Oswald had always lived in the city. His manners, his views, his attachments were all those of a city man. Thus it happened that when he saw himself suddenly, and as if by magic, transferred to the country, he was charmed and almost intoxicated with the unspeakable beauty of the first bright summer days at a beautiful country place. He enjoyed it more than most men. Everything was so new and yet so strangely familiar to him, as when we find ourselves in a country which we fancy we have seen before in a dream. Was the dark blue vault, which rose higher and higher every day, the same sky which hung so sadly and mournfully over the ocean of houses in the great city? Were these sparkling lights the same lonely stars to which he had now and then glanced up as he came from the opera or from a party? Could a summer morning really be so rich in splendor, a summer evening really so soft and almost lascivious? Had he never heard birds sing, that he must now listen forever to their simple piping? Had he never seen flowers, that he must stand and gaze at their bright colors and strange forms without ever being tired? He felt like a person who comes back to life again after a severe illness. The recent past lay behind him, covered with a thick veil; but days long since gone by, memories drowned in an ocean of oblivion, rose once more before his mind's eye like a dazzling, deceiving Fata Morgana. "Why, there is larkspur!" he cried out one of those days, full of happy surprise, as he saw the flower blooming brightly on many a bed of the garden in which he was walking up and down.
"To be sure," replied Bruno, who accompanied him; "have you never seen it before?"
"Yes, long since," murmured the young man, bending down and looking with deep emotion at the fanciful flower. He saw in his memory a little cozy garden near the town wall, where he played about, gathering small stones, flowers, and other rarities, and carried them to a beautiful but pale young woman, who always stroked his head when he came to throw his burden into her lap, and with a mother's patience never tired to answer his thousand questions. Then he had brought her such a flower, too, and the beautiful lady had said: "That is larkspur!" And then she had gazed so long at the flower that the tears had gathered in her eyes, and she had taken him passionately and pressed him to her bosom, and there he must have fallen asleep, tired from playing so long, for he remembered nothing more. The beautiful young lady he knew was his mother; she had died before he was five years old. Who has not experienced it himself, that amid the stir and turmoil of life, where one image continually crowds out another, and we are forever tyrannically held fast by the moment, everything gradually fades away, even what we held dearest upon earth, even the parents to whom we owe our life! Thus Oswald also had almost forgotten that he had ever had a mother; now the simple little flower awakened in him forcibly the memory of the long lost mother. The first weeks which he spent in the solitude of country life recalled to him the first years of his life, for he had never since communed so closely, so intimately, with nature, or beheld her charming face so near by. He remembered now also his father, who had died two years ago in the same isolation in which he had lived, and felt for him now that grateful affection, which, unfortunately, never blooms out fully till those are long gone whom its fragrance would have rejoiced most. He remembered his father, a strange pygmy in form, whom the son at eighteen years already overtopped by more than two feet; an eccentric misanthrope, who was known all over town as the "Old Candidate," and whose wornout black dress coat, in which he appeared winter and summer alike, was familiar to every child in the street. He remembered how the strange, enigmatical man jealously locked up the rich wealth of his learning and his goodness from all the world except from his only son, whom he loved with ineffable affection, whom he nursed and tended with all a mother's tenderness, and for whom even he, the miser, thought nothing too dear.
These pleasant, and yet also painful recollections passed through Oswald's mind as he roved about in his leisure hours, wandering alone, or with his pupils, through the garden, the fields, and the forest, and daily growing fonder of life in the country. Often he would run down into the great garden early in the morning before the lessons commenced, and look into the dew-filled flowers and listen to the song of the birds, and then it appeared to him marvellous how anybody, how he himself, had ever been able to live in a city.
It is true that Castle Grenwitz and its surroundings were such as to excite the admiration of eyes more familiar even than his with landscape beauties, although the crowds of tourists who every summer visited the island rarely penetrated so far. If some accidentally discovered it, they wondered why so charming a place, with so many points of interest about it, could have been forgotten in the hand-books for travellers, merely because it lay a few miles from the great high-road.
The château bears, to this day, traces of the wealth and the power of the old knightly race of the Barons of Grenwitz, who have been landowners here from time immemorial, and who built the castle for their own defence, and in defiance of the neighboring barons, towards the middle of the fourteenth century. The lower story of one of the wings, with its colossal blocks of stone, dates from that early period; so does also the big round tower, at the point where the old and the new castle now meet. The new part was built in the seventeenth century, in the prevailing style of that day, and looks, with its ornamented pillars and queer decorations by the side of the plain, massive tower, like a man of fashion of the time of Louis XIV. by the side of a knight in armor of the days of Crécy and Poitiers.
