Part 9

Then a carriage rolls up to the castle. Linda rises to go to the window. "Felix!" she cries in her clear, childish voice. No answer follows. Her eyes become gloomy, she listens, evidently listens to see whether he will go to his room without appearing to his guests. Then a dragging, stumbling step is heard in the corridor. "Felix!" cries Linda, excitedly and imperiously.

The door opens, Felix enters, he stumbles into the dining-room, his face is red and swollen, his eyes have a watery look, his knees bend at every step, and a repulsive flabbiness is betrayed in his whole form.

"You have guests?" he says, thickly.

"Sit down, you are not well," cries Erwin, seizing the staggering man by the arm, and forcing him into a chair.

"No--but--the----" begins Felix, and breaks off, not able to finish the sentence.

A pause ensues. The little company seem paralyzed with alarm and disgust. Then Sempaly rises. "We thank you for a very pleasant evening, Baroness," he turns politely to Linda, and he and his cousin withdraw.

Linda is as white as the table-cloth. "Come, Felix, lie down," says Erwin to his brother-in-law, whose condition he does not wish to expose to the impertinent curiosity of servile lackeys.

"A cigar," murmurs Felix, excusing himself like all drunkards.

"Come;" Erwin urges him more sharply. Felix is about to make some reply, when he discovers his wife, turns his head away, and trembling throughout his entire frame, lets himself be taken to his room without resistance.

When Erwin returns to the dining-room to bid farewell to Linda, he finds her still deathly pale, with gloomy eyes, sitting in the same place.

"Linda, you are wrong to take this so seriously," says he, softly and consolingly; "it is really often an accident, a glass of poor wine----"

At his first kind word she has burst into tears. "It is not the first time," she replies, with difficulty restraining her tears. "Ah! if it--if it was only because the wine went to his head or--but no--a year ago he was the most temperate man in the world--it began in London. It cannot all be my fault. What is the matter with him? My God! What is concealed from me?"

A new light dawns upon Erwin's mind; Linda's lack of tact is excused; a boundless pity overcomes him.

At a violent motion of her pretty head her hair has become loosened and now hangs in silken splendor over her shoulders.

"Calm yourself, fasten up your hair, be prudent, my poor little sister-in-law!" says Erwin. Softly and involuntarily, as one would do to a child, he strokes the hair back from her temples.

She tries to fasten it up, but suddenly she lets her arms sink, and looking directly at Erwin out of moist but not disfigured eyes, she whispers, "I cannot reach so high, and do not wish to be seen thus by my maid--it would be strange."

"Can I help you?"

She nods. Simply, but without undue haste or uneasiness, he twists the beautiful hair, fastens it firmly as one who is accustomed to perform such services. She keeps her head covered, breathes regularly, deeply, audibly--accidentally he touches her little glowing ear, then she starts. A clock strikes. "Half past ten!" cries Erwin, startled. "Good night, Baroness; poor Elsa will not know how to explain my absence," and he rushes out.

"Your horse must be saddled," says Linda, but he does not return--a few minutes later she hears him galloping rapidly away. "When he thinks of his wife he always calls me Baroness," she murmurs to herself with a peculiar smile.

An hour later Erwin knocks at his wife's door. "Who is it?" an indifferent, sleepy voice asks from within.

"I."

"Ah, you, Erwin!" Elsa unlocks the door, and comes out in the corridor, where only a single lamp breaks the darkness.

"Have you anything particular to ask me?" says she, and her feverish sparkling eyes contradict the indifferent voice.

"Nothing," he whispers, softly. "I merely could not resolve to retire without having bid you good night; I felt that you must be still awake. Do you insist upon receiving me in the corridor?" he asks, smilingly, as she has closed the door behind her.

"The baby is asleep," replies Elsa, coldly, rubbing her eyes with ostentation.

"My voice will not wake her," he says, softly, taking Elsa's hand. "Elsa, my dear pouting Elsa, forgive me," he whispers. "I had no right to be angry and run away, merely because you were intolerable. It has been a horrid day, let it at least have a good ending!"

He sees how she trembles, how she blushes, and tenderly he takes her thin little face between both hands. Then, then she changes color, her eyes open in wild horror, and she starts back from him with a gesture of decided aversion, but quickly collecting herself, and forcing herself to smile, she gives him her hand and says, "Good night!"

