Lieutenant Merckel was far from being pleased at the course events had taken on the day of the funeral. He called the Schrandeners poltroons and old women, and declared they were unworthy ever to have worn the king's uniform.
When some one ventured to ask why he had not shown himself in it to the procession, and had left the mob leaderless at a critical moment, he replied that that was a different matter altogether: he was an officer, and as such bound only to draw his sword in the service of the king.
The Schrandeners, not accustomed to logical argument, accepted the explanation, and promised to retrieve their reputation the next time the opportunity offered itself. But this did not satisfy Felix Merckel.
"Father," he said, late one evening when the old landlord was counting the cash taken during the day, "I can't bear to think that scoundrelly cur holds the rank of Royal Prussian officer as I do. I am ashamed to have served with him. Our army doesn't want to be associated with people like him. It drags the cockade through the gutter, not to speak of the sword-knot. I know what I'll do; I'll call him out and shoot him."
He stretched his legs on the settle, twisting his cavalry moustache with a bland smile. The old man let fall, in horrified dismay, a handful of silver that he was counting, and the coins rolled away into the cracks of the floor.
"Felixchen," he said, "you really mustn't drink so much of that Wacholder brandy. It's good enough for customers, but you, Felixchen, shall have a bottle of light wine to-morrow, and perhaps some of them will follow your example, and so it won't cost me anything."
"Father, you are mistaken," Felix answered. "It's my outraged sense of honour that gives me no peace. I am a German lad, father, and a brave officer. I can't stand the stain on my calling any longer."
"Felixchen," said the old man, "go to bed, my son, and you'll get over it."
"Father," replied his son, "I am sorry to have to say it, but you have no conception of what honour is."
"Felixchen," went on the old man, ignoring the taunt, "you haven't enough occupation. If you would only look after the bottles--of course the barmaid is there for the purpose--but it would do you good. It would distract your thoughts. Or you might go out shooting sometimes."
"Where?"
"Lord bless my soul! there are the woods and forest of Schranden. Whether the hares devour each other, or you annex your share of them, is all the same."
"That won't do for me, father. I am an officer, and don't wish to be caught poaching."
"Good gracious, Felixchen, how you talk! Do you forget that I am magistrate here. I am not likely to sentence you to the gallows. But do as you like, my boy. Of course youmightgo oftener to the parsonage. The old pastor enjoys a game of chess; there's nothing to be gained by chess, I know, but some people seem to like it, and then there's--Helene."
"Ah, Helene!" said Felix, stroking his chin and looking flattered.
The old man examined the artificial fly in the centre of his amber heart.
"I have a strong notion that she would be a good match if the pastor consented, and she liked you."
"Why shouldn't she like me?" asked Felix.
"Well, there might be some one else who----"
Felix smiled sceptically.
"Or do you mean that she has already set her heart on you?"
Felix shrugged his shoulders.
"You see, Felixchen, that would be a great piece of good fortune for us. People are constantly carping at the way in which they think I acquired my bit of money--without the smallest ground of course. If only the pastor gave you his daughter as wife, it would stop their mouths once for all. A man like Pastor Götz has great weight and influence. Well then, as I said, it's worth while your hanging about there a little. Court her, and a fellow like you is sure----"
"Dear father, spare me your advice, if you please," interrupted his son. "Whether Helene becomes my wife or not, is my own affair. I have not yet made up my mind. She has a pretty enough little phiz, but she is too thin. She might be fattened up with advantage. Then there's something old-maidish about her, something sharp and prudish that I don't quite fancy. For instance, if you put your arm round her waist she says, 'Ah, dear Herr Lieutenant, how you frightened me!' and wriggles away. And if you squeeze her arm, by Jokus, she screams out directly, 'Oh, dear Herr Lieutenant, don't do that, I've got such a delicate skin.' Of course that's all airs and affectation, and perhaps if a man caught hold of her firmly and didn't give in, she'd allow herself to be kissed at last; but as I say, I have not made up my mind, so don't build too much on it."
The old landlord, who with deft hand was rolling up his sovereigns in paper, looked proudly across at this magnificent son of his. Then he became anxious again.
"And you won't think any more about the duel, eh, Felixchen? That's all nonsense.... You wouldn't go and risk your life so recklessly as that."
Felix threw back his chest. "In affairs of honour, father, please don't interfere, for you know nothing about them. Directly I can find a respectable second----"
"What is that, Felixchen?"
"Why, the man who'll take the challenge."
"Where--to Boleslav?"
"Of course."
"To the island?"
"To the island."
"But, Felixchen, what are you thinking about? No Christian dare set foot on the island. It swarms with wolf-traps, bombs, and other deadly instruments. Look at Hackelberg; he was caught in one, and limps to this day--but never mention it. It mustn't come out that Hackelberg was ever on the island. Do you see?... As I was saying, you wouldn't get any one to go on such a dangerous errand--or to come in contact with such a man as that. No, my boy, think no more about it There's nothing to be gained by it."
"But Iwillchallenge him all the same to meet me here," growled Felix.
The old man contemplated him with the greatest concern for a few moments, then rose, filled a liqueur-glass with peppermint-schnaps, and brought it over to him.
"Drink it up, Felixchen," he said, "it'll soothe you." Felix obeyed.
"Leave the matter in the hands of your good, honest old father. Trust him to find in the night some other means of satisfying your so-called sense of honour. Good-night, Felixchen."
"The good, honest old father" had not promised more than he was able to perform.
The next morning, when he met his son at the breakfast table, he asked in an accent of benevolent sympathy--
"Well, Felixchen, have you slept off all those silly notions?"
Felix grew angry. "I told you, father, that on that subject you were----"
"Totally ignorant! Very good, my boy. But I want to be clear on one point. Is it with the Baron von Schranden that you propose to fight a duel, or with Lieutenant Baumgart?"
Felix did not answer at once. A suspicion of what his father was darkly hinting, dawned on him.