All around the château and the numerous outbuildings runs an immense wall, at least twenty feet high, which dates back into even greater antiquity than the tower; it leaves ample space open, so that even the enormous building looks but small in the wide circle. This wall has, however, long since been changed into a peaceful promenade, overshadowed on high by lofty beeches, walnut-trees, and lindens. The broad moat which follows it all around is now partly obliterated, forming a low swamp filled with reeds; and wherever the water has held its own, it is covered with a green carpet of water-plants, in which half-wild ducks love to feed and fatten. The wall and the moat had evidently been intended to afford safe protection not only to the inhabitants of the castle, but also to the faithful vassals of the warlike barons, with their wives and children, their herds and their provisions. Even the farm buildings, which, since the erection of the new château, had been removed to a distant part of the farm, had originally been enclosed within the wall. In those days there had been a single passage in the wall, a huge fortified gate under a tower, which opened upon a drawbridge, and then led to a strongtête de pont. Now the tower had been demolished; the drawbridge refused to move, and the fortification had long since been changed into a number of ovens and other useful contrivances. From this principal gate an avenue of magnificent lime-trees, some of which were several hundred years old, led to the great portal of the château. To the right of the avenue and in front of the castle was a vast lawn, with a stone basin in the centre; a naiad stood over it as patroness, but she had long since lost her head, perhaps from grief that for half a century the water had refused to come at her bidding.
The remaining space inside of the wall was filled with gardens and plantations, which dated from the time of the new building, and clearly enough betrayed the character of that period by the straight walks, carefully trimmed evergreen hedges, huge pyramids of box, and an abundance of gods carved in sandstone. Here and there, however, a spirit of innovation seemed to have been at work. Box-trees had made desperate efforts to stretch out their crippled branches, and to grow for a while as nature prompted them; the two sides of a long, stiff walk had made common cause, and formed, united, an impenetrable bosquet; and a gardener, who had no taste for the silent language of yew pyramids and box avenues, had defied all æsthetic rules, and boldly planted fruit-trees of every kind wherever he had found an open space; even vegetables were met with, encroaching impudently upon trim beds of flowers. A sister of the naiad in the courtyard was completely hid under brambles and briers; but, more easily resigned than the other goddess, she had preserved her head, and prattled in silent nights merrily of the good old times.
Thus every generation had for a thousand years contributed something to the strengthening or beautifying of the old castle, from the giant wall which belonged to pagan times, to the asparagus beds that had been laid out this spring. Much had disappeared without leaving a trace; much also had been preserved; but as even the oldest parts bore the marks of life, of continued usefulness, there was no sudden break visible, and the whole produced a most pleasing impression, as if everything was just as it ought to be. Castle Grenwitz had lost, it is true, its primitive character, and Oswald hardly thought he was looking upon an old feudal castle, built by robber-knights, but fancied rather he saw a peaceful convent of contemplative monks, when he returned in the evening from a walk with his pupils, and remained standing at a certain place of the wall, from whence he could look down upon the grass-covered yard in its dark shade, the garden with its countless flowers, and the castle itself, whose gray walls shone dimly in the twilight, while the swallows were flying swiftly to and fro, twittering merrily in their evening sport.
A quiet, convent-like life it was which they led at Castle Grenwitz. The region enclosed by the old wall lay virtually behind an ivy-covered churchyard wall, and no noise, no disturbance was ever heard there. No dogs barked there, no horses neighed; the hours glided quietly away, like the shadow on the sun-dial above the portal--quietly as the flowers in the garden bloomed and gave out their perfumes. The very wind seemed but to rustle gently in the branches; the birds sang low melodies in the tree-tops; and as for the inhabitants of the castle, why, the large hall-clock in its oaken stand could not do its daily work more punctually and systematically, or be freer from all desire of innovation than they were. The servants did their work with the regularity of automatons. Even the furniture seemed to be imbued with this spirit of order, so that Oswald could not get rid of the idea that the chairs and sofas moved by themselves back to their proper places, if by a rare chance they had been dislodged for a time. Little as Oswald had ever been accustomed to such a methodical life, and much as he disliked it by nature, he still had enough elasticity in him to adapt himself readily to the profound peace which reigned all around--an effort in which he was largely aided by his gentle disposition, full of good-will towards man. He did what he saw others do, and returned the formal bows with which people greeted each other on all occasions, with the same air of solemnity which he would have assumed when dancing a minuet at a masked ball.
