diff options
| author | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-05 22:22:42 -0800 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-05 22:22:42 -0800 |
| commit | 30288b537eebedaf0e7ec3c5a4e123fe3c346c8b (patch) | |
| tree | 7ac2f0a4b890f2f9d52c74411700fdbf189ba779 | |
| parent | 8fe7c60be556dc306005459187bf73250c7d23b4 (diff) | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 4 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/52137-0.txt | 8223 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/52137-h/52137-h.htm | 8382 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 89278 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old/52137-0.txt | 8614 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old/52137-0.zip | bin | 168610 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old/52137-h.zip | bin | 260831 -> 0 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm | 8790 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | old/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 89278 -> 0 bytes |
11 files changed, 17 insertions, 34009 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2efa12b --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #52137 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52137) diff --git a/old/52137-0.txt b/old/52137-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index f706413..0000000 --- a/old/52137-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8223 +0,0 @@ -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52137 *** - -WANDA - -BY - -OUIDA - - - _'Doch!--alles was dazu mich trieb_; - _Gott!--war so gut, ach, war so lieb!'_ - Goethe - - - -IN THREE VOLUMES - -VOL. III. - - -LONDON - -CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY - -1883 - - - - -WANDA. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX. - - -When they came home from their tour amidst the mines of Galicia and -the plains of Hungary, and from their reception amongst the adoring -townsfolk of restored Idrac, the autumn was far advanced, and the long -rains and the wild winds of October had risen, making of every brook a -torrent. - -On their return she found intelligence from Paris that a friend of -her father's, and her own godfather, the Duc de Noira, had died, -bequeathing her his gallery of pictures, and his art collection of -the eighteenth century, which were both famous. The Duc had been a -Legitimist and a hermit. He had been unmarried, and had spent all the -latter years of his life in amassing treasures of art, for which he had -no heir of his own blood to care a jot. The bequest was a very precious -one, and her presence in Paris was requested. Regretful for herself -to leave Hohenszalras, she perceived that to Sabran the tidings were -welcome. Moved by an unselfish impulse she said at once: - -'Go alone; go instead of me; your presence will be the same as mine. -Paris will amuse you more if you are by yourself, and you will be so -happy amongst all those Lancrets and Fragonards, those Reiseiners -and Gauthières. The collection is a marvel, but entirely of the Beau -Siècle. You never saw it? No! I think the Duc never opened his doors -to anyone save to half a dozen old tried friends, and he had a horror -of turning his _salons_ into showrooms. If you think well, we will -leave it all as it is, buying the house if we can. All that eighteenth -century _bibeloterie_ would not suit this place, and I should like to -keep it all as he kept it; that is the only true respect to show to a -legacy.' - -Sabran hesitated; he was tempted, yet he was half reluctant to yield to -the temptation. He felt that he would willingly be by himself awhile, -yet he loved his wife too passionately to quit her without pain. His -own conscience made her presence at times oppress and trouble him, yet -he had never lost the half-religious adoration with which she had first -inspired him. He suggested a compromise--why should they not winter in -Paris? - -She was about to dissent, for of all seasons in the Tauern she loved -the winter best; but when she looked at him she saw such eager -anticipation on his face that she suppressed her own wishes unuttered. - -'We will go, if you like,' she said, without any hesitation or -reluctance visible. 'I dare say we can find some pretty house. Aunt -Ottilie will be pleased; there is nothing here which cannot do without -us for a time, we have such trusty stewards; only I think it would be -more change for you if you went alone.' - -'No!' he said; 'separation is a sort of death; do not let us tempt fate -by it. Life is so short at its longest; it is ingratitude to lose an -hour that we can spend together.' - -'There was never such a lover since Petrarca,' she said, with a smile. -'Nay, you eclipse him: he was never tried by marriage.' - -But though he jested at it, his great love for her seemed like a -beautiful light about her life. What did his state-secret matter? What -did it matter what cause had led him to avoid political life?--he loved -her so well. - -The following month they were in Paris, having found an hotel in the -Boulevard St. Germain, standing in a great sunny garden; and when they -were fairly installed there, the Princess and the children and the -horses followed them, and their arrival made an event of great interest -and importance in the city which of all others in the world it is -hardest thus to impress. - -The Countess von Szalras, a notability always, was celebrated just -then as the inheritress of the coveted Noira collection, which it had -been fondly hoped would have gone to the hammer: and Sabran, popular -always, and not forgotten here, where most things and people are -forgotten in a week, was courted, flattered, and welcomed by men and -by women; and as he rode down the Allée des Acacias, or entered the -Mirlitons, he felt himself at home. His beautiful wife, his beautiful -children, his incomparable horses, his marvellous good fortune were the -talk of all those who had already left their country-houses for the -winter _rentrée_, and attained a publicity, beginning with the great -Szalras pearls and ending with the babies' white donkeys, which was the -greatest of all possible offences to her; she abhorred and contemned -publicity with the sensitiveness of a delicate temper and the contempt -of a scornful patrician. - -To Sabran it was not so offensive; there was the Slav in him, which -loved display, and was not ill-pleased by notoriety. All this -admiration around them made him feel that his life after all had been -a great success, that he had drawn prizes in the lottery of fate which -all men envied him; it helped him to forget Egon Vàsàrhely. He had -never so nearly felt affection for Bela as when lines of men and women -stood still to watch the handsome child gallop on his pony down the -avenues of the Bois. - -'Life is after all like baccara or billiards,' he said to himself. -'It is of no use winning unless there be a _galerie_ to look on and -applaud.' - -And then he felt ashamed of the poorness and triviality of the thought, -which was not one he would have expressed to his wife. That very -morning, when she had read a long flattery of herself in a journal of -fashion, she had cast the sheet from her with disgust on every line of -her face. - -'We are safe from _that_, at least, in the Iselthal,' she had said. -'Cannot you make them understand that we are not public artists to -need _réclames_, nor yet sovereigns to be compelled to submit to the -microscope? Is this the meaning of civilisation--to make privacy -impossible, to oblige every one to live under a lens?' - -He had affected to agree with her, but in his heart he had not done so. -He liked the fumes of the incense. So did his child. - -'They will put this in the papers!' said Bela, when the snow came and -he had his sledge out for the first time with four little Hungarian -ponies. - -'That is the poison of cities!' said Wanda, as she heard him. 'Who can -have been so foolish as to tell him of the papers?' - -'Your heir, my dear, will never want for reporters of any flattery,' -said his father. 'It is as well he should run the gauntlet of them -early.' - -Bela listened, and said to his brother a little later: 'I like Paris. -Paris prints everything we do, and the people read the print, and then -they want to see us.' - -'What good is that?' said Gela. 'I like home. They all of them _know_ -us; they don't want to _see_ us. That is much better.' - -'No, it isn't,' said Bela. 'One drives all day long at home, and there -is nothing but the trees; here the trees are all people, and the people -talk of us, and the people want to _be_ us.' - -'But they love us at home,' said Gela. - -'That does not matter,' said Bela with hauteur. - -Wanda called the children to her. - -'Bela,' she said gently, 'do you know that once, not so very long ago, -there was a little boy here in Paris very much like you, with golden -hair and velvet coat like yours, and he was called the Dauphin, and -when he went out with his servants, as you do, the people envied him, -and talked of him, and put in print what he did each day? The people -wanted to _be_ him, as you say, but they did not love him--poor little -child!--because they envied him so. And in a very little while--a -very, very little while--because it was envy and not love, they put -the Dauphin in prison, and they cut off his golden hair, and gave -him nothing but bread and water and filthy straw, and locked him up -all alone till he died. That is the use of being envied in Paris--or -anywhere else. Gela is right. It is better when people love us.' - -The next day, as Bela drove in his sledge down the white avenues -through the staring crowds, his little fair face was very grave under -its curls; he thought of the Dauphin. - -When the weather opened, Wanda took him and his brother to Versailles -and Trianon, and told them more of that saddest of all earthly -histories of fallen greatness. Gela sobbed aloud; Bela was silent and -grew pale. - -'I hate Paris,' he said very slowly, as they went back to it in the red -close of the wintry afternoon. - -'Do not hate Paris. Do not hate anything or anyone,' said his mother -softly; 'but love your own home and your own people, and be grateful -for them.' - -Bela lifted his little cap and made the sign of the Cross, as he did -when he saw anything holy. 'I am the Dauphin at home,' he thought; and -he felt the tears in his eyes, though he never would cry as Gela did. - -So she gave them her simples as antidotes to the city's poison, and -occupied herself with her children, with the poor around her, with the -various details of her distant estates, and paid but little heed to -that artificial world which, when she heeded it, offended and irritated -her. To please Sabran she went to a few great houses and to the opera, -and gave many entertainments herself, happy that he was happy in it, -but not otherwise interested in the life around her, or moved by the -homage of it. - -'It is much more my jewels than it is myself that they stare at,' she -assured him, when he told her of the admiration which she elicited -wherever she appeared. 'Believe me, if you put my pearls or my -diamonds on Madame Chose or Baroness Niemand, they would gather and -gaze quite as much.' - -He laughed. - -'Last night I think you wore no ornaments except a few tea-roses, and I -saw them follow you just the same. It is very odd that you never seem -to understand that you are a beautiful woman.' - -'I am glad to be so in your eyes, if I never shall be in my own. As for -that popularity of society, it never commended itself to me. It has too -strong a savour of the mob.' - -'When you are so proud to the world why are you so humble to me?' - -She was silent a moment, then said: - -'I think when one loves any other very much, one becomes for him -altogether unlike what one is to the world. As for being proud, I have -never fairly made out whether my pride is humility or my humility -pride, and none of my confessors have ever been able to tell me. I -assure you I have searched my heart in vain.' - -A shadow passed over his face; he thought that there even would be -pride enough to send him out for ever from her side if she knew---- - -One day she suggested to him that he should visit Romaris. - -'Now you are near for so long a time, surely you should go,' she urged. -'It is not well never to see your poor people. The priest is a good -man, indeed; but he cannot altogether make up for your absence.' - -He answered with some irritation that they were not his people. All -the land had been parcelled out, and nothing remained to the name of -Sabran except a strip of the sea-shore and one old half ruined tower: -he could not see that he had any duties or obligations there. She did -not insist, because she never pursued a theme which appeared unwelcome; -but in herself she wondered at the dislike which was in him towards his -Breton hamlet, wondered that he did not wish one of his sons to bear -its title, wondered that he did not desire the children to see once, -at least, the sea-nest of his forefathers. It was more effort to her -than usual to restrain herself from pressing questions upon him. But -she did forbear; and as a consolation to her conscience sent to the -Curé of Romaris a sum of money for the poor, which was so large that it -astounded and bewildered the holy man by the weight of responsibility -it laid on him. - -The indifference shocked her the more because of the profound -conviction, in which she had been reared, of the duties of the noble -to his poorer brethren, and the ties of mutual affection which bound -together her and her people's interests. - -'The weapon of our order against the Socialist is duty,' she had once -said to him. - -He, more sceptical, had told her that no weapon, not even that anointed -one, can turn aside the devilish hate of envy. But she held to her -creed, and strove to rear her children in its tenets. It always seemed -to her that the Cross before which the fiend shrinks cowering in -'Faust' is but a symbol of the power of a noble life to force even -hatred to its knees. - -She did not care for this season in Paris, but she did not let him -perceive any dissatisfaction in her. She made her own interests out of -the arts and charity; she bought the Hôtel Noira, and left everything -as the Duc had left it; she found pleasure in intercourse with her -royal exiled friends, and left her husband his own entire liberty of -action. - -'Are you never jealous?' said her royal friend to her once. 'He is so -much liked--so much made love to--I wonder you are not jealous!' - -'I?' she echoed: and it seemed to her friend as if in that one pronoun -she had said volumes. 'Jealous!' - -She repeated the word as she drove home alone that day, and almost -wondered what it meant. Who could be to him what she was? Who could -dethrone her from that 'great white throne' to which his adoration had -raised her? If his senses ever strayed, his soul would never swerve -from its loyalty. - -When she reached home that afternoon she found a card, on which was -written with a pencil, in German: - -'So sorry not to find you. I am in Paris to see my doctor. Zdenka has -taken my service at Court. I will come to you to-morrow.' - -The card was Madame Brancka's. - - - - -CHAPTER XXX. - - -Sabran, that same afternoon, as he had walked down the Rue de la Paix, -had been signalled and stopped by a pretty woman wrapped to the eyes -in blue fox furs, who was being driven in a low carriage by Hungarian -horses, glorious in silver chains and trappings. - -'My dear Réné,' had cried Madame Olga, 'do you not know me, that -you compel me to flourish my parasol? Yes: I am come to Paris. My -sister-in-law, Zdenka, will do my waiting. I wanted to consult my -physician; I am very unwell, though you look so incredulous. So Wanda -has all the Noira collection? What a fortunate woman she is. The -eighteenth century is the least suited to her taste. She will heartily -despise all those shepherdesses _en panier_ and those smiling deities -on lacquer. How could the Duc leave such frivolities to so serious a -person? What is her doubled rose-leaf amidst all her good luck? She -must have one. I suppose it is you? Well, you will find me at home in -an hour. I am only a stone's throw from your hotel. Have you brought -all the homespun virtues with you from Hohenszalras? I am afraid they -will wither in the air of the boulevards. _Au revoir!_ - -And then she had laughed again and kissed her finger-tips to him, and -driven away wrapped up in her shining furs, and he was conscious of a -stinging sense of excitement, annoyance, pleasure, and confusion, as if -he had drunk some irritant and heady wine. - -He had gone on to his clubs with an uneasy sense of something -perilous and distasteful having come into his life, yet also with a -consciousness of a certain zest added to the reductions of this his -favourite city. He did not go to the Hôtel Brancka in the next hour, -and was sensible of having to exercise a certain control over himself -to refrain from doing so. - -'Did you know that Olga was in Paris?' she said, in some surprise, to -him when they met in the evening. - -'I believe she arrived this morning,' he answered, with a certain -effort. 'I met her an hour or two ago. She came unexpectedly; she had -not even told her servants to open her hotel.' - -'Is Stefan with her?' - -'I believe not.' - -'But surely it is her term of waiting in Vienna?' - -He gave a gesture of indifference. - -'I believed it was. I think it was. She will be sure to write to you -this evening, so she said. We cannot escape her, you see; she is our -fate.' - -'We can go back to Hohenszalras.' - -'That would be too absurd. We cannot spend our lives running away from -Madame Brancka. We have a hundred engagements here. Besides, your Noira -affair is not one half settled as yet, and it is only now that Paris is -really agreeable. We will go back in May, after Chantilly.' - -'As you like,' she said, with a smile of ready acquiescence. - -She was only there for his sake. She, would not spoil his contentment -by showing that she made a sacrifice. She was never really happy away -from her mountains, but she did not wish him to suspect that. - -The Hôtel Brancka was a charming little temple of luxury, ordered -after the last mode, and as _pimpant_ as its mistress. It had cost -enormous sums of money, and its walls had been painted by famous -artists with fantastic and voluptuous subjects, which had not been paid -for at the present. - -In finance, indeed, she was much like a king of recent time, who never -had any money to give, but always said to his mistresses, 'Order -whatever you like; the Civil List will always pay my bills.' She had -never any money, but she knew that her brother-in-law, like the king's -ministers, would always pay her bills. - -'One expects to hear the "Decamerone" read here,' said Wanda, with some -disdain, as she glanced around her on her first visit. - -'At Hohenszalras one would never dare to read anything but the -"Imitationis Christi,"' said Madame Olga, with contempt of another sort. - -The little hotel was but a few streets distance off their own grand and -spacious residence, which had undergone scarcely any change since the -days of Louis XV. They saw the Countess Brancka very often, could not -choose but see her when she chose, and that was almost perpetually. - -He had honestly, and even intensely, desired not to be subjected to her -vicinity. But it was difficult to resist its seduction when she lived -within a few yards of him, when she met him at every turn, when the -changing scenes of society were like those of a kaleidoscope, always -composed of the same pieces. The closeness of her relationship to his -wife made an avoidance of her, which would have been easy with a mere -acquaintance, wholly out of possibility. She pleaded her 'poverty' very -prettily, as a plea to borrow their riding-horses, use their boxes -at the Opéra and the Théâtre Français, and be constantly, under one -pretext or another, seeking their advice. Wanda, who knew the enormous -extravagance of both the Branckas, and the inroads which their debts -made on even the magnificent fortunes of Egon Vàsàrhely, had not as -much patience as usual in her before these plaintive pretences. - -'_Wanda me boude_', said Madame Brancka, with touching reproachfulness, -and sought a refuge and a confidant in the sympathy of Sabran, which -was not given very cordially, yet could not be altogether refused. Not -only were they in the same world, but she made a thousand claims on -their friendship, on their relationship. Stefan Brancka was in Hungary. -She wanted Sabran's advice about her horses, about her tradespeople, -about her disputes with the artists who had decorated her house; she -sent for him without ceremony, and, with insistence, made him ride with -her, drive with her, dance with her, made him take her to see certain -diversions which were not wholly fitted for a woman of her rank, and so -rapidly and imperceptibly gained ascendency over him that before making -any engagement he involuntarily paused to learn whether she had any -claim on his time. It caused his wife the same vague impatience which -she had felt when Olga Brancka had persisted in going out with him on -hunting excursions at home. But she thrust away her observation of it -as unworthy of her. - -'If she tire him,' she thought, 'he will very soon put her aside.' - -But he did not do so. - -Once she said to him, with a little irony, 'You do not dislike Olga so -very much now?' and to her surprise he coloured and answered quickly, -'I am not sure that I do not hate her.' - -'She certainly does not hate you,' said Wanda, a little contemptuously. - -'Who knows?' he said gloomily; 'who could ever be sure of anything with -a woman like that?' - -'Mutability has a charm for some persons,' said his wife, with an -irritation for which she despised herself. - -'Not for me,' said Sabran, quickly. 'My opinion of Madame Olga is -precisely what it has always been.' - -'Are you very sincere to her, then?' said Wanda, and as she spoke, -regretted it. What was Olga Brancka that she should for a moment bring -any shadow of dissension between them? - -'Sincere!' he echoed, with a certain embarrassment. 'Who would she -expect to be so? I told you once before that you pay her in a coin of -which she could not decipher the superscription!' - -Wanda smiled, but she was pained by his tone. 'You are not the first -man, I suppose, who amuses himself with what he despises,' she -answered. 'But I do not think it is a very noble sport, or a very -healthy one. Forgive me, dear, if I seem to preach to you.' - -'Preach on for ever, my beloved divine. You can never weary me,' said -Sabran, and he stooped and kissed her. - -She did not return his caress. - -That day as she drove with the Princess in the Bois, Bela and Gela -facing her, she saw him in the side alley riding with the Countess -Brancka. A physical pain seemed to contract her heart for a moment. - -'Olga is very _accaparante_,' said the Princess, perceiving them also. -'Not content with borrowing your Arabs, she must have your husband also -as her cavalier.' - -'If she amuse him I am her debtor,' said Wanda, very calmly. - -'Amuse! Can a man who has lived with you be amused by her?' - -'I am not amusing,' said his wife, with a smile which was not mirthful. -'Men are like Bela and Gela; they cannot always be serious.' - -Then she told her coachman to leave the Bois and drive out into the -country. She did not care to meet those riders at every turn in the -avenues. - -'My dear Réné,' said the Princess, when she happened to see him alone. -'Can you find no one in all Paris to divert yourself with except Stefan -Brancka's wife? I thought you disliked her.' - -Sabran hesitated. - -'She is related to us,' he said a little feebly. 'One sees her of -necessity a hundred times a week.' - -'For our misfortune,' said the Princess, sententiously. 'But she is not -altogether friendless in Paris. Can she find no one but you to ride -with her?' - -'Has Wanda been complaining to you?' - -'My dear Marquis,' replied Madame Ottilie, with dignity. 'Your wife is -not a person to complain; you must understand her singularly little -after all, if you suppose that. But I think, if you would calculate the -hours you have of late passed in Madame Brancka's society, you would -be surprised to see how large a sum they make up of your time. It is -not for me to presume to dictate to you; you are your own master, of -course: only I do not think that Olga Brancka, whom I have known from -her childhood, is worth a single half-hour's annoyance to Wanda.' - -Sabran rose, and his lips parted to speak, but he hesitated what to -say, and the Princess, who was not without tact, left him to receive -herself some sisters of S. Vincent de Paul. His conscience was not -wholly clear. He was conscious of a pungent, irresistible, even whilst -undesired, attraction that this Russian woman possessed for him; it was -something of the same potent yet detestable influence which Cochonette -had exercised over him. Olga Brancka had the secret of amusing men and -of exciting their baser natures; she had a trick of talk which sparkled -like wine, and, without being actually wit, illumined and diverted -her companions. She was a mistress of all the arts of provocation, -and had a cruel power of making all scruples of conscience and all -honesties and gravities of purpose seem absurd. She made no disguise of -her admiration of Sabran, and conveyed the sense of it in a thousand -delicate and subtle modes of flattery. He read her very accurately, and -had neither esteem nor regard for her, and yet she had an attraction -for him. Her boudoir, all wadded softly with golden satin like a -jewel-box, with its perpetual odour of roses and its faint light -coloured like the roses, was a little temple of all the graces, in -which men were neither wise nor calm. She had a power of turning their -very souls inside out like a glove, and after she had done so they were -never worth quite as much again. The fascination which Sabran possessed -for her was that he never gave up his soul to her as the others did; he -was always beyond her reach; she was always conscious that she was shut -out from his inmost thoughts. - -The sort of passion she had conceived for him grew, because it was -fanned by many things--by his constancy to his wife, by his personal -beauty, by her vague enmity to Wanda, by the sense of guilt and of -indecency which would attach in the world's sight to such a passion. -Her palate in pleasure was at once hardened and fastidious; it required -strong food, and her audacity in search of it was not easily daunted. -She knew, too, that he had some secret which his wife did not share; -she was resolved to penetrate it. She had tried all other means; there -only now remained one----to surprise or to beguile it from himself. To -this end, cautious and patient as a cat, she had resumed her intimacy -with them as relations, and with all the delicate arts of which she was -a proficient, strove to make her companionship agreeable and necessary -to him. Before long he became sensible of a certain unwholesome charm -in her society. He went with her to the opera, he took her to pass -hours amidst the Noira collection, he rode with her often; now and then -he dined with her alone, or almost alone, in a small oval room of pure -Japanese, where great silvery birds and white lilies seemed to float on -a golden field, and the dishes were silver lotus leaves, and the lamps -burned in pale green translucent gourds hanging on silver stalks. - -An artificial woman is nothing without her _mise en scène_; -transplanted amidst natural landscape and out-of-door life she is -apt to become either ridiculous or tiresome. Madame Brancka in Paris -was in her own playhouse; she looked well, and was in her own manner -irresistible. At Hohenszalras she had been as out of keeping with -all her atmosphere as her enamel buttons, her jewelled alpenstock, -her cravat of pointe d'Alençon, and her softly-tinted cheeks had been -out of place in the drenching rain-storms and mountain-winds of the -Archduchy of Austria. - -He knew very well that the attraction she possessed for him was of -no higher sort than that which the theatre had; he seemed to be -always present at a perfect comedy played with exquisite grace amidst -unusually perfect decorations. But there was a certain artificial bias -in his own temperament which made him at home there. His whole life -after all had been an actor's. His wife had said rightly: 'Men cannot -be always serious.' It was just his idler, falser moods which Olga -Brancka suited, and his very fear of her gave a thrill of greater power -to his amusement. When the Princess, his devoted friend, reproved him, -he was unpleasantly aroused from his unwise indulgence in a perilous -pursuit. To pain his wife would be to commit a monstrous crime, a -crime of blackest ingratitude. He knew that; he was ever alive to the -enormity of his debt to her, he was for ever dissatisfied with himself -for being unable to become more worthy of her. - -'She jealous!' he thought. It seemed to him impossible, yet his vanity -could not repress a throb of exultation; it almost seemed to him -that in making her more human it would make her more near his level. -Jealous! It was not a word which was in any keeping with her; jealousy -was a wild, coarse, undisciplined, suspicious passion, far removed from -the calmness and the strength of her nature. - -At that moment she entered the room, coming from a drive in the -forenoon. It was still cold. She had a cloak of black sables reaching -to her feet; it still rested on her shoulders. Her head was uncovered; -she had never looked taller, fairer, more stately; the black furs -seemed like some northern robes of coronation. Beneath them gleamed the -great gold clasps of a belt, and gold lions' heads fastening her olive -velvet gown. - -'Jealous!' he thought, 'this queen amongst women!' His heart sank. -'She would never say anything,' he thought; 'she would leave me.' -Almost he expected her to divine his thoughts. He was relieved when she -spoke to him of some mere trifle of the day. Like many men he could -not be frank, because frankness would have seemed like insult to his -wife. He could not explain to her the mingled aversion and attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him, the curious stinging irritation -which she produced on his nerves and his senses, so that he despised -her, disliked her, and yet could not wholly resist the charm of her -unwholesome magic. How could he say this to his wife? How could he -hope to make her understand, or if she understood, persuade her not to -resent as the bitterest of affronts this power which another woman, -and that woman nearly connected with her, possessed? Besides, even if -he went so far, if he leaned so much on the nobility of her nature as -to venture to do this, he knew very well that she would in reason say -to him, 'Let us go away from where this danger exists.' He did not -desire to go away. He was glad of this old life of pleasure, which let -him forget his secret sorrow. Amidst the excitations of Paris he could -push away the remembrance that another man knew the shame of his life. -The calm and the solitude of Hohenszalras, which had been delightful -to him once, had grown irksome when he had begun to cling to them for -fear lest any other should remember as Vàsàrhely had remembered. Here -in Paris, where he had always been popular, admired, well known, he was -as it were in his own kingdom, and the magnificence with which he could -now live there brought him troops of friends. He hoped that his wife -would not be unwilling to pass a season there in every year, and he -stifled as it rose his consciousness that she would assent to whatever -he wished, however painful or unwelcome to herself. - -'It is really very unwholesome for you to be married to such a saint -as Wanda,' his tormentor said to him one day. 'You do not know what a -little opposition and contradiction would do for you.' - -They were visiting the Hôtel Noira, studying the probable effects of -a new method of lighting the gallery which he contemplated, and she -continued abruptly: - -'Wanda has been buying very largely in Paris, has she not? And she has -bought this hotel of the Noira heirs, I believe? You mean to keep it -altogether as it is; and of course you will come and live in it?' - -'Whenever she pleases,' he answered, intent on a Lancret not well hung. - -'Whenever you please,' said Madame Brancka. 'Why will you pretend -that Wanda has any separate will of her own? It is marvellous to see -so resolute a person as she was as obediently bent as a willow-wand. -But all this French property will constitute quite a fortune apart. I -suppose it will all be settled on your third son, as Gela is to have -Idrac? Will not you give him your title? Count Victor de Sabran will -sound very pretty, and you might rebuild Romaris.' - -He turned from her with impatience. - -'Are we so very old that you want to parcel out our succession amongst -babies? No; I do not intend to give my name to any of Wanda's children. -There is an Imperial permission for them all to bear hers.' - -'You are not very loyal to your forefathers,' said Madame Brancka. -'Wanda might well spare them one of her boys. If not, what is the use -of accumulating all this property in France?' - -'All that she buys is done out of respect for the Duc de Noira,' said -Sabran, curtly. 'If she bear me twenty sons they will all have her -name. It was settled so on the marriage-deeds and ratified by the -Kaiser.' - -'Are prince-consorts always deposed from any throne they have of their -own?' said Madame Olga, in the tone that he hated. 'If I were you I -should rebuild Romaris. I wonder so devoted a wife has not done so -years ago.' - -'There is nothing at Romaris to rebuild.' - -'Decidedly,' thought his companion, 'he hates Romaris, and has no love -of his own race. Did he drown Vassia Kazán in the sea there?' - -Unsparingly she renewed the subject to Wanda herself. - -'You should settle the French properties on little Victor, and give him -the Sabran title,' she urged to her. 'I told Réné the other day that -I thought it very strange he should not care to have one of his sons -named after him.' - -Wanda answered coldly enough: 'In my will, if I die before him, -everything goes to the Marquis de Sabran. He will make what division -he pleases between his children, subject of course to Bela's rights of -primogeniture.' - -Madame Brancka was silent for a moment from surprise. - -'It is odd that he should not care for Romaris,' she said, after a long -pause. 'You have much more trust in him, Wanda, than it is wise to put -in any man that lives.' - -'Whom one trusts with oneself, one may well trust with everything -else,' said her sister-in-law in a tone which closed discussion. But -when she was left alone the thorn remained in her. She thought with -perplexity: - -'No, he does not care for Romaris. He dislikes its very name. He would -never hear of one of the children bearing it. There must be something -he does not say.' - -She remembered sadly what the Duc de Noira had once said to her: - -'In morals as in metals, my dear, you cannot work gold without -supporting it by alloy.' - -Madame Brancka had patience and skill perfect enough to refrain -altogether from those hints and tentatives by which a less clever woman -would have attempted to approach and surprise the key to those hidden -facts which she believed to be the theme of his correspondence with -Vàsàrhely and the cause of his rejection of the Russian appointment. -A less clever woman would have alarmed him, and betrayed herself by -perpetual allusions to the matter. But she never did this: she treated -him with an alternation of subtle compliment and ironical, malice, such -as was most certain to allure and perplex any man, and he never by the -most distant suspicion imagined that she knew anything which he desired -unknown. She was a woman of strong nerve, and her equanimity in his -and his wife's presence was wholly undisturbed by her consciousness -that she had dispatched the anonymous suggestion as a seed of discord -to Hohenszalras. She knew indeed that it was not what people of her -rank and breeding did do, that it was not honest warfare, that it was -what even the very easy morality of her own world would have condemned -with disgust; but she bore the sin of it very lightly. If she had been -driven to excuse it, she would have characterised it as mere mischief. -If her sister-in-law had shown her the letter, she would have glanced -over it with a tranquil face and an air of utter unconcern. If she -could not have done this sort of thing she would have thought herself -a very poor creature. 'I believe you could be as wicked as the Scotch -Lady Macbeth,' Stefan Brancka had said once to her; and she had -answered with much contempt: 'At least I promise you I should not walk -in my sleep if I were so. Your Lady Macbeth was a grotesque barbarian.' - -A great deal of the sin of this world, which is not at all like Lady -Macbeth's, comes from the want of excitement felt by persons, only too -numerous, who have exhausted excitement in its usual shapes. She had -done so; she required what was detestable to arouse her, because she -had lived at such high pressure that any healthy diversion was vapid -and stupid to her. The destruction, if she could achieve it, of her -sister-in-law's happiness, offered her in prospect such an excitement; -and the whim she had taken for passion grew out of waywardness till -it nearly became passion in truth. She never precisely weighed or -considered its possible consequences, but she endeavoured to arouse -a response in him with all the unscrupulous skill of a mistress in -coquetry. When moved by Madame Ottilie's warning he strove honestly to -avoid her, and often excused himself from obedience to her summons, -the opposition only stimulated her endeavours, and made a smarting -mortification and anger against him supply a double motor-power for his -subjection. If she could have believed that she succeeded in making his -wife anxious, she might have been content; but Wanda always received -her with the same serenity and courtesy, which, if it covered disdain, -covered it unimpeachably with admirable grace. - -'If one broke her heart, she would only make one a grand courtesy with -a bland smile,' thought Olga Brancka, irritably and impatiently. 'There -are people who die standing. Wanda would do that.' - -That ill weeds grow apace is a true old saw, never truer than of -vindictive and envious passions. Sheer and causeless jealousy of her -sister-in-law had been alive in her many years, and now, by being fed -and unresisted, so grew that it became almost a restless hatred. It was -far more her enmity to his wife than any other sentiment which inspired -her with a fantastic and unhealthy desire to attract and detach Sabran -from his allegiance. Joined to it now there was a sense of some mystery -in him that baffled her, and which was to such a woman the most pungent -of all stimulants. In all her _câlineries_ and all her railleries she -never lost sight of this one purpose, of surprising from him the -secret which she believed existed. But he was always on his guard with -her; even when most influenced by her atmosphere and her magnetism -he did not once lose his self-control and his habitual coolness. At -moments when she was most nearly triumphing, the remembrance of his -wife came over him like a breath of sweet pure air that passes through -a hot-house, and restored him to self-possession and to loyalty. She -began to fear that all the ability with which she had procured her -exemption from Court duties, and had induced her husband to remain in -Vienna, was all vain, and she grew bolder and more reckless in her use -of stratagems and solicitations to keep Sabran beside her in these -early spring days given over to racing and sporting, and at all the -evening entertainments at which the great world met, and whither she -carried with so much effect her gleaming sapphires and her black pearls. - -'Black pearls argue a perverted taste,' said the Princess Ottilie once -to her, and she unabashed answered: - -'It is perverted tastes that make any noise in the world or possess -any flavour. White pearls are much more beautiful, no doubt, but then -they are everywhere, from the Crown jewel-cases to the peasant's necks; -but my black pearls! you cannot find their match--and how white one's -throat looks with them. I only want a green rose.' - -'Chemicals can supply any deformity,' said the Princess, drily. 'Doing -so is called science, I believe.' - -'Do you call me a deformity?' she asked, with some annoyance. - -'You are an elaborate production of the laboratory,' said the Princess, -calmly. 'I am sure you will admit yourself that nature has had very -little to do with you.' - -'My pearls are black by a freak of nature,' said Madame Olga. 'Perhaps -I am the same.' - -The Princess made a little gesture signifying that politeness forbade -her from assent, but she thought: 'Yes; you were never a white pearl, -but you have steeped yourself in acids and solutions of all degrees of -poison till you are darker than you need have been, and you think your -darkness light, and some men think so too.' - -Sabran had grown to look for that necklace of black pearls with -eagerness in the society to which they both belonged. Few evenings -found him where Madame Brancka was not. She had known his Paris of the -Second Empire; she had known Compiègne and Pierrefonds as he had known -them; she knew all the friendships and the bywords of his old life, -and all the _dessous des cartes_ of that which was now around them. She -amused him. She comprehended all he said, half uttered. She remembered -all he recalled. At Hohenszalras he had not found any charm in this, -but here he did find one. She suited Paris; she knew it profoundly, -she liked all its pastimes, she understood all its sports and all -its slang. She hunted at Chantilly, betted at La Marche, plunged at -baccara, shot and fenced well and gaily, had the theatres and all their -jargon at her fingers' ends; all this made her no mean aspirant to -the post of mistress of his thoughts. All which had seemed tiresome, -artificial, even ridiculous, amidst the grand forests and healthful air -of the Iselthal became in Paris agreeable and even bewitching. Once he -said almost angrily to his wife: - -'You, who ride so superbly, should surely show yourself at the Duc's -hunts. What is the use of long gallops in the Bois before anyone else -is out of bed?' - -'I never rode for show yet,' said Wanda, in surprise. 