No test--
The end. The end.
Lilly stared into s.p.a.ce. She seemed to hear a tread dying away--a step lower, another step, another step, and another--growing fainter--ever fainter--as when Konrad had slipped away from her at dawn.
But this time they would never return!
She felt a slight gnawing disenchantment creep about her heart--nothing more. The worst would come later, she knew from of old.
Then she saw herself dancing and yodeling and telling hoggish jokes with her hat tilted to one side and her petticoats raised to her knees--a drunken wench.
She of the "lofty spirit" and "head divine,"--a drunken wench, not a whit better.
Now she knew why he had stood there white as chalk, why that sob of distress had burst from his lips.
And the feeling that poured over her in that second like a stream of boiling water was compounded as much of pity for Konrad as of shame of herself.
"How does he bear it?" she faltered.
"You can imagine how," he replied, "but I think I can pull him through it."
"Uncle--I didn"t _mean_ to!" she cried with a great sob.
"I know, child, I know. He told me everything."
For an instant wounded pride flared up within her. She stopped, picked up a few of the scattered bits of paper, and held them out to him in the hollow of her hand.
"And you dared to offer me this?"
"Why, what was I to do, child? And what _will_ I do with you?"
"Bah!"
She struck at him with both hands; but the next instant threw her arms about his neck, and wept on his shoulder. That was the place perhaps on which Konrad"s tearful face had also rested the night before.
Mr. Rennschmidt began to speak again. He made various proposals for her future. He would help her begin a new life, would give her the means for cultivating her great talent for the stage.
But she shook her head at each of his suggestions.
"Too late, uncle. Waste-land, you yourself said, where confidence will not strike root. I might aspire to music-hall fame. But to be quite frank, that wouldn"t pay me."
"The d.a.m.ned curs!" he hissed.
"What curs?"
"You know."
She reflected as to whom he could possibly mean.
"There was really only one," she observed. "Oh, yes, and another--and then one more. And later there were two besides, but they don"t count."
"It seems to me that"s quite enough, little girl."
He stroked her cheeks, smiling kindly, and she did not find his fingers so disgusting.
She even had to smile in response, though she fell directly to crying again.
Mr. Rennschmidt prepared to take leave. She clung to his shoulder; she did not want to let him go. He was the last bridge that joined her departing vessel with the land of happiness.
"What message shall I take to him?" he asked.
She drew herself up. Her eyes widened. She wanted to pour out all her grief. Her squandered love sought for words which would carry it to him purged and sanctified.
But she found none.
She looked about the room as if help must come from some quarter. The pictures of the ancient actors smiled upon her. Those who had once been so eloquent had become dumb, dumb as her own soul. The framed lamp shade greeted her as if the future she had to pa.s.s at Mrs. Laue"s side was greeting her.
"I don"t know what to say," she faltered. Then something occurred to her after all. "Please ask him--please ask him--why he himself didn"t come to say good-by. I know him. He is not a coward."
Mr. Rennschmidt made his queerest face.
"Since you"re so remarkably sensible, child, I"ll tell you. Of _course_ he wanted to come and say good-by. I even told him I"d try to drag you to the station."
Without an instant"s reflection she made a dash for her hat.
"Stop!"
He had laid his hand on her arm.
The little fat figure grew taller.
"You will _not_ go."
"What! Konni is waiting for me--Konni wants to speak to me--and I am _not_ to go?"
"You--_will--not--go_, I tell you. If you"re the brave girl I took you to be, you will not nullify the sacrifice you"re making. You can reckon upon it, if he sees you again, you"ll both remain hanging on each other."
Her hat slipped from her hand.
"Then--tell him--I"ll love him--forever--forever--he"ll be my last thought on earth--and--and--I don"t know what else to say."
He left the room without a word.
Then she collapsed.