. The rest of the company settle themselves as best they can in the landau, the Baroness and Fräulein von Gurlichingen on the back seat, Rohritz with Katrine opposite them. A few anxious moments ensue, in which every one asks the rest if they have not forgotten something. The servants bring the due quantity of rugs, plaids, umbrellas, and opera-glasses, and the coachman is bidden to drive off. The hacks sadly stretch out their long, skinny legs, and trot laboriously after the brisk drag.
In Reierstein, at the foot of a romantic ruin,--no picnic is conceivable without a ruin,--adéjeûner à la fourchetteis to be spread in the open air. Dinner, which has been postponed from six to seven, is to be taken in Erlachhof on the return of the party.
Katrine is right: the day is superb, a fact of which she frequently reminds the possessor of the odious barometer.
"Wait until evening before declaring the day fine," Rohritz rejoins, sententiously. "The sun's rays sting like harvest-flies: that is a bad sign."
"Oh, you are always foreboding evil," Katrine says, with irritation.
Rohritz bows, and silence ensues. Katrine looks preoccupied, wondering whether the mayonnaise has not been forgotten at the last moment. Stasy flourishes her vinaigrette languishingly, and the Baroness, who has been hitherto absorbed in her own reflections, suddenly arouses sufficiently to utter in her deepest tones an astounding observation upon the imperfections of creation and the superfluity of human existence, whereupon Rohritz agrees with her, seconding her views with great ability in a Schopenhauer duet in which she maintains the principal part. She asserts that marriage, since it is a means for the continuance of the human species, should be avoided by all respectable people, while Rohritz suggests the invention of a tremendous dynamite machine which shall shatter the entire globe, as a fitting problem for the wits of future engineers.
Meanwhile, the sunbeams gleam warm and golden upon the luxuriant July foliage, and tremble upon the clear ripples of the trout-stream plashing merrily along by the roadside. In the white cups of the wild vines that drape with tender grace the willows and elders on the banks of the little stream, prismatic drops of dew are shining. The tall grasses wave dreamily, and at their feet peep out pink, yellow, and blue wild flowers, while the air is filled with the melody of birds.
Our two pessimists, however, take no note whatever of these trifles.
The road grows stony and steep; the hacks drag along more and more wearily and at last come to a stand-still. Anastasia becomes greener and greener of hue, and sinks back half fainting. "Ah, I feel as if I should die!"
In hopes of lightening the carriage and of avoiding the sight of Fräulein von Gurlichingen's distress, Rohritz proposes to alight and pursue on foot the shorter path to Reierstein, with which he is familiar.
Meanwhile, the captain's spirited steeds have long since reached the appointed spot. Horses and carriage have been disposed of at the inn of a neighbouring village. It is an excellent hostelry, and would have been a very pleasant place in which to take lunch, but, since the delight of a picnic culminates, as is well known, in preparing hot, unappetizing viands at a smoky fire in the open air and in partaking of excellent cold dishes in the most uncomfortable position possible, the party immediately leave the village, and Stella, Freddy, and the two gentlemen, with the help of a peasant-lad hired for the purpose, drag out the provisions to the ruin, where the table is to be spread, in the shade of a romantic old oak.
Directly across the meadow flows the stream, now widened to a considerable breadth, which had rippled at intervals by the roadside.
While Leskjewitsch and the general, both resigned martyrs to picnic pleasure, set about collecting dry sticks for the fire, Freddy, who has instantly divined crabs in the brook, having first obtained his father's permission, pulls off his shoes and stockings and wades about among the stones and reeds in the water.
"You look, little one, as if you wanted to go crabbing too," says the captain to Stella, noting the longing looks which the girl is casting after the boy.
"Indeed I should like to," she replies, nodding gravely; "but would it be proper, uncle?"
"Whom need you regard?--me, or that old fellow," indicating over his shoulder the general, "who is half blind?"
Stella laughs merrily.
"I certainly should not mind him; but"--she colours a little--"suppose the rest were to come."
"Ah! you're thinking of Rohritz," says the captain. "Make your mind easy: if I know those steeds, it will take them one hour longer to drag the carriage up here, and by the time they arrive you can have caught thirty-six Laybrook crabs. As soon as I hear the carriage coming I will warn you by whistling our national hymn. So away with you to the water, only take care not to cut your feet."