At first he had not been over-punctual in the matter of the lessons, and taken more delight in enjoying himself with his pupils in the open air. They had explored the beech forest, which extended for half an hour from Castle Grenwitz down to the sea-shore; they had discovered an ancient tumulus and a cave, and often they had climbed down from the lofty chalk cliffs to the beach below, where, standing upon a huge block, they had enjoyed seeing the tide rush up, and shouted aloud to see if the breakers overpowered their voices.
During these excursions, which Oswald jestingly called preliminary studies for Homer, he had had constant opportunity to study the character of his two pupils. A greater contrast could hardly exist. Bruno was tall for his years, but slender and agile, swift like a deer. Malte, the young heir, looked stunted and sickly by the side of his proud companion. He was narrow-chested and hollow-breasted; his angular, awkward movements contrasted strangely with the marvellously graceful carriage of Bruno, and the effect was still greater when the latter was running or leaping. Malte shrank back from every danger, from every exertion, conscious of his feeble strength, and from native or acquired cowardice; for Bruno no tree was too high, no rock too steep, no ditch too broad; it seemed almost as if he were trying to subdue the passionate heat of his soul by bodily exhaustion. Oswald bound a wreath of oak-leaves together and placed it on the boy's bluish-black curls, to make him still more like one of the Bacchantes. But as in his native land, Sweden, the icy night of winter suddenly gives birth to fragrant, smiling spring, so in his mind also sunshine and tempest changed in a moment. Now it was exuberant joy and now sad melancholy which prevailed; now he abandoned himself like a child to others, and now he became rigid in sudden defiance; and all this suddenly and without transition, as lights and shadows change on the mountain slope on a day when the wind is driving the clouds like arrows across the face of the sun. Thus Oswald found the boy, a stranger in the house of his relations, hated by some, feared by others, an inexplicable riddle for all, even for the good old baron, who always took the part of the boy, though generally more from inborn magnanimity than from conviction. But for Oswald a single glance at the dreamy dark eye of the boy had sufficed to recognize in him a kindred spirit, and the mystic alliance which they had formed at that moment had been strengthened by every hour of their intercourse since. Bruno had met him on the first day of their meeting with the dark, defiant look which he was wont to show to everybody. He had then watched him with his shy but penetrating glances for two or three days more, and then Oswald's kindly, cheerful manner had dissipated all suspicion, as the sun scatters unwholesome fogs. His eye had become more open, more brilliant, as if the unexpected happiness of meeting a man who loved him, and cared to be loved by him, was dazzling and confusing him; and at last all the passionate tenderness of his soul had broken forth, the long pent-up current of affection had overflowed its banks--powerfully, irresistibly, like a mountain torrent which breaks through a rocky gate and pours its waters exultingly into the broad valley.
"Do you know," said the boy to Oswald, "that I was determined beforehand to hate you?"
"Why, Bruno, is hatred so sweet?"
"Oh, no. But I thought all tutors were like our first, and so I said to myself that what was good for one was good for all."
"And how was Mr. Bauer?"
"Well, he was a boor," said the boy, bitterly.
"Why, my proud little lord, will you despise all low-born men?"
"Certainly not," exclaimed the boy, warmly; "my own father was but a peasant, although he was a nobleman; I have often seen him behind the plough; but this man was coarse and rude, and a coward into the bargain. Once after dinner, I do not know what I had done, he slapped me in the face because aunty was present, and he thought she would be pleased to see him do so. Yes, he beat me," and the boy's eye flashed as he recalled the insult, and the big vein on his forehead, where wrath lies hidden, swelled up high.
"And then, Bruno?"
"Then I took the knife that was lying before me on the table and jumped at him, and the wretch ran away, crying for help. And when I saw that, and all the pale faces around me, I could not help laughing, and went quietly out of the room. And I would have liked to run away into the wide, wide world on the spot, but uncle came after me and promised me that that man should never touch me again. Uncle is very kind; you don't know how kind he is. But he is afraid of aunty; everybody is afraid of her--and yet I am fond of her, for she has pluck like a man, and I hate only cowards. Malte is a coward."
"Malte is weak and sickly, and you ought to be patient with him; but if you are really fond of your aunt, why are you so cross to her?"
"Am I cross?" The boy became silent. A cloud passed over his brow, his nostrils quivered, and his dark-blue eyes looked like a thunder-cloud when he said, glancing quickly upward:
"I know I am cross; but how can I help that? I am only on sufferance here in the house; shall I be grateful for that? I cannot be so; I will not be so, and if they were to turn me out. Look here, Oswald, I have often wished they would drive me away; I have done things on purpose to make them send me off; then I would go into the wide world and earn my own bread, as thousands of boys do who are not half as strong and as brave as I am. Even to-day, as we were walking along the strand, and the great three-decker rose on the horizon and disappeared again, I wished, oh! so eagerly, I could have sailed away in her as a boy, as a sailor--only away, away from here, no matter where to."
