Part 8

"No, I like it here," she cries with a pretty childishness. "I should like to see the sun set from here, and am curious as to whether the Flora there"--pointing to a statue--"will become flushed pink. Prove your friendship and get me a wrap."

He goes away, but remains longer than the nearness of the castle seems to justify. Elsa does not notice his long absence. She prefers to be alone in this spot. The bench reminds her of old times, and is therefore dear to her. Whether the Flora becomes pink or not is perfectly indifferent to her--she does not look outward, she gazes inward. She thinks of the day when she sat there with Erwin, her betrothed. (Count Dey was still alive then.) She remembers--oh, something foolish--the little beetle which had fallen in her hair and which Erwin had brushed away with light hand; his caressing touch; how he looked lovingly at the beetle because it had touched his love's hair; how, instead of throwing the insect away, he had carried it with him when they left the bench, and had placed it carefully in the heart of the most beautiful rose which they passed.

How he loved her then! How passionately and at the same time how tenderly! "Ah! those were such lovely times," she sighs with the old song.

The voices of the lawn-tennis players are still heard. How can they play in such a gale? Suddenly she hears her name spoken near by.

"How this poor Mrs. Garzin has gone off!" cries the Klette's bass voice. "I scarcely recognized her."

"She looks badly," replies Count Pistasch's distinguished husky voice.

"She has grown old, fearfully old; she looks as if she were forty," asserts the Klette.

"Ah, bah! She looks rather like a consumptive pensioner," replies Pistasch. "What can be the matter with her? I hope no trouble is worrying her."

"Don't you think that this good Garzin is a little too fond of his pretty sister-in-law?"

"Nonsense, Caroline!" says Pistasch, reprovingly. "You are always imagining something. Recently you asked me whether poor Rudi----"

"Well, that is evidently over;" the Klette heaves a sigh of disappointment; "but she must coquet, poor Mrs. Lanzberg, to amuse herself, there is not much else for her to do; and say yourself--I do not assert that the good Garzin has already knelt to her, but would it not be natural? It would really serve this arrogant Elsa right. To force Garzin, a man of such a gay, sociable nature, to absolute solitude; to take away from him his career, his occupation, in short, everything."

Elsa springs up; she listens breathlessly. What does she care that it is ill-bred to listen? But the voices die away. Pistasch and the Klette turn into another path without noticing the white form in the dark elder niche.

Scirocco at length comes back.

"I could not find either your things or Mimi's maid all this time," he excuses himself for his long delay. "I hope this belongs to you," offering her a white crepe shawl.

She takes it, but immediately starts back with a violent gesture. "That belongs to my sister-in-law," she cries; "my things are never so strongly perfumed. Only smell it, how strange!"

"Yes, truly," says he, holding the shawl to his face; "that is a harem perfume which some one brought her from Constantinople. But what is the matter, Snowdrop?"

"I feel the storm approach," she murmurs, tonelessly. "Let us go to the house."

They go. The swallows fly yet lower, the clouds hang heavier, almost touch the black tree-tops. There is a whistling and hissing in the leaves.

Elsa hears nothing. With dragging, and yet overhasty, steps she walks near Sempaly. "Who knows whether he would even say 'poor Garzin' if I should die?" she thinks to herself.

The lawn-tennis party, which Pistasch and the Klette have now also joined, growing more and more animated, has lasted until the first drops of rain have driven them away.

Somewhat dishevelled and heated, her morbid self-consciousness healed by the admiration which Pistasch, escaped from his cousin's control, had unreservedly displayed for her, Linda enters the drawing-room where the Countess, Felix, Elsa and Scirocco are assembled.

"How did your lawn-tennis come on?" asks Scirocco, as the Countess, vexed at Linda's triumphant look, does not condescend to address her.

"Oh, excellently," cries Linda. "Count Kamenz and my brother-in-law display the greatest talent for this noble occupation."

"To whom do you give the palm?" cries Kamenz.

"I cannot decide that to-day," says she with as much gravity as if she were deciding upon the fortieth _fauteuil_ of the Paris Academy. "One judges talent not from what it first offers, but according to its subsequent development."

This pedantic phrase from her fresh lips is so irresistibly droll that Pistasch and Erwin laugh heartily, and even Scirocco cannot suppress a slight smile.

