Late autumn is wont to be a rough, inclement season in the neighbourhood of mountains, and this year, in and about R----, it had not belied its character; but now, at its close. Nature seemed by a supreme effort to rouse all her dying energies. The past days had been unusually clear and mild, so that the months appeared to have travelled back in their course. The earth fell to dreaming one last brief dream of sunshine and summer breezes, before it surrendered itself to grim Winter's icy chains.
It was afternoon now. Baron von Raven sat at his writing-table, engaged in looking through his papers. For some time past, his testamentary arrangements had been made; but there was still much to set in order. Colonel Wilten had promptly responded to the call made upon him. Though he no longer considered an alliance with Raven's family desirable for his son, the constraint and coolness which had lately, since their explanation, existed between himself and the Baron, had been annoying and painful to him; and he seized with alacrity this occasion of rendering the latter a service. He promised to settle all the necessary details, and to come round himself, and report as to what had been agreed upon regarding the duel, which was, if possible, to take place early on the following morning.
Raven had just finished a letter, which he folded and addressed to "Doctor Rudolph Brunnow." The lines on his gloomy brow grew deeper still, as with sure and steady strokes he traced the name on the paper.
"Would that I could have spared you, Rudolph!" he muttered. "The remembrance of this fatal hour will be with you to your dying day. I know it--but there was no alternative."
He laid the letter aside, and again took up the pen; but this time it was less obedient to the hand that wielded it. Some minutes elapsed before he wrote the first few lines; then he stopped suddenly--began anew--hesitated once more, and finally tore up the sheet. Why leave a farewell, every word of which must be barbed with bitterness? The letter would only be a standing reproach to her for whom it was intended.
The Baron threw down his pen, and rested his head on his hand. Not without reason had he dreaded the moment when the one great passion of his life, which had betrayed him into a passing weakness, but which he had resolutely driven from him far into the background, should break the restraining dykes, and rush in upon him again with its swift, strong current. He had maintained a perfectly calm demeanour during the last few hours--though hatred, indignation, and deeply mortified pride were at their fierce work with him; he had gone into the minutiæ of his affairs, arranging everything with his customary exactitude; but now all was in order--all was finished, except ... Lo! with a rush, the tide of long pent-up passion returned upon him with all its old irresistible force, and before it the strong man's composure gave way.
It was no soft or tender emotion which filled his breast. Arno Raven was not one easily to give up what he desired, or lightly to forgive where he believed himself wronged. He, of his own free will, had decreed the separation--had sent Gabrielle from him; and he did not repent it. No half-measures suited him. "Let it be this, or that," had been his motto through life; so now he would have absolute and undivided possession of his love, or he preferred to lose her altogether. Well, he had lost her--given her over to another who could rally to his aid the mighty influences of youth and a first love.
The Baron never doubted that the connection with Winterfeld had been renewed in the capital. The tyrannical guardian, who had so long stood between the young people, separating them, had now stepped back, leaving them free to draw together again; and the Baroness was far too weak, too wanting in character, to oppose any lasting resistance to her daughter's wishes, when no longer fettered by fear of her brother-in-law. Besides, Winterfeld's position had changed. He had risen in a most unexpected manner, and would surely rise further--thus the great barrier to the marriage was withdrawn. All was going the natural, appointed course, which he, in his madness, had sought to check and stay. How, indeed, could such a young creature as Gabrielle understand, far less return, a passion so profound, so all-absorbing as his? It had dazzled her, perhaps, had flattered her vanity, to find herself the object of his love; but there could be no question of any deeper feeling on her part--and, a choice being offered her, the blooming maiden, standing on the threshold of life, naturally turned to him who could bring youth as his dowry, who could set before her a long vista of happy years. That gay, sunny being had neither part nor lot in his destiny. The thought of her was altogether out of keeping with this dark hour of defeat, when a man's shattered honour lay in ruins about him, a man's life hung upon a thread.
The fine, but short, autumn day was fast declining, and the rays of the setting sun sought and found their way into the study. Through the deep bay window came a broad, golden stream of light, filling the sombre room with a strange transfiguring gleam. Raven's look rested moodily on the brilliant flood. So had the sunbeam glanced across his life, gilding, glorifying all for a brief space, to disappear suddenly, leaving him again to loneliness and darkness. In vain he tried to free himself from the remembrance, to stifle it by bitter reasoning--in vain! by every road his thoughts travelled back to Gabrielle; every object about him seemed to suggest her name--his mind was full of her. He had resolved to have done with the past, with the world, with life; but this wild, overpowering longing for the only being he had ever loved, chained him to the existence he was preparing to quit. A sigh, so deep as to be almost a groan, burst from his labouring breast. He was alone now, and needed not the mask of proud impassible calm. To have preserved it longer would have exceeded all human strength. He pressed his hand to his burning brow, and closed his eyes.
