Part 3

Mr. Hellinger, with his snow-white, carefully trimmed beard, and handsome, rosy, boyish face beaming with good nature and the pleasure of living, was leaning back comfortably in the blue chintz armchair, his Turkish dressing-gown pulled over his knees, and apparently awaiting with calmest resignation whatever fate, in the shape of his wife, might be about to bestow upon him.

She (his wife) was just throwing a pinch of soda into the little coffee-pot, whereupon she circumstantially wiped her powdery fingers on her white damask apron, which was edged in Russian fashion with broad red and many coloured stripes. Her white matron's cap, the ribbons of which were tightly knotted together like a chin strap under her fleshy chin, had shifted somewhat towards the left ear, and from out its frilly frame there shone, full of energy and enterprise, her coarse, comfortable, sergeant-like face, whose features were rather puffed out, as is often observable in old women who like to share their husband's glass of brandy.

One could see that she was accustomed to rule and to subdue, and even the smile of constant injured feeling that played about her broad mouth went to prove how inconsiderately she was wont to carry through her plans.

So that she might not sit unoccupied while waiting for the coffee to draw, she took up her coarse woollen knitting, which, in her capacity of president of the ladies' society and directress of the charity organisation, was never allowed to leave her hands, and the needles ran with remarkable rapidity through her bony, work-used fingers.

"Have you heard nothing from Robert, Adalbert?" she asked, with a hard metallic voice, which must have penetrated the house to its last corner.

The question appeared to be unpleasant to the old man. He shook his head as if he would shake it off; it disturbed his morning tranquillity.

"An affectionate son, one must say," she continued, and the injured smile grew in intensity. "Since a week we have neither heard nor seen anything of him; if he lived in the moon he could not come more rarely."

Mr. Hellinger muttered something to himself, and busied himself with his long pipe.

"It looks as if something were brewing again in that quarter," she began anew; "he has altogether been so peculiar lately; come slinking round me without a word to say for himself. It seems to me there is some debt hanging over him again that he can't satisfy."

"Poor fellow," said the old man, and smacked his lips, perhaps to get rid of the unpleasant idea by this means.

"Poor fellow, indeed!" she mocked him; "I suppose you pity him into the bargain; perhaps even you have been helping him on the sly?"

He raised up his white, well-kept hands in protest and defence of himself, but he had not the courage to look her in the face.

"Adalbert," she said, threateningly, "I make it a condition that such a thing does not happen again. Whatever you give him, you take from us and from our other children. And if at least he deserved it! but he that will not hear advice must suffer. If he is ruined, with his obstinacy and stubbornness----"

"Allow me, Henrietta," he interrupted her timidly.

"I allow nothing, Adalbert, my dear," replied she. "'He that will not hearken to advice must suffer!' say I; and if through his abominable ingratitude his poor mother, who is only anxious for his welfare, and who bothers and worries herself whole nights through, thinking----"

With the many-coloured border of her apron she rubbed her eyes as if there were tears there to be wiped away.

"But, Henrietta," he began again.

"Adalbert, do not contradict me! You know I close an eye to all your follies. I allow you to sit as long as ever you like at the 'Black Eagle'; I let you drink as much as ever you can do with of that bad, expensive claret. I even put your supper ready for you when you come home late though it is hardly necessary that you should on such occasions upset three chairs, as you did yesterday. I consider altogether that you have very little regard for the feelings of your old and faithful wife. But--yes, what I was going to say is--that, once for all, I will not have you meddle with my plans: as it is you understand nothing of such matters. Have you, altogether, any idea of all I have done already for that good-for-nothing Robert? I have run about, and driven about, made calls, and written letters, and Heaven knows what else. Five or six well-to-do--nay, very wealthy girls I have, so to say, brought ready to his hand, any of whom he could have had for the taking. But what did he do? Well, I should think you still remember how I was seized with convulsions when, four years ago, he arrived with that miserable, delicate creature, Martha? My whole illness dates from then."