'And you know I -never would join in any sort of chase.' - -'Surely such humanitarianism is exaggeration,' he said impatiently. -'Olga Brancka rides every day they meet at Chantilly, and she is by no -means of your form in the saddle.' - -'I have never yet imitated Olga,' said his wife, a little coldly; but -she did not object when day after day her finest horses were lent to -Madame Brancka. She never by a word or a hint reminded him that he -was not absolute master of all which belonged to her. Only when her -sister-in-law wanted to take Bela and his pony to Chantilly, she made -her will strongly felt in refusal. - -The child, whose fancy had been fired by what he had heard of the ducal -hunting, of the great hounds and the stately gatherings, like pictures -of the Valois time, was passionately angered at being forbidden to go, -and made his mother's heart ache with his flashing eyes and his flaming -cheeks. 'Cannot she leave even the children alone?' she thought, with -more bitterness than she had ever felt against anyone. - -A few nights later they were both at the Grand Opéra, in the box which -was allotted to the name of the Countess von Szalras. She was herself -not very well; she was pale, she sat a little away from the light. -Her gown was of white velvet; she had no ornament except a cluster of -gardenias and stephanotis, and her habitual necklace of pearls. Olga -Brancka, in a costume of many shaded reds, marvellously embroidered -in gold cords, was as gorgeous as a tropical bird, and sat with her -arms upon the front of the box, playing with a fan of red feathers, or -looking through her glass round the house. He talked most with her, but -he looked most at his wife. There was no woman, in a full and brilliant -house, who could compare with her. A thrill of the pride of possession -passed through him. The malicious eyes of the other, glancing towards -him over her shoulder, read his thoughts. She smiled provokingly. - -'_Le mari amoureux!_' she murmured. 'Really I did not believe in the -existence of that type. But it is quite admirable that it should exist. -Its example is very much wanted in Paris.' - -He felt himself colour like a youth, but it was with irritation; he was -at a loss for an answer. To have defended his admiration of his wife -at the sword's point would have been easy; to defend it from a woman's -ridicule was more difficult. Wanda did not hear; she was listening -to the song of Dinorah, and was dreamily regretting the solitude of -Hohenszalras, and thinking of what pleasure it would be to return. All -the news that Greswold and her stewards sent her thence was precious to -her; no details seemed to her insignificant or without interest; and -her own letters in return were full of minute attention to the welfare -of everyone and of everything she had left there. She was roused from -her home reverie by the voice of her sister-in-law, raised more highly -and saying impatiently: - -'Why should you object, Réné, when I say that I wish it?' - -'What do you wish?' said Wanda, who always felt a singular annoyance -whenever she heard him thus familiarly addressed. 'Whatever you may -wish, I am sure M. de Sabran can require no second bidding to procure -it for you, if it be within the limits of the possible.' - -'I wish to see a Breton Pardon,' said Olga Brancka, with a gesture of -her fan towards the stage. 'There is one next week in his own country; -I want him to invite me--us--to Romaris.' - -Wanda, who knew that he always shrank from the mention of Romaris, -interposed to save him from persecution. - -'There is nothing at Romaris to invite us to,' she said for him. -'Neither you nor I can live in a cabin or a fishing-boat; especially -can we not in March weather.' - -'You can live in a hut on your Alps,' returned the other, 'and I do -not dislike tent life in the Karpathians. If he sent his major-domo -down, he would soon make the sands and rocks blossom like the rose, and -villages would arise as fast as they did before the great Katherine. -Why not? It would be charming. Has he no feeling for the cradle of his -ancestors? We must put him through a course of Lamartine.' - -'An unfortunate allusion; he lived to lose Milly,' said Sabran, finding -himself forced to say something. 'In midsummer, Mesdames, you might -perhaps rough it, _tant bien que mal_; but now!--there is nothing to -be seen except fog and surf at sea, and mud and pools inland. Even -a Pardon would not reconcile you; not even the Breton jackets with -scriptural stories embroidered on them, nor the bagpipes.' - -'Positively, you will not take us?' - -'I must disobey even your wishes in the Ides of March.' - -'But whether in March or July--why do you never go yourself?' - -'There is nothing to go there for,' he answered, almost losing his -patience; 'a people to whom I am only a name, a strip of shore on which -I only own a few wind-tormented oak-trees!' - -'Only imagine the duties that Wanda would evolve in your place out of -those people and those oaks!' - -'I have not Wanda's virtues,' he said, half sadly, half jestingly. - -'We have none of us, or the Millennium would have arrived. I cannot -understand your dislike to your melancholy sea-shore. Most of your -countrymen are for ever home-sick away from their _landes_ and their -_dolmen._ You seem to feel no throb for the _mater patria_, even when -listening to Dinorah, which sets every other Breton's heart beating.' - -'My heart is Austrian,' said Sabran, with a bow towards his wife. - -'That is very pretty, and what you are also obliged to say,' -interrupted Madame Brancka. 'But why hate Romaris? For my part, I -believe you see ghosts there.' - -His wife said, with a quick reproach in her words: 'The ghosts of men -who knew how to live and to die nobly? He would not be afraid to meet -them.' - -The simplicity of the words and the trustfulness of them sank into his -soul. A pang of terrible consciousness went through him like poisoned -steel. As his wife's eyes sought his the lights swam round with him, -the music was only a confused murmur on his ear; he heard as if from -afar off the voice of Olga Brancka saying: 'My dear Wanda, you are -always so exalted!' - -At that moment some one knocked at the door: he was glad to rise and -open it to admit Count Kaulnitz and two other gentlemen. - -Hardly anything else which his wife could have said would have hurt -him quite so much. - -As he sat there in the brilliant illumination and the hot-house -warmth, with her delicate profile clear as a cameo against the light, -a sensation of physical cold passed through him. He saw himself as he -was, an actor, a traitor, a perjured and dishonoured man. What right -had he there more than any galley-slave at the hulks?--he, Vassia Kazán? - -Well tutored by the ways of the world, he laughed, and spoke, and -criticised the rendering of the opera with his usual readiness of -grace; but Olga Brancka had marked the fleeting expression of his face, -and said to herself: 'Whatever the secret be, the key of it lies in the -sands of Romaris.' - -As she took his arm, when they left the box, she murmured to him: 'I -shall go to Romaris, and you will take me.' - -'I think not,' he said curtly, without his usual suavity. 'I am the -servant of all your sex, it is true, but like all servants I am only -willing to be commanded by my mistress.' - -'O most faithful of lovers, I understand!' she said, with a -contemptuous laugh. 'And she never commands you, she only obeys. You -are very fortunate, even though you do have ghosts at your ruined tower -by the sea.' - -'Yes, I am fortunate, indeed,' he answered gravely, and his eyes -glanced towards his wife, who was standing a stair or two below -conversing with her cousin Kaulnitz. - -'Even though you had to abandon Russia,' murmured Olga Brancka, -dreamily. She could feel that a certain thrill passed through him. -He was startled and alarmed. Was it possible that Egon Vàsàrhely had -betrayed him? - -'Paris is much more agreeable than St. Petersburg,' he answered -carelessly. 'I am no loser. Wanda would have been unhappy, and, what -would have been worse, she would never have said so.' - -'No, she would never have said so. She is like the Sioux, the Stoics, -and the people who died in lace ruffles in '89. I beg your pardon, -those are your people, I forgot; the people whose ghosts forbid you to -entertain us at Romaris.' - -'I would brave an army of ghosts to please Madame Brancka,' said -Sabran, with his usual gallantry. - -'Call me _Cousinette_, at the least,' she murmured, as they descended -the last stair. - -'_Bon soir_, madame!' he said, as he closed the door of her carriage. - -'Are you coming with me?' said Wanda, as she went to hers. - -He hesitated. 'I think I will go for an hour to the clubs,' he -answered. He kissed her hand. As he drew the fur rug over her skirts, -she thought his face was very pale as she saw it by the lamplight. She -wished to ask him if he were quite well, but she restrained herself, -knowing how intolerable such importunities are to men. Instead, she -smiled at him, as she said, '_Amusez-vous bien_,' and left him to -divert himself as he chose. - -'How little women understand men, and how poorly they love them when -they do not leave them alone!' she thought, as her carriage rolled -homeward. She never troubled him, never interrogated him, never even -tried to conjecture what he did when away from her. Sometimes, when -he returned at sunrise, she had already risen, and had said a prayer -with her children, written her letters, or visited her horses, but she -always met him with a smile and without a question. - -It hurt her with an ever-deepening wound to perceive the attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him. She did not for a moment believe -that it was love, but she saw that it was an influence which had -audacity enough to compete with her own, a sort, of fascination which, -commencing with dislike, increased to an unhealthy and morbid potency. -She could not bring herself to speak of it to him. She was not one of -those women who reproach and implore. It would have seemed to her as -if both he and she would have lost all dignity in each other's sight -if once they had stooped to what society calls jestingly 'a scene.' He -guessed aright that if she had really believed herself displaced in his -heart she would have left him without a word. She was too conscious of -his entire worship of her to be moved to anything like that jealous -passion which would have seemed to her the last depths of humiliation; -but she was pained, fretted, stirred to a scornful wonder by the power -this frivolous woman possessed of usurping his time and giving colour -to his thoughts. - -It hurt her to think he feared her too much to tell her of any trouble, -any folly, any memory. She reproached herself with having perhaps -alienated his confidence by the gravity of her temper, the seriousness -of her opinions. It would be hard to think that frivolous shallow women -could inspire men with more confidence than a deeper nature could -do, but perhaps it might be so. He had sometimes said to her, half -jestingly: 'You should dwell among the angels; the human world is unfit -for you!' Was it that which alarmed him? - -With that subtle sense of what is in the air around which so often -makes us aware of what is never spoken in our hearing, she was sensible -that the great world in which they lived began to speak of the intimacy -between her husband and the wife of her cousin Stefan. She became -sensible that the world was in general disposed to resent for her, to -pity her, and to censure them, whilst it coupled their names together. -The very suspicion brought her an intolerable shame. When she was -quite alone, thinking of it, her face burned with angry blushes. No -one hinted it to her, no one breathed it to her, no one even expressed -it by a glance in her presence; yet she was as well aware of what they -were saying as though she had been in a hundred salons when they talked -of her. - -She knew the character of Olga Brancka, also, too well not to know that -her own mortification would be the sweetest triumph for one of whose -latent envy she had long been conscious. Ever since she had become the -sole owner of the vast fortunes of the Szalras she had felt for ever -upon her the evil eye of a foiled covetousness. The other had been very -young, and had waited long and patiently, but her hour had now come. - -She said nothing to her husband, and she preserved to her cousin's -wife the same perfect courtesy of manner; but in her own soul she -began to suffer keenly, more from a sense of littleness in him than any -mere personal feeling. To blame him, to entreat him, to seek to detach -him--all these things were impossible to her. - -'If all our years of union do not hold him, what will?' she thought; -and the great natural hauteur of her temper could never have let her -bend to the solicitation of a constancy denied to her. - -One night, when they had no engagements but a ball, to which they could -go at midnight, he did not come in to dinner. Always before, when he -had not returned to dine, he had sent her a message to beg her not to -wait. This evening there was no message. She and the Princess dined -alone. - -'He was never discourteous before,' said the Princess, who disliked -such omissions. - -'It is his own house,' said Wanda. 'He has a right to come or not to -come as he likes, without ceremony.' - -'There can never be too much ceremony,' said the Princess. 'It -preserves amiability, self-respect, and good manners. It is the silver -sheath which saves them from friction. It is the distinguishing mark -between the gentleman and the boor. When politeness is only for the -street or the salon, it is but a poor thing. He has always been so -scrupulous in these matters.' - -As Wanda later crossed the head of the grand staircase, to go and dress -for the ball, she heard her _maître d'hôtel_ in the hall below speak to -the groom of the chambers. - -'Are the Marquis's horses in, do you know?' asked the former; and the -latter answered: - -'Yes, hours ago; they are to go for him at the Union at eleven, but -they left him at the Hôtel Brancka.' - -Then the two officials laughed a little under their breath. Their -words and their laughter came upwards distinctly to her ear. Her first -impulse was a natural and passionate one of bitter burning pain and -wonder. A sensation wholly new to her, of hatred and of impotence -combined, seemed to choke her. - -'Is this what they call jealousy?' she thought, and the mere thought -checked her emotion and changed it to humiliation. - -'I--I--contend with her!' she said in her soul. With a blindness before -her eyes she retraced her steps, and went to the sleeping-rooms of her -children. They were all asleep as they had been for hours. She sat down -beside the bed of the little Ottilie; and gazed on the soft flushed -loveliness of the child, bright as a rose in the dew. - -She kissed the child's cheek without waking her, and sat still there -some time in the faint twilight and the perfect silence, only stirred -by the light breathing of the sleepers; the repose, the innocence, the -silence soothed and tranquillised her. - -'What matter a breath of folly?' she thought. 'He is their father; he -is my love; we have all our lives to spend together.' - -Then she rose and went to her chamber, and had herself clothed in a -court dress of white taffetas and white velvet, embroidered with silver -lilies. - -'Make me look well,' she said to her women. 'Put on all my diamonds.' - -When he entered, near midnight, repentant, self-conscious, almost -confused, she stopped his excuses with a smile. - -'I heard the servants say you dined with my cousin's wife. Why not, if -it please you? But I wonder she allows you to dine without _un bout de -toilette._ Will you not make haste to dress? We shall be late.' - -The words were perfectly simple and kind, but as she spoke them, so -royal did she look, standing there in the blaze of her jewels, with -her lily-laden train, that he felt abashed, ashamed, angered against -himself, yet more angered against his temptress. - -The old lines of Marlowe came to his mind and his lips: - - 'O! thou art fairer than the evening air - Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.' - -'I am not young enough to merit that quotation,' she said, with a -smile; 'ten years ago perhaps----' - -Her heart contracted as she spoke; she was conscious that she had -wished to look well in his eyes that night. The sense that she was -stooping to measure weapons with such an opponent as Olga Brancka smote -her with a sense of humiliation, which did not leave her throughout the -after hours in which she carried her jewels through the gorgeous crowd -of the ball at the Austrian Embassy. - -'If I lower myself to such a contest as that,' she thought, 'I shall -lose all self-respect and all his reverence. I shall seem scarcely to -him higher than an importunate mistress.' - -Now and again there came to her a passionate anger against himself, a -hardening of her heart to him, since he could thus be guilty of this -inexcusable and insensate folly. But she would not harbour these; she -would not judge him; she would not blame him. Her marriage vows were -not mere dead letters to her. She conceived that obedience and silence -were her clearest duties. Only one thing was outside her duty and -beyond her force--she could not stoop to rivalry with Olga Brancka. - -All at once she took a resolution of which few women would have been -capable. She resolved to leave them. - -Three days after the ball she said very quietly to him: - -'If you do not object, I will go home and take the children. It is time -they were at Hohenszalras. Bela, above all, is not improved by what he -sees and hears here; his studies are broken and his fancy is excited. -In a very little while he would learn quite to despise his country -pleasures, and forget all his own people. I will take them home.' - -He looked at her quickly in surprise. - -'I do not think I can leave Paris immediately,' he said, with -hesitation. 'I have many engagements. Of course you can send the -children.' - -'I said I should go, not you. I long to see my own woods in their -first leaf,' she answered, with a smile. 'It will be better for you to -remain. No one ought to be allowed to suppose that you are bound to my -side. That is neither for your dignity nor mine.' - -'Has anyone suggested----' he began, and paused in embarrassment, for -he remembered the incessant taunts and innuendoes of Olga Brancka. - -'I do not listen to suggestions of that sort,' she replied tranquilly. -'You wish to remain here, and I wish to return home. We are both at -liberty to do what we like. My love, she added, with a grave tenderness -in her voice, 'have I so poor an opinion of you that I dare not leave -you alone? I think I should hardly care for a fealty which was only to -be retained by my constant presence. That is not my ideal.' - -He coloured; he was uncertain what to reply: before her he felt -unworthy and disloyal. A vast sense of her immeasurable nobility swept -over him, and made him conscious of his own unworthiness. - -'Whatever you wish, I wish,' he murmured, and was aware that this could -not be what she would gladly have heard him say. 'I will follow you -soon. Your heart is always in your highlands. I know that you are too -grand a creature to be happy in cities. I have the baser leaven in me -that is not above them. The forests and the mountains do not say to me -all that they do to you.' - -'Men want the movement of the world, no doubt,' she said, without -showing any trace of disappointment. 'I only care for the subjective -life; I am very German, you see. The woods interest me, and the world -does not.' - -No more passed between them on the subject, but she gave orders to her -people to make arrangements for her departure and her children's in two -days' time, and sent out her cards of farewell. - -'Do you think you are wise?' the Princess ventured to say to her. - -She answered: - -'I know what you mean, dear mother; yes, I think so. To struggle for -influence with another, and that other Olga! I should indeed despise -myself if I could stoop so low. If he miss me he can follow me. If he -do not--then he has no need of me.' - -'I confess I do not understand you,' said Madame Ottilie; 'to surrender -so meekly!' - -'I surrender nothing,' she said, almost sternly. 'I know what I have -seen again and again in society. The woman jealous and anxious, losing -ground in his esteem and her own every hour, and rendering alike -herself and him actors in a ludicrous comedy for the mockery of the -world around them--a world which never has any sympathy for such a -struggle. Indeed, why should it have? for if the jealousy of a lover be -poetic, the jealousy of a wife is only ridiculous. I _am_ his wife; I -am not his gaoler. I refuse to admit to others or to him or to myself -that any other could be wholly to him what I am; and I should lose that -place I hold, lose it in his eyes and my own, if I once admitted my -dethronement possible.' - -She spoke with more force and anger than was common with her, and her -auditor admired while she still failed to comprehend her. - -'Is there a more pitiable spectacle,' she continued, 'than that of a -wife contending with others for that charm in her husband's sight which -no philtres and no prayers can renew when once it has fled for ever? -Women are so unwise. Love is like a bird's song--beautiful and eloquent -when heard in forest freedom, harsh and worthless in repetition when -sung from behind prison bars. You cannot secure love by vigilance, -by environment, by captivity. What use is it to keep the person of a -man beside you, if his soul be truant from you? You all say that Olga -Brancka has power over him. If she have, let her use it and exhaust it, -it will not last long; but I will not sink to her level by contesting -it with her. For what can you take me?' - -In her glance the leonine wrath of the Szalras flashed for a moment; -her face was pale, she paced the room with a hasty and uneven step. -The Princess sought a timid refuge in silence There were certain -heights in the nature and impulses of her niece of which she, a dweller -on a lower plain, never caught sight. There were times when the haughty -reserve and the admirable patience of this stronger character made a -union which awed her, and altogether escaped her comprehension. - -In two days' time she left Paris, the Princess and the children -accompanying her. - -He felt his heart misgive him as he let her go. What was Olga Brancka, -what was Paris, what was all the world compared to her? As he kissed -her hands in farewell before her servants at the _Gare de l'Est_, -the impulse came over him to throw himself into the carriage beside -her, and return with her to the old, fair, still, peaceful life of -Hohenszalras. But he resisted it; he heard in memory the mocking of -Olga Brancka's voice saying to him: - -'_Ah, quel mari amoureux!_' - -He had his establishment, his engagements, his horses, his friends, his -wagers; he would seem ridiculous to all Paris if he could not endure -a few weeks' separation from his wife. A great banquet at his house -was arranged to take place in a few days' time, at which only great -Legitimist nobles would be present, and at which the toast of '_Le -Roi!_' would be drunk with solemn honours. What would they say of him -if he failed to receive them because he had followed his wife into -Austria? With a thousand sophisms he reconciled himself to remaining -there without her, and would not face the consciousness within him that -the real motive of his staying on through the coming weeks in Paris -was that Olga Brancka was there. For herself, she parted, with him -tenderly, kindly, without any trace of doubt in him or of purpose in -her departure. - -'You will come when you wish,' were her last words to him. 'You know -well dear, that Hohenszalras without you will seem like a sadly empty -eagle's nest.' - -All his offences against her were heavy on him as he returned to the -great house no longer graced by her presence. He would have given -twenty years of his life to have been able to undo what he had done -when he had taken a name not his own. He was sensible of great talents -in him which might have brought him to renown had he been willing -to face hardship and laborious effort. Even as he had been at his -birth--even as Vassia Kazán--he might have achieved such eminence -as would have made him her equal in honest honour. But he had won -the world and her by a lie, and the act was irrevocable. Chance and -circumstance may be controlled or altered, but the fate which men -make for themselves always abides with them for good or ill: a spirit -either of good or ill which once incarnated by their incantations never -departs from them till death. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXI. - - -'Are you actually left alone?' said Madame Olga gaily to him that -evening, when they met at an embassy. 'I thought Wanda was an Una, who -never let her lion loose?' - -'The remembrance of her would recall him if she did,' he answered -quickly and coldly. 'She does not believe in chains because she does -not need them.' - -'Most knightly of men!' she said, with a little laugh. 'It must be very -fatiguing to have to play the part you so affect, even in absence. Our -metaphors are involved, but your loyalty seems one and indivisible. I -suppose you are left on parole?' - -The departure of his wife had disconcerted and disappointed her; as -he, to realise his position, had required to have the world about him -as spectator of it, so she felt all her triumph over him powerless and -pointless if Wanda von Szalras were not there to suffer by the sight -of it. He had remained; that was much; but she felt that the absence -of his wife had made him colder to herself, that the blank left made a -void between them, that remembrance might be more potent with him than -vicinity; and his consciousness that he was trusted might have more -power than any interference or opposition would have had. She became -sensible that she had less charm for him; that he was less easily -moved by her mockery and attracted by her wit. His earlier animosity -to her still flashed fire now and then, and with this sense of revived -resistance in him her own feeling, which had been born of caprice, took -giant growth as a passion. She grew cruel in it. If she could only know -his secret she thought she would crush him with it, grind him under her -foot, torture him. There was a touch of the tigress under her feverish -and artificial life. - -'_Il faut brusquer la chose_,' she said savagely to herself, when he -had been alone in Paris about a fortnight, and each day had convinced -her that he grew more wary of her, more unwilling to surrender himself -to the fascination which she exercised upon his baser nature. When -she attempted jests at his wife he stopped her sternly, and she felt -that she lost ground with him. Yet she had still a power upon him; an -unhealthy and fatal power. When he looked at her he thought often of -two lines:-- - - 'O Venus! shöne Frau meine, - Ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.' - -'Wanda writes to you every day?' she asked once. - -'She writes often,' he answered. - -'And what does she say of me?' - -'Nothing!' - -'Nothing? What does she write about? Of the priest's sermons and the -horses' coughs, of how much wood has been cut, and how many shoes the -children wear, of how she sorrows for you, and says Latin prayers for -you twice a day?' - -His face darkened. - -'Madame my cousin,' he said irritably, 'will you understand that men do -not like their religion spoken lightly of? My wife is my religion.' - -Then Madame Olga laughed with silvery, hysterical laughter, and clapped -her hands as if she were applauding a good comedy, and cried shrilly: -'_Oh! la bonne blague!_' - -But she knew very well that it was not '_blague._' She knew very well, -too, that though he was subjugated by a certain sorcery when in her -presence, when absent, his good taste condemned, and his good sense -escaped, her. She was one of those women who have a thousand means of -usurping a man's time, and are not scrupulous if some of those measures -are bold ones. All her admirers tacitly left the field open to one -for whom she made no scruple of her preference; and, under pretext of -her relationship to him, she contrived many ways to bring him beside -her. Every day he said to himself that he would go home on the morrow; -but each day bore its diversions, its claims, its interests, and each -day found him in Paris, sometimes driving her to the Cascade, to St. -Germain, to Versailles, sometimes escorting her to the tribune of a -race-course, or a _première_ at a theatre, sometimes dining with her -in her pretty room, the table strewn with rose-leaves, and the windows -open upon flowering orange trees. - -When he wrote home he wrote eloquent, witty, clever letters; but he did -not speak in them of the woman with whom he spent so much of his time, -and his wife as she read them wished that they had been less clever, -and had said more. She began to fear lest she had done unwisely. She -did not repent, for it seemed to her that she could have done nothing -else with any self-esteem; but she dreaded lest she had over-estimated -the power of her own memory upon him. Yet even so, she thought, it -was better that he should degrade himself and her in her absence than -her presence; and she still felt a certainty--baseless, perhaps--that -he would yet pause in time before he actually gave her a rival in her -cousin's wife. - -'If it were any other,' she thought, 'he might fall; but with Olga, -never! never!' - -And she prayed for him half the night, till her prayer seemed to beat -against the very gates of heaven. But in the day, to her children, to -the Princess, to the household, she seemed always tranquil, cheerful, -and at ease. She applied herself arduously to all those duties which -her great estates had always brought with them, and in occupation -and exertion strove to keep her anxiety at bay, and attain that -self-control which enabled her to write in return to him letters which -had no shade of reproach in them, no hint of distrust. - -It was now June. - -The Paris of the world of fashion was soon about to take wing, to -disperse itself to country-houses, sea-shores, and foreign baths; to -change its place, but to take with it wheresoever it should go all its -agitation, its weariness, its fever, its delirium, and its intrigues. -Olga Brancka saw the close of the season approach with regret yet -expectation. She knew that Sabran must escape her or succumb to her; -and she had a bitter, enraged sense that the power of his wife was -stronger over him than her own. '_Il faut brusquer la chose_,' she -said again and again to herself. She grew reckless, imprudent, and -was tempted to discard even that external decency which her station -in the world had made her assume. She would have compromised herself -for him with any publicity he might have chosen to exact. But she had -never been able to beguile him into any sort of declaration. When he -most felt the danger of her attraction, when he was nearest forgetting -honour and decency, nearest submitting, the memory of his wife saved -him. He recovered his coolness; he drew back from the abyss. Once or -twice she was tempted to throw the name of Vassia Kazán between them -and watch its effect; but she refrained--she knew so little! - -'You will not take me to Romaris?' she said, for the hundredth time, -one evening, as they rode towards St. Germain's. - -He laughed. - -'_Cousinette_! if you and I went off to Finisterre you will confess -that we should make a pretty paragraph for the papers, and Count -Stefan would have a very good right to run me through the lungs.' - -'Stefan!' she echoed, with contempt. 'It would be the first time he -ever----Besides, you have had duels; you are not afraid of them; and, -yet again, besides I do not see what harm we should do if we looked at -your _chouans_ and _chasse-marées_ for a few days. No one need even -know it.' - -She spoke quite innocently, but her black eyes watched him with the -'Teufelinne' cunning and passion. He caught the look. He put his hand -in the breast-pocket of his coat, where a letter of his wife's was -lying. - -'It is out of the question,' he said, almost rudely. 'I have no wish to -furnish _Figaro_ with so good a jest. Romaris,' he added, with a smile, -'is of course at your service, like all I possess, if you are so bent -upon seeing its desolation. But you must pardon my receiving you by -deputy, in the person of the curé, who is seventy years old and is the -son of a fisherman.' - -She cut her mare across the ears with a fierce gesture and galloped -away from him. Sabran as he galloped after her thought with a vague -apprehension, 'Why does she dwell on Romaris? Does she suspect that I -abhor the place? Can she have seen anything in my looks or in my words -that has raised any doubts in her?' But he told himself that this was -impossible. As she rode her heart swelled with rage and mortification. -There were many men in the world who would have been happy to go at -her call to Breton wilds, or any other solitude; and he refused her, -bluntly, coldly, because away there in the heart of Austria a woman, -who was the mother of his children, span, and read, and said her -prayers, and led her stupid, blameless, stately life! He escaped her -just because that woman lived! All that hot, cruel caprice which she -called love fastened upon him, and swore that it would not be denied. -She had a sense of a grand white figure which stood for ever betwixt -him and her. She brought herself almost to believe that it was Wanda -von Szalras who wronged her. - -Two nights later she was present at the last night of a gay comic -opera which had made all Paris laugh ever since the first fogs of -winter; a dazzling little opera, with a stage crowded by Louis Treize -costumes, and music that went as trippingly as a shepherdess's feet -in a pastoral. Sabran went to her box after a dinner-party which -he had given to a score of men. She looked well, in a gown of many -shades of yellow, which few women could have braved, but which suited -her night-like eyes and her pearly skin; she had deep yellow roses, -natural ones, in her bosom and hair. - -'I am flattered that you wear my yellow roses,' he murmured. - -'If you had sent me white ones you would have outraged the spirit of -Wanda.' - -He made an impatient movement. - -'When are you going home?' she said, suddenly. - -'Soon!' he answered, with the same impatience. - -'Soon means anything, from an hour to a year. Besides, you have said it -for the last six weeks.' - -'Do you go to Noisettiers?' - -'Of course I go to Noisettiers; you can come there if you please. I am -more hospitable than you.' - -He was silent. Noisettiers was a little place on the Norman -coast, which Stefan Brancka had given to her on his marriage; a -pleasure-house, with Swiss roofs, Cairene windows, Italian balconies -and a Persian court, which was bowered amongst lime-trees and filbert -trees, near Villeville, and had been the scene of much riotous -midsummer gaiety when she had filled it with Parisians and Russians. - -'You are always too good to me,' murmured Sabran, in the meaningless -compliment of usage, as other men entered her box. But she knew by the -coldness of his eyes, by the slightness of his smile, that he would no -more go to Noisettiers than to Romaris. - -'If Wanda had only remained here,' she thought angrily, opening and -shutting her tortoiseshell fan, 'he would have done whatever I had -chosen. Men are mere children; thwart them and they pine. - -'I suppose,' she said aloud to him, 'you will have your own -house-parties at Hohenszalras, as stiff as a minuet, crammed with -grand dukes and grand duchesses, all decorum and dignity, all ennui -and etiquette? By-the-by, are you restored again to the Emperor's good -graces?' - -'It is not likely that I shall be so,' replied Sabran, who always -dreaded the subject. 'If ever I be so fortunate I shall owe it to the -influence Wanda possesses.' - -'Why did you offend him?' she said, bending her inquisitive glance upon -him. - -'All sovereigns are offended when not obeyed. We have discussed this so -often. Need we discuss it again in a theatre?' - -'You are very impenetrable,' she said. 'Your rule of conduct -must follow the lines of M. de. Nothomb's '_il ne faut jamais se -brouiller, ni se familiariser, avec qui que ce soit: c'est le secret -de durer._' - -'M. de Nothomb only meant his rule to apply to his own sex,' replied -Sabran. 'With yours, unless a man be either _familiarisé_ or -_brouillé_, his life must be dull and his experience small.' - -'Which will you be with me?' she said, with significance. 'The choice -is open.' - -He understood that the words contained a menace. - -'I am your cousin and your humble servitor,' he said with gallantry, -giving his place up to a young Spanish noble. - -'Take me home,' she said to him an hour later, before the last scene of -the opera. 'Come to supper. I told them to have ortolans and bisque. -One is always hungry after a theatre, and we must have a last long -talk, since you go to your duties and I to my sea-bathing.' - -He desired to refuse; he dreaded her inquisitiveness and her -solicitation; but she had a magic about her, she subdued him to her -side even while he mentally resisted it. The fleshly charm of the -'Teufelinne' was potent as he wrapped her cloak about her and touched -the yellow roses as he fastened it. Almost in silence he entered her -carriage, and drove beside her to her house. She was silent also, -affecting to yawn and be tired, but by the gleam of the lamp he saw -her great black eyes glowing in the darkness, as he had seen those -of a jaguar in the forests of America glow, as it watched to seize a -sleeping lizard or unweary capybara. - -The few streets were soon traversed by her rapid Russian horses, and -together they entered the little hotel, with its strong perfume of -orange flowers and jessamine from the garden about it. The midsummer -stars were brilliant overhead; he looked up at them, pausing on the -threshold. - -'You are thinking how they shine on Wanda?' she said, with the laugh he -hated. 'Probably they do nothing of the kind. I dare say she is wrapped -in fog and cloud: those are the joys of the heights.' - -The little supper was perfectly prepared, and served with a fine claret -and some tokayer; the lights burned mellowly in the transparent gourds; -the windows were open, the moonlight touched the great gold birds, the -silver lilies on the walls. She had studied how to live and how to -please. She held that love was born as much out of scenic effects as of -the senses. In her own way she was a true artist. She had left him a -few moments to change her attire to a tea-gown, which was one cloud and -cascade of lace from head to foot; the yellow roses still nestled at -her breast. - -Stretched on a divan of oriental stuff, she put out her hand for a -cigar he lighted for her, and said with a little smile: - -'You cannot say I do not know how to live.' - -A brutal response rose to his lips; she did not know how to bridle her -life: but he could not say it. He murmured a compliment, and added: -'What a supreme artist the theatre has lost by your being born with a -Countess's _couronne!_' - -'Yes,' she said, with her eyes on the rings of smoke that her crimson -lips parted to send upward. 'Sometimes when Stefan does not give me -liberty, or Egon does not pay my accounts, I make them both tremble by -a threat that I will go on the stage. I should certainly draw all Paris -and all Vienna too. But perhaps it is too late; in a few more years I -shall have to marry my daughters. Can you realise that? I am sure I -cannot. Now it will suit Wanda perfectly to do that, and _her_ daughter -is not three years old; she is always so fortunate.' - -He listened impatiently. - -'If we left Wanda's name alone it might be better. Did you bring me to -supper to talk of her?' - -'No; she is your Madonna, I know. One must not be sacrilegious, but one -cannot always worship. You do not touch the tokayer; it came from the -Kaiser; you are always so abstemious--you irritate me.' - -She poured out some of the wine, into a jewel-like goblet of Venice, -and gave it him and made him drink it. She sat up on her divan and -leaned towards him; the breeze from the garden stirred the laces of her -gown and made the golden roses nod. - -Wine openeth the heart of man,' she cried gaily. 'Open yours and tell -me frankly why you refused to go to Russia? We are not in a theatre -now.' - -'Are we not?' he said, with the smile which she feared as her greatest -foe. 'Whether or not, I fear I must refuse to please you; the matter -lies between me and--the Emperor.' - -She remarked the hesitation which made him pause before the last word. - -'Between him and Egon,' she thought; but after all, what was the secret -to her except as a means of influence over him. She believed that she -had here present subtler and surer methods of influence which could -attain their end without coercion. - -She ceased to pursue the theme, and grew gentle and winning; she felt -that he was on the defensive. He had come weakly enough into the very -heart of temptation, but he was on his guard against her sorceries. -Lying back amongst her cushions she amused him with that gay and -discursive chatter of which she had the secret, and which imperceptibly -induced him to relax his vigilance and to feel her charm. There was -that about, her which made all scruples seem ridiculous; there was -a contagion of levity and mockery in her which awakened in him the -cynicism of earlier years, and made him only heed the marvellous force -of seduction of which she was mistress. - -'You ought to be ambitious,' she continued softly. 