Some time went by, and he still sat on, absorbed in his gloomy brooding; then the door opened gently, almost inaudibly, and as gently closed again. Raven did not notice it, and did not stir, until the rustle of a woman's dress close at hand startled him. He turned, and a great spasm passed across his face; but the exclamation he would have uttered died on his lips, and he gazed with speechless amazement, almost with awe, at the vision before him, which could only be a creation of his disordered fancy. Opposite him, in the full stream of light, stood Gabrielle, motionless, surrounded by an aureole of golden rays, as though in verity she were but an apparition called up by the earnest, passionate craving of a despairing heart, a phantom which would next minute vanish mysteriously as it had come.
The Baron had risen.
"Can it--can it be you?" he asked at length, and his breath came short and quick. "I thought you were far away."
"I left town this morning," replied the young girl, in a low voice. "I have only just arrived. They told me you were here in your room."
Raven did not answer. His eyes were still riveted on the fair tender face, as though even yet he could not believe in the reality of her presence. Yes, she was there indeed! how, wherefore, he did not at present think of inquiring. Gabrielle seemed to misinterpret his silence. She stood in the same spot, timid and anxious, not venturing to approach him. At last she took courage, and drew slowly nearer.
"Will you repulse me again now, Arno, when I tell you that you were wrong in suspecting me? I should have spoken long ago, but you put me from you so roughly, so harshly. You would not even hear me--that roused my pride. I would not beg for the confidence you refused me. I"--she stood close by his side now, and looked pleadingly into his face--"I knew nothing of that attack upon you. Only, when he was going away, George told me there would soon be open war between you and him. I pressed in vain for some explanation. He would give me none, and a few minutes later we had to part. Since that day, not a word, not a syllable on the subject reached me, until you yourself held up the book before my eyes. If I had had the slightest suspicion of what was coming, you would have heard of it. I never betrayed you, Arno, believe me."
Truth rang in those accents, shone in her face. Raven caught her hand with a quick movement. Still with the same expression of eager, intense anxiety, he drew her to him, and, without uttering a word, looked into her eyes, which, through their glistening dew, met his fearlessly. This silent, piercing scrutiny lasted some seconds; then the Baron stooped suddenly, and pressed his lips to the girl's brow.
"No, you are true," he said, with a deep long breath. "I believe you."
His hand clasped hers more firmly. He now remarked that Gabrielle was still in her travelling dress; she had merely thrown off her hat and cloak before coming in to him. As yet, however, he was far from divining how matters really stood. His next question proved this.
"Where is your mother, and what has caused this speedy return? I did not expect you for several weeks."
A deep crimson blush slowly mantled to the girl's cheeks.
"Mamma stayed behind. I could hardly make her consent to my coming. She only yielded when she saw there was no possibility of keeping me away, I came by myself, with only our old servant as escort."
Raven followed her words with breathless eagerness. A dim presentiment of boundless, inexpressible happiness stole over him; but at the same moment the old shadow crept between them.
"And Winterfeld?" he asked, in a keen, incisive tone.
Gabrielle's eyes fell, and her voice trembled as she answered:
"I have been forced to give him great pain, to cut him to the heart," she answered; "but it was right he should learn the truth before I left to come to you. George knows it all now; he knows to whom my love, my whole love, is given. He has released me--I am free----"
She could not finish. Arno had drawn her close, close to his breast. She felt his arms round her, felt the pressure of his lips on hers, and everything else, even to the remembrance of George's pain, melted away, drowned in the exceeding sweetness of that moment. At length Raven raised his head, and, still holding her to him, said:
"But what brought you to me at this precise time? Why did you hasten? You do not, cannot know what has happened."
Smiling through her tears, Gabrielle looked up at him.
"I only heard that fresh trouble was menacing, and I wanted to be with you."
