CHAPTER IIItwas towards the middle of December that we started upon the journey—a little sooner indeed than my surgeon and mentor approved of, but his power over me dwindled as my own strength returned.Being chiefly anxious to preserve my incognito, I hesitated some time before permitting János to accompany me, his personal appearance unfortunately being of a kind unlikely to be forgotten when once seen. But, besides the fact that I could not find it in me to inflict such pain upon that excellent fellow, there was an undoubted advantage to myself in the presence of one upon whose fidelity and courage I could so absolutely reckon in an expedition likely to prove of extreme difficulty and perhaps of peril. Moreover, the man would have followed me in spite of me. I insisted, however, upon his shaving off his great pandour moustaches—a process which though it altered did not improve his appearance; his aspect, indeed, being now so fantastically ugly as to drive me, despite my preoccupation, into inextinguishableparoxysms of laughter every time I unexpectedly got a glimpse of his visage, until habit wore away the impression.As to myself, my long illness had, as I thought, sufficiently changed me. Besides, the news of my resurrection was too recently and too vaguely rumoured in London to have reached, or to be likely to reach, the Continent for many a long day.Under the humble style, therefore, of a Munich gentleman returning from his travels,—one Theodor Desberger, with his attendant (now dubbed Johann), a character which my Austrian-German fitly enabled me to sustain,—I set sail from London to Hamburg, and after a favourable sea-passage, which did much to invigorate me, we landed in the free city and proceeded towards Budissin by easy stages; for, despite the ardour of my impatience, I felt the importance of husbanding my newly-acquired strength. At Budissin we put up of course at a different hostelry from that chosen upon our first venture—one much farther away from the palace.The little town presented now a very different aspect. Indeed, its gay and cheery bustle, and the crisp frosty weather which greeted us there, might have raised inspiriting thoughts. But it was with a heart very full of anxiety, with thedetermination rather to face ill fortune bravely than the hope of good, that I passed the night. I got but little sleep, for, having reached my goal, I scarcely knew how to begin. Nor in the morning had I arrived at any definite conclusion.The risk of presenting myself in person at the palace after my former fashion was too great to be entertained for a moment. I had therefore to content myself with despatching János to make cautious inquiries as to one Fräulein Pahlen and her relatives, not forgetting a bulky gentleman he knew of, recently returned from England.I myself, in my plainest suit, and with my cloak disposed as a muffler, partly concealing my face, set forth upon my side to gather what crumbs of information I might.At the very outset I had a most singular meeting. Traversing the little town in the brisk morning air under a dome of palest blue, I naturally directed my steps towards the castle, seated on its terrace and towering above the citizens’ brown roofs.I had taken a somewhat circuitous route to avoid passing in front of the main guard, and found myself presently in a quiet street, one side of which was bound by the castle garden walls, and the other—that upon which I walked—by a row of private houses seemingly of some importance.Now, as I walked, engaged in gazing upwards at the long row of escutcheoned windows which I could just see above the wall, and foolishly wondering through which of them my cruel little wife might be wont to look forth into the outer world, I nearly collided with a woman who was hurrying out of one of the houses.As I drew back to recover myself, and to apologise, something in the dark figure struck me with poignant reminiscence. The next instant, as she would have passed me, I caught her by the shoulder.“Anna!” I cried wildly, “God be thanked, Anna!” For upon this very first morning of my quest Heaven had brought me face to face with no less a person than Ottilie’s old nurse.The recognition on her side was almost simultaneous. No sooner had the muffling cloak fallen from my mouth, than the dull and rather surly countenance that she had turned upon me became convulsed by the most extraordinary emotion. She gave a stifled cry. Then she clapped her hands together, pressed them clasped against her cheek, and stared at me with piercing intensity, crying again and again:“God in heaven—you! God in heaven—you!” The black eyes were as hard to read as thoseof a shepherd’s dog, who fixes with the same earnest look the master he loves or the enemy he suspects. And as we stood thus, the space of a few seconds, my mind misgave me as to whether I had not already jeopardised all my prospects by this impulsive disclosure. It was evident that the woman had heard the story of my death, which in this hostile place was my chief security. But the die was cast, and the chance of information was too precious not to be seized even at greater risks. I laid hold of her cloak, then passionately grasped her hands. “Oh, Anna!” I cried again, and the bare thought that I was once more so near the beloved of my heart brought in my weakness the heat of tears to my eyes. “Where is she? Where is my wife? What does she? Anna, I must see her. My life is in danger in this place; they have tried to kill me because I love her, but I had rather risk death again a thousand times than give her up. Take me to her, Anna!”The woman had never ceased regarding me with the same enigmatic earnestness; all at once her eyes lightened, she looked from side to side with the cautiousness of some animal conscious of danger, then wrenched her hands out of mine:“Follow me, sir,” she said in a whisper, so urgent in its apprehension as to strike a colderchill into my veins than the wildest scream could have done. Without another glance at me she started off in front, and I as hastily followed, almost mechanically flinging my cloak once more across my mouth as I moved on.Whither was she leading me? Into the hands of my enemies, whoever they were?