Angelescu visibly annoyed, made answer,
"I am sorry, I did not wish Mademoiselle to see that I had taken the liberty of attempting her likeness without her permission, and I can only beg that she will accept the little sketch as a token that she bears me no ill will. As for the other, Your Highness, it was only an idle fancy of mine, and it is only by accident that it may seem to resemble you."
Ragna looked at the little sketches thoughtfully and said, "Count Angelescu, you were wrong in sketching me without my permission, but I will forgive that—especially as you have made me so pretty. As the Prince has some sketches of me, I will let you keep this, if you wish it, and I will keep the other."
But the Prince would have none of that.
"What, Mademoiselle, you wish to keep me before your eyes as a devil? Never in the world; I won't have it!"
In the end, Angelescu was persuaded to draw another portrait of the Prince with which to redeem the "Devil Sketch" which Ragna insisted on holding as hostage until it should be replaced by a better.
More than once, in the course of the afternoon, Angelescu pleaded that he had writing that must be attended to, official papers and reports that must be prepared, but Mirko refused to let him go.
"You can do all that later," he would say.
Ragna caught Angelescu glancing anxiously at him from time to time, as though suspecting him of some ulterior motive. The aide could hardly insist, however, especially after the episode of the sketches—indeed he had an uneasy feeling that the last word had not been said with regard to them, and that the Prince meant to turn the situation thus created to his own personal advantage. So the afternoon wore on, the Prince keeping the ball of conversation gaily rolling, nothing in his appearance giving the slightest hint that he thought of anything beyond the careless enjoyment of the passing hour.
The sun was nearing the horizon as they went below to prepare for dinner. A few light clouds flecked the sky, looking like the fleeces of wandering lambs.
"It will be a perfect evening," said Mirko, "and we shall have a full moon."
Ragna put on the same frock she had worn the evening before—it was her best—but to-night she turned it in a little more at the neck and bosom, and pinned on a piece of lace given her by her mother when she left home. Her skin showed white in the opening and her delicate throat rose from its frame like the stalk of a flower.
The Captain came to the saloon for dinner and sat at the head of the table, having Prince Mirko on his right and Angelescu on his left; Ragna sat by the Prince. All had good appetites and did full justice to the excellent fare provided.
The Prince had given orders that champagne be served from the very beginning and he made it his care to replenish Ragna's glass as often as she emptied it.
Captain Petersen, busy with his dinner and in entertaining his distinguished passengers to the best of his ability, noticed nothing, but Angelescu's eyes were grave as he observed the girl's flushed cheeks, and unnaturally bright eyes. He even ventured so far as to ask her whether she were fond of champagne, to which she answered innocently that she liked it very much but had never drunk much wine of any kind whatever.
Captain Petersen broke in with his genial roar. "So you like the champagne, Fröken Ragna? So do I! So do I! Not but what a little 'schnapps' in season, has its merits—still I suppose champagne is better for a young lady than 'schnapps'!"
Angelescu relapsed into silence; if the captain, who was, in a way the girl's guardian, saw nothing amiss, he himself would do no more. To do the Prince justice, he had no thought of making his neighbour take more than was good for her; he had no intention of doing her the slightest harm; he wished to give her pleasure and at the same time to enjoy himself. If in filling her glass he wore a slight air of bravado it was that Angelescu's evident distrust of him and his intentions had stirred up a certain obstinacy within him, and he was possessed by the desire to outrage the would be protector's feelings. Mirko had shrewdly guessed that Angelescu entertained a warmer regard for Ragna than he was willing to admit of to himself; that the assumption of the protector's role might not be wholly the disinterested or rather uninterested attitude that the Count wished it to appear, as that, when at the close of dinner Ragna went to her cabin for a wrap, he drew Angelescu aside and said to him:
"I wish you to understand once and for all, Otto, that I will not tolerate your interference and your silent criticism. It is all very well for you to think that because you are older than I, and because we have always been comrades you have the right to control me. I am your Prince, and you will do well to remember the fact."
Angelescu, his face burning, cut to the quick, saluted and answered stiffly.
"Your Highness shall be obeyed," then turned on his heel; but Mirko called him back, already regretting the sharpness of his tone and language towards his old playmate and faithful friend.
"Hold on, old man, don't take it like that! I didn't mean what I said, at least not all. You seem to think me a sort of villain in disguise, and you arrogate to yourself the responsibility for my conduct in every direction. You sat at table glaring at me as if I were trying to poison Mademoiselle. Now what is the matter with you?"
"I thought that Your Highness did not realize the fact that she is only a child and quite unused to champagne—"
"Did you not hear the Captain?"
"The Captain is a rough old sailor, unused to young girls; I thought—"
"You think too much, Otto. Besides, it's rather new for you to play the part of 'Squire of Dames' to wandering damsels—I believe the root of the matter is that you are in love with the girl, yourself. Why don't you marry her? You could, you know."
"Your Highness knows very well that I am not free to marry," said Angelescu in a low voice, a dark flush spreading over his face. The Prince knew well, as did everyone else, that his aide was bound, and had been for years, to a married woman of high rank, whose unhappy married life had been responsible for the forming of the liaison, and that now time and custom and a quixotic sense of moral obligation continued to bind the unfortunate Angelescu to the lady's chariot wheels, though any feeling he had had for her was long since dead.
Ragna's entrance put a stop to further explanations, and Angelescu excused himself, saying that he must attend to the neglected writing of the afternoon. So the other two were left with the deck to themselves.
It was a perfect evening, the full moon hung low in an almost cloudless sky and the broad silver pathway over the water looked like a carpet laid for a procession of fairies. Ragna hung over the rail in an ecstasy of appreciative joy.
"Oh, isn't it just like Heaven!" she murmured.
"I can't say," answered Mirko, "never having been there, but it would make a good setting for a love scene. Imagine it for a honeymoon!"
"I must answer like Your Highness," laughed Ragna, "never having had a honeymoon I can't very well imagine one."
"Then look at the lovers in the moon."
"Lovers in the moon!"
"What! have you never seen them?"
"I see only the hare, with his two long ears."
"Look again, the lady is on the right, and you see her head in profile, her lover has a beard—there, do you see?"
"No," said Ragna, "I still do not see."
"That is because your eyes have not been opened; when you have had a lover, you will see the Lovers in the moon."
Ragna laughed at the idea.
"Why should having a lover improve one's eyesight?" she asked.
"It will not improve your physical eyes, Mademoiselle, but it will open your spiritual eyes to the world; just now your heart is blind."
To this Ragna found no answer; she stood silent, her face turned up to the moon, still looking vainly for the Lovers. Mirko stood gazing at her tempted by her fairness, her simplicity, and the moonlight.
"Do you realize the delightfulness of this episode?" he asked her abruptly. "It will be like an oasis in the desert to look back on. I should like you to forget this evening, that we are anything but just our two selves; there is no Prince, there is no Fröken Andersen, we are just you and I and nothing more. Yesterday we met, to-morrow we part, probably for ever, so that there can be no thought of past or future to embarrass us. There is no yesterday and no to-morrow, no time and no limitation of space; we are all the world, we are quite alone and detached from everything, you and I and the moon!"