'I think you might -achieve any eminence if you chose to seek it.' - -'Surely I have enough blessings from fortune not to tempt it by that -last infirmity?' - -'You mean you have married a very rich aristocrat,' she said drily. -'Oh, yes; you have made one of the finest marriages in Europe; but -that is not quite the same thing as "winning off your own hand." It is -a lucky _coup_, like breaking the bank at _roulette_, but it cannot -give you the same feeling that a successful soldier or a successful -politician has, nor the same eminence. Indeed, I am not sure that your -wife's possession of every possible good and great thing has not -prevented you gathering laurels for yourself. You have dropped into a -nest lined with rose-leaves; to have fallen on the rocks might have -been better. Do you know,' she added, with a little smile, 'if I had -been your wife I should have given you no rest until you had become the -foremost man of the empire. I should not have cared about horses and -peasants and children; but I should have loved _you._' - -He moved uneasily, conscious of the implied satire upon his wife, -conscious also of a vibration of intense passion in the last words. He -remained silent. - -He knew well that had she been his wife, she would have been as false -to him as she was false to Stefan Brancka. But the words sent a thrill -through him half of emotion, half of repugnance. There was little light -on the divan where she reclined, the dewy darkness of the garden was -behind her; he could see the outlines of her form, the glister of rings -on her hands, and jewels at her throat, the shine of her eyes watching -him ardently. - -His heart beat with a certain excitation; he vaguely felt that some -hour of fate had come. - -They were as utterly alone as though they had been in a desert; no one -of her household would have ventured to approach that room without a -summons from her. A little drummer in silver beat twelve strokes upon -his drum, which was a clock. A nightingale was singing in the Cape -jessamine beneath one of the casements. The light was low and soft, -so faint that the moonbeams could be seen where they strayed over the -cranes and lilies on the wall. She said to herself once more: '_Il faut -brusquer la chose._' If she let him go now he would escape her for ever. - -Ever and again there came to him the memory of his wife, but he shrank -from it as he would have shrunk from seeing her in a gambling den. It -seemed almost a profanity to remember her here. He longed to rise and -get away, yet he desired to remain. He knew that every moment increased -his danger, and yet he prolonged those moments with irresistible -pleasure. Every gesture, glance, and breath of this woman was -provocative and alluring, yet he thought as he felt her power always -the same thing--'_ihr seyd eine Teufelinne._' Willingly he would have -embraced her and then killed her, that she might no more haunt him and -do no more harm on earth. - -As he sat with his face half averted from her she gazed at him with her -burning, covetous eyes; the droop of his eyelids, the curves of his -lips, the fairness of his features all seemed to her more beautiful -than they had ever done; the very disquiet and coldness that were in -them only allured her the more. She leaned nearer still and took his -wrist in her fingers. - -'Come to Noisettiers,' she murmured. - -'No,' he said, sharply and sternly, but he did not withdraw his hand. - -'Why not?' she said, with her whole person swayed towards him as by -an irresistible impulse. 'Why do you affect to be of ice? You are not -indifferent to me. You only obey what you think a law of honour. Why do -you try to do that? There is only one law--love.' - -He strove to draw away from him, but feebly, the clinging of her warm -fingers. The caress of her breath on his cheek, the scent of the roses -in her breast intoxicated him for the instant. She bent nearer and -nearer, and still held him closely in her slender hands, which were as -strong as steel. - -'You love me?' she murmured, so low that it scarce stirred the air, -and yet had all the potency of hell in it. A shudder went over him;. -the baseness of voluptuous impulse and the revulsion of conscious -shamefulness shook his strength as though it were a reed in the wind. -For a moment his arms enclosed her, his heart beat against hers; then -he thrust her away from him and rose to his feet. - -'Love, you? No, a thousand times, no!' he said with unutterable scorn. -'You are a shameless temptress; you can rouse the beast that lies hid -in all men. I despise you, I detest you--I could kiss you and kill you -in a breath; but love!--how dare you speak the word? Mine is hers; I am -hers: if I sinned to her with you I would strangle you when I awoke!' - -All the fierceness and the barbaric strength of the blood of desert -and of steppe broke up in him from underneath the courtesy and calm -of many long years of culture. He was born of men who had slain their -mistresses for a glance, and ravished; their captives in war, and -yielded them to no release but death, and his hereditary instincts -broke the bonds of custom and of habit, and spoke in him now as a wild -animal breaks its bars and leaps up in frank brutality of wrath. He -thrust her backward and backward from him, rose to his feet, wrenched -aside with rude hand the eastern stuffs that hung before the door, and -left her presence and her house before any power of voice or movement -had come back to her. - -As he pushed past the waiting servants in the vestibule, and went -through the courtyard and the gateway, he looked up once again at the -stars shining overhead. - -'Wanda! Wanda!' he said with a deep breath, as men may call in their -extremity on God. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXII. - - -Within half an hour he had given a few orders to his major-domo, -and had taken a special train to overtake the express, already for -on its way that night towards Strasburg. No steam could fly as fast -as his own wishes flew. Never had he felt happier than as the train -rushed across the windy level country of the north-east, bearing him -back to the peace and tenderness and honour which waited for him at -Hohenszalrasburg. He was content with himself, and the future smiled on -him. He slept soundly all that night, undisturbed by the panting and -oscillating of the carriage, and visited by tranquil dreams. He did not -break the journey till he reached S. Johann. The weather in the German -lands was wild and rough. The sound of the winds and rushing rains -brought the remembrance of that year of the floods which had been the -sweetest of his life. Amidst the Austrian Alps the cold was still keen, -and the brisk buoyant air and the strength, that seems always to come -on winds that blow over glaciers and snow-fields were welcome to him, -like a familiar and trusty friend. The servants who met him in answer -to his message, the horses who knew him and whinnied with pleasure, the -summits of the Glöckner, on which a noon-day sun was shining, all were -delightful to him: he thought of the Catullian 'laugh in the dimples of -home.' - -Their ways of life renewed themselves as if they had never been -broken. She divined what had passed, but she never spoke of it. She -was happy in his return, and never disturbed its happiness by inquiry -or allusion. He entered with eagerness into plans and projects which -had of recent years ceased to interest him, and he resumed his old -occupations and pursuits with almost boyish ardour. His restlessness -was appeased, and if a dull apprehension beat at his heart with -warning now and then, it was scarcely heeded in his deep sense of the -intense and forbearing love his wife bore to him. She never asked him -how he had escaped from Olga Brancka. She was satisfied that if he -had been faithless to herself, he would not have returned with such -single-hearted contentment and such lover-like fervour. - -'You are the only woman in the world who can forbear from putting -questions,' said Madame Ottilie to her. - -She answered smiling: - -'I remember Psyche's lamp.' - -'That is very pretty,' said the Princess, 'and I do believe you would -never have cared for the lamp. But, all the same, if the god had been -as honest as he ought to have been, would he have minded the light?' - -'I do not think that enters into the story,' said Wanda. 'He did not -resent the light either; he resented the inquisitiveness.' - -'You are the only woman who has none,' said the Princess, taking up her -netting, and at times she called her niece Pschye, little imagining the -terrible suitability of the name, and the secret that was hidden in -darkness from that noble confidence of the last of the Szalras. - -The remembrance of that night of base temptation left a sense of -uneasiness and of insecurity upon Sabran, but the influence his -temptress had possessed with him was of that kind which fades instantly -in absence. He honestly abhorred the memory of her, and never spoke -her name. - -His wife, to whom the utter degradation of her cousin's wife would -never have seemed possible in a woman nobly born and nurtured, never -imagined the truth or anything similar to it. - -Another woman would have tormented herself and him with innuendo or -direct reference to what had passed in those weeks when she had not -been beside him, and on which he was absolutely silent. But she put all -baseness of curiosity from her; she was content to know that her own -influence in absence had been strong enough to bring him back to his -allegiance. She would not have wished to hear, had he offered to reveal -them, all the various, conflicts of good and evil which had gone on in -his mind, all the subtle changes by which her own power had been for a -moment obscured, only to regain still stronger and purer ascendency. -She was indulgent because she knew human nature well, and expected no -miracles. That he had returned of his own accord, and was content so to -return, was all she desired to know. If to attain that equanimity had -cost her many a struggle, the fact was shut in her own soul and could -concern no other. She esteemed it a poor love which could not bear to -be sometimes shut out in silence. - -'For a man to be manly he must be free,' she thought; 'and how can he -be free if there be someone to whom he must confess every trifle? He -owes allegiance to no one but his own conscience.' - -If in their intercourse she had found his honour less scrupulous, his -code less fine than her own; if she had been ever pained by a certain -levity and looseness of principle betrayed by him at times, she always -strove not to attach too much importance to these. The creeds of a man -of pleasure were necessarily different, she told herself, to those of -a woman reared in austere tenets, and guarded by natural pride and -purity of disposition. Whenever the fear crossed her that he might not -be always faithful to her she put it away from her thoughts. 'What I -have to do,' she thought, 'is to be true to him, not to question or to -doubt him: a man's faithfulness has always such a different reading to -a woman's.' - -Sabran never quite understood the perfect indulgence to him which she -combined with the greatest severity to herself. He thought that the -same measure she gave she would exact. The' serenity and grandeur of -her character made it seem to him impossible that she would ever have -compassion for weakness or for falsehood. He fancied, wrongly, that -a woman less noble herself would be more indulgent than she would be -to error. He did not realise that it is only a great nature which can -wholly understand the full force of the words _aimer c'est pardonner._ -And then again, he said to himself, she might have pardoned a fault, a -crime even, of high passion, of bold mutiny against moral, law, but how -could she ever pardon a meanness, a treason, a lie? - -So he let the months slide away, and did not say to her whilst he still -might have said it himself, 'I am not what you think me.' - -But he was impressed and profoundly affected by that mute magnanimity, -which never vaunted itself or claimed any praise for itself by any hint -or suggestion. He felt disgust at his own folly in ever having cared to -be a single instant in the presence of the woman of whose libertinage -and inconstancy his yellow roses had been the fitting symbol. When -he had cast her from him, rejected and despised, the glamour she had -thrown over him had fallen like scales from the eyes of one blind. -Her memory made the beauty of his wife's nature and thoughts seem to -him more than ever things for reverence and worship. More than ever -his soul shrank within him when he recollected the treachery and the -deception with which, he had rewarded this noblest of friends. - -Ah! why when she had stretched out her hand to him in that supreme gift -of herself, in, that golden sunset hour after the autumn floods of -Idrac, had he not had courage to kneel at her feet and tell her all? -Perchance she might have still have loved him, might have still stooped -to him! - -He strove his utmost to conceal these anxious self-reproaches from her, -lest she should imagine that his hours of gloom were caused by any -lingering shadows of the fatal folly which had been forced on him, like -a drug by Olga Brancka. The sorceress had failed, and he had flung down -and shivered in atoms the glass out of which she had bidden him drink; -she was to him as utterly forgotten, as though she were in her grave; -but not so easily could he banish the memory of his own treachery to -his wife. The very forbearance of her made him the more conscious of -guilt, when he remembered that one man lived who knew that he was -unworthy even to kiss the hem of her garment. He had been faithful to -her in the present, and so could greet her with clean hands and honest -lips; but in the past he had betrayed her foully; he had done her what -in her sight, if ever she knew it would be the darkest dishonour the -treachery of ä human life could hold. - -The sense of crime, which had slept quiet and mute in his conscience so -many years, was now awake and seldom to be stilled. - -The time passed serenely; the autumn brought its hardy sports, the -winter its vigorous pastimes. With the new year she gave him another -son; she named him after Egon Vàsàrhely, without opposition from Sabran. - -'He is worthier to give them a name than I,' he thought bitterly. - -They did not care to move from the green Iselthal. Of Olga Brancka they -heard but rarely. Now and then she sent a little witty flippant note to -Hohenszalras, dated from Paris or Trouville, or Biarritz, or Vienna, or -Monaco, or St. Petersburg, according to the season and her caprices. -Of these little meaningless notes Wanda did not speak to her husband. -She could not bring herself to talk to him of the woman who had so -nearly wrecked their peace, and it seemed to her that the old saw was -wise: 'Let sleeping dogs lie.' It appeared to her, too, that theirs and -Madame Brancka's paths in life would henceforth very seldom, if ever, -meet. - -Sabran believed that her overtures towards him had sprung from one -of those insane unhealthy passions which sometimes are created by -their very sense of their own immorality; he fancied it had died of -its own fire. He did not credit her with the tenacity and endurance -she really possessed. He had little doubt that long ere now some dandy -of the boulevards, some soldier of the palace, had supplanted him in -that brazier of heated senses which she called by courtesy her heart. -He mistook, as the cleverest men often do mistake, in underrating the -cruelty of women. - -The summer was a soft and sunny one, and they enjoyed it in simple and -healthful pleasures of the open air and of the affections. The children -throve and never ailed a day. Sabran had lost all desire to return -to the excitations and passions of the world; his wife was more than -content in the joys of her home; and if above her a storm brooded, if -in his heart there fretted ceaselessly the chafing sense of a gross -treachery, of an incessant peril, she was as ignorant of what menaced -her as the child to whom she had given birth. With present security -also, the sense of dread often wore away from him. - -The months sped on swiftly and serenely for the mistress of -Hohenszalras, the only shadows cast on them coming from accidents -to her poor people through flood or avalanche, and the occasional -waywardness and turbulence of her eldest born. Bela had not been the -better for his sojourn in a great city, where parasites are never -lacking to the heir of wealth, and where his companions had been -small coquettes and dandies _pétris du monde_ at six years old. The -bright vigorous hardihood of the child had escaped the contagion of -affectation, but he had arrived at an inordinate sense of his own -importance and dignity, despite the memory of the Dauphin which often -came to him. He grew quite beyond the management of his governantes, -and though he never disobeyed his mother, gave little heed to anyone -else's authority. Of Sabran he was alone afraid; but at the same time -he preserved for him that silent intense admiration which a young child -sometimes nourishes for a man by whom he is little noticed, but who is -his ideal of all power, force, and achievement, and of whom he hears -heroic tales. - -He was now seven years old. It was time to think of a tutor for him, -since he was beyond the control of the women entrusted with his -education. When she spoke of it to his father, he answered at once: - -'Take Greswold. He has the best temper in the world to govern a child, -and he is a great scholar.' - -'But he is a physician,' she objected. - -'He has studied the mind no less than the body. He adores the boy, -and will influence him as a stranger could not. Speak to him; he will -be only too happy. As no one is ever ill here,' he added with a smile, -'his present position is a sinecure; he can very well combine another -office with it.' - -'I wanted you to take Bela in your hands,' he said later to the old -doctor, 'because I say to you what I should not care to say to a -stranger. The boy has all my faults in him. As he exactly resembles me -physically so he does morally. There is in him, too, I am afraid, a -tendency to tyranny that I have never had. I am not cruel to anything, -though I am indifferent to most things; he would be cruel if he were -allowed; perhaps it is mere masterfulness which may be conquered by -time. I imagine he has also my fatal facility. I call it fatal because -it renders acquisition and proficiency so easy that it prevents -laboriousness and depth of knowledge. You are much wiser than I am, -and will know how to educate the child much better than I can tell -you how to do. Only remember two things: first, that he is cursed by -certain hereditary passions coming to him from me which must be checked -and calmed, or he will grow up with a character dangerous to himself, -and odious to others in the great position he will one day occupy. -Secondly, that if any child of mine ever bring any kind of sorrow upon -her, I shall be of all men the most wretched. You have always been my -good friend. Be yet more so in preventing my suffering from the pain of -seeing my own moral deformities face me and accuse me in the life of -her eldest son.' - -The old physician listened with emotion and with surprise. Of the moral -defects Sabran spoke of, he had seen none. Since his marriage his -tenderness to his wife, his kindliness to his dependants, his courage -in field sports, and his courtesy as a host had been all that anyone -had seen in him; whilst his abstinence from all interference with and -all appropriation of his wife's vast possessions had aroused a yet -deeper esteem in all who surrounded him. As he heard, over the old -man's mind drifted the memories of all he had observed at the time of -Sabran's accident in the forest and subsequent prostration of nerve and -will. But he thrust these vague suspicions away, for he was blameless -in his loyalty to the house he served, and honoured as his master the -husband of the Countess von Szalras. - -'I will do my uttermost to deserve so precious a trust,' he said, -with deep feeling. 'I think that you exaggerate childish foibles, and -attach too much importance to them. The little Count Bela is imperious -and high-spirited, nothing more; and in this great household, where -everyone salutes him as the heir, it is difficult to keep him wholly -unspoiled by adulation and consciousness of his own future power. But a -great pride has been always the mark of the race of Szalras, although -my lady has so chastened hers that you may well believe the line she -springs from has been always faultless as--if one may say so of any -mortal--one may say she herself is. It is not from you alone that the -child inherits his arrogance, if arrogant he be. As for his facility, -it is like a fairy's wand, a caduceus of the gods; it may be used -for good unspeakable. At least believe this, my dear lord, what any -human teacher can do I will do, thankful to pay my debt so easily. I -have always,' he added less gravely, 'had my own theories as to the -education of young princes, and like all theorists believe everyone -else who has had any doctrine on that subject to be wrong. I shall be -charmed to have so happy an occasion in which to put my theories to the -test. I think nature and learning together, the woods and the study, -should be the preparation for the world.' - -'I have entire confidence in your judgment,' said Sabran. 'Above all, -try and keep the boy from pride. Train him, as Madame de Genlis -trained the d'Orléans boys, for any reverse of fortune. He is born with -that temper which would make any humiliation, any loss of position, -unbearable to him; and who can say----' - -He paused abruptly: what he thought was, who could say that in future -years Egon Vàsàrhely might not tell his son of that secret shame which -hung over Hohenszalras, a cloud unseen, but big with tempest? Greswold -looked at him in a surprise which he could not conceal, and Sabran left -his presence hastily, under excuse of visiting some stallions arrived -that morning from Tunis; he was afraid of the interrogations which -the old man might be led in all innocence to make. Greswold looked -after him with some anxiety; he had become sincerely attached to his -lord, whose life he had saved in Pregratten; but the unevenness of his -spirits, the unhappiness which evidently came over him at times in -the midst of his serene and fortunate life, the strangeness of a few -words which from time to time he let fall, had not escaped the quick -perception of the wise physician, and gave him at intervals a vague, -uncertain feeling of apprehension. - -'Pride!' he thought now. 'If the little Count were not proud he would -be no Szalras; and if his father have not also that superb sin he must -be a greater philosopher than I have ever thought him, and no fit mate -for our lady. What should overtake the child? If war or revolution -ruin him when he grows up that will be no humiliation; he will be none -the less Bela von Szalras, and if he be like my lady he will be quite -content with being that. Nevertheless, one must try and teach him -humility--that is, one must try and make the stork creep and the oak -bend!' - -Sabran, as he examined his Eastern horses and conversed about them with -Ulrich, was haunted by the thoughts which his own words had called -up in him. It was possible, it was always possible, that if she ever -knew, she might divorce him, and the children would become bastards. -The Law would certainly give her her divorce, and the Church also. The -most severe of judges, the most austere of pontiffs, would not hold her -bound to a man who had so grossly deceived her. - -By his own act he had rendered it possible for her, if she knew, to -sever herself entirely from him, and make his sons nameless. Of course -he had always known this. But in the first ardours of his passion, -the first ecstasies of his triumph, he had scarcely thought of it. -He had been certain that Vassia Kazán was dead to the whole world. -Then, as the years had rolled on, the security of his position, the -calmness of his happiness, had lulled all this remembrance in him. But -now tranquillity had departed from him, and there were hours when an -intense dread possessed him. - -True, he did justice to the veracity and honour of his foe. He believed -that Vàsàrhely would never speak whilst he himself was living; but then -again he himself might die at any moment, a gun accident, a false step -on a glacier, a thrust from a boar or a bear, ten thousand hazards -might kill him in full health, and were he dead his antagonist might -be tempted to break his word. Vàsàrhely had always loved her; would it -not be a temptation beyond the power of humanity to resist, when by a -word he could show to her that she had been betrayed and outraged by a -traitor? - -And then the children? - -Though were he himself dead, she would in all likelihood never do aught -that would let the world know his sin, yet she would surely change to -his offspring, most probably would hate them when she saw in their -lives only the evidence of her own dishonour, and knew that in their -veins was the blood of a man born a serf. - -'Born a serf! I!' he thought, incredulous of his own memories, of his -own knowledge, as he left the haras and mounted a young half-broken -English horse, and rode out into the silent, fragrant forest ways. -Almost to himself it seemed a dream that he had ever been a little -peasant on the Volga plains. Almost to himself it seemed an impossible -fable that he had been the natural son of Paul Zabaroff and a poor -maiden who had deemed herself honoured when she had been bidden to bear -drink to the _barine_ in his bedchamber. He had once said that he was -that best of all actors, one who believes in the part he plays; and at -all times, and above all since his marriage, he had been identified -in his own persuasions, and his own instincts and habits, with that -character of a great noble, which, when he paused to remember, he knew -was but assumed. Patrician in all his temper and tone, it seemed to -him, when he did so remember, incredible that he could be actually only -a son of hazard, without name, right, or station in the world. Was he -even the husband of Wanda von Szalras? Law and Church would both deny -it were his fraud once known. - -It was not very often that these gloomy terrors seized him--his temper -was elastic and his mind sanguine; but when they did so they overcame -him utterly; he felt like Orestes pursued by the Furies. What smote him -most deeply and hardly of all was his consciousness of the wrong done -to his wife. - -He rode fast and recklessly in the soft, grey atmosphere of the still -day, making his young horse leap brawling stream and fallen tree-trunk, -and dash headlong through the dusky greenery of the forests. - -When he returned Wanda was seated on the lawn under the great yews -and cedars by the keep. She kissed her hand to him as he rode in the -distance up the avenue. - -A little while later he joined her in her garden retreat, calm and -even gay. With her greeting his terror seemed to have faded away; his -home was here, he possessed her entire devotion--what was there to -fear? Never had the serenity of his life here appeared more precise -to him; never had the respect and honour which surrounded him seemed -more needful as the bulwarks of a contented career. What could the -furnace of ambition, the fatigue of exhausted pleasure give, that could -equal this profound sense of peace, this cultured leisure, and this -untainted atmosphere. The moral loveliness of his wife seemed to him -almost more than mortal in its absolute and unconscious rejection of -all things mean or base. 'The world would find the spring by following -her,' seemed to him to have been written for her--the spring of hope, -of faith, of strength, of purity. Perhaps a better man might have less -intensely perceived and worshipped that spiritual beauty. - -'Shall we have any house-parties this year or not?' she asked him as he -joined her. 'I fear you must feel lonely here after your crowded days -in Paris last year?' - -'No,' he said quickly. 'Let us be without people. We had enough of the -world in Paris, too much of it. How can I be lonely whilst I have you? -And the weather for once is superb, and promises to remain so.' - -'I do not know how it seems to you,' she replied, 'but when I came -from the glare and the asphalte of Paris, these deep shadows, these -cool fresh greens, these cloud-bathed mountains seemed to me to have -the very calm of eternity in them. They seemed to say to me in such -reproach, "Why will you wander? What can you find nobler and gladder -than we are?" I want the children to grow up with that love of country -in them; it is such a refuge, such an abiding, innocent joy. What does -the old English poet say: 'It is to go from the world as it is man's to -the world as it is God's.' - - 'Well, then, I now do plainly see - This busy world and I shall ne'er agree,' - -he said, with a smile. 'Cowley was a very wise man; wiser than -Socrates, when all is counted. But, then, Cowley forgot, and you, -perhaps, forget that one must be born with that wiser, holier love in -one; like any other poetic faculty or insight, it is scarcely to be -taught, certainly not to be acquired. I hope your children may inherit -it from you. There is no surer safeguard, no simpler happiness!' - -'But since you are content, may it not be acquired?' - -'Ah, my beloved!' he said with a sigh. 'Do not compare the retreat of -the soldier tired of his wounds, of the gambler wearied by his losses, -with the poet or the saint who is at peace with himself and sees all -his life long what he at least believes to be the smile of God. Loyola -and Francis d'Assisi are not the same thing, are not on the same plane.' - -'What matter what brought them,' she said softly, 'if they reach the -same goal?' - -'You think any sin may be forgiven?' he said irrelevantly, with his -face averted. - -'That is a very wide question. I do not think S. Augustine himself -could answer it in a word or in a moment. Forgiveness, I think, would -surely depend on repentance.' - -'Repentance in secret--would that avail?' - -'Scarcely--would it?--if it did not attain some sacrifice. It would -have to prove its sincerity to be accepted.' - -'You believe in public penance?' said Sabran, with some impatience and -contempt. - -'Not necessarily public,' she said, with a sense of perplexity at the -turn his words had taken. 'But of what use is it for one to say he -repents unless in some measure he makes atonement?' - -'But where atonement is impossible?' - -'That could never be.' - -'Yes. There are crimes whose consequences can never be undone. What -then? Is he who did them shut out from all hope?' - -'I am no casuist,' she said, vaguely troubled. 'But if no atonement -were possible I still think----nay, I am sure---a sincere and intense -regret which is, after all, what we mean by repentance, must be -accepted, must be enough.' - -'Enough to efface it in the eyes of one who had never sinned?' - -'Where is there such an one? I thought you spoke of heaven.' - -'I spoke of earth. It is all we can be sure to have to do with; it is -our one poor heritage.' - -'I hope it is but an antechamber which we pass through, and fill with -beautiful things, or befoul with dust and blood, at our own will.' - -'Hardly at our own will. In your ante-chamber a capricious tyrant -waits us all at birth. Some come in chained; some free.' - -They were seated at her favourite garden-seat, where the great yews -spread before the keep, and far down below the Szalrassee rippled -away in shining silver and emerald hues, bearing the Holy Isle upon -its waters, and parting the mountains as with a field of light. The -impression which had pursued her once or twice before came to her -now. Was there any error in his own life, any cruel, crooked twist -of circumstance concealed from her? An exceeding tenderness and pity -yearned in her towards him as the thought arose. Was he, with all -his talent, power, pride, grace, and strength, conscious of fault or -failure, weighted with any burden? It seemed impossible. Yet to her -fine instinct, her accurate ear, there was in these generalities the -more painful, the more passionate, tone of personal remorse. She might -have spoken, might once more have said to him what she had once said, -and invited him to place a fearless confidence in her affection; but -she remembered Olga Brancka; she shrank from seeking an avowal which -might be so painful to him and her alike. - -At that moment the pretty figure of the Princess Ottilie appeared in -the distance, a lace hood over her head, a broad red sunshade held -above that, and Sabran rose to go forward and offer her his arm. - -'You are always lovers still, and one is afraid of interrupting you,' -she said, as she took one of the gilded wicker chairs. 'I have had a -letter from Olga Brancka; the post is come in. She says she will honour -you in the autumn on her way to waiting at Gödöllö.' - -'It is impossible!' cried Sabran, who grew first red, then pale. - -'Nothing is impossible with Olga,' said the Princess, drily. 'I see -even yet you are not acquainted with her many qualities, which include -among them a will of steel.' - -'She cannot come here,' he said in haste under his breath. - -Wanda looked at him a moment. - -'My aunt shall tell her that it will not suit us. She can go to Gödöllö -by way of Gratz,' she said quietly. - -The Princess shifted her sunshade. - -'What effect do you think that will have? She will cross your -mountains, and she will call up a snowstorm by incantation, so that you -will be compelled to take her in. You who know so much of the world, -Réné, can you inform me how it is that women possess tenacity of will -in precise proportion to the frivolity of their lives? All these -butterflies have a volition of iron.' - -'It is egotism,' he replied with effort, unable to recover his -astonishment and disgust. 'Intensely selfish people are always very -decided as to what they wish. That is in itself a great force; they do -not waste their energies in considering the good of others.' - -'Olga's energies are certainly not wasted in that direction,' said -Madame Ottilie. - -Sabran rose and went in for his letters. It was intolerable to him -to hear the name of this woman, whom he had only escaped by brutal -violence, spoken in the presence of his wife; and even to him, hardened -to the vices of the world though experience had made him, it had never -occurred as possible that she would have the audacity to come thither; -he had too hastily taken it for granted that conscience would have -kept her clear of their path for ever, unless the hazards of society -should have brought them perforce together. The most secretive of men -is always more sincere than an insincere and crafty woman, and he -was overwhelmed for the moment at the infamy and the hardihood of a -character which he had flattered himself he had understood at a glance. -He forgot the truth that 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.' - -'There is not a _déclassée_ in Paris who would not have more decency!' -he thought bitterly. He stood in the Rittersaal and affected to be -occupied with his letters; but his eyes only followed their lines, his -mind was absent. He saw no way to prevent her continued intimacy with -them, if she were vile enough to persist in enforcing it. He could not -tell Egon Vàsàrhely or Stefan Brancka; a man cannot betray a woman, -however base she may be. He could not tell his wife of that hateful -hour, which seemed burnt into his brain as aquafortis bites into metal. -He shuddered as he thought of her here, in this house which had known -so many centuries of honour. He cursed the weak and culpable folly -which had first led him into her snares. If he had not dallied with -this Delilah, she would have been vile of purpose and of nature in -vain. He had escaped her indeed at the last; he had indeed remained -faithful in act to his wife; but had it been such fidelity of the soul -and the mind as she deserved? Would not even the semi-betrayal bring -its punishment soon or late? Could he ever endure to see her beside the -woman who so nearly had tempted him? He felt that he would sooner kill -the other, as he had threatened, rather than let her set foot across -the sacred threshold of Hohenszalras. - -'I knew what she was,' he thought with endless self-accusation. 'Why -did I ever loiter an hour by her side, why did I ever look once at her -hateful eyes?' - -If she had been a stranger he would have braved his wife's scorn of -himself and told her all, but when it was her cousin's wife--one who -even had once been in a still nearer relationship to her--he could -not do it. It seemed to him as if such nearness of shame would be so -horrible to her that he would be included in her righteous hatred of it. - -Moreover, long habit had made him reticent, and silence always seemed -to him safety. - -After some meditation he took his way to the library and there wrote a -brief letter. He said in it, with no preamble, ceremony, or courtesy, -that he begged to decline for himself and his wife the honour of the -Countess Brancka's presence at Hohenszalras. He sealed it with his -arms, and sent a special messenger with it to Matrey. He said nothing -of what he had done to his wife or her aunt. - -He knew that if his antagonist were so disposed she could make feud -between him and her husband for the insult which that curt rejection -of her offered visit bore with it. But that did not weigh on him; he -would have been glad to have a man to deal with in the matter. All -he cared to do was to preserve his home from the pollution of her -presence. Moreover, he knew that it would not be like the _finesse_ and -secrecy of Olga Brancka to do aught so simple or so frank as to seek -the support of her lord. - -Meantime, the Princess was saying to his wife: - -'Will you receive Olga? She will not give up her wishes; she will force -her way to you.' - -'How can I refuse to receive Stefan's wife?' - -'It would be difficult, but you would be justified. She endeavoured to -draw your husband into an intrigue.' - -'Are we sure? Let us be charitable.' - -'My dear Wanda, you are a truer Christian than I am.' - -'Justice existed before Christianity, if you do not think me profane to -say so. I try to be just.' - -'Justice is blind,' said the Princess, drily. 'I never understood very -well how, being so, she can see her own scales.' - -Wanda made no reply. She had not been blind, but she would have never -said to any living being all that she had suffered in those weeks -when he had stayed behind her in Paris. That he had returned to her -blameless she was certain; she had put far behind her for ever the -remembrance of those the only hours of anxiety and pain which he had -given her since their marriage. - -The Princess, communing with herself, wrote a letter to the Countess -Brancka, chill and austere, in which she conveyed in delicate, but -sufficiently clear, language, her sense that the same roof should -not shelter her and Sabran, especially when the roof was that of -Hohenszalras. She sent it because she believed it to be her duty to do -so, but she had little faith in its efficacy. She would have written -also to Stefan Brancka, but she knew him to be a weak, indulgent, -careless man, still young, who had been lenient to his wife's follies -and frailties, and who was only kept from ruin by the strong hand -of his brother. If she told him what was after all mere conjecture, -he might only laugh; if he did not laugh he might kill Sabran in a -duel, were his Magyar blood fired by suspicion. No one could be ever -sure what Count Stefan would or would not do; the only thing sure was -that he would be never wise. To his wife herself he was absolutely -indifferent, but this did not prevent him from having occasional moods -of furious resentment against her. He was too unstable and too perilous -a person to resort to in any difficulty. - -In a few days she received her answer, though Sabran received none. It -was brief and playful and pathetic. - - 'Beloved and reverend Mother,--You never like me, you always - lecture me, but I am glad that you honour me by remembrance, - even if it be to upbraid. I know not of what mysterious - crime you suspect me, nor do I understand your allusions - to M. de Sabran. I have always found him charming, and I - think if he had not married so rich a woman he would have - been eminent in some way; but content slays ambition. Salute - Wanda lovingly and the pretty children. How is your little - Ottilie? My Mila and Marie are grown out of knowledge. We - shall soon have to be thinking of their _dots_--alas! where - will these come from? Stefan and I have been the prey of - unjust stewards and extortionate tradesfolk till scarce - anything is left except the mine at Schermnitz. Pity me a - little, and pray for me much. - - 'Your ever devoted - 'OLGA.' - -Princess Ottilie was a holy woman, and knew that rage was a sin against -herself and heaven, but when she had read this note she tore it in a -hundred pieces, and stamped her small foot upon it, trembling with -passion the while. - -Two months went on; the Countess Olga wrote no more; they deemed -themselves delivered from her threatened presence. She had not replied -to his refusal to permit her to come thither, and Sabran felt relieved -from an intolerable position. Had she persisted, he had decided to -make full confession to his wife rather than permit her to receive -ignorantly the insult of such a visit. - -It was now the end of September, and the weather remained fine and -open. He spent a great deal of his time out of doors, and took his old -interest in the forests, the stud, and the hunting. The letter of Olga -Brancka had brought close to him again the peril from which he had so -hardly escaped in Paris, and the peace and sweetness of his home-life -seemed the more precious to him by contrast. The high intelligence, -the serene temper of his wife, and her profound affection seemed to -him treasures for which he could be never grateful enough to fate and -fortune; their days passed in tranquil and sunny happiness; but ever -and again a word, a look, the merest trifle, sufficed to awake the -sleeping snake of remorse which was, dormant in his breast. - -One day he took Bela with him when he rode--a rare honour for the -child, who rode superbly. His pony kept fair pace with his father's -English hunter, and even the leaping did not scare either it or its -rider. - -'Bravo, Bela!' said Sabran, when they at last drew rein; 'you ride like -a centaur. Is your education advanced enough to know what centaurs -were?' - -'Oh! they were what I should love to be,' replied Bela rapturously. -'They were joined on to the horse!' - -Sabran laughed. 'Well, a good rider is one with his horse, so you may -come very near your ideal. Ulrich has taught you an admirable seat. You -are worthy of your mother in the saddle.' - -Bela coloured with pleasure. - -'In the study you are not so, I fear?' Sabran continued. 'You do not -like learning, do you?' - -'I like some sorts,' said the child with a little timidity; 'I like -history, knowing what the people did in the other ages. Now the Herr -Professor lets us do our lessons out of doors, I do not mind them at -all. As for Gela, he likes nothing but books and pictures,' he added, -with a sense of his one grief against his brother. - -'Happy Gela! whatever his fate in life he will never be alone,' said -his father, as he dismounted to let his hunter take breathing space. -The child leapt lightly from his saddle, took his little silver folding -cup out of his pocket, and drank at a spring, one of the innumerable -springs rushing over the mossy stones and flower-filled grass. - -'One is never alone with horses?' he said shyly, for he never lost his -awe of Sabran. - -'Unless one be ill; then a horse is sorry consolation, and books and -art are faithful companions.' - -'I have never been ill,' said Bela, with a little wonder at himself. 