Two men from the village have, under old Baumann's superintendence, removed the snow in the park of Berkow at a place close to the edge of the beech forest, and where in summer a beautiful view may be had over the meadow, which slopes gradually down to the garden and the castle. They have dug a grave there in the black earth, and in the deep grave the gypsy woman sleeps now the deep, eternal sleep, weary from her restless wandering through this checkered, restless life, which has brought her so little happiness.
When the weather cleared up, a few days later, and the store-houses filled with snow seemed to have been emptied for a time, and when it had been possible to clear the walks through the garden and the park down to the forest itself, Melitta might often be seen, with Julius and Czika by her side, walking down to the grave of the gypsy, which is now marked by a large lock of granite, bearing simply the name ofXenobiaon its one smoothly-polished side. Melitta is almost always holding the brown child by the hand, and speaks more frequently to her than to her son, who in his turn waits on the child with almost chivalrous tenderness. "When the roads are a little better I will drive you in my sleigh, Czika. Oh, I have a beautiful sleigh; I'll show it to you when we get back. And we will go out quite alone. The pony knows me better than any one else; I have only to clack my tongue, and off he goes like lightning; and when I say: Brr, Pony! he stands as quiet as a lamb. Don't you think, mamma, I can go out quite alone with Czika?"
"If Czika is willing to go with you, why not?"
Czika's dark face had brightened up a little while Julius was speaking, but now a cloud was passing over it once more.
"Czika would like to have Hamet back again," she said, looking with her gazelle eyes into the far distance.
"Who is Hamet, Czika?" inquired Julius.
"Hamet? Hamet is Czika's donkey!"
"Pshaw; a donkey!" cries the boy, curving his upper lip contemptuously; but a glance from his mother's eye makes a sudden blush of shame to rise on his cheek.
"Where is your donkey, Czika?" he asks, with kindly sympathy.
"Hamet is dead, Mother and I buried him in the forest."
"Why, that's a pity. Well, never mind, Czika; I will buy you another one. You know, mamma, Mr. Griebenow, the gamekeeper at Fashwitz, has a big donkey, with such immense ears. Oh, Czika! the pony always shies when we meet him. But that does not matter. He must get accustomed to it, or else"--and Julius threatened him with his switch--"I'll soon teach him better. Wont you, mamma, wont you let me go over with Baumann and buy the donkey? Griebenow has offered him to me several times. Wont you, dear mamma?"
"Certainly," said Melitta; "and his name shall be Hamet."
"Oh that is beautiful," cried Julius; "and then we can ride out, all three of us. You on Bella, I on the pony, and Czika on Hamet; and then--but no, I am afraid Hamet wont be able to keep up with us!" he interrupts himself, and looks very grave and sober.
"Then we will go slowly."
"Well, to be sure, we can do that. We will ride very slowly, Czika; I should not like you to have a fall for anything in the world."
Thus the boy prattles on; and Melitta is delighted to see that his prattling and his cheerful ways have some effect upon Czika. She thinks of the time when the Brown Countess first came to Berkow, and how she had wished even then, long before she had any suspicion that the girl could be Oldenburg's child, to keep her, and to bring her up with her Julius; and how strangely her wish had now come to be fulfilled. And then her thoughts are wandering into the future, and of the possible time when she may call these children "our children." And when they get to the granite block, and she has placed a wreath of immortelles on it, she takes the two children in her arms and kisses them, and says: "My children, my dear dear children!"
Melitta was all day busy with Czika; and if Julius had not been himself so devoted to the pretty little girl he might well have become jealous. Czika even sleeps with his mother, and mamma puts her to bed herself every evening--or, rather, puts her on her couch, for Czika's bed consists as yet only of a few blankets spread on the floor, for she has declared, in her own grave and solemn way: "Czika will die if you put her into a bed." The little one retires very early--generally as soon as it is dark out-doors; so that Oldenburg, who comes over at that time from Cona, does not find her any more in the sitting-room. He has occasionally gone with Melitta and stood by her couch, but he does not do it any more, as the child sleeps very lightly, and the slightest noise wakes her up. He is content now to hear from Melitta that "their daughter" is doing well, that she has been out walking or riding with "their children," and that "their Czika" has called her "mother" to-day, for the first time.
"I fear I shall never hear her call me father," says Oldenburg, sadly.
"We must be patient, Adalbert," replies Melitta.
Hermann has taken more pleasure in unpacking his master's trunks than in packing them on that melancholy day. Oldenburg thinks no longer of leaving, since Melitta has asked him to stay, and the house at Berkow holds everything that is dear to his heart. Every day towards dark his sleigh jingles its bells in the courtyard of Berkow, and the young widow often appears on the threshold to welcome her daily visitor. Since the evening on which his child had been restored to him, Oldenburg has become more cheerful than he has ever been. He seems to have taken to heart Melitta's words--that it would be best to bear in patience what must be borne. He knows perfectly well what the beloved one had meant; he knows why she cannot yet look straight into his eyes with her own dear, sweet eyes. He is sorry it should be so; but he, who knows Melitta's noble soul better than anybody else, would have wondered most if it had been otherwise. Melitta no longer loves the man who had conquered her heart in an unguarded hour and in a storm of passion, but the wound which the joy and the sorrow of this love has inflicted on her heart is still bleeding, and here also time must do what reasoning cannot accomplish. The peculiar situation in which Oldenburg stands to Melitta is no doubt of great influence, for the time, on his whole manner of thinking and of feeling. He has laid aside the plans for the improvement of the world, which he formerly cherished, as impracticable, since he has found that he will have need of all his patience, prudence, and caution to steer the vessel that bears his own fortune, safely into port. He is all the more interested now in the management of his estates, and follows the politics of the day with unwearied interest. He regrets, when the representatives of his province hold their annual meeting, that he has dreamt away on the banks of the Nile the time which he owed to his country. Now it seems to him more important to discover new sources of public prosperity than those of the Nile. He perceives in his solitude the first traces of that revolution which is not only threatening in France, but which will unchain at the first outbreak the fearful thunderstorm that is now hanging gloomily over his own country.
Melitta takes a lively interest in all his hopes and fears, his wishes and plans, even in his impatience for the speedy coming of the hour which he feels must come. She understands it perfectly well that he wants to go to Paris in order to exchange his new views with his old friends there. He knows that this time she does not wish him away, but only thinks of himself, and on this account he decides to go.
Shortly before he leaves, Czika, who has become somewhat more communicative, tells him a remarkable circumstance. After Paris has been several times mentioned in her presence, the child suddenly begins to speak of an old man who had accompanied them for a long time, and who had at last brought them to this very place. Not far from the gates of Berkow, she says, he turned back. That man also had intended to go to Paris. They press the child, and at last there remains no doubt that the old man of whom she speaks was Berger. Who can tell why he left those whom he had so tenderly befriended almost at the threshold of the house? Who can tell what the strange man wants in Paris? Perhaps he is anxious to put his shoulder to the wheel and help them when help is needed; or, it may be, he will only convince himself that the restless mountain of revolution is once more to give birth to--nought!