"I wanted to be with you!" the words were simply, naturally spoken, but Raven understood the entire, the infinite devotion they expressed. He gazed down in silence on the young creature, whom but a short time before he had so bitterly accused, whom he had denounced as fickle and unstable of purpose, but who now resolutely tore asunder all restraining ties, to hasten to his side and share his fate. Through the deep night which encompassed him, irradiating all the gloom, came a flash of ineffable joy and triumph at finding himself so loved.
The golden stream of light faded gradually as the sun sank lower and lower. A few solitary rays still strayed into the room; but, little by little, these too vanished, and the space was filled with a faint rosy shimmer, a reflection from the gorgeous evening sky without. Arno and Gabrielle paid no heed to it. He had drawn her to his side, and was speaking in low, earnest tones, but not of downfall or of danger. For them such things existed not; they gave them not a thought. For the first time their hearts frankly met, no shadow, no misunderstanding interposing between them; for the first time they could be all in all to each other. Past and future were dissolved in this one consciousness; they loved, and in their love were infinitely blest.
"Colonel Wilten waits on your Excellency." A servant, coming in, made this dry, formal announcement.
Raven looked up as though he had been roused from a dream. He passed his hand across his brow.
"Colonel Wilten?" he repeated slowly. "Ah, true. I had forgotten that."
Gabrielle's attention was at once aroused.
"Must you see the Colonel to-night?" she asked, seized, as it were, by some vague foreboding. "The reception-hours were over long ago."
The Baron stood up. The radiant expression which had illumined his face was gone now.
"I expected him. There are matters it is necessary for us to discuss. Ask the Colonel to have the kindness to wait for me in the drawing-room. I will be with him directly."
The servant withdrew.
"I must leave you, Gabrielle. You little know what it costs me to part from you, even for a moment," he said, in an agitated voice; "but the affair which brings Wilten to the Castle must be settled at once, if I wish to have my evening free. Then we shall be alone together, and no one shall disturb us. Come, I will take you to your room."
He passed her arm through his, and led her through the library and across the corridor over to the opposite wing. A few minutes later he entered the drawing-room where the Colonel awaited him. Their interview was of short duration. Scarcely a quarter of an hour later Wilten left the Castle, and the Baron returned to his study, sitting down once more to his writing-table. He had said truly. It cost him a cruel pang to lose sight of Gabrielle, even for a few minutes, and yet he now remained absent from her a full hour. She could not be there at his side while he wrote to her that farewell letter.
The unexpected arrival of the young Baroness had caused some surprise at the Castle, especially as she came without her mother; but the old retainer, who had accompanied her, soon vouchsafed the necessary information. His Excellency had, by letter, summoned his ward and sister-in-law to him. Unfortunately, the latter had had a slight return of her illness, and was still too unwell to undertake the journey, so she sent the young lady on first, and would follow herself in the course of a few days. The Baroness, finding it impossible to detain her daughter, had imagined this pretext to give colour to the strange proceeding. She herself was really unwell; the news she had heard from Countess Selteneck had brought on one of her nervous attacks. This precluded any thought of her travelling, to the intense relief of Gabrielle, who well knew how unwelcome her mother would be to Raven at such a time. She accepted the pretext with all docility, and this simple, natural explanation found credence both at the house she was leaving and at the Castle.
Evening had now fully closed in. Gabrielle was still alone in her room, counting the minutes until Arno's return. Colonel Wilten's visit awakened no special surprise in her mind, for, before her departure, conferences between him and the Baron had been of very frequent occurrence. She had opened the window, and was leaning dreamily forward, looking out, when at length the longed-for step sounded at her door. She flew to meet her visitor, and he clasped her to him as though that brief hour had been as a separation of years.
"Now I am free," said the Baron, coming in; "altogether free, my Gabrielle. Now I am yours, and yours alone."
Gabrielle looked up at him. His countenance was paler than usual, but it wore an expression of grave, deep calm.
"The Colonel brought you no bad news?" she asked apprehensively.
"No: only some necessary information," replied Raven, very quietly, but withdrawing at once from the circle illumined by the lamp, and going up to the young girl at the window.
The air without was cool, but mild as on a spring evening, and the country around lay bathed in bright moonlight.
"I opened the window," said Gabrielle; "the room seemed so close, and it is such a beautiful evening."
"Yes, most beautiful," repeated the Baron, gazing out, apparently lost in thought. Then, turning suddenly to his young companion: "You are right," he said; "there is a stifling, oppressive feeling indoors to-day. I myself feel a longing for the open air, where one can breathe more freely. Shall we go down into the garden?"