'I -do not know what it is like.' - -'It is to be dependent upon others. A hero or a king grows as helpless -as a lame beggar when he is ill; you will not escape the common lot; -and when you stay in your bed, and your pony in his stall, then you -will be glad of Gela and his books.' - -'Oh! I do love Gela always,' said the child hastily and generously; -'and the Herr Professor says he is ever--ever--so much cleverer than I -am; a million times more clever!' - -'You are clever enough,' said Sabran. 'If you do not let yourself -be vain and overbearing you will do well. Try and remember that if -your pony made a false slip to-day and you fell badly, all your good -health would vanish at a stroke, and all your greatness would serve you -nothing. You would envy any one of the boys going with whole limbs up -into the hills, and, perhaps, all your mother's love and wealth could -do nothing to mend your bones again.' - -Bela listened with a grave face; when women, even his fearless mother, -spoke to him in such a way, he was apt to think with disdain that -they over-rated danger because they were women; and when his tutor so -addressed him, he was also apt to think that it was because the good -professor was a bookworm and cared for weeds, stones, and butterflies. -But when his father said so, he was awed; he had heard Ulrich and -Otto tell a hundred stories of their lord's prowess and courage and -magnificent strength, for the deeds of Sabran in the floods and on -the mountains had become almost legendary in their heroism to all the -mountaineers of the Hohe Tauern, and all the dwellers on the Danube -forest. - -'But ought one not to be brave?' he said with hesitation. 'You are.' - -'We ought to be brave, certainly, or we are not fit to live; but we -must not be vain of being brave, nor rely upon it too much. Courage is -a mere gift of '--he was about to say 'chance,' but seeing the blue -eyes of the child fastened upon him, changed the word and said 'a gift -of God.' - -'What a handsome boy he is,' he thought, as he looked thus at his -little son. 'And how wise it is to leave children wholly to their -mothers when their mothers are wise!' - -'I will remember,' said Bela thoughtfully; 'when I am a man I want to -be just what you are.' - -Sabran turned away at the innocent words. 'Be what your mother's people -were, and I shall be content,' he said gravely. - -'But your people too,' said Bela; 'they were very great and very good. -The Herr Professor reads us things out of that big book on Mexico, and -the Marquis Xavier was a saint,' he says. Gela likes the book better -than I because it is all about birds, and beasts, and flowers; but the -part about the Indians, and the Incas, that pleases me; and then there -are the Breton stories too that are in real history, they are quite -beautiful, and I would die like that.' - -Bela's tongue once loosened seldom paused of its own accord; his eyes -were dark and animated, his face was eager and proud. - -'The Marquis Xavier was a saint, indeed,' said his father abruptly. -'Revere his name. All my children should revere his name and memory. -But lean most to your mother's people; you are Austrian born, and the -chief of your duties and possessions will be in Austria. I think you -would die heroically, my boy, but you will find that it is harder to -live so. The horses are rested, let us ride home; it grows late for -you.' - -Bela, whose mind was quick in intuition, felt that his father did not -care to talk about Mexico or Bretagne. - -'I will ask the Herr Professor if I did wrong to speak to him of the -big book,' he said to himself as he mounted his pony; he was very -anxious to please his father, but he was afraid he had missed the way. -'I suppose it is because they were only saints, and the Szalras were -all soldiers,' he thought on reflection, soldiers being by far the -foremost in his esteem. - -'He says it is harder to live well than to die well,' said Bela over -his bread and milk that night to his brother. - -'I suppose that is because dying is over so soon,' said the meditative -Gela; 'and you know it must take an _enormous_ time to live to be -old--quite old--like Aunt Ottilie.' - -'I should like to die very grandly,' said Bela with shining eyes, 'and -have all the world remember me for ever and for ever, as they do great -Rudolph.' - -'I should like to die saving somebody,' said Gela, 'just as Uncle Bela -saved the pilgrims; that would please our mother best.' - -'I should like to die in battle,' said the living Bela; 'and that would -please our mother, because so many of us have always died so fighting -the French, or the Prussians, or the Turks. When I am a man I shall die -like Wallenstein.' - -'But Wallenstein was killed in a room,' said Gela, who was very -accurate. - -'You are always so particular!' said Bela impatiently, who had himself -only a vague idea of Wallenstein, as of someone who had gone on -fighting without stopping for thirty years. - -'The Herr Professor says it is just being particular which makes -the difference between the scholar and the sciolist,' said Gela -solemnly, his pretty rosy lips closing carefully over the long word -_halbgelehrte._ - -This night after the ride he and she dined quite alone. As he sat -in the Rittersaal and looked at the long line of knights, the many -blazoned shields, the weapons borne in gallant warfare, a sudden -sensation came to him of the vile thing that he did in being in this -place. It seemed to him that those armoured figures should grow animate -and descend and drive him out. Bela, then sleeping happily, dreaming -of the glories of his ride, had raised with his innocent words a -torturing spirit in his father's breast. What had he brought to this -haughty and chivalrous race?--the servile Slav, the barbaric Persian, -blood, and all the dishonour that their creed would hold the basest -upon earth. Besides, to lie to _her_ children! Even the blue eyes -of the boy had made him embarrassed and humiliated, as if she were -judging him through her first-born's gaze. What would it be when that -child, grown to man's estate, should speak to him of his people, of his -forefathers? - -For the first time it occurred to him that these boys would inevitably, -as they grew older, ask him many questions, wish to know many things. -He could turn aside a child's inquisitive interest, but it would be -more painful, less easy, to refuse to supply a grown youth's legitimate -interrogations. All these children would some time or another make many -inquiries of him that his wife, out of delicate sympathy, never had -intruded upon him. The fallen fortunes of the Sabran race had always -seemed to her one of those blameless misfortunes for which the best -respect is shown by silence. But her sons would naturally, one day or -another, be more interested in learning more of those from whom they -were descended. - -The lie in reply would be easy and secure. There were all the -traditions and recollections of the Sabrans of Romaris to be gathered -from the tongues of the people in Finisterre, and the private papers -of their race which he possessed. He could answer well enough, but it -would be a lie, and a lie seemed to him now a disgrace? Before his -marriage he had looked on falsehood as a necessary part of the world's -furniture, but he had not lived all these years beside a noble nature, -to which even a prevarication was impossible, without growing ashamed -of his former laxities. - -'There is not a dead man amongst all those knights who bore these arms -that should not rise to punish and disown me!' he thought with poignant -hatred of his past. - -When he went to his room the impulse once more came over him to tell -his wife all; to throw himself on her mercy, and let her do the worst -she would; but he had a certain fear of her which acted like a spell on -that moral cowardice, which his Slav temperament and his hidden secret -combined to bind in a dead weight on the physical courage and natural -pride of his character. - -He resolved to do his uttermost as they grew older to rear his sons to -worthiness of that great race whose name they bore; to uproot in them -by all means in his power any falser or darker faults they might have -inherited from him. He promised himself so to watch over his own words -and deeds that as they grew to manhood they should find no palliative -or example of wrong-doing in his life. The closeness of his peril, the -folly of his dalliance with Olga Brancka, had left him distrustful -and diffident of his own powers to resist evil. He said to himself -that he would seek the world no more; his wife was happiest in her own -dominion, amidst her own people; he would court neither pleasure nor -ambition again. Here he had peace; here he loved and was beloved; here -he would abide, and let courts and cities hold those less blessed than -he. - -In the morning he awoke refreshed and tranquil; a beautiful sunrise was -tinging with rose the snows of the opposite Venediger peaks; the flush -of early autumn was upon the lower woods, but no snow had fallen even -on the mountains. The lake was deeply green as a laurel leaf, and its -waters rolled briskly under a strong breeze. It was a brilliant day for -the hills, and the _jägermeister_ and his men were in waiting, for he -had arranged over night to go chamois-hunting on those steep alps and -glaciers which towered above the hindmost forests of Hohenszalras. He -did not very often give rein to his natural love of field sports, for -he knew that his wife liked to feel that the innocent creatures of the -mountains were safe wherever she ruled. But there was real sport to be -had here, with every variety of danger accompanying to excuse it, and -Otto and his men were proud of their lord's prowess and perseverance -on the high hills, and only sorrowed that he so often let his rifles -lie unused in the gun-room. He went out whilst the day was still red -and young, like a rose yet in bud, and climbed easily and willingly the -steep paths and precipitous slopes which led to the glaciers. - -'Count Bela wants sadly to come with us one of these days,' said Otto, -with a broad smile. 'He can use his crampons right manfully; will not -the Countess soon let me teach him to shoot?' - -'I think not willingly, Otto,' said Sabran. 'She thinks children's -hands are best free of bloodshed; and so do I. It can do a child no -good to see the dying agony of an innocent creature. Teach Herr Bela to -climb as much as you like, but leave powder and shot alone.' - -'I am sure the Herr Marquis himself must have been a line shot very -early?' - -'I was at a semi-military college,' said Sabran, thinking of those days -at the Lycée Clovis when he had sought the _salle d'armes_ with such -eagerness, as being the scene of those lessons which would most surely -enable him to meet men as their equal or their master. - -'If only Count Bela might be taught to shoot at a mark?' said the old -huntsman, wistfully. - -'You know very well, Otto, that your lady decides everything for her -children, and that all her decisions I uphold,' said his master. 'Be -sure they are wiser than either yours or mine would be. She can teach -him herself, too; she can hit a running mark as well as you or I. Do -you remember the day when you arrested me in these woods?' - -'Ah, my lord!' said Otto, with a rolling oath; 'never can I pardon -myself, though you have so mercifully pardoned me!' - -'And my good rifle is still lying in the bed of the lake,' said Sabran, -glancing backward at the Szalrassee, now many hundred feet below them, -a mere green ribbon shining through the deeper green of fir and pine -woods. - -'Yes, my lord!' answered the man, cheerily. 'The good English rifle -indeed was lost; but it seems to me that the Herr Marquis did not make -wholly a bad exchange!' - -'No, indeed,' said his master, as he paused and looked down to where -the towers and spires of Hohenszalras glimmered like mere points of -glittering metal in the sunshine far below. - -They were now at the highest altitude at which _gemsbocks_ are found, -and the business of the day commenced as they sighted what looked like -a mere brown speck against the greyness of the opposite glacier. Before -the day was done Sabran had shot to his own gun eight chamois on the -heights, and some score of ptarmigan and black-cock on the lower level. -He saw more than one _kuttengeier_ and _lammergeier_, but, in deference -to the traditions of the Szalras, did not fire on them. The healthful -fatigue, the rarefied air, the buoyant exhilaration which comes with -the atmosphere of the great heights, made him feel happy, and gave -him back all his confidence in the present and the future. When he -rested on a ledge of rock, listening to Otto's hunter's tales, and -making a frugal meal of some hard biscuit and a draught of Voslauer, he -wondered at himself for having so recently been beguiled by the febrile -excitations of Paris, or having desired the fret and wear of a public -career. What could be better than this life was? To have sought to -leave it was folly and ingratitude. The peace and the calm of the great -mountains which she loved so well seemed to descend into his soul. - -It was twilight when they reached the lower slopes of the hills, -the jägers loaded with game, he and Otto walking in front of them. -From the still far-off islet oh the lake, and from the belfry of the -Schloss, the Ave Maria was chiming; the deep-toned bells of the latter -ringing the Emperor's Hymn. - -Talking gaily with Otto, with that frank kindliness which endeared him -to all these mountaineers, he approached the house slowly, fatigued -with the pleasant tire of a healthy and vigorous man after a long day's -pastime on the hills, and entered by a back entrance, which led through -the stables into the wing of the building where his own private rooms -were situated. He took his bath and dressed himself for the evening, -then went on his way across the vast house to the white salon, where -his wife and her aunt were usually to be found at the time of the -children's hour before dinner. With some words on his lips to claim her -praise for having spared the vultures, he pushed aside the _portière_ -and entered, but the words died on his tongue, half spoken. - -His wife was there, but before the hearth, seated with her profile -turned towards him, also was Olga Brancka. His wife, who was standing, -came towards him. - -'My cousin Olga took us by surprise an hour ago. The telegram must have -missed us which she says she sent yesterday from Salzburg.' - -Her eyes had a cold gaze as she spoke; her sense of the duties of -hospitality and of high breeding had alone compelled her to give any -form of welcome to her guest. Madame Brancka, playing with a feather -screen, looked up with a little quiet self-satisfied smile. - -'Unexpected guests are the most welcome. When there is an old proverb, -pretty if musty, all ready made for you, Réné, why do you not repeat -it? I am truly sorry, though, that my telegram miscarried. I suspect it -comes from Wanda's old-fashioned prejudice against having a wire of her -own here from Lienz. I dare say they never send you half your messages.' - -Sabran had mechanically bowed over the hand she held out to him, but -he scarcely touched it with his own. He was deadly pale. The amazement -that her effrontery produced on him was stupefaction. Versed in the -ways of women and of the world though he was, he was speechless and -helpless before this incredible audacity. She looked at him, she -smiled, she spoke, like the most innocent and unconscious creature. -For a moment an impulse seized him to unmask her then and there, and -hound her out of his wife's presence; the next he knew that it was -impossible to do so. Men cannot betray women in that way, nor was he -even wholly free enough from blame himself to have the right to do so. -But an intense rage, the more intense because perforce mute, seized -him against this intruder by his hearth. Only to see her beside his -wife was an intolerable suffering and shame. When he recovered himself -a little, feeling his wife's gaze upon him, he said with some plain -incredulity in his contemptuous words: - -'The failure of messages is often caused by the senders of them; the -people are extremely careful at Lienz. I do not think the fault lies -_there._ We can, however, only regret the want of due warning, for the -reason that we can give no fit or flattering reception of an honoured -guest. You come from Paris?' - -For the first time a slight sudden flush rose upon Olga Brancka's -cheek, callous though she was. She felt the irony and the disdain. She -perceived that she had in him an inexorable foe, beyond all allurement -and all entreaty. - -'I passed by Paris,' she answered, easily enough. 'Of course I had to -see my tailors, like everyone else in September. I have been first to -Noissetiers, then to London, then to Homburg, then to Russia. I do not -know where I have not been since we met. And you good people have been -vegetating beneath your forests all that time? I was curious to come -and see you in your felicity. Hohenszalrasburg used to be called the -vulture's nest; it appears to have become a dove's!' - -'I spared a whole family of _lammergeier_ to-day in deference to your -forest law,' he said, turning to his wife, whilst to himself he thought -what a far worse beast of prey was sitting here, smoothing her glossy -feathers in the warmth of his own hearth. She noticed the extreme -pallor of his face, the sound of anger and emotion forcibly restrained; -she imagined something of what he felt, though she could guess neither -its intensity nor its extent. She had done herself violence in meeting -with courtesy and tranquillity the woman who now sat between them, but -she could not measure or imagine the guilt and the audacity of her. - -When, that evening, as twilight came on, she had heard the sound of -wheels beneath the terraces, and in a little while had been informed -by Hubert that the Countess Brancka had arrived, her first movement -had been to refuse to receive her, her next to remember that to one -who had been Gela's wife, and now was Stefan Brancka's, the doors of -Hohenszalras could not be shut without an open quarrel and scandal, -which would regale the world and make feud inevitable between her -husband and the whole race of Vàsàrhely. The Vàsàrhely knew the -worthlessness of Stefan's wife, but for the honour of their name they -would never admit that they did so; they would never fail to defend -her. Moreover, hospitality of a high and antique type had always been -the first of obligations upon all those whom she descended from and -represented. They would not have refused to harbour their worst foe -if he had demanded asylum. They would not have turned away sovereign -or beggar from their gates. Those days were gone, indeed, but their -high and generous temper lived in her. In the brief space in which -Hubert, having made the announcement, waited for her commands, she -had struggled with her own repugnance and conquered it. She had told -herself that to turn Stefan's wife from her doors would be the mere -vulgar melodrama of a common and undignified anger. After all she knew -nothing; therefore she traversed the house to receive her unasked -guest, and gave her welcome without any pretence of cordiality or -friendship, but with a perfect and unhesitating politeness void of all -offence. - -She was thankful that the Princess Ottilie was again in the south of -France with her sister-in-law of Lilienhöhe, so that her indignation, -her interrogation, and her quick regard were spared to them. Now that -her niece was no longer alone, the Princess did not think it her -bounden duty to endure these northern winds, blowing from Poland and -the Baltic over the old duchy of Austria, which she had at all times so -peculiarly detested, though she had been born a thousand miles nearer -the Baltic herself. - -Olga Brancka had been profuse in her apologies and expressions of -regret, but she had at once let her carriage, hired at S. Johann, with -its four post-horses changed at Matrey, be taken to the stables, and -had gone herself to her old apartments, where in little time her two -maids had altered her heavy furs and travelling clothes to the costume -of consummate simplicity and elegance in which she now sat, putting -forth her small feet in rose satin shoes to the warmth from the great -Hirschvogel stove, which, with its burnished and enamelled colour, -illumined one side of the white salon. - -Sabran and his wife both remained standing, he leaning his arm on the -scroll work of the great stove, she playing with the delicate ears of -one of the hounds. Madame Brancka alone sat and leaned back in her -low seat, quite content; she was aware that she was unwelcome, and -that her presence was an embarrassment and worse. But the sense of -the wrong and cruel position in which she placed them was sweet and -pungent to her; she was refreshed by the very sense of dilemma and of -danger which surrounded her. She had her vengeance in her hand, and -she would not exhaust it quickly, but tasted its savour with the slow -care and patient appetite of the connoisseur in such things. She had a -Chinese-like skill in patiently drawing out the prolonged pangs of an -ingeniously invented martyrdom. - -'Why do you both stand?' she said, looking up at him between her -half-closed lids. 'Are you standing to imply to me as we do with -monarchs, 'This house is yours whilst you are in it?' I am much -obliged, but I should sell it at once if it were really mine. It is a -splendid, barbaric solitude, like Taróc. We have not been to Taróc this -year. Stefan says Egon lives altogether with his troopers and grows -very morose. You hear from him sometimes, I suppose?' - -To Sabran it seemed as if her half shut black eyes shot forth actual -sparks of fire, as she spoke the name which he could never hear without -an inward spasm of fear. - -'Of course I hear from Egon,' said his wife. 'But he writes very -briefly; he was never much of a penman. He prefers a rifle, a sword, a -riding-whip.' - -'I hear you have called the last child after him? Where are the boys? -They cannot be in bed. Let me see them. It is surely their hour to be -here. Réné, ring, and send for them.' - -His brow contracted. - -'No; it is late,' he said abruptly. 'They would only weary you; they -are barbaric, like the house.' - -He felt an extreme reluctance to bring his children into her presence, -to see her speak to them, touch them; he was longing passionately to -seize her and thrust her out of the doors. As she sat there in the full -light of the many wax candles burning around, sparkling, imperturbable, -like a coquette of a vaudeville, with her rose satin, and her white -taffetas, and her lace ruff, and her pink coral necklace and ear-rings, -and a little pink coral hand upholding her curls in the most studied -disorder, she seemed to him the loath-liest thing that he had ever -seen. He hated her more intensely than he had ever hated anyone in all -his life; even more than he had hated the traitress who had sold him to -the Prussians. - -'Pray let me see the children; I know you never dine till eight,' -she was persisting to his wife, who knew well that she was entirely -indifferent to the children, but who was not unwilling for their -entrance to break the constraint of what was to her an intolerable -trial. She did ring, and ordered their presence. They soon came, -making their obeisances with the pretty grave courtliness which they -were taught from infancy; the boys in white velvet dresses, while their -sister, in a frock of old Venetian point, looked like a Stuart child -painted by Vandyck. - -'_Ah, quels amours!_' cried Olga Brancka, with admirable effusion, as -they kissed her hand. Sabran turned away abruptly, and muttering a -word as to some orders he had to give the stud-groom, left the chamber -without ceremony, as she, with an ardour wholly unknown to her own -daughters, lifted the little Ottilie on her knee and kissed the child's -rose-leaf cheek. - -'What lovely creatures they are,' she said in German; 'and how they -have grown since they left Paris. They are all the image of Réné; he -must be very proud. They have all his eyes--those deep dark-blue eyes, -like jewels, like the depths of the sea.' - -'You are very poetic,' said Wanda; 'but I should be glad if you would -speak their praises in some tongue they do not understand. The boys may -not be hurt; but Lili, as we call her, is a little vain already, though -she is so young.' - -'Would you deny her the birthright of her sex?' said Madame Brancka, -clasping her coral necklace round the child's throat. 'Surely she will -have lectures enough from her godmother against all feminine foibles. -By the way, where is the Princess?' - -'My aunt is with the Lilienhöhe.' - -'I am grieved not to have the pleasure,' murmured Madame Brancka, -indifferently, letting Ottilie glide from her lap. - -'Give back the necklace, _liebling_,' said Wanda, as she unclasped it. - -'No, no; I entreat you--let her keep it. It is leagues too large, but -she likes it, and when she grows up she will wear it and think of me.' - -'Pray take it,' said Wanda, lifting it from the child's little breast. -'You are too kind; but they must not be given what they admire. It -teaches them bad habits.' - -'What severe rules!' cried Madame Brancka. 'Are these poor babies -brought up on S. Chrysostom and S. Basil? Is Lili already doomed to the -cloister? You are too austere; you should have been an abbess instead -of having all these golden-curled cupidons about you. Where is the -youngest one, Egon's namesake?' - -'He is in his cot,' said Gela, who was always very direct in his -replies, and who found himself addressed by her. - -Meantime Bela took hold of his mother's hand and whispered to her, -'_Mütterchen_, she is rude to you. Send her away.' - -'My darling,' answered Wanda, 'when people laugh in our own house we -must let them do it, even if it be at ourselves. And, Bela, to whisper -is _very_ rude.' - -'Egon is so little,' continued Gela, plaintively. 'He cannot read; I do -not think he ever will read!' - -'But you could not when you were as small as he?' - -'Could I not?' said Gela, doubtfully, to whom that time seemed many -centuries back. - -'And Lili, can she read?' said Madame Olga, suppressing a yawn. - -'Oh yes,' said Gela; 'at least, two-letter words she can; and me, I -read to her.' - -'What model children!' cried Madame Brancka, with a little laugh. 'And -the naughty boy who was in a rage because he was not permitted to go to -Chantilly? That was Bela, was it not? Bela, do you remember how cruel -your mother was, and how you cried?' - -Bela looked at her, with his blue eyes growing as stern and cold as his -father's. - -'My mother is always right,' he said gallantly. 'She knows what I ought -to do. I do not think I cried, _meine gnädige Frau_; I never cry.' - -'Even the naughty boy has become an angel! What a wonderful -disciplinarian you are, Wanda! If your children were not so handsome -they would be insufferable with their goodness. They are very handsome; -they are just like Sabran, and yet they are not at all a Russian type.' - -'Why should they be Russian? We have no Russian blood,' said their -mother, in surprise. - -Madame Brancka laughed a little confusedly, and fluttered her feather -screen. - -'I do not know what I was thinking of. Réné always reminds me of my old -friend Paul Zabaroff; they are very alike.' - -'I have seen the present Prince Zabaroff,' said Wanda, wondering what -the purpose of her guest's words were. 'He was not, as I remember him, -much like M. de Sabran.' - -'Oh, of course he was not equal to your Apollo,' said Madame Brancka, -winding Ottilie's long hair round her fingers. - -'You have had enough of them; they must not worry you,' said their -mother, and she dismissed the children with a word. - -'In what marvellous control you keep them,' said Madame Olga. 'Now, my -children never obeyed me, let me scream at them as I would.' - -'I do not think screaming has much effect on anyone, young or old.' - -'It paralyses a man. But I suppose a child can always out-scream one?' - -'Probably. A child never respects any person who loses their calmness. -As for men, you are better versed in their follies than I.' - -'But do you and Réné absolutely never quarrel?' - -'Quarrel! My dear Olga, how very _bürgerlich_ an idea.' - -'Do you suppose only the bourgeois quarrel?' said Madame Brancka. -'Really you live in your enchanted forest until you forget what the -world is like,' and she began an interminable history of the scenes -between a friend of hers and her husband and her family, a quarrel -which had ended in _conseils judiciaires_ and separation. 'It is a -cruel thing that there is not one law of divorce for all the world,' -she said with a sigh, as she ended the unsavoury relation. 'If Stefan -and I could only set each other free, we should have done it years and -years ago.' - -'I did not know your griefs against Stefan were so great?' - -'Oh, I have no great griefs against him; he is _bon enfant_: but we -are both ruined, and we both detest each other; we do not know very -well why.' - -'Poor Mila and Marie!' - -'What has it to do with them? They are happy at Sacré Cœur, and -when they come out they will marry. Egon will be sure to portion them; -we cannot. We are not like you, who will be able to give a couple of -millions to Lili without hurting her brothers.' - -'Lili's _dot_ is far enough in the future,' said Lili's mother, who, -very weary of the conversation, saw with relief the doors open, and -heard Hubert announce that dinner could be served. By an opposite door -Sabran entered also, a moment later. The dinner was tedious to both him -and her; they alike found it an almost intolerable penance. Their guest -alone was gay, ironical, at her ease, and never at a loss for a topic. -Sabran looked at her now and then with absolute wonder coming over -him as to whether he had not dreamed of that evening in Paris, alone -beside her, with the smell of the jasmine and orange-buds, and the -moonbeams crossing her white throat, her auburn curls. Was it possible -that a woman lived with such incredible self-control, insolence, -shamelessness? There was not a shadow of consciousness in her regard, -not a moment of uneasiness in her manner. Except the one passing faint -flush which had come on her face at his words of greeting, there was -not a single sign that she was other than the most innocent of women. -The impatience, the disgust, the amazement which were in him were too -strong for his worldly tact and composure altogether to conquer them; -his eyes were downcast, his words were studied or irrelevant, his -discomposure was evident; he felt as reluctant to meet the gaze of his -wife as of his enemy. In vain did he endeavour to sustain equably the -airy nothings of the usual dinner-table conversation. He was sensible -of an effort too great for art to cover it; he felt that there was a -strange sound in his voice, he fancied the very men waiting upon him -must be conscious of his embarrassment. If he could have turned her out -of the house he would have been at peace, for, after all, her offences -were much greater than his own; but to be compelled to sit motionless -whilst she called his wife caressing names, broke her bread, and would -sleep under her roof, was absolute torture to him. - -When they went back again to the white room he sat down at the piano, -glad to find a temporary refuge in music from the embarrassment of her -presence. - -'He cannot have spoken to Wanda?' she thought, uneasy for the first -time, as she glanced at Sabran, who was playing with his usual -_maestria_ a concerto of Schubert's. With the plea that her long post -journey had fatigued her, she asked leave to retire when half an hour -had elapsed, filled with scientific and intricate melody, which had -spared them the effort of further conversation. Her host and hostess -accompanied her to the guest-chambers, with the courtesy which was an -antique custom of the Schloss, as of all Austrian country-houses. Their -leave-taking on the threshold was cold, but studied in politeness; the -door closed on her, and Sabran and his wife returned along the corridor -together. - -His heart beat heavily with apprehension: he dreaded her next word. To -his relief, to his surprise, she said simply to him: - -'It is very early. I will go and write to Rothwand about the mines. -Will you come and tell me again all you said about them? I have half -forgotten. Or if you would rather do nothing to-night, I have other -letters to look over, and I will go to my own room.' - -'I will come there,' he said; and though he was well used to her -strong self-control and forbearance, he felt amazed at the force -of these now, and was moved to a passionate gratitude. 'Any other -woman,' he thought, 'would have torn me asunder to know what there has -been between me and her guest. She does not even speak; and yet God -knows how she loves me! She trusts me, and she will not weary me, nor -importune me, nor seem to suspect me with doubt. Who shall be worthy of -that? How can I rid her house of this insult? The other shall go; she -shall go if I put her out with public shame before my servants. Would -to heaven that to kill such as she is were no more murder than to slay -a vicious beast or a poisonous worm!' - -He followed his wife into the octagon-room, where all her private -papers were. There were details of a mine in Galicia which were -disquieting and troublesome; on the previous day they had agreed -together what to do, but before she had answered her inspector, -fresh details had come in by the post-bag, whilst he had been -chamois-hunting. She sat down and handed him these fresh reports. - -'I do not think there is anything that will alter your decisions,' she -said. 'But read them, and tell me, and I will then write.' - -He drew the documents from her, and began to peruse them, but his hand -shook a little as he held the papers; his eyes were not clear, his mind -was not free. He laid them down and looked at her; she was seated near -him. She was paler than usual and her face was grave, but she seemed -quite absorbed in what she did, as she added figures together, and made -a quick _précis_ of the reports she had received. Her left hand lay on -the table as she wrote; on the great diamond of the _bague d'alliance_, -the only gift which he had presumed to offer her on their marriage, the -light was sparkling; it looked like a cluster of dewdrops on a lily. He -took that hand on a sudden impulse of infinite reverence, and raised it -to his lips. - -She looked at him, and a mist of tears came into her eyes which were -tears of pleasure, of relief, of restrained emotion comforted; the -gesture gave her all the reassurance that she cared, to have; she was -sure then that Olga Brancka had never made him false to his honour and -hers. She said nothing to him of what was foremost in the minds of -both. She held the value of silence high. She thought that there were -things of which merely to speak seemed a species of dishonour. A single -word ill-said is so often the 'little rift within the lute which makes -the music dumb.' - -She went to rest content; but he was none the less ill at ease, -disturbed, offended, and violently offended, at the presence of his -temptress under the roof of Hohenszalras. It was an outrage to all he -loved and respected; an outrage to which he was determined to put an -end. The only possible way to do so was to see his guest himself alone. -He could not visit her in her apartments; he could not summon her to -his; if he waited for chance, he might wait for days. The insolence -which had brought her here would probably, he reasoned, keep her here -some time, and he was resolved that she should not pass another night -in the same house with his wife and his children. - -Long after Wanda had gone to sleep he sat alone, thinking and -perplexing himself with many a scheme, each of which he dismissed as -impracticable and likely to draw that attention from his household -which he most desired to avoid. He slept ill, scarcely at all, and rose -before daybreak. When he was dressed he sent his man to ask Greswold to -come to him. The old physician, who usually got up before the sun, soon -obeyed his summons, and anxiously inquired what need there was of him. - -'Dear Professor,' said Sabran, with that gracious kindliness which -always won his listener's heart, 'you were my earliest friend here; you -are the tutor of my sons; you are an old man, a wise man, and a prudent -man. I want you to understand something without my explaining it; I do -not desire or intend the Countess Brancka to be the guest of my wife -for another day.' - -Greswold looked up quickly: he knew the character of Stefan Brancka's -wife, he guessed the rest. - -'What can I do?' he said simply. 'Pray command me.' - -'Do this,' said Sabran. 'Make some excuse to see her; say that the -chaplain, or that my wife, has sent you, say anything you choose to get -admitted to her rooms in the visitors' gallery. When you see her alone, -say to her frankly, brutally if you like, that _I_ say she must leave -Hohenszalras. She can make any excuse she pleases, invent any despatch -to recall herself; but she must go. I do not pretend to put any gloss -upon it; I do not wish to do so. I want her to know that I do not -permit her to remain under the same roof with my wife.' - -The old physician's face grew grave and troubled; he foresaw difficulty -and pain for those whom he loved, and to whom he owed his bread. - -'I am to give her no explanation?' he said doubtfully. - -'She will need none,' said Sabran, curtly. - -Greswold was mute. After a pause of some moments he said with -hesitation: - -'By all I have heard of the Countess Brancka, I am much afraid she will -not be moved by such a message, delivered by anyone so insignificant -as myself; but what you desire me to do I will do, only I pray you do -not blame me if I fail. You are, of course, indifferent to her certain -indignation, to her possible violence?' - -'I am indifferent to everything,' said Sabran, with rising impatience, -'except to the outrage which her presence here is to the Countess von -Szalras.' - -'Allow me one question, my Marquis,' said Greswold. 'Is our lady, your -wife, aware that the presence of her cousin's wife is an indignity to -herself?' - -Sabran hesitated. - -'Yes and no,' he answered at last. 'She knew something in Paris, but -she does not know or imagine all, nor a tithe part; of what Madame -Brancka is.' - -'I go at once,' said the old man, without more words, 'though of course -the lady will not be awake for some hours. I will ask to see her -maids. I shall learn then when I can with any chance of success get -admittance. You will not write a word by me? Would it not offend her -less?' - -'I desire to offend her,' said Sabran, with a vibration of intense -passion in his voice. 'No; I will not write to her. She is a woman who -has studied Talleyrand; she would hang you if she had a single line -from your pen. If I wrote, God knows what evil she would not twist out -of it. She hates me and she hates my wife. It must be war to the knife.' - -Greswold bowed and went out, asking no more. - -Sabran passed the next three hours in a state of almost uncontrollable -impatience. - -It was the pleasant custom at Hohenszalras for everyone to have their -first meal in their own apartments at any hour that they chose, but he -and Wanda usually breakfasted together by choice in the little Saxe -room, when the weather was cold. The cold without made the fire-glow -dancing on the embroidered roses, and the gay Watteau panels, and -the carpet of lamb-skins, and the coquettish Meissen shepherds and -shepherdesses, seem all the warmer and more cheerful by contrast. Here -he had been received on the first morning of his visit to Hohenszalras; -here they had breakfasted in the early days after their marriage; here -they had a thousand happy memories. - -Into that room he could not go this morning. He sent his valet with -a message to his wife, saying that he would remain in his own room, -being fatigued from the sport of the previous day. When they brought -him his breakfast he could not touch it. He drank a little strong -coffee and a great glass of iced water; he could take nothing else. He -paced up and down his own chambers in almost unendurable suspense. If -he had been wholly innocent he would have been less agitated; but he -could not pardon himself the mad imprudences and follies with which he -had pandered to the vanities and provoked the passions of this hateful -woman. If she refused to go he almost resolved to tell all as it had -passed to his wife, not sparing himself. The three or four hours that -went by after Greswold had left him appeared to him like whole, long, -tedious days. - -The men came as usual to him for his orders as to horses, sport, or -other matters, but he could not attend to them; he hardly even heard -what they said, and dismissed them impatiently. When at last the heavy, -slow tread of the old physician sounded in the corridor, he went -eagerly to his door, and himself admitted Greswold. - -The Professor spread out his hands with a deprecating gesture. - -'I have done my best. But may I never pass such a quarter of an hour -again! She will not go.' - -'She will not?' Sabran's face flushed darkly, his eyes kindled with -deep wrath. 'She defies me, then?' - -'She evidently deems herself strong enough to defy you. She laughed -at me; she spoke to me as though I were one of the scullions or the -sweepers; she menaced me as if we were still in the Middle Ages. In a -word, she is not to be moved by me. She bade me tell you that if you -wish her out of your wife's house you must have the courage to say so -yourself.' - -'Courage!' echoed Sabran. 'It is not courage that will be any match -for her; it is not courage that will rid one of her; she knows the -difficulty in which I am. I cannot betray her to her husband. No man -can ever do that. I cannot risk a quarrel, a scandal, a duel with the -relatives of my wife. I cannot put her out of the house as I might do -if she had no relationship with the Vàsàrhely and the Szalras. She -knows that; she relies upon it.' - -'My lord,' said the physician very gently, 'will you pardon me one -question? Is the offence done to the Countess von Szalras by Madame -Brancka altogether on her side? Are you wholly (pardon me the word) -blameless?' - -'Not altogether,' said Sabran, frankly, with a deep colour on his face. -'I have been culpable of folly, but in the sense you mean I have been -quite guiltless. If I had been guilty in that sense, I would not have -returned to Hohenszalras!' - -'I thank you for so much confidence in me,' said Greswold. 