When the boy thus laid open the most secret wishes of his heart to his friend and teacher, the latter often wondered whether he, with his own doubts as to the way which he ought to follow in life, was exactly the right person to guide a wild, passionate boy. But the less he felt himself able to keep down the vague wishes and chimerical hopes which he shared with him in secret, the more the distance disappeared between him and his pupil, the more brotherly became their relations. No human being had ever yet made so deep an impression upon Oswald as this strange boy. He loved him as the artist loves the work with which he is occupied, as the father loves his son in whom he hopes to realize what he has himself failed to accomplish, as a mother loves her child for whom she has to work, to watch, and to care. Every night, when he was weary from long reading and studying, he went, before seeking his own bed, into the boys' room. He would not have been able to sleep if he had not first seen his favorite once more. That reserve which makes it impossible for nobler natures to show the whole fulness of their tenderness, made him during the day withhold his caresses; but then, at night, he took the boy's hands in his own and stroked them, and kissed the sleeper on his brow.
"They call you unfeeling, my pet, you whose heart is hungering and thirsting after love! And if all misjudge you and hate you, I understand you and love you."
The farm-buildings and tenant-houses which belonged to the estate lay beyond the wall, and in order to make the communication between the castle and the farm-yard easier, a door had been broken through the wall. A wooden grating which could not be moved, and a bridge which could not be raised, bespoke the peaceful disposition of the descendants of those warlike barons who had built the massive gates on the other side, with its ponderous drawbridge suspended by iron chains. The intercourse between the castle and the farm was, however, generally limited to the exchange of energetic notes between the steward and the housekeeper, as the two officials were often at variance with each other as to the quantity and quality of provisions which the former had to send to the latter. The farm itself was, like all the other estates of the family, rented out; the tenant, a Mr. Bader, lived on one of the other farms, which he had also rented, and rarely came to Grenwitz, which he left to the management of his steward.
Oswald, to whom farming was as new as the life in the country itself, frequently went to the farm-yard, in order to be shown by the steward over the barns and stables, and to be introduced by him into the mysteries of agriculture and cattle-raising. The steward, whose name was Wrampe, was a giant who always went about in huge top-boots, and who seemed to cherish the superstitious belief that he would lose his strength if he were to trim his immense black beard, or ever deprive the rain of its exclusive privilege to wash his face. The broad jargon of that region was his native and his only tongue; he hated the pure German of the educated classes, and in his heart suspected all who spoke it of being dishonest; his voice sounded, when heard from afar, like the roaring of a slightly hoarse lion. His enemies accused him of the bad habit of getting drunk every now and then; but as he did so only once a month, and then always for several days at once, in order to show all the more energy during the rest of the time, his friends winked at it, and even his employer preferred to ignore his little foible. Oswald liked to talk with the man, who was a fair representative of the people of that region in his blunt good-nature, his straightforward though often rude speech, and his fondness for proverbs.
Thus he had one afternoon taken a walk towards the farm-yard with the two boys. They found it deserted. The men and the horses were all in the fields. In the stables nothing was left but the baron's four bays, who played a melancholy quartette on the iron chains of their halters. The silent coachman was sitting at the door, gazing at the blue sky, as he had nothing on earth to do when the horses had been fed. A big black cat was wandering slowly around his feet; it was hisspiritus familiaris, which accompanied him everywhere, and even on the box sat between his feet under the apron. In the cow-stables they found but a single cow, who was trying to shape her new-born calf, by industrious licking, into that form which may appear most desirable to a respectable cow-mother of certain pretensions. On the dungheap the chickens were scratching industriously, utterly unmindful of a battle royal between two young roosters, who had fallen out with each other about a little beetle, that lay on its back quietly awaiting its fate. An old cock, who might possibly have been the father of the two hostile brethren, was perched on the pole of a wagon, and crowed again and again, either from joy at the chivalrous nature of his offspring, or in order to report a cloud which was coming up above the roof of the barn. At one end of the roof sat a stork on her nest. The husband was just coming home, bringing the trophy of his hunt, a small snake, in his bill. The wife rattled her bill to give voice to her delight, and the stork, proud of having done his duty, was not slow to answer. From the little pond near the big stable a lot of ducks had begun their single file march across the yard, under the command of a majestic drake; they had evidently received an authentic report that behind the barn a sack of corn had burst, and the grains were lying about.