Gabrielle at once assented. The Baron took a shawl which was lying on the sofa, and wrapped it carefully about her slender figure. Then they left the room together.
The Castle-garden was still and solitary as ever, but its summer glory had long departed from it. The thick canopy of leaves, which had enclosed it in deep shade, was fast thinning. The mighty limes stood half bare, stripped of their foliage, and the moonlight fell full and clear on the stretch of greensward at their feet. The Nixies' Well babbled and rippled on; the fountain splashed and threw aloft its white veil of spray; and the two, to whom the voice of its waters had whispered so fateful a message, stood once again by its brink, within reach of its glittering shower.
Raven looked down at his companion with mingled tenderness and melancholy.
"The nixies' vengeance has overtaken me, after all," he said, in a low tone. "Why did I venture to jest at them and their magic spell? I have not visited the place since that day; but to-night I seemed drawn to it irresistibly. I felt I must see the fountain once again."
Gabrielle started at his last words.
"Once again? What do you mean, Arno? Why do you say that?"
Her words were eager, prompted by a quick, anxious misgiving.
Arno smiled, and passed his hand caressingly over the girl's fair hair.
"You must not be so timorous. I only mean that shortly, in the course of a few days, I shall leave the Castle and this town. The blow you believed to be impending has fallen on me, my child. This morning I ceased to be Governor of the province."
"So they have driven you to the last extremity," said Gabrielle, sadly. "You have resigned?"
"No; I am dismissed."
The Baron's lips twitched, but he could bring himself now to speak the word which was fraught with such profound humiliation.
"Dismissed!" repeated Gabrielle, "without your seeking it? Why, that is----"
"An insult," concluded Raven, as she hesitated. "Or a condemnation, as you like to take it. It is usual, if only for appearance's sake, to allow a fallen man the faculty of retiring; but even this favour has been denied me."
"And what will you do now?" asked Gabrielle, after a pause.
"Nothing," replied the Baron, coldly. "My public career is at an end. I shall go to one of my estates in the country, and there--live on."
"Will that be possible to you, Arno? You once told me that to work and to rule were as the necessary conditions of your being, that you could not endure an aimless existence, the monotonous round of an every-day life."
"I shall learn to endure them perhaps. One has so much to learn in this world. At all events, I must try."
"And I shall go with you," whispered Gabrielle, with the fervour of a great love. "I shall stay with you, always and always."
"Yes, always."
Again Raven smiled, but he avoided meeting Gabrielle's eye. He put his arm round her gently, and drew her to the seat near the fountain. Over this seat the tallest of the limes, still decked in half its wealth of leaves, cast its shadow; here the tale-telling moonlight would not reveal every varying expression of feature. The Baron could no longer meet those anxious, watchful eyes. They were dangerous--keen with the instinct of love, they might pierce through any mask; and yet there was a something which must yet, for a short season, be masked and hidden from them.
Arno sat for a while silent by Gabrielle's side. The great peace surrounding him soothed his weary spirit after all the tempests, all the din of the last few months. In his heart, too, the storm had spent itself. So long as it had been possible to fight, and to defend himself, he had remained in the arena, steady, strong, and to all appearance unmoved. How it had really been with him during that terrible time, when the two ruling passions of his life, pride and ambition, had been daily wounded, racked by a thousand mortifications, he alone knew. Now the battle and the strife were over, and the calm of a final, irrevocable resolve took from the remembrance of the past its deepest sting.
"Gabrielle, you have asked me nothing yet as to the cause of my overthrow," the Baron said, at length; "and yet you know the charges brought against me. Do you believe them?"
"Why should I ask? Of course, I knew at once the tale was false--a false and wicked calumny."
"So you, at least, believe in me," said Raven, with a deep breath of relief.
"I have never for an instant doubted you. But why do you bear the accusation in silence? Why do you not meet and utterly crush it? Even for your own sake you are bound to repel so foul a charge."
"I have publicly declared the statement which has been given to the world to be absolutely devoid of truth. You see how my word has been believed. I can no more bring forward proofs than they can who accuse me. One man, and only one, could have cleared me entirely, and he has long been in his grave. That man was your grandfather."
"My grandfather!" said Gabrielle, in surprise. "He died when I was quite a child, but I have always heard from my parents that you were his favourite and his confidential friend."
