The state dinner, prepared with lavish expense and on a most luxurious scale, was over at last. It had procured for Berkow one special triumph, independently of the pleasure he must have felt at seeing how numerous were the guests around him. The nobility of the neighbouring town, and its leading personages in particular, had always been exclusive to the last degree. No member of it had condescended as yet to enter the house of a parvenu, whose equivocal antecedents still shut him out from the highest circles of society; but the invitations bearing the name of Eugénie Berkow,néeBaroness Windeg, had been universally accepted. She was, and would ever remain, a scion of one of the most ancient and noble houses of the land.
No one could or would wound her by a refusal, more especially as it had not remained a secret how she had been forced into this union. But, if the bride were to be met with fullest esteem and sympathy, her father-in-law, in whose house the dinner was given, could not possibly be treated otherwise than with politeness, and so this too came to pass.
Berkow was jubilant; he knew well that this was only the prelude to what must happen in the capital next winter. The Baroness Windeg would certainly not be allowed to fall out of her sphere because she had sacrificed herself to filial love. She would now, as hitherto, be looked on as an equal in spite of the plebeian name she bore. And touching this name, too, the object for which he had so long striven lay now, as he hoped, almost within his grasp.
But if, on the one hand, the ambitious millionaire felt that he owed his daughter-in-law some thanks, notwithstanding that she had on this day more than ever assumed the airs of a princess, and had held herself completely aloof from him and his, the behaviour of his son, on the other hand, surprised as much as it angered him. Arthur, who had been in the habit of associating exclusively with people of rank, seemed all at once to have lost all taste for such company. He was so extremely cool in his politeness towards his distinguished guests, he even maintained so studied a reserve towards the officers of the garrison, with whom, on previous visits, he had always been on a familiar footing, that he more than once approached those bounds which a host cannot overstep without giving offence. Berkow could not understand this new whim. What could possess his son? Did he want to show his opposition to his wife by thus obviously avoiding her guests?
Those gentlemen from the town, who had ladies under their escort, started early on their return-journey, for the long rains had made the roads almost impracticable, and a drive of several hours in the darkness was not a thing to be desired. This gave the mistress of the house liberty to withdraw, and Eugénie at once availed herself of it, leaving the reception-rooms and retiring to her own private apartments, while her husband and his father stayed with the remaining visitors.
At the appointed hour, Ulric Hartmann made his appearance. Since his early childhood, since Frau Berkow's death, when his parents' relations with the great house had altogether ceased, he had not been within its walls. Indeed, the master's château, with its surrounding terraces and gardens, was to the whole working-population a closed Eldorado, into which even the officials only gained occasional access when called thither by some weighty matter of business, or by a special invitation. The young man walked through the lofty hall, lined on each side by flowering plants, up the carpeted stairs, and through the well-lighted corridors, until in one of the latter, he was received by the servant who had brought him the message in the morning. The man showed him into a room, saying:
"Her ladyship will be here directly," and, with this observation, shut the door and left him alone.
Ulric looked round the large handsomely decorated ante-room, the first of a long suite of apartments, all of which were now completely empty. The guests were still assembled in the distant dining-room which looked out on the garden, but the emptiness and stillness of this part of the house made its splendour yet more impressive. Theportièreswere all drawn back, and Ulric could see through the long suite of handsome rooms, each one of which seemed to surpass the others in beauty.
The thick, dark-coloured velvet of the carpets drank in the light, so to speak; but it shone all the brighter on the richly gilt decorations of the walls and doors, on the silk and satin furniture, in the tall mirrors which reached to the ceiling and cast forth the reflection of it in a thousand brilliant rays, yes, even on the waxed floors bright and smooth as glass; it set off to fuller advantage those pictures, statues and priceless vases with which the salons were so profusely ornamented. All that wealth and luxury can give was here brought together, and the effect was one which might well dazzle an eye accustomed to obscurity, and most at home in the dark mazes of the mine.
But the sight, though it would certainly have been confusing to any of his comrades, appeared to make no impression on Ulric. His look glanced darkly through the sparkling vista, but there was no admiration to be traced in it. Each costly thing which drew his attention seemed to rouse up within him a feeling of enmity, and he suddenly turned his back on the glittering perspective, and gave a little vehement stamp with his foot on finding that there were no signs of any one as yet. Ulric Hartmann, clearly, was not the man to wait patiently in an anteroom until such time as he could be conveniently received.
At last something rustled behind him; he turned round and took a step back involuntarily, for a few paces from him, just under the great chandelier, stood Eugénie Berkow. Up to this time he had seen her but once, on the day he had carried her from the carriage, and she then wore a travelling-dress of dark silk, whilst her face was shaded by her hat and veil. Of that meeting he had preserved only one remembrance, that of the great dark eyes which had scanned his countenance so closely.