"Don't deal in subterfuges, father," he said. "I am an upright, simple soldier, and don't understand them."
"But, Felix, you needn't be so headstrong. I mean well. As the Baron von Schranden never was an officer, there is no reason why you should concern yourself about him; and as Lieutenant Baumgart has proved a swindler, and assumed a false name, he is equally beneath your notice."
"That is true," said Felix, spreading honey on his bread and butter. "As a matter of fact, I oughtn't to do him the honour of challenging him."
Then a new idea seemed to occur to Felix. "If only," he added fiercely, "he could be stopped from entitling himself lieutenant. That's what offends my sense of honour more than anything."
His old father seemed prepared with an answer to this remark.
"Why should he go on calling himself lieutenant?" he asked, grinning and whistling under his breath. "Only because his superior officers are kept in ignorance of the deception he has practised. If they had an inkling of it, they'd be down on him fast enough."
Felix understood. "You mean we ought----" he began.
"Of course we ought."
But Felix's hypersensitive sense of honour again felt itself outraged. "Remember that I am an officer, father," he exclaimed indignantly. "Your proposal is in the highest degree insulting."
The host shrugged his shoulders. "Very well; if you don't wish it, leave it alone," he said.
Then the honourable young man saw a way of escape.
"If only it could be done without a signature," he meditated aloud.
"That difficulty is easily overcome," responded the old man. "I have a scheme in my head. Let me draw it up. All you've got to do will be to sign your name with the others at the foot. Then it will be only one of many."
On the afternoon of the same day, the parish crier, Hoffmann, invited all the country's defenders in the village to assemble at the Black Eagle. It was the merest matter of form, a tribute to the importance of the business to be discussed, for they were certain to have turned up there of their own accord sooner or later without an invitation. The tables were soon full (Schranden had sent a contingent of thirty warriors to the War of Liberty); and when Herr Merckel saw glasses emptying to right and left of him, he stepped behind the bar, and exchanging glances with his son, rubbed his hands with satisfaction, and began the following harangue:--
"Dear fellow-burghers, I desire to speak a few words to you. You are all brave soldiers, and have fought in many a bloody battle for your Fatherland in its dire extremity. You must have often been thirsty in those days, and have longed for even a few drops of dirty ditch-water. It's only to your credit, then, that after the heat and burden of the war, you turn into the Black Eagle occasionally, for a good draught of pale ale. You have earned it honestly with the sweat of your brow. Your health, soldiers!"
He flourished the mug that he kept specially for occasions like the present, and then raised it to his mouth, holding it there till he had assured himself that no glass had been put down unemptied. Then making a sign to the barmaid, he wiped his lips energetically, and continued--
"I, as your Mayor and magistrate, could not accompany you to the seat of war, being obliged to remain and look after the wants of those who stayed at home." A murmur of approval came from the audience. "But I am a patriot like you; my warm heart beats true for the honour of the Fatherland, just as your hearts do, brave soldiers! Fill up, Amalie, you slow-coach! Herr Weichert is nearly expiring for thirst." Herr Weichert protested, but in vain; his glass was snatched out of his hand. "And my bosom swells with pride when I look at my son, a gallant, upright soldier, whom the confidence of his comrades and the favour of his king promoted to the rank of officer. I speak for you all, I know, when I call three cheers for the joy of the village, the dutiful son, the good comrade, the brave soldier, and honourable officer, Lieutenant Merckel--Hip, hip, hurrah!"
The Schrandeners joined enthusiastically in the cheering, and Herr Merckel observed with satisfaction that several glasses had again become empty. To give Amalie time to fill up, he made an effective little pause, in which, in speechless emotion, he fell on his son's breast: then he resumed the thread of his discourse.
"All the more painful is it, therefore, to see that the disgrace you, by your glorious deeds of arms, did your best to remove from our beloved and highly favoured village, now rests on it again, through the presence here of the son of the man who wrought it such dire mischief. On the site of the fire he is now living with his father's mistress. I'll not enter into details, but you know, my children, what that implies."
There was a significant laugh, which changed gradually into a sullen muttering.
"Yes, and what's more, this immoral outlaw belongs to our glorious army. Under a false name he enlisted in its ranks, and raised himself to the position of officer. By lying, and cheating, and devilish craft, he succeeded in obtaining what you brave, honest fellows (with the exception of my son, of course) could not attain to. Will you tolerate this, you noble Schrandeners? Will you, I say, let a rascally cheat, the son of a traitor, continue to look down on you as his inferiors? Was it for this that his gracious Majesty made you free men?
"The moment was a favourable one for drinking his gracious Majesty's health, and Amalie, in obedience to a signal, began the filling-up process anew. Herr Merckel already felt he had cause to congratulate himself on the result of his stirring oration.
"No, brave Schrandeners," he went on, "such a scandal must not be tolerated! The army must be purged of this black spot; otherwise you will be ashamed, instead of proud, of calling yourselves Prussian soldiers."
"Kill him! kill him!" cried several voices at once.
"No, dear friends," he replied, with his unctuous smirk. "You mustn't always be talking of killing. I, as your Mayor, cannot countenance that," shaking a warning fat forefinger at them; "but I can give you wiser counsel. The authorities, naturally, have no suspicion of who it is has been masquerading as Lieutenant Baumgart; last spring no one had time to inquire into birth certificates and such-like details. But now there will be leisure to investigate the case of a Prussian officer passing under an assumed name. And the case presses for attention. Do you remember the story Johann Radtke related in this very room, the day he came over from Heide, when none of us had the slightest idea of what a savage kind of animal his celebrated hero, Lieutenant Baumgart, really was?
"He was interrupted by a laugh of pent-up hate and fury. It proceeded from his son Felix.
"He is said to have tramped home from France entirely alone, like a wandering journeyman. He had been wounded and taken prisoner, and all the rest of it. But mark my words, that signifies more than you think. It means that he didn't get his discharge--that he sneaked out of the service like a thief in the night, in the same straightforward manner as he entered it. And do you know what that is in good plain Prussian?Deserting! It means he is a deserter."