How she has pained him! Is her love dead? He cannot understand her manner. How could he? He does not notice that on his hands, in his clothes has remained the peculiar perfume which a gallant diplomat had brought Linda from Constantinople.

XVIII.

"One cannot please people," sighs Pistasch, several days after the lawn-tennis party, while, cigar between his teeth, a hat adorned with a cock's plume on the back of his head, his smoking jacket open over his broad chest, he tries to solve a difficult problem in billiards. "One cannot please people."

"Hm! I think this sentence belonged to Solomon's _repertoire_ of phrases," grumbles Sempaly, who, stretched out in a deep arm-chair, is looking over an old _Revue des Deux Mondes_.

"Solomon! Solomon!" says Pistasch, clutching his soft golden hair. "Was not that the Jew in the Leopoldstadt, whose money rate was so cheap, only three per cent, _per mese_?"

Count Kamenz considers it "chic" to have forgotten his Bible history.

"Do not make yourself out stupider than you are," Scirocco admonishes him. "We can be quite satisfied without that."

"Thanks, you see one can never please people," repeats Pistasch, shrugging his shoulders in droll despair. "After the sacrificial meal, Mimi rejoices me with a remark upon my stiffness to the Lanzberg. I show the latter much-calumniated beauty some slight attention and accept an invitation to lawn-tennis at her house. Mimi reproaches me concerning my morals. In order to satisfy her demands I yesterday paid court to a sixteen-year-old dove; she reproaches me for my inconsequence, says with feeling, 'One does not trifle with love!'--there, it sounds as if it were a bit from a play." Pistasch turns to Sempaly.

"Yes, it is the title of a play in which at the end some one is stabbed," says Scirocco, looking up from his reading.

"Thank you, Rudi; one can always learn from you," assures Pistasch.

"You are the first who has discovered that--I pity you," replies Sempaly, sarcastically.

"Surely not because I am weak in history and literature," says Pistasch, phlegmatically. "Bah! if one of us only knows who he is, he knows what he needs."

"Yes, everything else would only confuse him," says Scirocco, seriously.

"Precisely," answers Pistasch, coolly. He now sits on the corner of the billiard table, both hands in his pockets, in the large room with its faded leather furniture. "But confess that your sister maltreats me, after I have tried so hard to please her."

"Too hard, perhaps," says Scirocco, and looks gloomily at his cousin. Is the latter the only one who does not perceive that the Countess would prefer to preserve him in a cage, secure from the attacks of audacious women and mothers? "'_Ce sont toujour les concessions qui ont perdu les grands hommes_,' Philippe Egalite remarked on his way to execution," he continues, and takes his cousin's ostentatious _naivete_ for what it is really worth.

"That might be called forcing history," cries Rhoeden, entering at this moment, and hearing the last phrase.

"Who was Philippe Egalite?" asks Pistasch, with unembarrassed--yes, boasted ignorance.

"A man who, in order to make himself loved by the masses, voted for the death of his cousin, the king, made himself riding trousers of the _ancien regime_, and was beheaded by the masses by way of thanks."

"Ah! my historical knowledge is extensively widened--but if I only knew to whom to make love!"

"_Il y avait une fois un seducteur qui cherchait de l'ouvrage_," remarks Eugene.

"_Je crois Men qu'il cherchait!_" yawns Pistasch. "Really, it is not only on Mimi's and morality's account that I do not dare try it with the Lanzberg--but she is so magnificently prudish! Now I do not object to a little prudishness, that is piquant, but quite so much! Recently she, for really nothing at all----"

"Ah, really, for nothing at all?" repeats Scirocco, looking sharply at his cousin.

"Well, not exactly for nothing at all," the latter admits, grumblingly, "but on my word, for a very slight cause, she gave me a dissertation upon her dignity, and that she felt bound to keep the honorable name which she bears spotless."

"She is quite right," declares Sempaly, sharply.

Pistasch laughs rudely. "Well, Rudi, between ourselves, it is nevertheless a little droll to think so much of this name, to boast of its spotlessness--hm!"