"We have come to the conclusion that the ground here is not favorable," continues Linda, turning to Scirocco, "and the gentlemen are coming over to Traunberg to-morrow to practise. Will you be one of the party, Count Sempaly?"

"If you will permit me, I will have the pleasure, Baroness," he replies with a bow.

"You are as full of phrases as an old copy-setter to-day," cries she, shrugs her shoulders, laughs lightly, and sinks into the arm-chair which Pistasch pushes forward for her.

Pistasch seats himself opposite her. His light laugh as he leans forward, her satisfied leaning back, the continuous conversation wholly incomprehensible to the others, indicated a dawning flirtation. What did it matter to Pistasch whether Linda's father's name was Harfink or Schmuckbuckling? A man never troubles himself about such a thing when he is paying court to a pretty woman.

Poor Mimi! for years she has treated Pistasch as her exclusive property, she grows nervous, glances discontentedly in the direction of the two.

"Rudi, will you order the carriage?" asks Felix, uneasily.

Scirocco stretches out his hand to the bell, but asks politely, "Will you not wait until the rain has ceased?"

"I have no desire to get wet in our open carriage," interposes Linda.

"I could place a close carriage at your disposal," remarks the nervous Countess, irritated even more by Pistasch's manner than by Linda's victorious expression, and adds constrainedly, "However, I really see no reason for haste."

Hardly can permission to remain be given in a colder tone. But Linda replies with astonishing aplomb, "Neither do I," and has a sweet, naive smile for the Countess, and for Pistasch, on the contrary, a comical, expressive glance which delights him. He finds it quite in order that she should refresh herself with a little impertinence. "She is piquant as an actress," he thinks.

Then the door opens; unannounced, like very old friends, a lady and gentleman enter. She, small, fat, lively, cries out, hurrying up to the Countess, "We flee to thee, Mimi, the rain has surprised us. Ah, you have guests--how are you, Elsa? do I really see you at last?"

He, tall, thin, with a Velasquez nose, Don Quixote manner, and arrogant eyes, looking out through glasses, has meanwhile chivalrously kissed the hand of the Countess. Now he looks round, recognizes Erwin, greets him heartily, comes up to Felix, starts slightly, goes past him to Rhoeden, as if he had never seen Felix in his life before.

Felix stands motionless, ashy, rigid, with bluish lips and half-closed eyes. Scirocco has lived through many unpleasant moments, but never a more painful one. Still he rapidly collects himself, takes the new guest by both shoulders and turns him toward Felix.

"That is Lanzberg. Did you not recognize him, Max?" he cries.

After that nothing remains for Count L---- but to murmur in apology, so as not to insult the guests of the house in which he is, "I am so near-sighted," and to stretch out two arrogant fingers to Felix.

"Order the carriage, Rudi," begs Felix, very hoarsely.

Linda, who has not noticed the little scene, gives Pistasch a glance at the interruption of their _tete-a-tete_, which flatters his vanity.

XVI.

"You have slept badly, mouse; look at your poor eyes. You worry me, you pale person."

With these words Erwin greets his wife the next morning at breakfast, kisses her lightly on the forehead, then reads his letters, swallows a cup of coffee in great haste, greets Miss Sidney, who enters with her little pupil, absently though pleasantly, lets himself, still pleasantly but somewhat passively, be embraced by his little daughter, puts his letters in his pocket and hurries away, but turns at the door and cries: "Do not expect me to lunch, Elsa; I have a great deal to do in Radewitz."

Now he has gone, Elsa's eyes have grown sad. For a few minutes after Miss Sidney has led Litzi away Elsa remains at the deserted breakfast table and crumbling a roll, murmurs, "He has forgotten."

To-day is their wedding-day, a day which Erwin has always made much of, which has always been a day of sweetest recollections. She had remained in her room this morning longer than usual, because she had hoped that he would seek her. In vain! Then she, poor Elsa, had expected a little surprise at the breakfast table--in vain!

So now she sits there and hopes that perhaps he will return.

Yes, he returns--his steps rapidly approach, her heart beats fast, the door opens, Erwin bursts in with hat on his head, and cries: "Elsa, don't forget to send the White Duchess to Traunberg. I have not time to give the order," and disappears.