Now--ah yes, indeed! this was an apparition very different from any that had hitherto come within the young miner's sphere of vision. Over the white silk dress flowed a delicate white lace, which waved like a cloudlet round her tall and slender figure. Into these airy folds some roses seemed to have been wafted, and a wreath of roses encircled her blonde head, the shining tresses of which rivalled in their soft brilliancy the pearls about her neck and arms. The blaze of the wax-lights fell full on this lovely picture so fitly framed by its surroundings. As she stood there, it seemed as though nothing ought to approach her which had anything in common with the ordinary life of this work-a-day world.
But although Eugénie's whole appearance might betoken the high-born lady of fashion, that being the rôle which she had this evening exclusively played--her eyes showed plainly that she could be something else too. They lighted up now with a glad expression, as she caught sight of the young man, and she went up to him with quiet friendliness.
"I am pleased that you came when I sent for you. I wanted to speak to you to clear up a misunderstanding. Come with me."
She opened one of the side doors, and entered the adjoining room, followed by Ulric. It was her own boudoir, and separated her apartments beyond from the suite before mentioned--but what a contrast it was to the latter! Here only a mellowed light streamed from the lamp over the tender blue draperies and hangings. The foot, bold enough there to tread, sank silently into the yielding carpet, and the caressing air was warm and balmy with the scent of flowers.
Ulric stood on the threshold as if spell-bound, though he was in general but little used to fits of shyness. Here all was so different to the dazzling rooms he had left, so much more beautiful, so dreamily still. The wrath with which he had looked on all that splendour had gone out from him; in its place there stirred a something which he could not define, a something born of the gentler influences now so strangely surrounding him. But in the next minute a hot anger at this weakness burned up within him, he drew back instinctively as from some vaguely-felt danger, and his whole being rose up in inflexible hostility to this atmosphere of beauty and fragrance with all its seductive charm.
Eugénie stopped, noticing with some surprise that the miner was not following her. She took a seat near the door, and her eyes scrutinised his face narrowly. The curly light hair entirely covered the still fresh scar, and the wound, which might well have proved dangerous to another man, had had but little effect on this powerful frame. Eugénie sought for some trace of past suffering, but found none. Her first question related, however, to his injury.
"So you have quite recovered? Does the wound really give you no pain now?"
"No, my lady, it was not worth speaking about."
Eugénie did not appear to remark the short ungracious tone of the answer. She continued, speaking with the same kindness.
"I heard, certainly, from the Director's mouth on the very next day that there was nothing to be apprehended, or we should have had you more thoroughly cared for. After his second visit to you, the Director assured me again that there was no question of any danger, and Herr Wilberg, whom I sent to your house on the day after the accident, brought me the same report."
At the first words of her little speech Ulric had raised his eyes and fixed them on her face. His moody brow cleared slowly, and his voice had a gentler sound as he answered,
"I did not know, my lady, that you had troubled yourself so much about it. Herr Wilberg did not tell me he came from you, or"----
"Or you would have been rather more friendly to him," concluded Eugénie, a little reproachfully. "He complained of the brusque way in which you treated him that evening, yet he was so full of sympathy for you, and offered with such cheerful alacrity to procure me the news I wished for. What do you object to in Herr Wilberg?"
"Nothing--but he plays on the guitar and writes poetry."
"That does not seem to be any special advantage in your eyes," said she, half-jesting; "and I hardly think you would be guilty of it, if you were to change places with him. But we will leave that! It was for something else I sent for you. I hear," she played in rather an embarrassed way with her fan, "I hear from the Director that you have declined a mark of our gratitude, which he was commissioned to offer you from us."
"Yes," Ulric assented briefly, without adding one word to soften the harsh monosyllable.
"I am sorry if the offer, or the way in which it was made, has offended you. Herr Berkow,"--a faint flush overspread Eugénie's face as she uttered the untruth--"Herr Berkow certainly intended personally to express to you his thanks and mine. He was prevented from doing so, and therefore begged the Director to represent him. It would grieve me much if you were to see in that any proof of ingratitude or indifference on our part towards our deliverer. We both know how deeply we are in your debt, and you would hardly now refuse me too, if I were to beg you to receive from my hands"----
Ulric started up; the happy influence of her first words had been quite destroyed by the close of her speech. His face had grown pale, when he guessed what was her object, and he broke out recklessly,
"Let that matter be, my lady. If you offer me money, you too, I shall wish I had let the carriage go over with all that was in it!"
Eugénie was a little startled by this outbreak of that savage wildness for which Ulric Hartmann was feared by every one about the works. Such a look and such a tone had certainly never been addressed to Baron Windegs daughter; it was indeed the first time she had been brought in contact with one belonging to the working classes. She rose offended.
"I do not wish to impose my thanks upon you. If the expression of them displeases you so much, I regret that I should have called you hither."
She turned away and was about to leave the room, but the movement brought Ulric to his senses. He took one hasty step forwards.
"My lady--I--forgive me! I would not vexyoufor the world!"
Eugénie was struck by the passionate, remorseful tone. She stopped and looked at him, seeking in his face for the key to his strange conduct; but his vehement cry for pardon had disarmed her.
