While things stood thus I received a letter from Varvilliers (who was at Forstadt) accepting my invitation to Artenberg. His acceptance signified, he went on:
"Of course all the town is full of you and yourfiancée—her portrait is everywhere, your name and hers in every mouth. There is another coupled with them, surely in a strange conjunction! When they speak of you and the Princess they speak of Wetter also. It is recalled that you and he were friends and associates, companions in amusement and sport (especially, of course, in pistol practice!). Hence springs a theory that the fellow's odd rhapsody (mad and splendid!) was directly inspired by yourself, that you chose him as your medium, desiring to add to the formal expressions usual on such occasions an unofficial declaration of your private feelings. So you are hailed as a model and most romantic lover, and every tea-table resounds with your praises. Early indiscretions (forgive a pen itself indiscreet) are forgotten, and you are booked for the part of the model husband, an example of the beauty (and the duty) of marriages of inclination in high places. Believe me, your popularity is doubled. And the strange fellow himself, having money in his pocket and that voice of his in magnificent order, is to be seen everywhere, smiling mysteriously and observing a most significant reticence when he is pressed to say that he spoke at your request and to your pattern. But for your Majesty's own letters I should not have ventured to be a dissenter from the received opinion; if you bid me, at any moment I will gladly renounce my heresy and embrace the orthodox faith. Meanwhile I am wondering what imp holds sway in Wetter's brain;and I am laughing a little at this new example of the eternal antagonism between what is the truth and what is thought to be the truth. If mankind ever stumbled on absolute naked verity, what the devil would they make of it? By the way, I hear that Coralie is to make herdébutin Paris in a week or two. She being now reputably impresarioed, the Sempachs have shown her some civility. I told Wetter this when I last ran against him at the club. He raised his brows, twisted his lips, scratched his chin, looked full in my face and said with a smile, 'My dear Vicomte, Madame Mansoni is passionately attached to her husband. They are ideal lovers.' Your Majesty shall interpret, if it be your pleasure. I leave the matter alone."
"Of course all the town is full of you and yourfiancée—her portrait is everywhere, your name and hers in every mouth. There is another coupled with them, surely in a strange conjunction! When they speak of you and the Princess they speak of Wetter also. It is recalled that you and he were friends and associates, companions in amusement and sport (especially, of course, in pistol practice!). Hence springs a theory that the fellow's odd rhapsody (mad and splendid!) was directly inspired by yourself, that you chose him as your medium, desiring to add to the formal expressions usual on such occasions an unofficial declaration of your private feelings. So you are hailed as a model and most romantic lover, and every tea-table resounds with your praises. Early indiscretions (forgive a pen itself indiscreet) are forgotten, and you are booked for the part of the model husband, an example of the beauty (and the duty) of marriages of inclination in high places. Believe me, your popularity is doubled. And the strange fellow himself, having money in his pocket and that voice of his in magnificent order, is to be seen everywhere, smiling mysteriously and observing a most significant reticence when he is pressed to say that he spoke at your request and to your pattern. But for your Majesty's own letters I should not have ventured to be a dissenter from the received opinion; if you bid me, at any moment I will gladly renounce my heresy and embrace the orthodox faith. Meanwhile I am wondering what imp holds sway in Wetter's brain;and I am laughing a little at this new example of the eternal antagonism between what is the truth and what is thought to be the truth. If mankind ever stumbled on absolute naked verity, what the devil would they make of it? By the way, I hear that Coralie is to make herdébutin Paris in a week or two. She being now reputably impresarioed, the Sempachs have shown her some civility. I told Wetter this when I last ran against him at the club. He raised his brows, twisted his lips, scratched his chin, looked full in my face and said with a smile, 'My dear Vicomte, Madame Mansoni is passionately attached to her husband. They are ideal lovers.' Your Majesty shall interpret, if it be your pleasure. I leave the matter alone."
This fellow Wetter was very impertinent with his speeches and his parallels. But, good heavens, he had eyes to see! Madame Mansoni and her impresario were ideal lovers! Surely the world was grown young again! Elsa also made herdébutin a few weeks; I was her impresario. And she was passionately attached to her impresario! I lay back in my chair, laughing and wishing with all my heart that I could have a talk with Wetter.
The economy of belief which wisdom practices forbids us to embrace fanciful theories where commonly observed facts will serve our turn. They talk now about strange communications of mind to mind, my thought speaking to yours a thousand miles away. Perhaps; or perhaps there is a new fashion in ghost stories. In any case there was no need of these speculations to account for Wetter being near me at the very time when I was longing for his presence. From the moment I read his speech I knew that he was thinking of me; that my doings were stuff for his meditations; that his mind entered into mine, read its secrets, and was audience to all its scenes. Is not the desire to meet, at least to see, the natural sequence of such an interest and such a pre-occupation? Given the wish, what was simpler than its gratification? He need ask no leave from me, and need run no risk of my rebuff or of Princess Heinrich's stiffness. He knew all the world of Forstadt. From favour or fear every door opened when he knocked at it. He knew, among the rest, Victoria's Baron over at Waldenweiter. From no place could he better observe the King. Nowhere else was it so easy for a man to meet the King. He came to Waldenweiter; I jumped to the conclusion thatto be near me was his only object. By a stableman's chance remark, overheard as I was looking at my horses, I learned of his presence on the morning of the day when Varvilliers was to arrive at Artenberg. We were coming together again, we three who had met last for pistol practice in the Garden Pavilion.
About two o'clock I went out alone and got into my canoe. It was a beautiful day; no excuse was needed for a lounge on the water. I paddled up and down leisurely, wondering how soon the decoy would bring my bird. A quarter of an hour proved enough. I saw him saunter down to the water's edge. He perceived me, lifted his soft hat, and bowed. I shot across the space between, and brought the canoe up to the edge of the level lawn that bordered on the river.
