Then suddenly--from the depth of the silence that was about him--resounded in a long-drawn, shrill, whirring voice that he had never heard--his own name.
"Rrricharrd!" it shrilled, stern and hard as the command of some paternal martinet. The voice seemed to come from subterranean depths.
He shivered and looked about. Nothing moved. There was no living soul in the next room.
"Richard!" the voice sounded a second time. This time the sound seemed but a few paces from him, but it arose from the ground as though a teasing goblin lay under his chair.
He bent over and peered into dark corners.
The mystery was solved: Joko, Alice"s parrot, having secretly stolen from his quarters, sat on the rung of a chair and played the evil conscience of the house.
The tame animal stepped with dignity upon his outstretched hand and permitted itself to be lifted into the light.... Its glittering neck-feathers stood up, and while it whetted its beak on Niebeldingk"s cuff-links, it repeated in a most subterranean voice: "Richard!"
And suddenly the dear feeling of belonging here, of being at home came over Niebeldingk. He had all but lost it. But its gentle power drew him on and refreshed him.
It was his right and his duty to be at home here where a dear woman lived so exclusively for him that the voice of her yearning sounded even from the tongue of the brute beast that she possessed! There was no possibility of feeling free and alien here.
"I must find her!" he thought quickly, "I musn"t leave her alone another second."
He set Joko carefully on the table and sought to reach her bed-room which he had never entered by this approach.
In the door that led to the rear hall she met him. Her demeanour had its accustomed calm, her eyes were clear and dry.
"My poor, dear darling!" he cried and wanted to take her in his arms.
A strange, repelling glance met him and interrupted his beautiful emotion. Something hardened in him and he felt a new inclination to sarcasm.
"Forgive me for leaving you," she said, "one must have patience with the folly of my s.e.x. You know that well."
And she preceded him to his old place.
Screaming with pleasure Joko flew forward to meet her, and Niebeldingk remained standing to take his leave.
She did not hold him back.
Outside it occurred to him that he hadn"t told her the anecdote of Fritz and the Indian lilies.
"It"s a pity," he thought, "it might have cheered her." ...
Chapter VIII
Next morning Niebeldingk sat at his desk and reflected with considerable discomfort on the experience of the previous evening.
Suddenly he observed, across the street, restlessly waiting in the same doorway--the avenging spirit!
It was an opportune moment. It would distract him to make an example of the fellow. Nothing better could have happened.
He rang for John and ordered him to bring up the wretched fellow and, furthermore, to hold himself in readiness for an act of vigorous expulsion.
Five minutes pa.s.sed. Then the door opened and, diffidently, but with a kind of professional dignity, the knight of several honourable orders entered the room.
Niebeldingk made rapid observations: A beardless, weatherworn old face with pointed, stiff, white brows. The little, watery eyes knew how to hide their cunning, for nothing was visible in them save an expression of wonder and consternation. The black frock coat was threadbare but clean, his linen was spotless. He wore a stock which had been the last word of fashion at the time of the July revolution.
"A sharper of the most sophisticated sort," Niebeldingk concluded.
"Before any discussion takes place," he said sharply. "I must know with whom I am dealing."
The old man drew off with considerable difficulty his torn, gray, funereal gloves and, from the depths of a greasy pocket-book, produced a card which had, evidently, pa.s.sed through a good many hands.
"A sharper," Niebeldingk repeated to himself, "but on a pretty low plane." He read the card: "Kohleman, retired clerk of court." And below was printed the addition: "Knight of several orders."
"What decorations have you?" he asked.
"I have been very graciously granted the Order of the Crown, fourth cla.s.s, and the general order for good behaviour."
"Sit down," Niebeldingk replied, impelled by a slight instinctive respect.
"Thank you, I"ll take the liberty," the old gentleman answered and sat down on the extreme edge of a chair.
"Once on the stairs you--" he was about to say "attacked me," but he repressed the words. "I know," he began, "what your business is.
And now tell me frankly: Do you think any man in the world such a fool as to contemplate marriage because a frivolous young thing whose acquaintance he made at a supper given to "cocottes" accompanies him, in the middle of the night, to his bachelor quarters? Do you think that a reasonable proposition?"
"No," the old gentleman answered with touching honesty. "But you know it"s pretty discouraging to have Meta get into that kind of a mess.
I"ve had my suspicions for some time that that baggage is a keener, and I"ve often said to my sister: "Look here, these theatrical women are no proper company for a girl--""
"Well then," Niebeldingk exclaimed, overcome with astonishment, "if that"s the case, what are you after?"
"I?" the old gentleman quavered and pointed a funereal glove at his breast, "I? Oh, dear sakes alive! I"m not after anything. Do you imagine, my dear sir, that I get any fun out of tramping up and down in front of your house on my old legs? I"d rather sit in a corner and leave strange people to their own business. But what can I do? I live in my sister"s house, and I do pay her a little board, for I"d never take a present, not a penny--that was never my way. But what I pay isn"t much, you know, and so I have to make myself a bit useful in the boarding-house. The ladies have little errands, you know. And they"re quite nice, too, except that they get as nasty as can be if their rooms aren"t promptly cleaned in the morning, and so I help with the dusting, too ... If only it weren"t for my asthma ... I tell, you, asthma, my dear sir--"
He stopped for an attack of coughing choked him.
With a sudden kindly emotion Niebeldingk regarded the terrible avenger in horror of whom he had lived four mortal days. He told him to stretch his poor old legs and asked him whether he"d like a gla.s.s of Madeira.
The old gentleman"s face brightened. If it would surely give no trouble he would take the liberty of accepting.
Niebeldingk rang and John entered with a grand inquisitorial air. He recoiled when he saw the monster so comfortable and, for the first time in his service, permitted himself a gentle shake of the head.
The old gentleman emptied his gla.s.s in one gulp and wiped his mouth with a brownish cotton handkerchief. Fragments of tobacco flew about.
He looked so tenderly at the destroyer of his family as though he had a sneaking desire to join the enemy.
"Well, well," he began again. "What"s to be done? If my sister takes something into her head.... And anyhow, I"ll tell you in confidence, she is a devil. Oh deary me, what I have to put up with from her! It"s no good getting into trouble with her! ... If you want to avoid any unpleasantness, I can only advise you to consent right away.... You can back out later.... But that would be the easiest way."
Niebeldingk laughed heartily.
"Yes, you can laugh," the old gentleman said sadly, "that"s because you don"t know my sister."