"But, Henrietta!"

"My dear Adalbert, I beg of you, do not again harp upon the same old string about her being my own flesh and blood! If she wished to be a loving and grateful niece to me, why did she not bring the necessary dowry with her? She had nothing--of course she had nothing! My departed brother died as poor as a church mouse. Is that fitting for one of my family? But after all--he had a right to do as he liked with his own--what business is it of mine? Only he need not have saddled us with his daughter."

"Well, but she is dead now," remarked Herr Hellinger.

"Yes, she is dead," replied she, and folded her hands. "It were a sin to say, thank God for that. But as our Lord has so ordained it, I will at least profit by the circumstance, and endeavour to rectify his folly of then. While you were sitting in the 'Black Eagle,' drinking your claret, I was once more toiling and moiling and inquiring round, so that he has but to pick and choose. There is Gertrude Leuzmann; will get fifty thousand cash down and as much more when the old man dies. There is that little von Versen; very young yet certainly--only just confirmed--but she will get even more! And besides these, at least three or four others! But what do you imagine he will say to it all? 'Mother,' he will say, 'if you start that theme again, you will never more set sight on me.' Was ever such a thing heard of? He has only to marry the second sister now in place of the other one, to bring his good old mother to her grave! By the by where can the young lady be to-day? It is nearly nine o'clock, and she has not yet appeared. In my brother's Bohemian home it may very probably have been the fashion to lie a-bed till noon; but in my well-ordered household, I beg to say, most emphatically and politely, I will not have it, Adalbert."

"I cannot conceive, dear Henrietta," he said, "why you heap reproaches upon me which are meant for your niece!"

"If only for once you would not take her part, Adalbert. But, of course, there is nothing left for me to say. I am duped and betrayed in my own house! However, I shall very soon put an end to the matter. I have kept her here now for a whole year; now she begins to be very much _de trop_."

"But does she not toll and moil in Robert's household from early morn till late at night? Does a day pass on which she does not betake herself to the manor farm? Do not be unjust towards her, Henrietta."

She gave him a pitying look. "If you had not remained such a child, Adalbert, one might talk reason to you. Don't you see that that is just where the danger lies? Don't you imagine that she has her reasons for flaunting about every day at the manor and for behaving herself as mistress there before him and the servants? Ah--she--she is a deep one--is my niece Olga. Be sure she has done her part towards getting him accustomed to the idea that she--and she alone--has a right to the place of her dead sister. What else should she be looking for, day after day, at the manor, if it is not that?"

"I should think Martha's child is sufficient explanation."

"Of course, of course! Any nursery tale is good enough to impose upon you! She knows exactly why she behaves as she does, and why she is almost ready to eat up the poor little mite for very love. She knows exactly how to find the way to its father's heart!"

"But perhaps she does not love him at all," old Hellinger interposed.

She laughed out loud.

"My dear Adalbert, a man who owns an estate just outside the town-gates is always loved by a poor girl, and if I do not make an end now and send her about her business, it may very possibly come to pass that our dear Robert will take her by the hand one fine day and say to us, 'Here, papa and mamma, now be good enough to give us your blessing.' And rather than live to see that, Adalbert----"

At this moment the sound of lumbering male steps was audible in the entrance-hall; directly after these came a loud and violent knock at the door.

"Well!" said Mrs. Hellinger, "some one is making a noise as if the bailiffs were outside--we have not got as far as that yet." And very slowly and deliberately she said, "Come in."

The old doctor stepped into the room. His hat sat awry at the back of his head, his necktie hung loose over his shoulders, and his chest heaved as with breathless running. He forgot his "Good-morning" greeting, and only gave a wild, searching glance around.

"Good heavens, doctor!" cried Mr. Hellinger, senr., hastening towards him, "why, you burst in upon us like a bull into a china-shop."

Mrs. Hellinger once more assumed her injured air, and muttered something about pot-house manners.