"Why, what brings you here?" I cried.
"Why, what brings you here?" I cried.
"Why, what brings you here?" I cried.
His lips curved in a smile, as he replaced his hat in obedience to a sign from me.
"A passion for the Baroness, sire," said he.
"Ah, that's only a virtuous pretence," I laughed. "You've a less creditable motive?"
"Why, possibly; but who tells his less creditable motives?"
I looked at him curiously and attentively. He had grown older, the hair by his ears was gray, and life had ploughed furrows on his face.
"Well," said I, "a man might do even that who talks romance to the Chamber."
He gave a short laugh as he lit his cigarette.
"Your Majesty has done me the honour of reading what I said?"
"I am told that I suggested it. So runs the gossip in town, doesn't it?"
"And your opinion on it?"
"I think I won't expose myself to your fire again," said I. "It was careless last time; it would be downright folly now."
"Then we are to say no more about it?" he asked gravely.
"Not a word. Tell me, how came you to know that Coralie loves her impresario? You told Varvilliers so."
His lips twitched for a moment, but he answered, smiling:
"Because she has married him."
"I heard something of ambition in the case, of her career demanding the sacrifice."
"A slander, sire, depend on it. It is said in envy of her good fortune."
"Come, come, you love the Baroness so much, that you must have all the world in love."
"Indeed I can think of nobody more in love than I am."
"Think of me, Wetter."
"As though your Majesty could ever be absent from my thoughts," said he with a bow, a wave of his cigarette, and a smile.
I laughed outright in sheer enjoyment of his sword-play.
"And since we parted where have you been?" I asked.
"I have walked through hell, in such company as the place afforded," he answered, with a shrug that spoke ill for hell's resources.
"And you've come out the other side?"
"Is there another side?"
"Then you're still there?"
"Upon my word I don't know. It's so like other places—except that I picked up money there."
"I heard that."
"My resurrection made it obvious."
A silence fell on both of us; then our eyes met, and he smiled kindly.
"I knew you meant the speech for me," I said.
"I was not entitled to congratulate you officially."
"You have raised a mountain of misconception about me in Forstadt," I complained.
"A mountain-top is a suitable regal seat, and perhaps the only safe one."
"Won't you speak plainly to me?"
"Yes, if it's your pleasure."
"I have least of it of any pleasure in the world."
"Well, then, the Countess von Sempach grows no younger."
"No?"
"And Coralie Mansoni has married her impresario."
"I know it."
"And my hair is gray, and your eyes are open."
We both laughed and fell again to smoking in silence. At last I spoke.
"Her hair is golden and her eyes are shut," said I. "Why did you try to open them?"
"Wasn't it to look on a fine sight?"
"But you knew that the sight wasn't there."
"She looked?"
"For an instant. Then they turned her head the other way."
"It was pure devilry in me. You should have seen the Chamber! Good God! Bederhof, now!"
His eyes twinkled merrily, and my laugh answered their mirth.
"One can always laugh," said I with a shrug.
"It was invented for the world before the Fall, and they forgot to take it away afterward," he said. "But you? You take things seriously?"
"What I have to do, yes."
"But what you have to feel?"
"In truth I am not even there a consistent laugher."
"Nor I, or we shouldn't talk so much about it. Look at Varvilliers. Does he laugh on a theory?"
"He's coming to Artenberg to-day. There at least he'll laugh without any effort. Are you staying here long?"
"No, sire. One scene of despair, and I depart."
"I should like to see you oftener."
"Why not? You are finally, and I for the time, respectable. Why not, while my money lasts?"
"I have money of yours."
"You have more than money of mine."
He looked me in the face and held out his hand. I grasped it firmly.
"Are you making a fool of this Baroness?" I asked.
"Don't be afraid. She's making one of me. She is very happy and content. I am born to make women happy."
I laughed again. He was whimsically resigned to his temperament, but the mischief had not touched his brain. Then the Baroness' hold on him was not like Coralie Mansoni's; he would fight no duel for her. He would only make a fool of the greatest man in Forstadt. That feat was always so easy to him.
"Well," he said, "I must return to my misery."
"And I to my happiness," said I. "But you'll come to Artenberg?"
"It's Princess Heinrich's house," he objected with a smile.
"For the time, yes. Then come to me at Forstadt."
"Yes; unless I have disappeared again."
He put his hand on the bows of my canoe and thrust me out into the stream. Then he stood baring his head and crumpling up the soft hat in his fist. I noticed now that his hair was gray all over his head. He resumed his hat, put his hands in his pockets, and waited without moving, till I turned my back to him. Having reached the opposite bank, I looked round. He was there still. I waved my hand to him; he returned the signal. Then we both began to climb the hill, I to Artenberg, he to Waldenweiter; he to his misery, I to my happiness. And—which is better, who knows? At any rate the Baroness was pleased.
