Eugenie was silent
"Would you believe me?" he asked again, in a tone as though life or death hung on her answer.
She let her eyes rest for a moment on his face. It was fully turned towards her now, and she saw that it was ashy pale, and, like his voice, betrayed an agonised tension of feeling.
"You might be capable of a crime, I think, if you were stung to pa.s.sion. I do not think you are capable of a lie."
Ulric"s mighty chest heaved with a deep sigh of relief. As though completely to re-a.s.sure her, he stepped back again away from her.
"Ask me what you please, my lady, I will answer you."
She trembled a little and leaned against the back of the sofa. It was a dangerous colloquy, she felt, to hold with such a man, but still she put the all important question.
"They tell my husband that it was not by mere accident the ropes broke on that fatal day. How was it, Hartmann?"
"It was accident or something better, if you will, justice perhaps.
Our employer had caused alterations to be made in the pumps and lifting-machine, just what was indispensable to keep them working, but nothing to ensure safety. It was the same in this as in everything else. What did it matter if a few hundred miners, constantly going up and down, were every day brought in danger of their lives? Double and treble the loads were lifted, the most outrageous weights were raised, and at last the weights did their work, only this time the victim was not one of the men, but the master himself. It was no man"s hand, my lady, which severed the ropes just at the moment when they were bearing him up, and mine least of all. I saw the danger coming, we had just reached the last stage but one. I risked the leap and"----
"You thrust him?" said Eugenie breathlessly, as he paused.
"No, I only let him go. I could have saved him if I would. Half a minute would have been sufficient. I must have risked my own life, it is true; he might have dragged me down with him, but for any one among the men, for any of the officials even, I should have risked it; for that man I could not! In that instant the thought rushed through my head of all the evil he had done us, that the fate now threatening him was only what he had exposed us to, day by day, for nothing but to save money, and that I would not meddle in the matter if for once Providence chose to be just. I did not move a hand, in spite of his cries. Next minute it was too late; the cage had been dashed below and he with it."
Hartmann was silent. Eugenie looked up at him half in pity, half in horror. She knew well enough that the accusations he had heaped on the dead man were merited. Even she, however, would, in a moment of peril, have stretched forth her hand to save the hated Berkow, but the man opposite her had learnt neither to forgive nor forget. He stood quietly by, and saw his enemy perish before his eyes.
"You have told me the whole truth, Hartmann? On your word of honour?"
"On my word of honour."
His eyes met hers without flinching. There was no doubt now in her mind, and she answered reproachfully.
"And why did you not clear up the error? Why did you not speak to the others as you have done to me?"
A scornful look pa.s.sed over his face.
"Because not one of them would have believed me. Not a single one, not even my own father. He is right. I have been wild and reckless all my life, flinging down everything that stood in my way, and not caring for what others said to me. I have had to pay for it now. They all knew that I hated the man, and the accident happened when I was by, so I must have been the cause of it, there could be no doubt as to that. My own father told me so to my face, just because I could not say "yes" at once, when he asked me if I was in no way to blame for Berkow"s death.
"I should only have had to stretch out my arm to save him and I had not done it--because I could not say yes at once, he would not listen to me any more. He would not have believed me, if I had sworn it to him. Then I tried here and there among my mates. They did not contradict me, but I saw in their faces that they took me for a liar. I was not going to beg and pray them to believe me, so I let the thing go as it would. I had had enough of their friendship and companionship. If I had been brought into court and had found that matters were going against me, I should have spoken out, but it is a question if any one there would have believed what I said."
Eugenie shook her head.
"You should have made them believe you, Hartmann; you could have done it, if you had tried in earnest, but your pride would not suffer it.
You met suspicion with contempt, and that was the very way to strengthen it. Now you have an ill name on all the works, with the officials and with my husband."
"What do I care for Herr Berkow?" he broke in roughly, "what do I care for any of them? It is all the same to me whether they condemn me or not, but I could not bear that you should turn from me in loathing, and you believe me now, I see it in your eyes. The rest is all one to me."
"I do believe you," said Eugenie earnestly, "and my husband"s mind, at least, shall be cleared of those worst suspicions. If you failed to save, where rescue was possible, it is not for us to judge you. You must answer for it to your own conscience, but Arthur shall not think that it is his father"s murderer who stands opposed to him. It is too late now for a reconciliation, you have gone too far for that. It is only within the last few hours that I have learnt all that has happened, all that yet may happen, if the attack on the shafts is renewed to-morrow. Hartmann," she was imprudent enough to go right up to him and to lay her hand on his arm. "Hartmann, we are on the verge of a frightful catastrophe. You have compelled my husband to protect himself and those belonging to him, to prepare himself for whatever may befall, and he is determined to do it. If blood is shed, must needs be shed, to-morrow, think on whose head it will be?"
Her close vicinity, the touch of her hand on his arm, were not without effect on Ulric, but this time they worked no good. The dull quiet tone in which he had spoken hitherto was changed now; his voice grew sharper and louder, as he replied:
"On mine, you mean? Take care, my lady, you may have to suffer too, if for instance, some one you are very fond of should be made to answer for it. Herr Berkow will not stay securely here at home when there is fighting going on outside. I know that, and I know too whom I shall seek out first when once the battle is fairly on."