"You would not vexme?" she repeated, "but you do not mind how much you hurt other people's feelings by your ungracious ways? The Director's, for instance, and Herr Wilberg's?"
"No, I do not," returned Ulric, "no more than they would mind hurting mine, if the case were reversed. There is no talk of friendliness between the officials and us."
"No?" asked Eugénie in surprise. "I did not know that the officials and the hands were on such bad terms, and Herr Berkow cannot suspect it either, or he would assuredly have tried to mediate."
"Herr Berkow," said Ulric, sharply, "has cared during the last twenty years for every possible thing on the works, except for the welfare of the hands employed, and so it will go on, until we begin caring a little about him, and then--oh, my lady! I was forgetting that you are his son's wife. Forgive me!"
She was silent, a little confounded by his reckless plain-speaking. What she now heard was, in truth, only what had often before been hinted in her presence about her father-in-law, but the terrible bitterness of these words made her feel all the depth of the gulf which lay between him and his subordinates. Whoever brought an accusation against Berkow was sure beforehand of having his daughter-in-law's sympathy. Eugénie had herself had bitter proof of his unscrupulousness, but she was sensible that, as his son's wife, she ought not to make this evident. If she noticed Hartmann's last speech at all, it must be to reprove him, and she preferred to let it pass.
"So you will not accept any mark of our gratitude, not even from my hands?" she began again, waiving the dangerous subject. "Well, then, I can do nothing but tender my thanks to the man who saved me from certain death. Will you reject them, too? I thank you, Hartmann!"
She held out her hand to him. It lay only a few seconds, white and delicate as a flower, in the miner's strong work-hardened palm, but its touch sent a quiver through him. All the bitterness went out of his face, the threatening look from his eyes; the defiant head was bent over her outstretched hand, and his features bore an expression of gentleness and submissiveness, which none of his superiors could ever boast of having seen on Ulric Hartmann's countenance.
"Oh, you are giving audience here, Eugénie, and to one of our people!"
Berkow's voice sounded behind them, as he opened the door at this moment, and came in, accompanied by his son. Eugénie drew back her hand and Ulric stood up erect. As those tones met his ear, he resumed his characteristic attitude of silent hostility, which became even more marked, as Arthur exclaimed, with a sharpness, oddly contrasting with his habitual languid manner,
"Hartmann, how do you come here?"
"Hartmann?" repeated Berkow, attracted by the name, and going up nearer. "Oh, here we have our friend the agitator, who"----
"Who stopped our horses when they were running away in their mad fright, and who was injured himself in saving our lives!" put in Eugénie, quietly, but very decidedly.
"Ah, yes!" said Berkow, disconcerted by this reminder, and by his daughter-in-law's resolute look. "Yes, indeed, I heard of it, and the Director was telling me that you and Arthur had already given a proof of your sense of the obligation. The young man has come, no doubt, to express his thanks. I hope you were satisfied, Hartmann?"
The cloud rolled back on Ulric's brow blacker and more menacing than ever, and the reply, which hovered on his lips, would probably have brought down on him the most serious consequences. Eugénie stepped up to her protégé and touched him lightly on the arm with her fan. The miner understood the warning; he looked at her, saw the unconcealed anxiety in her eyes, and his hatred and defiance gave way once more. He answered quietly, almost coldly:
"Certainly, Herr Berkow, I am satisfied with her ladyship's thanks."
"I am glad of it," said Berkow, shortly.
Ulric turned to Eugénie.
"I can go now, my lady?"
She bowed her head in silent assent. She saw but too plainly what constraint the man had to put on himself in order to remain quiet. With one slight movement of the head directed to the master and his son, a salutation evidently bestowed with much reluctance, he left the room.
"Well, I must confess that your protégé has not very good manners," remarked Berkow, with a sneer. "He takes leave in rather an off-hand way, and does not wait to be dismissed. But there, how can such people learn the proper way to behave! Arthur, you seem to find something remarkably interesting in this Hartmann. I hope you have looked after him long enough?"
Arthur's eyes had indeed followed the miner with an intent gaze, and they were still fixed on the door he had closed behind him. The young man's eyebrows were drawn together slightly, and his lips firmly set. At his father's remark, he turned round.
The latter went up to his daughter-in-law, with a great show of politeness.
"I regret, Eugénie, that your complete ignorance of the state of things here should have led you to an act of excessive condescension. You, naturally, could have no idea of the part that fellow plays among his comrades, but he should, on no account, have been permitted to come to this house, much less to enter your boudoir, even under the pretext of returning thanks for a present."
The lady had seated herself, but there was a look on her face which made it seem advisable to her father-in-law to remain standing, instead of taking a place at her side as he at first intended. She compelled him too "to admire her only from a distance."
"I see they have only told you half the story," she answered, coolly. "May I ask when you last spoke to the Director?"
"This morning, when I learned from him that he had been commissioned to hand over to Hartmann a sum, which I, by the way, consider much too large. It is quite a fortune to such people! But I do not wish to lay any restrictions on you and Arthur, if you think it right to show your gratitude in this exaggerated way."