A cry of jubilation arose, which Herr Merckel greeted with profound approval, for, according to his ripe experience, shouting rendered the throat dry. He let the applause therefore exhaust itself, and then went on.
"It is our sacred duty, as genuine patriots and intrepid soldiers, to open the eyes of his Highness the Commander-General to this young man's true character. We owe it to our King, our Fatherland, above all, to ourselves. We'll get him cashiered out of our brave army, degraded and ruined. What is done to him afterwards, whether he is shot or cast into prison, is a matter of indifference to us. We are not responsible for him."
At the mere suggestion of such a vengeance the Schrandeners were beside themselves, and almost howled with rage.
Herr Merckel drew a sheet of paper from his breast-pocket.
"I have drawn up a little statement, in which I have respectfully lodged a complaint to a Deputy-General of high standing and noble birth. If you'll allow me, dear friends----"
He was in the act of unfolding the sheet when a still happier thought occurred to him.
"I could lay the document before you at once and ask you to sign it, but then it would be my composition, and not yours," he went on, beaming; "and I want every word well weighed and considered, and altered if needful. I therefore propose that a committee of five comrades be elected from amongst you, who shall withdraw with me and my son into the best parlour, where we can hold a quiet consultation over the wording of the address, while the rest of you remain here."
Then he gave the names of those he considered worthiest of filling this delicate office. They were five young men whom he knew to be lavish spendthrifts, and whom he expected to acquit themselves honourably in more senses than one. Half in envy, half in malice, his choice was agreed to.
The elected looked rather glum; then they knew what they had been let in for, but at the same time they were too flattered by the invitation to decline it.
Herr Merckel, with the air of solemnity he always considered due to any occasion on which the best parlour was brought into requisition, flung open the door, over which was inscribed the alluring caution, fraught with so much significance--"Only Wine drunk here."
With a somewhat nervous air the chosen committee entered the sanctum of gentility, awkwardly twirling their caps in their hands. The last to go in was the son of the house. At the door, Herr Merckel turned and called out in a loud impressive voice--
"Amalie, bring two bottles of Muscat for me and the Herr Lieutenant!"
Muscat was a wine made at home, from rum, sugar, cinnamon, currant juice, and a judicious quantity of water, and was sold to the Schrandeners for a thaler the bottle. Herr Merckel ordered two bottles, to demonstrate to his customers that he did not expect any of them to go shares in a bottle.
There was now a profound silence in the taproom. Its occupants gazed with serious excited faces at the closed door and then at each other.
Neither did any sound proceed from the reception room, where a dumb pitched battle was going on between the host and his guests. It was doubtful at one time who would come off victor. But a few minutes after the barmaid had hurried up from the cellar with the two freshly filled bottles, Herr Merckel tore open the door again, and shouted triumphantly--
"Amalie, five bottles more of Muscat!"
Tongues were loosened. The tension was over. As was generally the case, the customers had been mastered by the landlord. And soon the dull monotonous sound of reading aloud reached the ears of the listeners in the tap-room.
* * * * *
Herr Merckel, senior, when he retired to rest, felt that his day had not been wasted.
His son had abandoned his dangerous project; the fate of the last of the Schrandens had been sealed; and in the cash-box, beyond the usual takings, was a surplus of eight thalers and twenty-five silver groschens.
"Thus I have killed three birds with one stone!" he mused, with a self-satisfied grin, and, folding his hands, fell into a gentle slumber.
Winter had come. It had been preceded by a season of decay, inexpressibly cheerless and trying to the spirits. Boleslav, who had grown up in closest communion with Nature and her moods, could never have believed it possible that autumn's symbolic melancholy would affect him so profoundly and send such deathlike shivers through his limbs. The mere calculation of time dismayed and oppressed him.
His evenings began to be dismally long. Solitude swooped over his head like a vulture in ever-narrowing circles, till he began to fancy he felt the chill flap of its wings across his face.
It was strange that he who all his life had been much alone from choice, should now, when almost every human being was his deadly foe, crave for the society of his fellow-creatures.
He buried himself deeper and deeper in the mass of papers and manuscripts, a dreary enough occupation, without much object unless it were to help the hours to drag a little less slowly. He tried to convince himself that the portion of the past he unearthed from these dust-heaps might be of service to him in the future. But in reality he had found what was absolutely necessary to his purpose without much trouble, and the rest might as well have perished in the flames.
Regina remained tongue-tied, and performed her household duties swiftly and noiselessly. She moved about his room without lifting her eyes to his face, and if he addressed a word to her, shrank away with a startled look. But her answers to his questions, though given in a hesitating and embarrassed manner, were always clear, comprehensive, and to the point. Sometimes days together went by without their exchanging a syllable. Yet it was on these days he observed her in secret all the more closely, watching her as she laid the table, following her with his eyes as she crossed the little plot of garden and disappeared into the bushes. He caught himself constantly wondering what was passing in her mind. What did she think about all day long? Was it possible that her whole existence revolved round him and his personal comforts, a man who was nothing to her, who had not even rewarded her labours so far, with a brass farthing?
He felt ashamed when he thought of the innumerable self-sacrifices he accepted from her with such haughty indifference, and determined to be more friendly and conversational towards her in the future, so that she might feel the unpleasantness of her position less acutely. But a certain unaccountable shyness on his side seemed to hinder his putting these good intentions into practice. He no longer hated her. His aversion had yielded to something like regard at sight of so much unselfish loyalty and untiring industry; and the result was that he felt more than ever a constraint in conversing with her. Something came between them, a kind of mysterious veil that enveloped her and rendered her unapproachable as a stranger. It seemed almost as if the spirit of his father hovered about her, preventing by its ghostly presence any intercourse between them. Sometimes he wondered if it were her shame that invested her with that strange fascination that vice is said to exercise on inexperienced youth. Or was it the magnitude of her misfortunes that gave her an unconscious power and charm?
