Egon went to the window to wave a farewell to his guests, when he observed the young girl, who had taken her place on the back seat of the barouche, suddenly spring out of it again. "I have forgotten my parasol!" she called up to Egon.
The footman, who had been helping the visitors to get into their carriage, would have gone back for it, but with a "Never mind, I will get it myself," she ran into the house and up the stairs. The next instant she stood, with flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, beside Egon, and said hurriedly, in a low voice, "I left it on purpose, because I wanted to say something to you, Herr von Ernau. The doctor, I know, told Hugo yesterday that you could not drive to Linau before Monday, but you must come before. You are perfectly well, promise me to come on Sat.u.r.day at the farthest,--to-day is Monday. Oh, you can easily come before, or on, Sat.u.r.day, if you drive slowly."
"Why must I promise you to come "before, or on, Sat.u.r.day," little Clara?"
"Oh, because I want you to come so much that I can hardly wait for the time to pa.s.s."
"Oh, I am not vain enough to believe that."
The girl laughed merrily.
"Indeed! Well, there is somebody, at all events, who does want to see you, I know, and I must not tell you who it is, because I promised not to. But I did not promise not to beg you to come before Sunday. Oh, you must, or it will be too late. Adieu, Herr von Ernau! Here is my parasol; they are waiting for me. Remember, before Sunday!"
She hurried away, and waved her hand, flourishing her parasol, from the carriage, as it drove out of the court-yard.
Egon stood a long while at the window, gazing after the carriage as it disappeared. What had he just heard? Had Bertha made that innocent child her messenger, her tool, in the idle flirtation with which she would fain employ her empty hours? Yes, she was indeed false and shallow; and good, kindly w.a.n.gen deserved a better fate. What had become of the magical charm which Bertha von Ma.s.senburg"s beauty had exercised over the Egon of former days? He thought of her almost with aversion. Nevertheless, he must return the visit that had been paid him; kindly relations with Linau must be preserved.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CLARA TO THE RESCUE.
The afternoon was delightful, the setting sun glorious in the crimson splendour of the west, but the elder members of the party driving home to Linau through the warm summer air were scarcely in the mood to enjoy it. w.a.n.gen was annoyed at what he declared to himself were groundless suspicions of his beautiful wife; he tried to atone for them by redoubled tenderness in his manner when he addressed her, and this very tenderness irritated Bertha, in her consciousness of failure in her first attempt to vary the monotony of her existence by what she a.s.sured herself should be but an innocent flirtation,--merely a piece of feminine vengeance upon the man who had so insulted her vanity in years gone by. Clara, indeed, rattled away about the various delights of Plagnitz, winding up her eulogium of its lord, however, with a heavy sigh.
"If my darling Elise could but have been with us!" she exclaimed. "And now she may never see it! Oh, Bertha, how could you be so unkind to her? I know that it is all because of your bitter speeches that she is going to leave us on Sunday. Why do you not love her? Why can we not all be happy together?"
To this question Bertha deigned no reply, and Hugo said, rather sadly,--
"I too, dearest Bertha, should have been glad to have kept Fraulein Elise with us. But perhaps she is right. You two are like fire and water, and since she has so advantageous an offer, and can be so near her poor mother, I have nothing to say, only I am greatly mistaken if you do not wish for her many a time after she has left us."
"You know, Hugo, I cannot agree with you in your estimate of Elise. She has always disliked me, and of course I see her from my point of view.
Before she came, everything that I did was right in your eyes; her presence irritates me, and leads you to criticise and object to what I do and say; in short, I cannot be sorry that she leaves us on Sunday."
The sun was just disappearing as Linau was reached. Hugo and Bertha betook themselves to the balcony, and Clara went in search of her dear Elise, guessing correctly where she should find her. At the farthest end of the extensive garden at the back of the old manor-house of Linau, just where it was separated from the road that divided it from the meadows beyond by an old-fashioned picket-fence, there stood, concealed among the luxuriant shrubbery, a shady arbour, which was reached by a narrow pathway among the tall bushes bounding the garden on one side. This arbour had formerly been a favourite retreat of old Herr von w.a.n.gen; from it he could see far over his meadows and fields; here he was wont to sit with his pipe and book through the long summer hours, overlooking his people at work; and hence it had come to be called "the master"s arbour." After his death the shrubs and bushes about it were allowed to grow more rankly, so as almost entirely to conceal it, for his son did not like to sit here; he preferred to ride out over his estate, to visit his labourers; and his young wife would have thought it excessively tiresome to spend any time on a wooden bench in this lonely spot, when she might be lounging in a luxurious chair on her favourite balcony.
But for Elise this arbour was a delightful retreat,--she liked to teach Clara here, sure of freedom from all interruption,--and here Clara found her after the wonderful visit to Plagnitz. She was in the midst of writing a long letter, and the child"s presence might have been more welcome at another time, but she responded affectionately to her pupil"s enthusiastic caress; not for the world would she have grieved, by any show of a desire to be alone, the girl whom she had grown to love dearly.