"So you do not know that the young man has refused the money altogether?"
"Re--refused?" cried Berkow, starting back.
"Refused?" repeated Arthur. "Why?"
"Probably because it offended him to be put off with a sum of money offered through a third person, while those whom he had saved did not think it worth their while to add even a word of thanks. I have made good this latter negligence, but I could not persuade him to accept the smallest thing. It does not seem as though the Director had managed the matter so 'admirably.'"
Arthur bit his lip. He knew these words were meant for him, though they were spoken to his father.
"It appears, then, you sent for him yourself?" he asked.
"Certainly."
"I wish you had left it undone," said Berkow, somewhat irritated. "This Hartmann is pointed out to me on all sides as the chief promoter of that revolutionary spirit which I am about to meet with the utmost severity. I see now that too much has not been said about him. If this fellow dares to refuse such a sum, because it has not been paid to him with all the ceremony his mightiness demands, he may well be capable of anything. I must remind you, Eugénie, that there are certain considerations my daughter-in-law must keep in mind even when she is giving a proof of her kind feeling."
The old contemptuous look played about Eugénie's lips. Remembering the compulsion to which she had been subjected, she felt but little disposed to yield to her father-in-law's wishes, and the bitter thought of it rising within her made her overlook the real justice of what he said.
"I am sorry, Herr Berkow," she answered, icily, "that other considerations must have weight with me besides any your daughter-in-law may be bound to regard. This was an exceptional case, and you must allow me to act on my own judgment in such matters both now and for the future."
She was again every inch the Baroness Windeg, as she thus recalled the plebeian millionaire to his place; but whether the cause of dispute had angered him too much, or whether the wine, which had flowed so freely at dinner, had produced some little effect on him, he did not this time show her the same boundless respect, but answered with some heat,
"Really? Well, then, I shall thank you to remember,"----but he got no further in his speech, for Arthur, who had remained in the background so far, taking no part in the conversation, stood up all at once at his wife's side, and said quietly,
"I must beg you, sir, to put an end to this unpleasant discussion.--I have left Eugénie unlimited freedom of action, and I do not wish that any one else should attempt to restrain it."
Berkow looked at his son as though he had not heard aright. He was accustomed to see Arthur display the most passive indifference on all occasions, great and small, and was as much surprised by his son's interference as by this open championship.
"You seem to have quite gone over to the opposition to-day," he returned in a jesting tone. "I shall do well to beat a retreat before such combined forces, particularly as I have some business matters to attend to still. I hope I may find you rather less disposed to quarrel to-morrow, Eugénie; and you, Arthur, somewhat more tractable than you have shown yourself to-day. I wish you both a good evening."
When Berkow left the room in suppressed wrath, he had probably no idea of the embarrassment his sudden departure would cause to the two who remained behind, an embarrassment they had not felt since the evening of their arrival, for never since then had they been alone together. They had met only in the presence of strangers, or at table when the servants were in constant attendance, and this unexpected tête-à-tête seemed equally unwelcome to both. Arthur, no doubt, felt that he could not exactly follow on his father's heels; he must at least address a few words to his wife first, but several seconds passed before he made up his mind what to say, and when at last he was about to speak, Eugénie forestalled him.
"You need not have come to my assistance," said she coldly. "I should have been able to vindicate my independence and hold my own against your father."
"I do not in the least doubt your independent spirit," answered Arthur in the same cool tone, "but I have misgivings as to my father's delicacy. He was about to bring up a subject, the remembrance of which I wished to spare both you and myself. That was the sole object of my interference."
She was silent and leaned back in her seat, while her husband, standing by the table, took up the fan that was lying there and examined its arabesques with an appearance of much interest. A second and more uncomfortable pause ensued, until at last he began again:
"As to this business with Hartmann, I really do admire the self-abnegation you have shown in it. You, of all people, must feel a strong antipathy to persons of his class."
Eugénie opened her large eyes wide, and looked at him sternly.
"I feel an antipathy to nothing but to weakness and vulgarity. I respect any one who has energy thoroughly to fill his place in the world, whether that place be a high or a lowly one."
There was a hard ring in her voice. Arthur's hand, still playing with the fan, moved rather nervously, and there was a slight quiver about his lips. He started a little when she spoke of weakness and vulgarity, though the expression of his face was as indifferent as ever.
"A most elevated view of the matter," said he carelessly. "But I am afraid you would modify it in some degree, if you were to be brought in nearer contact with the rough wild sort of life which often obtains in the lowly places."
"But this young miner is something out of the common," declared Eugénie decidedly. "He may be wild and untamed, like one of Nature's elements which grow to be a danger when not properly directed. I did not find him rough."
She had involuntarily spoken with some warmth. The latent, half-stifled fire in Arthur's eyes gleamed out again, as he fixed them on her.
