It is early in the morning of the day before the famous betrothal festivity. The town-clock of X---- strikes three as Treurenberg, his bridle hanging loose, is riding along the lonely road towards Dobrotschau. He has passed the night with a few officers at the rooms of the Countess Wodin, his cousin and former flame, who "threw him over" because her views of life were more practical than his,--that is to say, than his were at that period; for he soon followed her example, and was very practical too. But it does not suit every man to be so.
The assemblage at the Countess Wodin's was unusually lively. She was the only lady present, with the exception of the major's wife, an insignificant, awkward woman, who was usually endowed with the Countess's cast-off gowns. A large number of men made up the gathering,--almost the entire corps of officers, and a couple of gentlemen from the neighbourhood. The time was whiled away with cards. At first Lato did not join the players, simply looking on at one and another of the tables; but by and by he took the cards for his cousin, who, suddenly possessed by an intense desire to dance, rose from her place, "just to take a couple of turns around the room." She waltzed until she was breathless with Ensign Flammingen, Treurenberg's relative, who was apparently head over ears in love with her. An officer of dragoons meanwhile droned out the music for them upon a little drawing-room hand-organ. When the Countess again took her place at the card-table Lato had won a small fortune for her. She congratulated him upon his luck, and advised him to try it in his own behalf. He did so.
Between the games a good deal of wine had been drunk, and various questionable witticisms had been perpetrated. Treurenberg laughed louder than the rest, although all such jesting was distasteful to him, especially when women were present. But the Countess had expressly requested to be treated as a man; and the major's wife, after an unfortunate attempt to smoke a cigarette, had retired to a sofa in the adjoining room to recover from the effects of the experiment.
In the absence of this victim of an evil custom for which she was evidently unfitted, the merriment grew more and more boisterous, until suddenly young Flammingen, who had but a moment before been waltzing gaily with the hostess, fell into a most lachrymose condition. The rest tried, it is true, to regard it as only an additional amusement, but it was useless: the mirth had received a death-blow. Some one began to turn the hand-organ again, but without cheering results. All were tired. They found the air of the room suffocating; the smoke was too thick to see through. Then the unfortunate idea occurred to one of the party to open a window. The fresh air from without wafted in among the fumes of wine and cigar-smoke had a strange effect upon the guests: they suddenly fell silent, and in a very short time vanished, like ghosts at cock-crow.
Lato took his leave with the rest, disappearing from his cousin's drawing-room with the consciousness of being a winner,--that was something. He rode through the quiet town, and on between the desolate fields of rye, where not an ear was left standing, between dark stretches of freshly-ploughed land, whence came the odour of the earth with its promise of renewed fertility. The moon was high in the colourless sky; along the eastern horizon there was a faint gleam of yellow light. The dawn enveloped all nature as in a white semi-transparent veil; every outline showed indistinct; the air was cool, and mingled with it there was a sharp breath of autumn. Here and there a dead leaf fell from the trees. The temperature had grown much cooler in the last few days; there had been violent storms in the vicinity, although the drought still reigned at Dobrotschau. Treurenberg felt weary in every limb; the hand holding the bridle dropped on his horse's neck. On either side stood a row of tall poplars; he had reached the avenue where Olga's white figure had once come to meet him. The castle was at hand. He shivered; a mysterious dread bade him turn away from it.
The half-light seemed to roll away like curling smoke. Lato could clearly distinguish the landscape. The grass along the roadside was yellow and dry; blue succory bloomed everywhere among it; here and there a bunch of wild poppies hung drooping on their slender stalks. The blue flowers showed pale and sickly in the early light; the poppies looked almost black.
On a sudden everything underwent a change; broad shadows stretched across the road, and all between them glowed in magic crimson light. From a thousand twittering throats came greetings of the new-born day.
Treurenberg looked up. Solemn and grand, in a semicircle of reddish-golden mist, the sun rose on the eastern horizon.
Yes, in a moment all was transformed,--the pale empty skies were filled with light and resonant inspiration, the earth was revivified.
Why languish in weary discouragement when a single moment can so transfigure the world? For him, too, the sun might rise, all might be bright within him. Then, at a sharp turn of the road, the castle of Dobrotschau appeared, interposing its mass between him and the sun. The crimson light, like a corona, played about the outlines of the castle, which stood out hard and dark against the flaming background. Treurenberg's momentary hopefulness faded at the sight,--it was folly to indulge in it: for him there was no sunrise; there was nothing before him but a dark, blank wall, shutting out light and hope, and against which he could but bruise and wound himself should he try to break through it.
