Part 19

After telling this direct falsehood, and serving his uncle’s second meal, he was going away, when the old man asked for a certain Bible which he seldom used, and which stood on a particular shelf of his library. Stenson directed him to place it before him on the table, and then motioned him to retire. Ulph, however, was curious to see what his uncle was about, and as he was very certain that he would not be heard, he came in again in a moment, and standing behind the old man’s chair, peeped over and saw him pass the knife at random between the leaves of the large book, and then open it, and look attentively at the verse where the point of the knife had stopped. Three times he tried this experiment; a practice half devout and half cabalistic, that prevails even among the Catholics of the north, for inquiring of the Almighty the secrets of the future, according to the interpretation of the words supposed to be indicated by destiny. When he had performed this ceremony, Stenson buried his face in his hands upon the closed book, as if to consult it with his brain, after having questioned it with his eyes; and Ulph went away, a good deal disquieted with the result of the experiment. He had read the three verses over his uncle’s head. They were these, in the order in which they had chanced to occur:

“Destruction and death say, We have heard the fame thereof with our ears.”

“Did I not weep for him that was in trouble? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?”

“A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children’s children; and the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just.”

Detached verses from this mysterious and sublime book will generally adapt themselves to almost any meaning which the imagination is desirous of obtaining. Accordingly, old Sten, who had trembled at the first verse, and clasped his hands over the second, drew a long breath at the third, as if his oppressed soul was relieved. But Ulphilas, who had drank too much the night before to be a competent interpreter of the utterances of the sacred volume, asked himself with anguish whether the old Bible had not, under the form of some allegory too deep for his intelligence, disclosed to his uncle the secret of his falsehood.

He was aroused from his revery by the appearance of a new visitor in the court. This was Puffo, who had come to arrange for the evening’s performance with Christian. Puffo was not a demonstrative person; he did not like the country in winter, and he did not speak a word of Dalecarlian. But still he was in a very good humor just at the present moment, and for sufficient reasons. He bade Ulph good-day, in quite a friendly manner, while the latter was greatly surprised to see him enter the bear-room unceremoniously, as if he was quite at home there.

Puffo found Christian occupied in classifying the mineralogical specimens in his box.

“Well, master, what are you thinking of?” said he. “It’s no time now to be playing with those little pebbles; we must get ready for the piece this evening.”

“_Parbleu!_ I know that very well,” replied Christian; “but what could I do without you? It is high time for you to show yourself. Where the devil have you been since yesterday?”

Puffo informed him--but without making any excuses for his absence--that he had finally found a good supper and good bed at the farm, that he had slept late, and having made acquaintance with a servant from the chateau, who was there, had told whom it might concern of the arrival of Christian Waldo at Stollborg. After breakfast the major-domo of the new chateau had sent for him, had talked to him very pleasantly, and informed him that the exhibition of marionettes would be expected at eight precisely that evening. The major-domo had added:

“You will mention to your employer Christian, that his lordship wishes a very brilliant entertainment, and he begs him to be infinitely witty.”

“Excellent!” said Christian. “Plenty of wit, by order of his lordship the baron. Let him take care, lest I prove altogether too witty for him! But, Puffo, did you hear nothing about the baron’s illness?”

“Yes, he was ill last night, it appears,” replied the stroller, “but he has recovered. Perhaps he was only drunk, though the servants say he does not drink at all. But who’s going to believe that a man as rich as he is would cheat his stomach out of good liquor when he has it in his cellar?”

“I wager that you did not cheat yourself, Puffo, out of whatever came under your hand.”

“Faith,” said Puffo, “thanks to a servant who is in love with a little girl at the farm, and who invited me to eat at his table, I had some very decent brandy. It was corn brandy, rather rough, but it’s warming, and I slept capitally after it.”

“I am delighted at your windfall, Master Puffo; but we must go to work. Come, go at once and see that Jean has plenty to eat and drink, and then come back and receive your instructions. Hurry!”

Puffo went out, and Christian, not without a sigh, closed his box of minerals, and was opening that which contained the _burattini_, when the noise of sleigh-bells drew him to the window. It was not the doctor of laws returning so soon; it was the pretty blue and silver sleigh which had brought Margaret to Stollborg the evening before.

Must we confess it? Christian had forgotten the promise which that agreeable young lady had made to the apocryphal M. Goefle of repeating her visit next day. The truth is, that he had no longer considered this visit possible, on account of what had happened at the ball, and had consequently said nothing about it to M. Goefle. Perhaps he regarded the whole adventure as inevitably ended, and perhaps he even wished to have it so; for to what could it lead, unless he should attempt to abuse the inexperience of a child, and so secure her contempt and her curse?