"You appear to exercise a marvellous degree of authority over this 'wild untamed element of Nature.' It was on the point of breaking out in an unseemly manner before my father. You had but to raise your fan, and the angry lion became as gentle as a lamb." Here the said fan was so violently opened and closed by the young man's slender white fingers that the costly toy was in serious danger, while he went on half mocking. "And in what a knightly manner he bent over your hand! If we had not come in, I believe he would have ventured to kiss it like a real preux chevalier."
Eugénie rose hastily. "I fear, Arthur, this man may force from you and your father something more than a mere sneer, and I do not know whether Herr Berkow does wisely to drive his people into an opposition, which is constantly growing, and the consequences of which may one day recoil on his own head."
Her husband's gaze was riveted on her as she stood before him, and yet her rustling silks and airy laces, her roses and soft pearls, were nothing new to him, any more than the proud and beautiful head with its dark indignant eyes. Perhaps he was struck by her earnest championship of her protégé. He preserved the same careless, half-mocking tone in which he had spoken hitherto, but it concealed a feeling of suppressed irritation, and the fan he held in his hands met with decided ill-luck. The delicately carved ivory was broken in two as he flung, rather than threw, it on to a chair.
"Our deliverer has been reading you a lecture on socialism, I am sorry I missed it. But this Hartmann is certainly remarkable in one way. He has accomplished that which nothing had hitherto achieved, he has actually led us into a lively conversation. But the interest of this theme must be pretty well exhausted by this time, do not you think so?"
The entrance of a servant with a message brought the conversation to an end. Arthur availed himself of the pretext to depart, taking leave of his wife in the cold, ceremonious manner which marked all their intercourse. Hardly had the servant closed the door and left her alone, when Eugénie began to pace up and down the room in evident agitation. She was revolted at the coldness and heartlessness shown about Ulric's brave deed, but it was not that alone which made her steps so hasty and drove the angry colour to her cheeks.
Why could she not meet her husband with that thorough contempt she found so easy towards his father? Was it possible he could be worthy of better things? There was something in Arthur's boundless indolence which parried every blow, and even gave him at times a secret superiority over the proud, passionate woman, carried away but too often by her warmth of temper. On that first evening when, with terrible candour, she had disclosed to him the truth, he must have felt himself a deeply humiliated man; to-day, when she had shown him how falsely he had judged his deliverer and hers, the wrong was clearly on his side; and yet on both occasions he had confronted her with a dignity which was not crushed and annihilated by her contempt.
She would not recognise this, would not confess to herself how it wounded her that never, since the explanation between them, had he made the slightest attempt to temper the coldness of their relations, even by a word. She would certainly have repulsed any such attempt with all the disdainful pride at her command, but that she should never be called on to do so, that he should never take the trouble to go one step beyond that which appearances absolutely required, vexed her in spite of herself.
Eugénie was prompt with her love as with her hate, and her feeling towards her husband had been of a decided nature even before she gave him her hand--but it was not possible to look down on him from a lofty eminence, as she could look down on his father. She felt that vaguely, though she could give no account to herself of what had compelled this feeling within her.
Arthur, going through the corridors, met the Director and the chief-engineer who had been detained to confer on some business matter with Berkow and were now about to leave the house. The young heir stopped all at once.
"May I ask, sir, why Hartmann's refusal to take the money offered him was immediately communicated to Lady Eugénie and to her alone? Why did I hear nothing of it?" asked he sharply.
"Well," said the Director rather confused, "I really did not know you attached any importance to it, Herr Berkow. You declined all personal interference in the matter so decidedly, and her ladyship showed from the first so much interest in it, that I thought myself bound"----
"Oh, indeed!" interrupted Arthur, with the same nervous little twitch about his lips. "Well, her ladyship's wishes should be complied with certainly, but I must beg of you, in all such matters of business"--he laid an emphasis on the last word--"not quite to overlook me another time. I expressly desire that I may be the first to be acquainted with them in future."
So saying, he left the astonished officials, passing on to his own rooms. The Director looked at his colleague.
"What do you say to that?"
The chief-engineer laughed. "Signs and wonders are to be seen! Herr Arthur begins to take an interest in matters of business! Herr Arthur desires to be acquainted with them! Such a thing has never happened before since I have known him."
"But this is not a business matter at all," said the Director irritably. "It is a mere private transaction, and I can guess how it has been. Hartmann has behaved to the lady in that delightfully amiable manner of his we know so well. I thought it was rather odd that she should send for him. Fancy him in a drawing-room, with his savage reckless ways! He is quite capable of telling her what he told me this morning in the office: he does not want any payment, and he did not risk his life for the sake of money. The lady has been indignant at his insolence and her husband also, and now there will be some nice pleasant things for me to hear from Herr Berkow, because I allowed the interview to take place."
"Well, it will be the first time Herr Arthur has ever been indignant at anything that concerns his wife," said the other indifferently, as they went down the steps. "It seems to me that the glacier-temperature about this married couple is extending gradually to all around them. You feel the ice in the air directly you come near them, does it not strike you?"
"It struck me that Lady Eugénie looked admirably handsome. She was rather cool, certainly, but still admirably handsome!"