Rhoeden displays the indifference of a man who knows that the conversation is upon delicate subjects, and retires to a window recess, where he unfolds a letter. A servant enters and reports that "The Countess begs the Baron to come to the music-room," whereupon Rhoeden vanishes.

Scarcely has the door closed behind him when Scirocco bursts out violently: "You are a muttonhead, Pistasch; the little banker is a hundred times cleverer than you."

"He needs it," says Pistasch, coolly.

"Can you not be silent before him?" Scirocco attacks him.

"No," replies Pistasch, lazily; "I have never accustomed myself to keeping secrets; respectable people have no secrets. Besides, Lanzberg begins to be fairly unbearable, his manner has become so unsteady, so nervous; he no longer finishes a single sentence correctly, has not an opinion of his own, and crouches like a whipped dog. He makes me nervous."

"Are you of stone, have you no heart?" cries Scirocco.

"I am under no obligations to Lanzberg," grumbles Pistasch, very defiantly. "I----"

"Yes, you would be ashamed to protect him a little," says Scirocco, cuttingly. "Recently when L---- remarked to you that you seemed to associate with Lanzberg a great deal, you replied, 'Yes, he has a pretty wife!' Really, Pistasch, at that moment, in my eyes, you stood morally lower than poor Felix."

"Really," Pistasch imitates his cousin's tragic tone, "I think I have blundered into an educational institution! Lectures and nothing but lectures! First you, then Mimi. How you can permit yourself to compare me with a man like a 'certain Lanzberg.'"

"Do not talk yourself into useless heat, my dear fellow," says Scirocco, laying his hand on his shoulder. "At present I feel just as inclined to fight a duel with you as I should to cut my own brother's throat. Consider a little and you will come to the conclusion that you are in the wrong."

Scirocco leaves the billiard-room. For a while Pistasch pushes the ivory balls over the green table with furious zeal, then he throws himself irritably into an arm-chair.

Yes, he feels plainly that he is in the wrong, but he cannot resolve to change his behavior to Felix. He might at least avoid him, but just now, because and in defiance of Linda's prudishness, he does not wish to. His prejudice against Linda was nothing but arrogant affectation, but his antipathy to Felix is sincere; it almost resembles that aversion which many egoistic men feel for one mortally ill.

Rhoeden spends an hour in teaching the Countess--a totally unmusical woman who does not know a note, has no feeling for rhythm, but possesses a good voice and a great desire to shine in that direction--twelve bars of a new Italian romance of Tosti.

He goes his little way, pursues his little aim, and will attain it. Only two years ago young aristocrats invited him exclusively to stag parties, hunts, etc.; then Count F---- wrote a little operetta for a society tenor. The tenor, a young diplomat, after the first rehearsal of the operetta was transferred to Constantinople--universal consternation. They had about resolved to surrender the operetta, which was to be performed for a charitable object, to a professional when Pistasch proposed his old Theresanium comrade, Eugene. Eugene, with his unusually beautiful voice, sang the little role charmingly; all were delighted with his singing, his graceful acting. At one stroke he became the fashion.

His passion for Linda, Eugene had long buried under his worldly egoism; he was glad that he had been prevented from the foolishness of a marriage with her. He planned quite a different match, made use of his opportunities, and meanwhile was in no hurry. He knew very well on what footing he stood with society, knew that they wished to fasten upon him Countess Fifi R----, who was red-haired and somewhat hump-backed, or even Countess Clarisse, who was scrofulous and had been much gossiped about, knew it and laughed at it. He was still young and could wait.

Social vanity was his religion, the world his god, to whom, however, he did not pay such passionate, credulous homage as Linda, for example, but always with an ironical smile on his lips.

After he had gone through the romance with the Countess for perhaps a hundred times, had finally taught her text, melody, and even a sentimental mordent, and is now dismissed from duty, Eugene looks into the billiard-room again before he goes to his own room, and finds Pistasch, between thick clouds of smoke, occupied with a tschibouk.

"Do I disturb you?" he asks, gayly.

"Oh, heavens, no! I have long been weary of my own society," sighs Pistasch with feeling.

"I have an amusing bit of news for you, Pistasch," continues Rhoeden, approaching him. "My uncle Harfink"--Eugene always speaks of his relations in a mocking tone, somewhat as one kind of cripples speak of their humps--"my uncle Harfink--you remember his first wife, whom you knew, is dead--well, he has married again!"