'I only -wanted to know so far, because I would suggest that you should send -for Prince Egon and simply tell him as much as you have told me. Egon -Vàsàrhely is the soul of honour, and he has great authority over the -members of his own family. He will make his sister-in-law leave here -without any scandal.' - -'There are reasons why I cannot take Prince Vàsàrhely into my -confidence in this matter,' said Sabran, with hesitation. 'That is not -to be thought of for a moment. Is there no other way?' - -'See her yourself. She imagines you will not, perhaps she thinks you -dare not, say these things to her yourself.' - -'See her alone? What will my wife suppose?' - -'Would it not be better frankly to say to my lady that you have need -to see her so? Pardon me, my dear lord, but I am quite sure that the -straight way is the best to take with our Countess Wanda. The only -thing which she might very bitterly resent, which she might perhaps -never forgive, would be concealment, insincerity, want of good faith. -If you will allow me to counsel you, I would most strongly advocate -your saying honestly to her that you know that of Madame Brancka which -makes you hold her an unfit guest here, and that you are about to see -that lady alone to induce her to leave the castle without open rupture.' - -Sabran listened, stung sharply in his conscience by every one of the -simple and honest words. When Greswold spoke of his wife as ready to -pardon any offences except those of falseness and concealment his soul -shrank as the flesh shrinks from the touch of caustic. - -'You are right,' he said with effort. 'But, my dear Greswold, though -I am not absolutely guilty, as you were led for a moment to think, I -am not altogether absolutely blameless. I was sensible of the fatal -attraction of an unscrupulous person. I was never faithless to my wife, -either in spirit or act, but you know there are miserable sensual -temptations which counterfeit passion, though they do not possess it; -there are unspeakable follies from which men at no age are safe. I -do not wish to be a coward like the father of mankind, and throw the -blame upon a woman; but it is certain that the old answer is often -still the true one, "The woman tempted me." I am not wholly innocent; -I played with fire and was surprised, like an idiot, when it burnt me. -I would say as much as this to my wife (and it is the whole truth) if -it were only myself who would be hurt or lowered by the telling of it; -but I cannot do her such dishonour as I should seem to do by the mere -relation of it. She esteems me as so much stronger and wiser than I am; -she has so very noble an ideal of me; how can I pull all that down with -my own hands, and say to her, "I am as weak and unstable as any one of -them"?' - -Greswold listened and smiled a little. - -'Perhaps the Countess knows more than you think, dear sir; she is -capable of immense self-control, and her feeling for you is not the -ordinary selfish love of ordinary women. If I were you I should tell -her everything. Speak to her as you speak to me.' - -'I cannot!' - -'That is for you to judge, sir,' said the old physician. - -'I cannot!' repeated Sabran, with a look of infinite distress. 'I -cannot tell my wife that any other woman has had influence over me, -even for five seconds. I think it is S. Augustine who says that it is -possible, in the endeavour to be truthful, to convey an entirely false -impression. An utterly false impression would be conveyed to her if I -made her suppose that any other than herself had ever been loved by me -in any measure since my marriage; and how should one make such a mind -as hers comprehend all the baseness and fever and folly of a man's mere -caprice of the senses? It would be impossible.' - -Greswold was silent. - -'You do not see how difficult even such a confession as that would be,' -Sabran insisted, with irritation. 'Were you in my place you would feel -as I feel.' - -'Perhaps,' said Greswold. 'But I believe not. I believe, sir, that you -underrate the knowledge of the world and of humanity which the Countess -von Szalras possesses, and that you also underrate the extent of her -sympathy and the elasticity of her pardon.' - -Sabran sighed restlessly. - -'I do not know what to do. One thing only I know--the wife of Stefan -Brancka shall not remain here.' - -'Then, sir, you must be the one to say so or to write it. She will heed -no one except yourself. Perhaps it is natural. I am nothing more in the -sight of a great lady like that than Hubert or Otto would be. She does -not think I am of fit station to go to her as your ambassador.' - -'You would disown her if she were your daughter!' said Sabran, with -bitter contempt. 'Well, I will see her; I will say a word to the -Countess von Szalras first.' - -'Say all,' suggested Greswold. - -Sabran shook his head and passed quickly through the suite of sleeping -and dressing chambers to the little Saxe salon, where he thought it -possible that Wanda might still be. He found her there alone. She had -opened one of the casements and was speaking with a gardener. The -autumnal scent of wet earth and fallen leaves came into the room; the -air without was cold, but sunbeams were piercing the mist; the darkness -of the cedars and the yews made the airy and brilliant grace of the -eighteenth-century room seem all the brighter. She herself, in a sacque -of brocaded silk, with quantities of old French lace falling down it, -seemed of the time of those gracious ladies that were painted on the -panels. She turned as she heard his step, a red rose in her fingers -which she had just gathered from the boughs about the windows. - -'The last rose of the year, I am afraid, for I never count those of the -hothouses,' she said, as she brought it to him. - -He kissed her hand as he took it from her; he suddenly perceived the -expression of distress and of preoccupation on his face. - -'Is there anything the matter?' she asked; 'did you overstrain yourself -yesterday on the hills?' - -'No, no,' he said quickly; then added, with hesitation: 'Wanda, I have -to see Madame Brancka alone this morning. Will you be angered, or will -you trust me?' - -For a moment her eyebrows drew together, and the haughtier, colder look -that he dreaded came on her face; the look which came there when her -children disobeyed or her stewards offended her, The look which told -how, beneath the womanly sweetness and serenity of her temper, were the -imperious habit and the instincts of authority inherited from centuries -of dominant nobility. In another instant or two she had controlled her -impulse of displeasure. She said gravely, but very gently: - -'Of course I trust you. You know best what you wish, what you are -called on to do. Never think that you need give explanation, or ask -permission to or of me. That is not the man's part in marriage.' - -'But I would not have you suspect--' - -'I never suspect,' she said, more haughtily. 'Suspicion degrades -two people. Listen, my love. In Paris I saw, I heard more than you -thought. The world never leaves one in ignorance or in peace. I neither -suspected you nor spied upon you. I left you free. You returned to me, -and I knew then that I had done wisely. I could never comprehend the -passion and pleasure that some women take in hawks only kept by a hood, -in hounds only held by a leash. What is allegiance worth unless it be -voluntary? For the rest, if the wife of my cousin be a worse woman than -I think, do not tell me so. I do not desire to know it. She was the -idol of my dead brother's youth; she once entered this house as his -bride. Her honour is ours.' - -A flush passed over her husband's face. 'You are the noblest woman that -lives,' he said, in a hushed and reverent voice. He stooped almost -timidly and kissed her; then he bowed very low, as though she were a -queen and he her courtier, and left her. - -'That devil shall leave her house before another night is down!' he -said in his own thoughts, as he took his way across the great building -to Olga Brancka's apartments. He had the red autumn rose, she had -gathered in his hand as he went. Instinctively he slipped it within -his coat as he drew near the doors of the guests' corridor; it was too -sacred for him to have it made the subject of sneer or of a smile. - -Wanda remained in the little Watteau room. A certain sense of fear--a -thing so unfamiliar, so almost unknown to her--came upon her as the -flowered satin of the door-hangings fell behind him, and his steps -passed away down the passages without. The bright pictured panels of -the shepherds in court suits, and the milkmaids in hoops and paniers, -smiling amidst the sunny landscapes of their artificial Arcadia; the -gay and courtly figures of the Meissen china, and the huge bowls filled -with the gorgeous deep-hued flowers of the autumn season; the singing -of a little wren perched on a branch of a yew, the distant trot of -ponies' feet as the children rode along the unseen avenues, the happy -barking of dogs that were going with them, the smell of wet grass -and of leaves freshly dropped, the swish of a gardener's birch-broom -sweeping the turf beneath the cedars--all these remained on her mind -for ever afterwards, with that cruel distinctness which always paints -the scene of our last happy hours in such undying colours on the memory -of the brain. She never, from that day, willingly entered the pretty -chamber, with its air of coquetry and stateliness, and its little gay -court of porcelain people. She had gathered there the last rose of the -year. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIII. - - -He was so passionately angered against the invader of his domestic -peace, he was so profoundly touched by the nobility and faith of -his wife, that he went to Olga Brancka's presence without fear or -hesitation, possessed only by a man's natural and honest indignation at -an insult passed upon what he most venerated upon earth. - -One of his own servants, who was seated in the corridor, in readiness -for the Countess Brancka's orders, flung wide the door which opened -into the vestibule of the suite of guest-chambers allotted to this most -hated guest, and said to his master: - -'The most noble lady bade me say that she waited for your Excellency.' - -'The brazen wretch!' murmured Sabran, as he crossed the antechamber, -and entered the small saloon adjoining it; a room hung with Flemish -tapestries, and looking out on the Szalrassee. - -Olga Brancka was seated in one of the long low tapestried chairs; she -did not move or speak as he approached; she only looked up with a smile -in her eyes. He wished she would have risen in fury; it would have -made his errand easier. It was difficult to say to her in cold blood -that which he had to say. But he loathed her so utterly as he saw her -indolent and graceful posture, and the calm smile in her eyes, that he -was indifferent how he should hurt her, what outrage he should offer -to her. He went straight up to where she sat, and without any preface -said, almost brutally: - -'Madame Brancka, you affected not to understand my message through -Greswold; you will not misunderstand me now when I repeat that you must -leave the house of my wife before another night.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, with nonchalance, moving the Indian bangles on -her wrist, and gazing calmly into the air. 'I am to leave the house of -your wife--of my cousin, who was once my sister-in-law? And will you -tell me why?' - -Sabran flushed with passion. - -'You have a short memory, I believe, Countess; at least your lovers -have said so in Paris,' he answered recklessly. 'But I think if your -remembrance could carry you back to the last evening I had the honour -to see you in your hotel, you will not force me to the brutality and -coarseness of further explanation.' - -'Ah!' she said tranquilly once more, in an unvaried tone, clasping her -hands behind her head and leaning both backward against the cushions -of her chair, whilst her eyes still smiled with an abstracted gaze. -'How scrupulous you are about trifles. Why not about great things, -my friend? What does Holy Writ tell us? One strains at a gnat and -swallows a camel. I have heard a professor of Hebrew say that the Latin -translation is not correct, but----' - -'Madame,' said Sabran sternly, controlling his rage with difficulty, -'pardon me, but I can have no trifling. I give you time and occasion to -make any excuses that you please; but once for all, you will leave here -before nightfall.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, for the third time; 'and if I do not choose to -comply with your desire, how do you intend to enforce it?' - -'That will be my affair.' - -'You will make a scene with my husband? That will be theatrical and -useless. Stefan is one of those men who are always swearing at their -wives in private, but in public never admit that their wives are -otherwise than saints. Those men do not mind being cheated, but they -will never let others say that they are so: _amour-propre d'homme._' - -Sabran could have struck her. He reined in his wrath with more -difficulty every moment. - -'I have no doubt your psychology is correct, and has taught you all the -weaknesses of our idiotic sex,' he said bitterly. 'But you must pardon -me if I cannot spare time to listen to your experiences. The Countess -von Szalras is aware that I have come to visit you, and I tell you -frankly that I will not stay more than ten minutes in your rooms.' - -'You have told her?' - -A wicked gleam flashed from under her half-shut eyelids. - -'I would have told her--told her all,' said Sabran, 'but she stopped -me with my words unspoken. What think you she said, madame, of you, -who are the vilest enemy, the only enemy, she has? That if you had -graver faults than she knew she wished not to hear them. You were her -relative, and once had been her brother's wife.' - -His voice had sternness and strong emotion in it. He looked to see her -touched to some shame, some humiliation. But she only laughed a little -languidly, not changing her attitude. - -'Poor Wanda!' she said softly, 'she was always so exaggerated--so -terribly _moyen âge_ and heroic!' - -The veins swelled on his forehead with his endeavour to keep down his -rage. He did not wish to honour this woman by bringing his wife's name -into their contention, and he strove not to forget the sex of his -antagonist. - -'Madame Brancka,' he said, with a coldness and calmness which it cost -him hard to preserve, 'this conversation is of no use that I can see. -I came to tell you a hard fact--simply this, that you must leave -Hohenszalras within the next few hours. As the master of this house, I -insist on it.' - -'But how will you accomplish it?' - -'I will compel you to go,' said Sabran, between his teeth, 'if I -disgrace you publicly before all my household. The fault will not be -mine. I have endeavoured to spare you; but if you be so dead to all -feeling and decency as to think it possible that the same roof can -shelter you and my wife, I must undeceive you, however roughly.' - -She heard him patiently and smiled a little. 'Disgrace _me?_' she -echoed gently. 'Count Brancka will kill you.' - -Sabran signified by a gesture that the possibility was profoundly -indifferent to him. He turned to leave her. - -'Understand me plainly,' he said, as he moved away. 'I leave it at -your option to invent any summons, any excuse, as your reason for -your departure; but if you do not announce your departure for this -afternoon, I shall do what I have said. I have the honour to wish you -good-morning.' - -'Wait a moment,' said Madame Brancka, still very softly. 'Are you -judicious to make an enemy of me?' - -'I much prefer you as an enemy,' said Sabran, curtly; and he added, -with contemptuous irony, 'your friendship is far more perilous than -your animosity; your compliments are like the Borgia's banquets.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, once again, 'you are ungrateful like all -men, and you are not very wise either. You forget that I am the -sister-in-law of Egon Vàsàrhely.' - -Sabran could never hear that name mentioned without a certain inward -tremor, a self-consciousness which he could not entirely conceal. But -he was infuriated, and he answered with reckless scorn: - -'Prince Vàsàrhely is a man of honour. He would disown you if he knew -that you offer yourself with the shamelessness of a _déclassée_, and -that you outrage a noble and unsuspecting woman, by forcing yourself -into her home when you have failed in tempting her husband to offer her -the last dishonour.' - -Her face paled under the unveiled and unsparing insults, but she did -not lose her equanimity. - -'We are very like a scene of Sardou's,' she said, with her unchangeable -smile. 'You would have made your fortune on the boards of the Français. -Why did you not go there instead of calling yourself Marquis de Sabran? -It would have been wiser.' - -He felt as if a knife had been plunged through his loins; all the -colour left his face. Had Vàsàrhely told _her_? No! it was impossible. -They were mere chance words of a woman eager to insult, not knowing -what she said. He affected not to hear, and with a bow to her he moved -once more to leave the chamber. But her voice again arrested him. - -'Tell me one thing before you go,' she said, very gently. 'Does Wanda -know that you are Vassia Kazán?' - -She spoke with perfect moderation and simplicity, not altering her -posture as she lay back in her tapestried chair, but she watched -him with trepidation. She was not altogether sure of facts she -had half-guessed, half-gathered. She had pieced details together -with infinite skill, but she could not be absolutely certain of her -conclusions. She watched him with eager avidity beneath her smiling -calmness. If he showed no consciousness her cast was wrong; she would -miss her vengeance; she would remain in his power. But at a glance she -saw her shaft had pierced straight home. He had strong control and even -strong power of dissimulation in need; but that name thrown at him -stunned him as a stone might have done. His face grew livid, he stood -motionless, he had no falsehood ready, he was taken off his guard: all -he realised was that his ruin was in the grasp of his mortal foe. His -hold on her was lost. His authority, his strength, his dignity, all -fell before those two hateful words, 'Vassia Kazán!' - -'He has told her!' he thought, and the blood surged in his brain -and made him dazed and giddy. He had not told her. By private -investigation, by keen wit, by careful and cruel comparison of various -information, she had arrived at the conclusion that Vassia Kazán and -he who had come from Mexico as the grandson of the Marquis Xavier de -Sabran were one and the same. Certain she could not be, but she was -near enough to certainty to dare to cast her stone at a venture. If it -missed--she was a woman. He could not kill or harm a woman, or call her -to account. - -Even now, if he had preserved his composure and turned on her with a -calm challenge, she would have been powerless. - -But he had lost the habit of falsehood; self-consciousness made him -weak; he believed that Egon Vàsàrhely had betrayed him. His lips were -mute, his tongue seemed to cleave to his mouth. A less keen-sighted -woman would have read confession on his face. She was satisfied. - -'You have not answered my question,' she said quietly. 'Does Wanda know -it? Does such a saintly woman "compound a felony"? I believe a false -name is a sort of felony, is it not?' - -He breathed heavily; his eyes had a terrible look in them; he put his -hand on his heart. For a moment the longing assailed him to spring -upon her and throttle her as a man may a dangerous beast. He could not -speak, a leaden weight seemed to shut his lips. - -He never doubted that she knew his whole history from Vàsàrhely. - -'It was an ingenious device,' she pursued, in her honeyed, even tones, -'but it was scarcely wise. Things are always found out some time or -another--at least, men's secrets are. A woman can keep hers. My dear -friend, you are really a criminal. It is very strange that Wanda of all -people should have made such a misalliance, and had such an imposture -passed off on her! I belong to her family; I ought to abhor you; and -yet I can imagine your temptation if I cannot forgive it. Still it was -a foolish thing to do, not worthy a man of your wit; and in France, -I believe, the punishment for such an assumption is some years' -imprisonment; and here, you know (perhaps you do not know?), your -marriage would be null and void if she chose.' - -He made a movement towards her, and for the moment, though she was a -woman of great courage, her spirit quailed before the look she met. - -'Hold your peace!' he said savagely. 'Speak truth, if you can. What has -Vàsàrhely told you?' - -Vàsàrhely had told her nothing, but she looked him full in the face -with perfect serenity, and answered--'All!' - -He never doubted her, he could not doubt her; what she said was met by -too full confirmation from his memory and his conscience. - -'He gave me his word,' he muttered. - -She smiled. 'His word to _you,_ when he is in love with your wife? The -miracle is that he has not told her. She would divorce you, and after a -decent interval I dare say she would marry him, if only _pour balayer -la chose._ For a man so devoted to her as you are, you have certainly -contrived to outrage and injure her in the most complete manner. _Mon -beau Marquis!_ to think how fooled we all were all the time by you. How -haughty you were, how fastidious, how patrician!' - -He leaned against the high column of the enamelled stove and covered -his eyes with his hands. He was unnerved, unstrung, half-paralysed. The -blow had fallen on him without preparation or defence being possible to -him. His thoughts were all in confusion; one thing alone he knew--he, -and all he loved, were in the power of a merciless woman, who would no -more spare them than the _sloughi_ astride the antelope will let go its -quivering flesh. - -She looked at him, and a contemptuous wonder came upon her that a man -could be so easily beaten, so easily betrayed into tacit confession. -She ignored the power of conscience, for she did not know it herself. - -She thought, with scorn: 'Why did he not deny, deny boldly, as I should -have done in his place? He would have twisted my weapon out of my -hand at once. I know so little, and I could prove nothing! But he is -unnerved at once, just because it is true! Men are all imbeciles. If he -had only denied and questioned me he must have found that Egon had told -me nothing.' - -And she watched him with derision. - -In truth, she knew so little; she had scarce more to guide her than -coincidence and conjecture. She longed to know everything from himself, -but strong as was her curiosity, her prudence and her cruelty were -stronger still, and she admirably assumed a knowledge that she had not, -guided in all her dagger-strokes by the suffering she caused. - -Yet her passion for him which, unslaked, was as ardent as ever, became -not the less, but the greater, because she had him in her power. She -was one of those women to whom love is only delightful if it possess -the means to torture. Besides, it was not himself whom she hated, -it was his wife. To make him faithless to his wife would be a more -exquisite triumph than to betray him to her. - -'He would be wax--in my hands,' she thought. A vision of the future -passed before her, with her dominion absolute over him, her knowledge -of his shame holding him down with a chain never to be broken. She -would compel him to wound, to deceive, to torment his wife; she would -dictate his every word, his every act; she would make him ridiculous to -the world, so servile should be his obedience to her, so great should -be his terror of her anger. He should be her lover, weak as water in -all semblance, because the puppet of her pleasure. This would be a -vengeance worthy of herself when she should see him kneel at her feet -for permission for every slightest act, and she should scourge him as -with whips, knowing he dare not rise; when she should say softly in his -ear a thousand times a year: 'You are Vassia Kazán!' - -She was silent a few moments, lost in the witchery of the vision she -conjured up; then she looked up at him and said very caressingly, in -her sweetest voice: - -'Why are you so dejected? Your secret may be safe with me. You -know--you know--I was willing ever to be your friend; I am not less -willing now. I told you that you were unwise to make an enemy of me. -Wanda's regard would not outlive such a trial, but perhaps mine may, -if you be discerning enough, grateful enough to trust to it. I know -your crime, for a crime it is, and a foul one: we must not attempt to -palliate it. When we last met you offended, you outraged me. Only a few -moments since you insulted me as though I were the lowest creature on -the Paris asphalte. Yet all this I--I--should be tempted to forgive if -you love me as I believe that you do. I love _you_, not as that cold, -calm, unerring woman yonder may, but as those only can who know and -care for no heaven but earth. Réné--Vassia--who, knowing your sin, your -shame, your birth, your treachery, would say to you what I say? Not -Wanda!' - -He seemed not to hear, he did not hear. He leaned his forehead upon his -arms; he was sunk in the apathy of an intense woe; only the name of his -wife reached him, and he shivered a little as with cold. - -At his silence, his indifference, her eyes grew alight with flame; but -she controlled herself; she rose and clasped her hands upon his arm. - -'Listen,' she murmured, 'I love you, I love you! I care nothing what -you were born, what sins you have sinned; I love you! Love me, and -she shall never know. I will silence Egon. I will bury your secret as -though it were one that would cost me my life were it known.' - -Only at the touch of her hands did he arouse himself to any -consciousness of what she was saying, of how she tempted him. Then he -shook off her clasp with a rude gesture; he looked down on her with -the bitterest of scorn: not for a single instant did he dream of -purchasing her silence so. - -'You are even viler than I thought,' he said in his throat, with a -dreary laugh of mockery. 'How long would you spare me if I sinned -against her with you? Go, do your worst, say your worst! But if you -stay beneath my wife's roof to-night, I will drive you out of the -house before all her people, if it be my last act of authority in -Hohenszalras!' - -'I love you!' she murmured, and almost knelt to him; but he thrust her -away from him, and stood erect, his arms folded on his chest. - -'How dare you speak of love to me? You force me to employ the language -of the gutter. If Egon Vàsàrhely have put me in your power, use it, -like the incarnate fiend you are. I ask no mercy of you, but if you -dare to speak of love to me I will strangle you where you stand. Since -you call me the wolf of the steppes you shall feel my grip.' - -She fell a few steps backward and stretched her hand behind her, and -rung a little silver bell. Absorbed in his own bitterness of thought he -did not hear the sound or see the movement. She had already, between -Greswold's visit to her and his master's, written a little letter: - - 'Loved Wanda,--Will you be so good as to - come to me for a moment at once?--Yours, - 'OLGA.' - -She had said to one of her women, who was in the next apartment: 'When -I ring you will take that note at once to my cousin, the Countess, -yourself, without coming to me.' She had had no fear of leaving the -woman in the adjoining room, who was a Russian, wholly ignorant of the -French tongue, which she herself always used. - -She recoiled from him, frightened for the moment, but only for that; -she had nerves of steel, and many men had cursed her and menaced her -for the ruin of their lives, and she had lived on none the worse. -'_On crie--et puis c'est fini_,' she was wont to say, with her airy -cynicism. Something in his look, in his voice, told her that here it -would not finish thus. - -'He will shoot himself if he do not strangle me; and he will escape -so,' she thought, and a faint sort of fear touched her. She was alone -before him; she had said enough to drive him out of all calmness and -all reason. She had left him nothing to hope for; she had made him -believe that she knew all his fatal past. If he had struck her down -into the dumbness of death he would have been scarcely guilty. - -But it was only for a moment that such a dread as this passed over her. - -'Pshaw! we are people of the world,' she thought. 'Society is with us -even in our solitude. Those violent crimes are not ours: we strike -otherwise than with our hands.' - -And, reassured, she sank down into her chair again, a delicate figure -in a cloud of muslin of the Deccan and old lace of Flanders, and -clasped her fingers gracefully behind her head, and waited. - -He did not move; his eyes were fastened on her, glittering and cold as -ice, and full of unspeakable hatred. He was deadly pale. She thought -she had never seen his face more beautiful than in that intense mute -wrath which was like the iron frost of his own land. - -'When he goes he will go and kill himself,' she mused, and she listened -with passionate eagerness for the passing of steps down the corridor. - -But he did not stir; he was absorbed in wondering how he could deal -with this woman so that his wife should be spared. Was there any way -save that vile way to which she had tempted him? He could see none. -From a passion rejected and despised there can be no chance of mercy. -He had ceased altogether to think of himself. - -To take his own life did not pass over his thoughts then. It would have -spared Wanda nothing. His shame, told when he were dead, would hurt -her almost more than when he were living. He had too much courage to -evade so the consequences of his own acts. In the confusion of his mind -only this one thing was present to it--the memory of his wife. All that -he had dreaded of disgrace, of divorce, of banishment, of ruin, were -nothing to him; what he thought of was the loss of her herself, her -adoration, her honour, her sweet obedience, her perfect faith. Would -ever he touch even her hand again if once she knew? - -His remorse and his grief for his wife overwhelmed and destroyed every -personal remembrance. If to spare her he could have undergone any -extremity of torture he would have welcomed it with rapture. But it is -not thus that a false step can be retrieved; not thus that a false word -can be effaced. It, and the fate it brings, must be faced to the bitter -end. - -He had no illusions; he was certain that the woman who would have -tempted him to be false to her would spare her nothing. He would not -even stoop to solicit a respite for her from Olga Brancka. He knew the -only price at which it could be obtained. - -He stood there, leaning his shoulders on the high cornice of the -stove, his arms crossed upon his chest, repressing every expression or -gesture that could have delighted his enemy by revelation of what he -suffered. In himself he felt paralysed; he felt as though neither his -brain nor his limbs would ever serve him again. He had the sensation -of having fallen from a great height; the same numbness and exhaustion -which he had felt when he had dropped down the frozen side of the -Umbal glacier. Both he and she were silent; he from the stupefaction -of horror, she from the eagerness with which she was listening for the -coming of Wanda von Szalras. - -After a short interval of her thirsty and cruel anxiety, the page, who -was in waiting outside, entered with a note for his master. - -Sabran strove to recover his composure as he stretched his hand out and -took the letter off the salver. It contained only two lines from his -wife: - -'Olga asks me to come to her. Do you wish me to do so?' - -A convulsion passed over his face. - -'Oh! most faithful of all friends!' he thought with a pang, touched to -the quick by those simple words of a woman whose fidelity was to be -repaid by shame. - -'Where is the Countess?' he asked of the young servant, who answered -that she was in the library. - -'Say that I will be with her there in a few moments.' - -The page withdrew. - -Olga Brancka was mute; there was a great anger in her veiled eyes. Her -last stroke had missed, through the loyalty of the woman whom she hated. - -He took a step towards her. - -'You dared to send for her then?' - -She laughed aloud, and with insolence. - -'Dare? Is that a word to be used by a Russian _moujik_, as you are, to -me, the daughter of Fedor Demetrivitch Serriatine? Certainly, I sent -for your wife, my cousin. Who should know what I know, if not she? Egon -might make you what promises he would; he is a man and a fool. I make -none. If you prevent my seeing Wanda, I shall write to her; if you -stop her letters, I shall telegraph to her; if you stop the telegrams, -I will put your story in the Paris journals, where the Marquis de -Sabran is as well known as the Arc de l'Étoile. You were born a serf, -you shall feel the knout. It would have been well for you if you had -smarted under it in your youth.' - -So absorbed was he in the memory of his wife, and in the thought of -the misery about to fall upon her innocent life, that the insults to -himself struck on him harmless, as hail on iron. - -'Spare your threats,' he said coldly. 'No one shall tell her but -myself. You know her present condition; it will most likely kill her.' - -'Oh, no,' said the Countess Brancka, with a little smile. 'Her nerves -are of iron. She will divorce you, that is all.' - -'She will be in her right,' he said, with the same coldness. Then, -without another word, he turned and left her chamber. - -'For a bastard, he crows well!' she said, loud enough to be heard by -him, in the old twelfth-century French of the words she quoted. - -Sabran went onward with a quick step; if he had paused, if he had -looked back, he felt that he would have murdered her. - -'Talk of the cruelty of men! What beast that lives,' he thought, 'has -the slow unsparing brutality of a jealous woman?' - -He went on, without pausing once, across the great house. So much he -could spare his wife, he could save her from her enemy's triumph in -her suffering; he could do as men did in the Indian Mutiny, plunge the -knife himself into the heart that loved him, and spare her further -outrage. - -When he reached the door of the library, he stopped and drew a deep -breath. He would have gone to his death with calmness and a smile; but -here he had no courage. A sickening spasm of pain seemed to suffocate -him. He knew that he met only his just punishment. If he could only -have suffered alone he would not have rebelled against his doom. But to -smite her!---- - -With greater courage than is needed in the battle-field he turned -the handle of the door and entered. She was seated at one of the -writing-tables with a mass of correspondence before her, to which she -had been vainly striving to give her attention. Her thoughts had been -with him and Olga Brancka. She looked up with the light on her face -which always came there when she saw him after any absence, long or -short. But that light was clouded as she perceived the change in his -look in his carriage, in his very features, which were aged, and drawn, -and bloodless. She rose with an exclamation of alarm, as he came to her -across the length of the noble room, where he had first seen her seated -by her own hearth, and heard her welcome him a stranger and unknown -beneath her roof. - -'Wanda! Wanda!' he said, and his voice seemed strangled, his lips -seemed dumb. - -'My God, what is it?' she cried faintly. 'Are the children----' - -'No, no,'he muttered. 'The children are well. It is worse than death. -Wanda, I have come to tell you the sin of my life, the shame of it. Oh! -how will you ever believe that I loved you since I wronged you so?' - -A great sob broke down his words. - -She put her hand to her heart. - -'Tell me,' she said, in a low whisper, 'tell me everything. Why not -have trusted me? Tell me--I am strong.' - -Then he told her the whole history of his past, and spared nothing. - -She listened in unbroken silence, standing all the while, leaning one -hand upon the ebony table by her. - -When he had ceased to speak he buried his face in her skirts where -he knelt at her feet; he did not dare to look at her. She was still -silent; her breath came and went with shuddering effort. She drew her -velvet gown from him with a gesture of unspeakable horror. - -'You!--you!' she said, and could find no other word. - -Then all grew dark around her; she threw her arms out in the void, and -fell from her full height as a stone drops from a rock into the gulf -below; struck dumb and senseless for the first time in all the years -that she had lived. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIV. - - -Twelve hours later she gave premature birth to a male child, dead. Once -in those hours when her physical agony lulled for a moment and her -consciousness returned, she said to her physician: - -'Tell him to send for Egon. Egon betrays no one.' - -They were the first words she had spoken. Greswold understood nothing; -but he saw that some great calamity had fallen on those he loved -and honoured, and that her lord never came nigh her chamber, but -only pacing to and fro the corridors and passages of the house, with -restless, ceaseless steps, paused ever and again to whisper--'Does she -live?' - -'Come to her,' said the old man once; but Sabran shuddered and turned -aside. - -'I dare not,' he answered, 'I dare not. If she die, it is I who shall -have killed her.' - -Greswold did not venture to ask what had happened; he knew it must -be some disaster of which the Countess Brancka was the origin or the -messenger. - -'My lady has spoken a few words,' he said later to his master. 'She -bade me tell you to send for Prince Vàsàrhely. She said he would betray -no one. I could ask nothing, for her agony returned.' - -Sabran was silent; the thought came to him for the first time that it -might be possible Olga Brancka had used the name of her brother-in-law -falsely. - -'Send for him yourself,' he said wearily; 'What she wishes must be -done. Nothing matters to me.' - -'I think the Prince is in Vienna,' said Greswold; and he sent an -urgent message thither, entreating Vàsàrhely's immediate presence at -Hohenszalras, in the name of his cousin. - -Olga Brancka remained in her own apartments, uncertain what to do. - -'If Wanda die,' she thought, 'it will all have been of no use; he -will be neither divorced nor disgraced. Perhaps one might plead the -marriage invalid, and disinherit the children; but one would want so -much proof, and I have none. If he had not been so stunned and taken -off his guard, he might easily have defied me. Egon may know more, but -if Wanda dies he will not move. He would care for nothing on earth. He -will forget the children were Sabran's. He will only remember they were -hers!' - -No one who loved her could have been more anxious for Wanda von Szalras -to live than was this cruellest of her enemies, who passed the time -in a perpetual agitation, and, as her women brought her tidings from -hour to hour, testified so much genuine alternation of hope and terror, -that they were amazed to see so much feeling in one so indifferent -usually to all woes not her own. She was miserably dull; she had no one -to speak to; she had no lover, friend, rival, or foe to give her the -stimulant to life that was indispensable to her. Even she did not dare -to approach the man whose happiness she had ruined, any more than she -would have dared to touch a lion wounded to the death. Yet she could -not tear herself away from the scene of her vengeance. - -The whole house was hushed like a grave; the servants were full of -grief at the danger of a mistress they adored; even the young children, -understanding that their mother was in peril, did not play or laugh; -but sat unhappy and silent over their books, or wandered aimlessly -along the leafless gardens. They knew that there was something -terrible, though they knew not what. - -'What is death?' said Lili to her brothers. - -'It is to go and live with God, they _say_,' answered Bela, doubtfully. - -'But how can God be happy Himself,' said Gela, 'when He causes so much -sorrow?' - -'Our mother will never go away from us,' said the little Lili, who -listened. 'They may call her from heaven ever--ever so much; she will -not leave _us_.' - -Bela sighed; he had a heavy, hopeless impression of death as a thing -that was stronger than himself. - -'Pride can do naught against death, my little lord,' one of the -foresters had once said to him. 'You will find your master there one -day.' - -A day and a night passed; puerperal convulsions succeeded to the birth -of the dead boy, and Wanda was unconscious alike of her bodily and her -mental torture. The physicians, whom Greswold had summoned instantly, -were around her bed, grave and anxious. The only chance for her lay in -the magnificent health and strength with which nature had dowered her. -Her constitution might, they said, enable her to resist what weaker -women would have gone down under like boats in an ocean storm. - -It was towards dawn on the second day when Egon Vàsàrhely arrived. - -'She lives?' he said, as he entered. - -'That is all,' said Greswold, with tears in his voice. - -'Can I see her?' - -'It would be useless. She would not know your Excellency.' - -Sabran came forward from the further end of the Rittersaal, where the -lights were burning with a yellow glare as the grey light of the dawn -was stealing through the unshuttered windows. - -'Allow me the honour of a word with you, Prince;' he said. 'I -understand; you have come at her summons--not at mine.' - -Greswold withdrew and left them alone. Vàsàrhely was still wrapped in -the furs in which he had travelled. He stood erect and listened; his -face was very stern. - -'Did you give up my secret to your brother's wife?' said Sabran, -abruptly. - -'Can you ask that?' said Vàsàrhely. 