The chief-engineer made a comic little grimace expressive of horror.
"For Heaven's sake, do not adopt Wilberg's style! You are getting on into the fifties, you know. Talking of Wilberg, he is already head over ears in romantic adoration, but I doubt whether he, or his inevitable verses, will excite much jealousy in high quarters. Herr Arthur seems as little inclined to worship his wife as she to be worshipped. Marriages of convenience are made up every day, it is true, but I can't help having a sort of feeling about this one, as if it could not take quite the usual course, as if beneath all the ice there lay something like a volcano, which will burst out one fine day with thunder and lightning, and give us a bit of an earthquake and a catastrophe on a small scale. That would certainly 'shed some poetry on the arid steppes of our everyday life,' as Wilberg would observe, supposing always the eruption spared him and his guitar. But here we are below, good night!"
More than a month had passed since the festivities. Herr Berkow, coming down "to surprise his children," as he said, had scarcely found the pleasure he had hoped for in his visit, which was certainly rather premature. He had gone back to the city after a few days to settle the arrears of business awaiting him there, and now he was expected to return to the château, for a second and, this time, for a longer stay.
Nothing was changed in the life of the young people; it was, if anything, more divided, colder, more "aristocratic" than at first. On both sides the end of the honeymoon was looked forward to with considerable longing; it had been arranged that they should stay in their country retreat until such time as the fine summer weather should make a longer journey desirable. They would return from their travels in the autumn, and definitively take up their residence in the capital, where their future abode had already been prepared for them by Berkow with much lavish expenditure.
The morning shift was just finished, and Ulric Hartmann was on his way back to his father's house. He had been obliged to moderate his usual swift pace, for at his side walked Herr Wilberg, also going home from his office. This gentleman had been lucky enough to catch Ulric up, and had attached himself to him. It was rather surprising to see one of the officials on such familiar terms with the Deputy Hartmann, who enjoyed but little sympathy among his superiors; still more surprising was it that such familiarity should come from Herr Wilberg, unless indeed the old saying that "extremes meet" be taken as an explanation.
There was, however, another reason here. The chief-engineer little knew what his jokes had brought about, but his laughing hints as to the subject-matter for a ballad had, unfortunately, fallen on a too receptive soil. Wilberg had made up his mind to treat the subject poetically, but he was still in doubt as to whether the masterpiece should be in the form of a ballad, an epic, or a drama. At present one thing only was settled, namely, that it should unite in itself the combined excellences of all three styles.
Unhappily for Ulric, his energetic and courageous act had awakened in the future author's mind the notion that the miner was exactly fitted for a hero of tragedy, and Wilberg now dogged his footsteps perpetually, in order to study this most interesting character. When Ulric further took it into his head to refuse the considerable sum offered him with a disdainful pride which abashed even the Director, the romantic halo about him grew so strong in the poet's eyes that nothing could shake or diminish his admiration, not even the inconsiderate rudeness of the object of it, nor the cutting remarks of those in authority, who hardly approved of such an intimacy.
Ulric could not be said to meet him half-way, or in any manner to facilitate his "studies;" he tried often impatiently to shake off the company thus forced upon him, as one tries to free one's self from a troublesome fly, but it availed him little. Herr Wilberg was determined to see in him a hero, a rough, wild, undisciplined sort of hero, it is true, but still a hero; and the more this view of him was justified by his behaviour, so much the better pleased was the would-be author, who only studied him the more closely for each such fresh development of character.
At last the young miner shrugged his shoulders, and resigned himself to the inevitable. Custom did its work, and there grew up at length between the two a sort of familiarity, not over respectful on Ulric's part.
The wind was still blowing rather cold from the north. Herr Wilberg prudently buttoned up his coat, and tied the ends of his thick woollen scarf carefully together, as he said with a sigh,
"What a lucky fellow you are, Hartmann, with your health and strength of iron! You can go up and down the shafts from heat to cold, and come out afterwards into this biting wind, whilst I have to protect myself from every variation of temperature. And I get so nervous, so shaken, so irritable! That is the way when the spirit gains too great dominion over the body. Yes, Hartmann, it is the press of thought and feeling that does it!"
"I think, Herr Wilberg, it is more likely your everlasting tea-drinking that is the cause of it," replied Ulric, with a rather compassionate glance at his weakly little companion. "If you go on swallowing that hot, thin stuff morning and evening, you will never get strong."
Wilberg glanced up aloft at his adviser with a look of infinite superiority.
"You do not understand, Hartmann. I could not possibly bear such a heavy diet as yours. My constitution would not stand it, besides, tea is of great service to the mental faculties. It quickens me, it stimulates me when the day's work is done, and when in the quiet eventide the Muses draw near"----
"You mean, when you are making your verses," interrupted Ulric, drily. "So that is what the tea is for? Well, they are just what I should expect from it."
It was fortunate that the poet was just then busy trying to fix in his memory a rhyme which had come into his mind. He hardly heard the insulting remark, but turned to his companion next minute in quite a friendly way.