A minute or two later, Stella, without gloves, the sleeves of her gray linen blouse rolled up above her elbows over her shapely white arms, and gathering up her skirts with her left hand, while with the right she feels for her prey, is wading in the sun-warmed water beside Freddy, moving with all the attractive awkwardness of a pretty young girl whose feet are cautiously seeking a resting-place among the sharp stones, and who, although extremely eager to capture a great many crabs, has a decided aversion to any spot that looks green and slimy.
The treacherous luck of all novices at any game is well known. Stella's success in her first essay at crabbing is marvellous. She goes on throwing more and more of the crawling, sprawling monsters into the basket which Freddy holds ready. Her hat prevented her from seeing clearly, so she has tossed it on the bank, and her hair, instead of being neatly knotted up, hangs in a mass of tangled gold at the back of her neck, nearly upon her shoulders, the sunbeams bringing out all sorts of glittering reflections in its coils. She is just waving a giant crustacean triumphantly on high, with, "Look, Freddy, did you ever see such a big one!" when the blood rushes to her cheeks, her brown eyes take on a tragic expression of dismay, and, utterly confused, she drops the crab and her skirts.
"Am I intruding?" asks the new arrival, Rohritz, smiling as he notices her confusion.
In her hurry to get out of the brook, she forgets to look where she is stepping, and suddenly an expression of pain appears in her face, and the water about her feet takes on a crimson tinge.
"You have cut your foot," Rohritz calls, seriously distressed, helping her to reach the shore, where she sits down on the stump of a tree. The captain and the general are both out of sight, and the blood runs faster and faster from a considerable cut in the girl's foot. "We must put a stop to that," says Rohritz, with anxiety that is almost paternal, as he dips his handkerchief in the brook. But with a deep blush Stella hides her foot beneath the hem of her dress, now, alas! soiled and muddy. "Be reasonable," he insists, adopting a sterner tone: "there should be no trifling with such things. Remember my gray hair: I might be your father." And he kneels down, takes her foot in his hands, and bandages the wound carefully and skilfully. In spite of his boasted gray hair, however, it must be confessed that he experiences odd sensations during this operation, the foot is so pretty, slender, but not bony, soft as a rose-leaf, and so small withal that it almost fits into the hollow of his hand.
Still more beautiful than her foot is her fair dishevelled head, so turned that he sees only a vague profile, just enough to show him how the blood has mounted to her temples, colouring cheek and neck crimson.
"Thanks!" she says, in a somewhat defiant tone, drawing the foot up beneath her dress after he has finished bandaging it. Then, looking at him with a lofty, rather mistrustful air, she asks, "How old are you, really?"
"Thirty-seven," he replies, so accustomed to her strange questions that they no longer surprise him.
"How could you say that you might be my father? You are at least five years too young!" she exclaims, angrily. "And why did you appear so suddenly?"
"I repent my intrusion with all my heart," Rohritz assures her. "The horses seemed so tired that I thought three people a sufficient burden for them, and so I alighted and came by the path across the fields."
At this moment shrill and clear across the meadow from the forest bordering it come the notes of 'God save our Emperor!' and immediately afterwards is heard the slow rumble of the approaching carriage.
"There, you see!" says Stella, still out of humour. "My uncle promised me to whistle that as soon as the carriage could be heard; but no one expected you on foot, and you came just twenty minutes too soon!"
All that the Baroness says when she hears of Stella's mishap is, "I cannot lose sight of you for an instant that you are not in some mischief!"
Stella only sighs, "Poor mamma!" while Stasy, still livid as to complexion, finds herself strong enough to glance with great significance first at Stella and then at Rohritz. When she hears that it is Rohritz that bandaged Stella's foot she vibrates between fainting and a fit of laughter. She calls Rohritz nothing but 'my dear surgeon,' accompanying the exquisite jest with a sly glance from time to time.
His enjoyment of this brilliant wit may be imagined.
The general grins; the Baroness looks angry; the captain and Katrine are the only ones who observe nothing of Rohritz's annoyance or Anastasia's jest; they are entirely absorbed in reproaching each other for the absence of the corkscrew, which has been forgotten.
Yet, in spite of the double mischance thus attending the beginning of thedéjeûner sur l'herbe, all turns out pleasantly enough. The general remembers that his pocket-knife is provided with a corkscrew; the married pair recover their serenity; the crabs, in spite of many obstacles, are half cooked at the fire, and--for Freddy's sake--pronounced excellent; the cold capon and thepâte de foie grasleave nothing to be desired; the mayonnaise has not been forgotten, and the champagne is capital.