His eyes were fastened on hers and held them; she could not have moved away had she wished.
She answered in an embarrassed way:
"You wish to stop the hands of the clock for this evening?"
"Exactly—with your help."
The romance of the situation appealed to her.
"The clock has stopped," she announced gravely.
"Thank you," he murmured raising her hand to his lips.
Ragna laughed uneasily; it seemed to her that she was living in some fairy tale.
The Prince led her to a deck chair and drew up another beside it. From where they sat they could see the moon and the light upon the water, but they were screened from the companion-way door, and indeed from most of the deck, by the ventilator of the saloon and the shadow of a life-boat. It was unusually warm for the North Sea, especially for so early in the season, and Ragna found her heavy cloak oppressive.
"Take care you do not get cold," said the Prince as he helped her to loosen the clasp at the neck. The whiteness of her throat seemed like marble in the moonlight. Her hook had caught in her lace collar, and in disentangling it the Prince's fingers brushed her bosom; they gave her a tingling sensation and she started up.
"I beg your pardon," said Mirko; "it was not intentional, but if it had been would you resent it? Where is the harm, are we not friends?"
"Friends," said Ragna, "just friends. You must not do things like that."
"Then give me your hand. Has anyone ever read your palm? No?"
He took her hand lying idly on a fold of her cloak and held it up in the moonlight.
"I cannot see the lines, it is too dark, but your hand is beautiful, so soft, so tapering!"
He drew the tips of his fingers over her palm and had the satisfaction of seeing her shiver. She tried to draw her hand away, but he kept it.
"Ragna, little Ragna, there are many things, I should like to say to you, but I am afraid you would misunderstand me. Do you know what you are? You are the Sleeping Beauty, you are asleep, no one has come yet to wake you; you are waiting for the Prince."
He paused, stroking her hand. His touch seemed to magnetise her, for her hand lay passive within his and she made no effort to withdraw it as he leaned towards her. The music of his voice seemed to hold her enthralled,—perhaps the champagne she had drunk had something to do with it,—she had no volition, her will was asleep.
"Who will the 'Prince' be, Ragna? A fair-haired lover with cold blue eyes, or a Southerner—one who will burn you with his passion, who will reveal to you all the magic of love? Is it not worth everything to feel one's self awake, to live?"
The sense of his physical nearness almost overpowered her and she moved uneasily. Mirko's fingers had crept to her wrist and seemed to burn the tender skin.
"Are you afraid of me, Ragna?" he asked.
She answered that she was not, ashamed that he should think her timid and unsophisticated. If he talked to her in this way, it must be the way of the world, of his world. She felt that none of the men she had known would speak to her as he spoke—but then she could not imagine their doing so, without appearing extremely ridiculous. And then, she reflected the Prince and she were on the open deck,—there could be no harm, so she surrendered herself to the fascination of the moment.
"Ragna," the melodious voice at her ear murmured, "I could teach you so much, so very much that you do not know—so many things that you will never know if you marry one of your cold country men! I would teach you to live, dear, to live and to love; I could make your heart beat and your veins burn; I would hold you hard and fast in my arms,—or quite lightly, and under my caresses you would live—oh, Ragna, to see the light of Life in your sea-blue eyes, to feel your red lips learn to kiss, to feel your beautiful body quiver, as you learned the mystery of Love!"
In reality he had lost his head, he had let himself be led on by his passionate fancy,—at first only a playful desire to flatter the girl, to lead her on to graceful flirtation, but his hot blood had got the better of him, and as he proceeded, the voluptuous image called up by his words inflamed his senses and lost him to all sense of restraint or prudence. He seized the girl, for Ragna, dazed, intoxicated and fascinated by his daring speech, and by the magnetic suggestion of his desire, opposed no resistance to his encircling arms. He drew her to him, and covered her neck and bosom with burning kisses. She gasped half fainting, then he took her mouth, and her eyes opened wide at the revelation of a sensation the like of which she had never imagined.
But with the revelation came the awakening; with a frantic effort she broke from him and stumbled to the rail. The action brought him to himself and to a sense of shame.
"Oh, Ragna," he said, his voice hoarse with emotion. "What have I done! Pardon me! It was too much for me, your beauty, having you there, so near me! Ragna, speak to me, tell me that you forgive me!"
He moved towards her, but seeing her shrink away from him, he stopped. Ragna put out a trembling hand, and with a shaking voice said:
"Oh, why did you! Oh, you have spoiled it all!"
She turned to the rail, and hiding her face in her hands began to cry.
Mirko was really touched and concerned. He had no idea that a girl could take a kiss so seriously, it gave him the measure of her innocence. He came to her side and putting his hand on her shoulders tried to console her with awkward phrases, but she still sobbed on. At last he began to be annoyed and said rather sharply:
"What are you weeping so about anyway? Your life is not ruined, I have kissed you, but I have apologized—I would never have done so if I had known you would take it like this!"
Ragna looked up, bewilderment on her face. What! He could take it so lightly! Then it was not so terrible after all? The poor child had felt herself dishonoured for ever.
"But you will despise me for letting you kiss me!"
He was quick to seize the advantage.
"Despise you? Never in the world! What a little goose you are! What harm is there in a kiss? And don't worry about it, I took it without your consent—but you liked it—come now, be honest and admit that! I know you liked it, I felt it!"
He stopped, seeing that he was going too far. Ragna had turned away from him, her face burning. It was quite true, too true, she had felt herself respond. What right had she to be indignant, since she must acknowledge to herself that she had not resisted him, that she had not wished to.
His low vibrant voice continued:
"And one thing you can never change, never drive from your memory,—I have had your first kiss; you will never forget that. No woman ever forgets her first kiss, or her first lover:—"
He paused hearing footsteps approaching over the deck, and stepped to the girl's side.
"Someone is coming," he said; "for God's sake pull yourself together and remember that a kiss is not a crime. Come now, tell me you forgive me, quick!" His voice had an imperious note, and Ragna yielded to it; she turned to him, tears still shining on her long lashes in the moonlight.
"There, you do forgive me, it is understood?"
"Yes," she murmured.
"Pull your cloak up about your shoulders and hook it," he ordered and she obeyed.
The footsteps had by now made the tour of the deck and were approaching the sheltered nook; they rang loud in the silence. It was Captain Petersen and as he hove in sight, his cheerful voice woke the echoes:
"So here I find them as snug as you please! Well, well, a moonlight night and the deck of a good ship, and a pair of young folk to profit by it all—what more could one want?"
Mirko engaged him in conversation, and Ragna thus had time to steady her voice and regain control over her excited nerves. The effort was good for her, and she was glad of the Captain's arrival. So was the Prince, for the good man's coming tided over an awkward moment, as the "voyage de retour" is bound to be—however short the journey may have been.
"To-morrow, our journey together will be over," said the Captain. "To-morrow morning you will wake at Christiansand, after that little Ragna and I go on to Molde alone—if we pick up no other passengers. I am sorry Your Highness leaves us so soon—if ever you should wish a cruise in northern waters, the oldNorjeand I are at your service, Prince!"
"Thank you, Captain Petersen," said Mirko, "I have enjoyed this little trip exceedingly, thanks to your kind attentions and to Mademoiselle, and I wish I might promise to renew it in the near future—but I am not entirely my own master, you know."