Still, Oldenburg is startled by the news. He has made Berger's acquaintance in Fichtenau, when he was there on a visit to Melitta. He had then had many a philosophical and political conversation with the shrewd, enthusiastic man, in which the word Revolution was mentioned quite frequently.
"The musty odor of casemates, and the foul air of a state where the police is supreme, which I have been compelled to breathe all my life, have made me what people call crazy," the professor had once said; "I feel as if nothing but a breathful of free air in my own country would ever lift the burden that lies here," and with these words he had repeatedly pointed to his breast.
"A breathful of free air in his country!" repeated Oldenburg, as he packed his trunks; "yes, indeed! that would ease us all, every one of us, wonderfully!"
The baroness had with her own tenacity held on to her plan to make her daughter Princess Waldenberg. She had spared no trouble, nay--what was much more in her case--no expense, and had spent an immense amount of hypocritical friendship and love, many smooth words, and still smoother compliments, in order to fulfil the duty of an affectionate mother towards her daughter.
She had conquered the ground foot by foot. In the first place, Felix, who had once enjoyed all her favor, and who was now fallen so low, had been compelled to leave the field, and to take his trip to Nice, according to the directions of the physicians. Felix had gone quite willingly. He had nothing more to gain in Grunwald, and nothing to lose but the last faint hope of recovery. His existence in Italy had been secured for several years by his generous aunt, who knew perfectly well that he had only a few months more to live. He had arranged all his affairs, and spoken candidly to his aunt about everything except that one unpleasant story about Timm. He left Anna Maria under the pleasant impression that the impertinent young man had been intimidated by him, and that he had been satisfied with a few hundred dollars. Felix, of course, did not desire to spoil his aunt's good humor by touching this sore point, and thus to ruin his own prospects. He thought he could arrange such matters much better in writing, and "when she sees that the thing cannot be helped, she will submit to it." Thus he left the house, followed by the sincere good wishes of his uncle, and bedewed with the tears of his aunt.
"Heaven be thanked, he is gone!" thought the baroness, as she returned to her room through the assembled servants, pressing her handkerchief upon her eyes; "now for Helen to come back, and--the rest will follow."
On the same day she paid a visit to the boarding school, and had first a long conversation with Miss Bear. The baroness was very tender to-day. She had just said farewell to a beloved relative whose fate oppressed her heart, and who went probably for a long time, perhaps forever--here the handkerchief performed its duty once more. Her heart was consequently deeply distressed. "Ah, believe me, my dear Miss Bear," she said; "it is hard to have to part in such a way with a young man whom I have loved as my own son; to have to see his youthful vigor cruelly broken, and with it all the fond hopes which had been cherished for his future. And poor Helen, also, will feel the blow sadly; for, if I am not altogether mistaken, a tender attachment had begun to bud between the two relatives, whom Heaven itself seemed to have formed for each other. An attachment which was at first concealed, as happens often enough, by an apparent aversion, and that so successfully that I myself was deceived for a time, and--quiteentre nous, dear Miss Bear--felt quite angry against the poor child. Now"--and the handkerchief goes once more to the eyes--"now, I know better. But all the greater is my desire to have my dear child back again. Would you take it amiss, my dear Miss Bear, if I were to carry off the precious jewel so soon again, after having entrusted it to your kind and prudent hands?"
The She Bear had too much sense not to perceive the contradiction in the former and the present manner of the baroness. She received, therefore, the confidence of the great lady with great reserve, and only asked whether Helen was to return to the paternal home at once, or only at a later time.
"I think we had better leave that to the dear child," replied Anna Maria, still afraid of a possible refusal on Helen's part. "I know she likes to be here; and, besides, I should not like to interfere in any way with her studies, her plans, and even her fancies. Helen knows my wishes. For the present, therefore, I would only ask you, dear Miss Bear, to use your influence over my child in my favor--in favor of a poor woman who is sorely afflicted by a grievous loss."
Anna Maria had scarcely left the institute when Miss Bear went up to Helen to communicate to her the conversation she had just had. She had taken off her gold spectacles for that purpose; she had smoothed down the official wrinkles on her brow, and carried up with her as much kindly feeling as a sober, pedantic She Bear can possibly feel for a fair young girl who, in her opinion, has been badly treated by her mother.
"Let us be candid with each other, dear Helen," said Miss Bear, taking the slender white hand of the young lady familiarly into her own bony hands. "My dear Sophie, who has just written to me, and who sends you much love, informed me at the beginning of our acquaintance of certain facts which helped me to understand what would otherwise be inexplicable in the conduct of your mother. You need not blush, my dear child; not a word has been said that could injure you in my eyes; on the contrary, Sophie and myself have only pitied you heartily, that you should have so much to suffer while you are still so young. We looked upon your removal from your father's house as upon a kind of banishment, and we thought at the same time you might find a desirable asylum here. If this is so, and if you still look upon it in that light, pray say so. It is not my way to create discord, especially between mother and daughter, but as matters are, I do not think it can be wrong in me to choose the side I like best."
The She Bear paused. Helen seemed to be more affected than she generally showed, but her self-control did not fail her even now. Almost cheerfully she said,
"You are very kind. Miss Bear; kinder indeed than I deserve; but your friendly interest in me has probably made my mother's conduct appear in too unfavorable a light to you. We have, for a time, stood in somewhat decided opposition to each other; but I hope mamma has forgotten it all as completely as I have. You know how fond I am of your house, and how much I like to be here; but if my mother really wishes me to return, as it seems she does, I should consider it my duty to obey her wishes, without asking whether it agrees with my own wishes or not."
The She Bear was by no means particularly pleased with this answer. She had opened her heart to the young girl; she had, to a certain extent, committed herself in order to win Helen's confidence; and now, instead of confidence, instead of frankness, she met nothing but reserve and diplomatic prudence! The good old lady felt deeply hurt, and left the room with pain at her heart, after having skilfully led the conversation into another channel.