Hilarity is so fully restored that when the carriages, ordered at five o'clock, make their appearance, the company is singing in unison 'Prince Eugene, that noble soldier,' to an exhilarating accompaniment played by the general with the back of a knife on a plate.
Baron Rohritz, who is not familiar with 'Prince Eugene,' and who consequently listens in silence to that inspiring song, glances critically at a small point of purple cloud creeping up from behind the mountains.
"My barometer----" he begins; but Katrine interrupts him irritably: "Ah, do spare us with your barometer!"
A foreign element suddenly mingles with the merry talk. A loud blast of wind howls through the mighty branches of the old oak, tearing away a handful of leaves to toss them as in scorn in the dismayed faces of the party; a tall champagne-bottle falls over, and breaks two glasses.
"It is late; we have far to go, and the hacks are scarcely trustworthy," the captain remarks. "I think we had better begin to pack up."
Preparations to return are made hurriedly. The general begs for a place in the landau, as his backbone is sorely in need of some support, and Freddy also, who is apt to catch cold, is taken into the carriage from the open conveyance.
No one expresses any anxiety with regard to Stella; she slips into her brown water-proof and is helped up upon the box of the drag, where the captain takes his place beside her, while Rohritz gets into the seat behind them. They set off. Once more the sun breaks forth from among the rapidly-darkening masses of clouds, but the air is heavy and in the distance there is a faint mutter of thunder.
Wonderful to relate, the hired steeds follow the sorrels with the most praiseworthy rapidity, due perhaps to the fact that the coachman makes the whip whistle uninterruptedly about their long ears. Katrine, who is sitting with her back to the horses, sees nothing of this, but rejoices to find the pace of the hacks so much improved. Suddenly Stasy in a panic exclaims, "Katrine!"
"What is the matter?"
"The driver--oh, look----"
Frau von Leskjewitsch turns, and sees the fat driver from the village swaying to and fro on his seat like a pendulum. The carriage bumps against a stone, the ladies scream, Freddy, who had fallen asleep between the Baroness and Anastasia, wakens and asks in a piteous voice what is the matter; the general springs up, tries to take the reins from the driver, and roars as loud as his old lungs will permit, "Leskjewitsch!"
The captain does not hear.
"Papa!" "Jack!" "Captain!" echo loud and shrill, until the captain, told by Rohritz to turn and look, gives the reins to his old comrade, jumps down from the drag, and runs to the assistance of his family. An angry scene ensues between him and the driver, who tries to withhold from him the reins,--is first violent, then maudlin, stammering in his peasant-patois asseverations of his entire sobriety, until the captain actually drags him down from the box and with a volley of abuse flings him into a ditch. Katrine is attacked by a cramp in the jaw from excitement. The Baroness ponders upon the etymological derivation of a word in the patois of the country which she has fished out of the captain's torrent of invective, and repeats it to herself in an undertone. The general folds his hands over his stomach with resignation, and sighs, "Dinner is ordered for seven o'clock." Freddy's blue eyes sparkle merrily in the general confusion, and Stasy, since there is positively no audience for her affectation, conducts herself in a perfectly sensible manner. In the midst of the excitement, one of the hacks deliberately lies down, and thus diverts the captain's attention from the driver.
"By Jove, our case is bad,--worse than might be supposed. These screws can scarcely stir," he exclaims: "that drunken scoundrel has beaten them half to death. How we are to get home God knows: these brutes cannot possibly drag this four-seated Noah's ark. We had better change horses. Ho! Rohritz?"
"What is the matter?"
"Unharness those horses!"
In a short time the exchange is effected. The sorrels in their gay trappings are harnessed to the heavy landau, the long-legged hacks to the drag.
It is beginning to rain, and to grow dark.
Freddy is nearly smothered in plaids by his anxious mamma. The captain mounts on the box of the four-seated vehicle, and calls to Rohritz,--
"Drive to Wolfsegg, the village across the ferry. We will await you with fresh horses, at the inn there. Adieu."
And the captain gives his steeds the rein, and trots gaily past the drag.
"Tiens!Stella is lefttête-à-têtewith Rohritz," Stasy whispers.
"And what of that?" Katrine says, rather crossly. "He will not kill her."
"No, no; but people might talk."
"Pshaw! because of an hour's drive!"
"Wait and see how punctual they are," Stasy giggles maliciously.