When the old doctor saw the undisturbed breakfast-table and the astonished, every-day faces of his friends, he let himself drop into an armchair with a sigh of relief. Then it had not taken place after all--this terrible thing! But next moment his fears took possession of him anew.

"Where is Olga?" he faltered, and fixed his gaze on the door as if he might see her enter there any moment.

"Olga?" said Mrs. Hellinger, shrugging her shoulders. "My goodness, she probably will be here shortly. Are you in such a hurry?"

"God be praised!" cried he, folding his hands. "Then she has been down already?"

"No--not so," remarked Mrs. Hellinger, "her ladyship thinks well to sleep somewhat long this morning."

"For God's sake," he cried, "has no one looked after her? Does no one know anything of her?"

"Doctor, what ails you?" cried old Hellinger, who was now beginning to be alarmed.

The physician may at this moment have recollected the request with which Olga's letter of farewell had closed. He felt that in this way his desire to comply with her request would, from the very first, become impossible, and made a last wretched attempt to preserve the secret.

"What ails me?" he faltered, with a miserable laugh. "Nothing ails me!--What should ail me? Confound it all!" And then, casting aside all dissimulation, he cried out: "My God! my God! Thou hast permitted this terrible thing! Thou hast withdrawn Thy hand from her." And he was about to sink down weeping, but he once more gathered up all the energy still remaining in his rickety old body, raised himself bolt upright, and--"Come to Olga," he said, "and do not be terrified--however--you may--find her."

Old Hellinger grew pale, and his wife commenced to scream and sob; she clung to the doctor's arm, and wished to know what had happened; but he spoke no further word.

So they all three climbed up the stairs leading to Olga's gable-room, and in the entrance-hall the servants collected and stared after them with great, inquisitive eyes.

Before Olga's door Mrs. Hellinger was seized with a paroxysm of despair.

"You knock, doctor," she sobbed, "I cannot."

The old man knocked.

All remained quiet.

He knocked again, and put his ear to the keyhole.

As before.

Then Mrs. Hellinger began to scream:

"Olga, my beloved, my dear child, do open--we are here--your uncle and aunt and old uncle doctor are here. You may open without fear, my love."

The physician pressed the latch; the door was locked. He looked through the key-hole; it was stopped up.

"Have the locksmith fetched, Adalbert," he said.

"No," cried Mrs. Hellinger, suddenly casting all sorrow to the winds, "that I shall not permit--that will on no account be done. The disgrace would be too great: I could never survive it--such a disgrace--such a disgrace!"

The doctor gave her a look of unmistakable loathing and contempt. She took little notice of it.

"You are strong, Hellinger," she said, "bear up against the door; perhaps you may succeed in breaking the lock."

Mr. Hellinger was a giant. He set one of his powerful shoulders against the woodwork, which at the first pressure began to crack in its joints.

"But softly," his wife admonished, "the servants are standing in the entrance-hall. Be off with you into the kitchen, you lazy beggars!" she shouted scolding down the stairs.

Down below doors banged. A second push----one of the boards broke right through the middle. Through the splintry chink a bright ray of daylight broke through into the semi-dark corridor.

"Let me look through," said the doctor, who now, in anticipation of the worst, was calm and collected.

Hellinger broke off a few splinters, so that through the aperture the whole room could be overlooked.

Opposite the door, a few paces removed from the window, stood the bed. The coverlet was dragged up, and formed a white hillock behind which a strip of Olga's light brown hair shone forth. A small portion of the forehead was also visible--white as the bed-clothes it gleamed. The feet were uncovered; they seemed to have been firmly set against the foot end of the bed and then to have relaxed.

By the pillow, on a chair, lay her clothes neatly folded. Her skirts, her stockings, were laid one upon the other in perfect symmetry, and on the carpet stood her slippers, with their heels turned towards the bed, so as to be quite ready for slipping into on rising.