In the meanwhile, the sleigh was approaching; it was now ascending the hill of Stollborg, and Christian could see the pretty head of the young countess, half hidden in her ermine hood. What was to be done? Would he be courageous enough to shut the door in her face, or to send her word by Puffo that the doctor was absent? Pshaw! Ulph would tell her so of his own accord! He had only to keep quiet, and the sleigh would return as it had come. Christian remained at the window, so as to watch it descend the hill, but it did not descend. The door opened, Margaret entered, and the young man had barely time to close hastily the open box where the marionettes were indiscreetly exhibiting their great noses and smiling mouths.

“What, monsieur!” cried the young girl, with an exclamation of surprise, “are you still here? I did not expect that. I hoped that you would be gone.”

“Did you meet no one in the court?” said Christian, who was, perhaps, not sorry to throw the blame of this circumstance upon destiny.

“I saw no one,” said Margaret; “and, as my visit is secret, I came in very quickly, so that no one should see me. But, once more, Monsieur Goefle, you ought not to be here. The baron must know, by this time, who it was who ventured to defy him. I give you my word that you ought to go away.”

“Go away! You say that very cruelly. But you remind me that I really have gone away already. Yes, yes, be satisfied; I have gone never to return. M. Goefle has intimated to me that he might be involved in my difficulties, and I have promised him to disappear. You find me in the very act of packing up.”

“Oh! Go on, then; do not let me detain you.”

“Are you in such great haste never to hear me spoken of again? Very well, imagine that your wish is accomplished; that I have already embarked for America at least, and am fleeing under full sail from my terrible enemy, while shedding a few tears at the memory of that first quadrille--the last, too, that I shall ever dance--”

“With me, not with others?”

“Who knows? The I who is speaking to you is a shade, a phantom, a mere reminiscence of what happened yesterday. The other I, about taking his departure, is the sport of the waves and of destiny. I care about him as much as I do for an inhabitant of the moon.”

“Good heavens! how gay you are, Monsieur Goefle! Do you know I am not so at all?”

“True,” said Christian, struck with Margaret’s sad expression; “I am ashamed to have spoken of myself, when I ought to have been expressing my anxiety about the consequences of the events of last evening. Will you be good enough to answer me, if I venture even now to make inquiries of you?”

“Oh, you are well entitled to do so, since chance has so fully informed you about my affairs already. My aunt reproved me severely last evening, and Mademoiselle Potin had orders to pack my trunks and take me back to Dalby to-day; but this morning everything is changed, and, after a private interview with the baron, who, she says, has quite recovered his health and good spirits, it was decided that I should remain, and should have nothing to do to-day, but to think about my toilet for this evening. By the way, have you heard that Christian Waldo is actually here? They say, indeed, that he is stopping at Stollborg. You must have met him, in that case. How is it--have you seen him?”

“Certainly.”

“Without his mask? Oh, how does he look? Has he really a death’s head?”

“Worse than that. He has a wooden head!”

“Oh no! You are joking.”

“Not in the least! To see him you would swear that his face had been whittled out of a block, with a dull knife. He looks like the ugliest of all his marionettes. Like this one, for instance!”

And Christian pointed to the grotesque physiognomy of a police officer that stuck out of the box, and which Margaret would probably have seen herself if she had not been so preoccupied.

“What, really!” said she, a little apprehensively. “And is that his conjuring-box? Does he occupy this room with you?”

“No; don’t be afraid, you will not see him. He has gone out, and he asked as a favor, of M. Goefle, to be allowed to leave his baggage here.”

“Poor fellow!” said Margaret, pensively; “and so he is as ugly as that! What stories people tell! Some persons who have seen him insist that he is handsome. And is he old?”

“Somewhere about forty-five. But what are you thinking about, and why are you so sad?”

“I don’t know--only I feel sad.”

“What--although you are to remain at the chateau, and see the marionettes this evening?”

“Ah! please, Monsieur Goefle, do not treat me quite so much like a child. Last night, at the ball, it is true that I was gay; I enjoyed myself and felt happy, because I thought I had once for all escaped from the baron. But to-day I see very well that my aunt has renewed her hopes, and I must meet again a man whom I shall always sincerely hate from this time forward. Did he not insult me in a cowardly manner yesterday? It is useless for my aunt to say that he was joking. One does not joke with a girl of my age as with a child. I have been trying to cure my wounded pride by persuading myself that he was delirious--that his nervous attack had already begun when he spoke so coarsely to me, and that is what my friends think also. But how do I know what will happen to-day, when I meet him? Whether he is ill-tempered or crazy, who will defend me if he insults me again? You will not be there, and nobody else will dare--”

“What! Nobody dare? But what sort of men have you around you then? And all those brave young fellows whom I saw last evening--”

“Yes, I believe they are brave. But they know nothing of me, and they may imagine I deserve such outrageous treatment from the baron. It is a poor recommendation for me to have been introduced into society by my aunt, since she has the reputation--although most surely it is undeserved--of sacrificing everything to political interests.”