"I have something to beg of you, Hartmann, to desire, to demand!" said he, reaching his climax in well-graduated tones. "Something which you must agree to, no matter at what cost. You are in possession of an article which is perfectly worthless to you, but which would make me the happiest mortal under the sun. You must give it up to me."
"What must I give up to you?" carelessly asked Ulric, who, as usual, when Wilberg was talking, had only half listened.
Herr Wilberg blushed, sighed, looked down, sighed a second time, and, after these preliminaries, thought fit to proceed to speech.
"You remember the day when you came to her ladyship's rescue! Ah, Hartmann, what a pity it is you should have no adequate conception of the poetry involved in such a situation! If I had been in your place! But we will leave that. She offered you her handkerchief when she saw you were bleeding. You kept it in your hand, while the others were looking to your wound. Good Heavens! you cannot possibly have forgotten such a circumstance as that!"
"Well, what do you want with the handkerchief?" asked Ulric, suddenly attentive.
"I wish to possess it," murmured Wilberg, casting down his eyes with a melancholy air. "Ask from me what you will, but let me have that precious souvenir of the woman I adore!"
"You!" cried Ulric, in a tone which made the other spring back and look anxiously round to see that no one was by.
"Don't shout like that, Hartmann! You need not be so horrified because I say I adore the future proprietor's wife. It is something far different from what you are accustomed to consider as love. It is--but you do not know what a platonic affection means.
"No, I don't," returned the miner, shortly, increasing his pace, and evidently desirous of breaking off the conversation.
"You cannot possibly understand it," declared Wilberg, with much self-satisfaction, "for you cannot, and never will, rise to that pure elevation of feeling of which only highly-cultivated minds are capable, that feeling which, without a hope, without a desire, can content itself with adoring in silence from afar. Or what do you think a man should do else, if he loves a woman who belongs to another?"
"Overcome his love," said Ulric, in a low voice, "or"----
"Or?"
"Strike the other man down."
Herr Wilberg beat a hasty retreat to the other side of the road, where he remained standing transfixed with horror.
"What brutality! What appalling principles! So you would seal your love by assault and murder? You are a man to be feared, Hartmann! And you can say such a thing as that with the tone, the look of .... Her ladyship was right when she said you were like one of Nature's untamed elements which"----
"Who said so?" broke in Ulric, looking at him darkly.
"Her ladyship. 'A wild untamed element,' she said, and the description was most striking, most apt, Hartmann"-- The young man ventured a little nearer his companion, but timidly still, and approaching him by degrees. "Hartmann, I could forgive you everything, even what you said just now, but the one thing I cannot forgive is your conduct toher. Have you alone no eyes for her beauty and grace, which disarm the very roughest of your comrades, that you should avoid the sight of her, as if it would bring you ill-luck? If her carriage appears in the distance, you turn round and get out of the way; if she rides by, you step into the house nearest at hand, and I warrant, you make that long round every day past the Director's house, for no other reason than that you might meet her once at the park-gates and be obliged to take off your cap to her. Oh, this stubborn, bitter class-hatred, which spares not even women! I repeat it to you, Hartmann, you are a man greatly to be feared."
Ulric was silent. Contrary to his wont, he submitted to these reproaches without answering a syllable, and by so doing, he strengthened Wilberg in the delusion that his arguments had at last produced some effect. Encouraged by this, he began again,
"But to return to the real matter in hand. The pocket-handkerchief"----
"How should I know where the thing is?" interrupted Ulric, roughly. "It is lost, or Martha may have given it back. How should I know!"
Wilberg was just going to launch out into indignation at the indifference with which an object, in his eyes of such priceless worth, was treated, when he suddenly perceived Martha standing before her uncle's house. He shot down on her like a hawk, and began to question her as to where the said handkerchief might be hidden, whether she had really given it back, or whether, within the range of possibility, it might yet be found.
The girl seemed not quite to understand him at first; when she found out what it was all about her face darkened perceptibly.
"The handkerchief is there still," she said, decidedly. "I thought to do well one day when I took it out and washed the stains from it, but Ulric raved like a madman, because I had even touched the thing. He has got it in his chest."
"Oh! so it was only a pretext for refusing me?" said Wilberg, with a reproachful look at Ulric, who had listened with suppressed anger, and who answered almost with a sneer:
"Make up your mind to it, Herr Wilberg, the handkerchief is not for you."
"And why not, may I ask?"
"Because I mean to keep it," said Ulric, laconically.
"But, Hartmann"----
"When I once say no, I mean it. You might know that, Herr Wilberg."
Wilberg lifted his hands and eyes towards Heaven, as though calling on it to witness the offence done him; but suddenly his arms fell down inert, and he drew himself up quickly, as a voice said behind Martha,
"Can you not inform me, my dear .... Ah, Herr Wilberg! I am interrupting a most animated conversation."