"He has forgotten--decidedly forgotten!" cries Elsa, "for the first time!" Then she leaves the breakfast room.

Time passes slowly and sadly for her. "It is a trifle not worth speaking about," she tells herself again and again. "I should have reminded him," but then she feels herself grow hot.

"He did not forget Linda's horse," she murmurs bitterly, and adds still more bitterly: "He is bored. Every diversion is welcome to him. Poor Erwin!"

The day passes--the dinner hour draws near, several minutes before five Erwin at length returns. Heated and irritable he seeks her in her room. "How vexed I have been!" he cries as he enters.

She smiles, a little excitement overcomes her. But soon it turns out that he has not been vexed at his forgetfulness--oh, no!--only at the cheating and roguery of his sugar factory director.

"It serves you right," remarks Elsa, coldly. She cannot deny herself the satisfaction of making some sharp remark to him. "When he introduced himself to you, you told me 'the man is repulsive to me!' and when he came back again you engaged him. You always do so. At the first glance you judge men according to your instincts, and very justly; at the second glance you judge them by the universal statutes of lofty philanthropy, and always falsely. I know no one for whom it is more unpleasant to believe ill of his neighbor than you."

"God be praised and thanked that the counterbalance of a desperately distrustful wife is given me, then," cried Erwin, somewhat irritably. Then a pair of large eyes meet his gloomily. "My distrust is a disease, and you know the cause," says she, earnestly.

The shrill dinner-bell at this point interrupts the conversation.

After dinner--Miss Sidney has gone into the garden with Litzi to play grace hoops--the husband and wife sit vexedly silent in the drawing-room, when a servant presents a letter to Erwin from Traunberg. Elsa has at once perceived that it is in Linda's, not in Felix's handwriting. Erwin has opened it, apparently indifferently, then suddenly the blood rushes to his cheeks, almost violently he throws the letter away, kneels before Elsa and takes both her hands in his. "How could I forget the 27th? Elsa, are you very angry with me?" he cries.

It would be hard to remain angry with him, if he had not been reminded of his duty by just Linda. But this vexes Elsa so much that she answers his warm glance and pleasant smile only with a cool "Why should I be angry?" as indifferently and calmly as if the 27th no more concerned her than the date of the battle of Leipzig.

"Had you forgotten, also?" he asks, wounded.

"Forgotten?--what?" asks she, dully.

"That to-day is my lucky day--the loveliest day of all the year for me? Oh, Elsa! Has it become indifferent to you?"

His voice goes deep to her heart, but she is ashamed to be so moved by his first warm words--is ashamed to show him how his forgetfulness has pained her. In proud fear of having shown too much feeling, she hardens her heart, and with the peculiar histrionic talent which is at the disposal of most women in critical moments, and which they love to display, so as to thereby ruin the happiness of their life, she says calmly, pleasantly, half laughingly: "Ah, indeed!--I should tease you for your lack of memory!"

"Elsa!" confused and surprised he looks in her eyes. "Do you not remember how we have always valued the day; do you not remember the first year? You had forgotten it, then?--and when I put the ring on your finger--perhaps you do not wear it any longer?"

"Oh, yes;" and Elsa looks down at the large diamond which sparkles like a dewdrop or a tear near her wedding-ring.

"Well, you were ashamed, then, not to have thought of me," he continued, "and then--then you repeated to me, half crying, half laughing, very tenderly a little childish wish: 'Had I an empire I would lay it at thy feet, alas, I can offer you nothing but a kiss,' do you not remember, Elsa?"

But Elsa only replies coldly, almost mockingly: "It is very long ago--hm! What does Linda write to you besides that to-day is the 27th?"

"I have not read all of her letter, read it yourself if you wish," and with that he hands his wife the letter.

Elsa at first struggles with herself, but then she reads it, and half aloud:

Dear Erwin:--It is really too charming in you to so kindly gratify my thoughtless wish. Many, many thanks for the beautiful White Duchess.

Felix just tells me that to-day is the 27th, a day on which you will have no pleasure in playing lawn-tennis with me. You might perhaps force yourself to come so as not to vex me, solitary as I am now. Therefore I release you from your promise. Kiss Elsa for me, and, with most cordial greetings, Sincerely yours, Linda Lanzberg.