—she had always, I had thought, hated me—or into the arms of my wife?She turned away from the palace, down a bye-street, and then took another turn which brought us into a poor alley where the houses became almost cottages, and where the gutters ran among the cobbles with liquid filth.My wild hope gave place to sinister foreboding; and as I plodded carefully after her unwavering figure, I loosened the hilt of my sword in its scabbard, and settled the folds of my cloak around my left arm so that at a pinch I might doff it and use it for defence.Suddenly my guide halted for a second, looked at me over her shoulder, and disappeared down some steps into the open door of a mean little shop. I entered after her, at once disappointed in all my expectations and reassured by the humble vulgarity of the place. Anna, as I had ever known her, was chary of speech. Even, as stoopingI made my way into the low, gloomy, and evil-smelling narrow room, I saw her imperiously motion an ugly sallow young woman out of her presence; and, still in silence, I watched her, wondering, as she made fast the doors and bent her dark face to listen if all were still. Then she produced from a counter, paper, ink, and pen, and spreading them out turned to me with a single word: “Write.”So small was the result of all these preliminaries.“You mean,” said I, “that if I write to your mistress, you will convey the letter? Alas! I have written before and she would not even receive my writing. Oh! can you not get me speech of her? I conjure you by the love you bear her, let me see her but for a few minutes.”The woman fixed me for a second with a startled wondering eye, opened her mouth as if to speak, but immediately clapped her hand to it as if to restrain the words. Then, with a passion of entreaty that it was impossible to withstand, she pointed to the paper and cried once more, “Write.”And so I seemed ever destined to communicate with my wife from strange places and by strange messengers.With a trembling hand and a brain in a whirl I wrote—I hardly know what: a wild, passionate, reproachful appeal, setting forth in incoherent words all I had done and suffered, all my desire, all my faithful love. When I looked up at length I found the black eyes still watching me with the same inscrutable fierceness. I was going to trust my life and its hopes to this woman, and for a moment I hesitated. But at the same instant there was some noise without, and snatching the letter unfinished from before me, she thrust it into her bosom, folded her cloak across it, and stooping close to me demanded in her breathless undertone:“Where do you live?”Mechanically I told her, adding: “Ask for M. Desberger.”She nodded with swift comprehension, unbolted the barred front door of the little shop, and drew me hastily out by the back, along a close, flagged passage, leaving an irate customer hammering and clamouring for admittance.We proceeded through a small yard into another alley, and here she halted a second, still detaining me by my cloak.“Go home,” she said then; “keep close. There is danger—danger. You will hear.”She suddenly caught my hand, kissed it, and was gone. I stood awhile bewildered, astonished, staring, hardly able to grasp the meaning of what had passed, for this last scene in the drama of my life had been acted hurriedly and was full of mysterious significance. Then, unobtrusively, I sought the shelter of my own inn, resolving to obey to the letter the injunctions laid upon me; but fate had willed it otherwise.Determined not to interfere with the course of fortune by any least indocility, I retired into the seclusion of my chambers, and pretexting a slight indisposition, to rouse no undue suspicion by an air of mystery, gave orders for my dinner to be served there.A stout red-cheeked wench with rough bare arms had just, grinning, clattered the first greasy dish before me, when I heard János’s foot upon the stairs. I had learnt to know the sound of his step pretty well in my recent weeks of sickness, but I had not been wont to hear it come so laggingly, and the fact that it halted altogether outside the door for a second or two, as if its owner hesitated to enter, filled me with such a furious impatience that I got up and flung it open to wrest his news from him. Not even when he had held up my poor great-uncle in hisarms to let him draw his last breath on earth, had I seen the fellow wear a countenance of such discomposure.“In Heaven’s name, János,” cried I, and the sturdy house-wench turned and stared at him more agoggle and agrin than before.“Get out of that, you ——” cried my servitor, snapping at her with such sourness, and so forgetful of the decorum he usually displayed in my presence, that it was clear he was mightily moved.She fled as if some savage old watch-dog had nipped at her heel, and we were alone.I had returned from my own exploration full of hope, and at the same time of wonder, so that I was at once ill and well prepared for any tidings, however extraordinary. But János’s tidings seemed difficult of telling.