'You had my word.' - -'Madame Brancka knows all that you know. She said that you had -betrayed me to her. She would have told Wanda. I chose sooner to tell -her myself. The shock has killed the child. It may kill her. Your -sister-in-law is here. If she used your name falsely it is for you to -avenge it.' - -'Tell me what passed between you,' said Prince Egon. His face was dark -as night. - -Sabran hesitated a moment. Even now he could not bring himself to -disclose the passion which his enemy had conceived for him. It was one -of those women's secrets which no gentleman can surrender to another. - -'You are aware,' he replied, 'that Madame Brancka has been always -envious of your cousin; always willing to hurt her. When she got -possession of the story of my past she used it without mercy. She -would have told my wife with brutality; I told her myself, hoping to -spare her something by my own confession. Madame Brancka affirmed to -me, twice or thrice over, that you had given her all the information -against me.' - -'How could you believe her? You had had my promise.' - -'How could I doubt her?' - -'It is natural you should know nothing of honour!' thought Vàsàrhely, -but he did not utter what he thought. He saw that, dark as had been the -crimes of Sabran against those of his race, the chastisement of them -was as great. - -He said simply: - -'You might sooner have doubted anything than have believed that I -should entrust the Countess Brancka with such a secret, and have given -her such a power to injure my cousin. How can she have learned your -history? Have you betrayed yourself?' - -'Never! Since she had it not from you, I cannot conceive how or where -she learned it. Not a soul lives that knows me as----' - -He paused; he could not bring himself to say the name he bore from -birth. - -'My brother is unfortunate,! said Vàsàrhely, curtly. 'He has wedded a -vile woman. Leave her to me.' - -He saluted Sabran with cold but careful ceremony, and went, to his -own apartments. Sabran passed to the corridor which led to his wife's -rooms, and there resumed his miserable restless walk to and fro before -her door. He dared not enter. In her conscious hours she had not asked -for him. He had ever present before his eyes that movement of horror, -of repulsion, with which she had drawn the hem of her gown from his -grasp. - -Now and again, when her attendants came in and out, he saw through -the opening of the door the bed on which she lay and the outline of -her form in the pale light of the lamp. He could not rest. He could -not even sit down or break a mouthful of bread. If she died, his sin -against her would have slain her as surely as though his hand had taken -her life. It was about six of the clock in the chilly dawn of the -autumnal day. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXV. - - -Egon Vàsàrhely passed the next three hours in mental conflict with -his own passions. It would have been precious to him--would have been -a blessed and sacred duty--to avenge the woman he adored. But he had -a harder task. For her sake he had to befriend the traitor who had -wronged her, and shelter him from the just opprobrium of the world. -Crueller combat with temptation none ever waged than he fought now -against his own truest instincts, his own dearest affections. She lay -there, perchance dying, of this treachery which had struck her down in -her happiest hours; and it seemed to him as if, through the silence of -the darkened and melancholy house, he heard her voice saying to him: -'For my sake, spare him--spare my children!' - -'I give you more than my life, my beloved!' he murmured, as he sat -alone, whilst the grey day widened over forest and mountain, and for -her sake prepared to shield the man who had deceived her from disgrace -and death. - -'The hound!' he thought. 'He should be branded as a perjurer and thief -throughout the world! Yet for her--for her--one must protect him.' - -An hour or two later he sent his name to the Countess Brancka, with -a request to be received by her. She was but then awaking, and heard -with astonishment and alarm of his arrival, so unlooked for and so -dreaded. It had never occurred to her as possible that he would come to -Hohenszalras. - -'Wanda must have sent for him!' she thought. 'Oh heavens! why could she -not die with the child!' - -It was impossible for her to avoid him; shut up here she could neither -deceive nor escape him. She could not go away without her departure -being known to the whole household. She was afraid of him, terribly -afraid; the Vàsàrhely had a hand of iron when they were offended or -injured. But she put a fair face on a bitter obligation, and, when she -was dressed, went with a pretty smile into the salon to receive him. - -Vàsàrhely gave her no greeting as he entered. A great fear took -possession of her as she saw the expression of his eyes. He was the -only living being of whom she was in awe. He approached her without any -observances of courtesy. He said, simply and sternly: - -'I hear that you have used my name falsely, to the husband of Wanda; -that you have dared to give me as your authority for accusations -against him. What is your excuse?' - -She was for the moment so bewildered and disturbed by his presence and -his charge that she lost all her ability and power of interminable -falsehood. She was silent, and he saw her bosom heave and her hands -tremble a little. - -'What is your excuse?' he said again. 'Why did you come into this house -to injure Wanda von Szalras? How did you dare to use my name to do her -that injury?' - -She tried to laugh a little, but she was nervous and thrown off her -guard. - -'I wished to do her a service! Since she has married an adventurer--an -impostor--she ought to know it and be free.' - -'What is your authority for calling the Marquis de Sabran an -adventurer? To him you employed my name as your authority. What truth -was beneath that lie?' - -She was silent. For the only time in her life she knew not what to -say. She had no facts in her hands. Her ground was too uncertain to -sustain her in a steady attitude. - -'You know that he is Vassia Kazán!' she said, with another little laugh. - -The face of Vàsàrhely revealed nothing. - -'Who is Vassia Kazán?' he repeated. - -'He is--the man who robbed you of Wanda.' - -'He could not rob me of what I never possessed. What grounds have you -for calling him by this name?' - -'I have reason to believe it.' - -'Reason to believe it! You told him that you heard this story from -myself.' - -'He never denied it.' - -'I am not concerned to discuss what he did or did not do. I come here -to know on what grounds you employed my name?' - -'Egon, I will tell you the truth!' - -'Can you?' - -'Yes; I can and I will. When I was at Taróc, three summers ago, I saw -a fragment of a letter in Sabran's writing. I saw the name of Vassia -Kazán. I put this and that together. I heard something from Russia; I -sent some people to Mexico. I had always had my suspicions. I do not -say I have any positive legal proof, but I am morally convinced that he -is no Marquis de Sabran, and that he was born a serf near the city of -Kazán. I have charged him with it, and he has as good as confessed it. -He was struck dumb with consciousness.' - -She watched the face of Vàsàrhely, but it might have been cast in -bronze for anything that it told her. - -'You saw a fragment of a letter, of which you knew nothing,' he said -coldly; 'you formed some vague suspicions; you descended to the use -of spies, and, because you have invented a theory of your own on your -so-called discoveries, you deem you have a title to ruin the happiness -of your cousin's home. And you father your work upon me! Often have I -pitied my brother, but never so deeply as now.' - -'If my so-called discoveries were false,' she interrupted, with -hardihood, 'why did he not say so? He was convicted by his own -admissions. If my charge had been baseless, would he have said that he -would tell his wife himself rather than let her learn it from me?' - -'I neither know nor care what he said,' answered Vàsàrhely. 'I have -only your version for it. You must pardon me if I do not attach -implicit credence to your word. What I do know is that you ventured to -use my name to give force and credibility to your accusations. Had you -really known for certainty such a history, you would, had you had any -decency or feeling, have consulted your husband and myself on the best -means of shielding our cousin's honour. But you have always envied and -hated her. What is her husband to you--what is it to you whether he be -a noble or a clown? You snatch at the first brand you think you see, -in the hope to scorch her honour with it. But when you used my name -falsely you did a dangerous thing for yourself. I shall waste no more -words upon you, but you will sign what I write now, or you will repent -it.' - -She affected to laugh. - -'My dear Egon, _quel ton de maître!_ What authority have you over me? -Even if you invest yourself in your brother's, that counts for very -little, I assure you.' - -'Perhaps so; but if my brother be too careless of his honour and too -credulous of your deceptions, he is yet man enough to resent such -infamy as you have been guilty of now. You will sign this.' - -He passed to her a few lines which he had already written and brought -with him. They ran thus: - -'I, Olga, Countess Brancka, do acknowledge that I most untruthfully -used the name of my husband's brother, the Prince Vàsàrhely, in an -endeavour to injure the gentleman known as the Marquis de Sabran; and I -hereby do ask the pardon of them both, and confess that in such pardon -I receive great leniency and forbearance.' - -'Sign it,' said Prince Egon. - -'Pshaw!' said Madame Brancka, and pushed it away with a loud laugh, -deigning no further answer. - -'Will you sign it or not?' asked Vàsàrhely. - -She replied by tearing it in shreds. - -'It is easily rewritten,' he said, unmoved. He went to a writing-table -that stood in the room, looked for paper and found it, and wrote out -the same formula. - -'Do not be foolish, Olga,' he said curtly, as he returned. 'You are a -clever woman, and always consult your own interests. I dare say you -have done a thousand things as base as your attempt to ruin my cousin's -happiness, but I do not suppose you have often done anything so unwise. -You will sign this at once, or you will regret it very greatly.' - -'Why should I sign it?' she said insolently. 'The man is what I say; he -could not deny it. If I only guessed at the truth, I guessed aright. I -wonder that you do not see _your_ interests lie in exposing him. When -the world knows he is an impostor Wanda will divorce him and put the -children under other names in religious houses. Then you will be able -to marry her. I told him she would marry you _pour balayer la honte._' - -For the moment she was alarmed at the fires that leapt from Vàsàrhely's -sombre eyes. It cost him much--as much as it had cost Sabran--not to -strike her where she stood. He paused a second to control himself, then -answered her coldly and calmly-- - -'My cousin will never seek a divorce, nor shall I wed with a divorced -woman. Your hate misleads you; there is no blinder thing than hate. You -will sign this paper, or I shall telegraph for my brother.' - -'For Stefan!' - -All her boundless indifference to her husband, and her contempt for -him, were spoken in the accent she gave his name. - -'For Stefan. You are pleased to despise him because you can lead him -into mad follies, and can make him believe you are an innocent woman. -But Stefan is not altogether the ignoble dupe you think him. He is -a dupe, wiser men than he have been so; but he would not bear your -infidelity to him if he really knew it, nor would he bear other things -if he knew of them. Two years ago you took two hundred thousand -florins' worth of diamonds, in my name, from my jeweller Landsee in -the Graben. How should a tradesman suspect that a Countess Brancka was -dishonest? At the end of the year he brought his bill for that and -other things to me, whilst I was in Vienna. He had never, of course, -doubted that you went on my authority. Equally, of course, I did not -betray you, but paid the amount. When you do such things you should -not give written orders. They remain against you. Now, if Stefan knew -this, or if he knew that you had taken money from the richest of your -lovers, the young Duc de Blois, as I knew it so long as seven years -ago, you would no longer find him the malleable easily-cozened fool -you deem him. You would learn that he has Vàsàrhely blood in him. I -have only named two out of the many questionable facts I know against -you. They have been safe with me. I would never urge Stefan to a public -scandal. But, unless you sign this, and apologise for using my name to -the husband of my cousin, as you used it to Landsee of the Graben, I -shall tell my brother. He will not divorce you. That is not our way; -we do not go to lawyers to redress our wrongs. But he will compel you -to retire for your life into a religious house--as you would compel -the harmless children of Wanda; or he would imprison you himself in -one of our lonely places in the mountains, where you would cry in vain -for your lovers, and your friends, and your _menus plaisirs_, and none -would hear you. Do not mistake me. You have often called us barbaric; -you will find we can be so. As I say, we do not carry our wrongs to -lawyers. We can avenge ourselves.' - -She had lost all colour as he spoke. A nervous spasm of laughter -contracted her mouth, and remained on it like the ghastly _rictus_ of -death. She knew him well enough to know that he meant every syllable -he said. The Vàsàrhely had had stern tragedies in their annals, and to -women impure and unfaithful had been merciless as Othello. - -She felt that she was vanquished; that she would have to obey him or -suffer worse things. But though she was aware of her own impotence, she -could not resist a retort that should sting him. - -'You are very chivalrous! I always knew you had an insane adoration -of your cousin, but I never should have thought you would have put -on sabre and spurs in her husband's defence. Will he reward you by -effacing himself? Will he end as he has begun, like the hero of a -melodrama at the Gymnase, and shoot himself at Wanda's feet? You would -marry a widow, though you would not marry a divorced woman!' - -'Some time ago, when we spoke of him,' he replied, still with stern -self-control, 'I told you that were his honour called in question I -would defend it as I would my brother's--not for his sake, for hers. -I would, for her sake, defend it so were he the guiltiest soul on -earth. He belongs to her. He is sacred to me. You mistake if you deem -her such a woman as yourself. She has loved him. She will love no -other whilst she lives. She has given herself to him. She will give -herself to no other, though she outlive him from this hour. You make -your calculations unwisely, for when you make them you suppose that -every man and every woman have your own dishonesty, your own passions, -your own baseness. You are short of sight, because you only see in the -circle of your own conceptions.' - -She understood that he knew the secret of the man he protected, but -that he would never admit that he did so; would never reveal it or let -any other reveal it. She understood that he had himself forborne from -its exposure, and would never, whilst he lived, allow any other to hold -it up to the derision of the world. She understood that, if need were, -Vàsàrhely would defend, as he said, the honour of his cousin's husband -at the point of the sword against all foes or mockers. - -'For her sake!' she cried, 'always for her sake! What can you both see -so marvellous in her? She has been a greater fool than any woman that -has ever lived, though she can read Greek and write in Latin! What -has she done with all her wisdom and her holiness? You know as well -as though it were written there upon the wall that he is what I say. -Why do you put your lance in rest for him? Why are you ready to shed -blood on his behalf? He is an impostor who has taken in first the world -and then the mistress of Hohenszalras. If you were the hero you have -always seemed to me you would tear his heart out of his breast, shoot -him like a wolf in these very woods! If her honour is yours, avenge her -dishonour!' - -She spoke with force and fire, and longing to behold the spirit of evil -roused in her hearer's soul and stung to action. - -But she might as well have tried to move the mountains from their base -as rouse either pain or rage in her brother-in-law. Vàsàrhely kept his -attitude of stern, cold, contemptuous disgust. Not a muscle of his face -changed. He said merely: - -'You have been told what I shall do if you do not sign this paper. The -choice is yours. If you desire to hear any more episodes of your past I -can tell you many.' - -Then she changed her attitude and her eloquence. She dissolved in -tears; she wept; she implored; she tried to kneel to him. But he was -inflexible. - -'You are a good actress,' he said simply. 'But you forget; it is Stefan -whom you can deceive, not me.' - -When she had vainly used all her resources of alternate entreaty -and invective, of cajolery and insolence, she sank into her chair, -exhausted, hysterical, nerveless. - -'I am ill; call my woman,' she said faintly. - -He replied: - -'You are no more ill than I am.' - -'You are brutal, Egon,' she said, raising herself, with flashing eyes -and hissing tongue. - -'What have you been to her?' said Vàsàrhely. - -He waited with cold, inflexible patience. When another half-hour had -gone by she signed the paper, and flung it with fury to him. - -'You know very well it is true!' she cried, as she leaned across the -table like a slender snake that darted. 'Would she lie dying of it if -it were only a lie?' - -'That I know not,' said Vàsàrhely, coldly. 'What I know is that your -carriage will be ready in an hour, and that you will go hence. If ever -you be tempted to speak of what has occurred here, you will remember -that my silence to Stefan and your own people is only conditional on -yours on another matter.' - -Then he left her. - -She was cowed, intimidated, vanquished. When the hour was over she went -through the two lines of bowing servants, and left Hohenszalras ere the -noon was past. - -'It is the first time in my life I ever failed,' she thought, as the -pinnacles and towers of the burg were lost to her sight. 'What do these -men see in that woman?' - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVI. - - -Vàsàrhely, when he left her, went straight to Sabran, who, seated on an -oaken bench in the corridor of his wife's apartments, knew not how the -hours passed, and seemed aged ten years in a day. Vàsàrhely motioned -him to pass into one of the empty chambers. There he gave him the lines -which Olga Brancka had signed. - -'You are safe from her,' he said. 'She cannot tell your story to the -world. She will not dare even to whisper it as a conjecture.' - -Sabran did not speak. This great debt owed to his greatest foe hurt him -even whilst it delivered him. - -'For the first time I have concealed the truth,' pursued Vàsàrhely. 'I -affected to disbelieve her story. There was no other way to save it -from publicity. That alone would not have sufficed, but I had means to -coerce her.' - -'You have been very generous.' - -Vàsàrhely shrank from his praise as though from some insolence. He did -not look at Sabran; he spoke briefly between his closed teeth. All -his soul was full of longing to strike this man; to meet him in open -combat and to kill him; forcing him and his foul secret together down -underneath the sole sure cover of the grave. But the sense that so -near, within a few feet of them, she lay in peril of her life, made -even vengeance seem for the moment profane and blasphemous. - -'There will be always time,' he thought. - -That hushed and darkened chamber hard by awed his hatred into silence. -What would she wish? What would she command? Could he but know that, -how clear would be his path! - -He hesitated a moment, then turned away. - -'I shall wait here until the danger is past, or she is called to God,' -he said hoarsely. - -Then he walked away down the corridor slowly, like a man wounded with a -wound that bleeds within. - -Sabran stood awhile where he had left him, his eyes bent on the ground, -his heart sick with shame. - -'_He_ was worthy of her!' he thought with the most bitter pang of his -life. - -Three more days and nights passed; they were to him like a hideous -nightmare; at times he thought with horror that he would lose his -reason. The dreadful stillness, the dreadful silence, the knowledge -that death was so near that bed which he dared not approach, the -impossibility of learning what memories of him, what hatred of him, -might not be haunting the stupor in which she lay, together made up a -torture to which her bitterest reproach, her deadliest punishment would -have seemed merciful. - -All through that exhaustion, in which they believed her mind was -without consciousness, the memory of all that he had told her was -alive in it, in that poignant remembrance which the confusion of a -dulled brain only makes but the more terrible, turning and changing -what it suffers from into a thousand shapes. In her worst agony this -consciousness never left her; she kept silence because in her uttermost -weakness she was strong enough not to give her woe to the ears of the -others, but in her heart there seemed a great knife plunged, a knife -rusted with blood that was dishonoured. - -When she knew that the child she bore was dead, she felt no sorrow, -she thought only--'Begotten of a serf, of a coward!' - -The intolerable outrage, the intolerable deception, were like flames of -fire that seemed to eat up her life; her love for him, for the hour at -least, had been stunned and ceased to speak. To the woman who came of -the races of Szalras and Vàsàrhely, the dishonour covered every other -memory. - -'All his life only one long lie!' she thought. - -Her race had been stainless through a thousand years of chivalry and -heroism, and she--its sole descendant--had sullied it with the blood of -a base-born impostor! - -Whilst she lay sunk in what they deemed a perfect apathy, the disgrace -done to her, to her name, to her ancestry, was ever present to her -mind: a spectre which no one saw save herself. Every other emotion was -for the time quenched in that. She felt as though the whole world had -struck her on the cheek and she was powerless to resent or to revenge -the blow. In hours of delirium she thought she saw all the men and -women of her race who had reigned there before her standing about her -bed, and saying: 'You held our honour, and what did you do with it? You -let it sink to the earth in the arms of a nameless coward.' - -One night she said suddenly: 'My cousin--is he here?' - -When they told her that he had remained at Hohenszalras she seemed -reassured. At sunrise she asked the same question. When they answered -with the same affirmative, she said: 'Bid him come to me.' - -They fetched him instantly. As he passed Sabran in the corridor he -paused. - -'Your wife has sent for me,' he said; 'have I your permission to see -her?' - -Sabran bent his head, but his heart beat thickly with the only jealousy -he had ever felt. She asked for Egon Vàsàrhely in her stupor of misery, -and he, her husband, had lost the right to enter her chamber, dared not -approach her presence! - -'Wanda, I am here!' said Vàsàrhely, softly, as he bent over her. She -looked at him with eyes full of unspeakable agony. - -'Is it true?' she murmured. - -'Yes!' he said bitterly between his teeth. - -'And you knew it?' - -'Too late! But Wanda--my beloved Wanda--trust to me. The world shall -never hear it.' - -Her eyes had closed, a shiver ran through all her frame. 'Olga?' she -muttered. - -'She is in my power. I will deal with her,' he answered. 'She will be -silent as the grave.' - -She gave a long shuddering sigh, and her head sank back upon her -pillows. - -Vàsàrhely fell on his knees beside her bed, and buried his face on her -hands. - -'My violated saint!' he murmured. 'Fear not; I will avenge you.' - -Low though the words were, they reached and moved her in her dim blind -weakness. She stretched out her hand, and touched his bowed head. - -'No, no--not _that._ He is my children's father. He must be sacred; -give me your word, Egon, there shall be no bloodshed between him and -you.' - -'I am your next friend,' he said, with intense appeal in his voice. -'You are insulted and dishonoured--your race is affronted and -stained--who should avenge that if not I, your kinsman? There is no -male of your house. It falls to me.' - -All the manhood and knighthood in him were athirst for the life of the -impostor who had dishonoured what he adored. - -'Promise me,' she said again. - -'Your brothers are dead,' he muttered. 'I may well stand in their -place. Their swords would have found him out ere he were an hour -older.' - -She raised herself with a supreme effort, and through the pallor and -misery of her face there came a momentary flash of anger, a momentary -flash of the old spirit of command. - -'My brothers are dead, and I forbid any other to meddle with my life. -If anyone slew him it would be I--I--in my own right.' - -Her voice had been for the instant stern and sustained, but physical -faintness overcame her; her lips grew grey, and the darkness of great -weakness came before her sight. - -'I forbid you! I forbid you!' she said, as her breath failed her. - -Vàsàrhely remained kneeling beside her bed. His shoulders trembled with -restrained emotion. Even now she shut him out of her life. She denied -him the right to be her champion and avenger. - -She moved her hand towards him as a blind woman would have done. - -'Give me your word.' - -'You are my law,' he answered. 'I will do nothing that you forbid.' - -She inclined her head with a feeble gesture of recognition of the -words. He rose slowly, kissed the white fingers that lay near him, and, -without speaking, left her presence. - -'Bloodshed, bloodshed!' she thought, in the vague feverish confusion -of half-conscious thought. 'Though rivers of blood rolled between him -and me what could they wash away of the shame that is with me for ever? -What could death do? Death could blot out nothing.' - -A sense of awful impotence lay upon her like a weight of iron. Do what -she would she could never change the past! Her sons must grow to youth -and manhood tainted and dishonoured in her sight. There were times when -all the martial and arrogant spirit in her was like flame in her veins, -and she thought: 'Could I but rise and kill him--I, myself!' - -It seemed to her that it would be but justice. - -When Vàsàrhely, coming out from her chamber, passed the impostor who -had done her this dishonour, it cost him the greatest self-sacrifice -of his life not to order him out yonder in the chilly twilight of the -leafless woods, to stand before him in that ordeal of combat which, in -the code of honour of the Magyar Prince, was the sole tribunal to which -a man of honour could appeal. But she had forbade him to avenge her. -He felt that he had no share in her life sufficient to give him title -to disobey her. His own love for her told him that this offender was -still dear enough to her for his life to be sacred in her sight. - -'If I had not loved her,' he thought, 'I could have avenged her without -suspicion; but what would it seem to her and to the world?--only that I -slew him out of jealous rancour! In her soul she loves him still. Her -hate will fade, her love will survive, traitor and hound though he be.' - -He motioned Sabran towards one of the empty chambers in the gallery. -When he had closed the door of it he spoke with a low, hoarse voice: - -'Sir, I have the right as her kinsman, I have the right her brothers -would have had, to publicly insult you, to publicly chastise you. But -she has commanded me to abstain; she will have no feud between us. I -obey her; so must you. I have but one thing to say to you. Once you -spoke of suicide. I forbid you to follow up your crimes by causing the -unending misery that death by your own hand would bring to her. You -have been coward enough. Have courage at least not to leave a woman -alone under the disgrace you have brought upon her.' - -'Alone!' echoed Sabran. 'She will never admit me to her presence again. -She will demand her divorce as soon as ever she has strength to -remember and to speak.' - -'Do you know her so ill after nine years of marriage? Whatever she -do it will be for you to accept it, and not evade your chastisement -by the poltroon's refuge of oblivion in the grave. You have said you -think yourself my debtor; all the quittance I desire is this. You will -obey me when I forbid you to entail on your wife the lifelong remorse -that your suicide--however you disguised it--would bring upon her. In -obeying her, by holding back my hand from avenging her, I make the -greatest sacrifice that she could have demanded. Make yours likewise. -It would be easy for you to escape chastisement in death. You must -forego that ease, and live. I leave you to your conscience and to her.' - -He opened the door and passed down the corridor, his steps echoing on -the oaken floor. - -In half an hour he had left the house, and gone on his lonely way to -Taróc. - -Sabran stood mute. - -He had lost the power to resent; he knew that if this man chose to -strike him across the eyes with his whip he would be within his right. -The insults cut him to the bone as though the lash were on him; but he -held his peace and bore them, not in submission, but in silence. His -profound humiliation, his absolute despair, had broken the nerve in -him. He felt that he had no title to look a gentleman in the face, no -power to defend himself, whatever outrages were heaped on him. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVII. - - -In time the convulsions ceased, the stupor lightened; they began to -hope. - -The danger had been great, but it was well-nigh past; the vigour and -perfection of her strength had enabled her to keep her hold on life. -After those few words to her kinsman she spoke seldom, she appeared -sunk in silent thought; when the door opened she shrank with a sort of -apprehension. Greswold watching her said to himself: 'She is afraid -lest her husband should enter.' - -She never spoke of him or of the children. - -Sabran did not dare to ask to see her. When Greswold would fain have -urged him, he refused with vehemence. - -'I dare not--it would be to insult her more. Only if she summon -me--but that she will never do.' - -'He has been faithless to her,' thought the old man. - -All those weeks of her slow and painful restoration to life she was -mute, her lips only moving in reply to the questions of her physicians. -It seemed to her strange that when her spiritual and mental life -had been poisoned to their source, her bodily life should be able -mechanically to gather force, and resume its functions. Had matter so -far more resistance than the soul? - -Her women were frightened at the look upon her face; it had the -rigidity, the changelessness of marble, and all the blood seemed gone -out of it for ever. - -In after days her heart would speak; remembered happiness, lost -beliefs, ruined love, would in their turn have place in her misery; but -now all she was sensible of was the unbearable insult, the ineffaceable -outrage. She was like a queen who beholds the virgin soil of her -kingdom invaded and wasted by a traitor. - -Any other thing she would have pardoned--infidelity, indifference, -cruelty, any sins of manhood's caprice or passion--but who should -pardon this? The sin was not alone against herself; it was against -every law of decency and truth that ever she had been taught to hold -sacred; it was against all those great dead, who lay with the cross -on their breasts and their swords by their side, from whom she had -received and treasured the traditions of honour, the purity of a race. - -It was those dead knights whom he had smote upon the mouth and mocked, -crying to them:. 'Lo! your place is mine; my sons will reign in your -stead. I have tainted your race for ever; for ever my blood flows with -yours.' - -The greatness of a great race is a thing far higher than mere pride. -Its instincts are noble and supreme, its obligations are no less than -its privileges; it is a great light which streams backward through -the darkness of the ages, and if by that light you guide not your -footsteps, then are you thrice accursed holding as you do that lamp of -honour in your hands. - -So had she always thought; and now he had dashed the lamp in the dust. - -Her convalescence came in due course; but the silence, almost absolute -silence, which she preserved on the full recovery of her consciousness -alarmed her physicians, who had no clue to the cause. Greswold alone, -who divined that there was some wrong or disaster which severed her -from her husband, guessed that this immutable speechlessness was but -the cover and guard of some great sorrow. No tears ever dimmed her -eyes or relieved her bursting heart; she lay still, absorbed in mute -and terrible retrospection. As her great weakness left her, there came -upon her features the colder darker look of her race, the look which he -who had betrayed her had always feared. She never spoke of him, nor of -the children. Her women would have ventured to bring the children to -her, unbidden, but Greswold forbade them; he knew that for the devoted -tenderness she bore them to be thus utterly still and changed, some -shock must have befallen her so great that the instincts of maternity -were momentarily quenched in her, as water springs are dried up by -earthquake. - -'She never speaks of me, nor of them?' asked Sabran with agony every -day of Greswold, and the old man answered him: - -'She never speaks at all. She replies to our questions as to her -health, she asks briefly for what she needs; no more.' - -'The children are innocent!' he said wearily, and his heart had never -gone forth to them so much as it did now, when they were shut out like -himself from the arms of their mother. - -Yet he understood how she shrank from them--might well almost abhor -them--seeing in them, as Vàsàrhely saw, the living proofs of her -surrender to a coward and a traitor. - -'What can he have done?' mused Greswold. 'Infidelity, perhaps, she -would not forgive; but it would not make her thus blind and deaf to the -children.' - -He passed his days in utter wretchedness; he wandered in the wintry -woods for hours, or sat in weary waiting outside her door. He cared -nothing what his household thought or guessed. He had forgotten every -living creature save herself. When he saw his young sons in the -distance he avoided them; he dreaded their guileless questions, the -stab of their unconscious words. Again and again he was tempted to blow -out his brains, or fling himself from the ice walls that towered above -him; but the sense that it would seem to her the last cowardice--the -last shame--restrained him. - -Sometimes it seemed to him that the tie between them was so strong, the -memories of their past passion so sweet, that even his crime could not -part them. Then he remembered of what race she came, of what honour she -was the representative and guardian, and his heart sank within him, and -he knew that his offence was one beyond all pardon. - -The whole household dimly felt that some great grief had fallen on -their master. His attitude, his absence from his wife's room, the -arrival of Prince Vàsàrhely, the abrupt departure of the Countess -Brancka, all told them that some calamity had come, though they were -loyally silent one to the other, their service having been always one -of devotion and veneration for their mistress, since they were all -Tauern-born people, bred up by their fathers in loyalty to Hohenszalras. - -'The first who speaks of aught he suspects goes for ever,' old Hubert -had said to his numerous _dienerschaft_ in the hearing of them all, -when one of the pages--he who had borne the note to his master in Olga -Brancka's rooms--ventured to hint that he thought some evil was abroad, -and would part their lord and lady. But all the faithful silence of -their attendants could not wholly conceal from the elder children -that something wrong, some greater sorrow even than their mother's -illness, was hanging over the old house. They were dull and vaguely -alarmed. They had not even the kindly presence of the Princess, who, -if she sometimes wearied them with admonitions, treated them with -tenderness, and atoned for her homilies by unending gifts. They were -very unhappy, though they said little, and wandered like little ghosts -among the wintry woods and in their spacious play-rooms. They were -tended, amused, provided for in all the same ways as usual. There were -all their pastimes and playthings; all their comforts and habits were -unaltered; but from the background of their sports and studies the -stately figure of their mother was missing, with her serene smile and -her happy power of checking all dispute or turbulence with a mere word -or a mere glance. - -The winter had come at a stroke, as it does without warning oftentimes -in the old Archduchy; the snow falling fast and thick, the waters -freezing in a night, the hills and valleys growing white and silent -between a sunset and a sunset. - -Their sledges carried them like lightning over the frozen roads, and -their little skates bore them swift as circling swallows over the ice. -It was the season Bela loved so well; but he had no joy in anything. -There was no twilight hour in the white-room at their mothers feet, -whilst she told them legends and stories: there was no moment in the -mornings when she came into their study and found their little puzzled -brains weary over a Latin declension or a crabbed page of history, and -made all clear to them by a few lucid graphic sentences; there was no -possible hope that, when the day was broad and bright over the wintry -land, she would call to them to bring the dogs and go with her and her -black horses through the glittering forests, where every bough was -heavy with the diamonds of the frost. To the little boys it seemed as -if the whole world had grown suddenly silent, and they were left all -alone in it. - -Their troops of attendants were no more consolation to them than his -crowd of courtiers is to a bereaved sovereign. - -Then, again, when Egon Vàsàrhely had by chance met them he had looked -at them strangely, and had always turned away without a greeting. 'And -when I was quite little he was so kind,' thought Bela, whose pride -seemed falling from him like a useless ragged garment. - -'It's all since Madame Olga came,' he said once to his brother. 'She is -a bad, bad woman. She was rude to our mother.' - -'I thought ladies were always good?' said Gela. - -'They are much wickeder than men,' said Bela, with premature wisdom. -'At least, when they _are_ wicked. I heard a gentleman say so in Paris.' - -'What could she do when she was here, do you think?' asked Gela, with a -tremor. - -'I do not know,' said Bela, gravely and sadly. 'But I am sure that she -hated our mother.' - -He was sure that all the evil had come from her; he had heard of evil -spirits, the people believed in them, and had charms against them. She -was one of them. Had she not tempted him to disobedience and revolt, -with her pictures of the grand gaiety, the magnificent gatherings, the -heart-rousing 'Halali!' of the Chantilly hunt? - -Bela did not forget. - -He would have cut off his little right hand, now, never to have vexed -his mother. - -He was yet more sorrowful still for his father. Though they were not -allowed to approach their mother's apartments, he had disobeyed the -injunction more than once, and had seen Sabran walking to and fro that -long gallery, or seated with bent head and folded arms on one of the -oaken benches. With all his boldness Bela had not dared to approach -that melancholy figure; but it had haunted his dreams, and troubled -him sorely as he rode and drove, and played and did his lessons. The -snow had come on the second week of his mother's illness, and when he -visited his riding-pony in its loose box on these frosted days on which -he could not use it, he buried his face in its abundant mane, and wept -bitterly, though he boasted that he never cried. - -Eight weeks passed by after the departure of Olga Brancka before his -mother could leave her bed; and all that while, save for a brief -question now and again as to their health, put to her physician, she -had never mentioned the children once. 'She does not want us any more,' -said Bela, with the great tears dimming his bold eyes. - -In the ninth week she was lifted on to a great chair, placed beside -one of the windows, and she turned her weary gaze on to the snow world -without. What use was life? Why had it returned to her? All emotion of -maternity, all memory of love, were for the time killed in her. She was -only conscious of an intolerable indignity, for which neither God nor -man could give her consolation. - -She would have gone barefoot all the world over sooner than be again -in his presence, had not the imperious courage which was the strongest -instinct of her nature refused to confess itself unable to meet the man -who had wronged her. In the long dark night which these past two months -had seemed to her, she had brought herself to face the inevitable end. -She had nerved herself to be her own judge and his. Weaker women would -have made the world their judge; she did not. She did not even seek the -counsel of that Church of which she was a reverent daughter. Her priest -had no access to her. - -'God must see my torture, but no other shall,' she said in her heart, -nor should the world ever have her fate to make an hour's jesting -wonder of, as is its way with all calamity. It would be her lifelong -companion; a rusted iron for ever piercing deeper, and deeper into her -flesh; but she would dwell alone with it--unpitied. The men of her race -had always been their own lawgivers, their own avengers; she would be -hers. - -Once she bade them bring her pens and ink, and she began to use them. -Then she laid them down, and tore in two an unfinished letter. 