"Wish him much happiness," replies Pistasch, who does not see why that should interest him particularly.

"He has married, and none other than the famous Juanita," says Rhoeden, with the calmness of a virtuoso who is sure of his effect.

Pistasch drops his pipe, springs up from his armchair. "Harfink--married--Juanita, the----" he interrupts himself.

"Yes," says Rhoeden, calmly, "the same Juanita who in her day ruined poor Lanzberg."

"Hm! So you know the story?" asks Pistasch, breathing freely in the consciousness that now all discretion is unnecessary.

"It will go no further through me," Rhoeden assures him solemnly. "But is not that delightful? My uncle writes me that he has married the aforesaid celebrity, and as his digestion is still not as good as it might be, they have gone to Marienbad for their wedding trip. He begs me to reconcile his daughter to his step, and to find out what kind of a reception his wife may expect in Traunberg. Piquant, eh? Very piquant!"

A shrill bell announces lunch.

"Rudi! Mimi!" cries Pistasch, rushing into the dining-room, where both these, together with Elli and Mademoiselle, are assembled, "old Harfink has married the Juanita, and has gone to Marienbad for his wedding trip. Is not that magnificent, is not that famous?"

XIX.

"A Modern Donna Elvira!" This sarcastic nickname originated at the time when the charming Privy Councellor Dey, whose wife we are acquainted with, was still alive. Count Dey was a red-haired gnome, who was continually mistaken for his own tutor which, as the facetious Pistasch maintained with conviction to this day, was very annoying to the tutor. Besides, Count Dey was eighteen years older than his wife, who, if not beautiful, was still uncommonly attractive, and still the poor woman embittered her young life with the most painful jealousy, followed her husband about distrustfully, accompanied him on the briefest visits of inspection to his estates, shivering and heroic, shared with him the cold inconveniences of his grouse hunt in the Tyrol. The world maliciously delighted in the industry with which she defended her rights, and also in the fact that, in spite of her astonishing and extensive precautions, she was continually deceived by her red-haired spouse.

Mimi Dey now served as a warning example for Elsa. She, Elsa, had not the slightest wish to undertake the role of the "modern Donna Elvira," and expose herself to universal mockery. Therefore she concealed her jealousy from Erwin with Spartan self-control, and smiled with the most charming loftiness, while the poisonous mistrust tore her bosom as pitilessly as the young fox tore the brave little Lacedaemonian.

When, the day after the lawn-tennis party, Erwin remorsefully sought the cause of her changed manner in his own behavior, and after he had tried to drive away her displeasure by a thousand loving attentions, put his arm around her and whispered to her softly: "Elsa, confess why you were so angry with me yesterday--only because I stayed away so long?" Frightened that he had so nearly touched upon her secret, she displayed the most arrogant indifference.

"You surely do not think that I am vexed if you amuse yourself with Linda a little?" she replied, with an irritating smile. "I am glad that you have found a little amusement, my poor Erwin," she continued.

He looked at her in some surprise. "Yes, but then I do not understand----" he murmured. "What is the real matter with you?--does anything worry you?---tell me--two can bear it more easily."

"No, no, I have nothing to tell," she replied, hastily. "Nothing at all--I am tired, not very well."

"Yes, that you decidedly are not," he admitted, and anxiously scrutinized her thin cheeks and the dark shadows under her eyes. "We must consult a physician."

"We consulted him four weeks ago," she answered, "and he advised me to drink Louisen-Quelle, and I drink Louisen-Quelle." She folded her hands resignedly over her breast, with an expression as if to say how little faith she had in Louisen-Quelle, and how indifferent her health was to her.

"Perhaps a trip to the sea-shore would do you good," proposed Erwin.

"Could you go away now?" she asked, apparently calmly, but with her heart full of distrust.

"Now? Hardly! But you could take Miss Sidney and Litzi with you, or, as far as I am concerned, both children."

"With the necessary servants that would cost a good deal," replies Elsa, discouragingly.

"Well, we are not quite such beggars that we need think of that when it is a question of your health," he cries, almost angry. "We have saved long enough and can now spend something. Decide upon Cowes; perhaps I can join you there later."