I mounted through the woods slowly, although I had been detained longer than I expected, and was already too late to greet Varvilliers on his arrival. As I came near the terrace I heard the ring of merry voices. The ladies and gentlemen of the household were all there, making a brave and gay group. In the centre I saw my family and Elsa. Varvilliers himself was standing by Princess Heinrich's side, talking fast and with great animation. Bursts of glad laughter marked his points. There was not a hint of care nor a touch of bitterness. Here was no laughing on a theory, as Wetter called it, but a simple enjoyment, a whole-hearted acceptance of the world's good hours. Were they not nearer truth? Were they not, at least, nearer wisdom? A reaction came on me. In a sudden moment a new resolve entered my head; again Varvilliers roused the impulse that he had power to rouse in me. I would make trial of this mode of living and test this colour of mind. I had been thinking about life when I might have been exulting in it. I ran forward to the group, and, as they parted to let me through, I came quickly to Varvilliers with outstretched hands. He seemed to me a good genius. Even my mother looked smiling and happy. The faces of the rest were alight with gaiety. Victoria was in the full tide of a happy laugh, and did not interrupt it on account of my arrival. Elsa's lips were parted in a smile that was eager and wondering. Her eyes sparkled; she clasped her hands and nodded to me in a delicious surprised merriment. I caught Varvilliers by the arm and made him sit by me. A cry arose that he should repeat the last story for the King's benefit. He complied at once, and launched on some charming absurdity. Renewed applause greeted the story's point. A rivalry arose who should cap it with a better. The contact of brains struck sparks. Every man was wittier than his wont; every woman more radiant. What the plague had I and Wetter been grumbling and snarling at down there on the river?
The impulse lasted the evening out. After dinner we fell to dancing in the long room that faced the gardens. My mother and the Duchess retired early, but the rest of us set the hours at defiance and revelled far on into the night. It was as though a new spirit had come to Artenberg; the very servants wore broad grins as they bustled about, seeming to declare that here at last was something like what a youthful king's court should be. William Adolphus was boisterous, Victoria forgot that she was learned and a patroness of the arts, Elsa threw herself into the fun with the zest and abandonment of a child.I vied with Varvilliers himself, seeking to wrest from him the title of master of the revels. He could not stand against me. A madman may be stronger than the finest athlete. No native temper could vie with my foreign mood.
Suddenly I knew that I could do to-night what I had vainly tried to do; that to-night, for to-night at least, I felt something of what I desired to feel. The blood ran free in my veins; if I did not love her, yet I loved love, and for love's sake would love Elsa. If to-night the barrier between us could be broken down, it need never rise again; the vision, so impossible a few hours before, seemed now a faint reflection of what must soon be reality. I looked round for her, but I could not see her. I started to walk across the room, threading my way through the merry company, who danced no longer, but stood about in groups, bandying chaff and compliments. Engrossed with one another, they hardly remembered to give me passage. Presently I came on William Adolphus, making himself very agreeable to one of his wife's ladies.
"Have you seen Elsa?" I asked him.
"What, you've remembered your duty at last, have you?" he cried, with a burst of laughter.
"No; I believe I've forgotten it at last," I answered. "Where is she?"
"I saw her with Varvilliers on the steps outside the window."
I turned in the direction which he indicated, and stepped out through the open window. Day was dawning; I could make out the gray shape of Waldenweiter. Was the scene of despair played there yet? I gave but a passing thought to old Wetter, his mad doings and wry reflections. I was hot onanother matter, and, raising my voice, I called, "Varvilliers! Where are you, Varvilliers?"
"I am not Varvilliers, but here I am," came in answer from across the terrace.
"Wetter!" I whispered, running down the steps and over to where he stood. "What brings you here?"
"I couldn't sleep. I saw your lights and I rowed across. I've been here for an hour."
"You should have come in."
"No. I have been very well here, in the fringe of the trees."
"You have had your scene?"
"No; he would not sleep after dinner. Early to-morrow! And then I go. Enough of that. I have seen your Princess."
"You have? Wetter, I am in love with her. Tell me where she went. She has suddenly become all that I want. I have suddenly become all that I ought to be. Tell me where she is, Wetter!"
"It is not your Princess; it is the dance, the wine, the night."
"By God, I don't care what it is."
"Well, then, she's with Varvilliers, at the end of the terrace, I imagine; for they passed by here as I lay in my hole watching."
"But he would have heard my cry."
"It depends upon what other sounds were in his ears. They seemed very happy together."
I saw that he rallied me. I smiled, answering:
"I'm not in the mood for another duel."
He shrugged his shoulders, and then caught me by the hand.
"Come, let's slink along," he said. "We may get a sight of them."
"I can't do that."
"No? Perhaps you can't. Walk up to them, send him away, and make your love to her. I'll wait for you here. You'll like to see me before the night's out."
I looked at him for a moment.
"Shall I like to see you?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered. "The olive after the sweets." He laughed, not bitterly, I thought, but ruefully.
"So be it," I said. "Stay here."
I started off, but he had laid a cold hand on my heart. I was to want him; then I should be no lover, for a lover wants but one. Yet I nerved myself and cried again loudly, "Varvilliers!" This time I was answered. I saw him and Elsa coming toward me; his voice sounded merry and careless as he shouted, "Here I am, sire"; a moment later they stood before me. No, there was no ground for Wetter's hint, and could be none. Both were merely happy and gay, both utterly unembarrassed.
"Somebody wants you inside, Varvilliers," said I, with a nod.
He laughed, bowed gracefully to Elsa, and ran off. He took his dismissal without a sign of grudge. I turned to her.
"Oh, dear," she said with a little yawn, "I'm tired. It must be very late."
I caught her by both hands.
"Late!" I cried. "Not too late, Elsa!" I bent down and kissed both her hands. "Why did you run away?" I asked.
"I didn't know you wanted me," she said in a sort of wonder.
I looked full in her eyes, and I knew that therewas in mine the look that declares love and asks for it. If her eyes answered, the vision might be reality. I pressed her hands hard. She gave a little cry, the sparkle vanished from her eyes, and their lids drooped. Yet a little colour came in her cheeks and the gray dawn showed it me. I hailed it with eagerness and with misgiving. I thought of Wetter waiting there among the trees, waiting till the moment when I wanted him.
"Do you love me, Elsa?" I asked.
The colour deepened on her cheeks. I waited to see whether her eyes would rise again to mine; they remained immovable.
"You know I'm very fond of you," she murmured.