As Lato trotted into the court-yard of the castle a window was suddenly closed, the window above his room,--Olga's. She had been awaiting his return, then. He began to shiver as in a fever-fit.
"There must be an end to this," he said to himself, as he consigned his horse to a sleepy groom and entered the castle.
His room was on the ground-floor; when he reached it he threw himself, still dressed, on the bed, in a state of intolerable agitation; by degrees he became calmer, his thoughts grew vague; without sleeping soundly he dreamed. He seemed to be swimming with Olga in his arms through a warm, fragrant lake, upon the surface of which pale water-lilies were floating. Suddenly these pale lilies turned to greedy flames, the lake glowed as with fire, and a stifling smoke filled the air. Lato started up, his heart beating, his brow damp with moisture. His fatigue tempted him to try again to rest, but he tossed about restlessly; thinking himself still awake, he listened to the ticking of his watch, and looked at Lion, who lay crouched beside his bed, when suddenly Olga stood there gazing at him, her eyes transfigured with heavenly compassion, as she murmured, "Will you not share your woe with me?" She stretched out her arms to him, he drew her towards him, his lips touched hers--he awoke with a cry. He rose, determined to dream no more, and, drawing up one of his window-shades, looked down into the courtyard. It was barely six o'clock. All was quiet, but for one of the grooms at work washing a carriage. The fountain before the St. John rippled and murmured; a few brown leaves floated in its basin. The silvery reflection from the water dazzled Lato's eyes; he turned away, and began slowly to pace the room. The motion seemed to increase his restlessness; he threw himself into an arm-chair, and took up a book. But he was not in a condition to read a line; before he knew it the volume fell from his hand, and the noise it made in falling startled him again. He shook his head in impatience with his nervousness; this state of affairs could not be longer endured, he must bring about some change; matters could not go on thus. He thought and thought. What could be patched up from the ruins of his life? He must try to stand on a better footing with his wife, to leave Dobrotschau as soon as possible. What would be his future? could he ever become reconciled to his existence? Oh! time was such a consoler, could adjust so much, perhaps it would help him to live down this misery.
Then, like an honourable merchant who sees bankruptcy imminent, he reckoned up his few possessions. His wife had certainly loved him once passionately. It was long since he had recalled her former tenderness; he now did so distinctly. "It is not possible," he thought to himself, "that so strong a feeling can have utterly died out;" the fault of their estrangement must be his, but it should all be different. If he could succeed in withdrawing her from the baleful influences that surrounded her, and in awakening all that was honest and true in her, they might help each other to support life like good friends. It was impossible to make their home in Vienna, where his sensitive nature was continually outraged and at war with her satisfied vanity. Under such circumstances irritation was unavoidable. But she had been wont to talk of buying a country-seat, and had been eloquent about, the delights of a country life. Yes, somewhere in the country, in a pretty, quiet home, forgotten by the world, they might begin life anew; here was the solution of the problem; this was the right thing to do! He thought of his dead child; perhaps God would bestow upon him another.
What would, meanwhile, become of Olga? Like a stab, the thought came to him that with her fate he had nothing to do. Olga would miss him, but in time, yes, in time she would marry some good man. He never for an instant admitted the idea that she could share his sinful affection.
"I must let the poor girl go," he murmured to himself. "I cannot help her; all must look out for themselves." He said this over several times, nervously clasping and unclasping his hands,--hands which, long, narrow, and white, suggested a certain graceful helplessness which is apt to distinguish the particularly beautiful hands of a woman. "Yes, one must learn to control circumstances, to conquer one's self."
The others are seated at the breakfast-table when Treurenberg enters the dining-room, all except Fainacky, who, true to his self-imposed task, is still busy with the decorations of the garden-room. That enterprisingmaître de plaisirhas a deal to do, since there is to be a rehearsal, as it were, in the evening of the morrow's festivities. Various guests from far and near are expected to admire and to enhance this prelude of coming glories.