The baroness had shown by her conduct to-day that she knew the heart of her daughter, at least in one direction. It flattered Helen's pride that her mother should not even venture to come with her request directly to her, but prefer hiding behind Miss Bear. She had decided, on the evening on which she wrote to Mary Burton, that she would return to her father's house. While she was describing the triumphs she had enjoyed in the salons of her mother, and the homage that had been offered her on all sides, she had felt a delight which, to call it by its proper name, was nothing else but the sweet sense of gratified vanity after deep humiliation. Helen's friendship for Mary Burton by no means excluded envy--for such are the friendships of girls; and Miss Burton had, it must be confessed, done all she could do to fan the fire of this evil passion in her friend's heart. The young English girl had no sooner returned to her country from the boarding-school in Hamburg than she had made a great match, marrying one of the most eligible men in all England. Helen recollected very well how the romance which had come so suddenly to a happy end had first commenced. She and Mary, then girls of fourteen, had made a trip to Heligoland in company with the principal of the school and half a dozen other girls from Hamburg, and on this occasion they had gone on board a British man-of-war, lying at anchor there. The officers had, of course, received their charming visitors with the greatest courtesy and after refreshments had been offered, they had wound up with an exceedingly pleasant little ball on the main deck. The captain of the frigate, a handsome young man, with a dark sunburnt complexion, had especially attracted the attention of the young ladies, and would have been still more popular with them all if he had not so signally distinguished his countrywoman, Mary Burton. The consequence was that Miss Mary Burton was henceforth incessantly teased about the handsome captain, until at last the trip to Heligoland and all that belonged to it was forgotten amid new and more stirring events. But two persons had never forgotten it, and these two were the captain and Miss Mary Burton. When the young lady returned to England, three years later, one of the first persons she met at the house of a relative, a great lady in town, was Captain Crawley, who now, since his father and elder brother had died, was Lord Crawley and the owner of a magnificent property. A week later the fashionable world was surprised by the marriage of his lordship with Miss Mary Burton, a young lady utterly unknown before. But no one was more painfully struck by this news than Helen Grenwitz. She had been Mary's most intimate friend; she had always been seen with her, spoken of with her; but, and this was the bitter thing, she had always been considered the prettier by far and the more striking, and nobody had acquiesced more readily in this decision than Mary in her modesty. Mary worshipped her brilliant friend; Helen Grenwitz was in her eyes an inapproachable beau ideal; she invariably submitted to her better judgment; and when the two girls built their castles in the air for the future, Mary built magnificent palaces for Helen, and contented herself with a thatched cottage by the side of a purling brook. Helen had accepted this worship as a princess accepts the attentions of her ladies in waiting. Mary had told her so often that she was the more beautiful, the more charming of the two--Helen would have been a marvel of nature if, with her pride and self-sufficiency, she had been able to resist the effects of this affectionate worship.
And now it was this humble friend who made such a brilliant match, which raised her at once to the very highest rank in society, and actually brought her in connection with more than one sovereign family, while she--Helen dared not think it out. But now, when an opportunity offered to escape from this humiliating position; now, when even her proud mother condescended to proffer a request which she did not dare present in person; now there could be no doubt any longer as to what she ought to do; and Miss Bear, who offered her with troublesome kindness an asylum at her institute, simply did not know how matters stood at that moment.
When Miss Bear had left her, Helen walked up and down in her room with folded arms. At last she stepped to the window and gazed into the autumnal evening. On the sky, heavy dark clouds were drifting slowly; below them light-gray little clouds passed with the swiftness of arrows. The almost bare branches of the slender poplar-trees rocked to and fro in the sharp wind which hissed and whistled through the few leaves, while a crow came flapping her wings, sat for a few moments on the topmost branch of one of the trees, rocking restlessly to and fro, cawed as if the inhospitable treatment was too provoking, and flew away again. Helen opened the window. The cool, damp breath of evening brought her the sharp odor of mouldering leaves. The poplars in the garden rustled louder, and the tall beeches in the park waved ghastly, and every now and then the low roar of the waves of the sea came in monotonous intervals far inland.
She looked out; she did not mind the damp air which in an instant covered her black hair with a dewy veil; she only stared more perseveringly into the evening as it grew darker every moment. Strange visions passed through her mind. Proud palaces rose by the side of blue lakes, in which dark forests were reflected; and from the palace came a merry hunting train with horn and bugle; and at the head of the long procession rode a lady on a small horse by the side of a man who negligently curbed his fiery black horse and never turned his dark face from the young lady by his side; and all, as far as the eye could reach--castle and lake and forests and fields, which spread down, down along the lake, and far, far into the country--all belonged to the young lady and her husband, the knight on the proud horse And then castle and forests and fields sank into the lake, and the lake grew into a sea which beat high up against the white chalk-cliffs with their crown of lofty beech forests; and up there on the high bank, in the glow of the setting sun, stood the same young lady who had been riding on the small graceful horse by the side of a man who was not the cavalier on the black horse, and they looked both out upon the glorious sight as the sun sank in the swelling masses of waves; and as they stood and looked, they folded their hands like praying children, and looked at each other with eyes full of love and overflowing with tears.
The wind rushed wildly through the poplars, and the young girl started up from her reveries. She cast a glance at the dim twilight that was hovering over the park. Two figures--a man and a woman--were passing the open space between the bosquets, walking arm in arm. It was only an instant, but the sharp eye of the young girl had recognized them both; at least she thought she had recognized them. A feeling such as she had never yet experienced overcame her. She must be sure that she had seen correctly--that Oswald Stein had really met Emily Cloten at this hour here in this place. The next moment she had wrapped herself up in a shawl, put on a hat with a close veil, and had hurried down the stairs which led into the garden, and was now standing at the gate that led from the garden into the park. All of a sudden her courage left her. She was ashamed of an impulse that had misled her, and made her take so unwomanly a step, of which she heartily repented. She was just about to turn back again, when the two figures once more came up the avenue which led past the garden gate. She hid behind one of the pillars of the gate, so as not to be seen; but a single glance at the two had convinced her that she had not been mistaken before. There was no doubt: it was Oswald and Emily who were passing her, lost in secret, anxious conversation. Helen's heart beat as if it would burst. She understood now why Emily asked her the other day if she had any news of Oswald Stein; she understood now Emily's anxiety at the ball at Grenwitz, when Cloten and the other young noblemen were loudly threatening Oswald ... Fooled then! and fooled by whom? By a man who could not resist Emily Cloten. Helen crept back to her room, threw aside hat and shawl, and now it was settled that she would return to her parents.
Prince Waldenberg had not been able to find anything to interest him in Grunwald until he had become acquainted with Helen Grenwitz. He could not exactly say that he was tired of it, or that the town and the people had been particularly unpleasant to him, for he scarcely knew such a state of mind; at least he never showed any symptoms of weariness or disgust. His stern, rigid face never betrayed pleasure or annoyance; it looked as if his features had been frozen, for all time to come, in the northern climate in which the prince was born, and as if they could not thaw in the glow of love or of hatred. And it was really so, to a certain extent. The ordinary sensations of common mortals were not capable of that sublime self-consciousness which was given to him. He could not laugh at the wittiest anecdote, nor could he look disgusted at a stupidity. His servants never heard a bad word from him; he never showed childish wrath before his soldiers. Nevertheless the men trembled before him, and even the general did not inspire half as much respect as First-Lieutenant Prince Waldenberg; for the servants knew that their master never scolded, but dismissed them upon the slightest neglect, and the men had terrible stories to tell about him in the guardhouse and in the barracks. The rumor was that the prince had the unpleasant habit, if a soldier showed the faintest sign of insubordination of killing him on the spot--a habit which he had quite recently indulged in at the capital, and which had led to his being detached from the Guards and sent to a line regiment in garrison at Grunwald. The story was probably a myth, like so many others; the prince had been sent to Grunwald in order to study fortification and coast and harbor defence, and other useful branches, in preparation for the high position to which he was entitled, if not by his military genius, at all events by his high rank; but the myth proved how the common people, who have a very keen eye for the virtues and the faults of the higher classes, thought about First-Lieutenant Prince Waldenberg. The officers, however, seemed also to treat him on their part with some misgivings, and certainly with great circumspection. No one presumed to speak to him at the mess-table, or at night at the club, or wherever else they happened to meet, in that cordial tone which is generally used between comrades. On the contrary, they rather avoided him, and, when that was not possible, they confined their words to what was indispensable; especially the captain of the company to which the prince was attached--a gentleman like a ball, who barely reached up to the shoulder of his lieutenant, and who felt probably all the smaller by his side as he was not even noble. It was most amusing to hear Captain Miller at drill exclaim, in almost piteous tones, "First-Lieutenant Prince Waldenberg will have the kindness to step forward--a mere thought!" and even the old, gray-headed sergeant could hardly keep from smiling.