On the marble slab of the pedestal, half leaning against the lamp, lay a book, still open, as if it had been placed there before extinguishing the light. Over everything there seemed to rest a shimmer of that serene, unconscious peace which irradiates a pure maiden's soul. She who dwelt here had fallen asleep yesterday with a prayer on her lips, to awaken to-day with a smile.

After the physician had held silent survey, he stepped back from the aperture.

"Put your arm through, Adalbert," he said, "and try to reach the lock. She has bolted the door from the inside."

But Mrs. Hellinger squeezed herself up against the door, and with loud cries implored her sweet one to wake up and draw the bolt herself. At last it was possible to push her on one side, and the door was opened. The three stepped up to the bedside.

A marble-white countenance, with lustreless, half-open eyes, and an ecstatic smile on its lips, met their gaze. The beautiful head, with its classic, refined features, was slightly bowed towards the left shoulder, and the unbound hair fell down in great shining waves upon the regal bust, over which the nightdress was torn. A white button with a shred of linen attached, which hung in the buttonhole, was the only sign that a state of excitement must have preceded slumber.

"My sweet one, you are sleeping, are you not?" sobbed Mrs. Hellingen "Say that you are sleeping! You cannot have brought such disgrace upon your aunt, your dear aunt, who cared for you and watched over you like her own child." With that she seized the unconscious girl's pale, pendant, white hand, and endeavoured to drag her up by it.

Her tender-hearted husband had covered his face with his hands, and was weeping. The physician gave himself no time for emotion. He had pulled out his instruments, pushed Mrs. Hellinger aside with scant politeness, and was bending over the bosom, which with one rapid touch he entirely freed of its covering.

When he rose up, every drop of blood had left his face.

"One last attempt," he said, and made a quick incision straight across the upper arm, where an artery wound itself in a bluish line through the white, gleaming flesh. The edges of the wound gaped open without filling with blood; only after some seconds a few sluggish, dark drops oozed forth.

Then the old man threw the shining little knife far from him, folded his hands and--struggling with his tears--uttered a prayer.

III.

On the afternoon of the same day, a light one-horse cabriolet sped over the common which extends across country for several miles northwards of Gromowo, and in the direction of the little town.

Dark and lowering, as if within reach of one's hand, the clouds lay over the level plain. Here and there a willow stump stretched its gnarled excrescences into the fog-laden air, all saturated with moisture and glistening with the drops which hung in long rows on its bare branches. The wheels sank deep into the boggy road, winding along between withered reed-grass, and often the water splashed up as high as the box-seat.

The man who held the reins took little heed of the surrounding landscape; quite lost in thought he sat huddled up, only occasionally starting up when the reins threatened to slip from his careless fingers. Then the herculean build of his limbs became apparent, and his broad, high-arched chest expanded as if it would burst the coarse grey cloak which stretched across it in scanty folds.

The man's stature was similar to that of old Hellinger, perhaps even superior, and the face, too, bore an undeniable family resemblance; but what had there remained pleasing and soft and undefined even in old age, had here developed into harsh, impressive lines, testifying to defiance and gloomy brooding. A curly, terribly-neglected beard in dark disorder encompassed the firm-set jaw, assumed a lighter dye near the corners of the mouth, and fell upon the breast in two fair points.

This was Robert Hellinger, the owner of Gromowo manor, Olga's betrothed. Of the happiness that had come to him yesterday there was little written in his face. His grey, half-veiled eyes stared moodily into the distance, and the wrinkles between his eyebrows never for one moment disappeared. He well knew that hard work was in store for him before he could lead home his bride--hours of bitterest struggle were imminent, and even victory would bring him nothing but care and anxiety. His thoughts travelled back over the dark times that lay in the past, and that had hardly ever been illumined by a ray of light.

It was now six years since his father had solemnly made over to him, as eldest son, the old family inheritance, the manor, and had himself retired to a comfortable quiet life in the little town. On this day his period of suffering had commenced, for he was burdened with a yoke so heavy that even his herculean shoulders threatened to break under its weight; everything he gained by the work of his sinewy hands--everything of which he positively pinched himself--melted away and was swallowed up by the claims which his family laid upon him. He had no right to complain. Was it not all according to strict law? The inheritance had been exactly divided to the very last farthing among him and his six brothers and sisters, not counting the reserve which his parents claimed for themselves.