Presently the Captain remarked that it was growing late, and Ragna, rising, said she would go to bed. The Captain wished her a hearty, if gruff "Good-night," but Mirko walked with her to the companion-way, and after kissing her hand, held it while he murmured in a low voice:
"You will never forget this evening, nor shall I—dear!"
With a final pressure he released her hand and Ragna went slowly down.
Captain Petersen grumbled to himself as he watched them.
"Pity the fellow is a Prince. Handsome couple they would make, handsome couple! After all, who knows, little Ragna is as pretty as a princess—he might do worse!"
Prince Mirko returned to him fumbling vainly in his pockets.
"Have you a match about you, Captain?" he asked, "I must have left my box below."
On a former occasion he had offered the Captain a cigarette from his case, but the old sea-dog had refused it, explaining that he would get no good out of a little paper stick, a pipe was the thing for him.
The Captain produced a box of matches and the Prince lit his cigarette. Seeing him disinclined for further conversation, the old sailor left him, and Mirko, leaning both elbows on the rail enjoyed his smoke while he reviewed the events of the evening. In his innermost heart he was a little ashamed of having given way to an impulse but then, he reflected complacently, there was no real harm done, and after all, what is a kiss? He was rather amazed at himself for giving the slightest importance to the occurrence. His thoughts turned again to Ragna.
"What a little witch it is, and as unsophisticated as a newborn babe; pretty, too, much too pretty, in the moonlight!" The fresh taste of her mouth came back to him, like a strawberry, just ripe, he thought, and the throbbing of her firm young bosom, as he had pressed her to him. What a mistress she would make! Then he laughed at himself—"What! take a mistress, a mere school girl at that, from the bosom of a respectable bourgeoise family! What a row there would be! No, my son," he admonished himself, "that game is not worth the candle!" He remembered too well the trouble subsequent to his latest escapade of the sort, and made a wry face. "No, no more luring of innocent maidens from their happy homes!" He thought of Ragna going to bed in her little cabin, and a wild desire came over him to follow her. The recollection of the kiss he had given her suddenly maddened him. His pulses beat strongly and rang in his ears. He must have her, he felt, must have her in spite of everything and he started towards the companion-way, but before he reached it shame seized him, and thrusting his hands savagely into his greatcoat pockets he strode up and down the deck, fighting the impulse.
"Am I lost to all sense of decency?" he murmured, "What has come over me?"
He walked until he was tired out, then went below and locked himself into his state-room.
Ragna, as soon as she reached her cabin, took down the oil lamp from its swinging bracket and carrying it to the small mirror studied her face. Was this creature with gleaming eyes, rosy cheeks, red mouth and loosened hair the prim little Ragna of but a few hours since? This looked more like the head of some young Bacchante, wine flushed and triumphant. Indeed the "Princess" slept no longer, the spell was broken and Ragna knew it. She replaced the lamp and undressed slowly, her thoughts running tumultuous riot. She was astonished at finding herself neither indignant nor ashamed—all that had passed. It seemed to her that she had entered upon a new life, a door had opened upon a heretofore unknown country, and many things came into perspective, that she had not understood before. She had crossed the dividing line, she was no longer a child, Eve had tasted of the apple.
As she lay in her berth some of the Prince's sayings came into her mind, "an oasis in the desert," "there is no to-morrow and no yesterday," and for the moment she hugged the thought, little dreaming how insidious it was to prove. Who was to tell her that some day Eve's apple would prove to be an Apple of Sodom?Carpe diemwas the Prince's avowed motto, and was she already a convert and had she forgotten her own answer, "Somebody has to bear the consequences"? She was too young though, to realise that every act, no matter how insignificant, how detached apparently from the main trend of life, has far-reaching consequences, cropping out when we least expect them, bearing in their wake the most extraordinary changes.
How was she to know that the kiss on deck in the moonlight bore in it the seed of her future life. Her lips burned, and she felt, in imagination, the pressure of Mirko's arms about her,—but at the same time she was curiously conscious that this was not love, or not yet. She felt, but could not define the distinction. Still she was not ashamed, being still borne up by the wave of elemental impulse; she had no room as yet for introspection and self blame—indeed they might never come. The timid, untried girl of yesterday had vanished, a new, passionate Ragna had taken her place.
Lars Andersen met his daughter at Molde. He seemed to have grown older, and his face had a care-worn look. "The Grandmother was ill," he said; "she had been ailing for some time, but now was bedfast and could not live long."
Though he was truly glad to welcome Ragna home again, his undemonstrative manner gave hardly a hint of it and the girl felt her joy at seeing him effectually repressed and chilled.
At dinner with her father and the Captain she sat almost silent until the old sailor rallied her on her dulness.
"You had more to say for yourself, Fröken, when the Prince was with us!"
"The Prince! What Prince?" asked Andersen.
"Prince Mirko of Montegria, who crossed with us from Hamburg to Christiansand, on his way to the Court of Russia." The Captain went on to give a roseate account of the Prince, his condescension, his amiability, and wound up with:
"Little Ragna entertained him as though she had been a court-lady, and you may well be proud of her!"
Andersen frowned; he knew more of men and of the ways of the world than did the good Captain, who in many respects was but a grown-up child, and he was displeased that his young and inexperienced daughter should have been thrown into such companionship with a strange young man, prince or no prince, as the Captain's account suggested.
Still, he did not wish to hurt the feelings of his old friend, and since it was over and done with, the less said about the matter, the better. Ragna, watching his face, guessed with newborn intuition the trend of his thoughts, and with feminine diplomacy changed the subject, leading the talk to her stay at the convent and entertaining the two men with a lively account of the nuns, and of her school-fellows.
Her father studied her with a clearing face.
"What a child it still is," he thought, "this Prince Mirko nonsense has rolled off her mind like water off a duck's back!" So he mused, and putting aside his cares, encouraged her to continue her chatter. The Captain was delighted to see his friend unbend, and joined his efforts to Ragna's to keep the ball rolling.
So the evening passed merrily enough and it was not till the girl was alone in her room that she let herself go. Rather scornfully she thought:
"Oh, yes, they all think me a child! I am nearly nineteen, and they think I have learned nothing but French verbs and embroidery. Well, let them think it, better so! But if they knew, if they could guess!"
She shook out her long golden hair—it fell nearly to her knees—she slipped out of her clothes and winding her long gauze scarf about her, looked at herself in the glass, turning this way and that. Her body, wonderfully white and firm had slight graceful curves like those of a young nymph. She played with her hair, draping it about her shoulders and bosom—truly this was a new Ragna! Then a sudden shame came over her; she put on her nightgown, and blowing out the candle, plunged into bed and lay blinking in the darkness. The thought she had had was not: "I am beautiful," but "Hewould think me beautiful."