The prince was thus very much left to his own company, even at the evening parties, which he occasionally frequented. He met here again his comrades, who had already avoided him at parade, and a lot of old and young country gentlemen, whose talk about tillage and cattle-raising could not exactly interest him much who had more estates than they had acres of land, and more shepherds than they had sheep. As for the ladies--why there were some very pleasant ones among them, like the beautiful Misses Frederika, Nathalie and Gabriella Nadelitz, Hortense Barnewitz, a triflepasséebut all the more clever and interesting, Emily Cloten as piquante as she was coquettish--but they were either not to the taste of his highness, or the prince was altogether inaccessible to the charms of the fair sex. For a time, at least, it seemed as if he were not disposed to pay special attention to any one of these ladies.
But no sooner had the prince seen the beautiful Helen Grenwitz in the salons of her mother than the rumor began to spread--nobody knew how--that his highness was very much pleased with beautiful Helen Grenwitz, and that an engagement was not very far off. The report continued to live, and was even confirmed by numerous details, the discovery of which did great honor to the ingenuity of the before-mentioned lovers of gossip and watchers of features. The Countess Grieben knew positively that the prince was spending every evening at the Grenwitz mansion; others had it that he passed the institute of Miss Bear daily after dress-parade, on his superb Tcherkessian stallion; and still others, that he was frequently seen at night walking up and down for hours before the house, concealed in a large cloak. Hortense Barnewitz whispered into Countess Stilow's ear: "Now I know why poor Felix had so suddenly to go to Italy;" and the Countess Stilow whispered in reply: "You'll see, dear Hortense; it will not be a week before Helen, who seemed to be banished forever, will be back again."
A smile of satisfaction lighted up all faces when the prophecy of the toothless Countess Stilow was actually fulfilled, and Helen Grenwitz exchanged her modest little room in Miss Bear's boarding-school for the stately rooms of the Grenwitz mansion.
It was strange, however, that the old baron, who had so urgently desired this step before, should now seem to be least pleased with it of all. The old gentleman had of late become exceedingly capricious, obstinate, and violent, so that one hardly recognized in him the kind good-natured man of former days, and everybody pitied and admired poor Anna Maria, who bore her cross with truly Christian patience and forbearance.
"Ah, you may believe me, dear Helen," the excellent old lady said to her daughter on the first evening after her return, as they were sitting on the sofa in the reception-room, and after the baron had left the room to retire; "it is very difficult now to get along with your father, and I need your kind support more than ever. Malte is too young, and I fear too heartless, to admit of putting any confidence in him. I have been so long accustomed to bear all alone that I can hardly realize the happiness of having a friend and a confidante." And the good lady shed tears while she was gathering up her work in order to follow her husband.
The relations between mother and daughter seemed indeed to promise a better understanding for the future. It was not in the nature of either of them to be particularly affectionate. They treated each other as adversaries who have mutually tried their strength and found out that they had better be friends again.
After Anna Maria had thus taken the second step toward the attainment of her end she pursued her plan with greater security. She had every reason to be pleased with the results. Prince Waldenberg came almost every evening; and as he did not play cards, and it could not well be presumed that he found many charms in the conversation with Count and Countess Grieben, who were near neighbors, and also came very frequently to play a game with the baron and the baroness, the magnet could be none other than Helen, with whom, indeed, he spent the whole of his time.
Anna Maria took care that the prince and Helen should not be disturbed more than was unavoidable; and as in these circles the older people had no other way of spending time than in playing cards, and young people were but rarely invited, the task was not very difficult. The prince and Helen spent long hours alone in the little boudoir by the side of the large room with three windows, where the card-tables were placed, at least until supper was announced, and even then they were generally again left very nearly to themselves, as the others had to discuss the different games that had been played.
It was most creditable to the conversational powers of the prince that the young lady, with her pretensions, was never tired of these interviews. And yet, what he said could not be called interesting, exactly; at all events the manner in which he said it was not so. He was never heard to speak in that animated and quick manner which is peculiar to young people (and the prince was very young yet, perhaps twenty-four), especially when they speak of favorite topics, or are excited by opposition. It was always the same monotonous utterance, as if the words were men and the sentences sections, and they were all marching about, carefully keeping pace. It was significant, too, that the prince preferred speaking French, a language which has naturally such a logical rhythm, although he spoke German as well and as fluently. It was perhaps due to this fact--that the conversation was almost exclusively carried on in a foreign idiom--that Helen felt the strange character of his mind so much less. For the prince was, after all, in his appearance, and not less so in his manner of thinking and feeling, more of a Russian than of a German. All the memories of his childhood and youth, with the only exception of the short time which he had spent in France, and more recently in Germany, were Russian. He had been page at the court of the Emperor Nicholas, and the daily sight of this magnificent monarch, with whom he was even said to share certain peculiarities of figure and carriage, had probably not been without influence on the character of the young prince. He had received a purely military education among the cadets of the Michailow palace, the same palace whose vast apartments witnessed in that fearful night the murder of an emperor, when the wife of Paul I., frightened by the low sound of a number of voices and clanking of arms, snatched the young Princes Nicholas and Michael from their beds and hastened with them through the long suit of rooms to the emperor's apartments, when icy Count Pahlen met her, carried her almost forcibly back to her rooms, and locking the door carefully, said: "Restez tranquille, madame; il n'y a pas de danger pour vous." The prince had quite a number of similar stories, and they did not fail to have their effect upon the mind of the fanciful girl. It was a new version of the adventures with which the warlike Moor filled the heart of the daughter of the Venetian patrician. Desdemona also shuddered at the blood flowing in streams, through his accounts, but the hero appeared only the more marvellous; and although Helen often felt an icy breath rising from these palace souvenirs of the Russian page, she was none the less captivated and ensnared by the secrecy and the horrors that surrounded them with an irresistible charm. She dreamt of a life in comparison with which the life she was now leading appeared very pitiful and mean. She saw herself a lady in waiting at a court where beauty and cleverness are all-powerful; she fancied herself the soul of grand enterprises, as the confidante of generals and statesmen; and then she started from her reveries and looked at the calm, dark face of the giant who had rocked her to sleep with his strange stories, and she asked herself whether she would ever venture to enter, on his hand, those lofty regions towards which she was drawn by the ardent wishes of her proud, ambitious heart.