A seat beside Selina is empty. Lato goes directly towards it. Nothing about him betrays his inward agitation or the sleeplessness of the past night. Rather pale, but refreshed by a long walk, and dressed with exquisite care, he looks so distinguished and handsome in his light summer array, that Selina is struck by his appearance. He has a rose in his hand, and as, bending over his wife, he places it among her curls, and then kisses her hand by way of morning greeting, she receives him quite graciously. She is inclined to be proud to-day of her aristocratic possession, which she is shortly to have an opportunity of displaying before so many less-favoured friends. Half returning the pressure of his hand, she says, "To what do I owe these conjugal attentions?"
"The anniversary of our betrothal, Selina," he says, in the half-jesting tone in which married people of a certain social standing are wont to allude before witnesses to matters of sentiment, and then he takes his seat beside her.
"True, our anniversary!" she rejoins, in the same tone, evidently flattered. "And you remembered it? As a reward, Lato, I will butter your toast for you."
Here the Pole comes tripping into the room. "Changement de décoration. You have taken my place to-day, Treurenberg," he says, not without irritation. "Since when have modern couples been in the habit of sitting beside each other?"
"It is permitted now and thenen famille," Selina informs him, placing before Lato the toast she has just prepared for him. She glances at Fainacky, and instantly averts her eyes. For the first time it occurs to her to compare this affected trifler with her husband, and the comparison is sadly to Fainacky's disadvantage. The petty elegancies of his dress and air strike her as ridiculous. He divines something of this, and it enrages him. He cares not the slightest for Selina, but, since their late encounter in the park, he has most cordially hated Lato, whom he did not like before. The friendly demeanour of the pair towards each other this morning vexes him intensely; he sees that his attempt to cast suspicion upon Lato has failed with Selina; nay, it has apparently only fanned the flame of a desire to attract her husband. It irritates him; he would be devoured by envy should a complete reconciliation between the two be established, and he be obliged to look on while Lato again entered into the full enjoyment of his wife's millions. He takes the only vacant place, and looks about him for somewhat wherewith to interrupt this mood upon the part of the pair. Finally his glance rests upon Olga, who sits opposite him, crumbling a piece of biscuit on her plate.
"No appetite yet, Fräulein Olga?" he asks.
Olga starts slightly, and lifts her teacup to her lips.
"Do you not think that Fräulein Olga has been looking ill lately?" The Pole directs this question to all present.
Every one looks at Olga, and Fainacky gloats over the girl's confusion.
Treurenberg looks also, and is startled by her pallor. "Yes, my poor child, you certainly are below par," he says, with difficulty controlling his voice. "Something must be done for your health."
"Change of air is best in such cases," observes the Pole.
"So I think," says Treurenberg; and, finding that he has himself better in hand than he had thought possible awhile ago, he adds, turning to his mother-in-law, "I think, when everything here is settled after the old fashion----"
"After the new fashion, you mean," Paula interposes, with a languishing air.
"Yes, when all the bustle is over," Treurenberg begins afresh, in some embarrassment this time, for his conscience pricks him sorely whenever Paula alludes to her betrothal.
"I understand, after my marriage," she again interposes.
"About the beginning of November," Treurenberg meekly rejoins, again addressing his mother-in-law, "you might take Olga to the south. A winter in Nice would benefit both of you."
"Tiens! c'est une idée," Selina remarks. "Such quantities of people whom we know are going to winter in Nice this year. Not a bad plan, Lato. Yes, we might spend a couple of months very pleasantly in Nice."
"Oh, I have other plans for ourselves, Lina," Treurenberg says, hastily.
"Ah, I begin to understand," Frau von Harfink observes: "we are to be got out of the way, Olga, you and I." And she smiles after a bitter-sweet fashion.
"But, Baroness!" Lato exclaims.
"You entirely misunderstand him, Baroness," Fainacky interposes: "he was only anxious for Fräulein Olga's health; and with reason: her want of appetite is alarming." Again he succeeds in attracting every one's attention to the girl, who is vainly endeavouring to swallow her breakfast.
"I cannot imagine what ails you," Paula exclaims, in all the pride of her position as a betrothed maiden. "If I knew of any object for your preference, I should say you were in love."
"Such suppositions are not permitted to the masculine intelligence," the Pole observes, twirling his moustache and smiling significantly, his long, pointed nose drooping most disagreeably over his upper lip.
Olga trembles from head to foot; for his life Lato cannot help trying to relieve the poor child's embarrassment.
"Nonsense!" he exclaims; "she is only a little exhausted by the heat, and rather nervous, that is all! But you must really try to eat something;" and he hands her a plate. Her hand trembles so as she takes it that she nearly lets it fall.