"This must not go on," she said to herself. "You were a fool, Ragna, to let him kiss you—you are a fool to think about him at all. Why can't you let it be just an episode,—as he said? Of course he was only playing with you. What do you suppose it meant to him to say a few complimentary things to a little country girl—and kiss her?" But she thought of the quiver in his deep voice, as he talked to her, on deck that last evening, the passionate vibration of it that had fascinated and stirred her, body and soul. She thought of his burning lips on hers and his arms straining her to him so closely that it hurt her. No, in that moment at least he had been sincere, he had loved her! The formal leave-taking under the eyes of Angelescu and the Captain had meant nothing. Oh! why could she not have been a princess—now she would never see him again! Great tears welled up in her eyes and rolled down, wetting her pillow, but she did not wipe them away. She was thinking how dull it would be at home—how unendurable after this one brief glimpse into the reality of life and emotion. Her innermost soul rebelled; she threw out her arms, then strained them to her bosom.
"I want to live, to live, to live!" she cried to herself.
When she was calmer her clear mind reasserted its power as she reflected that after all she was very young still, that the future might bring much.
"It shall," she promised herself. "I will make it! I will not, I will not be buried alive!"
She had not stopped to ask herself if she loved Prince Mirko; as a fact she did not, but he had awakened her to life, he was identical to her with Life and emotion. The mere fact of his being a stranger to her, quite outside her limited field of experience, of his being a Prince and heir to a throne, endowed him in her eyes with a halo of romance. In default of a real hero, he would become her dream-hero, the axle round which would revolve the wheel of her intimate thought.
In the morning, when dressed for the homeward journey, she joined her father in the dining-room; she presented to his eyes the same innocently childlike expression she had worn the evening before, and he kissed her smooth brow, little dreaming of the thoughts which filled her head.
As they drew nearer home, and the familiar mountains, the Trolltinder with its jagged crest, and oddly shaped Romser Horn, loomed up against the sky, Ragna felt her spirits rising. The air was cool and crisp, the little horse trotted briskly along, shaking his short stiff mane, the meadows were carpeted with flowers: forget-me-nots, pansies, and the purple swamp orchids, the pine-trees filled the air with balsam. It was home, the country of her birth. They rounded the last turn in the long road; the sun was setting and the long rays illuminated the summits of the mountains which her childish imagination had peopled with gnomes and trolls.
Now they were turning in at the wooden gateway—another few minutes and there was the long low cinnamon-coloured house, smoke rising hospitably from the chimneys, behind it the stables and sod-roofed cottages, and on the steps stood a welcoming group, mother, the sisters. "Oh, how they have grown," thought Ragna, "and there is Aunt Gitta too!" she cried. Behind them stood the servants, smiling and excited.
Almost before thestulkjarrehad stopped, Ragna was out over the wheel, embracing them all in turn, laughing and trying to answer a dozen questions at once.
Fru Andersen held her daughter at arm's length, to see her better.
"It is my 'little' Ragna no longer," she wailed. "You are taller than I, and you have changed, dear—you went away a child, you come back a woman!"
Her husband interrupted her, calling for the servants to take in Ragna's luggage, and the good woman's further comments, if there were any, were lost in the bustle that ensued.
The days that followed were occupied with filling in the gap of the past two years. All had much to ask, and Ragna was kept busy answering their questions. Fru Andersen and Fru Boyesen were most interested in the life at the convent, and the latter especially examined Ragna thoroughly as to the studies pursued and the accomplishments acquired.
The sisters, Lotte and Ingeborg, wished to hear about the Prince,—a Prince being to them almost as mythical a being as the old gods they had read of in their mythology; they imagined him robed in ermine, his manly brow decorated by a coronet. They never tired of returning to the subject, but were much disappointed by Ragna's matter of fact story, and the Prince lost much of his prestige in their eyes when they learned that he dressed and spoke like an ordinary mortal.
"And you talked to him just as if he were one of us?" asked Lotte in an awe-struck voice. "You really did and you were not a bit scared, not one bit?"
"Of course not, you silly little goose!" laughed Ragna, as if conversation with princes were an everyday occurrence to her. She was not above airing her recently acquired graces before these country mice.
"What did you say to him? What did he talk to you about?" chimed in Ingeborg.
"Oh, about the weather and the gulls and the moon—anything."
"I don't call that very much," said Lotte, much disappointed. "I should have thought you would talk about wars and court-balls, and things like that."
"Oh, dear, no,—one doesn't talk about those things, it would seem affected and silly."
"And didn't he make love to you? They always do in stories," queried Lotte, then seeing her sister blush. "I believe he did—and you're too mean to tell. What did you talk about anyway, that makes you blush like that?" she added with a child's terrible perspicacity.
"I'm blushing at your curiosity, that's what I'm blushing at," returned Ragna, angry at having betrayed herself. "And if you went to the Sisters they'd tell you it was ill-bred to ask so many questions and pry into what isn't your business!" Afraid of betraying herself further she got up and left them.
The three girls had been sitting on a rock, not far from the house, where they had long been accustomed to take their work on summer afternoons. The younger girls stared at each other thunderstruck, as Ragna walked away.
"Well," said Lotte, "it's rude to ask a civil question, and it's all right to get up and go off in a temper. What is the matter with her anyway? I'm sure I wish the old Prince had never spoken to her at all, it has turned her head, being taken notice of, that's what it is!"
Ingeborg said nothing; she merely bit off her thread reflectively as she followed Ragna's retreating figure with her eyes. Less impulsive than Lotte, and endowed with a finer intuition, she felt that if Ragna were keeping something from them it would be useless to try and drag it out of her, and not only that, she realized as Lotte did not, that each of us has his or her own little "Secret Garden," of memory and fancy, of which no hand, however intimate, may open the gate. But vaguely conscious of this, herself, she felt how useless it would be to explain it to Lotte, whose frank curiosity knew no such restraint.
Lotte stitched on viciously, indignant at the snub she had received, and giving vent to her feelings in intermittent monologue.
"She thinks us ninnies or children, that's what she does, but she's not so awfully grown up, after all! She's not nineteen yet, and I'm sixteen, and you're nearly fifteen. Oh, yes, we're not good enough for her Ladyship to talk to; she's used to Princes and Kings and Popes, she is! And she thinks she has come back to teach us her fine French manners!"
Ragna walked on, away from her sisters and away from the house. Her path lay some way through the woods, then across two or three pastures and out to a rocky point overlooking the fjord. She marched on, looking neither to the right nor to the left, consumed with vexation for having been so easily led on to retort. Of course Lotte had been annoying, but she had always been a bundle of curiosity. And how sharp the child was! "I must be a transparent fool," thought poor Ragna, "if any child can see through me like that!"
As she crossed the third pasture someone hailed her; she looked up, and saw, sitting on a rock under a tree, her Aunt Gitta, knitting industriously, a sheaf of flowers lying on the ground beside her. Ragna went to her, and she indicated a place on the boulder beside her.
"Sit down, Ragna," she said, "I have been wishing for a chance to talk to you alone."
Ragna obediently seated herself, and drawing the flowers to her, began sorting them and making them up into bouquets. Fru Boyesen coughed once or twice, as though in doubt how to begin. She looked at her niece in a tentative way, but the girl was seemingly intent on her flowers, and gave no assistance.
Finally in a rather embarrassed manner, she began by asking Ragna what she thought of doing.
"Doing, Aunt Gitta?" asked Ragna, lifting her head in surprise, "I had not thought of doing anything!"
"Then your father has not told you?"