The prince must have been particularly interested in winning the young girl's confidence, for he laid aside the cool reserve with which he treated all others, when he was alone with her. He even spoke of his family with the greatest frankness. He told her that, as for his parents, he only knew his mother really, because he saw his father but very rarely. His mother was living in St. Petersburg, where her influence at court was still very great, although an incurable affection had sadly disfigured the once surpassingly beautiful woman, and made her a melancholy enthusiast. His father, Count Malikowsky, he said, was spending most of his time in travelling and at watering-places, as he was still passionately fond of the pleasures of life in spite of his age and his delicate health, and thus could combine at these Spas pleasure and profit. He, the prince, had, properly speaking, nothing to do with his father. They exchanged short letters with each other once or twice a year, on special occasions; he had seen his father the last time at the capital, when he was swearing his oath of allegiance to the king, and he had been shocked by the sad appearance of the old gentleman, which the latter had tried in vain to conceal by the subtlest arts of the toilette. The count and the princess harmonized very little, as their characters were so utterly different. The count went once a year to St. Petersburg, appeared at court, showed himself once or twice at the Letbus House, and disappeared again, in order to send friendly greetings for another year from Homburg, Baden-Baden, Pyrmont, etc.
Nor did the prince conceal his views on other subjects. He had evidently thought much about matters which are usually of no interest to young men of his rank; but as he was far from being brilliant, and as he looked upon everything from the unchangeable standpoint of the officer and the aristocrat, his views and thoughts were all more or less stiff and wooden, as if they had been so many well-drilled recruits.
Of his profession he thought very highly.
"I consider the soldier's profession," he said, "not only the noblest, but also the most useful; the noblest, because here alone every faculty of man is roused and developed; the most useful, because it is the only security for all the other professions, which cannot exist without it. If the peasant wishes to raise his cabbages, if the mechanic wants to sit quietly in his work-shop, the artist in his atelier, and the scholar in his study they must all thank the soldier, who for their sake stands guard at the town-gate, patrols the streets at night, disperses noisy revellers, and fights the enemy when he threatens the country. Compared with this profession, all others are low and vulgar. And that it is beyond doubt the highest and noblest, is proved by the fact that the rulers of the earth adopt its costume for their daily wear, or at least for all solemn occasions. Therefore I think that nobles alone ought to be officers. And I think it a deplorable mistake that, of late, others also have been admitted to our ranks, for which the penalty will have to be paid sooner or later."
"But do you really think that all who are not nobles are unfit for this profession?" asked Helen.
"Certainly," replied the prince, with energy. "Sport and war ought to be reserved for the nobility, not because those who are not noble cannot also fire a gun or wield a sword, but because they cannot do it in the right spirit. Nor is this mere theory; the question has its practical side also. The spirit of innovation, of insolent disobedience to the order of things as ordained by God, is everywhere stirring. In our state they have most unfortunately attempted to keep it down by gentle means and by concessions. I believe that sternness and severity alone can check this spirit. We are sure of the men who have been for three years under, our control and influence; but we are not sure of the officer who is not noble. Send a platoon under a Lieutenant Smith, or Jones, against a rebellious mob, and ten to one he will see among the mob a brother Smith, or a cousin Jones, and therefore hesitate to give the command Fire! at the right moment. Take your officers from the nobility, and only from the nobility, and such a thing cannot happen; and you can quell the rising of a whole town like Grunwald with a single battalion."
The prince spoke with great energy and strong condemnation of the concessions which the king had made that spring to the liberal party, and to the spirit of the times generally, by convoking a legislative assembly of the whole people.
"I do not see," he said, "where this is to end. If the king does not wish--and I believe he really does not wish--that a sheet of paper, which they call a constitution, should rise between him and the people, according to which he is forced to govern, whether he will or not, then he ought not to have conjured up even the shadow of a constitution. The shadow is soon followed by the substance. I confess that I am disgusted by the patience of the king, while these fellows cry so loud; and that I have long doubted whether I could honorably serve a monarch who thus misjudges the duty of a king 'by the grace of God.'"
When the prince was thus judging things by the standard of his Russian ideas of absolute government, it sometimes happened that there arose in Helen's naturally good and affectionate heart a repugnance, not unmixed with terror, towards one who could utter such inhuman thoughts in cold blood. At other times she would have shrunk from the fearful consequences of such principles, but now she was too deeply irritated by the wound which Oswald's treachery had inflicted on her proud heart, and, as is the case with violent dispositions, she had hastened from one extreme to the other. Helen hated Oswald. She wept tears of indignation and of shame when she thought how dear this man had been to her, and how near she had been to the danger of showing him her love for him. The treachery itself was no longer doubtful to her mind. Emily's manner had changed so strikingly of late that even outsiders had noticed it. The young lady who had formerly found happiness only in the wildest turmoil of pleasure, now avoided society as much as she had formerly sought it; and when she could not escape from invitations to her former circles, she seemed to have only scoffing and scorn for all she had admired in other days. She declared that the officers were stupid, dancing a childish amusement, and a masked ball the height of absurdity. She treated the ladies with undisguised irony, and the men with open contempt, especially her husband, who did not know what to make of the strange change, and only discovered gradually the one fact, that of all the many foolish things which Albert Cloten had done in his time, the making of an accomplished coquette, like the "divine Emily Breesen," his wife, was beyond all doubt the most foolish. Most people laughed, and said: "It is a whim of the little woman's; she will soon come right again." Others, who were less harmless, said: "There is something behind that! When a young woman treats the whole world, not excluding her husband,en canaille, she does so only for the sake of a man who is himself her whole world." But they racked their brains in vain to find out who the lucky man could be. Some guessed it was young Count Grieben, who had formerly courted her; others, Baron Sylow; still others, even Prince Waldenberg; and only Helen Grenwitz knew that they were all mistaken, and that the object of Emily's love was not to be met with in the aristocratic circles of the Faubourg St. Germain of Grunwald.
If Anna Maria had known what an admirable ally she had at that moment for the execution of her plan in Oswald Stein, she would probably have been less displeased with this excessively objectionable and dangerous young man. At all events, it seemed as if the relations between Helen and the prince were gradually assuming the desired shape. She considered it at least a good sign that Helen expressed no desire to improve the conversation in the boudoir next to the card-room by inviting other young men to take part in it, and that she did not frown contemptuously when she (Anna Maria) recently ventured to say: "That would be a son-in-law to my heart," but quietly let the dark lashes droop upon the gently-blushing cheeks.
Any one who had seen Oswald Stein and Albert Timm sitting every night behind their bottle, in the city cellar of Grunwald, both full of jokes and jests and merry tales, would have been convinced that both of them lived fully up to the motto of the illustrious club of "the Rats," to which they had the honor to belong. They evidently enjoyed life; and yet this was true only of Albert Timm, who had seriously adopted the first and sole article of faith of the secret society: "Live as thou wilt desire to have feasted when thou diest," and made it the principle of his existence. For Oswald, on the contrary, this wild life was but a means to stifle within him the incessant, painful longing after a nobler model of life. The memory of all "that had once been his" mingled like the notes of an Æolian harp with the wild allegro of his present life. His enthusiastic youth, when rosy clouds edged the horizon, and behind them lay a mysterious, wonderful future; his days of supreme happiness at Grenwitz, where the old legend of the paradise seemed to be repeated for him; his friendly intimacy with great and at least good men;--whither had all this flown? His youth was gone forever, with all the sweet rosy dreams of youth. Of the paradise, nothing was left but the bitter taste of the fruit from the tree of knowledge: that fickleness of heart and true love can never go hand in hand .... And his friends? With Berger he had parted, and probably forever, at the gate of the insane asylum; in Oldenburg he now hated a rival, and the rich aristocrat, the favorite of fortune, who easily overcame all impediments that exhausted the full strength of others. Franz, who had stood by him like a brother in the most embarrassing moments of his life, he had treated with black ingratitude; and in vain did he try to excuse himself on the ground that he could not possibly have continued to be the friend of a character which, in its self-poised calmness and dispassionate seriousness, was so entirely different from his own. From Bemperlein, the good, harmless, honorable man, who had met him with the offer of his enthusiastic friendship, he was separated by the consciousness that he had mortally offended him through her whom he worshipped, so that when he met him in the street he was apt to look to the other side in his painful embarrassment.