"But do you love me?"
"Yes, of course I love you. Please let my hands go, Augustin."
If Wetter were listening, he must have smiled at the peal of laughter that rang out from me over the terrace. I could not help it. Elsa started violently as I loosed her hands; now she looked up at me with frightened eyes that swam in tears. Her lips moved; she tried to speak to me. I was full of brutal things and had a horrible longing to say them to her. There was a specious justice in them veneering their cruelty; I am glad to say that I gave utterance to none of them. We were both in the affair, and he is a poor sort of villain who comforts himself by abusing his accomplice.
"You're tired?" I asked gently.
"Very. But it has been delightful. M. de Varvilliers has been so kind."
"He's a delightful fellow, Varvilliers. Come, let me take you in, and we'll send these madcaps to bed."
She put her hand on my arm in a friendly trustful fashion, and I found her eyes fixed on mine with a puzzled regretful look. We walked most of the way along the terrace before she spoke.
"You're not angry with me, Augustin?"
"Good heavens, no, my dear," said I.
"I'm very fond of you," she said again as we reached the window.
At last they were ready for bed—all save myself. I watched them as they trooped away, Elsa on Victoria's arm. Varvilliers came up to me, smiling in the intervals that he snatched from a series of yawns.
"A splendid evening!" he said. "You surpassed yourself, sire."
"I believe I did," said I. "Go to bed, my friend."
"And you?"
"Presently. I'm not sleepy yet."
"Marvellous!" said he, with a last laugh and a last yawn.
For a few moments I stood alone in the room. There were no servants about; they had given up waiting for us, and the lights were to burn at Artenberg till the hour of rising. I lit a cigarette and went out on the terrace again. I had no doubt that Wetter would keep his tryst. I was right; he was there.
"Well, how did you speed?" he asked with a smile.
"Marvellously well," said I.
He took hold of the lapels of my coat and looked at me curiously.
"Your love scene was short," he said.
"Perhaps. It was long enough."
"To do what?"
"To define the situation."
"Did it need definition?"
"I thought so half an hour ago."
"Ah, well, the evening has been a strange one, hasn't it?"
"Let's walk down to the river through the woods," said I. "I'll put you across to Waldenweiter."
He acquiesced, and I put my arm through his. Presently he said in a low voice:
"The dance, the wine, the night."
"Yes, yes, I know," I cried. "My God, I knew even when I spoke to her. She saw that a brute asked her, not a man."
"Perhaps, perhaps not; they don't see everything. She shrank from you?"
"The tears were very ready."
"Ah, those tears! Heavens, why have we no such appeals? What matter, though? You don't love her."
"Do you want me to call myself a brute again? Wetter, any other girl would have been free to tell me that I was a brute."
"Why, no. No man is free even to tell you that you're a fool, sire. The divinity hedges you."
I laughed shortly and bitterly. What he said was true enough.
"There is, however, nothing to prevent you from seeing these things for yourself, just as though you were one of the rest of us," he pursued. "Ah, here's the river. You'll row me across?"
"Yes. Get into the boat there."
We got in, and I pulled out into mid-stream. It was almost daylight now, but there was still a grayness in the atmosphere that exactly matched the tintof Wetter's face. Noticing this suddenly I pointed it out to him, laughing violently.
"You are Lucifer, Son of the Morning," I cried. "How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, Son of Morning!"
"I wouldn't care for that if I had the trick of falling soft," said he. "Learn it, O King, learn it! On what padded bed falls William Adolphus!"
My laugh broke again through the morning loud and harsh. Then I laid myself to the oars, and we shot across to the bank of Waldenweiter. He shook my hand and sprang out lightly.
"I must change my clothes and have my scene, and then to Forstadt," said he. "Good-day to you, sire. Yet remember the lesson of the moralist. Learn to fall soft, learn to fall soft." With a smile he turned away, and again I watched him mount the slope of Waldenweiter.
In such manner, on that night at Artenberg, did I, having no wings to soar to heaven and no key wherewith to open the door of it, make to myself, out of dance, wine, night, and what not, a ladder, mount thereby, and twist the door-handle. But the door was locked, the ladder broke, and I fell headlong. Nor do I doubt that many men are my masters in that art of falling soft.
The next morning all Artenberg had the air of being rather ashamed of itself. Styrian traditions had been set at naught. Princess Heinrich considered that the limits of becoming mirth had been overstepped; the lines of her mouth had their most downward set. Nothing was said because the King had led the dance, but disgrace was in the atmosphere. We had all fallen from heaven—one may mean many things by heaven—and landed with more or less severity, according to the resources of padding with which Nature furnished us. To Varvilliers' case, indeed, the metaphor is inadequate; he had a parachute, sailed to earth gaily with never a bruise, and was ready to mount again had any of us offered to bear him company. His invitation, given with a heartiness that mocked his bidden companions, found no acceptance. We were all for our own planet in the morning. It was abundantly clear that revels must be the exception at Artenberg. Victoria was earnestly of this opinion. In the first place, the physical condition of William Adolphus was deplorable; he leered rueful roguishness out of bilious eyes, and Victoria could not endure the sight of him; secondly, she was sure that I had said something—what she did not know, but something—to Elsa; for Elsa hadbeen found crying over her coffee in bed in the morning.
"And every word you say to her now is of such supreme importance," Victoria observed, standing over my writing-table.
I took my cigarette out of my mouth and answered perversely enough, but with an eye to truth all the same.
"Nothing that I say to her now is of the very least importance, Victoria."
"What do you mean?" she cried.
"Much what you do," I rejoined, and fell to smoking again.
Victoria began to walk about the room. I endured patiently. My eyes were fixed on Waldenweiter. I wondered idly whether the scene of despair had been enacted yet.
