At his voice, Louise lifted a wild face, stared at him as though she did not recognise him, then rose with a cry, and flung herself upon him.
"Take care! I"m wet through."
For all answer, she burst out crying, and trembled from head to foot.
"What is it, darling? Were you afraid?"
But she only clung to him and trembled.
Amalie was weeping with equal vehemence; he ordered her out of the room. Notwithstanding his dripping clothes, he was forced to support Louise. In vain he implored her to speak; it was long before she was in a state to reply to his questionings. Outside the storm still raged; it was a wild night.
"What was it? Were you afraid? Did you think I was lost?"
"I don"t know--Oh, Maurice! You will never leave me, will you?"
She wounded her lips against his shoulder.
"Leave you! What has put such foolish thoughts into your head?"
"I don"t know.--But on a night like this, I feel that anything might happen."
"And did it really matter so much whether I came back or not?"
He felt her arms tighten round him.
"Did you care as much as that?--Louise!"
"I said: my G.o.d!--what if he should never come back! And then, then ..."
"Then----?"
"And then the noise of the storm ... and I was so alone ... and all the long, long hours ... and at every sound I said, there he is ... and it never was you ... till I knew you were lying somewhere ... dead ...
under a tree."
"You poor little soul!" he began impulsively, then stopped, for he felt the sudden thrill that ran through her.
"Say that again, Maurice!--say it again!"
"You poor, little fancy-ridden soul!"
"Oh, if you knew how good it sounds!--if I could make you understand!
You"re the only person who has ever said a thing like that to me--the only one who has ever been in the least sorry for me. Promise me now--promise again--that you will never leave me.--For you are all I have."
"Promise?--again? When you are more to me than my own life?"
"And you will never get tired of me?--never?"
"My own dear wife!"
She strained him to her with a strength for which he would not have given her credit. He tried to see her face.
"Do you know what that means?"
"Yes, I know. It means, if you leave me now, I shall die."
By the next morning, all traces of the storm had vanished; the sun shone; the slanting roads were hard and dry again. Other storms followed--for it was an exceptionally hot summer--and many an evening the two were prisoners in her room, listening to the angry roar of the trees, which lashed each other with a sound like that of the open sea.
Every Sunday in August, too, brought a motley crowd of guests to the inn, and then the whole terrace was set out with little tables. Two waiters came to a.s.sist Amalie; a band played in an arbour; carts and wagonettes were hitched to the front of the house; and the noise and merry-making lasted till late in the night. Together they leaned from the window of Louise"s room, to watch the people; they hardly ventured out of doors, for it was unpleasant to see their favourite nooks invaded by strangers. Except on Sundays, however, their seclusion remained undisturbed; half a dozen visitors were staying in the other wing of the building, and of these they sometimes caught a glimpse at meals; but that was all: the solitude they desired was still theirs.
And so the happy days slid past; August was well advanced, by this time, and the tropical heat was at its height. In the beginning, it had been Maurice who regretted the rapid flight of the days: now it was Louise. Occasionally, a certain shadow settled on her face, and, at such moments, he well knew what she was thinking of: for, once, out of the very fulness of his content, he had said to her with a lazy sigh: "To-day is the first of August," and then, for the first time, he had seen this look of intense regret cross her face. She had entreated him not to say any more; and, after that, the speed with which the month decreased, was not mentioned between them.
But his carelessly dropped words had sown their seed. A couple of weeks later, the remembrance of the work he had still to do for Schwarz, before the beginning of the new term, broke over him like a douche of cold water. It was a resplendent morning; he had been leaning out of the window, idly tapping his fingers on the sill. Suddenly they seemed to him to have grown stiff, to have lost their agility; and by the thoughts that now came, he was so disquieted that he shut himself up in his own room.
At his first words to her, Louise, who was still in bed, turned pale.
"Yes, yes, be quiet!--I know," she said, and buried her face in the down pillow.
In this position she remained for some seconds; Maurice stood staring out of the window. Then, without raising her face, she held out her hand to him.
He took it; but he did not do what she expected he would: sit down on the side of the bed, and put his arm round her. He stood holding it, absent-mindedly. She stole a glance at him, and turned still paler.
Then, with a jerk, she released her hand, sat up in bed, and pushed her hair from her face.
"Maurice! ... then if it has to be ... then to-day ... please, please, to-day! Don"t ask me to stay here, and think, and remember, that it"s all over--that this is the end--that we shall never, never be here in this little room again! Oh, I couldn"t bear it!--! can"t bear it, Maurice! Let us go away--please, let us go!"
In vain he urged reason; there was no gainsaying her: she brushed aside, without listening to it, his objection that their rooms in Leipzig would not be ready for them. Throwing back the bedclothes, she got up at once and dressed herself, with cold fingers, then flung herself upon the packing, helped and hindered by Amalie, who wept beside her. The hour that followed was like a bad dream. Finally, however, the luggage was carried downstairs, the bill paid, and the circ.u.mstantial good-byes were said: they set off, at full speed, down the woodpath to the station, to catch the midday train. Louise was white with exhaustion: her breath came sobbingly. In a firstcla.s.s carriage, he made her lie down on the seat. With her hand in his, he said what he could to comfort her; for her face was tragic.
"We will come again, darling. It is only AUF WIEDERSEHEN, remember!"
But she shook her head.
"We shall never be here again."
Leipzig, at three o"clock on an August afternoon, lay baking in the sun. He put her in a covered droschke, himself carrying the bags, for he could not find a porter.
"At seven, then! Try to sleep. You are so pale."
"Good-bye--good-bye!"
His hand rested on the door of the droschke. She laid hers on it, and clung to it as though she would never, let it go.
Part III.
... dove il Sol tace.