“Let us go home, honoured sir” he stammered again and again, surveying me with a compassion and an anxiety he had not vouchsafed upon me at the worst of my illness. I had to drag the words from him piecemeal, as the torturer forces out the unwilling confession.Yes, he had news—bad news. This was no place for me. It was not wholesome for us here. Let us return to Tollendhal, or Vienna, or even England. Let us start before further mischief overtook us.I believe I fell upon him at last and shook him. What had he heard. What had he heard of her? I vowed he was driving me mad, vowed that if he did not instantly tell me all I would throw caution to the wind and go to the palace and demand my wife in person, were it of the Duke himself. This threat extorted at length the terrible thing that even the rough old soldier feared to utter.“The lady,” he stammered, “the lady can no longer be spoken of as your honour’s wife. She is married.”“Married!” I cried. “What do you mean, you scoundrel? No longer my wife! Married! You are raving—this is stark lunacy.”He shook his grey head under the shower of my fury.“Married. Does your honour forget that they think here that they have at last succeeded in killing you?”I looked at him aghast, unwilling to admit the awful illumination that flashed upon my mind. He, believing me still incredulous, proceeded:“Married she is. Fräulein Pahlen, the lady-in-waiting,—Fräulein Pahlen, as your honour bade me call her, and as it seems she called herself until ...” and then with a significant emphasis, “until six weeks ago.”“And who is the man?” said I. The words sounded in my ears as if some one else had spoken, but I believe I was astoundingly calm.Misled no doubt by this appearance of composure, János seemed to take more confidence, and continued in easier tones, while I held myself still to listen.“It is the Court physician, one privy counsellor Lothner. I was shown his house, a big one in the Schloss Graben, number ten, opposite the palace walls. Ay, yes, they were married six weeks ago, and the Duke was present at the marriage ... and the Princess too! They say it was made up by their wishes. Oh! honoured sir, let us hence. You are well quit of it all; this is a bad place!”Yet I stood without moving. Chasm after chasm, horror after horror, seemed to be opening before my mind; chasms so black that I scarce ventured to look into their depths; horrors so unspeakable that I could put no word-shape to them. After Ottilie’s messenger had failed to induce me to give up my rights, had come the attempts upon my life, then the duel. The mysterious stranger who had sought to slay me with such rancorous hate, and had called “Ottilie” into my dying ears, had returned to claim his bride, and they hadwedded in their blood-guilt. Well might the nurse cry and repeat the cry of “God in heaven! God in heaven!”What new ambush would they now contrive?“Your honour——” said János, and he put his hand respectfully upon my sleeve. I caught sight of his frightened face and burst into a fit of rasping laughter.“Look at your master, János, and see the greatest fool in Christendom! The fool of the play, that is tricked and mocked and beaten from one act to another. Tricked into marrying a serving-maid instead of a princess; tricked into loving her when he should have repudiated her with scorn; abandoned by her when he could no longer live without her; mocked when he sought his wife; driven away by lackeys; stabbed by a murdering hound, a skulking thief in the night!... But the last act is only about to begin—every one has had his laugh at the fool, but we shall see, János, we shall see! He laughs best who laughs last, they say. Ten, Schloss Graben, did you say?”I caught my cloak. I think the faithful fellow actually laid hands upon me to arrest me, but I broke from him as if his clasp had been a straw.“I’ll drive my sword,” I remember saying, “intothe first man who dares come between me and my purpose.”And indeed as I fled along the street, scarce knowing what way I took, yet going as straight as a die to my goal, I had no other thought but how clean I would run my blade through the clumsy lumbering brute who deemed he had so well widowed my wife. I had the strength of ten men in me.
CHAPTER IIItwas towards the middle of December that we started upon the journey—a little sooner indeed than my surgeon and mentor approved of, but his power over me dwindled as my own strength returned.Being chiefly anxious to preserve my incognito, I hesitated some time before permitting János to accompany me, his personal appearance unfortunately being of a kind unlikely to be forgotten when once seen. But, besides the fact that I could not find it in me to inflict such pain upon that excellent fellow, there was an undoubted advantage to myself in the presence of one upon whose fidelity and courage I could so absolutely reckon in an expedition likely to prove of extreme difficulty and perhaps of peril. Moreover, the man would have followed me in spite of me. I insisted, however, upon his shaving off his great pandour moustaches—a process which though it altered did not improve his appearance; his aspect, indeed, being now so fantastically ugly as to drive me, despite my preoccupation, into inextinguishableparoxysms of laughter every time I unexpectedly got a glimpse of his visage, until habit wore away the impression.As to myself, my long illness had, as I thought, sufficiently changed me. Besides, the news of my resurrection was too recently and too vaguely rumoured in London to have reached, or to be likely to reach, the Continent for many a long day.Under the humble style, therefore, of a Munich gentleman returning from his travels,—one Theodor Desberger, with his attendant (now dubbed Johann), a character which my Austrian-German fitly enabled me to sustain,—I set sail from London to Hamburg, and after a favourable sea-passage, which did much to invigorate me, we landed in the free city and proceeded towards Budissin by easy stages; for, despite the ardour of my impatience, I felt the importance of husbanding my newly-acquired strength. At Budissin we put up of course at a different hostelry from that chosen upon our first venture—one much farther away from the palace.The