The person addressed stood speechless, overcome at least as much by despair as by delight at this unexpected meeting; for the distressing consciousness was on him, that he, who hitherto had only confronted her ladyship in the faultless attire of full-dress, must now stand before her, arrayed in a blue paletot and green comforter, to say nothing of a nose tipped by the cutting wind with a most unbecoming red. He knew how unfavourable this combination of colour must be to him; not an hour ago he had vowed to himself that he would exchange the green comforter for one of a more flattering hue, and now a mischievous chance had brought him before the eyes of his ideal!
Herr Wilberg wished himself deep down in the shafts, and yet retained sufficient power of thought to be irritated at Hartmann, who, with all the dust of his daily work upon him, stood like a statue, and moved never a muscle.
Eugénie had come along the road which led by the Manager's house, and seeing at first only the young girl, had entered the garden unnoticed. Her last question remained a moment unanswered, for both men were silent.
At last Martha spoke. She had cast a rapid glance at her cousin, when the lady appeared on the scene so unexpectedly; now she turned quickly to her.
"We were just speaking of the lace handkerchief your ladyship gave for a bandage, and which has never been returned."
"Ah, yes, my handkerchief," said Eugénie, indifferently. "I had quite forgotten it, but since you have kept it so carefully, child, you can give it me back."
"I did not keep it; Ulric has it." Martha gave him another look, dark and scrutinising as the first, and even Eugénie turned with some surprise to the young man who had greeted her neither by word nor gesture.
"Well, you then, Hartmann! Or do you not wish to restore it?"
Wilberg was growing more and more exasperated at Ulric's "shameful behaviour," for he stood there motionless with knitted brows and lips firmly closed, and just the same look of stubborn resistance on his face as that with which he had armed himself on entering her boudoir. One could see plainly that he was struggling with himself to keep down the hatred he felt for his master's young wife! This time his better nature conquered.
Herr Wilberg noticed that, at the first sound of that voice addressing itself to him, he started, as though pricked with shame at his own conduct, that a flush rose to his brow, and that his attitude lost something of its defiant hostility. The sermon so lately delivered had certainly had some effect, else how should this stiff-necked Hartmann, whose will was of iron, and who was to be moved neither by fear nor favour, have yielded in silent obedience to a simple question, have turned to the house, and, after the lapse of a few minutes, come back holding the handkerchief?
"Here it is, my lady."
Eugénie took the morsel of cambric, seeming to attach very little importance to it.
"And now, Herr Wilberg, as I have met you here, perhaps you can best give me the information I want. It is the first time I have come by this road, and I find that the bridge which leads to the park is closed by a gate. Can it be opened, or must I go back all round by the works again?"
She pointed to a bridge at a little distance from them. It crossed a wide ditch, which bordered the park on this side, and it was closed by means of an iron gate.
Herr Wilberg was in despair. The gate was securely fastened; it was done to keep the work-people, whose dwellings lay for the most part about here, out of the park, but the gardener had the key; Wilberg would hasten, would fly to fetch it, if only her ladyship could bear to wait until ....
"Oh no," broke in Eugénie, rather impatiently. "You would have twice to make the round which I want to avoid. I would rather go back."
Wilberg would not hear of it. He begged and entreated the lady to grant him the happiness of this one small service. His pretty little speech was brought to an abrupt conclusion by the sound of a loud crack.
Ulric had gone up to the gate and seized it with both hands. He shook the iron rails with such force that the bolts and locks creaked again. Finding that it did not give way promptly, his features contracted angrily, he gave one violent thrust at it with his foot, and so made an end of all resistance. The fastenings, which were not in the best condition, yielded; the gate flew open.
"Good Heavens! Hartmann, what are you about?" cried Wilberg, terrified. "You are spoiling the lock. What will Herr Berkow say?"
Ulric gave him no answer. He pushed the gate quite back and turned quickly round.
"The way is open, my lady."
Eugénie did not look half so shocked as the young clerk. She even laughed, as she proceeded towards the path so vigorously cleared for her.
"Thank you, Hartmann. Do not make yourself uneasy as to the spoilt lock, Herr Wilberg; I will take the responsibility on myself. But, as the gate is open now, will you not take the shorter cut through the park?"
What a proposal! Herr Wilberg did not hasten, he rushed, he flew to the lady's side, racking his brain even in this hurried moment to find an interesting and striking theme on which to discourse; but he was obliged to begin with a very prosaic one, for Eugénie, turning her head once more, looked curiously after the enigmatic being who had puzzled her so much once before, as though she would again try to read the riddle of his character with her grave meditative eyes. "That Hartmann has the strength and the fury of an old Berserker. He crashes down locks and bolts without more ado, just to"----
"Just to make my way easy," continued Eugénie, with a touch of irony, as she looked at her companion. "You would not have been guilty of such a forcible act of politeness?"
Wilberg protested against even the supposition of such a thing. Her ladyship could not believe for a moment that he would have laid violent hands on other people's property, and that too in her presence; no, most assuredly he would not.... But she listened to his protestations with marked abstraction, and in spite of all the pains he took to interest her, he could not succeed in fully gaining her attention once during their walk through the park.