"Anastasia, you are outrageous!" Katrine declares.
"Wait and see," Anastasia repeats; "wait and see."
"Are you well protected, Fräulein Stella?" Rohritz asks his young companion, after a long silence.
"Oh, yes," says Stella, contentedly wrapping herself in her shabby, thin, twenty-franc water-proof and pulling the hood over her fair head, "I am quite warm. It was a good thing that you gave us warning, or I should certainly have left my water-proof at home."
"You see an 'old bore,' as Les called my barometer, can be of use under certain circumstances."
"Indeed it can," Stella nods assent; "but it would have been a pity to give up the picnic at the bidding of your weather-prophet, for, on the whole, it was a great success."
"Are you serious?" Rohritz asks, surprised.
"Why should you doubt it?"
"Why, you have had less cause than any of us to enjoy the day. You have cut your foot, have spoiled a very pretty gown, and are in danger, if it goes on pouring thus, of being wet to the skin in spite of your water-proof."
"That is of no consequence," she declares from out the brown hood, her fair dripping face laughing up at him through the rain and the gathering darkness. "Where is the harm in getting a little wet? It is quite delightful."
He is silent. She is to be envied for her gay, happy temperament, and she looks wonderfully pretty in spite of her grotesque wrap.
Not the faintest breath of wind diverts from the perpendicular the downfall of rain. The road leads between two steep wooded heights, whence are wafted woodland odours both sweet and acrid. Intense peace--an unspeakably beneficent repose--reigns around; in grave harmonious accord blend the rushing of the brook, the falling of the rain, and the low whisper and murmur of the dripping leaves, informing the silence with a sense of enjoyment.
"How beautiful! how wonderfully beautiful!" Stella exclaims; her soft voice has a strange power to touch the heart, and in its gayest tones there always trembles something like suppressed tears.
"Yes, it is beautiful," Rohritz admits, "but"--with a glance of mistrust at the wretched hacks--"when we shall reach Wolfsegg heaven alone knows!"
Is he so very anxious to reach Wolfsegg? To be frank, no! He feels unreasonably comfortable in this rain-drenched solitude, beside this pretty fair-haired child; he cannot help rejoicing in thistête-à-tête. Since the day when Stella thanked him with perhaps exaggerated warmth for returning her locket, she has never seemed so much at her ease with him as now.
The desire assails him to probe her pure innocent nature without her knowledge,--to learn something of her short past, of her true self.
Meanwhile, he repeats, "But it is beautiful,--wonderfully beautiful!"
The wretched horses drag along more and more laboriously. Rohritz has much ado to prevent their drooping their gray noses to the ground to crop the dripping grass that clothes each side of the road in emerald luxuriance.
"Delightful task, the driving of these lame hacks!" he exclaims. "I can imagine only one pleasure equal to it,--waltzing with a lame partner. This last I know, of course, only from hearsay."
"Did you never dance?" asks Stella.
"No, never since I left the Academy. Have you been to many balls?"
"Never but to one, in Venice, at the Princess Giovanelli's," Stella replies. "After the first waltz I became so ill that I would not run the risk of fainting and making myself and my partner ridiculous. My enjoyment then consisted in sitting for half an hour between two old ladies on a sofa, and eating an ice to restore me. At twelve o'clock punctually I hurried back, moreover, to the Britannia, for I knew that my poor sick father would sit up to be regaled with an account of my conquests. He was firmly convinced that I should make conquests. Poor papa! You must not laugh at his delusion! The next day the other girls in the hotel pitied me for not having had any partner for the cotillon; they displayed their bouquets to me, as the Indians after a battle show the scalps they have taken. They told me of their adorers, and of thepassions funesteswhich they had inspired, and asked me what I had achieved in that direction. And I could only cast down my eyes, and reply, 'Nothing.' And to think that to-day, after all these years, I must give the same answer to the same question,--'Nothing!'"
"You have never danced, then!" Rohritz says, thoughtfully.
Strange, how this fact attracts him. Stella seems to him like a fruit not quite ripened by the sun, but gleaming among cool, overshadowing foliage in absolute, untouched freshness. Such dewy-fresh fruit is wonderfully inviting; he feels almost like stretching out his hand for it. But no, it would be folly,--ridiculous; he is an old man, she a child; it is impossible. And yet----
Both are so absorbed in their thoughts that they do not observe how very dark it has grown, how threatening is the aspect of the skies. Leaving the ravine, the road now leads along the bank of the Save. The pools on each side grow deeper, the mud splashes from the wheels on Stella's knees: she does not notice it.