Frau von Harfink frowns, but says nothing, for at the moment a servant enters with a letter for Treurenberg. The man who brought it is waiting for an answer. Lato hastily opens the missive, which is addressed in a sprawling, boyish hand, and, upon reading it, changes colour and hastily leaves the room.
"From whom can it be?" Selina soliloquizes, aloud.
"H'm!" the Pole drums lightly with his fingers on the table, with the air of a man who knows more than he chooses to tell. A little while afterwards he is left alone with Selina in the dining-room.
"Have you any idea of whom the letter was from?" the Countess asks him.
"Not the least," he replies, buttoning his morning coat to the throat, an action which always in his case betokens the possession of some important secret.
"Will you be kind enough to inform me of what you are thinking?" Selina says, imperiously, and not without a certain sharpness of tone.
"You are aware, Countess, that ordinarily your wish is law for me," the Pole replies, with dignity, "but in this case it is unfortunately impossible for me to comply with your request."
"Why?"
"Because you might be offended by my communication, and it would be terrible for me were I to displease you."
"Tell me!" the Countess commands.
"If it must be, then----" He shrugs his shoulders as if to disclaim any responsibility in the matter, and, stroking his moustache affectedly, continues: "I am convinced that the letter in question has to do with Treurenberg's pecuniary embarrassments,--voilà!"
"Pecuniary embarrassments!" exclaims the Countess, with irritation. "How should my husband have any such?"
She is vexed with the Pole, whose affectations begin to weary her, and she is strangely inclined to defend her husband. Her old tenderness for him seems to stir afresh within her. Fainacky perceives that his game to-day will not be easily won; nevertheless he persists.
"Then you are ignorant of the debts he contracts?"
"If you have nothing more probable to tell me, you need trouble yourself no further," the Countess angrily declares.
"Pardon me, Countess," the Pole rejoins, "I should not have told you anything of the kind were I not sure of my facts. Treurenberg has accidentally had resort to the same usurer that transacts my little affairs. For, I make no secret of it, I have debts, a necessary evil for a single man of rank. Good heavens! we gentlemen nowadays----" he waves his hand grandiloquently. "Yet, I assure you, my friendship with Abraham Goldstein is a luxury which I would gladly deny myself. I pay four per----"
"I take not the slightest interest in the percentage you pay," interposes Selina, "but I cannot understand how you venture to repeat to me a piece of gossip so manifestly false."
Her manner irritates him extremely, principally because it shows him that he stands by no means so high in her favour as he had supposed. The fair friendship, founded upon flattery, or at least upon mutual consideration for personal vanity, is in danger of a breach. Fainacky is consumed by a desire to irritate still further this insulting woman, and to do Treurenberg an injury.
"Indeed!--a manifestly false piece of gossip?" he drawls, contemptuously.
"Yes, nothing else," she declares; "apart from the fact that my husband has personal control of a considerable income,--my father made sure of that before he gave his consent to my marriage; he never would have welcomed as a son-in-law an aristocrat without independent means,--apart from this fact, of course my money is at his disposal."
"Indeed! really? I thought you kept separate purses!" says the Pole, now--thanks to his irritation--giving free rein to his impertinence.
Selina bites her lips and is silent.
Meanwhile, Fainacky continues: "I can only say that my information as to Treurenberg's financial condition comes from the most trustworthy source, from Abraham himself. That indiscreet confidant informed me one day that the husband of 'the rich Harfink'--that was his expression--owed him money. The circumstance seemed to gratify his sense of humour. He has a fine sense of humour, the old rascal!"
"I cannot understand--it is impossible. Lato cannot have so far forgotten himself!" exclaims the Countess, pale and breathless from agitation. "Moreover, his personal requirements are of the fewest. He is no spendthrift."
"No," says the Pole, with an ugly smile, "he is no spendthrift, but he is a gambler! You may perhaps be aware of this, Countess, ignorant as you seem to be of your husband's private affairs?"
"A gambler!" she breaks forth. "You are fond of big words, apparently."
"And you, apparently, have a truly feminine antipathy to the truth. Is it possible that you are not aware that even as a young man Treurenberg was a notorious gambler?"
"Since his marriage he has given up play."