And what had he gained in return for so much lost happiness? The few rare moments which Oswald gave to serious thoughts on his present situation were unsatisfactory enough. His position in the college was almost untenable, and yet he had occupied it scarcely three months. The whole "humanity" of the rector, Clemens, was not sufficient to cover with the cloak of charity the great and the small vices which Oswald had committed in his official capacity; and Mrs. Clemens declared before the assembled dramatic club, with regard to the same unfortunate young man, that "she had cherished a serpent in her bosom." And the worthy lady had good reason to complain. She had met Oswald with a three-fold friendship: as the mother of two marriageable daughters, as the wife of his superior, and as the president of the dramatic club, and she had been deeply offended in all these capacities. Oswald had not only failed to return the bashful attachment which had begun to germinate in the hearts of Thusnelda and Fredegunda, but he had called these victims of his caprice before a numerous company "little goslings, who wanted nothing but the plumage to be perfect." Ah, it had all been duly and faithfully reported! He had compared the fair president, the wife of his presiding officer, with an old turkey hen, who was so proud of the goslings she had hatched that her empty head was utterly turned; and, finally, he had not only ceased to frequent the dramatic club, after reading there three times amid general applause, but he had passed over, with flags flying, so to say, into the hostile camp, and had become an active member of the lyric club which had rapidly risen under Mrs. Jager's direction to a splendor unheard of in the annals of the dramatic club. Certainly, if Oswald had felt no other misdeed but this on his conscience, the cloud of dark discontent which was continually hanging on his brow would have seemed natural enough.
But Oswald had to answer for more than this faithlessness. His connection with Emily Cloten, which he had so suddenly begun, partly from caprice and partly from real attachment, now weighed upon his soul like a heavy burden, especially since the reckless, passionate temper of the young lady threatened to betray their secret at every moment. Emily no sooner felt sure of Oswald's affections than she thought she could throw down the gauntlet to the whole world. "To love you, and to be loved by you, is my sole wish and will--everything else is utterly indifferent to me," she said; and she acted accordingly. Was she to bridle her inordinate desires, now that her heart for the first time clearly felt its own capacities? And she loved Oswald with the whole passion of a naturally most tender, affectionate heart, and with the whole recklessness of a woman who had all her life looked upon the world only as a football of her sovereign pleasure. It was in vain that Oswald reminded her of the duties of his position--of the difficulties arising from his narrow circumstances. "I cannot conceive how you can hesitate between the weariness you feel in teaching your boys and the delight we feel in each other's company. Why don't you give up the stupid college, and live only for me?" "But, my dear child, I am already living almost alone for you; and if matters continue so much longer. Rector Clemens will not only consent to my leaving the college, but desire that I should only live for you." "Oh, wouldn't that be splendid!" cried Emily, clasping her hands; "then we could carry out my pet wish, and go to Paris, where there are no stupid people watching every step we take." Oswald shrugged his shoulders. "And what are we to live on in Paris?" Emily made a long face; but the next moment she was laughing again, and said: "Oh, that will take care of itself if we are once there."
The desire to get away from Grunwald, where indeed her position was every moment liable to be exposed, had of late become a fixed idea with Emily, and she returned constantly to the danger they were running. She wanted to enjoy Oswald's love without interruption, and not to pay for every half-hour spent stealthily in his company with long days of care and anxiety. So far they had met either in Primula's boudoir, or in Ferrytown at the house of Emily's old nurse, Mrs. Lemberg, which they could easily reach as long as the ice held that covered the bay between the island and the continent. Primula had been initiated into the secret after Emily's recklessness had once led to a most ridiculous scene of discovery, and it was characteristic that the author of the "Cornflowers" had soon overcome her first feeling of jealousy, and henceforth looked upon this "union of loving souls" as extremely romantic, and found that the lovers in their helplessness, threatened by an unloving world, were highly pitiable, and she herself, as the protector of such an "heroic passion," worthy of all admiration! She dreamt herself more and more into the part she was playing, and the subscribers to the "Daffodils," for whose "album" Primula Veris was now writing her poems, were forced to read long pages about "the twisted thread of love; the silent, secret doings of secret love, shunning the light of day;" and especially of the "chaste guardian of the faithful love." She even warned her readers not to imagine that the latter was "the moon--the pale virgin," but hinted very explicitly at the meaning.
Primula also favored Emily's plan. "Flee, my children," she said, "from this rude Cimmerian sky to milder skies, away from these wild cyclopses and soulless ichthyophagi! Amid snow and ice even the blue cyane cannot thrive, much less the red rose of wild love."
Oswald was not so blinded that he could not have seen the insanity of the project, but he was pleased with the adventurous nature of the plan, and he was dazzled by the hope of thus ridding himself at one blow of all the troubles that beset him, no matter what the blow might cost. Finally, his attachment for Emily had grown from a mere whim into a full passion, which did not exactly warm his heart but influenced his imagination, and which he did not care to combat very earnestly because it afforded him a kind of excuse for his fickleness. He began to reflect seriously on the plan for an elopement, especially as the little remnant of his fortune was rapidly disappearing, owing to the life he was now leading, and he saw, therefore, that he would have to do quickly whatever was to be done.
Oswald would have liked to consult his friend Albert on this embarrassing subject, but he no longer ventured to speak to him about Emily. At first he had now and then dropped a word about his last romance, and Albert was one of those clever men who need be told only half a word to be at home in the most complicated affair. He had never troubled Oswald with curious questions, and yet knew how to draw from him very quickly nearly all he desired to hear. He knew that Oswald had secret meetings at Mrs. Jager's house, and across in Ferrytown; he knew who the young, thoughtless woman was, and he was yet by no means misled when Oswald suddenly ceased speaking of Emily. He only concluded that matters had entered that stage where silence becomes a duty.
Timm had not exactly desired that matters should go quite so far. Timm did not object to Oswald's reviving his taste for an aristocratic mode of life by an affair with a great lady, and to his becoming thus more and more anxious for larger means; but he did not desire that this should turn into a serious attachment, which might lead no one could tell where, and which, above all, threatened to become fatal to Oswald's romantic passion for Helen. For it was upon this love that Timm had based his whole plan. If Oswald could not be induced by any other means to enter into a lawsuit with the Grenwitz family for the legacy, then the hope of winning Helen should be his motive. Thus it was why Helen must not be lost for Oswald, nor Oswald for Helen. And even this might now happen. Albert, whose eyes were everywhere, had not failed to learn that Prince Waldenberg was daily at the Grenwitz mansion; he had discovered, besides, other suspicious evidences of the favorable progress of the new relations between Helen and the prince; as, for instance, magnificent bouquets ordered at the first florist's establishment by the prince, which were "to be sent that night to Grenwitz House." Since the snow was firm, and thejeunesse doréewas devising sleighing parties in all possible directions of the compass, he had, moreover, repeatedly seen Helen by the side of the prince in a magnificent sleigh, whose costly coverings, with the three horses harnessed abreast after Russian fashion, pointed it out as the property of his highness. He had as frequently warned Oswald against so dangerous a rival, but the latter had only given evasive answers. This state of things displeased Albert altogether, and he considered how he might, to use his own words, "get the cart into a new track."
