Meanwhile, entirely unconscious of the suffering she had caused, Lucie walked slowly towards the garden-room, to carry into effect the plan she had hastily formed. The Freiherr greeted her with a smile of welcome. "Why, here we have Fraulein Anna!" he said, in great satisfaction. "Have you come to bestow your charming society upon an old fellow at this unwonted hour? But what is that?" he added, pointing to Kurt"s letter, which she held in her hand. "I owe the pleasure of your visit to business, I see, not to my own attractions. Never mind, I am always delighted to see you, whatever brings you."
"Indeed, Herr Baron? May I rely upon that?" Lucie asked, meaningly, as she drew a chair to his side and sat down. "Are you sure that you will not drive me away indignantly if I come to prefer a request that does not please you?"
"A request? "Tis granted before "tis asked; I know of nothing that I could refuse you."
"I might take you at your word, Herr Baron, but that I will not do. You shall not be bound by a promise to grant my request, you must do it of your own free choice."
"Why, this sounds quite solemn. I am curious; out with your request, whatever it is. What do you ask?"
"Nothing for myself, Herr Baron. My request concerns Herr von Poseneck."
The Freiherr was not made in the least angry, as would formerly have been the case, by this mention of the name of Poseneck; on the contrary, he laughed, saying, as if in badinage, "Always Poseneck!
Really, child, I believe you are in love with this infernal Poseneck, who must be a tremendously fine fellow to excite such an interest in you."
"That he certainly is, Herr Baron, although I just as certainly am not in love with him. He is a n.o.ble-hearted fellow, who now, after having served with honour in America, is going off to Berlin to enter the army there as a volunteer. His life in America never lessened his honest love for his German fatherland."
"He is a fine fellow then, and I honour him. I never would have believed it of a Poseneck," the Freiherr said, with a kindly nod at Lucie.
"You may believe anything that is good and true of him," Lucie continued; "his self-devotion costs him more than it does most men. He not only has to conquer his ambition as a former major in thus entering the army as a common soldier, but he sacrifices his whole future happiness. He pa.s.sionately loves a young girl, whose father is a bitter enemy to Prussia, and who never will give his daughter to a man who fights for Prussia in this war."
"Who is the scoundrel?" the Freiherr exclaimed, indignantly.
"You do an excellent old man great injustice, Herr Baron," Lucie replied, with a smile. "He is a man of honour, but the victim of a prejudice which so possesses him that he cannot conquer it sufficiently to call a Prussian his son-in-law."
"Then he does not love his child!" the Freiherr eagerly a.s.serted, and then suddenly paused and eyed Lucie suspiciously. "Stop! stop, child!"
he said. "I begin to suspect that you have been playing your own little game with me. Honestly, what has all this to do with your request?"
"Will you really not be angry with me, Herr Baron, if I speak perfectly frankly to you?" Lucie asked, laying her little hand on the old man"s brown, wrinkled fist, and bestowing upon him one of her charming smiles.
"Little flatterer, how can any one be angry with you? Oh, you have the old bear fast in your toils, and now come, tell me all about it."
"You shall hear, Herr Baron. First read this note which I received not an hour ago from Herr von Poseneck; it will tell you all, and when you have finished I will tell you how it came to be written."
The Baron read Kurt"s note, while Lucie noted with keen anxiety every change in his features as he read. She saw his face darken, and then a smile dawned about his mouth; he was not very angry. She could have shouted for joy at her victory.
"A most interesting production!" the Freiherr said, he handed the note back to her. "Really, this Herr von Poseneck----"
"Wait until you hear all, Herr Baron, and then judge," Lucie interrupted him.
And she went on to tell the old Freiherr how Celia had accidentally made the young man"s acquaintance; how, in her childlike innocence and trust, she had grown to love him, and how, at last, chance had betrayed her secret. She told how Kurt had given his promise never to see Celia without her governess"s consent, and how faithfully he had kept his word. "And now for my request, Herr Baron," she said, in conclusion. "I know it will be hard for you to grant it, but I hope everything from your magnanimity. Let me take Celia with me; she knows nothing of this note, and if you refuse me she shall know nothing; but you will not be so cruel. There must be a farewell,--a last farewell. May not Celia go with me?"
"You are a white witch, and know how to wind the old ogre round your finger," the Freiherr said, shaking his finger at Lucie. "In fact, I ought to be excessively angry with you, but as this is impossible I may as well take my pill without a wry face. The will-o"-the-wisp had certainly better see the young man under your auspices than run off, perhaps through the night and storm, to take leave of him; the child might do it if she should hear that Poseneck was going away. But one very serious word I must speak. Your Poseneck certainly is an honest, honourable young fellow, his note and his whole conduct show that.
Celia in her unsuspicious innocence might have fallen into bad hands.
You cannot expect me to be quite content, but time will bring counsel.