Oswald had been looking with much pleasure at this still-life picture of a farm-yard during a warm summer afternoon, while Bruno had tried to engage the reticent coachman into a conversation on the only two topics on which he could hope for success--his horses and his cat. Malte was tired, as there were few things anywhere in which he could take much interest, and ducks and chickens surely were not among them, at least as long as they were wandering about in the light of the sun. He asked, therefore, that they should go on; and so they passed through the yard, and a little cluster of miserable huts, into the open field. At some distance before them, on the road lined with willow trees, a servant seemed to have upset his wagon. The horses were standing across the road, and he was pulling at them, and cursing fearfully, as people of his class are apt to do under such circumstances. At last he seemed to have lost the little patience which nature had given and which liquor had left him. He seized the bridle of one of the horses and kicked it unmercifully with his heavy feet, encased as they were in immense boots. Oswald hardly noticed all this, till Bruno flew at the man like an arrow, crying out: "What a barbarian! what a brute!"
In an instant he was by his side, and ordered the man to stop his ill-treatment; his voice trembled, but more from indignation than from the effort of running.
"I know what I am doing!" replied the servant, and kicked the horse, which had become entangled in the traces, harder than ever.
"Let the horse go this instant, or----"
"Oh!" replied the servant, "or what?"
"Or I stab you with this knife."
The man started back and gazed at Bruno with amazement. It was not the fear of the knife which the boy held in his uplifted right hand--for the servant was a large, powerful man, who might have felled the boy with a single blow, and was, moreover, half drunk--but it was the fear of the demon that showed himself in Bruno's flashing eye, the fear of the terrible passion which made the boy's blood flow back from his cheeks to his heart, and caused his nostrils to tremble and his lips to quiver.
"The beast is so savage," stammered the man, as if to excuse himself.
But Bruno did not deign to answer. With quick hands, and as cleverly as if he had managed horses all his life, he undid the traces in which the animal had become entangled. Oswald tried to help him, but his efforts were more distinguished by good-will than by great success. Then the boy ran to the ditch, filled his straw-hat with water, and washed the wounds on the ill-treated legs of the horse.
At that moment a horseman leaped across the same ditch and alighted on the road. It was the steward, Wrampe, who had witnessed the scene from a distance and came galloping up at full speed.
"Now I come," said the slater, as he fell from the roof; "what on earth does that mean? Why do you drive through the ditch, if you have a bridge within ten yards? and to ill-treat brown Lizzie! I will pay you for your laziness, you--" and here followed a curse of two minutes' length.
To deliver this energetic speech, to jump down from his horse, to spit in his hands in order the better to take hold of the heavy riding-whip, and to begin belaboring the broad back of the servant according to rule--all this was the work of a moment for the impetuous steward.
"I will not be beaten, sir," remonstrated the man.
"You won't be beaten, you rascal," replied the other, never stopping for a moment; "I dare say not, but you'll get your beating notwithstanding."
Oswald, who suffered witnessing the scene, although he knew well how fully the man had deserved his punishment, begged Mr. Wrampe to let him go now. The latter gratified his wrath by a few last blows of great energy, and then said, as if concluding a quiet argument:
"Well, now come along, John, we'll get the wagon right again."
Then he put his broad shoulders to the wagon and got it into the road as if it had been a child's carriage; the horses, who had had time to recover, pulled heartily, and the servant could go on his way.
"Drive slowly home, you hear, and don't forget what I have told you," the steward cried after him.
"But you have told him nothing; you have only beaten him," said Oswald, smiling.
"And do you think these people understand any other kind of talking?"
"Have you ever tried it?"
Mr. Wrampe seemed to be slightly embarrassed by this question. He said, in reply: "That has made me warm."
Then he pulled a brandy-flask, which held at least a quart, from his pocket, put his thumb against the place down to which he meant to empty it, drank, held the bottle against the light, and then, as he seemed to think that he had not done the whole of his duty, he took another good pull. After that he mounted his horse, which had stood quietly by him as if accustomed to such scenes, wished them a good evening, leaped once more across the ditch, and rode off at full gallop.
With Bruno everything turned into a passion. The glow of his imagination changed the fictions of poetry into men of flesh and blood. The death of Hector drew tears of sympathy and indignation from his eyes, and the moral disgust which he felt, when he witnessed an act of injustice or of cruelty, was so intense that it caused him a physical indisposition.