Raven mused awhile in silence. Then he went on:
"His was an exceptional nature. Perhaps that was why we understood each other so well, for I myself have never accepted common prejudices for the rule and guidance of my life. He, indeed, was born to the eminence I had laboriously to attain. An aristocrat through and through, he yet possessed sufficient impartiality to recognise talent and force of character wherever he found them, or however they might be employed. I, above all, have cause to know this. It was no small thing for the proud and wealthy nobleman, for the all-powerful Minister to accord his daughter's hand to a young middle-class official who had yet to win for himself a name and a position. Your grandfather was well aware, indeed, that I should not fail to win these, and to no other man of my social status would he have given his daughter in marriage. To him I owe all my subsequent success. To the day of his death he was to me a father and a true friend, and yet I would that he had let me go my own way, that his hand had not forcibly diverted the course of my life. It led me upwards to the dreamed-of height, but the price I had to pay for its help was too onerous, too great."
He paused, and gazed away into the misty distance. Gabrielle laid her hand on his arm entreatingly.
"Arno, I have long felt that there is some bitter memory in your life, and I know it has come through some misfortune, and no fault. Will you not open your heart to me now? I think I have a right to hear the tale."
"You have a right," said Raven, gravely, "and you shall hear it."
He put his arm round her shoulder, and drew her nearer to him.
"You know that I come of plain burgher stock. The early death of my parents taught me betimes to think and act for myself. I entered the service of the State, and had to work my way up from the lowest grade. When the whole land was swept by a storm of revolution, and the capital itself was in a state of armed insurrection, of open rebellion against the Government, I was chained to my desk in a remote provincial town, and so prevented from taking part in a movement with which my convictions led me to sympathise. The very next year, as chance would have it, I was transferred to the capital; I was thus brought into closer contact with my chief, who had lately come into office, and was about to inaugurate that period of reaction which has since followed. He must have perceived that I was not to be weighed in the same scale with his other officials, for he showed a decided preference for me, and I felt that I and my work were being watched with special attention. As yet, however, no opportunity of distinguishing myself occurred. In the capital I fell in again with Rudolph Brunnow, my old and intimate university friend. Though the revolutionary movement itself had been quelled, the land was still in a state of ferment; and as the factious elements, now kept down with a strong hand, could no longer agitate their designs openly, they met and pursued their work in secret. I was drawn into these circles, to which my political convictions had long inclined me, by Brunnow, who was an enthusiastic reformer. He was at the head of a secret association of which I now became a member. We believed in Utopias, impossibilities, and chimeras, which could have no lasting existence in real life; but, foolish as was our creed, we would have died rather than abandon it."
Raven paused a moment. These recollections seemed to move him greatly.
"Then came the catastrophe," he went on, speaking now with more animation. "We were suspected and watched, though we ourselves had no idea of it, until the Minister himself took action against us. He must have supposed that I was in some way connected with the band, for one day he sent for me, and called me to account, though by no means as an offender whom he was anxious to convict. He talked to me in a kind, almost a paternal manner, and that disarmed me. At that time I was not well enough acquainted with him to be aware how inexorable, irreconcilable an opponent of the revolution he was at heart. Like many others, I allowed myself to be deceived by the moderation he displayed at the outset. I was so far carried away as to avow my political views, and to defend them--to defend them to him!
"It was a grave error, and one that has cost me dear. No word fell from my lips regarding the secret I was bound to keep; the Minister, indeed, made no attempt to extract a confession of it from me. He knew me, and was well aware that neither threat nor promise could induce me to act a perfidious part; but my ardent enthusiasm, my imprudent championship of Liberal ideas, were enough to put the experienced statesman on the right track. He dismissed me with apparent friendliness, but I had hardly reached my home when I was arrested, my papers were seized, and every chance of communicating with my comrades was cut off from me. Rudolph, who was known as my intimate friend, was the next victim. At his lodgings was found the correspondence relating to our association, and in it a key was had to the whole business. Four others of our band shared our fate. The blow fell so unexpectedly that none had time to escape.
"The charge against us was one of high treason, and we might hold ourselves prepared for any fate. After a short interval I was again conducted to the Minister's presence. He informed me that I was released from confinement. He had, he said, convinced himself that I had been led astray, that I had merely been the dupe of Brunnow and his confederates, and offered to overlook what had passed, if I would give him my word of honour to break once for all with the revolutionary party. I stared at my chief in stunned amazement. Did he really not know how I stood towards this secret society, or was he intentionally ignoring the offence? My name, it was true, had nowhere figured in its records. Rudolph was esteemed our leader, but so keen-sighted and discerning a man as the Minister must be conscious that the passive, subordinate part of a lowly recruit was foreign to my whole character. I did not then divine that he purposely shut his eyes, in order to pardon. I decidedly refused to give the promise required of me, declaring that I would not abjure my principles, and was ready to share the fate of my friends.
