"A most disagreeable, grasping lot," said Lohm decidedly. "They received every bit of their dues, and are all well off. Surely the old man could do as he liked with the one place that was not entailed?"
"It isn"t the usual thing to leave one"s land to a foreigner. Is she coming to live in it?"
"She came last week."
"Oh?" This in a tone of sudden interest.
There was a pause. Then Trudi said, "Is she young?"
"Quite young."
"Pretty?"
"Exceedingly pretty."
Trudi looked up at him and smiled.
"Well?" said Axel, smiling back at her.
"Well?" said Trudi, continuing to smile.
Axel laughed outright. "My dear Trudi, your astuteness terrifies me. You not only know already why I wrote to you, but you know more reasons for the letter than I myself dream of. I want to be able to help this extremely helpless young lady, and I can hardly be of any use to her because I have no woman in the house. If I had a wife I could be of the greatest a.s.sistance."
"Only then you wouldn"t want to be."
"Certainly I should."
"Pray, why?"
"Because I have a greater debt of obligations to her uncle than I can ever repay to his niece."
"Oh, nonsense--n.o.body pays their debts of obligations. The natural thing to do is to hate the person who has forced you to be grateful, and to get out of his way."
"My dear Trudi, this shrewdness----" murmured her brother. Then he added, "I know perfectly well that your thoughts have already flown to a wedding. Mine don"t reach farther than an elderly companion."
"Who for? For you?"
"Miss Estcourt is looking for an elderly companion, and I would be grateful to you if you would help her."
"But the elderly companion does not exclude the wedding."
"When you see Miss Estcourt you will understand how completely such a possibility is outside her calculations. You won"t of course believe that it is outside mine. Why should you want to marry me to every girl within reach? Five minutes ago it was Bibi, and now it is Miss Estcourt.
You do not in the least consider what views the girls themselves might have. Miss Estcourt is absorbed at this moment in a search for twelve old ladies."
"Twelve----?"
"Her ambition is to spend herself and her money on twelve old ladies.
She thinks happiness and money are as good for them as for herself, and wants to share her own with persons who have neither."
"My dear Axel--is she mad?"
"She did not give me that impression."
"And you say she is young?"
"Yes."
"And really pretty?"
"Yes."
"And could be so well off in that flourishing place!"
"Of course she could."
"I"ll go and call on her to-morrow," said Trudi decidedly.
"It will be kind of you," said Lohm.
"Kind! It isn"t kindness, it"s curiosity," said Trudi with a laugh. "Let us be frank, and call things by their right names."
Anna was in the garden, admiring the first crocus, when Trudi appeared.
She drove Axel"s cobs up to the door in what she felt was excellent style, and hoped Miss Estcourt was watching her from a window and would see that Englishwomen were not the only sportswomen in the world. But Anna saw nothing but the crocus.
The wilderness down to the marsh that did duty as a garden was so sheltered and sunny that spring stopped there first each year before going on into the forest; and Anna loved to walk straight out of the drawing-room window into it, bare-headed and coatless, whenever she had time. Trudi saw her coming towards the house upon the servant"s telling her that a lady had called. "Nothing on, on a cold day like this!" she thought. She herself wore a particularly sporting driving-coat, with an immense collar turned up over her ears. "I wonder," mused Trudi, watching the approaching figure, "how it is that English girls, so tidy in the clothes, so trim in the shoes, so neat in the tie and collar, never apparently brush their hair. A German Miss Estcourt vegetating in this quiet place would probably wear grotesque and disconnected garments, doubtful boots and striking stockings, her figure would rapidly give way before the insidiousness of _Schweinebraten_, but her hair would always be beautifully done, each plait smooth and in its proper place, each little curl exactly where it ought to be, the parting a model of straightness, and the whole well deserving to be dignified by the name _Frisur_. English girls have hair, but they do not have _Frisurs_."
Anna came in through the open window, and Trudi"s face expanded into the most genial smiles. "How glad I am to make your acquaintance!" she cried enthusiastically. She spoke English quite as correctly as her brother, and much more glibly. "I hope you will let me help you if I can be of any use. My brother says your uncle was so good to him. When I lived here he was very kind to me too. How brave of you to stay here! And what wonderful plans you have made! My brother has told me about your twelve ladies. What courage to undertake to make twelve women happy. I find it hard enough work making one person happy."
"One person? Oh, Graf Hasdorf."
"Oh no, myself. You see, if each person devoted his energies to making himself happy, everybody would be happy."
"No, they wouldn"t," said Anna, "because they do, but they"re not."
They looked at each other and laughed. "She only needs Jungbluth to be perfect," thought Trudi; and with her usual impulsiveness began immediately to love her.
Anna was delighted to meet someone of her own cla.s.s and age after the severe though short course she had had of Dellwigs and Manskes; and Trudi was so much interested in her plans, and so pressing in her offers of help, that she very soon found herself telling her all her difficulties about servants, sheets, wall-papers, and whitewash. "Look at this paper," she said, "could you live in the same room with it? No one will ever be able to feel cheerful as long as it is here. And the one in the dining-room is worse."
"It isn"t beautiful," said Trudi, examining it, "but it is what we call _praktisch_."
"Then I don"t like what you call _praktisch_."
"Neither do I. All the hideous things are _praktisch_--oil-cloth, black wall-papers, handkerchiefs a yard square, thick boots, ugly women--if ever you hear a woman praised as a _praktische Frau_, be sure she"s frightful in every way--ugly and dull. The uglier she is the _praktischer_ she is. Oh," said Trudi, casting up her eyes, "how terrible, how tragic, to be an ugly woman!" Then, bringing her gaze down again to Anna"s face, she added, "My flat in Hanover is all pinks and blues--the most becoming rooms you can imagine. I look so nice in them."
"Pinks and blues? That is just what I want here. Can"t I get any in Stralsund?"
Trudi was doubtful. She could not think it possible that anybody should ever get anything in Stralsund.