Every brick of his house, every clod of his land, was encumbered--on every ear of corn ripening in his fields his mother's suspicious gaze was fixed, for she kept strict watch lest the interests should come in a minute late. And was she not justified in so doing? Had he a right to claim more love from her than she gave to her other children? There were brothers who wanted to make their way in the world; sisters who had only been married for the sake of their dowry: they all looked anxiously and eagerly towards him as the promoter and preserver of their happiness.

The interests! That was the dreadful word that henceforth hour by hour droned in his ears, that by night startled him from his sleep and filled his dreams with wild visions. The interests! How often on their account he had beaten his brow with clenched fists! How often he had run without sense or feeling through the loamy fields, to escape from this host of glinting, gleaming devils! How often in a blind fit of rage he had smashed to pieces some tool, a ploughshare, a waggon-pole, with his fist, as if he did not mind with what weapon he fought them! But they did not leave him. All the more tenaciously did they fasten themselves on to his heels; all the more thirstily did they suck the marrow from his young bones.

What good was it that he sometimes succeeded in mastering them? This hydra everlastingly brought forth new heads; from quarter to quarter it stood there before his terrified gaze, more and more monstrous, more and more gigantic, growing and swelling, ready to pounce upon him and crush him with the weight of its body. Thus from one reprieve to the next his life had dragged along since that day which was so merrily celebrated at the "Black Eagle" with drinking of claret and champagne.

If only his mother had exercised some leniency! But she did not even exempt him from the stipulated asparagus in spring, nor even from the loan of the carriage for drives during harvest-time when the horses were so badly wanted in the fields.

"He that will not hearken to advice must suffer," she was wont to say, and he would not hearken; no, indeed not! With one short, simple "yes" he might have put a stop to all his misery, might have lived in the lap of luxury to the end of his days; and because he would not do it, out of sheer, inconceivable stubbornness, because all her wife-hunting had been to no purpose--that was why his mother could not forgive him.

Thus two years passed away. Then he began to feel that such a life must sooner or later make a wreck of him. This anxiety and worry was exhausting him more and more; he decided to put an end to it all and to demand of fate that modest share of happiness which was pledged and promised to him by a pair of faithful blue eyes, and a pale, gentle mouth. Then came a day when he brought home, as wife to his hearth, the love of his youth, who had shortly become orphaned and homeless.

It was a dreary, sad November day, and dark clouds sped like birds of ill omen across the sky. Trembling and pale, in her black mourning dress, the frail, delicate creature hung on his arm and quaked beneath every half-compassionate, half-contemptuous glance with which the strange people examined her.

As for his mother, she had received her with reproaches and maledictions, and a year had elapsed before tolerable relations were established between the two.

Martha had kept up bravely, and in spite of her delicate health, had worked from morn to night in order to set to rights what had all gone topsy-turvy during the master's long bachelorhood.

And when, after three years of quiet, cheering companionship. Heaven was about to bless their union, she had--even when her condition already required the greatest care--always been up and doing, working and ordering in kitchen, attic, and cellar.

It almost seemed as if thus by labour she wanted to give an equivalent for her missing dowry.

Then--two days after the birth of a child--Olga had suddenly arrived in Gromowo. He had not seen her since his marriage. At first sight of her he was almost startled. She came towards him with an expression of such proud reserve and bitterness; she had blossomed forth to such regal beauty.

And this woman he was to-day to call his own! Yet what a world of suffering, how many days of gloomiest brooding and despair, how many nights full of horrible visions lay between now and then!

He shuddered; he did not like to recall it any more. To-day everything seemed to have turned out well; Martha's glorified image smiled down in peace and benediction, and, like a flower sprung from her grave, happiness was blooming anew for him.