"He has told me nothing,—what is there to tell?"
"You have been away for two years, and I suppose no one wished to worry you, but the fact is," Aunt Gitta lowered her voice as if about to reveal some terrible secret,—and really, to her practical mind anything connected with money-loss was terrible,—"the fact is that your father has lost money in several ways and the estate is mortgaged!"
Ragna gazed at her with wide eyes; this explained then, her father's anxious look, the small changes in the way of living, the thread-bareness, slight as yet, of things in general. She had put it down to the Grandmother's illness—but again that had not explained the fewer horses in the stables and the simpler fare.
"Oh, poor father!" exclaimed Ragna.
"Oh, yes," said Fru Boyesen, "but it is partly his own fault; he would not take my advice, he made some imprudent investments, and of course he has had bad luck with the horses, this year of all years. Three good foals lost, and Green Hunter broke his leg and had to be shot. But that is not the point; it is this, when your Grandmother dies, and she cannot live long, poor woman, her income goes with her, and what your father and mother will do then, I do not know. Of course your father can't afford to send Ingeborg and Lotte away to school as he has sent you—and it is better for them that he can't, they can help at home and your mother need keep fewer servants. Now as to you, you are of no earthly use in the house, you know nothing about cheese and butter-making, nor of practical housekeeping. Your fine embroidery and piano playing and French and Italian won't help you here, and I know you don't want to be a burden." She paused to wipe her glasses before turning the heel in her stocking.
Ragna had listened to her, leaning her head on her hand and her elbow on her knee, the flowers quite forgotten. Being so young she was rather exhilarated than depressed by the implied suggestion that she must fend for herself.
"Don't you think, Aunt Gitta, that I might teach?"
"Teach whom? Where? One, two, three, four, um-um,—Who wants to learn,—five, six and seven,—French here? There now, I've lost count, I must begin all over again! Don't interrupt me for five minutes."
Fru Boyesen said this intentionally in order to give Ragna time to take the situation in. The girl knew that her Aunt was quite correct: who indeed, out in the country would wish to learn anything she could teach? When she was sure the five minutes were up, she spoke again, timidly.
"I meant in a town, Aunt Gitta, or I could be a governess."
"Teach in a town! Where are your certificates, my dear?"
It was true, of certificates Ragna had none but those of elementary study. The convent gave no certificates. Her face fell.
"And as for governessing,—my niece a governess? An Andersen a governess? Never."
"Well, then, Aunt Gitta, what can I do? You say yourself I can't live on here and be a burden." She had reached the point her Aunt had meant her to reach from the start.
"Listen, Ragna," she said kindly, "you know you have always been my favourite niece, you are the one who takes most after our side of the family. Now, my child, this is my proposition,"—she took Ragna's hand and held it, with a fine disregard of her knitting. "My idea is this: I have no children and I am often lonely in my house,—it is too large for one woman. Now I think the best thing would be for you to come and live with me. I should look after you and give you an allowance as if you were my own daughter, and I should consider you as such.—No, don't speak yet, let me finish. I have spoken of this plan to your parents; of course they would rather keep you with them, but I pointed out to them how foolish it would be to throw away such a chance for a purely sentimental scruple. I said to them: 'The girl is grown, she is of no use to you here, and she should marry—but who? With her new ideas she won't take up with any man from these parts, she is not the kind of a girl who can marry a farmer and be happy! With me she will have the advantages of city life, and I shall keep my eye on her and her chances.' So they said they would leave it to you; if you wish to go with me, well and good,—if not, you may stay with them and weigh them down!" She stopped, searching the girl's face, but Ragna did not answer at once, nor jump at the proposition as the good lady had expected.
Indeed, Ragna was by no means sure of her own mind; but a few days since, she had vowed that she would not submit to being buried alive, and yet before this most unexpected chance of escape from the monotony of country life she hesitated. An unaccountable repugnance to leaving home again, seized her—perhaps the mere spirit of contradiction called up by her Aunt's certainty as to her answer. Besides it seemed to her like a sort of treachery, an evidence of moral cowardice, to desert her parents at this juncture. But then, as her Aunt had said, what could she do to help them, at home? Nothing. On the other hand, if she accepted her Aunt's offer, and the arrangement proved impossible, she would be better situated to find employment in a city like Christiania. She knew Fru Boyesen's determined character, her love of ordering the lives of others, and doubted if life with her would be bearable for long. If it were not for that! Then she reproached herself for ingratitude—was this the way to receive such a generous offer?
"Well?" asked Fru Boyesen.
"Aunt Gitta," said Ragna slowly, choosing her words, "it is very, very good of you to want me, and if Father and Mother tell me they do not need me, I shall be glad to accept your offer."
"Well then, that's settled," said her Aunt cheerfully, "only you don't seem as pleased as you might. It's not every girl has such chances come her way, let me tell you!"
The girl leaned forward impulsively and kissed her Aunt who returned the embrace amply, and they sat in silence for a short time, until Fru Boyesen's lively tongue got the better of her. She launched into a lengthy description of her life in Christiania and of the neighbours and friends, but Ragna heard little; her thoughts were busy with the new life opening before her, as she mechanically finished tying up the flowers. As in a dream she heard fragments,—details of Fru Hendersen's illness that had puzzled all the doctors, and why the Klaad girls wore blue stockings with all their frocks, and how much Ole Bjornsten had paid for his new carriage—"Most extravagant I call it,"—till her Aunt finally shook out her completed stocking and rose, brushing the moss from her skirts.
"You are a good girl, Ragna," she said commendingly, "and you have learned to talk quite interestingly."
Ragna smiled but made no comment, so they wended their way home, Aunt Gitta looming up large in front, her skirts held high displaying a well-filled pair of worsted stockings—she boasted of always knitting her own,—ending in stout elastic-sided boots. Ragna followed her, outwardly meek, but inwardly convulsed with her relative's appearance, and wondering what would happen, should the bull have been in his usual pasture, for the good lady confessed to a taste for bright colours and affected a cathedral-window style of dress, and the combination she had evolved to-day was wonderful to behold. Her dress was of royal purple, over which miniature rising suns made splotches of white, her bonnet was a deep, rich blue, while a small scarlet shawl decorated her portly shoulders.
"I hope to goodness she won't try to dress me in her own style!" thought Ragna.
As they neared the house it was evident that something had happened; there was a confusion of people rushing to and fro and a servant was officiously closing the shutters of the upper rooms.
Ingeborg, standing in the doorway flew to meet them as they reached the gate.
"Oh, Aunt Gitta! Oh, Ragna!" she exclaimed in a loud hoarse whisper, looking at the same time frightened and important. "I've been looking for you everywhere! It happened an hour ago, and where you've ever been—"
Fru Boyesen took the girl by the shoulders and shook her.
"What is it? Can't you speak out? Don't beat about the bush like a fool!"
"Grandmother's dead" said the child, boldly, and burst into tears.
Fru Boyesen pushed her aside and ran into the house and up to her mother's room. It was as Ingeborg had said, the old woman had quietly passed away. Her daughter-in-law, sitting in the room, had not seen when it happened,—she only noticed after a time that the place seemed unusually silent, as when a clock in a living-room stops its ticking, and going over to the bed, she saw that the old woman was no longer breathing. She felt for a pulse in vain, and a mirror held to the mouth remained unclouded, so she had drawn the sheet up over the still, white face and called the family.