Thus, when Oswald the same night approached the bed of his favorite he found him, contrary to his usual habit, still wide awake. His face was paler than ordinarily, and large drops of perspiration stood on his forehead. Oswald was concerned, and learnt, after some hesitation on the boy's part, that the latter had concealed his sickness in order not to trouble his friend, and was now suffering great pain. Oswald was about to wake up everybody in the house and to send for a doctor, but Bruno begged him not to do so, because such a thing was always looked upon at the château as a very grave affair of state, and he disliked excessively to give so much trouble to others; besides, he confessed that the hubbub they made about the matter was apt to make his sickness only worse.
"Moreover," he said, "I am quite used to these attacks, and if you will be good enough to make me some tea, and to give me a few drops of the medicine which the doctor prescribed for me the other day,--the phial is on my desk,--you will see that I shall be right again directly."
Oswald hastened to bring him what he wanted. He gave the boy the medicine, made him drink his tea, arranged the pillows, brought another blanket, and did it all with that thoughtfulness and handiness, in which men of delicate feelings, even when they are not accustomed to sick-rooms, often far surpass professional nurses.
"It is almost a pleasure to be sick when one has you for a nurse," said Bruno, gratefully pressing his friend's hand.
"Hush! hush!" replied the latter; "now do me the favor and get rid of your pain."
"I will do my best," said the boy, smiling.
Oswald's good wishes were soon fulfilled. The cold drops on the patient's brow became warm, and kindly nature lulled him to sleep, in order to restore in silence and secret the disturbed equilibrium of his system. At first, the delicate narrow hand which Oswald held in his own would now and then twitch a little; then all became quiet, and the improvised physician congratulated himself on the good success of his treatment. But he probably had some fears of a relapse; for he quietly slipped his hand from that of the boy, went for an easy-chair to his own room, and then sat down at the head of the bed. He had screwed down the lamp, so that the unusual light should not disturb the sleeper, and thus he sat in the dark, watching the moonlight as it was slowly sinking on the wall through an opening in the curtain, and listened to the regular breathing of the boy until weariness overcame him also and he fell asleep.
It was in the evening hours of one of the next following days when two ladies were seated in the garden saloon of the château; one was the Baroness Grenwitz, and the other a young lady who had ridden over from her seat in the neighborhood to pay a visit. The glass door which led from the room into the garden was wide open, and showed immediately before them a large lawn enclosed by tall trees, in the centre of which a Flora, carved in sandstone, had now for a century and a half poured stone flowers from her cornucopia. Within the room, which lay towards the north, it was almost dark already; but outside, the evening light was still lying warm on the green turf and the magnificent beech-trees and oaks; and the outlines of the two ladies, as they sat near a table pushed into the door, were sharply defined against the bright background.
A greater contrast than that which they formed could hardly be imagined. The Baroness Grenwitz was scarcely forty years old, but her large, cold gray eyes, which she always fixed long and piercingly upon those with whom she conversed, her lofty stature, far exceeding the ordinary height of women, and especially her peculiar way of dressing, made her sometimes look almost ten years older than she really was. Whether from love of extreme simplicity, or, as others would have it, from a love of economy which degenerated into avarice, she preferred materials more famous, like the wedding-dress of the worthy wife of the Vicar of Wakefield, for their durability than for other showy qualities, and she chose a way of having her dresses made which could not be called old-fashioned, because there never had been such a fashion in existence. The first impression which she generally made was that of imposing dignity; the careful observer noticed, moreover, in her always perfect carriage, and especially in the unfailing quietness of her deep, sonorous voice, and her carefully chosen language, which was scrupulously free from any vulgar expression, a consciousness of the impression she produced, and a desire not to break the charm by any fault of hers.
We cannot say with certainty whether the lady who was with the baroness really was overawed by her stately appearance, or merely appeared to be so; this much only was evident, that she endeavored at that moment to assume an air which harmonized neither with the expression of her features nor with the costume which she wore. She was dressed in a riding-habit of dark green velvet, which she had tucked up sufficiently not to be troublesome in walking, and not to hide her small feet in their elegant little boots. The tight-fitting dress set off to great advantage the well-rounded outlines of her youthful form; and the little round hat, now lying with the gloves and the whip on a small table near by, must have been exceedingly becoming to the well-shaped head with the rich brown hair, which, simply parted in the middle, was falling in rich waves over forehead and ears, and was then gathered up behind in a wreath. She is seated opposite the baroness, who is a pattern of industry, and sews zealously on a piece of linen, which may possibly become a napkin, while the visitor is busy embroidering a cipher in another napkin. This is strange kind of work to be done in a riding-habit, and the lady does not seem to be particularly fond of it; at least she quickly throws up her head, when the baroness rises in order to look for something in another part of the room, and shows a pretty face, with soft, child-like features, and large brown eyes, full of moist tenderness. Just now, however, the face bears rather the expression of a wilful school-girl, when her rigid teacher's back is turned for a moment.