Often when she brought in his supper, or turned back the counterpane from his bed, he would look up from his work and endeavour to open a conversation. But his tongue would cleave to the roof of his mouth, he could never think of anything to talk to her about that was not beneath his dignity. So, after all, only curt and harsh commands crossed his lips.
He had remarked for a long time how much more careful she had become about her personal appearance, which had wonderfully improved. She no longer went about ragged, unkempt, anddécolletée, but wore her jacket buttoned up modestly to her throat, with the ends neatly tucked under her waistband. A woollen scarf was knotted round her neck by way of giving a finish to her costume, and her skirt carefully brushed and mended. Her hair did not hang about her as formerly, in untidy plaits and a hundred rough, loose curls, but was combed and neatly dressed. Of a morning the top of her head sometimes presented a smooth, polished surface, the effects of the shower-bath, by means of which she brought her unruly mane into subjection.
The weather grew bitterly cold, but she still shivered in her cotton gown, only throwing on the red cross-over when she went into the open air.
One evening as she was preparing for her regular weekly expedition for the purchase of provisions, and had come to him for orders, he said--
"Why have you brought no winter clothes back with you yet, Regina?"
She looked on the ground and replied--
"I should like to--only--"
"Only?"
"I wasn't sure whether I might."
"Of course you may. You mustn't freeze."
"There's a----" she began eagerly, then stopped and blushed.
"Well?"
"There's a jacket at the shop--a blue cloth one trimmed with beautiful fur. The shopman says----"
He smiled. "Thank God," he thought "she is beginning to be human at last. A love of finery has awakened in her."
"What does the shopman say?" he asked.
"That it would fit me exactly. And I need something warm and comfortable for the long walks. But it's a real lady's jacket, and----"
"All the more reason why you should have it," he interrupted, laughing. "Don't come back without the jacket, now mind. Good-night, and a pleasant journey."
With a joyous exclamation she stooped to kiss his hand, but he evaded the caress.
When her footsteps had died away in the darkness, he took the lamp and went into the greenhouse, which was her private apartment.
The fire still smouldered on the hearth, but the room was icily cold and comfortless. A stray flake or two whirled through the holes in the roof, for outside a gentle dusting of snow had begun to fall.
"Why doesn't she doctor the laths?" he thought, and resolved that the next morning he would come and lay boards over the weak places. He climbed on one of the boxes and tested with a tap the glass roofing. Then he understood why Regina preferred to sleep half in the open air. The leaden framework of the panes had become rotten and brittle. At his mere touch the whole decrepit roof rattled and trembled in all its joints. Any attempt to mend it would bring it down altogether.
"It's a positive sin to allow her to be housed like this," he said to himself.
He went back to his room and drew from under his sheets as many of his feather mattresses as he could do without, and carried them, with one of his pillows, to her wretched resting-place. He carefully made up a bed, and then threw her horse-cloth over it, so that not a scrap of the bedding was visible.
"That will make her open her eyes," he thought, "when, worn out, she comes to throw herself on her pallet." And well satisfied with his evening's work, he returned to his papers.
The next morning, when he awoke, his walls shone with the dazzling reflection of the snow. In the night the world had arrayed itself in the garb of winter.
He dressed, and called Regina. There was no answer. She had not come back.
He waited two hours, and then went to prepare his own breakfast. Three snow-heaps had collected underneath the holes in the glass roof, and a fourth was accumulating on the hearth. A greenish twilight filled the room. He took the shovel and broom, and half mechanically swept the white mounds out at the door; then he fetched a sheet of strong cardboard that had served as a cover to the stacks of documents, cut it into strips, which he cautiously pushed through the holes so that they roofed in the bad places from the snow.
"That's the best I can do," he said, as he shivered about the room, which he had now made nearly as dark as night. Then, sighing heavily, he went to the hearth, and lit the fire.
The day crept on, and still Regina did not return. In all probability the snowstorm would detain her at Bockeldorf till the next morning. He felt moped to distraction as he sat over his work. Now and then, to vary the dull monotony, he took a walk to the Cats' Bridge, over which she was bound to come. After he had bolted his cold dinner he did nothing but watch the clock, whose hands seemed hardly to move.
He missed Regina at every turn; for though she kept out of his way when at home, he knew he had only to whistle to bring her instantly to his elbow.
He put his papers aside, and to change the current of his thoughts began to draw. On the back of a coachbuilder's bill of fifty years ago he painted a long garden border of stiff rows of stately lilies and red roses. First he made a line of lilies, then one of roses, then lilies again, and so on until the whole resembled some gorgeous carpet. Then he threw himself on the creaking sofa, and dreamed of the Madonna who presided over that wall of flowers, and shed the blessed light of her countenance on all who had the courage to penetrate it.
Already it was dusk. There was a sound of footsteps on the cobble-stones before the door. He sprang to his feet and hurried out.
Regina came timidly over the threshold. She was laden with bundles and parcels, and covered from head to foot with snow; even the little curls on her forehead were powdered white. Her face glowed, but there was an expression of fear in her brilliant eyes as she lifted them to his.
"I ran,Herr, as fast as I could," she panted, laying her right hand on her heart. "The shopman wouldn't let me start till daylight, because he thought--the jacket might----"
She broke off, looking guilty.
He smiled kindly. He was much too glad to know that she was back again to scold her.
"Go and cook me something hot as quickly as you can," he said. "You'll be glad of your supper too."
She gazed at him in mute amazement.
"Why don't you go?"
"I will--but, oh!" And then as if ashamed of what she was on the point of saying, she rushed past him into the kitchen.
"She almost claimed her flogging," he murmured, laughing, as he looked after her.