Ragna and Ingeborg followed their Aunt up the stairs and into the room. Lars Andersen stood by the bed, holding the dead woman's hand; his sister had thrown herself upon her knees beside him; at the foot of the bed stood Lotte and her mother, and by them Ragna took her place. Ingeborg stopped in the doorway, sobbing loudly with hysterical excitement, and also with honest grief, for she sincerely loved her grandmother. Lars Andersen turned in his place and in a low, stern voice reprimanded her.
"Stop that boisterous sobbing, Ingeborg! I am ashamed of you! Go to your room until you can control yourself!"
Ragna quietly slipped out and led the weeping child away—none of the others had even turned a head.
"Oh, Ragna," sobbed Ingeborg, as they reached the little room with its dormer window, "isn't it dreadful? Only this morning I was sitting with her and she said the knitting hurt her eyes, and she would finish it to-morrow—and it was for me—and now she is de-e-ad—" her voice rose in a wail.
Ragna took her into her arms, and sitting down, drew her on her knees.
"Oh, Ingeborg," she said, "you mustn't cry so, indeed you mustn't! We ought to be glad she died peacefully like that. Of course it would have been awful if it had happened when you were alone with her this morning."
"It isn't that, it isn't that at all," said Ingeborg, in an awed voice. "It's just dreadful that she should have been alive like you or me only an hour ago,—and now she is dead like a light when it is blown out. She was here and now she is gone—she's nowhere!"
"Oh, Ingeborg, you shouldn't talk like that!" cried Ragna, shocked. "Her soul has gone to God in Heaven!"
"Do you really believe that, Ragna?" asked the child. "I don't,—I don't care what they say. When Balke, my dog, died, I wanted to bury him and put up a tombstone, but the Pastor wouldn't let me; he said animals have no souls and Christian burial is only for people. Balke knew lots more than ever so many people; he had a great deal more soul than a baby. When do babies get their souls? I know they don't have them when they are born, they're too stupid,—and so when do they get them? I said if Balke wouldn't go to Heaven I didn't believe there was one at all, so there!"
She sat up with flushed face and looked at her sister defiantly.
Ragna did not know what to answer; she had never seriously questioned any religious doctrine that had been taught her and Ingeborg's revolt both shocked her and found her unprepared.
"Aren't you ashamed to talk like that, Ingeborg Andersen?" she said indignantly. "Of course there is a Heaven and a Hell, and perhaps good dogs have a Heaven of their own—I don't know! If there is one, I'm sure Balke went there," she ended lamely.
Ingeborg was watching her with curious unchildlike eyes.
"You don't believe in Heaven any more than I do," she asserted. "If you did you'd talk about it differently. People have told you things and you have just gone on believing them to save yourself the trouble of thinking."
She slipped from Ragna's knees and crossed to the window, where she stood looking out; she left her sister thunderstruck. The child had spoken the truth—but how had she known, by what intuition had she understood? Ragna went over to her, and putting an arm about her, stood some minutes in silence before she asked:
"What made you say that, Ingeborg?"
"I don't know, but it is so and you can't deny it. Oh, I often know what people think about when they don't know themselves, and I often know, too, what is going to happen to people. Grandmother told me I was fey; you see I'm the youngest and I'm the seventh daughter and so was mother, and those people always are, Grandmother said so."
"How can you know? What do you do?"
"Oh, nothing, I just look into people's eyes, and sometimes I see things, and sometimes I don't."
"Can you tell me what will happen to me?" asked Ragna in a low voice.
Ingeborg turned and looked long into her sister's eyes. The sun had sunk below the mountains and a cool grey light pervaded the place. She stood motionless a long time, then she passed her hand over her forehead and half turned away.
"I don't want to tell you, Ragna," she said.
But Ragna insisted, she would know, she was not superstitious; she only wanted to see if it would come true.
"It will come true—it always does," said Ingeborg sadly.
"Then tell me, I'm not afraid."
Ingeborg hesitated, then seeing that Ragna was in earnest:
"I will tell some of it, but I do not see very clearly. You are going away, to begin with, I see you with Aunt Gitta and there are many people but their faces are shadows. Then you go away farther still, where the sun is hot—it dazzles you, and there is a man—or is it a greyhound?" Ragna started. "Yes, it is a man, but there is a greyhound and a hare and some stone arches, and you are very sad after that, Ragna. But the man goes away and there is another man with eyes like coals, and he hates you—he puts chains on you, and you can't break them, and you never come home any more—" Her voice died away.
Ragna stood spellbound: a greyhound and a hare—her dream! And the rest, the chains, the man with the burning eyes! She shivered; it was as though the shadow of a dark wing had passed over her, her flesh crept. Neither spoke for some time; it grew darker.
A maidservant entered the room with a light. Ragna shook herself to throw off the incubus. The maid began to speak of the Grandmother, of how good she had been, and the girls looked at one another ashamed—they had quite forgotten it all for the moment.
"Come, Ingeborg," said Ragna, "let us go down again." Hand in hand they descended the stair.
The funeral was set for the day week and the intervening time seemed interminable, at least to the younger members of the family. Fru Boyesen was invaluable; her practical good sense which not even grief could impair, employed itself in arranging the thousand and one details incident to a death.
Ragna took her turn with her elders in watching at night in the death-chamber. She had begged to do it and had obtained permission, but when the night came and she was left alone in the terrible silent room, a single candle burning on the table beside her, casting grotesque and fitful shadows over the motionless form on the bed, and over the walls, a kind of panic seized her. She wished she had not persisted in obtaining the vigil. It was horribly lonely, more so than she could have imagined by day. She could hear the ticking of the tall clock on the landing outside the door; no other sound came from the sleeping house—it was like sitting in a funeral vault she thought. An owl was hooting dismally in a tree far off and the mournful noise had an uncanny sound in the pervading stillness. The window was partly open and occasionally a puff of air would make the candle gutter, and then the shadows moved and took on unearthly shapes.
Ragna tried to keep her mind on the book her mother had left with her, but without avail; her mind would wander, and her eyes turned continually to the bed in the corner—it was as though the dead woman called her, requiring insistently her whole attention. She was a healthy girl, not in the least morbid, but the stillness, the tension wore on her nerves until the strain became unbearable. She looked uneasily to right and left and over her shoulder as though she expected to see strange and grisly shapes emerging from the shadows. A kind of panic seized her; she felt as if she must scream. A terrible unreasoning fear overcame her, the horror of the presence of the dead body submerged her spirit, a curious stiffness possessed her limbs and seemed to bind her to her chair; she felt the roots of her hair crawl, and her fingers worked convulsively. The book she had been reading dropped to the floor with a bang. The noise broke the spell and she gave a long shuddering sigh; she raised her hand to her forehead and was surprised to find it wet.