"Indeed? And what carries him to X---- day after day? How does he pass his mornings there? At cards!" Selina tries to speak, but words fail her, and the Pole continues, exultantly, "Yes, he plays, and his resources are exhausted,--and so is Abraham Goldstein's patience,--so he has taken to borrowing of his friends, as I happen to know; and if I am not vastly mistaken, Countess, one of these days he will swallow his hidalgo pride and crypeccavito you, turning to you to relieve his financial embarrassments; and if I were you I would not repulse him,--no, by heaven! not just now. You must do all that you can to keep your hold upon him just at this time."
"And why just at this time?" she asks, hoarsely.
"Why?" He laughs. "Have you no eyes? Were my hints, my warnings, the other evening, not sufficiently clear?"
"What do you mean? What do you presume to----" Selina's dry lips refuse to obey her; the hints which had lately glanced aside from her armour of self-confidence now go to the very core,--not of her heart, but of her vanity.
Drawing a deep breath, she recovers her voice, and goes on, angrily: "Are you insane enough to imagine that Lato could be seriously attracted for one moment by that school-girl? The idea is absurd, I could not entertain it for an instant. I have neglected Lato, it is true, but I need only lift my finger----"
"I have said nothing," the Pole whines, repentantly,--"nothing in the world. For heaven's sake do not be so angry! Nothing has occurred, but Treurenberg has no tact, and Olga is the daughter of a play-actor, and also, as you must admit, and as every one can see, desperately in love with Lato. All I do is to point out the danger to you. Treat Treurenberg with caution, and then----"
"Hush! Go!" she gasps.
He rises and leaves the room, turning in the doorway to say, with a voice and gesture that would have won renown for the hero of a provincial theatre at the end of his fourth act, "Selina, I have ruined myself with you, I have thrown away your friendship, but I have perhaps saved your existence from shipwreck!"
Whereupon he closes the door and betakes himself to the garden-room to have a last look at the decorations there. He does not think it worth while to carry thither his heroic air of self-sacrifice; on the contrary, as he gives an order to the upholsterer, a triumphant smile hovers upon his lips. "It will surprise me if Treurenberg now succeeds in arranging his affairs in that quarter," he thinks to himself.
Meanwhile, Selina is left to herself. She does not suffer from wounded affection; no, her heart is untouched by what she has just heard. But memory, rudely awakened, recalls to her a hundred little occurrences all pointing in the same direction, and she trembles with rage at the idea that any one--that her own husband--should prefer that simpleton of a girl to her own acknowledged beauty.
The clever Pole had, however, been quite mistaken as to the contents of Lato's letter. Abraham Goldstein's patience with the husband of the "rich Harfink" was not exhausted,--it was, in fact, inexhaustible; and if, nevertheless, the letter brought home to Lato the sense of his pecuniary embarrassments, it was because a young, inexperienced friend, whom he would gladly have helped had it been possible, had appealed to him in mortal distress. His young cousin Flammingen was the writer of the letter, in which he confessed having lost at play, and entreated Lato to lend him three thousand guilders. To the poor boy this sum appeared immense; it seemed but a trifle to the husband of the "rich Harfink," but nevertheless it was a trifle which there would be great difficulty in procuring. And the lad wanted the money within twenty-four hours, to discharge gambling-debts,--debts of honour.
Treurenberg had once, when a young man, been in a like situation, and had been frightfully near vindicating his honour by a bullet through his brains. He was sorry for the young fellow, and, although his misery was good for him, he must be relieved. How? Lato turned his pockets inside out, and the most he could scrape together was twelve hundred guilders. This sum he enclosed in a short note, in which he told Flammingen that he hoped to send him the rest in the course of the afternoon, and despatched the waiting messenger with this consolation. His cousin's trouble made him cease for a while to ponder upon his own.
Although he could not have brought himself to apply to his wife for relief in his own affairs, it seemed to him comparatively easy to appeal to her for another. He did not for an instant doubt that she would comply with his request. She was not parsimonious, but hard, and he could endure that for another's sake. He went twice to her room, in hopes of finding her there, but she was still in the dining-room.
He frowned when her maid told him this, and, lighting a cigar, he went down into the garden, annoyed at the necessity of postponing his interview with his wife.