"What were you saying, my dear Anna Maria?" asked the lady, bending once more over her work as the baroness turned round.
"I was asking, dear Melitta, whether you had enough red yarn?"
Melitta looked as if she were going to say, "More than I want!" but she contented herself with the reply: "I think I have enough."
The baroness had taken her seat again and continued the conversation, which had been interrupted for a moment.
"Then there if little hope of complete recovery?" she said.
"Little or none," replied Melitta, "especially now, since his violent attacks have ceased. Doctor Birkenhain writes that only a miracle can save Carlo from insanity, and I presume that means simply, he is irrevocably lost."
"It is a sad fate which the Almighty has decreed for you, my poor Melitta," said the baroness.
Melitta shrugged her shoulders, but said nothing.
"It was in this very room," continued the baroness, taking it apparently for granted that the subject could not be in any way painful to Melitta, "that I saw Berkow the last time. I must confess that I could not overcome a slight suspicion already, on the evening on which he had that disagreeable quarrel with your cousin Barnewitz, when Baron Oldenburg tried in vain to make an end to the trying scene."
Melitta von Berkow did not seem to be specially delighted with this evidence of the admirable memory of the baroness; she became restless, and asked, apparently without knowing what she was saying:
"Have you heard from Oldenburg?"
"The baron came back a week ago."
"Oh!" cried Melitta, in a tone which made the baroness look up from her work.
"What is the matter, Melitta?"
"I am so awkward," said the latter, and pressed a tiny drop of blood from a finger of her left hand. "So Oldenburg is back again? What brings him back to us? Has he found Egypt as tiresome as our own country here?"
"The contracts with his tenants expire next November, like some of our own. I presume that was the cause of his return. He seems to have become a greater misanthrope than ever. Griebenow, one of our men, met him in the forest; he has not been here yet."
"Well, my dear Anna Maria, you will not mind, I am sure, that want of attention on his part; you never were very good friends, I believe."
"I am not aware that Oldenburg ever desired to be a friend of mine. He never had any friends. A man who openly scoffs at all religion, who forgets the honor of his caste and the interests of his equals so far as to speak in the National Assembly and at every meeting in favor of all innovators; a man who apparently only comes among us in order to laugh at us--such a man has only to blame himself if we bestow our interest and our sympathy upon others who deserve it better."
"Well, I should not have thought that he was ever made to feel the want of interest in himself. Nor will he be left without it now. I never could understand why all the world took so much trouble about a man who minds the world as little as he does."
"That is easy of explanation, dear Melitta. The Oldenburgs are one of our oldest families; we cannot look on with indifference when the last scion of such a race becomes a plebeian."
"Oldenburg will never be a plebeian," said the younger lady, with some warmth.
"Why, dear Melitta, you take the baron's part very warmly. Would you also defend his immoral way of living, and his love affairs with which he has enriched thechronique scandaleuseof this and other districts?"
"I have never done anything immoral, as far as I know, nor approved of it," said the visitor, with greater heat than before. "And as for Baron Oldenburg's private life, I do not presume to judge it, because I know nothing of it. However," she continued, after a short pause and in a much quieter tone, "I should really be astonished if Oldenburg were such a Don Juan as people make him out to be. You must admit, my dear Anna Maria, that he has neither the beauty nor the address which are commonly expected in such a character?"
"Now that is a point on whichIdo not presume to judge," said the baroness, with an effort to be ironical. "I leave that to you young people."
"Young people!" exclaimed Melitta, laughing. She let her work fall into her lap, and leaned back comfortably in her chair, looking at the baroness, who worked on industriously, and showing much humor blended with a goodly share of malice. "Young people? Do you know, dearest Anna Maria, that I shall be thirty this very year? My Julius will be twelve next month--only four years younger than your Helen. By the way, how is the child? Is she to remain forever in the boarding-school in Hamburg? How long has she been there now? Two--no, it is already three years! and not once has she been back here all that time! You will not know your own child any longer, dear baroness."
"The boarding-school is so very superior, everybody praises it so highly, that I should blame myself if I did not leave the child there as long as I can. But you seem to have forgotten, dearest Melitta, that we saw Helen last year at Ostend; and since you seem to have such a longing for the young lady, I will tell you in secret that you will be able to see her here at Grenwitz this summer."
"This very summer? Why see there! Has that any connection with Oldenburg's return? Pardon my indiscretion! But I recollect that some years ago, when the baron came back from his first great journey, you said a match with Oldenburg would perhaps not be objectionable to you."