little town presented now a very different aspect. Indeed, its gay and cheery bustle, and the crisp frosty weather which greeted us there, might have raised inspiriting thoughts. But it was with a heart very full of anxiety, with thedetermination rather to face ill fortune bravely than the hope of good, that I passed the night. I got but little sleep, for, having reached my goal, I scarcely knew how to begin. Nor in the morning had I arrived at any definite conclusion.The risk of presenting myself in person at the palace after my former fashion was too great to be entertained for a moment. I had therefore to content myself with despatching János to make cautious inquiries as to one Fräulein Pahlen and her relatives, not forgetting a bulky gentleman he knew of, recently returned from England.I myself, in my plainest suit, and with my cloak disposed as a muffler, partly concealing my face, set forth upon my side to gather what crumbs of information I might.At the very outset I had a most singular meeting. Traversing the little town in the brisk morning air under a dome of palest blue, I naturally directed my steps towards the castle, seated on its terrace and towering above the citizens’ brown roofs.I had taken a somewhat circuitous route to avoid passing in front of the main guard, and found myself presently in a quiet street, one side of which was bound by the castle garden walls, and the other—that upon which I walked—by a row of private houses seemingly of some importance.Now, as I walked, engaged in gazing upwards at the long row of escutcheoned windows which I could just see above the wall, and foolishly wondering through which of them my cruel little wife might be wont to look forth into the outer world, I nearly collided with a woman who was hurrying out of one of the houses.As I drew back to recover myself, and to apologise, something in the dark figure struck me with poignant reminiscence. The next instant, as she would have passed me, I caught her by the shoulder.“Anna!” I cried wildly, “God be thanked, Anna!” For upon this very first morning of my quest Heaven had brought me face to face with no less a person than Ottilie’s old nurse.The recognition on her side was almost simultaneous. No sooner had the muffling cloak fallen from my mouth, than the dull and rather surly countenance that she had turned upon me became convulsed by the most extraordinary emotion. She gave a stifled cry. Then she clapped her hands together, pressed them clasped against her cheek, and stared at me with piercing intensity, crying again and again:“God in heaven—you! God in heaven—you!” The black eyes were as hard to read as thoseof a shepherd’s dog, who fixes with the same earnest look the master he loves or the enemy he suspects. And as we stood thus, the space of a few seconds, my mind misgave me as to whether I had not already jeopardised all my prospects by this impulsive disclosure. It was evident that the woman had heard the story of my death, which in this hostile place was my chief security. But the die was cast, and the chance of information was too precious not to be seized even at greater risks. I laid hold of her cloak, then passionately grasped her hands. “Oh, Anna!” I cried again, and the bare thought that I was once more so near the beloved of my heart brought in my weakness the heat of tears to my eyes. “Where is she? Where is my wife? What does she? Anna, I must see her. My life is in danger in this place; they have tried to kill me because I love her, but I had rather risk death again a thousand times than give her up. Take me to her, Anna!”The woman had never ceased regarding me with the same enigmatic earnestness; all at once her eyes lightened, she looked from side to side with the cautiousness of some animal conscious of danger, then wrenched her hands out of mine:“Follow me, sir,” she said in a whisper, so urgent in its apprehension as to strike a colderchill into my veins than the wildest scream could have done. Without another glance at me she started off in front, and I as hastily followed, almost mechanically flinging my cloak once more across my mouth as I moved on.Whither was she leading me? Into the hands of my enemies, whoever they were?—she had always, I had thought, hated me—or into the arms of my wife?She turned away from the palace, down a bye-street, and then took another turn which brought us into a poor alley where the houses became almost cottages, and where the gutters ran among the cobbles with liquid filth.My wild hope gave place to sinister foreboding; and as I plodded carefully after her unwavering figure, I loosened the hilt of my sword in its scabbard, and settled the folds of my cloak around my left arm so that at a pinch I might doff it and use it for defence.Suddenly my guide halted for a second, looked at me over her shoulder, and disappeared down some steps into the open door of a mean little shop. I entered after her, at once disappointed in all my expectations and reassured by the humble vulgarity of the place. Anna, as I had ever known her, was chary of speech. Even, as stoopingI made my way into the low, gloomy, and evil-smelling narrow room, I saw her imperiously motion an ugly sallow young woman out of her presence; and, still in silence, I watched her, wondering, as she made fast the doors and bent her dark face to listen if all were still. Then she produced from a counter, paper, ink, and pen, and spreading them out turned to me with a single word: “Write.”So small was the result of all these preliminaries.