Only there must be no more of it all for the present; no talk of a betrothal as yet, no tender exchange of letters and such stuff. Celia is as yet little more than a child. If the young man ever comes back from the war he may come and see me here and we will talk it over together. But before then I"ll not listen to another word about it. Do you agree, you white witch?"
"Your will shall be my law in the matter, Herr Baron, and I thank you from my very heart for conquering for your child"s sake your dislike of a Poseneck."
"You may spare your thanks, child, or rather keep them for yourself, who honestly deserve them for taking care that my dislike should gradually subside. Have you not hammered away at my heart with your Poseneck every evening, for weeks, until at last the tough old muscle has grown quite tender?"
The Freiherr had caused his rolling-chair to be pushed near the open gla.s.s doors of the garden-room, that he might inhale the fragrance which now towards evening was borne in upon the delicious breeze from the garden, already lying in shadow from the lofty forest. The papers lay upon the table beside him. His thoughts were busy with the occurrences of the day. "Where can Werner be?" he suddenly asked himself. Several letters that had arrived at the castle for the Finanzrath and had been forwarded to his address in Dresden had been to-day returned, with the notice on the envelopes that he had left Dresden. Hence the question that the father asked himself. He nearly started from his chair when old Franz flung wide the folding-doors leading into the hall and announced, "The Herr Finanzrath!"
His visit was not welcome, and when Werner entered, not alone, but daring to introduce a stranger without permission, the old man"s patience was too sorely tried. The look with which he regarded his son was by no means amiable, but that with which he greeted his companion was darker still. He was very unfavourably impressed by this man from the first instant of his appearance. In spite of his long seclusion from society the Freiherr had always retained the greatest neatness, and withal an old-fashioned elegance, in his dress. Nothing was more distasteful to him than a want of cleanliness or an air of neglect, and both of these characterized the former fastidious Herr von Sorr, whom Werner now presented to his father. And Sorr"s countenance did not belie his dress. The pale flabby cheeks, the watery eyes, the whole expression indeed of the man, bore witness to his degraded, debauched character and made him odious to the old Baron. For such a guest no consideration was necessary.
"What in thunder do you mean?" he said angrily to Werner. "How dare you bring a stranger here? Don"t you know that I receive no visitors?
Whoever you are, sir, learn that I permit no invasion of my seclusion!
There is the door!"
Sorr, trained though he had been by Repuin to submit to all sorts of contemptuous treatment, was nevertheless abashed by this reception, and might perhaps scarcely have ventured to persist in his intrusion had not Werner come to his aid.
"Before you express yourself so angrily, sir," he said to his father, "you should hear the reasons that exist for my transgression of your commands and my introduction to you of Herr von Sorr. I appeal to your sense of justice, sir, in informing you that Herr von Sorr has no desire to intrude upon you, but has come hither because I have a.s.sured him that no Freiherr von Hohenwald ever refused what another had a right to claim, and that his just demand must be made directly to yourself."
"What have I to do with this man?" the Freiherr asked, crossly.
"This you can only learn, sir, by granting a hearing to Herr von Sorr, not by repulsing him in a manner that cannot but be offensive to a gentleman who comes. .h.i.ther at the request of your eldest son."
Again, as often before, the Finanzrath"s imperturbable composure a.s.serted its sway over his father"s pa.s.sion. The old man gave his son a dark look, but yielded, and turning to Sorr, said, with forced calmness, "Approach, sir; I regret it if my hastiness offended you,--such was not my intention. I can make no exception to the rule which I have observed for years of denying myself to visitors, and therefore I beg you to tell me as briefly as possible what you desire."
Sorr complied with the invitation in spite of the ungracious manner in which it was conveyed, and took a chair near the old man, but when he met his dark, searching eye the words which he had committed to memory that they might serve him in this need would not at first be uttered.
He cleared his throat in a vain endeavour to begin with some fitting introductory phrase.
"Well, sir?"
The Baron"s impatient tone admitted of no further delay, and Sorr began, overcoming his first stammering hesitation as he proceeded.
"Herr Baron," he said, "you see in me a wretched man, who appeals to you for aid in recovering his lost happiness. In the terrible misfortunes that have overwhelmed me I have not been guiltless, but I a.s.sure you on my honour that I repent the wrong I have done, and that I am determined to begin a new life if through your aid I succeed in attempting it."
"What is it that you want of me? What business have you to ask me for your lost happiness?" the Freiherr interrupted Sorr"s studied speech.