He was sitting at his desk where he generally worked, when she brought in the evening meal. The lamp with its green shade cast a subdued uncertain light over the apartment. He liked to watch her as she moved swiftly to and fro, in and out of the shadows. To-day her appearance almost frightened him. She looked resplendently, proudly beautiful. Not a trace of her former degradation was apparent. The once forlorn and half-tamed girl might have been taken for a duchess, so graceful and distinguished were all her movements; so pure and full of charm the contour of her young erect figure. Was it the neat woollen dress, or the new jacket with its silver-grey fur--kazabeika, as they called it in Poland--that was responsible for the transformation? As she laid the table she smiled to herself a happy shame-faced little smile, and every now and then flashed a rapid stealthy glance across at him. It was evident she wanted to be admired, but dared not attract his attention.
When she came within the circle of light made by the lamp, in order to place it on the supper table, he turned his eyes quickly away to make her think he had noticed nothing. But all the same he could not resist letting fall a remark.
"How conceited we are of our new clothes!" he said banteringly.
A vivid blush spread over her face and neck.
"They are much too good for me," she whispered, still smiling, still glancing at him in half-ashamed coquetry. But she was not yet daughter of Eve enough to take a sidelong peep at herself in the glass.
On going to turn down his bed for the night, she was astonished to see how it had diminished in size, but gulped back an exclamation of surprise, lest he should be annoyed. Then wishing him good-night she left the room.
With a grin of inward satisfaction he thought of the great surprise that was in store for her, and soon became engrossed in his manuscripts again.
About an hour had elapsed, when he was startled by a rustling sound at the back of his chair. He turned round and found her standing beside him. Her face was very white, her lips trembling, her breath coming quick through dilated nostrils. The fur collarette was unfastened at the throat, and showed the coarse chemise underneath, the folds of which rose and fell with her billowing breast. In the excitement of the moment she had forgotten to arrange her clothing.
"How handsome she is!" he thought, filled with involuntary admiration of her strange beauty, and then he tried not to look at her.
"Now then, what's the matter?" he asked in his gentlest tones.
She made an effort to speak, but some moments passed before a sound escaped her lips.
"Oh,Herr!" she stammered forth at last, "was it you--did you do that with the beds?"
"Yes, of course. Who else should do it?"
"But--why--why?" and she lifted her swimming eyes in alarm and consternation.
Apparently his kindness frightened her. It was necessary to adopt a firmer tone in order to become master of his own emotions.
"Stupid girl," he said loftily, "do you think I wish you to die out there of cold?"
For a moment she stood like a statue, silent and motionless, and big sparkling drops rolled down her cheeks. And then suddenly she threw herself at his feet, clung to both his hands, and covered them with kisses and tears.
At first he was too unnerved and thrilled at the sight of her agitation to speak. He had never imagined that she would be so deeply moved. Then he collected himself, and withdrawing his hands commanded her to rise.
"Don't make a scene, Regina," he said. "Go to bed. I'm sure you must be tired out."
She would have wiped her eyes with her sleeve, as was her habit, only she remembered the new soft fur trimming in time, and so let her tears run on.
"Ah,Herr!" she sobbed. "I hardly know what's come over me. But were you really serious? I don't deserve all your kindness. First the beautiful jacket, and then when I expected a whipping for being gone the whole day--for you to ... Oh----"
"Say no more. I won't listen to another word," he insisted. "You must have some sort of bed. Where used you to sleep before?"
She started and cast down her eyes.
"Before?" she murmured.
"Yes, in my father's time."
"Ah, then, I used to lie on the door-mat or----" she paused.
"Or where?"
She still remained silent, and trembled.
"Where?" he asked again.
Her eyes moved shyly in the direction of the canopied bed.
"You know; ah, you know,Herr," she murmured. And then overwhelmed with shame she covered her face with her hands.
Yes, he knew. How could he forget it for a moment.
"Begone!" he cried, his voice shaking with anger and disgust, and he motioned her to the door.
Without a word she crept out, her head still bowed in her hands.
Boleslav was almost happy. He had hit on a new and brilliant idea, and the hopes of carrying it out brightened for a time the deadening monotony of his existence. He believed he could clear his father's memory.
How it had first occurred to him he hardly knew. He had found certain letters from Polish noblemen addressed to his father, which seemed to suggest that the deceased had felt himself bound by a hastily-made promise which at the time he had not meant seriously, and that a chain of tragic circumstances had compelled him against his will to be a party to the treachery. If this did not exonerate him from all guilt, it at least put the slandered man in a new light--the light of a martyr.
If by minute study of the documents he could trace the affair to its source, and make public a true history of the disaster, in which he would demonstrate that Eberhard von Schranden, far from having played the devilish rôle that rumour attributed to him, had only been a victim of circumstances, surely there would at least arise some who would hold out their hand in remorse to the sufferer's heir. The more he absorbed himself in this task of vindication the more he began to feel united with the dead man, and accustomed to the idea of sacrificing his own innocent reputation for his sake.
His brain was so much occupied with these schemes that he slept little at night, and in the daytime tore about the park like one possessed. The less hope he cherished in his secret heart that his plan would succeed, the more did he long for some human soul into whose ear he could pour his doubts and fears. But there was no one to speak to but the taciturn woman, who glided past him with eyes guiltily cast down.
One evening, when his solitude almost maddened him, he said to her--
"Regina, aren't you frozen in your kitchen?"
"I never let the fire out,Herr."
"But what do you do in the evening, when it's dark?"
"I sit by the fire and sew, till my fingers get quite stiff."
"Then you have a light?"
"I burn fir-cones."
He was silent; he gnawed his under-lip, and hesitated as to what he should say next. Then he took courage.
"Regina, if you like you may bring your sewing into the sitting-room, after supper," he said.
She grew pale, and stammered out, "Yes,Herr."
He thought her wanting in gratitude.
"Of course, if you'd rather not--" he said, shrugging his shoulders.
"Oh,Herr--I should like to come."
"Very well, then, come; but you must make yourself look respectable. Why have you given up wearing your new clothes?" Since that evening she had taken to shivering about in the cotton jacket again.
"I thought it would hurt them."
"Hurt them! How?"