"It's not the smallest good making ourselves unhappy about it," Victoria announced, just as she was on the turn at the other end of the room.
"Not the smallest," I agreed.
"It's much too late."
"A great deal too late."
Victoria darted down and kissed my cheek.
"After all, she ought to think herself very lucky," she decided. "I'm sure everybody else considers her so."
"Under such circumstances," said I, "it's sheer perversity in her to have her own feelings on the matter."
"But you said something that upset her last night," remarked my sister, with a return to the point which I hoped she had lost sight of. This time I lowered my guard in surrender.
"Certainly. I tried to make love to her," said I.
"There, you see!" she cried reproachfully. Her censure of the irrelevant intrusion of such a subject was eloquent and severe.
"It was all Wetter's fault," I remarked, sighing.
"Good gracious! what's it got to do with Wetter? I hate the man!" As she spoke her eyes fell on a box which stood on my writing-table. "What's that?" she asked.
"Diamonds," I answered. "The necklace for Elsa."
"You bought the big one you spoke of? Oh, Augustin, how fortunate!"
I looked up at Victoria and smiled.
"My dear Victoria," said I, "it is the finger of Providence. I'll present them to her after luncheon."
"Yes, do; and mind you don't upset her again."
Alas! I had no desire to "upset" her again. The fit had passed; my only relations toward it were those of an astonished spectator or a baffled analyst. It was part of the same mood that had converted Artenberg into a hall of revelry, of most unwonted revelry. But to-day, with Princess Heinrich frowning, heaven at a discount, and everybody rather ashamed of themselves, was it likely that I should desire to upset her again? The absence of any such wish, combined with the providential diamonds, would (it might reasonably be hoped) restore tranquillity to Elsa. Victoria was quite of this optimistic opinion.
Our interview was interrupted by the arrival of Bederhof, who came to take my final commands with regard to the marriage arrangements. The whole programme was drawn out neatly on a sort of chart (minus the rocks and shoals, of course). The Duchess and her daughter were to stay at Artenberg for another week; it would then be the end of August. On the 1st of September they would reach home, remain there till the 1st of October, when they and the Duke would set out for Forstadt; they were to make their formal entry on the 4th, and on the 12th (a week being allowed for repose, festivities, and preparations) the marriage would be solemnized; in the evening of that day Elsa and I were to come back to Artenberg to pass the first days of our married life.
"I hope your Majesty approves?" said Bederhof.
"Perfectly," said I. "Let us go and find the Princess. Hers must be the decisive word;" and with my programme in one hand and my diamonds in the other I repaired to the Duchess's room, Bederhof following in high contentment.
I imagine that there must have been a depression in my looks, involuntary but reassuring. It is certain that Elsa received me with more composure than I had ventured to hope. She studied Bederhof's chart with grave attention; she and her mother put many questions as to the ceremonial; there was no doubt that Elsa was very much interested in the matter. Presently my mother came in; the privy council round Bederhof grew more engrossed. The Chancellor was delighted; one could almost see the flags and hear the cannon as his descriptive periods rolled out. Princess Heinrich sat listening with a rather bitter smile, but she did not cut him short. I leaned over the back of her chair. Once or twice Elsa glanced at me, timidly but by no means uncheerfully. Behind the cover of the chair-back I unfastened my box and got out my necklace. Then I waited for Elsa's next look. It seemed entirely in keeping with the occasion that I, as well as Bederhof, should have my present for her, my ornament, my toy.
"Their Majesties' carriage will be drawn by four gray horses," said Bederhof. The good Duchess laughed, laid her hand on Elsa's, and whispered, "Their Majesties!" Elsa blushed, laughed, and again glanced at me. My moment had come. I held up my toy.
"Their Majesties will be dressed in their very best clothes," said I, "with their hair nicely brushed, and perhaps one of them will be so charming as to wear a necklace," and I tossed the thing lightly over the chair-back into Elsa's lap.
She caught it with a little cry, looked at it for a moment, whispered in her mother's ear, jumped up, and, blushing still, ran round and kissed me.
"Oh, thank you!" she cried.
I kissed her hand and her cheek. My mother smiled, patiently it seemed to me; the Duchess was tremulously radiant; Bederhof obviously benign. It was a pretty group, with the pretty child and her pretty toy for the centre of it. Suddenly I looked at my mother; she nodded ever so slightly. I was applauded and commanded to persevere.
Bederhof pursued his description. He went through it all; he rose to eloquence in describing our departure from Forstadt. This scene ended, he seemed conscious of a bathos. It was in a dull, rather apologetic tone that he concluded by remarking:
"Their Majesties will arrive at Artenberg at seven o'clock, and will partake of dinner."
There appeared to be no desire to dwell on this somewhat inglorious conclusion to so eventful a day. A touch of haste betrayed itself in my mother's manner as she asked for the list of the guests. Elsa had dropped her necklace in her lap, and sat looking before her with an absent expression. The names of distinguished visitors, however, offered a welcome diversion. We were all in very good spirits again in a few minutes. Presently the names bored Elsa; she jumped up, ran to a mirror, and tried on her necklace. The names bored me also, but I stood where I was. Soon a glance from her summoned me, and I joined her. The diamonds were round her neck, squeezed in above the high collar of her morning gown.
"They'll look lovely in the evening," she said.
"You'll have lots more given you," I assured her.
"Do you think so?" she asked, in gleefulness dashed with incredulity.
"Scores," said I solemnly.
"I am very grateful to you for—for everything," she said almost in a whisper, with a sort of penitence that I understood well enough, and an obvious desire to show every proper feeling toward me.
"I delight to please you above all things now," I answered; but even to myself the words sounded cold and formal. Yet they were true; it was above all things my wish to persuade her that she was happy. To this end I used eagerly the aid of the four (or was it six?) gray horses, the necklace, and "Their Majesties."