'Only -cowards write to save themselves from pain,' she thought, and on the -tenth day after she had risen from her bed she said to Greswold: - -'Tell the women to leave me alone, and ask--my husband--to come here.' - -She said the last words as if they choked her in their utterance. Her -husband he was; nothing could change the past. - -The old man hesitated, and ventured to suggest that any exertion was -dangerous; would it be wise, he asked, to speak of what might agitate -her? And thereon he paused and stammered, knowing that it was not his -place to have observed that there was any estrangement between them. - -She looked at him with suspicion. - -'Have I spoken in my sleep or in my unconsciousness?' she thought. - -Aloud she said only: - -'Be so good as to go to him at once.' - -He bowed and went, and to himself mused: - -'Since she loves him, her heart will melt when she meets his eyes. -His sin after all cannot be beyond those which women have forgiven a -million times over since first creation began.' - -Yet in himself he was not sure of that. The Szalras had had many great -and many generous qualities, but forgiveness of offence had never been -among them. - -She remained still, her hands folded on her knees, her face set as -though it were cast in bronze. The great bedchamber, with its hangings -of pale blue plush and its silver-mounted furniture, was dim and -shadowy in the greyness of a midwinter afternoon. Doors opened, here -to the bath and dressing chambers, there to the oratory, yonder to the -apartments of Sabran. She looked across to the last, and a shudder -passed over her; a sense of sickness and revulsion came on her. - -She sat still and waited; she was too weak to go further than this -room. She was wrapped in a long loose gown of white satin, lined and -trimmed with sable. There were black bearskins beneath her feet; the -atmosphere was warmed by hot air, and fragrant with, some bowls full of -forced roses, which her women had placed, there at noon. The grey light -of the fading afternoon touched the silver scroll-work of the bed, and -the silver frame of one large mirror, and fell on her folded hands and -on the glister of their rings. Her head leaned backward against the -high carved ebony of her chair. Her face was stern and bitterly cold, -as that of Maria Theresa when she signed the loss of Silesia. - -He approached from his own apartments, and came timidly and with a slow -step forward. He did not dare to salute her, or go near to her; he -stood like a banished man, disgraced, a few yards from her seat. - -Two months had gone by since he had seen her. When he entered he read -on her features that he must leave all hope behind. - -Her whole frame shrank within her as she saw him there, but she gave -no sign of what she felt. Without looking at him she spoke, in a voice -quite firm though it was faint from feebleness. - -'I have but little to say to you, but that little is best said, not -written.' - -He did not reply; his eyes were watching her with a terrible appeal, a -very agony of longing. They had not rested on her for two months. She -had been near the gates of the grave, within the shadow of death. He -would have given his life for a word of pity, a touch, a regard--and he -dared not approach her! - -She did not look at him. After that first glance, in which there had -been so much of horror, of revulsion, she did not once look towards -him. Her face had the immutability of a mask of stone; so many wretched -days and haunted nights had she spent nerving herself for this -inevitable moment that no emotion was visible in her; into her agony -she had poured her pride, and it sustained her, as the plaster poured -into the dry bones at Pompeii makes the skeleton stand erect, the ashes -speak. - -'After that which you have told me,' she said, after a moment's silence -in which he fancied she must hear the throbbing of his heart, 'you must -know that my life cannot be lived out beside yours. The law gives you -many, rights, no doubt, but I believe you will not be so base as to -enforce them.' - -'I have no rights!' he muttered. 'I am a criminal before the law. The -law will free you from me, if you choose.' - -'I do not choose,' she said coldly; 'you understand me ill. I do not -carry my wrongs or my woes to others. What you have told me is known -only to Prince Vàsàrhely and to the Countess Brancka. He will be -silent; he has the power to make her so. The world need know nothing. -Can you think that I shall be its informant?' - -'If you divorce me----' he murmured. - -A quiver of bitter anger passed over her features, but she retained her -self-control. - -'Divorce? What could divorce do for me? Could it destroy the past? -Neither Church nor Law can undo what you have done. Divorce would make -me feel that in the past I had been your mistress, not your wife, that -is all.' - -She breathed heavily, and again pressed her hand on her breast. - -'Divorce!' she repeated. 'Neither priest nor judge can efface a past as -you clean a slate with a sponge! No power, human or divine, can free -_me_, purify _me_, wash your dishonoured blood from your children's -veins.' - -She almost lost her self-control; her lips trembled, her eyes were full -of flame, her brow was black with passion. With a violent effort she -restrained herself; invective or reproach seemed to her low and coarse -and vile. - -He was silent; his greatest fear, the torture of which had harassed him -sleeping and waking ever since he had placed his secret in her hands, -was banished at her words. She would seek no divorce--the children -would not be disgraced--the world of men would not learn his shame; -and yet as he heard a deeper despair than any he had ever known came -over him. She was but as those sovereigns of old who scorned the poor -tribunals of man's justice because they held in their own might the -power of so much heavier chastisement. - -'I shall not seek for a legal separation,' she resumed; 'that is to -say, I shall not, unless you force me to do so to protect myself from -you. If you fail to abide by the conditions I shall prescribe, then you -will compel me to resort to any means that may shelter me from your -demands. But I do not think you will endeavour to force on me conjugal -rights which you obtained over me by a fraud.' - -All that she desired was to end quickly the torture of this interview, -from which her courage had not permitted her to shrink. She had to -defend herself because she would not be defended by others, and she -only sought to strike swiftly and unerringly so as to spare herself -and him all needless or lingering throes. Her speech was brief, for -it seemed to her that no human language held expression deep and vast -enough to measure the wrong done to her, could she seek to give it -utterance. - -She would not have made a sound had any murderer stabbed her body; she -would not now show the death-wound of her soul and honour to this man -who had stabbed both to the quick. Other women would have made their -moan aloud, and cursed him. The daughter of the Szalras choked down her -heart in silence, and spoke as a judge speaks to one condemned by man -and God. - -'I wish no words between us,' she said, with renewed calmness. 'You -know your sin; all your life has been a lie. I will keep me and mine -back from vengeance; but do not mistake--God may pardon you, I never! -What I desired to say to you is that henceforth you shall wholly -abandon the name you stole; you shall assign the land of Romaris to the -people; you shall be known only as you have been known here of late, -as the Count von Idrac. The title was mine to give, I gave it you; no -wrong is done save to my fathers, who were brave men.' - -He remained silent; all excuse he might have offered seemed as if from -him to her it would be but added outrage. He was her betrayer, and she -had the power to avenge betrayal; naught that she could say or do could -seem unjust or undeserved beside the enormity of her irreparable wrongs. - -'The children?' he muttered faintly, in an unuttered supplication. - -'They are mine,' she said, always with the same unchanging calm that -was cold as the frozen earth without. 'You will not, I believe, seek to -enforce your title to dispute them with me?' - -He gave a gesture of denial. - -He, the wrong-doer, could not realise the gulf which his betrayal had -opened betwixt himself and her. On him all the ties of their past -passion were sweet, precious, unchanged in their dominion. He could not -realise that to her all these memories were abhorred, poisoned, stamped -with ineffable shame; he could not believe that she who had loved the -dust that his feet had brushed could now regard him as one leprous and -accursed. He was slow to understand that his sin had driven him out of -her life for evermore. - -Commonly it is the woman on whom the remembrance of love has an -enthralling power when love itself is traitor; commonly it is the man -on whom the past has little influence, and to whom its appeal is vainly -made; but here the position was reversed. He would have pleaded by it: -she refused to acknowledge it, and remained as adamant before it. His -nerve was too broken, his conscience was too heavily weighted for him -to attempt to rebel against her decisions or sway her judgment. If she -had bidden him go out and slay himself he would gladly have obeyed. - -'Once you said,' he murmured timidly, 'that repentance washes out all -crimes. Will you count my remorse as nothing?' - -'You would have known no remorse had your secret never been discovered!' - -He shrank as from a blow. - -'That is not true,' he said wearily. 'But how can I hope you will -believe me?' - -She answered nothing. - -'Once you told me that there was no sin you would not pardon me!' he -muttered. - -She replied: - -'We pardon sin; we do not pardon baseness.' - -She paused and put her hand to her heart; then she spoke again in that -cold, forced, measured voice, which seemed on his ear as hard and -pitiless as the strokes of an iron hammer, beating life out beneath it. - -'You will leave Hohenszalras; you will go where you will; you have the -revenues of Idrac. Any other financial arrangements that you may wish -to make I will direct my lawyers to carry out. If the revenues of Idrac -be insufficient to maintain you----' - -'Do not insult me--so,' he murmured, with a suffocated sound in his -voice, as though some hand were clutching at his throat. - -'Insult _you_!' she echoed, with a terrible scorn. - -She resumed, with the same inflexible calmness: - -'You must live as becomes the rank due to my husband. The world need -suspect nothing. There is no obligation to make it your confidante. If -anyone were wronged by the usurpation of the name you took it would -be otherwise, but as it is you will lose nothing in the eyes of men; -society will not flatter you the less. The world will only believe that -we are tired of one another, like so many. The blame will be placed on -me. You are a brilliant comedian, and can please and humour it. I am -known to be a cold, grave, eccentric woman, a recluse, of whom it will -deem it natural that you are weary. Since you allow that I have the -right to separate from you--to deal with you as with a criminal--you -will not seek to recall your existence to me. You will meet my -abstinence by the only amends you can make to me. Let me forget--as -far as I am able--let me forget that ever you have lived!' - -He staggered slightly, as if under some sword-stroke from an unseen -hand. A great faintness came upon him. He had been prepared for rage, -for reproach, for bitter tears, for passionate vengeance; but this -chill, passionless, disdainful severance from him for all eternity he -had never dreamed of: it crept like the cold of frost into his very -marrow; he was speechless and mute with shame. If she had dragged him -through all the tribunals of the world she would have hurt him and -humiliated him far less. Better all the hooting gibes of the whole -earth than this one voice, so cold, so inflexible, so full of utter -scorn! - -Despite her bodily weakness she rose to her full height, and for the -first time looked at him. - -'You have heard me,' she said; 'now go!' - -But instead, blindly, not knowing what he did, he fell at her feet. - -'But you loved me,' he cried, 'you loved me so well!' - -The tears were coursing down his cheeks. - -She drew the sables of her robe from his touch. - -'Do not recall _that_,' she said, with a bitter smile. 'Women of my -race have killed men before now for less outrage than yours has been -to me.' - -'Kill me!' he cried to her. 'I will kiss your hand.' - -She was mute. - -He clung to her gown with an almost convulsive supplication. - -'Believe, at least, that I loved _you_!' he cried, beside himself in -his misery and impotence. 'Believe that, at the least!----' - -She turned from him. - -'Sir, I have been your dupe for ten long years; I can be so no more!' - -Under that intolerable insult he rose slowly, and his eyes grew blind, -and his limbs trembled, but he walked from her, and sought not again -either her pity or her pardon. - -On the threshold he looked back once. She stood erect, one hand resting -upon the carved work of her high oak chair; cold, stalely, motionless, -the furred velvets falling to her feet like a queen's robes. - -He looked, then passed the threshold and closed the door behind him. He -walked down the corridors blindly, not knowing whither he went. - -They were dusky, for the twilight of the winter's day had come. He did -not see a little figure which was coming towards him until the child -had stopped him with a timid outstretched hand. - -'Shall we never see her again?' said Bela, in a hushed voice. 'It is so -long!--so long! Oh, please do tell me!' - -Sabran paused, and looked down on the boy with blood-shot burning eyes. -For a moment or so he did not answer; then, with a sudden movement, he -drew his son to him, lifted him in his arms and kissed him passionately. - -'You will see her, not I--not I!' he said with a sob like a woman's. -'Bela, listen! Be obedient to her, adore her, have no will but hers; be -loyal, be truthful, be noble in all your words and all your thoughts, -and then in time perhaps--perhaps--she will pardon you for being also -mine!' - -The child, terrified, clung to him with all his force, dimly conscious -of some great agony near him, but far beyond his comprehension or -consolation. - -'I love you, I will always love you!' he said, with his hands clasped -around his father's throat. - -'Love your mother!' said Sabran, as he kissed the boy's soft cheeks, -made wet by his own tears; then he released the little frightened -form, and went himself away into the darkness. - -In a little time, with no word to any living soul there, he had -harnessed some horses with his own hands, and in the fast falling gloom -of the night had driven from Hohenszalras. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVIII. - - -Bela heard the galloping hoofs of the horses, and ran with his fleet -feet, quick as a fawn's, down the grand staircase and out on to the -terrace, where the winds of the north were driving with icy cold and -furious force over a world of snow. With his golden hair streaming in -the blast, he strained his eyes into the gloom of the avenues below, -but the animals had vanished from sight. He turned sadly and went into -the Rittersaal. - -'Is that my father who has gone?' he said in a low voice to Hubert, who -was there. The old servant, with the tears in his eyes, told him that -it was. A groom had come to him to say that their lord had made ready -a sledge and driven away without a word to any one of them, while the -night was falling apace. - -Bela heard and said nothing; he had his mother's power of silence in -sorrow. He climbed the staircase silently, and went and listened in the -corridor where his father had waited and watched so long. His heart was -heavy, and ached with an indefinable dread. He did not seek Gela. It -seemed to him that this sorrow was his alone. He alone had heard his -father's farewell words; he alone had seen his father weep. - -All the selfishness and vanity of his little soul were broken up and -vanished, and the first grief he had ever known filled up their empty -place. He had adored his father with an unreasoning blind devotion, -like a dog's; and this intense affection had been increased rather than -repressed by the indifference with which he had been treated. - -His father was gone; he felt sure that it was for ever: if he could not -see his mother he thought he could not live. To the mind of a child -such gigantic and unutterable terrors rise up under the visitation of a -vague alarm. Abroad in the woods, or under any bodily pain or fear, he -was as brave as a lion whelp, but he had enough of the German mystic in -his blood to be imaginative and visionary when trouble touched him. The -sight of his father's grief had shaken his nerves, and filled him with -the first passionate pity he had ever known. A man so great, so strong, -so wonderful in prowess, so far aloof from himself as Sabran had always -seemed to his little son, to be so overwhelmed in such helpless sorrow, -appeared to Bela so terrible a thing that an intense fear took for the -first time possession of his little valiant soul. His father could slay -all the great beasts of the forests; could break in the horse fresh -from the freedom of the plains; could breast the stormy waters like -a petrel; could scale the highest heights of the mountains. And yet -someone--something--had had power to break down all his strength, and -make him flee in wretchedness. - -It could not be his mother who had done this thing? No, no! never, -never! It had been done because she was lying ill, helpless, perhaps -was dead. - -As that last dread came over him he lost all control over himself. -He knew what death was. A little girl he had been fond of in Paris -had died whilst he was her playmate, and he had seen her lying, so -waxen, so cold, so unresponsive, when he had laid his lilies on her -little breast. A great despair came over him, and made him reckless -what he did. In the desperation of terror blent with love, he started -up and ran to the door of his mother's apartments. It yielded to his -pressure; he ran across the ante chamber and the dressing-rooms, and -pulled aside the tapestry. - -Then he saw her; seated at the further side of the great bedchamber. -There was a feeble grey light from the western sky, to which the -casements of the chamber turned. It was very pale and dim, but by it he -saw her lying back, rigid and colourless, the white satin, the dusky -fur, the deep shadows gathered around her. There was that in her look -and in her attitude which made the child's heart grow cold, as his -father's had done. - -She was alone; for she had bade her women not come unless she summoned -them. Bela stood and gazed, his pulses beating loud and hard; then with -a cry he ran forward and sprang to her, and threw his arms about her. - -'Oh, mother, mother, you are not dead!' he cried. 'Oh, speak to me; do -speak to me! He is gone away for ever and ever, and if we cannot see -you we shall all die. Oh, do not look at me so! Pray, pray, do not. -Shall I fetch Lili?---' - -In his vague terror he thought to disarm her by his little sister's -name. She had thrust him away from her, and was looking with cold and -cruel eyes on his face, that was so like the face of his father. She -was thinking: - -'You are the son of a serf, of a traitor, of a liar, of a bastard, -and yet you are _mine_! I bore you, and yet you are his. You are -shame incarnate. You are the living sign of my dishonour. You bear my -name--my untainted name--and yet you were begotten by him.' - -Bela dropped down at her feet as his father had done. - -'Oh, do not look at me so,' he sobbed. 'Oh, mother, what have I done? -I have tried to be good all this while. He is gone away, and he is so -unhappy, and he bade me never vex or disobey you, and I never will.' - -His voice was broken in his sobs, and he leaned his head upon her -knees, and clasped them with both his arms. She looked down on him, and -drew a deep shuddering breath. The holiest joy of a woman's life was, -for her, poisoned at the springs. - -Then, at the child's clinging embrace, at his piteous and innocent -grief, the motherhood in her welled up under the frost of her heart, -and all its long-suffering and infinite tenderness revived, and -overcame the horror that wrestled with it. She raised him up and -strained him to her breast. - -'You are mine, you are mine!' she murmured over him. 'I must forget all -else.' - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIX. - - -He spring dawned once more on Hohenszalras, and the summer followed it. -The waters leapt, the woods rejoiced, the gardens blossomed, and the -children played; but the house was silent as a house in which the dead -are tying. There was indeed a corpse there--the corpse of buried joy, -of murdered love, of ruined honour. - -The household resumed its calm order, the routine of the days was -unbroken, the quiet yet stately life had been taken up in its course -as though it had never been altered; and wherever young children are -there will always be some shout of mirth, some sound of happy laughter -somewhere; the children laugh as the birds sing, though those amidst -them bury their dead. - -But the house was as a house of mourning, and the sense of death was -there as utterly as though he who was gone had been laid in his grave -amidst the silver figures and the marble tombs in the Chapel of the -Knights. No one ever heard a sigh from her lips, or ever saw the tears -beneath her eyelids; but the sense of her bereavement, as one terrible, -inconsolable, eternal, weighed like a pall on all those who were about -her; the lowliest peasant on her estates understood that the sanctity -of some untold woe had built up a wall of granite between her and all -the living world. - -She had always been grateful to fate for her old home set amidst the -silence of the mountains, but she had never been so thankful for it -as now. It shielded her from all the observation and interrogation of -the world; no one came thither unbidden, unless she chose, no visitant -would ever break that absolute solitude which was the sole approach -to peace that she would ever know. Even her relatives could not pass -the icy barrier of her cold denial. They wearied her for a while with -written importunities and suggestions, hinted wonder, delicately -expressed questions. But they made no way into her confidence; they -soon left her to herself and to her children. They said angrily to -themselves that she had been always whimsical and a solitary; they -had been certain that soon or late that ill-advised union would be -dissolved in some way, private or public. They were all people haughty, -sensitive, abhorrent of scandal; they were content that the separation -should be by mutual consent and noiseless. - -She had had letters from Egon Vàsàrhely full of delicate tenderness; in -the last he had asked with humility if he might visit Hohenszalras. She -had written in return to him: - -'You have my gratitude and my affection, but until we are quite old we -will not meet. Leave me alone; you can do naught for me.' - -He obeyed; he understood the loyalty to one disloyal which made her -refuse to meet him, of whose loyalty she was so sure. - -He sent a magnificent present to the child who was his namesake, and -wrote to her no more save upon formal anniversaries. - -The screen of her dark forests protected her from all the cruel comment -and examination of the men and women of her world. She knew them well -enough to know that when she ceased to appear amidst them, when she -ceased to contribute to their entertainment, when she ceased to bid -them to her houses, she would soon cease also to be remembered by them; -even their wonder would live but for a day. If they blamed her in their -ignorance, their blame would be as indifferent as their praise had -been. - -She had been told by her lawyers that her husband had refused to touch -a coin of the revenues of Idrac, and had once visited them to sign a -power of procuration, whereby they could receive those revenues and set -them aside in accumulation for his son Gela. That was all she heard. -Whither he had gone she was ignorant. She did not make any effort to -learn. On the night following his departure a peasant had been sent -with the sleigh and horses home to Hohenszalras. The solicitors of -Salzburg had seen him a week or two later at their ancient offices -under the Calvarienburg: that was all. She had bade him let it be -forgotten that he had ever lived beside her. He had obeyed her. - -The days, and weeks, and months went on, and his place knew him no -more. The jägers, seated round their fires in their forest-huts, spoke -longingly and wonderingly of his absence. The hunters, when they -brought down a steinbock with unusual effort or skill, said that it had -been a shot that would have been worthy of his praise. His old friend -wept for him with the slow sad tears of age, and the child Bela prayed -for his return every night that he knelt down before his crucifix. But -his name never passed his wife's lips, and was never written by her -hand. She had given her all with the superb generosity of a sovereign; -she had in her wrongs the intense abiding unutterable disgust of a -sovereign betrayed and outraged. When she let grief have its way, it -was when no eyes beheld her, when the night was down and solitude -sheltered her. - -She had never spoken of what had befallen her to any human ear; not -even to her priest's. The horror of it was buried in her own breast; -its sepulchre all the waste and ashes of her perished joys. - -When the Princess Ottilie, weeping, entreated to be told the worst, she -answered briefly: - -'He betrayed me. How, matters nothing.' - -More than that she never said. The Princess supposed that she spoke -of the disloyalty of the passions, and dared not urge her to more -confidence. 'I warned him that she would never forgive if he were -faithless,' she thought, and wept for hours at her orisons, her gentle -soul resenting the inflexibility of this mute immutable bitterness of -offended love. - -Too proud and too delicate to intrude undesired into any confidence, -and too tenderhearted to utter censure aloud to one she loved, the -Princess showed in a thousand ways without speech that she considered -there were cruelty and egotism in her unexplained separation from -her husband. Believing as she did that his offence was that conjugal -infidelity which, however blameable, is one of those injuries which -all women who love forgive, and which those who do not love endure in -silence from patience and dignity, herself offended at her exclusion -from all knowledge of the facts, she said but little; but her whole -attitude was one of restrained reproach. - -'With time she will change,' she said to herself. But time passed on, -and she could see no change, nor any hope of it. - -The grave severe beauty of their mother had a vague terror for her -children. She never now smiled at their mirth, laughed at their sports, -or joined in their pastimes. She was almost always silent. Bela longed -to throw his arms about her knees, and cry out to her: 'Mother, -mother, where is _he?_' But he did not venture to do so. Without his -reasoning upon it, the child instinctively felt that her frozen calm -covered depths of suffering which he did not dare disturb. He had been -so completely terrified once, that the remembrance of that hour lay -like ice upon his bright courage. Even the younger ones felt something -of the same fear. Their mother remembered them, cared for them, was -heedful that their needs of body and of brain were perfectly supplied. -But they felt, as young children feel what they cannot explain, that -they were outside her life, insufficient for her, even fraught with -intense pain to her. Often when she stooped to kiss them a shudder -passed over her; often when they came into her presence she looked away -from them, as though the sight of them stung and blinded her. They -never heard an angry word from her lips, but even repeated anger would -have kept them at less distance from her than did that mute majesty of -a grief they could not comprehend. - -She was more severe to all her dependants; she never became unjust, -but she was often stern; the children at the schools saw her smile no -more. Santa Claus still filled their stockings on Christmas Eve; but of -the stately figure which moved amidst them, robed in black, they grew -afraid. She seldom went to them or to her peasantry. Bela and Gela were -sent with her winter gifts. In the summer the sennerins never now saw -her enter their high huts and drink a cup of milk, talking with them of -their herds and flocks. - -She was tranquil as of old. She fulfilled the duties of her properties, -and attended to all the demands made upon her by her people; her -liberalities were unchanged, her justice was unwarped, her mind was -clear and keen. But she never smiled, even on her young daughter; and -the little Lili said once to her brothers: - -'Do you know, I think our mother is changing to marble. She will soon -be of stone, like the statues in the chapel. When I touch her I feel -cold.' - -Bela was angered. - -'You are ungrateful, you little child,' he said to his sister. 'Who -loves us, who cares for us, who thinks of us, as our mother does? If -her lips are cold, perhaps her heart is broken. We are only children; -we can do so little.' - -He had treasured the words of his father in his soul. He had never -told them, except to Gela, but they were always present to him. He -alone had seen and heard enough to understand that some dire disaster -had shattered in pieces the beautiful life which his parents had led -together. He had received an indelible impression from the two scenes -of that evening. Without comprehending, he had felt that something -had befallen them, which struck at their honour no less than at -their peace. He had a clear conception of what honour was; it was -the first tuition that Wanda von Szalras gave her children. Vague as -his understanding of their grief had been, it had been sufficient -to strike at that pride winch was inborn in him. He was like the -Dauphin of whom he had thought in Paris. He had seen his father driven -from his throne; he had seen his mother in the sackcloth and ashes -of affliction. He was humiliated, bewildered, softened; he, who had -believed himself omnipotent because all the people of the Iselthal ran -to do his bidding, felt how helpless he was in truth. He was shut out -from his mother's confidence; he had been powerless to console her or -to retain his father; there was something even in himself from which -his mother shrank. What had his father said? 'She will in time pardon -you for being mine.' What had been the meaning of those strange words? -And where had his father gone? - -When the summer came and Bela rode through the glad green woods, his -heart was heavy. Would his father never ride there any more? Bela -had often watched, himself unseen, the fiery horse that bore the -man he loved come plunging and leaping through bough and brake till -it passed him as though the wind bore it. He had always thought as -he had watched, 'When I grow up I will be just what he is'; and now -that splendid and gracious figure which had been always present on -the horizon of his child's mind, magnified and glorified like the -illuminated figures in the painted chronicles, was no more there--had -faded utterly away in the dusk and the snow of that wintry twilight. - -A thousand times was the question to his mother on his lips: 'Will he -never come back? Shall we never see him again?' But he dared not speak -it when he saw that look of a revulsion they could not comprehend -always upon her face. - -'He bade me never vex her,' Bela thought, and obeyed. - -'I wonder if ever he think of us,' he said once to Gela, as their -ponies walked down one of the grassy rides of the home woods. - -'Perhaps he is dead,' said Gela, in a hushed, wistful voice. - -'How dare you say that, Gela?' said his brother, angry from an -intolerable pain. 'If he were--were--_that_, we should be told it. -There would be masses in the chapel. We should have black clothes. Oh -no! he is not dead. I should know it, I am sure I should know it. He -would send down some angel to tell me.' - -'Why do you care so much for him?' said Gela, very low. 'It must be he -who has made our mother so changed, so unhappy; and it is she whom we -should love most. You say even he told you so.' - -Bela's lips unclosed to loose an angry answer. He was thinking; 'It is -she who sent him away, she who made him weep.' But his loyalty checked -it; he would not utter what he thought, even to his brother. - -'I think he would not wish us to talk of it,' he said gravely and -sadly. 'We will pray for him; that is all we can do.' - -'And for her,' said Gela, under his breath. - -They were both mute, and let the bridles lie on their ponies' necks as -they rode home quietly and sorrowfully in the still summer afternoon to -the great house, which, with all its thousand casements gleaming in the -sun, seemed to them so silent, so empty, so deserted now. Bela looked -up at the banner, with its deep red and its blazoned gold streaming on -a westerly wind. 'The flag would be half-mast high if it were _that_,' -he thought, his heart wrung by the dread which Gela had suggested to -him. He had seen the banner lowered when Prince Lilienhöhe had died. - -On the lawn under the terrace the other children were playing with -little painted balloons; the boys did not go to them, but riding round -to the stables entered the house by the side entrance. Gela went to his -violin, which he loved better than any toy, and studied seriously. -Bela wandered wearily over the building, tormented by the doubt which -his brother had put in his thoughts. They were always enjoined to keep -to their own wing of the house; but he often broke the rule, as he did -most others. He walked listlessly along the innumerable galleries, and -up and down the grand staircases, his St. Hubert hound following his -steps. His face was very pale, his little hands were folded behind -his back, his head was bent. He knew that the Latin and Greek for the -morrow were all unprepared, but he could not think of them. He was -thinking only: 'If it should be, if it should be?' - -He came at last to the door of the library. It was there that his -mother now spent most of her time. She took long rides alone, always -alone; and often chose for them the wildest weather. When she was -indoors, she passed her time in unremitting application to all the -business of her estates. He opened the great oak door very softly, and -saw her seated at the table; Donau and Neva, who now were old, were -lying near her feet. She was studying some papers. The sunset glow came -through the painted casements and warmed all the light about her, but -by its contrast, her attitude, her expression, her features, looked -only the graver, the colder, the more colourless. Her gown was black, -her pearls were about her throat, her profile was severe, her cheek, -turned to the light, was pale and thin. She did not see the little -gallant figure of her son in his white summer riding-clothes, and with -his golden hair cut across his brows, looking like a boy's portrait by -Reynolds. - -He stood a moment irresolute; then he went across the long room and -stood before her, and bowed as he knew he ought to do. She started and -turned her head and saw the pallor of the child's face. She put out her -hand to him; it was very thin, and the rings were large upon it. He -saw a contraction on her features as of pain; it was but of a moment, -because he looked so like his father.-- - -'What is it, Bela?' she said to him. 'You ought not to come here.' - -His lower lip quivered. He hesitated; then, gathering all his courage, -said timidly: - -'May I ask you just one thing?' - -'Surely, my child--are you afraid of me?' - -It struck her, with a sudden sense of contrition, that she had made the -children afraid of her. She had never thought of it before. - -Bela hesitated once more, then said boldly: Gela said to day _he_ might -be dead. Oh, if he ever die, will you please tell me? I shall think of -it day and night.' - -Her face changed terribly; the darker passions of her nature were -spoken on it. - -'I have forbidden you to speak of your father, if it be him you mean,' -she said sternly and very coldly. - -But Bela, though frightened, clung to his one thought. - -'But he may die!' he said piteously. 'Will you tell me? Please, will -you tell me? He might be dead now--we never hear.' - -She leaned her arm upon the table, and covered her eyes with her hand. -She was silent. She strove with herself so as not to treat the child -with harshness. Though he hurt her so cruelly, he was right. She -honoured him for his courage. - -'If you will only tell me that,' said the boy, with tears in his -throat, 'I will never ask anything else--never--never!' - -'Why do you cling so to his memory?' she said, with a sudden impatience -of jealousy. 'He never took heed of you.' - -'I was so little,' said Bela, with a sigh. 'But I loved him--oh! I have -always loved him--and I was the last to see him that night.' - -'I know!' she said harshly, ashamed meanwhile of her own harshness, for -how could the child suspect the torture his words were to her? What -had his father given her beautiful boy?--disgraced descent, sullied -blood, the heritage of falsehood and of dishonour. Yet the boy loved -his memory better than he loved her presence. And the time had been, -not so long passed, when she would have recognised the preference with -fond and generous delight. - -Bela stood beside her, his eyes watching her with timid interrogation, -with longing appeal. The look upon his face went to her heart. She knew -not what to say to him. She had hoped he would be always silent, and -forget, as children usually forget. - -'You are right to feel so,' she said to him at last, with a violent -effort. 'Cherish his memory, and pray for him always; but do not speak -of him to me. When you are grown to manhood, if I be living then, you -shall hear what has parted your father and me; you shall judge us -yourself. But there are many years to that; many weary years for me. -I shall endeavour that they shall be happy ones for you; but you must -never ask me, never speak, of him. I gave you that command that night; -but you are very young, you have forgotten.' - -Bela listened with a sinking heart. He gathered from her words that -his father's absence was, as he had feared, for ever. - -'I had not forgotten,' he said in a whisper, for the moment was -terrible to him. 'But if--if what Gela said should ever be, will you -tell me that? I will not disobey again, but pray--pray--tell me _that._' - -His mother's face seemed to him to grow colder and colder, paler and -paler, till she scarcely looked a living woman. - -'I will tell you--if I know,' she said, with a pause between each slow -spoken word. Then the only smile that had come upon her lips for many -months came there; a smile sadder than tears, more bitter than all -scorn. - -'He will outlive me, fear not,' she said, as she put out her hand to -the child. 'Now leave me, my dear; I am occupied.' - -Bela touched her hand with his lips, which, despite his will, quivered -as he did so. He felt that he had failed, that he had disobeyed and -hurt her, that he had been unable to show one tenth of all the feelings -which choked him with their force and longing. He hung his head as -he went sorrowfully away. 'She may not know! She may not know!' he -thought, with terror. - -He looked back at her timidly as he closed the door. She had resumed -her writing; the red sunset light fell on her black gown, on her -stately head, on her profile, cut clear as on a cameo. - -He dared not return. - -The mother whom he had known in other years, on whose knee he had -rested his head as she told him tales in the twilight hour, whose hand -had caressed his curls, whose smile had rewarded his stammering Latin -or his hardly achieved line of handwriting, who had stooped over him -in his drowsy dreams, and made him think of angels, the mother who had -said to Egon Vàsàrhely: 'This is my Bela: love him a little for my -sake,' seemed as far from him as though she were lying in her tomb. - -She, when the tapestry had fallen behind the slender figure of her -little son, continued to write on. It was hard, dry matter that she -wrote of; the condition of her miners amongst the silver ore of the -north-east. She forced her mind to it, she compelled her will and -her hand; that was all. These things depended on her; she would not -neglect them, she strove to find in them that distraction which lighter -natures seek in pleasure. But in vain she now endeavoured to compel her -attention to the details she was following and correcting; soon they -became to her so confused that they were unintelligible; for once her -intelligence refused to obey her will. The child's words haunted her. -She laid down her pen, pushed aside the reports and the letter in which -she was replying to them, and rising paced to and fro the long polished -floor of the library. - -It was here that he had first bowed before her on that night when -Hohenszalras had sheltered him from the storm. - -'We had a mass of thanksgiving!' she thought. - -The child's words haunted her. Not to know even _that_ when they had -passed nine years together in the closest of all human ties! For the -first time the misgiving came to her, had she been too harsh? No; it -would have been impossible to have done less; many would have done far -more in chastisement of the fraud upon their honour and good faith. -Yet as she recalled their many hours of joy it seemed as if she had -remembered these too little. Then again she scouted her own weakness. -What had been all his life beside her save one elaborate lie? - -The broad shafts of the blazing sunset slanted across the inlaid woods -of the floor which she paced; the windows were open, the birds sang in -the rose boughs and ivy without. The summers would come thus, one after -another, with their intolerable light, and the intolerable laughter of -the unconscious children; and she would carry her burden through them, -though the day was for ever dark for her. - -Time had been when she had thought that she should die if he were lost -to her; but she lived on and marvelled at herself. Her very soul seemed -to have gone from her with the destruction of her love. Her body seemed -to her but a mere shell, an inanimate pulseless thing. The only thing -that seemed alive in her was shame. - -She paced now up and down the long room while the sunset died and the -grey evening dulled the painted panes of the casements. The boy's -question had pierced through her frozen serenity. It was true that she -had no knowledge where his father was; he might be dead, he might be -killed by his own hand--she knew nothing. She had bidden him let her -forget that he had ever lived beside her, and he had obeyed her. He -might be in the world of men, careless and content, consoled by others, -or he might be in his grave. - -All she knew was that he never touched the revenues of Idrac. - -She paused on the same spot where he had stood before her first, with -his fair beauty, his courtier's smile, his easy grace, the very prince -of gentlemen; and her hands clenched the folds of her gown as she -thought--'the first of actors! Nothing more.' - -And she, Wanda von Szalras, had been the dupe of that inimitable -mimicry and mockery! - -The thought was like a rusted iron, eating deeper and deeper into her -heart each day. When her consciousness, her memory, would have said -otherwise, would have told her that in much he was loyal and sincere, -though in one great thing he had been false, she would not trust -herself to hearken to the suggestion. 