"Then I did not know the baron as I have unfortunately learnt to know him since. Nor would that fall in with my husband's wishes, who, I believe, has promised Helen half and half to somebody else."
"To somebody else? Not to your worthy cousin Felix?"
"As I said before, I know nothing positive about it; Grenwitz is very reserved; but I almost guess so, from the fact that he has procured for Felix a year's leave of absence, and he is going to spend that year here. They say his health is very much impaired."
"I hope not as much so as his fortune," said Melitta, dryly.
"His fortune? What do you know of his circumstances?"
"I only repeat what the world says. You must agree, my dear, that if thechronique scandaleusehas something to say about Oldenburg, it is far more eloquent about Felix, and the lieutenant surely has furnished topics enough."
"Felix is very young."
"Not younger than Oldenburg."
"Five years."
"One would not think so upon looking at him. But then he has lived rather fast."
"One could really imagine, my dear Melitta, that Felix was nearer to you than he really is. Candidly, I should like to know what you think of this match, if Grenwitz should not abandon the project."
"Well, then--I should consider it a misfortune, a very great misfortune, and in proportion as Helen is beautiful and innocent; what in all the world can suggest to the baron such a match? For I shall never believe that a mother could consent to such a union, which cannot fail to make her daughter inexpressibly unhappy."
Melitta had risen and cut the air with her riding-whip, as if she wished to say: That is what he deserves, who offers to aid in such a piece of rascality. Her tall, slender form looked a different being from her who had been timidly bending over her work or negligently reclining in her easy-chair. Even the features of her face seemed to change, and to become sharper, older; the fire in her large eyes blazed forth ominously. The mention of this match had evidently struck a chord in her soul which vibrated painfully through her whole system. She continued in the same excited tone:
"Felix is notoriously a fast young man. How can such a man feel love? And even if Helen's beauty, her youth, and her innocence should for a time get the better of his exhaustion, that would not last long. A man like him, thoroughlyblasé, never becomes again a real man, and can Helen ever love such a person? And is life worth anything without love? And can you prevent all the misery that must needs spring from such a match? I know----"
The young wife suddenly stopped and walked rapidly up and down the room. Then, after a short pause, she said:
"And what external advantages can such a match have? Felix has satisfied his excessive vanity at the expense of his fortune as well as of his health. His estates are mortgaged beyond their real value; and he has, as far as I know, no expectations."
"Except that in case Malte should die, which God prevent! he would inherit the Grenwitz fortune," said the baroness.
"Ah! indeed," replied Melitta, with a strange emphasis. This last remark of the baroness had presented the whole matter in a new light to the generous woman; it was a ray like the light from the dark lantern of the thief, which falls upon the strong-box he is about to steal. But she took good care not to let the baroness see what was going on in her heart, and continued in an unconcerned tone, throwing herself once more into the easy-chair:
"I hope Malte will not be so kind to the creditors of Felix as to die before his time. I see he is getting stronger visibly, and if you would only give the boy a little more liberty----"
"Liberty!" exclaimed the baroness. "Must I hear that word again? I give him as much liberty as a sensible mother ought to give her child. My opinion is that a man who, like Malte, will have a large fortune at his command, cannot learn too soon to obey, to economize, and to deny himself all that is superfluous and unnecessary. We have in our nephew Felix an example of the sad effects of too great indulgence."
"That is very true," said Melitta; "but----"
"We had, if I am not mistaken, agreed to avoid all discussion on the subject of education," said the baroness, with a smile of superiority. "I know what I am doing, and I hope, with the help of God, to carry it out successfully."
"By the way, did I tell you that I mean to send my Julius, a few days hence, to the college at Grunwald?"
"What a venture again!" replied the baroness. "That is the kind of public education, as they call it, which Baron Oldenburg enjoyed when he was young, and you see what the results are. To be sure, private tutors have their dark sides also."
"You have a new one, I believe?" said Melitta, who had risen and was leaning against the door-frame. "How is he?"
The baroness shrugged her shoulders.
"But what a question, to be sure," said Melitta, laughing. "He is probably like all the rest: terribly learned, awkward, pedantic, a bore. Bemperlein, Bauer--they are all after the same pattern. I should know a tutor at a hundred yards. Ah! who is that young man, crossing the lawn there with Bruno?"
The question remained unanswered, for at that moment Mademoiselle Marguerite entered the room, and the baroness rose to give her some orders. Melitta turned round, but the baroness had left the room with the words, "Pray excuse me!" Melitta was alone, and had to find the answer to her question for herself. She drew a little back behind the door and examined the form of the unknown young man.