In the next few days I was much with Elsa, but not much alone with her. There was, of course, no want of ready company, but most of those who offered themselves merely intensified the constraint which their presence was expected to remove. Even Victoria overdid her part rather, betraying an exaggerated fear of leaving us to ourselves. Varvilliers' admirable tact, his supreme apparent unconsciousness, and his never-failing flow of gaiety made him our ideal companion. I missed in him that sympathy with my sombre moods which bound me to Wetter, spirit to spirit; but for lighter hours, for hours that must be made light, he was incomparable. With him Elsa bloomed into merriment, and being, as it were, midway between us, he seemed to me to bridge the gulf of mind and temperament that separated her from me. Hour by hour she grew happier, less timid, more her true self. I took great comfort from this excellent state of things. No doubt I must be careful not to upset her (as Victoria said), but she was certainly getting used to me (as William Adolphus said). Moreover, I was getting used to her, to the obligations she expressed, and to the renunciations she involved. But I had no more wish to try to upset her.
It must be a familiar fact to many that we are very prone to mistake or confuse the sources of our pleasure and the causes of such contentment as we achieve. We attribute to our surroundings in general what is due to one especial part of them; for the sake of one feature the landscape's whole aspect seems pleasant; we rob Peter with intent to pay Paul, and then in the end give the money to somebody else. It is not difficult to see how Elsa and I came to think that we got on better with one another because we both got on so well with Varvilliers, that we were more comfortable together because he made us both comfortable, that we came nearer to understanding each other because he understood us so admirably. We did not perceive even that he was the occasion of our improved relations, far less did we realize that he was their cause and their essence; that it was to him I looked, to him shelooked; and that while he was between there could be no rude direct contact of her eyes with mine, nor of mine with hers. Onlookers see most of the game, they say, but here the onlookers were as blind as the players; there was an air of congratulation at Artenberg; the King and his bride were drawing closer together. The blindness was complete; Varvilliers himself shared it. Of his absolute good faith and utter unconsciousness I, who doubt most things, can not doubt. Had he been Wetter, I should have been alert for the wry smile and the lift of the brows; but he was his simple self, a perfect gentleman unspoiled by thought. Such are entirely delightful; that they work infinite havoc with established relations between other people seems a small price to pay for the privilege which their existence confers upon the world. My dear friend Varvilliers, for whom my heart is always warm, played the mischief with the relations between Elsa and myself, which we all (very whimsically) supposed him to be improving.
It was a comparatively small, although an interestingly unusual, thing that I came to enjoy Elsa's society coupled with Varvilliers', and not to care much about it taken alone; it was a more serious, though far more ordinary, turn of affairs that Elsa should come to be happy enough with me provided that Varvilliers were there to—shall I say to take the edge off me?—but cared not a jot to meet me in his absence. The latter circumstance is simply and conventionally explained (and, after all, these conventional expressions are no more arbitrary than the alphabet, which is admitted to be a useful means of communicating our ideas) by saying that Elsa was falling in love with Varvilliers; my own state of mindwould deserve analysis, but for a haunting notion that no states of mind are worth such trouble. Let us leave it; there it was. It was impossible to say which of us would miss Varvilliers more. He had become necessary to both of us. The conclusion drawn by the way of this world is, of course, at once obvious; it followed pat from the premise. We must both of us be deprived of him as soon as possible. I am not concerned to argue that the world is wrong; and the very best way to advance a paradox is to look as though you were uttering a platitude. In this art the wittiest writer cuts a poor figure beside the laws of society.
The end of the week approached. Elsa was to go; Varvilliers was to go. So the arrangement stood; Elsa was to return, about Varvilliers' return nothing had been said. The bandage was still over the eyes of all of us; we had not perceived the need of settling anything about him. He was still as insignificant to us as he was to Princess Heinrich herself.
This being the state of the case, there enters to me one morning my good Cousin Elizabeth, tearfully radiant and abundantly maternal. The reason was soon declared. Elsa had been found crying again, and wondering vaguely what she was crying about. It was suggested to her that her grief was due to approaching departure; Elsa embraced the idea at once. It was pointed out that a month's absence from me was involved; Elsa sighed deeply and dabbed her eyes. Cousin Elizabeth dabbed hers as she told the story; then she caught me in her arms, kissed me, and said that her happiness was complete. What was I to do? I was profoundly surprised, but any display of that emotion wouldhave been inappropriate and ungracious. I could appear only compassionate and gratified.
"Things do happen right sometimes, you see," pursued Cousin Elizabeth, triumphing in this refutation of some little sneer of mine which she had contested the day before. "I knew you had come to care for her, and now she cares for you. I never was indifferent to that side of it. I always hoped. And now it really is so! Kiss me, Augustin dear."
I kissed Cousin Elizabeth. I was miles away in thought, lost in perplexed musings.
"I comforted her, and told her that the time would soon pass, and that then she would have you all to herself, with no tiresome people to interrupt. But the poor darling still cried a little. But one can't really grieve, can one? A little sorrow means so much happiness later on, doesn't it? And though I couldn't comfort her, you'll be able to, I daresay. What's a month?"
"Nothing," said I. I was conscious of realizing that it was at all events very little.
"I shall expect to see her quite smiling after she's had a little talk with you," was Cousin Elizabeth's parting speech. It won from me a very reassuring nod, and left me in mazes of bewilderment. There was nothing in particular which I believed, but I disbelieved one thing very definitely. It was that Elsa wept because she must be absent from me for a month—a month delightfully busied with the making of four hundred frocks.