"This will never do," she said to herself resolutely, and rising, she went to the window. There was no moon, but everything showed clearly in the light northern night. The trees near the house rose in a dark stippled mass against the sky. Everything was peaceful and quiet, only the drowsy twittering of birds broke the silence from time to time; the owl had gone. Ragna stood at the window breathing the chill night air and let the peace of the night sink into her soul. When she was quite calm she closed the window and taking the candle walked resolutely over to the bed and stood there, looking. The face of the dead woman wore an expression of ineffable peace—a repose almost inhuman in its detachment. Her white hair was brushed in smooth bandeaux over her brow, her features, ashy grey with violet shadows, appeared almost unreal, as though carved in some strange alabaster. Her hands, waxen and stiff with bluish nails lay folded on her bosom. The flickering light of the candle lent no semblance of life. Ingeborg's words came to Ragna's mind. Where indeed was the spirit that had animated this clay? And to the question she found no answer. In the actual presence of death the formally taught maxims regarding a future life—a life of reward and punishment—fell to the ground; the flimsiness of all speculation on the Life hereafter appeared naked to the girl's eyes.
"No one can know, no one can tell," she thought, "it is a mystery, but at least one may find peace—she has found peace!" She stooped and reverently kissed her grandmother's cold hands, then she returned to her seat.
The moment had been a crucial one, for in that instant of putting her conventional belief to the touchstone of reality, it had failed and she recognized the fact; the bed-rock on which her childish faith had been built fell from beneath her feet, for, if she lost her belief in part, disbelief in all must follow. A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, but the weak link in her chain was not, as she thought, the insufficient grounds for belief, rather the formality of her teaching; to her the "letter which killeth" had indeed become dead, and of the "Spirit which giveth light" she knew as yet nothing. This one thing she knew, that never again should she be afraid of the dead or of death. "It is peace," she said to herself softly, "it is like sleep when one is very, very tired."
When morning had come and they relieved her at her post, she walked out to the high rocky promontory from which she could see the sea. The day was still young and the grass and bushes were covered with dewdrops. Ragna gathered a handful of flowers as she went and pressed their wet freshness to her face. She felt grave and old; the bright sunlight seemed like an insult in the fact of the long night and the silent darkened room. She seated herself on a grey lichen-covered boulder overlooking the water. The fjord was like glass, as far as the eye could reach and it reflected the surrounding mountains like a mirror; to her tired eyes it was unreal, like a pictured scene. As she sat there, a breeze sprang up and tiny ripples ruffled the surface of the water, spreading from shore to shore. The reflections of tree and crag shivered into a thousand fragments. Up the bay a boat was putting out from the little village. Ragna idly watched the rise and fall of the oars. A girl was rowing, swaying to the rhythm of the stroke; she was standing and her red bodice stood out against the background, a vivid patch of colour. She was singing and her clear voice rose in plaintive minor notes. Smoke began to rise from the village chimneys, and a dog barked.
It was Life going on, taking no heed of those who fall by the wayside, Life, the cruel Wheel, crushing the weak, casting to one side those who would clog the onward march—life, the Life of the world to whom the individual existence, the individual pain and strife are of no importance; life continuing the same throughout the ages, no matter who dies, no matter who suffers.
"The mountains do not change, nor the sky, no matter who comes or goes," thought Ragna, "and everything goes on just the same, no one is necessary, continuity is everything. If we suffer, if we die, what does it matter? I shall die, we shall all die, and in a few years it will make no difference to anyone; there is no real change, only people come and go. That is the real eternity—just the same old round, over and over again, and on forever." She sat a long time, her chin supported in her palms, her eyes, steel blue, gazing out steadily over the New World made manifest to her.
In after years she often thought of the hours spent there by the fjord in the early morning, and the memory nearly always brought peace to her heart. Her own troubles seemed so trivial, so transient in comparison with the age old changelessness of life, her own life and destiny so unimportant in the endless chain of humanity.
When all was over, Ragna accompanied her aunt to Christiania. She was given a comfortable room on the first floor and soon settled into the pleasant regularity of the household. It was very quiet—there could be no entertaining until the period of mourning should be over—but intimate friends often came in the afternoon and evening, and very pleasant circles formed about the cheerful lamp. Fru Bjork was a frequent visitor and made much of Ragna. The girl had taken her fancy when they had journeyed to Paris together and moreover she was convinced that the friendship of a serious-minded girl like Ragna was excellent for Astrid. The girls kept up a lively correspondence and in a few months Astrid would be coming home. Ragna looked forward to her coming with some impatience; though they had actually but little in common, there was at least the mutual experience of school-life, and since Ragna's awakening experience, much that had been incomprehensible to her in Astrid's nature now became clear.
"She knew more than I did about things—and I was proud of my ignorance," she reflected. She was as yet unable to realize the difference between Astrid's shallow feminine coquetry and her own awakening consciousness of womanhood.
Fru Boyesen and Fru Bjork had been schoolmates and although differing as to character, were excellent friends, owing to the ties of life-long association and a common point-of-view in social matters. Each of the ladies entertained a tolerant pity for the foibles of the other, which is perhaps the most comfortablemodus vivendito be found.
Ragna's time was well occupied. By her own wish she continued her studies under the best professors obtainable—that part was Aunt Gitta's doing. Literature interested her more than anything else and after a time she was encouraged to try her hand at writing a series of short essays. To her great delight a well-known review accepted them, and this materially affected her relations with her aunt. The good lady had heretofore regarded her as a child to be exhaustively directed and controlled, but a niece whose writings were published was quite a different person in her estimation. In common with many people of prosaic mind she had a genuine respect for intellectual attainments, therefore, Ragna was promoted to a position of semi-independence, her working hours were held sacred, and to give her more time for her literary pursuits such household tasks as had fallen to her share were removed as incompatible. This was a mistake, for the homely work would have been a wholesome antidote to the romantic trend of the girl's mind. Withdrawn from the ordinary business of the house, she lived an unreal life made up of fanciful imaginings which her philosophical and literary studies were unable to counteract. She had no experience of actualities to control and place in their proper perspective the various social and philosophical theories which formed the greater part of her reading. Consequently with nothing to counter-balance the paramount influence of the moment, she swayed to the mental attitude of whatever author she happened to be reading, being in turn, or imagining herself a Swedenborgian, an agnostic, an atheist, and a mystic.
She was cynical with Voltaire and romantic with Byron and De Musset. For a considerable period the "categorical imperative" haunted her days and nights, and during three months at least. "Also sprach Zarathustra" was the sun whose rising and setting determined her getting up and her sitting down. But Nietsche did not last long; his doctrine was too foreign to her nature and she returned to Kant as to an old friend.
Fru Boyesen was not a little worried by these moral and spiritual waverings, but never having known anything of the kind herself, was unable to cope with the case. She took a purely material view of the situation. They were now out of mourning, but Ragna seemed to have little taste for society in general, and none for that of young men; she preferred her books, she said, when her aunt rallied her on the subject. Now Fru Boyesen had been at some pains to obtain for her niece a circle of eligible masculine acquaintances; she had made it known that she considered the girl as her adopted daughter and would make her her heiress, and there was no lack of eligible suitors; so when Ragna had sent two of the most desirable firmly but kindly about their business with no better excuse than that they did not happen to be congenial to her, her aunt felt that it was time to interfere.