"How well she writes," says Elsa, who is sorry that she can find nothing to complain of in the letter, and with the firm resolve not to let her jealousy be perceived in the slightest, she continues: "I should be sorry if our foolish lovers' traditions should prevent you from amusing yourself a little, my poor Erwin." She had taken up some fancy work and seemed to ponder over a difficulty in it. "Pray go over to Traunberg and invite Linda to dinner Sunday."

Erwin gazes angrily before him. "You send me away, Elsa--you--to-day--on our wedding-day?" says he then, slowly.

She laughs lightly and threads a fresh needle. "Ah! do not be childish, Erwin," cries she. "It is not suited to our age now."

He pulls the bell rope violently. "Elsa," he whispers once more before the servant enters, but with such intolerable cordiality she says, "Well, Erwin?" that he turns away his head and calls to the servant, who just then appears, "Tell Franz to saddle my horse."

XVII.

A small room with large windows opening on the park, innumerable flowers in vases of different forms standing about the room, a perfume as intoxicating and painfully sweet as poison which gives one death in a last rapture; on the walls, hung with silver-worked rococo damask, a few rare pictures, only five or six; two Greuze heads with red-kissed lips and tear-reddened eyes, eyes which look up to heaven because earth has deceived them; then a Corot, a spring landscape, where dishevelled nymphs dance a wild round with dry leaves which winter has left; a Watteau, in which women, in the bouffant paniers of the time of the regents, with bared bosoms and hair drawn high up on their heads, touch glasses of champagne with gallant cavaliers, a picture in which everything smiles, and which yet makes one deeply mournful; a picture in which men and women, especially women, seem to have no heart, no soul, no enjoyment on earth, no belief in heaven; but in deepest _ennui_ float about like butterflies, tormented by the curse of the consciousness that their life lasts only from sunrise to sunset; a Rembrandt, a negress, brutally healthy, bestially stupid, with dull glance, broad, hungry lips, huge, homely, and wholly satisfied with herself and creation; about the room soft, inviting furniture; no dazzling light, pale reddish reflections; draperies in Roman style, artistic knick-knacks and soft rugs--this is what Erwin finds as, pushing aside the drawn portieres, he enters Linda's boudoir without announcement.

Amid these surroundings she sits at an upright piano, and softly and dreamily sings an Italian love-song.

Erwin comes close up to the piano. "Ah!" cries she, springing up. It would be impossible not to see what unusual pleasure his visit gives her. Her eyes shine, and a faint blush passes over her cheeks. "Erwin, did you not receive my letter?" she cries almost shyly, and gives him a soft hand which trembles and grows warm in his.

"Certainly," he replies. "It was very nice in you to consider our foo----" in spite of all the bitterness which for the moment he feels toward Elsa, he cannot use the byword foolish, and rather says--"little traditions. I only came for a moment, I----" he hesitates. "Elsa hopes that you will do us the pleasure of dining with us Sunday."

"Sunday?" repeats Linda, letting her fingers wander absently in dreamy preluding over the keys.

"Have you planned anything else?" asked Erwin, who had meanwhile taken a very comfortable chair.

"What should I have planned?" asked she, shrugging her pretty shoulders. "No, no, I will come gladly. You are very good to me, Erwin, and I am inexpressibly thankful to you."

A strangely exaggerated feeling was in her accent, in her moist glance, and the quick gesture with which she stretched out both hands to him.

"Where is Felix?" he asked, turning the conversation.

"Felix is, I believe, over in Lanzberg," she answered. "He has 'something to attend to.' He always has 'something to attend to' when I expect people," she added, bitterly. "It makes my position so uncommonly easy, Erwin! Can you account for his behavior? Would you, if you had once resolved to choose a wife of unequal birth, afterward be so passionately ashamed of her as Felix is?"

"How can you talk so foolishly, Linda?" Erwin interrupted the young wife, uneasily.

"Foolishly!" Linda shook her head with discouragement. "If you only saw him! Lately he made a scene before I could be permitted to accept the Deys' invitation; then, at the last moment, he had a headache, and expressed the wish that I should join Elsa and go without him."

"Strange idea to hang this monster in your pretty rococo nest!" cried Erwin, growing more and more embarrassed, and abruptly changing the conversation from Felix to the Rembrandt negress.