Eugenie had long ago withdrawn her hand, now she moved away from him, warned by that tone and look. He was still but as a half-tamed tiger, obeying her voice one minute, but ready perhaps the next to rise up against her with all the old fury of his savage nature. That minute seemed to be at hand. His look had menace in it even to her.
"Hartmann, you are speaking to your employer"s wife," she said, making a vain attempt to recall him to his senses.
"My employer!" cried he in scorn. "There is no question of my employer here. I have only to do with him when I am at the head of my men. It is Arthur Berkow I hate, because you are his wife, because you love him, and I ... I love you, Eugenie more than any one in the whole wide world. Do not shrink from me so in horror. You must have known it long ago.
"It has mastered me each time I have come near you. I have kept it down and tried to crush it by force, but it was of no use. It is of no use now either, though to-day again I have had to learn the old lesson that like cleaves to like, and that nothing is left for such as we are but disdain and just a haughty shrug of contempt, even though we should have risked our lives in your service. But next time there is a life to be lost, I shall not be the one to offer myself up madly, as I did on the day of your home-coming, by rushing under your horses" hoofs. Next time the peril shall be another"s, not mine. I have hated one Berkow to the death already; it seemed to me then I never could hate any one worse, but I know better now. He did not make a murderer of me; but there is one man, and only one in the world, who could! I did the father no hurt, but, if ever I find myself so, man to man, with the son, then it shall be he or I ... or, if it must be, both!"
It was a terrible moment. The man"s frenzied pa.s.sion had burst all bounds and broken loose in a wild torrent which nothing now could stem or stay. Eugenie saw that no words would avail her at the present crisis, she understood that her power was at an end. She could not escape, he had placed himself between her and the door, but she ran to the bell and pulled it with all the force at her command. The servants were upstairs at the other side of the house, still it was just possible the sound might reach their ears.
Hartmann had followed her; seizing her hand, he would have dragged it from the bell rope, but at that moment he was himself thrust back by an arm to which indignation lent such strength that it flung his giant form aside as though he had been a child. Arthur stood between them.
With a cry of joy and yet of mortal fear, Eugenie rushed to her husband; she knew what would come now.
Ulric recovered himself quickly and no sound pa.s.sed his lips, but his face was so distorted by rage as to be hardly recognisable. There came a look in his eye, as he turned and faced his enemy, which foreboded that enemy"s immediate destruction; but Arthur, with quick presence of mind, tore down one of the pistols which hung over his writing-table, and throwing his left arm round his wife, he levelled the weapon at the intruder.
"Back, Hartmann! Do not dare to come nearer. One step forwards towards my wife, one single step, and I stretch you on the ground."
The threat took effect. Almost blinded by pa.s.sion as he was, Ulric saw the barrel pointed at him with a firm and sure aim, saw too that the hand which held it did not tremble; at the second step he took forward the bullet would strike him, and his foe would remain victor. He clenched his fist and gnashed his teeth in his rage that a like weapon was wanting to him.
"I have no pistols," said he, "or we should meet here on equal terms, as we never have met yet. You are better provided than I. I have nothing but my fists to set against your bullets, it is easy to see who would get the best of it."
Arthur kept his eyes steadily fixed upon him. "You have taken care, Hartmann, that we should always have at hand arms ready for use. I shall protect my house and my wife even at the cost of a bullet. Back, I repeat."
For one second the two looked each other full in the face, as on that first occasion, so pregnant with consequences, when they had measured each other"s strength: now, as then, victory declared itself for the young master, though, in the pa.s.s they had now reached, other means of coercion had been needed than the look of his undaunted eyes. He stood motionless, his finger ready to press the trigger, following every movement of his foe, until the latter receded.
"I have never set much store by my life," said Ulric. "I should have thought you both might have known that, but I am not going to let myself be shot down at your door. I have accounts to settle with you.
You need not tremble so, my lady, you are in his arms, and he is safe, for the present at least, though we have not finished with each other yet. You stand there together as if nothing could tear you apart, as if you were bound one to the other for ever and ever; but my time will come yet, and then you shall have cause to remember me."
So saying, he went; his departing steps echoing through the adjoining room, then more faintly in the ante-chamber, until at last they died away outside.
Eugenie nestled more closely in her husband"s arms; she had learned to know now how well they could protect her.
"You came at the right moment, Arthur," said she, trembling still. "I had left my rooms in spite of your warning. It was very imprudent, I know, but I wanted to wait for you here, and I thought in the house I should be sure to be safe."
Arthur lowered the pistol, and drew her nearer to him.
"But you were not, we have gained that experience. What was Hartmann doing here in my study?"
"I do not know. He was looking for you, and certainly with no good intent."
"I am prepared for anything from that quarter," he answered quietly, as he laid the pistol on the table. "You see, I had provided for any such emergency, but I greatly fear it was only the prelude to what will take place to-morrow, when the real drama begins. Does it frighten you, Eugenie? The help we have sent for cannot be here before evening; we shall have to hold out alone all day against the rebels."
"Nothing frightens me when I am with you. But, Arthur," she pleaded anxiously, "do not go out by yourself again into the midst of all that tumult, as you did this morning. He will be there, and he has sworn to take your life."
He raised her head gently and looked into her eyes.
"Life and death are not in Hartmann"s hands alone; their decision rests with another. Make your mind easy, Eugenie; I will do my duty, but I will do it in a different way than in the days gone by. I know now that my wife is anxious about me; that is not a thing one forgets so easily!"