"Your last remark was a little bold," Rohritz now says, bending towards her.
"Bold?" Stella repeats, in dismay: 'bold,' for her, means pert, aggressive,--in short, something terrible.
"Yes," he continues, smiling at her agitation; "you asserted something that seems to me incredible,--that you never have inspired any one with a----"
He hesitates.
A brilliant flash quivers in the sky; by its light they see the Save foaming along in its narrow bed, swollen to overflowing by the recent torrents of rain. Then all is dark as night; a loud peal of thunder shakes the air, and the blast of the storm comes hissing as if with repressed fury from the mountains.
The horses tremble, one of them stumbles and falls, the traces break, and down goes the carriage.
"Now we are done for!" Rohritz exclaims, as he jumps down to investigate the extent of the damage.
Further progress is out of the question. He succeeds by a violent effort in dragging to his feet the exhausted horse, then unharnesses both animals and ties them as well as he can to a picket-fence, the accident having occurred close to an isolated cottage with an adjacent garden. Rohritz knocks at its doors and windows in vain; no one appears. In the deep recess of one of the doors is a step affording a tolerable seat. He spreads a plaid over it, and then, going to Stella, he says, "Allow me to lift you down; I must drag the carriage aside from the road. There! you are not quite sheltered yet from the rain; move a little farther into the corner,--so."
"Oh, I don't in the least mind getting wet," Stella assures him; "but what shall we do? We cannot sit here all night long in hopes that some chance passers-by may fish us out of the wet."
"If you could walk, there would be no difficulty. The inn this side of the ferry is only a quarter of a mile off, and we could easily hire a couple of horses there. Can you stand on your foot?"
"It gives me a great deal of pain to stand, and, since Uncle Jack has my other shoe in his pocket, how am I to walk?"
"That is indeed unfortunate."
"You had better go for help to the inn of which you speak," Stella proposes.
"Then I should have to leave you here alone," says Rohritz, shaking his head.
"I am not afraid," she declares, with the hardihood of utter inexperience.
"But I am afraid for you; I cannot endure the thought of leaving you here alone on Sunday, when all the men about are intoxicated. One of the roughest of them might chance to pass by."
"In all probability no one will pass," says Stella. "Go as quickly as you can, that we may get away from here."
"In fact, she is right," Edgar says to himself. He turns to go, then returns once more, and, taking his mackintosh from his shoulders, wraps it about her.
He is gone. How slowly time passes when one is waiting in the dark! With monotonous force, in a kind of grand rhythmical cadence the rain pours down to the accompaniment of the swirling Save. No other sound is to be heard. Stella looks round at the horses, which she can dimly discern. One is lying, all four legs stretched out, in the mud, in the position in which artists are wont to portray horses killed on a battle-field; the other is nibbling with apparent relish at some greenery that has grown across the garden fence. From time to time a flash of lightning illumines the darkness. Stella takes out her watch to note the time by one of these momentary illuminations. It must have stopped,--no, it is actually only a quarter of an hour since Edgar's departure.
Hark! the rolling of wheels mingles with the rush of the Save and the plash of the rain. The sound of a human voice falls upon the girl's ear. She listens, delighted. Is it Rohritz? No, that is not his voice: there are several voices, suspiciously rough, peasants rolling past in a small basket-wagon, trolling some monotonous Slav melody. By a red flash of lightning the rude company is revealed, the driver mercilessly plying his whip upon the back of a very small horse, that is galloping through the mire with distended nostrils and fluttering mane.
Stella's heart beats, her boasted courage shrivels up to nothing. A few more minutes pass, and now she hears steps. Is he coming? No; the steps approach from the opposite direction, stumbling, dragging steps,--those of a drunkard.
A nameless, unreasoning dread takes possession of her. Ah! she hears the quick firm rhythm of an elastic tread.
"Baron Rohritz!" she screams, as loud as she can. "Baron Rohritz!"
The step quickens into a run, and a moment later Rohritz is beside her. "For God's sake, what is the matter?" he says, much distressed.
"Oh, nothing, nothing,--only a drunken man. My courage oozed away pitifully. Heaven knows whether, if you had not appeared, I might not have plunged into the Save from sheer cowardice. But all is well now. Is a vehicle coming?"