Impelled partly by duty but more by curiosity, I went in search of her. Having failed to find her in the house or on the terrace, I descended into the hanging woods, and made for an arbour which she and I and Varvilliers had fallen into the habit of frequenting. A broad grass path ran up to the front of it, but, coming as I did, I approached it by a side track. Elsa sat on the seat and Varvilliers stood before her. He was talking; she leaned forward listening, with her hands clasped in her lap and her eyes fixed on his face. Neither perceived me. I walked briskly toward them, without loitering or spying, but I did not call out. Varvilliers' talk was light, if it might be judged by his occasional laughs. When I was ten yards off I called, "Hallo, here you are!" He turned with a little start, but an easy smile. Elsa flushed red. I had not yet apprehended the truth, although now the idea was dimly in my mind. I sat down by Elsa, and we talked. Of what I have forgotten. I think, in part, of William Adolphus, I laughing at my brother-in-law, Varvilliers feigning to defend him with good-humoured irony. It did not matter of what we talked. For me there was significance in nothing save in Elsa's eyes. They were all for Varvilliers, for him sparkled, for him clouded, for him wondered, laughed, applauded, lived. Presently I dropped out of the conversation and sat silent, facing this new thing. It was not bitter to me; my mood of desire had gone too utterly. There was no pang of defeated rivalry. But I knew why Elsa had cried, who had power to bring, and who also had power to dry, her tears.
Suddenly I saw, or seemed to see, a strange and unusual restraint in Varvilliers' manner. He missed the thread of a story, stumbled, grew dull, and lost his animation. He seemed to talk now for duty, not for pleasure, as a man who covers an awkward moment rather than employs to the full a happy opportunity. Then his glance rested for an instant on my face. I do not know what or howmuch my face told him, but I did not look at him unkindly.
"I must go, if I may," he said addressing me. "I promised to ride with Vohrenlorf, and the time is past."
He bowed to Elsa and to me.
"We shall see you this afternoon?" she asked.
He bowed again in acquiescence, but with an air of discomfort. Elsa looked at him, and from him to me. She flushed again, opened her lips, but did not speak; then she bent her head down, and the blush spread from neck to forehead.
"Go, my dear friend, go," said I.
He looked at me as though he would have spoken, almost as though he would have protested or excused himself, inadmissible as such a thing plainly was. I smiled at him, but waved my hand to dismiss him. He turned and walked quickly away along the broad grass path. I watched him till he was out of sight; all the while I was conscious of an utter motionlessness in Elsa's figure beside me.
We must have sat there a long while in that unbroken eloquent silence, hardly moving, never looking at one another. For her I was full of grief; a wayward thing it was, indeed, of fate to fashion out of Varvilliers' pleasant friendship this new weapon of attack. She had been on the way to contentment—at least to resignation—but was now thrust back. And she was ashamed. Poor child! why, in Heaven's name, should she be ashamed? Should she not better have been ashamed of a fancy so ill directed as to light on me when Varvilliers was by? For myself I seemed to see rising before me the need for a new deception, a hoodwinking of all the world, a secret that none must know or suspect, that she and I musthave between us for our own. The thing might pass; she was young. Very likely, but it would not pass in time. There were the frocks. Ah, but the wardrobe that half hid me would not suffice to obscure Varvilliers. Or would it? I smiled for an instant. Instead of hiding behind the wardrobe, I saw myself becoming part of it, blending with it. Should I take rank as the four-hundred-and-first frock? "Willingly give thyself up to Clotho, allowing her to spin thy thread into whatever things she pleases." Even into a frock, O Emperor? Goes the philosophy as far as that?
At last I turned to her and laid my hand gently on her clasped hands.
"Come, my dear," said I, "we must be going back. They'll all be looking for us. We're too important people to be allowed to hide ourselves."
As I spoke I jumped to my feet, holding out my hand to help her to rise. She looked up at me in an oddly pathetic way. I was afraid that she was going to speak of the matter, and there was nothing to be gained by speaking of it. "Give me your hand," I said with a smile, and she obeyed. The pleading in her eyes persisted. As she stood up, I kissed her lightly on the forehead. Then we walked away together.
That afternoon I was summoned to Princess Heinrich's room to drink tea with her and the Duchess. Cousin Elizabeth was still exuberant; it seemed to me that a cold watchfulness governed my mother's mood. Relations between my mother and myself have not always been cordial; but I have never failed to perceive and respect in her a fine inner sincerity, an aptitude for truth and a resolute facing of facts. While Cousin Elizabeth talked, the Princesssat smiling with her usual faint smile; it never showed the least inclination to become a laugh. She acquiesced politely in the rose-coloured description of Elsa's feelings and affections. She had perception enough to know that the picture could not be true. Presently I took the liberty of informing her by a glance that I was not a partner in the delusion. She showed no surprise; but the fruit of my act was that she detained me by a gesture, after Cousin Elizabeth had taken her leave. For a few moments she sat silent; then she remarked:
"The Duchess is a very kind woman, very anxious to make everybody happy."
"Yes," said I carelessly.
"But it must be in her own way. She is romantic. She thinks everybody else must be the same. You and I know, Augustin, that things of that kind occupy a very small part of a man's life. My sex deludes itself. And when a man occupies the position you do, it's absurd to suppose that he pays much attention to them."
"No doubt Cousin Elizabeth exaggerates," said I, standing in a respectful attitude before my mother.
"Well, I daresay you remember the time when Victoria was a girl. You recollect her folly? But you and I were firm—you behaved very well then, Augustin—and the result is that she is most suitably and most happily married."
I bowed. I did not think that any agreement of mine could be worthy of the magnificent boldness of Princess Heinrich's statement.
"Girls are silly; they pass through a silly time," she pursued, smiling.
A sudden remembrance shot across me.