He had not reappeared for some time at Grenwitz House. Felix had sent him, before leaving, four hundred dollars in advance for the month of November, taking it from his travelling money, and requesting him at the same time to address himself hereafter, "in all business matters," directly to his aunt, the baroness. Albert had as yet not availed himself of this permission, as it was difficult even for him to spend four hundred dollars a month in the modest town of Grunwald; and he had, besides, been specially successful at faro of late. Nevertheless, he proposed to pay his visit very soon, and to avail himself of the opportunity for a better examination of the whole situation.
It happened in these same days that Albert received one evening, just as he was going out, a letter by the town mail, which put him into such bad humor that he gave up his original intention to attend an extraordinary meeting of "the Rats" in the city cellar, and instead, paid a visit to his landlord--the sexton, Toby Goodheart--the man who had filled all the little crooked streets and lanes around St. Bridget's with the odor of his sanctity.
Mr. Toby Goodheart was a bachelor, because he was too ugly to obtain a wife, as he said himself: because his heaven-aspiring mind did not condescend to such worldly thoughts, as his admirers insisted upon believing. But neither the one nor the other could be the true reason, for Mr. Toby was not ugly, but a very good-looking man of some forty years, whose high forehead, bald at the temples, gave him a most god-fearing expression. Nor was Mr. Toby really so very god-fearing, unless his piety consisted in the solemn manner with which he stepped, Sunday after Sunday and year after year, dressed in his shiny-black dress-coat, black trousers, and a long flowing black gown fastened to the collar, through the church, pushing his velvet bag by means of a long pole under the noses of the "devout listeners." That Mr. Toby was in reality a son of Belial was known to but very few men in Grunwald, where the excellent man had now been living for twenty years--perhaps only to one single man, and that was the occupant of the two best rooms in the sexton's official dwelling: Mr. Albert Timm, surveyor.
Mr. Toby had dropped his mask in an evil hour, when the spirit of his much-beloved grog was stronger in him than the spirit of lies, and shown his true face to Mr. Timm, the "famous fellow." Mr. Toby Goodheart and Mr. Albert Timm had since that hour formed the closest intimacy, a friendship which was cemented and secured in its firmness and duration by a remarkable community of fondness for women, wine, and dice, and the common possession of delicate secrets.
Albert Timm entered the little room behind the parlor, where his landlord used to sit, with his hat on his head, and found the excellent man engaged in the pleasant occupation of preparing a glass of his favorite beverage.
"You may make one for me too," said Albert, throwing his hat upon a chair and himself into the corner of the well-padded sofa.
"As heretofore, Albert mine?" asked the obliging landlord, taking another tumbler and spoon from the cupboard and placing it on the table by the side of the smoking tea-kettle.
"Rather a little more than less," was the mysterious reply.
While Mr. Toby was brewing the hot drink according to this prescription, Albert was gazing at the tips of his boots.
"You are not in good humor to-night, Albert mine!" said Toby, looking up from his occupation.
"It would be a lie to say the contrary!"
"What's the matter? Has little Louisa caught you?"
"Little Louisa be d----d."
"Or have they sent you a little note, which you had conveniently forgotten?"
"Something of the kind!"
"Well, what is it?" asked Toby, placing the grog he had mixed for Albert upon the table and stirring it busily. "There, take a mouthful, and then speak out!"
Albert took the tumbler, tasted, to see if it was neither too hot nor too cold, neither too sweet nor too bitter, neither too strong nor too weak, and when he had gained the conviction that it came fully up to his standard, he more than half emptied it at one draught.
"It goes down easily to-night," said Toby, good naturedly. "Try it again."
"You recollect that I commenced last summer at Grenwitz a foolish sort of a thing with a little black-eyed witch of a French girl?" continued Timm.
"I know," said Toby, smiling cunningly; "I know what's the matter now."
"No, you don't. The little thing was as shy as a wild-duck. In other respects, to be sure, she was as stupid, too, for you know she lent me, poor as I was, three hundred dollars, which she had put into the savings bank."
"That was noble in her."
"But now she wants them back."
"Did you give her a note?"
"No!"
"Why, then, you have only to say that you know nothing about it, and it's all right. Selah!"
"That is not so easy. She has great friends, with whom I should not like to have trouble."
"Why not?"
"Did I not tell you that Marguerite is no longer with the Grenwitz people?"
"Not a word. Where is she?"
"At Privy Councillor Rohan's."
"How did she get there?"
"I believe through Bemperlein, the candidate for the university, forsooth; the hypocrite who, I am told, is now the privy councillor's right hand, and as others say engaged to my pet of other days."
"Much good may it do him!" said Toby. "But who has dunned you?"
"The old privy councillor himself; look!"--and here Albert drew from his pocket the letter he had received half an hour ago. "The old sinner writes, 'Dear sir! As Miss Marguerite, who now does me the honor,' etc., etc., 'tells me,' etc. 'As the relations which formerly may have existed between yourself and the young lady are now entirely and forever broken off--you know best why--you will understand that you cannot, as a man of honor, keep a moment longer a sum of money which was placed at your disposal under very different circumstances. Finally, I beg leave to say that the young lady feels a very natural inclination to leave the matter untouched, but that I learnt accidentally from members of the Grenwitz family that Miss Martin had been enabled to save a little capital while staying with that family, and that this led me to question the young lady on the subject, and to insist upon being told,' etc. 'Of course, I must consider it my duty,' etc., etc. Well, what do you say of that?" asked Albert, crushing the letter and stuffing it angrily into his pocket.
"That is a bad thing," replied the honorable Toby, scratching his grizzly head. "The privy councillor is a man of high standing in the town, especially since he has paid his debts--heaven knows how; so that you cannot enter the lists against him. I am afraid you will have to pay."
"So am I," replied Albert. "That cursed gossip, the baroness! It is malice in her; but she shall pay for it. I'll put the thumbscrews on her, till----"
Albert paused, and poured the rest of the drink down his throat.
"Look here, Albert mine," said Toby; "how are you standing with the baroness? I hope, Albert mine, my boy, you have got all the lots of money which you have made such an unusual show of, of late, in an honest way?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, the baroness is not so bad yet, and----"
"Nonsense. That old vixen! I am not so low yet."
"Then tell me; how did you get the money?"
"First tell me what you mean by your mysterious allusions to the power you have over the Grenwitz family, and let me hear it all."
"Will you then tell me where the money comes from?"
"Yes."
"Well! But let us first brew another tumbler, and then we can begin our stories. But look here; honor bright, Albert mine; honor bright, and no prattling!"