“Poor Margaret!” exclaimed Christian, struck by the painful position of this lovely girl.

He was so evidently sincere, and without the least thought of offensive familiarity, that Margaret did not resent his taking her hand; and besides, he dropped it again immediately, as he thought of their relative positions.

“Well,” he said, “you must take some resolution or other, at any rate.”

“It is taken already. It is only the first step that costs. From this time I will affront the terrible Olaus whenever we meet; I will tell him what I think of him before all the world; I prefer to pass for a perfect demon of malice, rather than for the favorite of this Dalecarlian pasha. And, after all, I shall defend myself better alone; for, if you were present, I should be afraid of having you take my part at your own peril, and that would make me more acquiescent. But I will not forget any more for that, the good counsel you gave me, and the chivalrous way in which you repulsed that frightful baron. I do not know whether we shall ever see each other again, but wherever you are, you will always have my good wishes, and I will pray to God to make you happier than I am.”

Christian was extremely touched by the sincere and affectionate manner of this charming girl. He made no display of affected gallantry, but his expressions, and the very sound of his voice, revealed the deepest emotion.

“Kind Margaret!” he said, lifting her pretty hand to his lips. “I swear to you truly that I also will remember you. Ah! why am I not rich and noble? Perhaps then I should have power to help you, and most certainly I would do everything in the world to obtain the happiness of being able to do so. But I am nothing, so I can do nothing.”

“But I thank you just as much,” replied Margaret. “You seem to me like a brother that I have never known, whom God has sent to me for a moment in the hour of my distress. Let this short meeting be so considered, and we will say good-by, without despairing of the future.”

Margaret’s candor caused Christian to feel a sense of remorse. M. Goefle might return at any moment, and it would be impossible for the young countess, after having been so much struck with the similarity between the voices of the false uncle and false nephew, not to detect the entire absence of any such resemblance when she should see them together. Besides, it was certain that M. Goefle would not lend himself to any such deceit; and it pained Christian to think that Margaret would retain an unfavorable recollection of him. So he confessed the truth of his own accord, acknowledging that he had allowed himself, as he did not know her, to play a joke at her expense, by disguising himself in the doctor’s pelisse and cap, and pretending to be he. He added that he had deeply repented, upon discovering how angelic a nature it was that he had thus been trifling with. Margaret was a little displeased. She had had an instant’s revelation of the truth, when Christian’s voice first fell upon her ear at the ball; but his manner was so perfectly natural when he told her that he had heard everything from the next room, that she had dismissed all doubts from her mind.

“Ah!” she said, “how skilful you are in deceiving, and how easy it is to be duped by your explanations! I cannot be offended at your joke in itself, for I was guilty of an imprudence in coming here, and I was properly punished by a mystification. But what I am sorry for is that you should have carried on the deceit for so long, with so much assurance and such an appearance of candor.”

“Say with remorse, and a consciousness of guilt. One fault always occasions others, and--”

“And what? What more have you to confess?”

Christian had been on the very point of telling the whole truth. But he paused; for he remembered at that instant that at the name of Christian Waldo Margaret would fly, annoyed and indignant. He therefore resigned himself to a half sincerity: to the young countess he continued to be Christian Goefle. But this dissimulation, which would have merely amused him with any one else, became extremely irksome when he saw her limpid eyes fixed on him with an expression of fear and reproach.

“I only meant to play with her,” he said to himself, “as one child might with another; but now, in spite of all we could do, sentiment has intervened, and the more honorable and delicate it is, the more guilty I feel--”

He became sad in his turn, and Margaret perceived it.

“Come,” she said, with a smile all radiant with goodness, “let us not allow any regrets to spoil our romantic meeting. We are about to part, but we do so with our kind feelings towards each other unchanged. You have not abused my confidence by turning me into ridicule; on the contrary, you have helped me to rely upon myself, and to struggle against an unfortunate destiny. Instead of feeling hurt and ridiculous, I feel that I am standing more firmly on my poor feet than I was yesterday at this hour.”

“That is true, is it not?” said Christian, warmly; “and I call heaven to witness--”

“Go on,” said Margaret.

“I call heaven to witness,” he repeated, with enthusiasm, “that I have been influenced by no selfish motive in anything I have done; that my only thought has been to promote your happiness.”

“I know it is so, Christian,” exclaimed Margaret, rising, and holding out her hand to him; “I know well that in me you have only beheld your poor sister in the sight of God. I thank you for it; and now I must say farewell, for your uncle will be coming back. He does not know me, and it will be quite useless to tell him that I have been here. But you may tell him whatever else you think proper. I am very sure that he will not work against me, and that he is as honorable and generous as yourself.”