Meanwhile, Olga, out of spirits and unoccupied, had betaken herself to the library. All day she had felt as if she had lost something; she could not have told what ailed her. She took up a book to amuse herself; by chance it was the very novel of Turgenieff's which she had been about to read, seated in the old boat, when Fainacky had intruded upon her. She had left the volume in the park, whence it had been brought back to her by the gardener. She turned over the leaves, at first listlessly, then a phrase caught her eye,--she began to read. Her interest increased from chapter to chapter; she devoured the words. Her breath came quickly, her cheeks burned. She read on to where the hero, in an access of anger, strikes Zenaide on her white arm with his riding-whip, and she calmly kisses the crimson welt made by the lash.
There the book fell from the girl's hand; she felt no indignation at Zenaide's guilty passion, no horror of the cruel rage of the hero; no, she was conscious only of a kind of fierce envy of Zenaide, who could thus forgive. On the instant there awoke within her a passionate longing for a love which could thus triumph over all disgrace, all ill usage, and bear one exultantly to its heaven!
She had become so absorbed in the book as to be insensible to what was going on around her. Now she started, and shrank involuntarily. A step advanced along the corridor; she heard a door open and shut,--the door of Selina's dressing-room.
"Who is there?" Selina's voice exclaimed.
"I." It was Treurenberg who replied.
Selina's dressing-room was separated by only a partition-wall from the library.
It was well-nigh noon, and Selina's maid was dressing her mistress's hair, when Treurenberg entered his wife's dressing-room for the first time for years without knocking. She had done her best to recover from the agitation caused her by Fainacky's words, had taken a bath, and had then rested for half an hour. Guests were expected in the afternoon, and she must impress them with her beauty, and must outshine the pale girl whom Lato had the bad taste to admire. When Treurenberg entered she was sitting before the mirror in a long, white peignoir, while her maid was brushing her hair, still long and abundant, reddish-golden in colour. Her arms gleamed full and white from out the wide sleeves of her peignoir.
"Who is it?" she asked, impatiently, hearing some one enter.
"Only I," he replied, gently.
Why does the tone of his soft, melodious voice so affect her to-day? Why, in spite of herself, does Lato seem more attractive to her than he has done for years? She is irritated by the contradictory nature of her feelings.
"What do you want?" she asks, brusquely.
"To speak with you," he replies, in French. "Send away your maid."
Instead of complying, Selina orders the girl, "Brush harder: you make me nervous with such half-work."
Treurenberg frowns impatiently, and then quietly sends the maid from the room himself. Selina makes no attempt to detain her,--under the circumstances it would be scarcely possible for her to do so,--but hardly has the door closed behind Josephine, when she turns upon Lato with flashing eyes.
"Why do you send away my servants against my express wish?"
"I told you just now that I want to speak with you," he replies, with more firmness than he has ever hitherto displayed towards her,--the firmness of very weak men in mortal peril or moral desperation. "What I have to say requires no witnesses and can bear no delay."
"Go on, then." She folds her arms. "What do you want?"
He has seated himself astride of a chair near her, and, with his arms resting on the low back and his chin in his hands, he gazes at her earnestly. Why do his attitude and his way of looking at her remind her so forcibly of the early time of their married life? Then he often used to sit thus and look on while she arranged her magnificent hair herself, for then--ah, then----! But she thrusts aside all such reflections. Why waste tenderness upon a man who is not ashamed to--who has so little taste as to----
"What do you want?" she asks, more crossly than before.
"First of all, your sympathy," he replies, gravely.
"Oh, indeed! is this what you had to tell me that could bear no delay?"
He moves his chair a little nearer to her. "Lina," he murmurs, "we have become very much estranged of late."
"Whose fault is it?" she asks, dryly.
"Partly mine," he sadly confesses.
"Only partly?" she replies, sharply. "That is a matter of opinion. The other way of stating it is that you neglected me and I put up with it."
"I left you to yourself, because--because I thought I wearied you," he stammers, conscious that he is not telling quite the truth, knowing that he had hailed the first symptoms of her indifference as a relief.
"It certainly is true that I have not grieved myself to death over your neglect. It was not my way to sue humbly for your favour. But let that go; let us speak of real things, of the matter which will not bear delay." She smiles contemptuously.
"True," he replies; "I had forgotten it in my own personal affairs. I wanted to ask a favour of you."
"Ah!" she interposes; and he goes on: "It happens that I have no ready money just now; what I have, at least, does not suffice. Will you advance me some?"
She drums exultantly upon her dressing-table, loaded with its apparatus of glass and silver. "I would have wagered that we should come to this. H'm! how much do you want?"
"Eighteen hundred guilders."