"The Minister preserved his imperturbable calm, and repeated the offer he had made.
"'I will give you a month for reflection,' he said. 'I have too good an opinion of you, I am too hopeful as regards your future, to allow you to ruin yourself with these wild Socialist intrigues. Your head can render better service to the State than by weaving endless, fruitless conspiracies in prison or in exile. You are not the first man who has recognised his error, and become in after-times the zealous opponent of the cause he once defended, and the very pertinacity and defiance with which you now put from you the proffered means of rescue, prove to me that I may take on myself the responsibility of readmitting you to the service, if you make up your mind to come back as one of ours. As yet no one has accused you, and it depends entirely upon yourself whether the charge against you shall be withdrawn. The few documents which might be compromising to you are in my hands, and will be destroyed directly I have your word. I shall expect to hear your decision in a month from this time. For the present, you are free, and have the choice between an honourable, possibly a brilliant, career, and ruin."
"And you chose----?" asked Gabrielle.
"No," replied Raven, bitterly. "In reality, no choice was left me. They had taken care I should be spared the pain of making one. My first endeavour was to find out how much was really lost to our cause, and how much might yet be saved. I sought out my friends, and met with a reception for which I was utterly unprepared. 'Treason,' they cried, on seeing me. 'Treason,' saluted my ears, wherever I showed myself. Hate, indignation, abhorrence--the whole gamut was run through. At first, I did not understand the meaning of it all--too soon it was made intelligible to me. In their eyes I was the traitor who had brought about the discovery. My official position, the evident favour shown me by my chief, had already given rise to some distrust--now it was clear as day. I had been the Minister's tool and spy. I had disclosed, had sold to him the secrets of our society. My own arrest, they concluded, was nothing but a blind, a concerted plan by which I was to be withdrawn from the vengeance of those whom I had betrayed, and my prompt liberation showed beyond a doubt that I was in league with the enemy, I now found that my chief's magnanimity had not been so complete as I had supposed. He had taken his precautions before setting me at liberty, and had thus definitively shut me out from the ranks of the 'wild reformers.'
"At first I stood bewildered by the terrible accusation, then with indignant vehemence I made my protest. Openly avowing my imprudence, the only crime of which I had been guilty, I gave a circumstantial account of my interview with the Minister--in vain, my words were received as so many mere evasive shifts. I was judged, and against their sentence there was no appeal. One man alone would perhaps have believed me--Rudolph Brunnow. He was the principal sufferer, the one on whom the blow had fallen most heavily; and yet, had I been able to confront him, to look him in the face, and say: 'It is a lie, Rudolph. I am no traitor!' he would have given me his hand, and together we should have fought down the calumny. But he was in prison--beyond my reach. I gave the others my word of honour. They answered that I had no honour to lose, and even refused me all satisfaction for the gross insult. These men, baited, persecuted, irritated to madness, were not capable of forming an unbiased judgment, and I fear that their suspicions were purposely directed against me. This, indeed, I have never learned for a fact; but the pardon, which was soon afterwards granted me, set the seal on my supposed ignominy and my disgrace.
"A month later I was with the Minister again. I had tried every means in my power to clear myself from the shameful suspicion, and had failed. I was still shunned, proscribed by the members of my own party, thrust out from their midst--and now I resolved in my turn to cast them from me. Up to this time I had been blameless. A last resource was still left to me. I could have quitted my native land, and have begun a new life elsewhere, accepting exile, in order to remain true to my principles--as Rudolph did later on, when he regained his freedom. Such a course would in time have vindicated my character, though years might have elapsed first; but I never had any great sympathy with the heroism which seeks a martyr's fate. On the one hand, I saw exile with all its bitterness and privations; on the other I was promised a career which was likely to satisfy, and more than satisfy, my ambition. The late events had destroyed my illusions. I now knew exactly what would be demanded of me, were I to accept my chief's proposal; but my whole soul rose in arms against those who had condemned me without a hearing. The insults I had endured, the injustice of my former friends, drove me straight into the enemy's camp. I knew that the price of my new position would be the renunciation of my principles--yet I broke with my past, and gave the required promise."