“You mean,” said I, “that if I write to your mistress, you will convey the letter? Alas! I have written before and she would not even receive my writing. Oh! can you not get me speech of her? I conjure you by the love you bear her, let me see her but for a few minutes.”The woman fixed me for a second with a startled wondering eye, opened her mouth as if to speak, but immediately clapped her hand to it as if to restrain the words. Then, with a passion of entreaty that it was impossible to withstand, she pointed to the paper and cried once more, “Write.”And so I seemed ever destined to communicate with my wife from strange places and by strange messengers.With a trembling hand and a brain in a whirl I wrote—I hardly know what: a wild, passionate, reproachful appeal, setting forth in incoherent words all I had done and suffered, all my desire, all my faithful love. When I looked up at length I found the black eyes still watching me with the same inscrutable fierceness. I was going to trust my life and its hopes to this woman, and for a moment I hesitated. But at the same instant there was some noise without, and snatching the letter unfinished from before me, she thrust it into her bosom, folded her cloak across it, and stooping close to me demanded in her breathless undertone:“Where do you live?”Mechanically I told her, adding: “Ask for M. Desberger.”She nodded with swift comprehension, unbolted the barred front door of the little shop, and drew me hastily out by the back, along a close, flagged passage, leaving an irate customer hammering and clamouring for admittance.We proceeded through a small yard into another alley, and here she halted a second, still detaining me by my cloak.“Go home,” she said then; “keep close. There is danger—danger. You will hear.”She suddenly caught my hand, kissed it, and was gone. I stood awhile bewildered, astonished, staring, hardly able to grasp the meaning of what had passed, for this last scene in the drama of my life had been acted hurriedly and was full of mysterious significance. Then, unobtrusively, I sought the shelter of my own inn, resolving to obey to the letter the injunctions laid upon me; but fate had willed it otherwise.Determined not to interfere with the course of fortune by any least indocility, I retired into the seclusion of my chambers, and pretexting a slight indisposition, to rouse no undue suspicion by an air of mystery, gave orders for my dinner to be served there.A stout red-cheeked wench with rough bare arms had just, grinning, clattered the first greasy dish before me, when I heard János’s foot upon the stairs. I had learnt to know the sound of his step pretty well in my recent weeks of sickness, but I had not been wont to hear it come so laggingly, and the fact that it halted altogether outside the door for a second or two, as if its owner hesitated to enter, filled me with such a furious impatience that I got up and flung it open to wrest his news from him. Not even when he had held up my poor great-uncle in hisarms to let him draw his last breath on earth, had I seen the fellow wear a countenance of such discomposure.“In Heaven’s name, János,” cried I, and the sturdy house-wench turned and stared at him more agoggle and agrin than before.“Get out of that, you ——” cried my servitor, snapping at her with such sourness, and so forgetful of the decorum he usually displayed in my presence, that it was clear he was mightily moved.She fled as if some savage old watch-dog had nipped at her heel, and we were alone.I had returned from my own exploration full of hope, and at the same time of wonder, so that I was at once ill and well prepared for any tidings, however extraordinary. But János’s tidings seemed difficult of telling.“Let us go home, honoured sir” he stammered again and again, surveying me with a compassion and an anxiety he had not vouchsafed upon me at the worst of my illness. I had to drag the words from him piecemeal, as the torturer forces out the unwilling confession.Yes, he had news—bad news. This was no place for me. It was not wholesome for us here. Let us return to Tollendhal, or Vienna, or even England. Let us start before further mischief overtook us.I believe I fell upon him at last and shook him. What had he heard. What had he heard of her? I vowed he was driving me mad, vowed that if he did not instantly tell me all I would throw caution to the wind and go to the palace and demand my wife in person, were it of the Duke himself. This threat extorted at length the terrible thing that even the rough old soldier feared to utter.“The lady,” he stammered, “the lady can no longer be spoken of as your honour’s wife. She is married.”“Married!” I cried. “What do you mean, you scoundrel? No longer my wife! Married! You are raving—this is stark lunacy.”He shook his grey head under the shower of my fury.“Married. Does your honour forget that they think here that they have at last succeeded in killing you?”I looked at him aghast, unwilling to admit the awful illumination that flashed upon my mind. He, believing me still incredulous, proceeded:“Married she is. Fräulein Pahlen, the lady-in-waiting,—Fräulein Pahlen, as your honour bade me call her, and as it seems she called herself until ...” and then with a significant emphasis, “until six weeks ago.”“And who is the man?” said I. The words sounded in my ears as if some one else had spoken, but I believe I was astoundingly calm.Misled no doubt by this appearance of composure, János seemed to take more confidence, and continued in easier tones, while I held myself still to listen.“It is the Court physician, one privy counsellor Lothner. I was shown his house, a big one in the Schloss Graben, number ten, opposite the palace walls. Ay, yes, they were married six weeks ago, and the Duke was present at the marriage ... and the Princess too! They say it was made up by their wishes. Oh! honoured sir, let us hence. You are well quit of it all; this is a bad place!”Yet I stood without moving. Chasm after chasm, horror after horror, seemed to be opening before my mind; chasms so black that I scarce ventured to look into their depths; horrors so unspeakable that I could put no word-shape to them. After Ottilie’s messenger had failed to induce me to give up my rights, had come the attempts upon my life, then the duel. The mysterious stranger who had sought to slay me with such rancorous hate, and had called “Ottilie” into my dying ears, had returned to claim his bride, and they hadwedded in their blood-guilt. Well might the nurse cry and repeat the cry of “God in heaven! God in heaven!”What new ambush would they now contrive?