"Unfortunately, there was none to be had. I could only get a peasant-lad to take care of the horses. If there was the slightest dependence to be placed upon these confounded brutes I could put you on the least broken-down of them and lead him slowly to the inn. But, unfortunately, I am convinced that the beast could not carry you: he would fall with you in the first pool in the road. With all the desire in the world to help you, I cannot. You must try to walk as far as the inn. I have brought you one of the ferryman's wife's shoes."
And while Stella is putting the huge patent-leather shoe on her bandaged foot, Rohritz directs the peasant-lad to fish his plaid and rugs out of the mud and to lead the horses slowly to the inn. As he walks away with Stella they hear the boy's loud drawling 'Hey!' 'Get up,' with which he seeks to inspirit the miserable brutes.
Leaning on the arm of her escort, Stella does her best to proceed without yielding to the pain which every minute increases, but her movements grow slower and more laboured, and finally a low moan escapes her lips.
"Let me rest just one moment," she entreats, piteously, ashamed of a helplessness of which a normally constituted woman would have made capital.
"Do not walk any farther," he rejoins, and, bending over her, he says, with decision, "I pray you put your right arm around my neck, clasp it well: treat me absolutely as aporte-faix."
"But, Baron----"
"Do not oppose me, I entreat: at presentIam in command." His tone is very kind, but also very authoritative.
She obeys, half mechanically. He carries her firmly and securely, without stumbling, without betraying the slightest fatigue. At first her sensations are distressing; then slowly, gradually, a pleasant sense of being shielded and cared for overcomes her: her thoughts stray far, far into the past,--back to the time when her father hid her against his breast beneath his cavalry cloak, and she looked out between its folds from the warm darkness upon the world outside. The minutes fly.
"We are here!" Rohritz says, very hoarsely.
She looks up. A reddish light is streaming out into the darkness from the windows of a low, clumsy building. He puts her down on the threshold of the inn.
"Thanks!" she murmurs, without looking at him. He is silent.
The inn parlour is empty. A bright fire is burning in the huge tiled stove; the fragrance of cedar-berries slowly scorching on its ledge neutralizes in part the odour of old cheese, beer, and cheap tobacco plainly to be perceived in spite of the open window. In a broad cabinet with glazed doors are to be seen among various monstrosities of glass and porcelain two battered sugar ships with paper pennons, and a bridal wreath with crumpled white muslin blossoms and arsenic-green leaves. The portraits of their Majesties, very youthful in appearance, dating from their coronation, hang on each side of this piece of furniture.
Among the various tables covered with black oil-cloth there is one of rustic neatness provided with a red-flowered cover, and set with greenish glasses, blue-rimmed plates, and iron knives and forks with wooden handles.
The hostess, a colossal dame, who looks like a meal-sack with a string tied around its middle, makes her appearance, to receive the unfortunates and to place her entire wardrobe at Stella's disposal.
"Can we not go on, then?" Stella asks, in dismay.
"Unfortunately, no. I have sent to the nearest village for some sort of conveyance, and my messenger cannot possibly return in less than an hour. And I must prepare you for another unfortunate circumstance: we shall be forced to go by a very long and roundabout road; the Gröblach bridge is carried away, and the Save is whirling along in its current the pillars and ruins, making the ferry impracticable for the present."
"Oh, good heavens!" sighs Stella, who has meanwhile taken off her dripping water-proof and wrapped about her shoulders a thick red shawl loaned her by the hostess. "Well, at least we are under shelter."
Thereupon the hostess brings in a grass-green waiter on which are placed a dish of ham and eggs and a can of beer.
"I ordered a little supper, but I cannot vouch for the excellence of the viands," Rohritz says, in French, to Stella. "I should be glad if you would consent to eat something warm. It is the best preventive against cold."
Stella shows no disposition to criticise what is thus set before her. "How pleasant!" she exclaims, gaily, taking her seat at the table. "I am terribly hungry, and I had not ventured to hope for anything to eat before midnight."
It is a pleasure to him to sit opposite to her, looking at her pretty, cheerful face,--a pleasure to laugh at her gay sallies.
Would it not be charming to sit opposite to her thus daily at his own table,--to lavish care and tenderness upon the poor child who had been so neglected and thrust out into the world,--to spoil and pet her to his heart's content? "Grasp your chance,--grasp it!" the heart in his bosom cries out: "her lot is hard, she is grateful for a little sympathy, will she not smile on you in spite of your gray hair?" But reason admonishes: "Forbear! she is only a child. To be sure, if, as she has avowed, her heart be really untouched, why then----"
Whilst he, absorbed in such careful musings, grows more and more taciturn, she chatters away gaily upon every conceivable topic, devouring with an appetite to be envied the frugal refection he has provided.