"It doesn't do to take any notice of such things," said I gravely.
Happily, perhaps, Princess Heinrich was not awake to the fact that she herself was being quoted to herself.
"I'm glad to hear you say so," she said. "You have your work to do. Don't waste your time in thinking of girls' megrims—or of their mothers' nonsense."
I left her presence with a strong sense that Providence had erred in not making her a saint, a king, or anything else that demands a resolute repression of human infirmities. Some people are content to triumph over their own weaknesses; my mother had an eye also for the frailty of others.
She made no reference at all to Varvilliers. There was always something to be learned from Princess Heinrich. From early youth I was inured to a certain degree of painfulness in the lesson.
"Willingly give thyself up to Clotho." My mother was more than willing. She was proud; and, if I may be allowed to vary the metaphor, she embarked on the ship of destiny with a family ticket.
To many the picture presented by my life might seem that of a man who detects the trap and yet walks into it, sinks under burdens that he might cast aside, groans at chains that he could break, and will not leave the prison although the door-key is in his pocket. Such an impression my record may well give, unless it be understood that what came upon me was not an impossibility of movement, but a paralysis of the will to move. In this there is nothing peculiar to one placed as I was. Most men could escape from what irks, confines, or burdens them at the cost of effacing their past lives, breaking the continuity of existence, cutting the cord that binds together, in a sequence of circumstances and incidents, youth, and maturity, and age. But who can do the thing? One man in a thousand, and he generally a scoundrel.
Our guests returned to Bartenstein, the Duchess still radiant and maternal, Elsa infinitely kind, infinitely apologetic, a little tearful, never for an instant wavering in her acceptance of the future. Varvilliers took leave of me with great friendliness; there was in his air now just a hint of amusement, most decorously suppressed; he was charmingly unconscious of any possible seriousness in the position.My mother went to visit Styrian relatives. Victoria and William Adolphus had taken a villa by the seaside. I was quite alone at Artenberg, save for my faithful Vohrenlorf, and Vohrenlorf was bored to death. That will not appear strange; to me it seemed enviable. A prisoner under sentence probably discerns much that is attractive even in the restricted life of his jailer.
In a day or two there came upon me a persistent restlessness, and with it constant thoughts of Wetter. I wondered where he was and what he did; I longed to share the tempestuousness of his life and thoughts. He brought with him other remembrances, of the passions and the events that we two had, in friendship or hostility, witnessed together. They had seemed, all of them, far behind in the past, belonging to the days when, as old Vohrenlorf had told me, I had still six years. Now I had only a month; but the images were with me, importunate and pleading. I was asking whether I could not, even now, save something out of life.
Three days later found me established in a hotel in the Place Vendome at Paris, Vohrenlorf my only companion. I was in strictestincognito; Baron de Neberhausen was my name. But in Paris in August myincognitowas almost a superfluity for me, although a convenience to others. It was very hot; I did not care. The town was absolutely empty. Not for me! Here is my secret. Wetter was in Paris. I had seen it stated in the newspaper. What brought the man of moods to Paris in August? I could answer the question in one way only: the woman of his mood. I did not care about her; I wanted to see him and hear again from his own lips what he thought of the universe, of my part and his in it, and of the waysof the Power that ruled it. In a month I should be on my honeymoon with Cousin Elsa. I fought desperately against the finality implied in that.
On the second evening I gave Vohrenlorf the slip, and went out on the Boulevards alone. In great cities nobody is known; I enjoyed the luxury of being ignored. I might pass for a student, a chemist, at a pinch, perhaps, for a poet of a reflective type. My natural manner would seem no more than a touch of youth's pardonable arrogance. I sat down and had some coffee. It was half-past ten, and the pavements were full. I bought a paper and read a paragraph about Elsa and myself. Elsa and myself both seemed rather a long way off. It was delicious to make believe that this here and this now were reality; the kingship, Elsa, the wedding and the rest, some story or poem that I, the student, had been making laboriously before working hours ended, and I was free to seek the Boulevards. I was pleased when a pretty girl, passing by, stared hard at me and seemed to like my looks; this tribute was my own; she was not staring at the king.
Satisfaction, not surprise, filled me when, in about twenty minutes, I saw Wetter coming toward thecafé. I had taken a table far back from the street, and he did not see me. The glaring gaslight gave him a deeper paleness and cut the lines of his face to a sharper edge. He was talking with great animation, his hands moving constantly in eager gesture. I was within an ace of springing forward to greet him—so my heart went out to him—but the sight of his companion restrained me, and I sat chuckling and wondering in my corner. There they were, large as life, true to Varvilliers' description; the big stomach and the locket that a hyperbole, soinevitable as to outstrip mere truth in fidelity, had called bigger. Besides there were the whiskers, the heavy jowl, the infinite fatness of the man, a fatness not of mere flesh only, but of manner, of air, of thought, of soul. There was no room for doubt or question. This was Coralie's impresario, Coralie's career, her duty, her destiny; in a word, everything to Coralie that poor little Cousin Elsa was to me. Nay, your pardon; that I was to Cousin Elsa. I put my cigar back in my mouth and smoked gravely; it seemed improper to laugh.
The two men sat down at an outer table. Wetter was silent now, and Struboff (I remembered suddenly that I had seen Coralie described as Madame Mansoni-Struboff) was talking. I could almost see the words treacling from his thick lips. What in Heaven's name made him Wetter's companion? What in Heaven's name made me such a fool as to ask the question? Men like Struboff can have but one merit, and, to be fair, but one serious crime. It is the same; they are the husbands of their wives.
I could contain myself no longer. I rose and walked forward. I laid my hand on Wetter's shoulder, saying:
"My dear friend, have you forgotten me—Baron de Neberhausen?"