“Your honour——” said János, and he put his hand respectfully upon my sleeve. I caught sight of his frightened face and burst into a fit of rasping laughter.“Look at your master, János, and see the greatest fool in Christendom! The fool of the play, that is tricked and mocked and beaten from one act to another. Tricked into marrying a serving-maid instead of a princess; tricked into loving her when he should have repudiated her with scorn; abandoned by her when he could no longer live without her; mocked when he sought his wife; driven away by lackeys; stabbed by a murdering hound, a skulking thief in the night!... But the last act is only about to begin—every one has had his laugh at the fool, but we shall see, János, we shall see! He laughs best who laughs last, they say. Ten, Schloss Graben, did you say?”I caught my cloak. I think the faithful fellow actually laid hands upon me to arrest me, but I broke from him as if his clasp had been a straw.“I’ll drive my sword,” I remember saying, “intothe first man who dares come between me and my purpose.”And indeed as I fled along the street, scarce knowing what way I took, yet going as straight as a die to my goal, I had no other thought but how clean I would run my blade through the clumsy lumbering brute who deemed he had so well widowed my wife. I had the strength of ten men in me.
Itwas towards the middle of December that we started upon the journey—a little sooner indeed than my surgeon and mentor approved of, but his power over me dwindled as my own strength returned.
Being chiefly anxious to preserve my incognito, I hesitated some time before permitting János to accompany me, his personal appearance unfortunately being of a kind unlikely to be forgotten when once seen. But, besides the fact that I could not find it in me to inflict such pain upon that excellent fellow, there was an undoubted advantage to myself in the presence of one upon whose fidelity and courage I could so absolutely reckon in an expedition likely to prove of extreme difficulty and perhaps of peril. Moreover, the man would have followed me in spite of me. I insisted, however, upon his shaving off his great pandour moustaches—a process which though it altered did not improve his appearance; his aspect, indeed, being now so fantastically ugly as to drive me, despite my preoccupation, into inextinguishableparoxysms of laughter every time I unexpectedly got a glimpse of his visage, until habit wore away the impression.
As to myself, my long illness had, as I thought, sufficiently changed me. Besides, the news of my resurrection was too recently and too vaguely rumoured in London to have reached, or to be likely to reach, the Continent for many a long day.
Under the humble style, therefore, of a Munich gentleman returning from his travels,—one Theodor Desberger, with his attendant (now dubbed Johann), a character which my Austrian-German fitly enabled me to sustain,—I set sail from London to Hamburg, and after a favourable sea-passage, which did much to invigorate me, we landed in the free city and proceeded towards Budissin by easy stages; for, despite the ardour of my impatience, I felt the importance of husbanding my newly-acquired strength. At Budissin we put up of course at a different hostelry from that chosen upon our first venture—one much farther away from the palace.
The little town presented now a very different aspect. Indeed, its gay and cheery bustle, and the crisp frosty weather which greeted us there, might have raised inspiriting thoughts. But it was with a heart very full of anxiety, with thedetermination rather to face ill fortune bravely than the hope of good, that I passed the night. I got but little sleep, for, having reached my goal, I scarcely knew how to begin. Nor in the morning had I arrived at any definite conclusion.
The risk of presenting myself in person at the palace after my former fashion was too great to be entertained for a moment. I had therefore to content myself with despatching János to make cautious inquiries as to one Fräulein Pahlen and her relatives, not forgetting a bulky gentleman he knew of, recently returned from England.
I myself, in my plainest suit, and with my cloak disposed as a muffler, partly concealing my face, set forth upon my side to gather what crumbs of information I might.
At the very outset I had a most singular meeting. Traversing the little town in the brisk morning air under a dome of palest blue, I naturally directed my steps towards the castle, seated on its terrace and towering above the citizens’ brown roofs.
I had taken a somewhat circuitous route to avoid passing in front of the main guard, and found myself presently in a quiet street, one side of which was bound by the castle garden walls, and the other—that upon which I walked—by a row of private houses seemingly of some importance.Now, as I walked, engaged in gazing upwards at the long row of escutcheoned windows which I could just see above the wall, and foolishly wondering through which of them my cruel little wife might be wont to look forth into the outer world, I nearly collided with a woman who was hurrying out of one of the houses.
As I drew back to recover myself, and to apologise, something in the dark figure struck me with poignant reminiscence. The next instant, as she would have passed me, I caught her by the shoulder.