"It is delightful, our improvised supper," she declares, "almost as charming as the little suppers at the Britannia which papa used to have ready for me when I came home from parties in Venice, as terribly hungry as one always is on returning from a Venetian soirée, where one is delightfully entertained but gets nothing to eat."
"It seems, then, that the Giovanelli ball was not your only glimpse of Venetian society?" Rohritz remarks, with a glance that is well-nigh indiscreetly searching.
"Before papa grew so much worse I very often went out: papa insisted upon it. The Countess L---- chaperoned me. And at Lady Stair's evenings in especial I enjoyed myself almost as much as I was bored at the Giovanelli ball. I cannot, 'tis true, dance; but talk,"--she laughs somewhat shyly, as if in ridicule of her talkativeness,--"Icantalk."
"That there is nothing to eat at a Venetian soirée I know from experience," Rohritz says, rather ill-humouredly, "but how one can find any enjoyment there I am absolutely unable to understand. Venetian society is terrible: the men especially are intolerable."
"I did not find it so," Stella declares, shaking her head with her usual grave simplicity in asserting her opinion; "not at all."
"But you must confess that Italians are usually low-toned; that----"
"But I did not meet Italians exclusively; I met Austrians, English, Russians; although in fact"--she pauses reflectively, then says, with conviction--"the nicest of all, my very particular friend, was an Italian, Prince Zino Capito."
"He calls himself an Austrian," Rohritz interposes.
"He was born in Rome," Stella rejoins.
"I see you know all about him," Rohritz observes.
"We saw a great deal of each other," Stella chatters on easily. "We were in the same hotel, papa and I, and the Prince. His place at table was next to mine, and in fine weather he used to take us to sail in his cutter. He often came in the evenings to play bézique with papa. He was very kind to papa."
"Evidently," Rohritz observes.
"You seem to dislike him!" Stella says, in some surprise.
"Not at all. We always got along very well together," Rohritz coldly assures her. "I know him intimately; my oldest brother married his sister Thérèse."
"Ah! is she as handsome as he?" Stella asks, innocently.
"Very graceful and distinguished in appearance; she does not resemble him at all." And with a growing sharpness in his tone Rohritz adds,--
"Do you think him so very handsome?"
The hostess interrupts them by bringing in a dish of inviting strawberries. Stella thanks her kindly for her excellent supper, the woman says something to Rohritz in the peasant patois, which Stella does not understand, and he fastens his eye-glass in his eye, a sign with him of a momentary access of ill humour.
After the woman has withdrawn he remarks, with an odd twinkle of his eyes, "How many years too young did you say I was, Baroness Stella, to be your father? four or five, was it not?Eh bien, our hostess thinks differently: she has just congratulated me upon my charming daughter."
But Stella has no time to make reply: her eyes are riveted in horror upon the clock against the wall. "Is it really half-past ten?" she exclaims. "No, thank heaven; the clock has stopped. What o'clock is it, Baron Rohritz?"
"A quarter after eleven," he says, startled himself, and rather uncomfortable. "I do not understand why the messenger is not here with the conveyance."
"Good heavens!" Stella cries, in utter dismay. "What will mamma say?"
"Be reasonable. Your mother cannot blame you in this case; she must be informed that it was impossible to cross the ferry," he says, anxious himself about the matter, however.
"Certainly; but while she does not know of our break-down she will think we have had plenty of time to reach Wolfsegg by the longest way round. You certainly acted for the best, but it would have been better, much better, if Uncle Jack had stayed with me. He knows all about the country, and he has a decided way of making these lazy peasants do as he pleases."
"I do not believe that with all his knowledge of the country, and his decision of character, he could have succeeded in procuring you a conveyance," Rohritz says, with growing irritation.
"If the ferry is useless, perhaps we might cross in a skiff," Stella says, almost in tears.
"I will see what is to be done," he rejoins. "At all events it shall not be my fault if your mother's anxiety is not fully appeased in the course of the next half-hour."
With this he leaves the room. Shortly afterwards the hostess makes her appearance.
"Where has the Herr Papa gone?" she asks.
"He has gone out to see if we cannot cross the Save in a boat."