“But still,” said Christian, who saw with regret the end of his romantic adventure rapidly approaching, “you came to say something to him. Perhaps he ought to know it.”

“I came to ask him,” said Margaret, with a little hesitation, “to tell me plainly what my aunt’s intentions were in case of an open revolt upon my part. But that again was an act of cowardice, I do not require to know. Let her banish me, isolate me, imprison me, strike me--what does it matter? I will not yield, I promise you. I swear to you, I will never marry any man whom I cannot--esteem.”

Margaret dared not say love, and Christian was just as powerless to utter that word, but their eyes said it, and their cheeks glowed with a sympathetic blush. After conversing confidentially for an hour, their souls, in that brief glance, spoke to each other, and acknowledged their inward emotion, and yet neither of them was conscious of the fact; Margaret, because she did not know that she loved, and Christian, because he felt certain that he did not. And yet, when Margaret had stepped into her sleigh again, and when Christian could see her no longer, they were both conscious of a sudden pain, as if their hearts had been rent asunder. Tears, that she did not feel, coursed slowly down the young girl’s cheeks; while Christian, buried in confused reveries, sighed as deeply as if he had awakened from a dream of sunshine to find himself once more in the frigid winter. In order to watch the sleigh the longer, he went back to the bear-room, and stepped between the two sashes of the window, when a rustling behind him made him turn round, and he beheld a sight that filled him with amazement.

An old man, thin and pale, but with noble features, and carefully dressed in a gray suit of ancient fashion, was standing erect in the midst of the chamber, with a green branch in his hand. Christian had not heard him enter, and the figure, illumined by the declining sun, which, as it neared the west, was sending a red and dusty beam of light through the one long window of the sombre room, seemed a fantastic vision. His expression, moreover, was as singular as his unexpected presence. He seemed undecided; astonished, as it were, to find himself in that place; and his small, glassy eyes inspected with amazement the changes which the new guests had made in the previous melancholy arrangements of the room. A moment’s reflection satisfied Christian that this strange apparition, instead of being a spectre, was probably old Stenson, come to wait upon M. Goefle and surprised at not finding him. But what was the meaning of that green branch, and why that timid and disappointed look?

It was, in fact, old Stenson; and his sight being as good as his hearing was poor, he had quickly noticed that the fire was burning, the table set, and the clock going. He did not move quickly, however, and Christian had time to draw back behind the folds of an old curtain, nibbled almost to a fringe by the mice, before the old man’s eye had reached the open window. From this hiding-place he could watch him without being seen. Stenson’s idea was that his nephew, of whose drunken habits he was aware, had, without notifying him, invited some of his boon companions to a Christmas revel in the bear-room. The height of his indignation no one but himself could have expressed. His first care was to put out of sight the traces of such scandalous disorder. He began by scattering all the live coals in the stove, so that the fire should go out of itself; and then, before either clearing off the table, or going to send the delinquent to do it, he stopped the pendulum of the clock, and put the hands back to four o’clock, where it had stood before the profane hand of Christian had set it going. Next, he turned and looked up, as if to count the candles in the chandelier, but the sun shone in his eyes, and he stepped forward to the window, probably to shut it.

At this moment, Christian, seeing that he was about to be discovered, came forward. But at this apparition, standing in a nimbus of the rays of the setting sun, Stenson, who was probably not the least superstitious member of his family, recoiled to the middle of the floor under the chandelier, with a countenance of such anguish, that Christian, forgetting the old man’s deafness, spoke to him kindly and respectfully, with the intention of reassuring him. But his voice was lost without awakening an echo, in the large and fast chilling room. Stenson fell on his knees before him, stretching out his arms as if to implore his protection or to bless him, and holding out, with a tremulousness that was almost convulsive, the cypress-bough, as one offers a votive palm-bough to some divinity.

“Why, my good man,” said Christian, raising his voice, and coming nearer, “I am not God, nor even the Christmas angel that comes in at the window or down the chimney. Get up! I am--”

But he stopped short, for a livid pallor overspread the old man’s face, which was already so wan. He perceived that his appearance had thrown Stenson into mortal terror, and drew back to allow him to recover himself. This the old man did in a measure, but only sufficiently to think of escaping. He dragged himself along for a few instants, and then rising up with difficulty, fled through the sleeping chamber, murmuring, as he went, disconnected words, without any distinguishable meaning. Christian, who supposed that he was suffering from some attack of mental disorder, brought on by old age or excessive religious devotion, refrained from following him, for fear of making him worse. There was a small slip of parchment fastened to the branch which the old man had let fall at his feet, and picking it up, he read the following three verses of the Bible, written upon it in a reasonably firm hand:

“Destruction and death say, We have heard the fame thereof with our ears.”

“Did I not weep for him who was in trouble? Was not my soul grieved for the poor?”

“A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children’s children, and the wealth of the sinner is laid up for the just.”