The Baron's voice vibrated strangely; his quick, short breathing betrayed the emotion these painful reminiscences aroused within him. Gabrielle hung on his words in a great tension of suspense; but she did not venture to interrupt the story. He had withdrawn his arm from her now; and when he spoke again, it was in a dull, hollow tone.
"From that time forth my career is known to you and to the world. I became the Minister's secretary, became his confidential friend, and, finally, his son-in-law. His potent influence overcame all the obstacles which stand in the path of a nameless commoner struggling upwards, and when once the road was clear before me, I had only to exert the natural powers I possessed. That in this new life I had to bury and disown my past was a thing of course. I had known that it would be so, and it is not in my nature to make half-resolves, or lamely to perform that which I have decided on. Moreover, by temperament I was inclined to despotic action. Power and authority had ever possessed for me a singular fascination. Now I tasted both, and the brilliant, the almost unexampled success of my career, helped me to vanquish old memories more easily than I had expected. The constant influence of my father-in-law, whom I sincerely revered, that of the circle in which I lived, did the rest. I must go onwards, without looking back--and onwards I went. The way was steep, and led over the ruins of former shrines, but I reached the goal. I have lived great and honoured--to end in this way!"
"But it is only a lie, a wicked calumny which has brought about your fall!" broke in Gabrielle, "This must and shall be clearly shown."
Raven shook his head gloomily.
"Can I compel that belief which the world does not willingly accord me? I have already heard from Rudolph Brunnow's mouth that I have forfeited all claim to confidence. He, indeed, can meet any charge with an unruffled brow; no defence set up by him would pass unnoticed, for his past, his whole life testifies for him--mine condemns me. The man who has abjured his convictions may also have betrayed his friends. The curse of that fatal hour, wherein I proved untrue to myself, weighs on me now, and makes me powerless to refute the calumny which works my fall."
"And who are they who turn against you?" cried Gabrielle, with a burst of indignation. "The very men for whom you have toiled, for whom you have sacrificed all. Oh, the base ingratitude!"
"Ingratitude! Have I the right to look for gratitude at their hands?" asked Raven, with quiet, bitter meaning. "No bond of confidence has existed between us. They had need of me to work out their plans, and I had need of them as stepping-stones by which to mount. It has been one continual state of warfare, a perpetual balancing of our respective strength. I have often let them feel the power of the hatedparvenu; now that the power is in their hands, they overturn me--I could expect nothing else; but I feel now that Rudolph was right. It is worth something to have kept one's faith in one's self, in the better, higher part of one's nature. The man who stands and falls by his principles can endure reverses; but he who has given the best energies of his life to a cause which was never his at heart, which in his inmost soul he must condemn and despise, has no anchor, no stay in the hour of misfortune."
"And I?" asked Gabrielle, reproachfully. "Am I nothing?"
"Ah yes, you, my darling!" cried the Baron, with passionate tenderness. "Your love is the one thing left to me. But for you, I could not have endured this fate."
"Will you be able to endure it?" asked the young girl, apprehensively. "Ah, Arno, I feel as though it will hardly be in my power to reconcile you to a lot which will lack all that really constitutes your life. You will pine and waste away in solitude, even though I share it with you."
"Let us talk no more of this now," said Raven, gently parrying her question. "We will speak of it later on. I have drawn the veil from my past; it was right that you should know both it and me thoroughly. But now we have had enough of these gloomy recollections. They shall no longer come between us and the happiness of this hour."
He drew himself up quickly, as though by an effort he would cast all troubling thoughts from him for awhile. And truly it was very beautiful, this quiet hour in the moonlit garden. The half-stripped trees, the widowed earth, bereft of flowers and perfumes, seemed to win back their long-lost charm in the mystic light which spread its mild glamour over the scene, veiling the ravages caused by the late storms, and investing it with a calm, transcendent beauty.
Dreamily still lay the Castle-garden, and the broad landscape out beyond it. The prospect, indeed, no longer stretched, beaming and definite, in the radiant clearness of a summer day. Now the valley slept half hidden in its shimmering depths. At the foot of the Castle-hill the city lamps burned steadily, and its roofs and towers rose, white and glittering, aloft into the pure night air. The foremost mountain summits stood forth plainly discernible, their jagged peaks detached, as it were, from the dark masses beneath; farther off, the lines grew hazier, softer, and the remoter heights were altogether lost in the blueish nebulous distance. Infinite peace rested on all the woods, the hills, the valleys around, as they lay bathed in the silvery flood. Below in the valleys, on the meadows, through the fields, the rolling mists furled and unfurled themselves, a sparkling gleam here and there betokening a bend in the river. High overhead arched the great vault of heaven in all its starry splendour, while everywhere, over earth and sky, was drawn a thin transparent film, a tissue of mist and moonbeam, toning down the picture, lending to it a soft dream-like enchantment. It was a scene of wondrous beauty, of deep, unutterable calm.