"I mean," she said incoherently, "that when you are angry with me,-- such as I, am not fit----"
"Nonsense!" he interrupted quickly, feeling that if she went on he would be angry with her again.
After supper she appeared in some trepidation at the door. Snowy linen shimmered in her hand. She remained standing till he had impatiently invited her to sit down.
"You want people to stand on ceremony with you, as if you were some fine lady," he said.
She laughed in confusion.
"I am only nervous,Herr, because I am not quite sure--how to behave." And she turned to her work.
No more passed between them that evening, and it was more than a week before they broke into conversation again.
He sat brooding over his yellow papers, and she let her needle fly through the crackling calico. When the clock struck eleven, she gathered up her sewing, and whispering "Good-night," slipped out on tiptoe without waiting for an answer.
"What are you working at so industriously?" he asked her one evening, after he had watched her intently for some minutes.
She looked up and pushed a curl off her forehead with damp fingers.
"I am making shirts for you,Herr," was the answer.
"So you undertake that too?"
"Who else should do it,Herr?"
A short silence; then he questioned her further.
"Who taught you all you know, Regina? Your mother?"
She shook her head. "My mother died very young,Herr. I can hardly remember her. People say my father beat her to death."
He thought of the thin pale face and tired eyelids in the picture-gallery, of which the last trace had perished in the great fire.
"Can you remember what your mother was like?" he demanded again.
"She had long black hair, and eyes like mine, at least, so I have heard people say; and I can remember her hair, for she often wrapped me in it when I was undressed. I used to sit in it as if it were a cloak, and laugh; and when father--" She stopped in sudden alarm. "But you won't care to hear more,Herr?"
"Go on, tell me the rest," he exclaimed.
"And when father came home and wanted to beat me, because he was drunk, you know, she stood in front of me, and told me to get under her dress; and inside her dress it was like being in a cave, quite dark and still, and father's swearing sounded a long, long way off. And then she died. It was on a Sunday--yes, it was on a Sunday. For I was standing by the hedge and wondering whether she'd have a beautiful coffin--a green one, like the coffin on the trestle in the garden--when you,Herr, went by on your way to church. At that time you were little, like me, and you had on a blue coat with silver buttons, and a little sword at your side; and you stopped and asked me why I was crying, and I couldn't answer, I was so frightened, and then you gave me an apple."
He had not the smallest recollection of the incident, but he remembered how he had taken the young sparrow away from her, and related the story. She had not forgotten it. Her eyes became illumined, as if lost in contemplation of some blissful sight.
"I wonder, now, that you gave it up so meekly," he said.
"How could I have done otherwise?" she answered.
"You might easily have refused," he said.
She bent over her work. "I was only so glad for you to have it," she said, in a low soft voice. "It's not often that a poor little village girl gets the chance of giving anything to a rich young nobleman."
He bit his lips. Truly he had taken more from her since than his pride and manliness should have permitted.
"And besides," she went on, "even if I hadn't wanted to give it to you, it was yours by right. You were theJunker."
How perfectly natural the argument sounded from her lips.
"Regina, tell me honestly," he said, "if you haven't entirely forgotten the days when you ran wild in the village."
"Oh no,Herr; indeed I haven't," she replied, with an almost roguish smile. "For instance, I remember a great many things about thegnädiger Junker."
He withdrew far back into the shadow of the lamp-shade. "What splendid stuff she has in her!" he thought, and devoured her with his eyes. And then he made her relate all her reminiscences of him at that time. He did not appear in a very amiable light. Once he had pushed her into a duck-pond; another time sent her floating down the river in a flour-vat, till her cries of terror had brought people to the bank with life-saving apparatus; when she had on a new white frock, given her by the Castle housekeeper, he had painted her hands and face with white chalk, and told her to stand motionless like one of the statues in the Park. She had submitted meekly till the chalk got into her mouth and eyes and made them smart, and then she had burst out crying and run away.
She recalled all this with beaming eyes, as if his pranks had been a source of infinite happiness to her. Although when reminded of such and such an escapade he recollected it perfectly, he could not remember that it was Regina who had been the victim of his caprice. A sensation of shame rose within him. Instead of the dreamy, generous young cavalier he had been in the habit of picturing himself, he saw a cruel little village tyrant, who exercised his power over his small contemporaries with a relentlessness that was almost vicious.
"And did I make no amends for my wicked deeds?" he inquired, hoping to hear he had at least been capable of doing good sometimes.
"Oh, you used to give us things," she answered. "'Divide that,' you used to say, and scatter on the ground either apples and nuts, or broken tin soldiers, or a handful of counters. But, of course, the strongest and biggest got everything. Felix Merckel was the best at a scramble; the girls only had the leavings."
"And did you ever get anything from me, Regina?" he asked.
She flushed scarlet, and bowed lower over her work. "Yes,Herr, once!" she said softly.
"What was it?"
She was silent, and dared not lift her eyes.
"Good heavens! why do you look so ashamed about it?"
"Because--I ... have it still."
"Oh, not really!" He smiled. A feeling of pleasure shot through him.
Without answering, she felt in the pocket of her dress, and laid before him on the table a little straw box plaited out of coloured blades. It was hardly bigger than a baby's fist.
He held it in his hand, and examined it all over attentively. Something rattled inside.
"May I open it?"
"You needn't ask,Herr!"
It was a ring of glass beads--blue, white, and yellow, such as a little girl, following the first instincts of vanity, threads for herself. He took it out, and tried to force it on his little finger, but it was far too narrow, and he couldn't get it over his nail.
"Did I give you the ring too?" he asked.
"No,Herr, it belonged to my dear mother. It cut into her flesh once, and that's why I used to wear it day and night till the thread broke. Then she had been dead a long time, and as it was the only keepsake I had of her, I threaded the beads again, and have never parted with the ring, and I always have it on me."
"In my little box?"
She nodded, and her head drooped. "Why shouldn't I,Herr?" she said in a whisper, "it brings me luck."