"He cannot do it to-night," the woman asserts. "He would surely not think of----" Without finishing her sentence she puts down the plate of cheese she has just brought, and hurries away.
Stella is perplexed. What does he mean to do? What is the hostess so foolishly afraid of? She limps to the open window, and sees Rohritz on the bank of the stream, talking in the Slavonic dialect, which she does not understand, with a rough-looking man. The rain has ceased, the clouds are rent and flying, and from among them the moon shines with a bluish lustre, strewing silver gleams upon the quiet road with its net-work of pools and ruts, upon the wildly-rushing Save with its foaming billows, upon the black roof of the hut which serves as a shelter for the ferrymen, and upon a rocking skiff which is fastened to the shore. A sudden dread seizes upon Stella, a dread stronger by far than her childish fear of her mother's harsh words. The hostess enters.
"Not a bit will the gentleman heed,--stiff-necked he is, the water boiling, and not a man will risk the rowing him: he be's to sail alone to Wolfsegg, and ne'er a one can hinder him."
Stella sees Rohritz get into the skiff, sees the fisherman take hold of the chain that fastens it to the shore. Not even conscious of the pain in her wounded foot, she rushes out, and across the muddy road to the bank, where the fisherman has already unfastened the chain and is preparing to push the boat out of the swamp into the rushing current.
"Good heavens! are you mad?" she calls aloud to Rohritz. "What are you about?"
Rohritz turns hastily; their eyes meet in the moonlight. "After what you said to me there is nothing for me to do save to shield your reputation at all hazards.--Push off!" he orders the fisherman.
"No," she calls: "it never occurred to me to consider my reputation. I was only a coward, and afraid of mamma."
The fisherman hesitates. Rohritz takes the oars. "Push off!" he orders, angrily.
"Do so, if you choose," Stella cries, "but you will take me with you!" Whereupon she jumps into the boat, and, striking her poor wounded foot against a seat, utterly breaks down with the pain. "I was a coward; yes, yes, I was afraid of mamma; but I would rather have her refuse to speak to me than have you drowned," she sobs.
Her streaming eyes are riveted in great distress upon his face, and her soft, trembling hands try to clasp his arm. About the skiff the waves plash, "Grasp it, grasp it; your happiness lies at your feet!"
His whole frame is thrilled. He stoops and lifts her up. "But, Stella, my poor foolish angel----" he begins.
At this moment there is a rattle of wheels, and then the captain's voice: "Rohritz! Rohritz!"
"All's right now!" says Rohritz, drawing a deep breath.
As it now appears, the captain has come by the long roundabout road, with a borrowed vehicle, to the relief of the unfortunates. The general, who, whatever disagreeable qualities he may possess, is a 'gentleman coachman' of renown, has declared himself quite ready to conduct the landau with its spirited span of horses to Erlach Court.
"What have you been about? What has happened to you?" the captain repeats, and he shakes his head, claps his hands, and laughs by turns, as with mutual interruptions and explanations the tale of disaster is unfolded to him.
Then Stella is packed inside the little vehicle, Rohritz takes his place beside her, and the captain is squeezed up on the front seat.
Before fifteen minutes are over Stella is sound asleep. Rohritz wraps his plaid about her shoulders without her knowledge.
"She is tired out," he whispers. "I only hope her foot is not going to give her trouble. Were you very anxious?"
"My wife was almost beside herself. My sister took the matter, on the contrary, very quietly, until finally Stasy put some ridiculous ideas of impropriety into her head, and then she talked nonsense, alternately scolding you and the child, marching up and down the common room at the Wolfsegg inn like a bear in a cage, until I could bear it no longer, but left the entire party on the general's shoulders to be driven home, and set out in search of you. How did Stella behave herself? Did she give you any trouble?"
"No; she was very quiet."
"She is a dear girl, is she not? Poor child! she really has had too much to bear. Of course I would not confess it to Stasy, but it is a fact that if any other man had been in your place I should have been excessively annoyed."
"My gray hair has been of immense advantage to your niece," Rohritz assured him. "The hostess at the ferry persisted in taking me for her father."
"Nonsense!"
"Nonsense which at least showed me at the right moment precisely where I stood," Rohritz murmured. "And, between ourselves,--never allude to it again,--it was necessary."
The captain, who naturally enough sees nothing in his friend's words but an allusion to his altered circumstances, sighs, and thinks, "What a pity!"