"And do you consider that a trifle?" she exclaims, provokingly. "If I remember rightly, it amounts to the entire year's pay of a captain in the army. And you want the money to--discharge a gambling-debt, do you not?"
"Not my own," he says, hoarsely. "God knows, I would rather put a bullet through my brains than ask you for money!"
"That's very easily said," she rejoins, coldly. "I am glad, however, to have you assure me that you do not want the money for yourself. To pay your debts, for the honour of the name which I bear, I should have made any sacrifice, but I have no idea of supporting the extravagancies of the garrison at X----." And Selina begins to trim her nails with a glittering little pair of scissors.
"But, Selina, you have no idea of the facts of the case!" Treurenberg exclaims. He has risen, and he takes the scissors from her and tosses them aside impatiently. "Women can hardly understand the importance of a gambling-debt. A life hangs upon its payment,--the life of a promising young fellow, who, if no help is vouchsafed him, must choose between disgrace and death. Suppose I should tell you tomorrow that he had shot himself,--what then?"
"He will not shoot himself," she says, calmly. "Moreover, it was a principle with my father never to comply with the request of any one who threatened suicide; and I agree with him."
"You are right in general; but this is an exception. This poor boy is not yet nineteen,--a child, unaccustomed to be left to himself, who has lost his head. What if you are right, and he cannot find the courage to put an end to himself,--the hand of a lad of eighteen who has condemned himself to death may well falter,--what then? Disgrace, for him, for his family; dismissal from the army; a degraded life. Have pity, Selina, for heaven's sake!"
He pleads desperately, but he might as well appeal to a wooden doll, for all the impression his words make upon her, and at last he pauses, breathless with agitation. Selina, tossing her head and with a scornful air, says, "I have little sympathy for young good-for-naughts; it lies in the nature of things that they should bear the consequences of their actions; it is no affair of mine. I might, indeed, ask how it happens that you take such an interest in this case, did I not know that you have good reason to do so,--you are a gambler yourself."
Treurenberg starts and gazes at her in dismay. "A gambler! What can make you think so? I often play to distract my mind, but a gambler!--'tis a harsh word. I am not aware that you have ever had to suffer from my love for cards."
"No; your friendship with Abraham Goldstein stands you in stead. You have spared me, if it can be called sparing a woman to cause her innocently to incur the reputation for intense miserliness!"
There is some truth in her words, some justice in her indignation. Lato casts down his eyes. Suddenly an idea occurs to him. "Fainacky has told you, then, of my relations with Abraham Goldstein?"
"Yes."
"Ah!" he exclaims; "I now understand the change in you. For heaven's sake, do not allow yourself to be influenced by that shallow, malicious coxcomb!"
"I do not allow myself to be influenced by him," the Countess replies; "but his information produced an impression upon me, for it was, since you do not deny it, correct. You are a gambler; you borrow money at a high rate of percentage from a usurer, because you are too arrogant or too obstinate to tell me of your debts. Is this not so?"
Treurenberg has gone towards the door, when he suddenly pauses and collects himself. He will make one more attempt to be reconciled with his wife, and it shall be the last. He turns towards her again.
"Yes," he admits, "I have treated you inconsiderately, and your wounding of my pride, perhaps unintentionally, does not excuse me. I have been wrong,--I have neglected you. I play,--yes, Selina, I play,--I seek the society of strangers, but only because I am far, far more of a stranger at home. Selina," he goes on, carried away by his emotion, and in a voice which expresses his utter misery, "I cannot reconcile myself to life amid your surroundings; call it want of character, weakness, sensitiveness, as you please, but I cannot. Come away with me; let us retire to any secluded corner of the earth, and I will make it a paradise for you by my gratitude and devotion; I will serve you on my knees; my life shall be yours, only come away with me!"
Poor Lato! he has wrought his own ruin. Why does he not understand that every word he speaks wounds the most sensitive part of her,--her vanity?
"You would withdraw me from my surroundings? And, pray, what society do you offer me in exchange?" she asks, bitterly. "My acquaintances are not good enough for you; I am not good enough for the atmosphere in which you used to live."
He sees his error, perceives that he has offended her, and it pains him.
"Selina," he says, softly, "there shall be no lack of good friends for you at my side; and then, after all, what need have we of other people? Can we not find our happiness in each other? What if God should bless us with an angel like the one He has taken from us?"
He kneels beside her and kisses her hand, but she withdraws it hastily.