She would have considered either of them a most desirable husband for her niece—was not young Nansen tall and handsome as well as the only son of wealthy parents? And was not Peter Näss a most estimable young man and well situated to make a wife comfortable and happy? What was Ragna waiting for? A white blackbird?
Ragna threw her arms about her aunt's neck.
"Dear Aunt Gitta, I am so happy with you! I don't want to marry ever, I think!"
"Not want to marry, child? You are crazy! It is a woman's duty to marry and rear children—the Bible says so. Perhaps you think you are in love with some other young man?"
No, Ragna was in love with no one.
"Well then, why did you refuse Ole Nansen?"
"Because I did not love him."
"Oh, stuff and nonsense! Not love him! Very probably you don't, but that is not essential, not one woman in a hundred 'loves' her husband until after she has married him. The important part is that everything else should be suitable. There's nothing you dislike in him, is there?"
"No, Auntie."
Fru Boyesen raised her eyes to Heaven.
"Well, all I can say is, you'll never get such a chance again; young Nansen is a man in a thousand."
"Are you so anxious to be rid of me, Auntie dear?"
"No, of course not, goosie," she kissed the girl affectionately, "but I should like to see you married, in a home of your own. It would be much better for you, I am sure. I don't really approve of this one-sided life you are leading."
"But, Auntie dear, how could I marry a man who takes no interest in my work? These young men are very nice and all that, but we have absolutely nothing in common. I asked Peter Näss the other day what he thought of the Kantian philosophy, and he said he had never thought about it at all. These young men never like to talk about serious subjects and they refuse to take me seriously when I do."
"Ah, Ragna," said the elder woman, "when you have a home and children to look after, you will find that all your philosophy goes to the wall."
"But that is just what I am afraid of, why should I stifle all my higher instincts in a commonplace marriage?"
She had not told her aunt, however, what was the real matter with her. The fact was that try as she might, she could not rid herself of the memory of Prince Mirko and that moonlit crossing of the North Sea. His kiss remained imprinted on her lips and his idealized image on her heart. She mentally compared with him the young men of her acquaintance and weighing them in the balance, found them woefully wanting.
One evening, sitting alone with her in the drawing-room, young Nansen had kissed her—the effect had been electrical. Furiously rubbing her offended cheek, she had reprimanded him in such terms of withering scorn that the poor young man fled, never to call again. Afterwards she was ashamed of her outburst, and analysing her feelings, as she had come to do, was obliged to admit to herself that the cause of her resentment was not the temerity of her suitor, but the fact that he had failed to awake in her an answering thrill. She liked the young man, and her vanity would have been pleased by the marriage, for he was the best "parti" in Christiania, but her conscious womanhood revolted at a loveless union. Was the shadow of a kiss to spoil her life? In vain she reasoned with herself, the unconquerable memory remained; she felt it like an indelible mark on her.
Fru Boyesen in despair at her niece's obstinacy and foolishness, and after many fruitless attempts to bring the girl round to her point of view, finally betook herself to Ragna's old professor, Dr. Tommsen. She laid the case before him and begged him to use his influence with his wayward pupil—she would surely listen to him.
Dr. Tommsen had received Fru Boyesen in his study. He sat, in an old leather-covered armchair between the porcelain stove where a fire was burning, and his large, much belittered writing table, gazing at his visitor in good-humoured perplexity and twiddling his thumbs—a habit of his when not engaged in writing or reading. His spectacles were pushed up on his bulging forehead and his keen grey eyes peered out from under shaggy, grizzled eyebrows, which he had a habit of working up and down in a terrifying manner. His sanctum was not often invaded by ladies, and the presence of a portly dame arrayed in green silk trimmed with bugles and yellow lace and protected by a dead-leaf mantle, and the singularity of her coming to him, a bachelor of well-known eccentricity, in order that her niece should be prevailed upon to enter the bonds of matrimony, appealed to his sense of humour.
Therefore, when Fru Boyesen had finished her elaborate exposition of the case, the Doctor pursed up his lips and his eyes twinkled.
"My dear Madam," he said, "I fail to see how I can be of any assistance to you, I have so little experience in these matters."
"You could advise Ragna, my dear Herr Doctor—she would listen to you. She must be persuaded to take a reasonable view of life."
"Ah, that depends on what one considers a reasonable view," he said judicially, putting the tips of his fingers together. "From my standpoint your niece's objections appear quite reasonable. You may not be aware, my dear lady, though most people are, that theoretically I disapprove of marriage."
"Disapprove of marriage! Oh, Herr Doctor, you can't mean that!" cried Fru Boyesen horrified, feeling the solid ground slipping from beneath her feet, as it were.
"Precisely, Madam—or to be more exact, I disapprove of marriage as now generally practised. I regard it as a social contract, useful to humanity in general, since no better substitute has been found as yet, but I certainly do not consider it an ideal state, and it would be against my avowed principles to urge any young person—much more so one of the 'élite,' among whom I place Ragna—to enter upon a form of contract which I personally consider both futile and degrading—an insult to the intelligence."
This was too much for Fru Boyesen; she gasped angrily, but found herself unable to give articulate utterance to her amazement and indignation. The Professor, his eyes twinkling more and more, pursued in a calm deliberate voice.
"Since you do not answer, I take it that you agree with me in the main—or perhaps your estimation of your niece is not the same as mine?"
"I most certainly do not agree with you, Dr. Tommsen," said Fru Boyesen hotly; "I am a married woman myself, and a respectable one, and I assure you I have found nothing either degrading or futile in the married state. I do not think you should use such words in connection with a divine institution."
"Ah, that is where we differ, dear Madam," returned the Professor, gently rubbing his palms together—it amused him on occasions to tease the conventionally-minded—"You consider it a divine institution and I do not—however that is not the point. I admit that some persons are obviously qualified for matrimony and find their vocation in it—you think your niece to be one of those, I do not."
Fru Boyesen interrupted him.
"But there is where you are wrong, Herr Doctor. Ragna is made for marriage, trust an old woman for that. She is not the girl to be an old maid. I am anxious for that reason—if she lets her best years go by and despises the chances that offer, she will regret it when it is too late. I love her, Herr Doctor, and old women see farther than young ones—I want to see her happy in the way that God intended her to be."
"Then for God's sake leave her alone, Madam, leave her to God. If you are right about her, and she does marry, let it be at her own time and by her own choice; nothing but harm can come of forcing her inclinations in any way."
"But, Doctor, she has already refused two of the most eligible—I think it a poor return after all I have done for her—"
"Let her refuse ten, let her refuse twenty! To show her gratitude must she sell her body to the highest bidder?"
Fru Boyesen bounded rather than rose from her chair; the very ribbons on her bonnet bristled with indignation. Her back was a study in outraged virtue as she moved majestically towards the door. The doctor was before her.
"One moment, Madam, I beg!"
"I have heard quite enough, more than enough," she said in a frozen voice.
"My dear lady, I beg your pardon if my words were too forcible; what I intended to say was that should your niece marry a man for his position, without love for him, it would be equivalent to selling herself, and you who have her ultimate happiness at heart would not wish that, I am sure." He smiled, and he had a most winning smile. "My dear Fru Boyesen, you come to discuss this matter with me; I am an old man, you are a widow, why should we mince matters?"