"Forgive me, Herr Baron, if, carried away by my emotion, I fail to use the right words in which to convey my request. Bear with me for a little while and you shall learn all. I will be as brief as possible, A few years ago I was a happy man, my fortune was considerable, I enjoyed the esteem of my friends, an exalted position in society, and I possessed a charming wife, to whom I was ardently attached. I lacked but one thing,--the strength to withstand temptation. One pa.s.sion ruled my life,--the love of gaming. Although I was usually fortunate, my success in winning large sums destroyed in me all appreciation of the value of money. I indulged in the wildest extravagances, and my income was always exceeded by my expenses. Thus my property dwindled almost without my knowledge. My wife, who loved me tenderly, warned me, entreated me, but even her prayers, all-powerful in every other direction, availed nothing to induce me to resist the fatal temptation offered me by cards. It dragged me down into an abyss that engulfed my fortune and that of my wife also. I found myself at last a beggar, my fortune, friends, position in society, and, worse than all, the affection of a wife whom I idolized, all gone. Meanwhile, one of my friends had, with inconceivable cunning and treachery, abused my confidence. The evenings that I spent at the gaming-table he pa.s.sed with my wife, representing himself as having been sent by me to beguile her solitude. He was enormously wealthy, and no sacrifice being too great in his eyes where the attainment of his vile ends was concerned, he at times forced upon me large sums for the payment of my debts, and I--with shame I confess it--was weak enough, when my wife complained to me of the persistent attentions of this treacherous friend, to entreat her not to offend him by any harsh rejection of them. I had utter confidence in my wife, and never suspected to what depths of infamy my false friend would descend."
"What the devil have I to do with all this?" the Freiherr burst out, more and more disgusted with Sorr, who had hoped his theatrical pathos was producing a very different impression. "For Heaven"s sake, come to the point!"
"I am about to do so. My treacherous friend, Count Repuin----"
"Stay! What name was that? Count Repuin, the Russian, Werner"s friend and confidant,--was he the man?"
"The same, Herr Baron. I lost the greater part of my fortune to him; he systematically contrived my ruin, believing that when I found myself a beggar, my wife, with dest.i.tution staring her in the face, would lend an ear to his vile proposals. When I had lost all, so that I knew not where to turn for the barest necessaries of existence, he carried to my wife the false report that I was dishonoured, that I had been detected in cheating at cards, and that it was in his power to send me to a jail. It was a bold falsehood, but it found credence with my wife, whose esteem for me my pa.s.sion for play had destroyed; and when he further informed her that, in consideration of a large sum of money, I had resigned to him all claim upon her duty, in short, that I had sold her to him, in her despair the wretched woman believed this lie also."
"Infamous! incredible!" the Freiherr indignantly exclaimed, involuntarily interested at last in Sorr"s recital.
"But the scoundrel failed in his schemes, although he has plunged me into misery. Devilish though his cunning was, he failed to take into account one thing,--in which, indeed, he had no faith,--that a woman might be impregnably virtuous. He did not know my Lucie. What was his wealth to her in comparison with her honour? She spurned his offers with contempt, and yet she believed him, and driven by despair almost to madness, she secretly left my house. When on the morning after the fearful night in which I had sacrificed my last hope at the gaming-table I sought my wife"s apartment to pray for her forgiveness and to make her the promise for which she had so often implored me, that never again would I touch a card, I found upon her table this terrible letter. Read it, Herr Baron; it will explain to you better than any words of mine the depth of my misery." And Sorr handed to the Freiherr the letter that Lucie had left behind her on the evening of her flight. The old Baron read:
"You have given back to me my freedom; I accept it. It is your desire that we should part; it shall be fulfilled: you will never see me again. Should you dare to persecute me, you will force me to denounce you publicly, and to give to the world the reasons that justify my conduct. The detected thief, who would barter his wife"s honour, has forfeited the right to control her destiny.--LUCIE."
An odious smile hovered upon Sorr"s lips as he watched the Freiherr while he read this letter aloud, and as he marked the impression that it produced upon him. He exchanged a significant glance with Werner, and then, when the reading was finished, continued: "I was beside myself with grief and fury when I found that my adored Lucie had left me. She had fled, that was clear, although I could understand neither her threat nor her strange intimations that I had desired to part from her, that I had sold her. She had vanished; no trace of her could I find, although I even summoned the police to my aid. Surely, as a forsaken husband, I had a right to do so. All was in vain. Again and again I read her mysterious letter, and at last, upon a sudden impulse, I hastened to Repuin, showed him Lucie"s note, and demanded and received its explanation. The wretch had the effrontery to tell me with a smile, of the manner in which he had destroyed the happiness of my life. We fought. I arose from the sick-bed, where a wound received in the duel prostrated me for weeks, an altered man. I have taken a vow never again to touch a card. I have since that day earned my daily bread by honest toil, correcting proofs for publishers, and giving lessons in French and English. I have now an a.s.sured although moderate income. In this period of struggle one hope alone has sustained me, that of finding my Lucie again. She is my wife by the indissoluble bond of marriage, a marriage blest by the Church. I know that she will gladly return to me and share my toil and my poverty when she knows of my change of heart and life. And chance has befriended me, Herr Baron, leading me to a knowledge of your son, the Herr Finanzrath, from whom I have learned that, in order to secure herself from fancied persecution, my wife has taken refuge in a feigned name, and that she dwells beneath your roof as Anna Muller."
The Freiherr stared at Sorr in blank amazement. "Good G.o.d, sir! what do you mean? Are you mad?" he exclaimed. "Fraulein Muller a wife, and your wife!"