For a while she gazes silently and gloomily before her, then a slight shudder runs over her.

"Elsa! You seriously alarm me!" cries Erwin: "something must be done!"

"Yes, certainly; I will go to Cowes," she decides, as if it was a decision to let herself be bound upon the wheel, then she turns her head to look at an approaching carriage. "Oh, Linda," she cries, and her voice betrays absolutely nothing, not even antipathy to her sister-in-law, and Erwin begs, "Be a little good to her--for Felix's sake. She needs women friends and has none but you."

These naive words may give the impression that Erwin is very obtuse. But he certainly was not, only his knowledge of human nature was always bounded by a great good-will, his keen sight blinded by good-nature. He possessed a true passion for making every one who came near him happy, and also the impractical habit of never thinking evil of his fellow-men, except when he absolutely could not otherwise.

Therefore he saw to-day in Linda's visit nothing but a praiseworthy wish of coming nearer to Elsa.

Linda wore a very simple gown, which was very becoming to her; she had brought a work-basket, and sewed almost the whole time of her visit upon a little collar for Gery which had a very exemplary appearance. She made the most modest and tender attempts to be friends with Elsa, and without the slightest touch of familiarity, took a tone of comradeship towards Erwin which pleased him greatly--perhaps so much the more as a charming, childlike smile accompanied this tone, and the merriest little stories.

When evening had already become night, and Felix had still not appeared, as Linda seemed to have expected, to fetch her, and she confessed that she was afraid to return alone with her groom only, in the low pony carriage, Erwin good-naturedly escorted her on horseback to Traunberg.

This was really unwelcome to him, but Elsa suspected the contrary, and as he had not the common habit of afterwards complaining of his obligingness, she remained of the same opinion. She herself had behaved perfectly charmingly to Linda. No one could have suspected that jealousy could smile so! No one--but Linda.

And how she triumphed! how flattered vanity quivered in her every fibre, and how the drive home with Erwin amused her!

She drove herself, and really she did not overdrive the ponies.

Around them was the sultry, gloomy charm of the summer night. Long-drawn sighs and sweetly monotonous murmurs passed through the trees, the short grass trembled as if caressed by invisible hands. From time to time a glow-worm shot through the gray air like a falling star.

"How beautiful!" said Linda to herself.

"Yes, charming!" Erwin admitted, and secretly looked at his watch.

In spite of the fact that he galloped home at a very sharp pace, it was midnight before he arrived there, which confirmed Elsa's strange idea.

Almost every evening after tea Erwin was accustomed to read aloud to his wife, and this had originated in their honeymoon, when Erwin, very young, very much in love, still shyly coquetted with his little talents.

He read well, and liked to read, and Elsa had until now always looked forward to the confidential chat, the happy fact of being alone together, which was a part of the reading hour, and both did not know which they really preferred: the wild, stormy winter evenings, in which Elsa sat as near the fireplace as possible, and contrary to his sensible prohibition, held one foot at a time over the glowing coals, until he stopped reading, and crouching on a stool, took the little feet from their light house slippers, and rubbed them warm between his hands; or the mild, fragrant summer evenings, when Elsa, gazing through the window at the sky, often interrupted the bitter earnestness of St. Simon, or the graceful bitterness of Voltaire, and with childish joy signalled a shooting star, and as Erwin laughingly asked her whether she had availed herself of the opportunity to wish something very beautiful, softly, with lips close to his ear, whispered, "Oh, yes, that it may always be so."

Usually he read serious books aloud, but sometimes he brought the old Musset which had accompanied him on his wedding journey, and then they vied with each other in gay recollections of their honeymoon, and laughed when they came to verses the meaning of which had been dark to her, and had made her ask the most remarkable questions. They contradicted each other animatedly as to who had the most faithful memory for every foolish, tender jest, and Elsa, whose remembrance exceeded his, faintly whispered softly, "Do you see I have not let a single joy be lost out of my life. I have laid-them all away for my old days."

The day after Linda's visit, Elsa made no move to leave the drawing-room when Erwin asked her softly, "How about our Mahon?" (they were just then reading this knightly pedant's English history), but replied discouragingly, "I am going to retire early this evening," and engaged Miss Sidney in a conversation upon English philanthropy.