"Do not touch me!" she exclaims; "I am not Olga!"
He starts to his feet as if stung by a serpent. "What do you mean?"
"What I say."
"I do not understand you!"
"Hypocrite!" she gasps, her jealousy gaining absolute mastery of her; "I am not blind; do you suppose I do not know upon whom you lavish kind words and caresses every day, which fall to my share only when you want some favour of me?"
It seems to him that he hears the rustle of feminine garments in the next room. "For God's sake, Selina, not so loud," he whispers.
"Ah! your first emotion is dread of injuring her; all else is indifferent to you. It does not even occur to you to repel my accusation."
"Accusation?" he murmurs, hopelessly. "I do not yet understand of what you accuse me."
"Of your relations with that creature before my very eyes!"
Transported with indignation at these words, he lifts his hand, possessed by a mad impulse to strike her, but he controls himself so far as only to grasp her by the arm.
"Creature!" he exclaims, furiously. "Creature! Are you mad? Olga!--why, Olga is pure as an angel, more spotless than a snowflake before it has touched the earth."
"I have no faith in such purity. If she has not actually fallen, her passion is plainly shown in her eyes. But there shall be no open scandal,--she must go. I will not have her in the house,--she must go!"
"She must go!" Treurenberg repeats, in horror. "You would turn her out of doors,--a young, inexperienced, beautiful girl? Selina, I will go, and the sooner the better for all I care, but she must stay."
"How you love her!" sneers the Countess.
For a moment there is silence in the room. Lato gazes at his wife as if she were something strange which he had never seen before,--gazes at her in amazement mingled with horror. His patience is at an end; he forgets everything in the wild desire to break asunder the fetters which have bound him for so long, to be rid of the self-control which has so tortured him.
"Yes," he says, raising his voice, "I love her,--love her intensely, unutterably; but this is the first time that I have admitted it even to myself, and you have brought me to do so. I have struggled against this passion night and day, have denied its existence, have done all that I could to stifle it, and I have tried to the utmost to be reconciled with you, to begin with you a new life in which I could hope to forget her. How you have seconded me you know. Of one thing, however, I can assure you,--the last word has been uttered between you and myself; it would not avail you now though you should sue for a reconciliation on your knees. A woman without tenderness or compassion I abhor. I have a horror of you!" He turns sway, and the door closes behind him.
"Where is the Count?" Frau von Harfink asks a servant, at lunch, where Treurenberg's place is vacant.
"The Herr Count had his horse saddled some time ago," the man replies, "and left word that he should not be here at lunch, since he had urgent business in X----."
"Indeed!" the hostess says, indifferently, without expending another thought upon her son-in-law. She never suspects that within the last few hours, beneath her roof, the ruin has been completed of a human existence long since undermined.
Lunch goes on,--a hurried meal, at which it is evident that the household is in a state of preparation for coming festivities; a meal at which cold dishes are served, because the entire culinary force is absorbed in elaborating the grand dinner for the evening; a lunch at which no one talks, because each is too much occupied with his or her own thoughts to desire to inquire into those of the others.
Frau von Harfink mentally recapitulates the evening'smenu, wondering if nothing can be added to it to reflect splendour upon the Harfink establishment.
Paula's reveries are of her coming bliss; her usually robust appetite is scarcely up to the mark. In short, the only one who seems to eat with the customary relish is the Pole, who, very temperate in drinking and smoking, is always ready for a banquet. He is also the only one who notices the want of appetite in the rest. He does not waste his interest, however, upon the Baroness or Paula, but devotes his attention exclusively to Selina and Olga.
The Countess is evidently in a very agitated state of mind, and, strange to relate of so self-satisfied a person, she is clearly discontented with herself and her surroundings. When her mother asks her whether two soups had better be served at dinner, or, since it is but a small family affair, only one, she replies that it is a matter of supreme indifference to her, and will certainly be the same to the guests, adding,--
"The people who are coming will probably have some appetite; mine was spoiled some days ago by the meremenu, which I have been obliged to swallow every day for the last fortnight." These are the only words spoken by her during the entire meal.
The Pole finds her mood tolerably comprehensible. She has had a scene with Treurenberg, and has gone too far,--that is what is annoying her at present. But Olga's mood puzzles him completely. The depression she has manifested of late has entirely vanished, she holds her head erect, her movements are easy, and there is a gleam in her eyes of transfiguring happiness, something like holy exultation.