He looked at her with a compassionate smile. "Luck? Bringsyouluck?"
"I'll tell you how,Herr," she exclaimed triumphantly. "Every bead you count----"
But at that moment he leant back in his chair, and the ring slipped through his fingers on to the floor.
Regina started up and hurried round the table to pick it up, but could not find it.
"The earth seems to have swallowed it up," she said in alarm, and she dropped on to all fours close by Boleslav's side.
He saw the nape of her beautiful neck with its fringe of crisp, dark curls, gleaming near his knee. His heart began to beat, a cold shiver thrilled through his limbs. He stared down on her with a fixed smile.
"Here it is!" she exclaimed, and raised herself into a kneeling position to hand him the treasured bauble.
He lifted his hand. He felt as if some occult power had lifted it for him, and that it weighed hundreds of pounds. Then with a timid, caressing touch he laid it on her cheek.
She drew back trembling. A great light swam in her eyes, that rested on him in dreamy inquiry. His arm sank heavily to his side.
"Thank you," he murmured hoarsely.
She went back to her place, and there was a profound stillness. It seemed to him that he had committed a crime, and that every moment of silence between them made it worse. He must force himself to speak.
"What was I asking you? Ah! to be sure. Who taught you to sew?"
She had unthreaded her needle, and was trying hard to pull the cotton through the eye again. But the small glittering shaft oscillated between her unsteady fingers like a reed shaken by the wind.
"I learnt at the parsonage,Herr," she replied. "Helene had a class----" She paused, embarrassed, for at the sound of the beloved name, which he heard for the first time from her lips--such lips--he winced as if from the lash of a whip. She took his excitement for anger, and added apologetically, "I mean the Pastor's daughter."
"Never mind," he said, controlling himself with difficulty. "Go to bed now."
That night Boleslav fought a severe battle with himself. He felt as if his ideal of exalted purity had been polluted since his eyes had rested with favour on this abandoned woman. And he himself was polluted too by that involuntary caress.
It was absolutely necessary to regain his peace of mind and purity. He must come to some distinct understanding with Helene without delay, in order that he might be strengthened in his struggle against his treacherous senses and benumbing doubt.
So urgent did it seem that his resolutions should at once be put into force, that he rose in the middle of the night, and by the glimmer of his night-light wrote to Helene assuring her of his undying love and eternal devotion, and imploring her to make some sign to show that she stood by him in trouble as she had once done in happiness, so that he might know for certain it was worth while his continuing to wage for her sake the fight against such enormous odds. With every line he wrote, his anxiety lessened, and when he lay down in his bed again, he felt that, through bracing his energies for the task, he had relieved himself of a load of care that had long heavily oppressed him.
"Can you undertake, Regina," he asked the next evening, "to deliver this letter unseen to theFräuleinat the parsonage?"
She regarded him for a second with wide eyes, then looking down, she murmured, "Yes,Herr."
"But supposing they attack you down in the village?"
"Pah! What do I care forthem?" she exclaimed, shrugging her shoulders contemptuously, as she always did when the villagers were in question.
Soon afterwards he saw her glide by the window like a shadow and disappear in the gloaming.
Hours passed. She did not return. He began to reproach himself for having engaged her in his amatory mission when her life was at stake.
At last, towards midnight, he heard the front door latch click.
She appeared on the threshold with chattering teeth, blue with cold, the letter still grasped in her cramped fingers.
He made her sit down by the stove, and gave her Spanish wine to drink--and gradually she found her voice.
"I have been lying all this time in the snow under the parsonage hedge," she said, "but there was no possibility of getting at her. Just now she put the light out in her bedroom, so I came home. But don't be vexed,Herr. Perhaps I shall have better luck to-morrow."
He wouldn't hear of her repeating the adventure, but when she came to him the following evening equipped for her walk, he did not forbid her to go.
This time she came back with glowing cheeks, panting for breath. Two peasants on their way home from the Black Eagle had seen her and given chase.
"But to-morrow,Herr, to-morrow, I shall succeed."
She was right. More breathless than the evening before, but radiant with delight, she came into the room, and stood at the door, stretching out two empty hands in triumph.
"Thank God," he thought, "that I shan't have to send her a fourth time on a fool's errand."
In joyous excitement she told him all about it. Sultan, the big dog in the kennel, knew her; and as a hostage she had taken him a bone, then he had permitted her to stand at the back door and look through the keyhole. She had seen Helene standing at the great store-cupboard. "I knew that Helene,--I mean the pastor's Fräulein,--went to the store-cupboard every night to put out coffee and oatmeal for the morning," she explained, "and sure enough I just timed her right, for there was her candle flickering in my face, and she standing within three steps of me----"
He gave a deep sigh. Happy creature! She hadseenher!
I opened the back door very softly, and called, 'Helene, Fräulein Helene!' And when she caught sight of me, she screamed and let the candle fall. 'Helene,' I said, 'I am not going to hurt you. Here is a letter from Junker Boleslav.'
"She trembled so, she could hardly take the letter out of my hand. And then she shrieked in horror, 'Go! Goat once!' And almost before I could tell her about the letter-box on the drawbridge, she had slammed the door and bolted it in my face. Ah, dear God!" she added with a melancholy little smile. "I am used to being treated in that way, but she might have been kinder because I brought a message fromyou!"
He leant his head on his hands. Helene's conduct gave him food for meditation. Of course her reception of her fallen playmate was in every way excusable. No wonder that her chaste and maidenly soul revolted at the sight of this unfortunate girl!
Every day Regina now ran down to the drawbridge to peep into the letter-box that was fastened to a pillar there, to see if there was an answer from Helene. But the letter-box remained empty; and Boleslav's brighter mood soon clouded again. He became more bitter and defiant than ever, and a prey to tormenting reflections. In his pride he would not allow that he had been spurned by the woman he loved; yet it was hardly any longer a matter for doubt that she wished in no way to be associated with him in his dishonour. He saw his great plans for the future fall in ruins in this abandonment of hope of winning the love of his youth.