"One crow does not peck at another!" said Albert.
Mr. Toby smilingly nodded his venerable head, mixed the grog with artistic care, unbuttoned his black satin waistcoat, leaned back in his chair, and said,
"I have not always lived in Grunwald; and I have not always been sexton at St. Bridget's."
"I know! The capital has the undisputed honor to call you her own; and whose sexton you were before you became St. Bridget's own sexton, the gentleman in black will probably know best."
Toby Goodheart seemed to take this as a high compliment. He smiled contentedly, and sipped his grog with evident delight.
"Don't be coarse, Albert mine, or I cannot go on," he said. "My father was a servant; and I was, from tender infancy, intended for the same profession. You may judge what remarkable talents I had for my vocation, when I tell you that I had had twenty masters before I was twenty years old. About this time it occurred to me how much more pleasant it would be to be my own master; and as I had laid by a considerable little sum during the time of my service,"--here the honorable Toby smiled with his left eye and the left corner of his mouth--"I had capital enough to open a house of entertainment."
"Nice entertainment, I dare say, you gave," said Albert.
"Yes, indeed!" replied Toby, adding another lump of sugar to his grog; "at least the fair sex was abundantly represented in my nice little business. I made it a principle to have only female waiters, and so the 'Cafe Goodheart' was well frequented. I had at least six or eight young ladies to do the honors of my house."
Albert Timm seemed to listen to these statistics with much delight. He leaned back in the corner of the sofa and broke out into a loud laugh, while the honorable Toby again only smiled--but this time, for the sake of change, with the right eye and the right corner of the mouth.
"Hush, hush, Albert mine!" he said; "the people might hear us in the street. How can a prudent youth like yourself ever laugh aloud? I have never in all my life done more than smile, and I have succeeded pretty well. But never mind that. The young ladies were, of course, always very pretty; and I can say that, of all my colleagues, I managed to get the prettiest. But I must also confess that this was not so much due to my own good taste as to the discrimination and cleverness of a lady with whom I had once upon a time stood in tender relations, when we were both in service, and who was still a friend and a partner in business. This lady, called Rose Pape, was in her way a very remarkable woman, with a marvellous talent for business."
"I can imagine what kind of business that was," said Albert.
"You can imagine no such thing, young man," replied Toby. "Mrs. Rose Pape was an excellent lady, whose society was not only sought after by the most respectable ladies, but also paid for with large sums of money, and whose night-bell was well known in the whole thickly-settled neighborhood in which she lived. But Mrs. Rose Pape took not only a warm interest in young wives, but very consistently, also, in those who might become such; and thus she had as extensive an acquaintance among the pretty chambermaids and seamstresses as among the wives of high officials and rich merchants.
"One fine day, now, Mrs. Rose came to see me, and told me that an immensely rich baron of her acquaintance had fallen desperately in love with a pretty girl, and had charged her, Rose, to help him, without regard to expense. She had already formed a plan, but she was in need of a valet of special abilities in order to carry out her superb conception. She added that there was a lot of money to be made in the business, and asked me to join her.
"It so happened that just at that time the police had found occasion to interfere with the management of my café, and I was afraid of unpleasant consequences; I seized, therefore, with eagerness the opportunity of leaving the capital for a time in such good company. Twenty-four hours later I was on my way, accompanying the young lady in question, and riding in the comfortable carriage of my new master, who was going to--well, guess, Albert mine, where he was going?"
"How can I know? But you were surely not going to give me the complete history of your life? I thought you were going to tell me how you got to Grenwitz," said Albert, who had been busy with his own affairs, and had not listened very attentively.
"Why, you hear, we are on the way to Grenwitz," said Toby, glancing at Albert from the corner of his left eye across the rim of his tumbler; "for my new master was Baron Grenwitz, and the end of our journey was Castle Grenwitz, where you were last summer."
An Indian, who on his pursuit has discovered his enemy's track in the grass of the prairie, cannot exert himself more powerfully, with all his senses, than Albert did as soon as he heard the last words. He had instantly recognized in Toby Goodheart the valet who had played so ambiguous a part in the story of Mother Claus; but he did not betray by a word or gesture the importance of this discovery, but asked, with well-feigned indifference,
"The old baron? Upon my word! I should not have expected such things from the old boy!"
"Not the present baron, but his cousin, of the older line--Baron Harald; or Wild Harald, as he is still called by those who have known him. I tell you, Albert mine, it was a merry life we were leading at Castle Grenwitz in the year of the Lord eighteen hundred and twenty-two. Wine and women in abundance! and with all that we played comedy--well, it was equal to the best thing I have ever seen on the stage. Just imagine: my good friend. Rose----"
"She was there, too?"
"Certainly! Did I not tell you the baron had engaged her to play his great-aunt?"
"His what?"
Toby smiled--this time with both eyes and both corners of the mouth.
"She played the great-aunt of the baron, with wig and crutch: because that foolish thing, Marie--Marie Montbert was the name of the little monkey; and as pretty a girl she was as I have ever seen with these eyes of mine--I have never seen the like of her. What was I going to say? Yes! Marie had made aconditio sine qua non, as we scholars say, that an old lady of the baron's family should be at the castle, if she was to come there. Well, now we had an elderly lady, a famous elderly lady, eh! Albert mine, eh?" and the honorable Toby tittered, and poked Albert most cordially in the side.
"Well, and how did the matter end?" asked Albert, who did not want to hear the part of the story which he knew.
"Why, I did not see it end; for we, Rose and I, ran away sometime before. To tell the truth, we were afraid the whole story might upset; for Marie had many friends in the city, who might make a great noise about it, and get us all, especially Rose and myself, into serious trouble. So we slipped off one fine morning, or rather one fine night, without taking leave, but requesting various things which happened to fall into our hands to keep us company in going away with us. Here in Grunwald we parted, or rather we were separated. For I was taken so sick--probably in consequence of the high living we had enjoyed at Grenwitz--that I could not go on, and had to be carried to the hospital. What I then thought was a great misfortune, turned out afterwards to be the most fortunate thing; for the late Dean Darkling, the father of Mrs. Professor Jager, who was then chaplain to the hospital, fell in love with my modest smiles, and insisted, as soon as I was well again, upon my entering his service. Well! from the servant of a minister to the sexton of his church, it is but a step!" and Mr. Toby sipped comfortably the remainder of his grog.
"And did you ever hear anything more of your friend Mrs. Rose?"
"She is living at the capital, and carries on her business with double entry, and more profitably than ever. If you ever go up to town, Albert mine, you must not forget to call on her. She lives at the corner of Gertrude and Rose streets, third story."
"I am going to take that down at once," said Albert, entering the address in his note-book. "But what has become of Marie, or whatever the stupid thing's name was?"
"Well, that is a curious story. Shortly after we had left, there really did come one of her friends, a Mr. d'Estein, and stole her away from the baron, who was so furious at the whole story that he died soon after from sheer anger. But the most curious part of the whole is this: Just imagine! Rose has hardly taken up her business again, when the bell wakes her one fine night, and who do you think wants her? The same Mr. d'Estein! and for whom? for the same Marie, who is in need of a midwife!"