“Anna!” I cried wildly, “God be thanked, Anna!” For upon this very first morning of my quest Heaven had brought me face to face with no less a person than Ottilie’s old nurse.
The recognition on her side was almost simultaneous. No sooner had the muffling cloak fallen from my mouth, than the dull and rather surly countenance that she had turned upon me became convulsed by the most extraordinary emotion. She gave a stifled cry. Then she clapped her hands together, pressed them clasped against her cheek, and stared at me with piercing intensity, crying again and again:
“God in heaven—you! God in heaven—you!” The black eyes were as hard to read as thoseof a shepherd’s dog, who fixes with the same earnest look the master he loves or the enemy he suspects. And as we stood thus, the space of a few seconds, my mind misgave me as to whether I had not already jeopardised all my prospects by this impulsive disclosure. It was evident that the woman had heard the story of my death, which in this hostile place was my chief security. But the die was cast, and the chance of information was too precious not to be seized even at greater risks. I laid hold of her cloak, then passionately grasped her hands. “Oh, Anna!” I cried again, and the bare thought that I was once more so near the beloved of my heart brought in my weakness the heat of tears to my eyes. “Where is she? Where is my wife? What does she? Anna, I must see her. My life is in danger in this place; they have tried to kill me because I love her, but I had rather risk death again a thousand times than give her up. Take me to her, Anna!”
The woman had never ceased regarding me with the same enigmatic earnestness; all at once her eyes lightened, she looked from side to side with the cautiousness of some animal conscious of danger, then wrenched her hands out of mine:
“Follow me, sir,” she said in a whisper, so urgent in its apprehension as to strike a colderchill into my veins than the wildest scream could have done. Without another glance at me she started off in front, and I as hastily followed, almost mechanically flinging my cloak once more across my mouth as I moved on.
Whither was she leading me? Into the hands of my enemies, whoever they were?—she had always, I had thought, hated me—or into the arms of my wife?
She turned away from the palace, down a bye-street, and then took another turn which brought us into a poor alley where the houses became almost cottages, and where the gutters ran among the cobbles with liquid filth.
My wild hope gave place to sinister foreboding; and as I plodded carefully after her unwavering figure, I loosened the hilt of my sword in its scabbard, and settled the folds of my cloak around my left arm so that at a pinch I might doff it and use it for defence.
Suddenly my guide halted for a second, looked at me over her shoulder, and disappeared down some steps into the open door of a mean little shop. I entered after her, at once disappointed in all my expectations and reassured by the humble vulgarity of the place. Anna, as I had ever known her, was chary of speech. Even, as stoopingI made my way into the low, gloomy, and evil-smelling narrow room, I saw her imperiously motion an ugly sallow young woman out of her presence; and, still in silence, I watched her, wondering, as she made fast the doors and bent her dark face to listen if all were still. Then she produced from a counter, paper, ink, and pen, and spreading them out turned to me with a single word: “Write.”
So small was the result of all these preliminaries.
“You mean,” said I, “that if I write to your mistress, you will convey the letter? Alas! I have written before and she would not even receive my writing. Oh! can you not get me speech of her? I conjure you by the love you bear her, let me see her but for a few minutes.”
The woman fixed me for a second with a startled wondering eye, opened her mouth as if to speak, but immediately clapped her hand to it as if to restrain the words. Then, with a passion of entreaty that it was impossible to withstand, she pointed to the paper and cried once more, “Write.”
And so I seemed ever destined to communicate with my wife from strange places and by strange messengers.
With a trembling hand and a brain in a whirl I wrote—I hardly know what: a wild, passionate, reproachful appeal, setting forth in incoherent words all I had done and suffered, all my desire, all my faithful love. When I looked up at length I found the black eyes still watching me with the same inscrutable fierceness. I was going to trust my life and its hopes to this woman, and for a moment I hesitated. But at the same instant there was some noise without, and snatching the letter unfinished from before me, she thrust it into her bosom, folded her cloak across it, and stooping close to me demanded in her breathless undertone:
“Where do you live?”
Mechanically I told her, adding: “Ask for M. Desberger.”
She nodded with swift comprehension, unbolted the barred front door of the little shop, and drew me hastily out by the back, along a close, flagged passage, leaving an irate customer hammering and clamouring for admittance.
We proceeded through a small yard into another alley, and here she halted a second, still detaining me by my cloak.
“Go home,” she said then; “keep close. There is danger—danger. You will hear.”
She suddenly caught my hand, kissed it, and was gone. I stood awhile bewildered, astonished, staring, hardly able to grasp the meaning of what had passed, for this last scene in the drama of my life had been acted hurriedly and was full of mysterious significance. Then, unobtrusively, I sought the shelter of my own inn, resolving to obey to the letter the injunctions laid upon me; but fate had willed it otherwise.
Determined not to interfere with the course of fortune by any least indocility, I retired into the seclusion of my chambers, and pretexting a slight indisposition, to rouse no undue suspicion by an air of mystery, gave orders for my dinner to be served there.