Clara"s talkative gaiety, however, seemed to have exhausted itself upon the homeward drive. She sat down beside her governess, and gazed thoughtfully from the leafy opening of the window in the little arbour abroad over the fields and meadows in the direction where in the unseen distance lay Castle Plagnitz. She was silent for a long while, and then, suddenly turning to Elise, she exclaimed,--
"You do not know how dearly I love you!"
"Oh, yes, I do, dear child; I know your warm little heart very well."
"But indeed you cannot dream how much I care for you. I did not know it myself. And how can I bear to have you leave us forever on Sunday?"
"I must go, Clara."
"I suppose you must, for Bertha does not love you; she does not know you. But, oh! Elise, why would you not let me tell Herr von Ernau that you are here, and that you are going away on Sunday?"
"Clara!"
"Yes, Elise; it grieves me to the very heart that you have no confidence in me. I am not such a child that I do not see and understand a great deal more than you think I do. You might confide in me."
"What could I confide in you, Clara?"
"You might have told me how much you cared for Herr von Ernau."
Elise blushed crimson and uttered another indignant "Clara!" but the girl threw her arms around her, and, undeterred, continued, "Oh, your blush betrays you! You need tell me nothing; I knew it all before. I love you so much that I saw it in your dear, beautiful face,--in your eyes. I knew it when you recognized him as he lay, pale and bleeding, in the hall. I saw it in your happy look when Hugo told us that his wound was not dangerous. And then I asked Hugo, and begged him to tell me when he and you had known Herr von Ernau, and he told me all about how he had been in disguise at Castle Osternau, and had given you music-lessons. Oh, I know it all, and a great deal more!"
"Much more than it is right that you should," Elise said, gravely.
"No, just enough to let me show you that I am not such a child as you think me, and that, at all events, I am old enough to have plans and schemes of my own. I was very glad to go to Plagnitz to-day, and I enjoyed my visit there very much."
"Clara, you did not forget----"
"No, you need not be anxious. I promised you that I would not even mention your name, and I shall keep my promise, although I cannot see why you made me give it. But I shall find some way to let Herr von Ernau know that you are here without breaking my word. My mind is made up, and I tell you so, because I never mean to deceive you."
"Clara, promise me, if you love me, to do nothing."
"Oh, it is just because I love you that I will make you no more promises. I have learned wisdom."
From the manor-house came the clear tones of the bell ringing for the evening meal.
"There goes the bell!" Clara exclaimed. "We must hurry to be in time. I am glad we can stay here no longer, for I do not wish to say another word. My mind is made up, and I feel much pleased with myself."
With a laugh she left the arbour and tripped along the path towards the house. Elise slowly followed her; she needed a few moments of solitude to evoke some order in the wild confusion of thought caused by Clara"s words. She trembled as she reflected upon the possibility of seeing again him upon whom her mind had dwelt for four long years, and who had occupied her thoughts ceaselessly during these last days and nights.
How she dreaded meeting him! and yet, in thinking of such a meeting, a strange, sweet hope stirred within her which she herself refused to recognize.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CLARA DEA EX MACHINa.
Never during the past four years had Egon been so lonely, never had he felt so deserted, so miserable and dissatisfied, as during the first ten days of his residence at Plagnitz. Everything combined to make his mood of the gloomiest. He was not ill, and yet he was not perfectly well. The doctor now permitted him to take short walks, but had exacted from him a promise that he would curb his impatience to take more exercise until the next week. There was nothing for him to do, after walking through a field or two, but to return to his room and take up a book or sit down at the piano.
Could he only have given entire attention to his book, or have become absorbed in his music,--but this was impossible. After he had determinedly read a page or two his rebellious thoughts would wander back to old times at Castle Osternau, or fly after Storting in his travels, or try to peer into the future. And it was just the same when he sat down at his piano: before long his hands would drop listlessly from the keys, and he would resign himself to profitless and cheerless musings.
After the visit of the w.a.n.gens he was, if possible, more uncomfortable than before; he was annoyed to feel any restraint in his intercourse with Linau. Bertha"s presence, too, had made old memories more vivid than ever. Where, where was Lieschen? He had received only one brief letter from Storting, in Berlin. Frau von Osternau had left the capital a couple of weeks previously; the mistress of the house where she had lodged could not tell him whither she had gone, and Herr von Sastrow and his wife were unfortunately absent, travelling. Storting could do nothing save go to Osternau, where he hoped that the pastor might tell him what he wished to know; if this hope were disappointed, he was resolved to apply directly to Herr Albrecht von Osternau, who would certainly know the address to which the quarterly payment of the widow"s legal income was to be sent.
After this letter, which had been dispatched immediately before Storting"s departure for Osternau, no further news had been received from him. His silence filled Egon with restless anxiety; he sent a mounted messenger to the post-office three times every day, but on Friday evening he had not yet heard that Frau von Osternau had been found.
At last, on Sat.u.r.day morning, Egon"s eager expectations were gratified,--the post-bag contained a letter addressed in Storting"s handwriting. Egon tore it open with a hand trembling with anxiety, and read,--