Many days went by before he roused himself from this fresh depression--it was not till the feverish unrest of waiting had subsided that he slowly recovered his calmness and fortitude.
Then he threw himself with renewed energy into the search for proofs of his father's innocence. The evidence was contradictory and confused. Letters in which his father was referred to as the staunchest of Prussian patriots were counterbalanced by others in which he was addressed as the pioneer of Polish liberty. That might possibly have been a mere figure of flattering speech, designed to win over the vacillating nobleman, but to make it public would be once more putting the deceased's reputation in the pillory.
During these disheartening investigations of the truth, his only refreshment was the evening hours in which Regina's presence gave him something else to think about. So soon as she came and sat down opposite him he felt a curious satisfaction mingled with uneasiness. Sometimes, before she made her appearance, and he with bowed head listened to the sounds that came from her kitchen, he would be suddenly seized with anxiety, and feel as if he must jump up and call out, "Stay where you are! Don't come!" And yet, when she walked into the room he breathed more freely. "It is loneliness that attracts me to her," he often told himself. "She has a human face and a human voice."
As she sat over her work silently putting in stitch after stitch, he would pretend to be napping, and with closed eyes listen to the rise and fall of her breath. It was a full, slow, muffled sound, which fell on his ear like suppressed music. It resembled the ebbing and flowing of an ocean of restrained life and energy. After she had been sitting for a long time in a stooping attitude she would suddenly straighten herself, and stretch her arms with closed fingers over the sides of the chair, till the curve of her bosom stood out in powerful grandeur, and threatened to burst its bonds. It was as if from time to time she was obliged to become conscious of the fulness of life that pulsated and throbbed within her.
Then she resumed her old attitude and quietly sewed on.
It lasted all too short a time. These hours spent in her society had unconsciously become dear to him, and almost indispensable. The lamp seemed to give a brighter light since its rays fell on that pile of shining white linen; the hand of the clock accelerated its pace now he was not always looking at it to hurry it onwards. The wind that used to howl and whistle so dismally in the branches of the trees now murmured soft lullabies, and even the laths in the rotten roof cracked less ominously. He dreaded the evenings when at dusk she started on her journey to Bockeldorf, and more than once had meditated accompanying her.
But in their relations, that had become so friendly, there was one blot, and the knowledge of it pierced him at times like a poisonous arrow. Often, after he had been watching her in silence, he was tormented with a desire to penetrate into the secrets of her past, and to cross-examine her on the subject of her intercourse with the dead. For long he kept back the questions that burned on the tip of his tongue, feeling that little good could come of asking them; but at last he felt driven to speak.
"She is the only living witness of the catastrophe," he thought; "what's more, the only accomplice. She alone can give authentic information."
And one evening he broke the silence which had been so enjoyable to both, with a brusque demand that she should tell him all she knew.
She changed colour, and dropped her hands in her lap.
"You'll only be angry with me again,Herr," she stammered.
"Do as I bid you."
She still hesitated. "It's ... so long ago," she whispered piteously, "and I don't know how to tell things."
"But you can at least answer questions."
Then she resigned herself to fate.
"Who was it that first suggested to you the midnight sortie?"
"Thegnädiger Herr."
He clenched his teeth. "When and how?"
"Thegnädiger Herrordered me to wait at table. The great candelabra, that was hardly ever lit as a rule, was burning, and shone on the gold uniforms of the French officers, and it was all so dazzling I felt quite giddy when I carried the soup into the hall. They all laughed and pointed at me, and spoke in French, which I didn't understand."
"How many were there?"
"Five, and one with grey hair, who was the General, and had the most gold on his coat; and when I brought him the soup he caught hold of me round the waist, and I put the plate down on his finger and pinched it. Then they all laughed again, and thegnädiger Herrsaid, 'Don't be so clumsy, Regina.' I felt so ashamed and vexed at his saying that that I said, quite loud, I didn't see why I should wait if I was only to be scolded for it. Then they laughed louder than ever, and the General began to speak German, like little children speak it. 'You are a plucky, pretty little girl,' he said; and thegnädiger Herrtold him I was a girl who might prove useful to him and them all--or something of the kind. And when I brought in the liqueur at the end of dinner, he drew me down to him and whispered in my ear. I was to go to him in the night."
He started up. "And you went?"
She cast down her eyes.
"Ah,Herr," she said imploringly, "why do you ask me? I wish you wouldn't. I had often done it before, and I saw no harm in it then."
He felt his blood boiling.
"How old were you at that time?"
"Fifteen."
"And so corrupt--so----" His voice died away in wrath.
She cast an unspeakably sad and reproachful glance at him.
"I knew you'd be angry," she said, "but I can't make myself out better than I am."
"Continue your story," he cried.
"And when I went to him at midnight he was still up, striding round the table, and he asked me if I should like to earn a great sum of money. 'Of course,gnädiger Herr,' I said, 'I should like it very much,' for then I was very poor. Whereupon he asked me if I was afraid of the dark. I laughed, and said he ought to know best; and after a few more questions it came out what he wanted me to do. Could I be trusted to show the French the way over the Cats' Bridge and through the wood in an hour? I began to cry, for the French had behaved dreadfully since they had been quartered in the Castle, running after and insulting all the servant-girls, and I was afraid they might insult me too."
"Oh, you were afraid of that, were you?" he interposed with a contemptuous smile.
"Yes; and I told thegnädiger Herrnothing would induce me to do it. But then he became terribly angry, and thumped me on the shoulders till I sank on my knees, and he cried out that I was an ungrateful hussy, and that he would have me sent back to the village in disgrace, and would tell the Herr Pastor what sort of a wench I was, and he would make me confess and do penance; and then he took me by the throat, and when he had almost throttled me, and I could scarcely draw a breath, then,then..."
"Say no more," interrupted Boleslav; and seizing the letters that were to establish his father's innocence, he tore them to pieces.