Up here too, in the garden, the curling mists crept over the grass, and here too the fitful moonbeams wove their fantastic imagery. Under their influence the grey moss-grown figures about the Nixies' Well seemed to grow into life, to move to and fro behind their humid screen of falling water. The fountain, struck in full by the chaste stream of light from above, rose and sank again in shining sheets of silver rain. Intermingled with its plash and murmur came those voices which are heard only in the stillness of the night, strange, unfamiliar voices, mysterious as the night itself The wind was hushed. No faintest breeze stirred the air, and yet from time to time a low whisper arose, and was wafted on and on, until, like a breath from spirit-land, it swept by and was gone.
The evening was so mild and clear, one might have dreamed that spring had come again; and, truly, the dream that was now filling Raven's mind was gracious as any May-morning--a late-timed, short-lived dream, no doubt, but concentrating in its brief space all the blessedness which earth can give; so, in passionate heart-stirring words, he swore to the fair young creature he held in his arms, to the woman who had taught him to know both love and happiness. Had any unseen, unsuspected spectator looked on Raven, listened to his impassioned accents, such an one would have understood that this man, despite his years, despite his sternness and reserve, despite all the darker side of his nature, must surely carry off the palm, must win the day against all others where his intenser feelings were engaged, where his heart was set on victory. All the long pent-up ardour and tenderness flamed up in him anew; every word, every look, told of a passion which, in its power and depth, could have fired no youthful breast, a passion such as only a strong man in his maturity could conceive. This Gabrielle felt, as, closely nestling to his side, her head resting on his shoulder, she looked up at him with a happy smile. Those gloomy, distressing forebodings of an hour ago could not hold good before the magic of his voice and presence; and through the music of his words, distinctly audible, came the rippling of the spring, singing on the sweet, monotonous melody to which they had listened in the birth-hour of their love. That land of Eden, which once seemed to lie far off in the glistening distance, away beyond the blue mountains, was not there, but here around them. Paradise had opened, and received them within its gates. It was an hour of pure and perfect bliss, such as comes but once in a life-time, but then outweighs all the joys and sorrows which fill the years from the cradle to the grave.
Slowly the clocks in the town below chimed the hour of eleven. The Baron shuddered slightly at this warning. Then he rose quickly, as by a strong and resolute effort.
"We must go back to the Castle," he said. "The night air is growing cool, and you need rest after your rapid and fatiguing journey. Come, Gabrielle."
She made no opposition, but, passing her hand through his arm, moved away with him. They went by the Nixies' Well, and left the garden. The door closed upon them, shutting out the moonlight and the peace. That happy hour had run its sands; the bright May-dream was over.
They entered the Castle. Upstairs in the corridor, which led to Madame von Harder's apartment, the Baron suddenly halted. Could it be that his iron strength of will was failing him at last? His being was torn and shaken to its very depths by the great agony of that parting, but Gabrielle's questions, full of a vague foreboding, had not fallen on his ears in vain. He knew that the least imprudence on his part would betray all, and would bring on her unnecessary anguish and suspense. The blow must fall--better it should strike her unawares.
"Good-night," said Gabrielle, all unsuspectingly, giving him her hand. "We shall meet again tomorrow."
"To-morrow!" repeated Raven, with profound significance. "Ay ... surely."
He raised the young girl's head gently, so that the light from the hanging lamps fell full upon it, and looked into the fair face now again brightened by the rosy flush of happiness, into the clear, sunny eyes--looked long and deeply, as though he would grave the image on his brain for ever. Then he bent down, and kissed her.
"Good-bye, my Gabrielle--good-night!"
Gabrielle softly freed herself from his arms, and left him. On the threshold of her room she stopped, and waved him a last farewell; then she closed the door behind her. Arno stood motionless, his eyes fixed on the door through which the "sunbeam" of his life had vanished. His voice quivered, as he said, in a low tone:
"Poor child, what an awakening is in store for you!"