"The monster pleases me, I like contrasts--but to return to Felix----"

"You expect Pistasch and Sempaly, do you not?"

"They wished to come this evening--alas--I could renounce their society; to-day I should like greatly to confide in you, Erwin. You are the only person who is sorry for me."

There was a pause in the conversation of the two. Without, a murmur like a sigh of love sounds through the trees, and a few withered rose-leaves are blown into the room. Erwin's glance rests dreamily upon the young woman. She pleases him in somewhat the same manner as the Greuze head on the wall; no, differently--there is always something dead about a picture. A picture is either a recollection preserved in colors or a dream, and has the charm of a recollection, of a dream; while Linda has the charm of a foreboding, of a riddle, and above all things, the charm of life, of full young life.

Then a carriage approaches. "Pistasch and Sempaly," cries Erwin, looking out of the window and seizing his hat. "On Sunday, eh, Linda?" says he in a tone of farewell.

"Now you run away from me just like Felix," cries she, pouting. "Please stay; it is so unpleasant for me to receive young people without a protector."

And he stays.

"You have come late; we have scarcely three-quarters of an hour of daylight left."

With these words, spoken in a very indifferent tone, Linda receives the young men. "Shall we set about it at once?" she continues.

The lawn-tennis court is in a broad flat meadow in the park. The ground is not yet dry from yesterday's rain, still the players are unwearied, Erwin, after a short time, as animated as the others. He competes vigorously with Pistasch, whose skill he soon surpasses, and enjoys the society of the two agreeable and to-day good-tempered young men, who are both old acquaintances of his.

Pistasch in old times he has pulled by the ear, paid his youthful debts, and on holidays taken him away from the Theresanium; with Scirocco, who is but little younger than Erwin himself, he has taken an Oriental trip, they were both overturned in the same drag, both raved over the same dancer, etc.

Merry reminiscences pass between the players almost as quickly as the tennis balls, and Linda encourages all these reminiscences most charmingly; her smile lends a new spice to the play and the conversation.

Erwin is of a much too lovable nature, is far too much occupied with the happiness of others and too little with his own, to think of what might have been if he had not, for love of Elsa, renounced the world.

He possesses a decided disinclination for the "if," always looks straight before him, never behind him. It does not even occur to him to-day, when he is vexed with Elsa, to complain of the serious monotony of his life, to philosophize, but he feels well, likes to amuse himself again, laughs frequently, and is not unsusceptible to the evident wish to please him which Linda shows. No objection can be found to her behavior to-day--it is animated without being loud, cordial without being coquettish.

The three-quarters of an hour are over, the daylight has become first pale, then gray, the balls have flown aimlessly, like plump night birds through the air; they have laughed, ridiculed the opposite side for their faults, finally lost several balls, and come to the conclusion that for the present nothing more can be done.

The players have now assembled for a light supper in the somewhat gloomy dining-room, from whose walls a few old portraits, gentlemen with huge wigs and large flowered brocade vests, ladies with wasp waists and immoderately high powdered coiffures, look down upon them. The light of the lamps is reflected in the crystal decanters, in which red and white wine sparkles; the flowers, a mixture of transparent ribbon-grass and wild roses, move softly in their vases in the middle of the table, trembling in the night air which streams in through the open windows. Beautiful fruit shines fresh and inviting, in silver dishes, and Linda presides, somewhat flushed, cordial and wonderfully pretty. No annoying servants disturb the pleasant little repast.

Pistasch behaves like the perfect gentleman which he is when he does not consider it his duty to be a perfect boor, or does not take pleasure in representing a perfect street Arab. He entertains the little circle by gay anecdotes, is attentive without impertinence to the hostess.

Scirocco, more serious in manner, nevertheless laughs at his cousin's jokes, and often interposes a witty little remark.

Erwin is as gay as the two others, but from time to time, however, his conscience reminds him that this is not the place for him, and that it is time for him to return home. "But can I leave my young sister-in-law alone with the two men?" he calms his inconvenient conscience. "Impossible!" He must wait for Felix to return.

That Kamenz and Sempaly, well-bred as both are, and with no cause for importunity, would both leave as soon as he should start, he does not tell himself.