A stout red-cheeked wench with rough bare arms had just, grinning, clattered the first greasy dish before me, when I heard János’s foot upon the stairs. I had learnt to know the sound of his step pretty well in my recent weeks of sickness, but I had not been wont to hear it come so laggingly, and the fact that it halted altogether outside the door for a second or two, as if its owner hesitated to enter, filled me with such a furious impatience that I got up and flung it open to wrest his news from him. Not even when he had held up my poor great-uncle in hisarms to let him draw his last breath on earth, had I seen the fellow wear a countenance of such discomposure.
“In Heaven’s name, János,” cried I, and the sturdy house-wench turned and stared at him more agoggle and agrin than before.
“Get out of that, you ——” cried my servitor, snapping at her with such sourness, and so forgetful of the decorum he usually displayed in my presence, that it was clear he was mightily moved.
She fled as if some savage old watch-dog had nipped at her heel, and we were alone.
I had returned from my own exploration full of hope, and at the same time of wonder, so that I was at once ill and well prepared for any tidings, however extraordinary. But János’s tidings seemed difficult of telling.
“Let us go home, honoured sir” he stammered again and again, surveying me with a compassion and an anxiety he had not vouchsafed upon me at the worst of my illness. I had to drag the words from him piecemeal, as the torturer forces out the unwilling confession.
Yes, he had news—bad news. This was no place for me. It was not wholesome for us here. Let us return to Tollendhal, or Vienna, or even England. Let us start before further mischief overtook us.
I believe I fell upon him at last and shook him. What had he heard. What had he heard of her? I vowed he was driving me mad, vowed that if he did not instantly tell me all I would throw caution to the wind and go to the palace and demand my wife in person, were it of the Duke himself. This threat extorted at length the terrible thing that even the rough old soldier feared to utter.
“The lady,” he stammered, “the lady can no longer be spoken of as your honour’s wife. She is married.”
“Married!” I cried. “What do you mean, you scoundrel? No longer my wife! Married! You are raving—this is stark lunacy.”
He shook his grey head under the shower of my fury.
“Married. Does your honour forget that they think here that they have at last succeeded in killing you?”
I looked at him aghast, unwilling to admit the awful illumination that flashed upon my mind. He, believing me still incredulous, proceeded:
“Married she is. Fräulein Pahlen, the lady-in-waiting,—Fräulein Pahlen, as your honour bade me call her, and as it seems she called herself until ...” and then with a significant emphasis, “until six weeks ago.”
“And who is the man?” said I. The words sounded in my ears as if some one else had spoken, but I believe I was astoundingly calm.
Misled no doubt by this appearance of composure, János seemed to take more confidence, and continued in easier tones, while I held myself still to listen.
“It is the Court physician, one privy counsellor Lothner. I was shown his house, a big one in the Schloss Graben, number ten, opposite the palace walls. Ay, yes, they were married six weeks ago, and the Duke was present at the marriage ... and the Princess too! They say it was made up by their wishes. Oh! honoured sir, let us hence. You are well quit of it all; this is a bad place!”
Yet I stood without moving. Chasm after chasm, horror after horror, seemed to be opening before my mind; chasms so black that I scarce ventured to look into their depths; horrors so unspeakable that I could put no word-shape to them. After Ottilie’s messenger had failed to induce me to give up my rights, had come the attempts upon my life, then the duel. The mysterious stranger who had sought to slay me with such rancorous hate, and had called “Ottilie” into my dying ears, had returned to claim his bride, and they hadwedded in their blood-guilt. Well might the nurse cry and repeat the cry of “God in heaven! God in heaven!”
What new ambush would they now contrive?
“Your honour——” said János, and he put his hand respectfully upon my sleeve. I caught sight of his frightened face and burst into a fit of rasping laughter.
“Look at your master, János, and see the greatest fool in Christendom! The fool of the play, that is tricked and mocked and beaten from one act to another. Tricked into marrying a serving-maid instead of a princess; tricked into loving her when he should have repudiated her with scorn; abandoned by her when he could no longer live without her; mocked when he sought his wife; driven away by lackeys; stabbed by a murdering hound, a skulking thief in the night!... But the last act is only about to begin—every one has had his laugh at the fool, but we shall see, János, we shall see! He laughs best who laughs last, they say. Ten, Schloss Graben, did you say?”
I caught my cloak. I think the faithful fellow actually laid hands upon me to arrest me, but I broke from him as if his clasp had been a straw.
“I’ll drive my sword,” I remember saying, “intothe first man who dares come between me and my purpose.”
And indeed as I fled along the street, scarce knowing what way I took, yet going as straight as a die to my goal, I had no other thought but how clean I would run my blade through the clumsy lumbering brute who deemed he had so well widowed my wife. I had the strength of ten men in me.