'Let me see clearly, though I die -of what I see!' she said in her soul. She would be blind no more. She -hated herself that she had been ever blind. - -She had been always his dupe, from the first sonorous phrases she had -heard him utter in the French Chamber to the last sentence with which -he had left her when he went from her to the presence of Olga Brancka. -So she believed. Here she did him wrong; but how was she to tell that? -To her it seemed but one long-sustained comedy, one brilliant and -hateful imposture. - -Sometimes his cry to her rang in her ears: 'Believe at least that I -did love you!' and some subtle true instinct in her whispered to her -that he had there been sincere, that in passion and devotion at least -he had never been false. But she thrust the thought away; it seemed but -another form of self-deception. - -The dull slow evening passed as usual; it was late in summer and the -night came early. She dined in company with Madame Ottilie and sat with -her as usual afterwards. The room seemed full of his voice, of his -laughter, of the music of which he had had such mastery. - -She never opened her lips to say to the Princess Ottilie: 'But for you -he would have passed from my life a mere stranger, seen but once.' -But the tender conscience of the Princess made her feel the bitterest -reproach every time that the eyes of her niece met her own, every time -that she passed the blank space in the picture gallery where once had -hung the portrait of Sabran, painted in court dress by Mackart. The -portrait was locked away in a dark closet that opened out from the -oratory of his wife. With its emblazoned arms and marquis's coronet on -the frame, it had seemed such a perpetual record of his sin that she -had had it taken from the wall and shut in darkness, feeling that it -could not hang in its falsehood amidst the portraits of her people. But -often she opened the door of her oratory and let the light stream upon -the portrait where it leaned against the closet wall. It seemed then as -if he stood living before her, looking as he had looked so often at the -banquets and balls of the Hofburg, when she had felt so much pride in -his personal beauty, his grace of bearing, his supreme distinction. - -'Who could have dreamed that it was but a perfect comedy,' she thought, -'as much a comedy as Got's or Bressant's!' - -Then her conscience smote her with a sense that she did him injustice -when she thought so. In all things save his one crime he had been -as true a gentleman as any of the great nobles of the empire. His -intelligence, his bearing, his habits, his person, were all those of a -patrician of the highest culture. The fraud of his name apart, there -had been nothing in him that the most fastidious aristocrats would -have disowned. He had inherited the qualities of a race of princes, -though he had been descended unlawfully from them. His title had been -a borrowed thing, unlawfully worn; but his supreme distinction of -manner, his tact, his bodily grace, that large and temperate view of -men and things which marks a gentleman, these had all been inborn and -natural to him. He had been no mere actor when he had moved through -a throne-room by her side. Her calmer reason told her this, but her -instincts of candour and of pride made her deny that where there was -one fraud there could be any truth. - -She span on now at her ivory wheel because it was mere mechanical work, -which left thought free. The Princess, in lieu of slumbering, looked at -her ever and again. Suddenly she gathered her courage and spoke. - -'Wanda, you are a Christian woman,' she said slowly and softly. 'Is it -Christian never to forgive?' - -Her face did not change as she turned the spinning-wheel. - -'What is forgiveness?' she said coldly. 'Is it abstinence from -vengeance? I have abstained.' - -'It is far more than that!' - -'Then I do not reach it.' - -'No; you do not. That is why I presumed to ask you, is it in consonance -with your tenets, with your duties?' - -'I think so.' - -'Then change your creed,' said the Princess. - -A sombre wrath shone in her eyes as she looked up one moment. - -'I have the blood in me of men who were not always Christians, but who, -even when Pagan, knew what honour was. There are some things which are -so vile that one must be vile oneself before one can forgive them.' - -The Princess sighed. - -'I am in ignorance of the nature of your wrongs; but this I know--they -erred who gave you absolution at Eastertide, whilst you still bore -bitterness in your soul.' - -'Would I lay bare my soul and his shame now to any priest?' thought -Wanda; but she repressed the answer. She said simply: 'Dear mother, -believe me, I have been more merciful than many would have been.' - -'You mean that you have not sought for a divorce? Nay, that is not -mercy; that is decency, dignity, self-respect. When they of a great -race go to the public with their wrongs they drag their escutcheon in -the mud for the pleasure of the crowd. That you have not done; that is -not mercy. You do but follow your instincts; you are a gentlewoman.' - -A momentary impulse came over her, as she heard, to tell her companion -his sin and her own shame; the woman's weakness, desiring sympathy -and comprehension, assailed her for an instant. But she resisted and -repressed it. The Princess Ottilie was aged and feeble. She had had no -slight share in bringing about this union, which was now so cruelly -broken; she had been ever proud of her penetration and devoted to his -defence. To learn the truth would be a shock so terrible to her that -it must needs be veiled from her for ever. Besides, his wife felt as -though the relation would blister her lips were she to make it even to -her oldest friend. - -Had she known all, the elder woman would have been even more bitter -in her hatred, even more inflexible in her sense of outrage than she -herself; but she could not purchase sympathy at such a price. She chose -rather to be herself condemned. - -Offended, the Princess rose slowly to go to her own apartments. The -tears welled painfully in her eyes. - -'You were so happy, he was so devoted,' she murmured. 'Can all that -have crumbled like a house of sand?' - -Wanda von Szalras said bitterly: - -'What did I say once, the day of my betrothal? That I leaned on a reed. -The reed has withered, that is all. You see, I can stand without it.' - -She conducted her aunt to her bedchamber with the usual courteous -observances; then returned and sat long alone in the silent chamber. - -'Forgive! what is the obligation of forgiveness?' she thought. 'It is -the obligation to pardon offences, infidelity, unkindness, cruelty, but -not dishonour. To forgive dishonour is to be dishonoured. So would my -fathers have said.' - - - - -CHAPTER XL. - - -Bela that dawn was awakened by his mother standing beside his bed. She -stooped and touched his curls with her lips. - -'I was harsh to you yesterday, my child,' she said to him. 'I come to -tell you now that you were quite right to have the thought you had. You -are his son; you must not forget him.' - -Bela lifted up his beautiful flushed face and his eye brilliant from -sleep. - -'I am glad I may remember,' he said simply; then he added, with his -cheeks burning: 'When I am a man I will go and find him and bring him -back.' - -His mother turned away her face. - -When his manhood should come and he should hear the story of his -father's sin, what would he say? Would not all his soul cry out aloud -and curse the impostor who had begotten him? - -The eyes of Bela followed the dark form of his mother as she passed -from his room. - -'She is very unhappy,' he thought wistfully. 'If I could find him -_now_, would it make her happy again, I wonder?' - -And the chivalry that was in his blood stirred in his childish veins. - -'But you said that she sent him away?' whispered Gela, when Bela got -upon his brother's bed and confided his thoughts to him. - -'I did think so; but I might mistake,' said Bela. 'Perhaps he went -because he was obliged, and that it is which grieves her.' - -'Perhaps,' said Gela, meditatively. - -'If I only knew where to go to find him I would go all over the world,' -said Bela, with passion. 'I would ride Folko to the earth's very, very, -end to reach him.' - -'You could not get over the seas so,' said Gela; 'and he may be over -the seas.' - -'And we have never even seen the sea!' said Bela, to whom the suggested -distance seemed more terrible than he had ever imagined. 'What can we -do, Gela, do you think? you are clever about everything.' - -Gela was silent a moment. - -'Let us pray for him with all our might,' he said solemnly; and the two -little boys knelt down by the bedside in their little nightshirts and -prayed together for their father. - -When Bela rose his face was very troubled, but very resolute. He drew -out of its sheath a small sword with a handle of gold, which Egon -Vàsàrhely had sent him years before. 'One must pray first,' he thought, -'but afterwards one must help oneself. God does not care for cowards.' - -In the day he went out all alone and found Otto; the children were -allowed to go over the home woods at their pleasure. The _jägermeister_ -was very dear to Bela, for he told such wondrous tales of sport and -danger, and spoke with such reverent affection of his lost lord. - -'Where _can_ he be, Otto?' said the child now, in a low hushed voice, -as they sat under the green oak boughs. - -'Ah, my little Count, if only I knew!' said Otto. 'I would walk a -thousand miles to him, and take him the first blackcock that shall fall -to my gun this autumn.' - -'You really say the truth? You do not know?' said Bela, with stern -questioning eyes. - -'Would I tell a lie, my little lord?' said the old hunter, -reproachfully. 'Since your father drove away that cruel night none of -us have set eyes on him, or ever heard a word. If Her Excellency do not -know, how should we?' - -'I mean to find him,' said the child, solemnly. - -The old man sighed. - -'How should you do that? Our hills are between us and all the rest of -the world. Perhaps he is gone because he was tired of being here.' - -'No,' said Bela, who remembered his father's farewell to him, of which -he could never bring himself to speak to any living creature. - -Otto was silent too: he could not tell the child what all the household -believed--that his father had found too great a charm in the presence -of the Countess Brancka. - -The weeks and months stole on their course, which in the forest-heart -of the old Archduchy seems so leisurely beside the feverish haste of -the mad world. The ways of life went on unchanged; the children throve, -and studied, and played, and grew apace; the health of the Princess -became more delicate, and her strength more feeble; the seasons -succeeded each other with monotony; no sound from the cities of men -that lay beyond the ramparts of the glaciers broke the silence and the -calm of Hohenszalras. - -Wanda herself would not have known that one year was different to -another had she not been forced to count time by the inches which it -added to the stature of her offspring, and the recurrence of the days -of their patron saints. They grew as fast as reeds in peaceful waters, -and forced her to recognise that the years were dropping into the past. -Time for her was shod with lead, and crept tamely, like a cripple upon -broken ground. For the children's sake she lived; but for them she -knew not why she rose to these long, colourless, lonely hours. But -her corporeal life ailed nothing, whilst her spiritual life was sick -unto death. Almost she could have wished for the lassitude of weakness -to dull her pain; her bodily strength seemed to intensify what she -suffered. - -In the frosted brilliant winter time she still drove her fiery horses -over the snow that was like marble, plunging into the recesses of the -woods, seeing above her the ramparts, and bastions, and pinnacles of -the great ice-range of the Glöckner glaciers. The intense cold, the -rushing air, the whiteness as of a virgin earth, the sense of profound -solitude, did her good, cooled the sense of shame that seemed burnt -into her life, soothed the anguish of a love fooled, betrayed, and -widowed. She felt with horror that the longer she kneeled beside -the altar, the longer she prayed before the great Christ in her -chapel, the more passionately she rebelled against the fate that had -overtaken her. But, alone in the rarefied air, with the vastness of -the mountains about her, with the cold wind pouring like spring water -down a thirsty throat in its merciful coldness, with the white peaks -meeting the starry skies, and the waters hushed in their shroud of ice, -she gathered some kind of peace, some power of endurance: consolation -neither earth nor heaven could give to her. - -Of him she never heard. She could only have heard through her lawyers, -and they knew nothing. Neither in Paris nor in Vienna was he seen. By -a letter she received from the priest of Romaris she had learned that -he was not there. She had sent one of her men of business thither with -money and plans, to build on the site of the old house of the Sabrans a -Maison de Dieu for the aged and sick fishermen of the coast and their -widows.' It will be a _chapelle expiatoire_,' she had thought bitterly, -and she had endowed it richly, so that it should be independent of -all those who should come after her. In all the occupations entailed -by this and similar projects she was as attentive as of yore to all -demands made on her. - -When she perused a lawyer's long preamble, or corrected an architect's -estimates and drawings, she was the same woman as she had been ere her -betrayer had crossed the threshold of her home. Her character had been -built on lines too strong, on a base too firm, for the earthquake of -calamity, the whirlwind of passion, to undo it. But in her heart there -was utter shipwreck. She had given herself and all that was hers with -magnificent generosity; and she had received in return betrayal and a -dishonour under which day and night all the patrician in her writhed -and suffered. - -When in the autumn of that year Cardinal Vàsàrhely, travelling in great -state from Buda Pesth, arrived at Hohenszalras--a guest whom none -could deny, a judge whom none could evade--he did not spare her open -interrogation, searching censure, stern rebuke. - -The Lilienhöhe she had excused herself from receiving; the Kaulnitz she -had also refused; others as nearly related to her had encountered the -same resistance to their overtures; but Cardinal Vàsàrhely came to take -up his residence at the Holy Isle, with the weight of authority and the -sanctity of the Church. - -He visited his niece for the sole purpose of remonstrance. When he -found himself met by a respectful but firm refusal to acquaint him -with the reasons for her conduct, he did not, either, spare her the -stately wrath of the incensed ecclesiastic. He was a man of noble -presence, and of austere if arrogant life. He spoke with all the weight -of his sixty years and of his eminence in the service of the Church. -His eyes were bent on her in stern scrutiny as he stood drawn up to all -his great height beside her in the library. - -'If your griefs against your husband,' he urged, 'are of sufficient -gravity to justify you in desiring eternal separation from him, you -should not lean merely upon your own strength. You should seek the -support of your spiritual counsellors. Although the Holy Church has -never sanctioned the concubinage which the laws of men have called by -the name of divorce; yet, as you are aware, my daughter, in extreme -cases the Holy Father has himself deigned to unloose an unworthy bond, -to annul an unsuitable marriage. In your case, if the offences of your -lord have been so grave, I make no doubt that by my intercession with -His Sanctity it would be possible to dissolve an union which has become -unholy.' - -She met his gaze calmly and coldly. - -'Your Eminence is very good to interest yourself in my sorrows,' she -replied; 'but for the intercession with our Holy Father which you -offer, I will not trouble you. Whatever the offences of my husband be -against me, they can concern me alone. I have summoned no one to hear -them. I seek no one's judgment. As regards the power of the Supreme -Pontiff to bind and loose, I would bow to it in all matters spiritual, -but I cannot admit that even he can release me from an earthly tie -which I voluntarily assumed.' - -A rebuking wrath flashed from the eagle eyes of the great Churchman. - -'I did not think that Wanda von Szalras would heretically deny the Pope -his power over all souls!' he said sternly. 'Are you not aware that -when the Holy Father deigns in his mercifulness to decree a marriage as -null and void, it becomes so from that instant? It is as though it had -never been; the union is effaced, the woman is decreed pure.' - -'And the children,' she said bitterly; 'can the Holy Father efface -_them?_' - -The Cardinal was affronted and appalled. - -'You would call in question the infallible omnipotence of the Head of -the Church!' he said with horror. - -'The days of miracles are past,' she said coldly. 'I shall not entreat -for them to be wrought for me. I trust your Eminence will pardon me if -I say that no human, nay, no heavenly, permission could legitimate -adultery in my sight or in my person.' - -'You merit excommunication, my daughter,' said the haughty prelate, -his brow black with wrath. He saw no reason why this marriage, which -had offended all her house, should not be annulled by the all-powerful -verdict of the Vatican. Such cases were rare, but it would be possible -to include hers amongst them. The children could be consigned to -religious houses, brought up to religious lives, unknown to and -unknowing of the world. - -'If the man whom you chose to wed,' he continued sternly, 'has offended -or outraged you so greatly, let your relatives judge him and deal with -him. You were warned against the gift of your hand to a stranger with -an uncertain past behind him; he had not the eminence, the repute, the -character that should have been demanded in your husband. But you were -inflexible in your resolve then, as you are now in your silence.' - -'I know of no one living to whom I owe any account,' she said with -haughty decision; 'no one to whom I was bound to lay bare my mind and -heart then, or to whom I am so bound now.' - -'You are so bound every time you kneel in the confessional.' - -'To reveal my own sins, perchance, not his.' - -'Your soul should be as an open book before your priest.' - -'Your Eminence will pardon me. I bow willingly and reverently to the -Church in all matters spiritual, but in the rule of my own conduct I -admit no guide but my conscience. My sorrows are all my own. No priest -or layman shall intrude upon them.' - -She spoke with peremptory and unyielding decision; the old spirit of -her race was aroused in her, which in times bygone had bearded popes -and monarchs, and braved the thunders of excommunication. They had been -pious sons of Rome, but yet ofttimes rebellious ones; when their honour -called one way and the priests pointed the other, they had lifted their -swords in the sunlight and gone whither honour bade. - -The Churchman knew that power of secular revolt which had been always -latent in the Szalras blood; he knew now that, armed with the weapons -of the Church though he was, he might as well seek to bow the mountains -down as bend her will. He took for granted that her wrongs were great -enough to entitle her to freedom; he had thought that she might wed -again with his nephew, who had loved her so long; their mighty fortunes -would have fitly met; this hateful union with a foreigner, a sceptic, -a debauchee, would have become a thing of the past, washed away into -absolute non-existence;--so he had dreamed, and he found himself -confronted with a woman's illogical inconsistency and obstinacy. - -He was deeply incensed. He assailed her for many days with all the -subtle arguments of the ecclesiastical armoury, but he made no -impression. She utterly refused to tell why she had exiled her husband -from her house, and she as utterly refused to take any measures to -attain her own freedom. When he left her he said a word of rebuke -that long lingered in her memory. 'You are rebellious and almost -heretical, my daughter. You entrench yourself in your silence and your -pride, which you appear to forget are heinous sins when opposed to -your spiritual superiors. But this only I will remind you of: if you -deny the Church the power to annul the union of which its sacrament -sanctified the consummation, be at least consistent: do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' - -With that keen home thrust in parting he left her, giving his blessing -to the kneeling household; and six white mules, always kept there in -readiness for his visits, bore him away through the embrowning woods. - -When he reached his palace in Buda he summoned Egon Vàsàrhely and -related what had passed. - -His nephew heard in silence. - -'Your Eminence erred in your judgment of Wanda,' he said at length. -'She would never make her wrongs, whatever they be, public, nor seek -for dissolution of her marriage. She may repent it, but she will repent -it in solitude.' - -'If the marriage be so sacred in her eyes,' said the angry prelate, -'let her continue to live with her husband. She has been a law to -herself; she has parted from him; where is the wifely submission there? -Where the sanctity of the immutable bond?' - -'Perhaps some day she will bid him return,' said Vàsàrhely, whose -features were very grave and pale. - -'She could forget this fatal folly like a bad dream,' continued the -Cardinal, unheeding. 'She could begin a new life; she could wed with -you.' - -'Your Eminence mistakes,' said Vàsàrhely, abruptly. 'Though that man -were dead ten times over, Wanda would never wed with me--nor I with -her.' - -'You are both wiser than the wisdom and holier than the holiness of the -Church,' said the incensed ecclesiastic, with boundless scorn. He was -accustomed to bend human volition like a willow wand in his hand. - -When she herself had left the terrace where she had parted from the -prelate, having accompanied him there in that stately etiquette which, -though she had been dying, habit would have compelled her to observe in -every detail, she had turned with a sense of intolerable pain from the -sunshine of the September day. - -It was a pretty scene that stretched before her, the children standing -bareheaded, the household hushed and kneeling still where the mighty -dignitary of the Mother Church had given them his benediction; the gold -embroideries and rich colours of the liveries glowing in the light; -the white mules and the scarlet-clothed attendants of the Cardinal -passing down the avenue of oaks, with the immediate background of the -darksome yews, and, further, the flushed foliage of the forests and the -shine of the snow peaks; but to her it was fraught with unendurable -associations. The central figure was missing from it which for so many -years had graced all pageants and conducted all ceremonies there. It -was the sole time since the exile of her husband that there had been -any arrival or departure at Hohenszalras. - -She had been compelled to receive the Cardinal with all due state and -observance, and the oppressiveness of his three days' sojourn had worn -and wearied her. - -'I would sooner receive five emperors than one Churchman,' she said to -the Princess. 'We are far from the days of the Apostles!' - -'Christ must be honoured in His Vicars,' said the Princess, coldly, and -with disapprobation chill on all her features. - -Wanda turned away as the white mules disappeared in a bend of the -avenue, and went into the house alone, whilst the children and the -household still lingered in the sunshine. She traversed the whole -length of the building to reach her octagon-room, where she was certain -to be alone. The interrogation and censure of her uncle had left on her -a harassed sense of being somewhere at fault: not to him, nor to the -Church he represented and invoked, but to her own Conscience. - -As she passed through one of the galleries she saw her youngest child -Egon, now nearly two years old, playing with his nurse, an old, grave -North German woman. They were the only living beings of the house who -had not been upon the terraces to receive the Cardinal's last blessing; -the one too young, the other too old to care. The child, with his fair -face and his light curls, was like the child Christ of Carlo Dolce, -yet there was the same resemblance in him to his father which pierced -her soul whenever she looked in the faces of her other offspring. - -She paused and stooped towards him now, where he played with a toy lamb -in the breadth of sunlight that fell warm and broad through the open -lattices of an oriel window, in the embrasure of which his attendant -was sitting. The baby looked up under his long dark lashes, and made a -little timid movement towards his nurse. - -'Is he afraid of me?' said Wanda, with the same vague sense of remorse -which she had felt before his eldest brother. - -'Oh no! he is not afraid, my lady,' said the old woman with him, -hurriedly. 'But he sees you so rarely now, and when they are so young -they are frightened at grave faces.' - -The nurse stopped herself, fearing she had said too much; but her -mistress listened without anger and with a sharp pang of self-reproach. - -'Come for him to my room when I ring,' she said; and she stooped again -and lifted the little boy in her arms. - -'Are you all afraid of me, my poor children,' she murmured to him. -'Surely I have never been cruel to you?' - -He did not understand; he was still frightened, but he put his arm -about her throat and hid his pretty face on her shoulder with a gesture -that was half terror, half confidence. She took him to her own room -and soothed and caressed and amused him, till he regained his natural -fearlessness and sat happy on her knee, playing with some Indian ivory -toys; then he grew tired, and leaned his head against her breast, and -fell asleep as prettily as a Star of Bethlehem shuts its white leaves -up at sunset. - -She watched him with an aching heart. - -She could look on none of her children without a throb of intolerable -shame. They were the symbols as they were the offspring of all her -hours of love. Another woman might have forgotten all except that they -were hers. - -She could not. - -From that day she had the younger children brought to her more often, -drove them out at times, and soon regained their affection, although -to them all a majesty and melancholy, as inseparable from her now as -shadows from the night, made her presence inspire them with a certain -awe; even Lili, the most willful of them all, in her pretty, gay, -childish vanity and naughtiness, never ventured to disobey or to weary -her. - -'When I am with her it is as if I were at Mass,' Lili said to her -brothers. 'You know what one feels when the Host comes and the bell -rings, and it is all so still, and only the Latin words----' - -'It is the presence of God that we feel at Mass,' said Gela, in a -hushed voice. 'And I think our mother has God with her very much. Only -He makes her sad.' - -'But she never does cry,' said her little daughter. - -'No,' said Gela, 'I think she is too sad for that. You know when it is -very, very cold the skies cannot rain. I think that it is just so cold -with her.' - -And Gela's own eyes filled, for he, the most thoughtful and the most -quick in perception of them all, adored his mother. When he could he -would sit in her presence for hours, mute and motionless, with a book -on his knees, glancing at her with his meditative eyes now and then in -rapt veneration. - -'When Bela grows up he will wander, I dare say, and perhaps be a great -soldier,' Gela thought at such times. 'But for me, I shall stay always -with our mother, and read every thing that is written, and do all I can -for the people, and care for nothing but for her and them.' - -She had not let loose in the presence of Cardinal Vàsàrhely the -burning wrath which had consumed her. And yet the valedictory words of -the prelate recurred to her with haunting persistency. He had said to -her: 'If you refuse to be released from your marriage, do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' Was it possible, she asked herself, that -she still owed allegiance to one who, whilst he had embraced her, had -dishonoured her? - -'As well,' she thought bitterly, 'as well say that the man and woman -chained and drowned together in the Noyades of Nantes were united in a -holy union!' - - '_Ego conjungo vos in matrimonium, in nomine Patris et Filii - et Spiritus Sancti._' - -As she remembered those words of the Marriage Sacrament, uttered as she -had stood beside him in the midst of the incense, the colour, the pomp, -the gorgeous grandeur of the Court Chapel in Vienna, she felt that -they had bound on her eternal silence, perpetual constancy, even in a -sense continual submission; they forbade her to disgrace him before the -world; they made his shame hers, they required her to defend him so far -as in her lay from the punishment with which the laws would have met -his wrong-doing: but she could not bring herself to acknowledge that it -demanded more. Truth could not be forced to dwell beside falsehood. -Honour could not take the kiss of peace from dishonour. - -The natural veneration she bore to the speaker added to the weight of -the reproach implied in the Cardinal's words. Even beyond her pride -was her intense sense of the obligations of duty. She asked herself a -thousand times a week if she had indeed failed in these. Honour was -a yet higher thing than duty. Offended honour had its title to any -choice. Her race had never gone to others with their wrongs; they had -known how to avenge themselves by their own hand, in their own way. -If she had chosen to stab him in the throat which had lied to her she -would not, she thought, have gone outside her right. Yet she had been -merciful to him; she had neither exposed nor chastised him; she had -simply cut his life adrift from hers, which he had outraged. - -No man's repute is hurt by separation from his wife; he was in no worse -circumstance than he had been ere he had met her; she did not withdraw -her gifts. She had given a noble name to one nameless; she had granted -a feudal title to a bastard; she had enriched a man who previously -had owned nothing, save half a million of francs won at play and a -strip of sea-shore that was stolen. She withdrew none of her gifts; -she left the impostor to the full enjoyment of the world; she did -not even move a step to secure the world's sympathy with herself. All -she had done as her just vengeance was to withdraw herself from the -pollution of his touch, and to exile him from the home of her fathers. -Who could have done less? His children would in the future possess all -she had, though through him they destroyed the purity of her race for -ever: centuries would not wash out in her sight the stain that was in -their blood: but she did not disinherit them. She could not see that -she had failed anywhere in her duty; she had been more generous in her -judgment than many could have been. Wherever women spoke of her and of -her separation from her husband, there would they surely, with many a -bitter word, repay her all the affronts which she had put upon them by -her indifference and by what they had esteemed her arrogance. She knew -that in such a position as she had perforce created, unexplained, the -man is easily and constantly absolved of blame, the woman is always and -certainly condemned. Therefore she had never doubted that the future -would lie lightly on his shoulders, passed in sensual idleness, in -oblivion more or less easily attained. Could it be possible that though -she had been so cruelly betrayed her own obligations remained the same? -Had her marriage vows compelled her to endure even such offence as -this without alteration in her own obedience? Was she inconsistent in -sending her betrayer from her, whilst she still considered her bond to -him binding? Since she refused to take advantage of the release that -the Law and the Church would give her, was it unjustifiable to free -herself from his hourly presence, his daily contact? No! she could not -believe that it was so. - -On her name-day, in the following spring, addressing his felicitations -to her, Egon Vàsàrhely added words which had cost him much to write. - -'You know how dear, more dear than any earthly thing, you have been -ever to me,' he wrote, 'therefore you will pardon me what I am about to -say. If I had followed my own selfish desires I should have entreated -you to disgrace him publicly, begged you to shake off publicly all -bonds to a traitor; and I should have shot him dead, with or without -the formula of a quarrel; he himself knew that well. But for your own -sake I would say to you now, pardon him if you can. Though you are the -possessor of a position and of a character rare amongst women, yet even -you must suffer as a separated wife. The children as they grow older -will suffer from it likewise. You could divorce your husband; the Law -and the Church would set you free from an union contracted in ignorance -with a man guilty of a fraud. You would be free, and he would endure -his fit chastisement. But I understand why you refuse to do that. I -comprehend your feeling. Publicity would to you intensify disgrace. -Divorce could do nothing to heal your cruel wounds. Therefore I urge -on you forgiveness. It has cost me many months' bitter struggle to be -able to write this to you. His offence is vile. His past is hateful. -He himself merits nothing. But for your commands I would have set my -heel on his throat as on a snake's. But there may have been excuses -even for him; and since you acknowledge him as your husband you will, -in the end, be more at peace if you do not continue to insist on a -separation which will be food for the world's calumny. Besides, though -you know it not, you have not exiled him from your heart, though you -have sent him from your house. If you had not still loved him you would -have said to me--Slay him. I believe that he loved you, though he had -such foul guilt against you, and he must have some true qualities of -character and mind since he satisfied yours for many long years. Of -where he may be now I know not. Since I saw you I have not quitted my -own country. But I would say to you--wherever he be, send for him. You -will understand without words what it costs me to say to you--Since you -will not accept the freedom of the Law, summon him to you and cleanse -his soul in yours. I speak for you, not him. If I saw him lying dead -like a dog in a ditch, for myself, I should thank God. Sometimes I look -with stupor at my sword. Can it lie idle there and you be unavenged?' - -The letter touched her profoundly. She realised the grandeur of -generosity, the force of compelling duty, which had enabled Vàsàrhely -to write it, proudest of gentlemen as he was, most devoted of lovers as -he had been. - -She replied to him: - -'I have thought myself strong, but of late years I have found that -there are things beyond my strength; what you counsel is one of them. -Religion enjoins, indeed, forgiveness without limit; but there are -wrongs for which religion makes no provision, and of which it has no -comprehension. Nevertheless, I thank you for him and for myself.' - -Any crime, any folly, any violence or faithlessness, which yet should -have left his honour pure, she thought it would have been possible to -condone; the life of a woman who loves must ever be one long pardon. -But such shame as this of his ate into her very soul, as rust into -the pure metal. It was such shame that when her heart went out to what -she had once loved in the yearning of affection, she felt herself -disgraced, feeling that the dominion of the senses, the weakness of -remembered and desired joys made her oblivious of indignity, feeble as -an enamoured fool. - -Her friends, her priests, even her own conscience might say to her -'Forgive,' but she could not bend her will to do it. Forgiveness would -mean reconciliation, union, life spent together as in their days of -love. She could not bring herself to endure that perpetual contact, -that incessant communion. To her sight he was stained with a moral -leprosy. She could not consent to admit that one in spiritual health, -and clean of guilt, must dwell with one spiritually diseased. - - - - -CHAPTER XLI. - - -Another year passed by, and of him she still heard nothing. As, once -before, his silence had told her of his passion more eloquently than -speech could have done, so now the same silence tended to soften her -wrath, to soothe her horror. She had expected him to take one of two -courses: either to assail her with written entreaties for pardon, and -ceaseless efforts to palliate his crime in her sight, or to go out into -the world of men to seek oblivion in pleasure, and perhaps absolution -in ambition. - -He had done neither. - -Once she, having occasion to go to the room which had been set aside -for the boys' studies, saw the old professor absorbed in the perusal -of a letter. Confused and startled he slipped it hurriedly beneath a -Latin exercise of Bela's, which lay with other papers on the table. The -children were out riding. - -His mistress looked at him, and her face grew a shade paler still. - -'You correspond with my husband?' she said abruptly, pausing, as she -always paused, before she said the latter words. - -Greswold flushed consciously, stammered a few unintelligible words, and -was silent. - -'You hear from him?' she continued with correct inference. 'You know -where he is?' - -'I have promised that I will not say. I pray your Excellency to pardon -me,' murmured the old man, the colour mounting upward to his grey locks. - -She was silent a moment; she knew not what emotion moved her, whether -wrath, or wonder, or offence; or whether even relief from long suspense. - -'Do not be angered, my lady,' pleaded Greswold, timidly. 'It is the -only way in which he can hear of you and of his children. Could your -Excellency believe that all these months, these years, he lived on -without any tidings?' - -'I think you have exceeded your duty,' she said coldly. 'I think that -you should have asked my permission.' - -The old man stood penitent, like a chidden child. He was afraid of her -interrogations; but she made none. - -'You will give me your word,' she pursued, 'never to speak of this -correspondence to Herr Bela or to any of the children.' - -Greswold bowed his assent. 'My lord has forbidden me also,' he said -eagerly. - -Her brows contracted. - -'You have committed an imprudence,' she said, in a tone which chilled -the old man to the marrow. 'Be heedful that no one knows of it.' - -She said no more; took the volume she had needed, and quitted the room. - -'Who shall tell the heart of a woman?' thought Greswold, left to -himself. 'She knows not whether the man she once adored be living or -dead, and she does not put to me one single question, does not even -seek to learn where he dwells or what he does! What could his sin be to -sweep all love away as fire makes a desert of a smiling meadow? And be -it what it would, of what use is human love if it have not enough of -the divine love in it to rejoice over the sinner who repents?' - -He knew not that the sin she might, she would, have forgiven, but that -the shame ate into the fair marble of her honour like a corroding acid. - -From that time he expected daily some fresh question, some allusion at -least to the confession which she had surprised from him. But she never -spoke to him again of it. If she placed a violent control upon herself, -because she did not think it fitting to speak of her husband to one -in her employ, or if her husband were absolutely dead to her memory -and her affections, he could not tell. He only knew that by no word or -sign did she appear to recall the brief conversation which had passed -between them. - -Although what he had done was innocent enough, the old physician, in -his scrupulous sense of duty, began to have a sense of guilt. Had he -any right to retain any hidden knowledge from the mistress whose roof -sheltered him, and whose bread he ate? - -But his loyalty to his pledged word, and to him whom the world of men -still called Sabran, obliged him to be mute. - -'After all,' he thought, 'if she knew it might be better, but my first -duty is to keep my word.' - -She never tempted him to break it. She was not callous and hardened -as he supposed. She felt a growing desire to learn where and how her -husband had taken up the broken threads of his severed life. She had -believed either that he would return to the unfettered existence that -could be dreamed away under the cedar groves of Mexico, with the senses -satisfied and the moral law set at naught, or that he would go amongst -the men and women of the great world, popular, pitied, and easily -consoled. She had seen that world exercise a potent fascination over -him, and if it were called to pronounce against her or against him, she -was well aware that he would bear away all its suffrages. He had always -humoured and flattered it; she never. - -He had passed from the sight of those who knew him as utterly as -though he had descended to his grave. No sound or hint told her of his -destiny. She still thought at times that he must have sought those -flowery recesses of the West which had given his youth their shelter. -It might well be that in his total ruin his instincts had urged him to -return to the free barbaric life of his early manhood, where none would -reproach him, none deride him, none know his secret or his sin. His -correspondence with Greswold suggested a doubt to her. Perhaps remorse -was with him and the weight of remembrance. - -When, too harshly, she had assumed that all his love and life had been -a lie, because one lie had been beneath it, she had told herself that -he would find solace in those vices and pastimes which, in his earlier -years, had been fatal to his ambition and to his perseverance. But -since he cared to hear of his children's welfare, it might well be that -their life together was nearer to his heart than she had credited. She -believed that, if he had been sunk in the kind of self-indulgence she -had imagined, he would have shunned all tidings, all memories, of his -lost home. - -Then again, with the inconsistency of all great suffering, an intense -indignation possessed her that he did dare to remember, did dare to -recall, that her offspring were also his. Even alone the hot flush of -an ever-increasing shame came to her face when she thought that she -had been for nine long years his, in the most absolute possession that -woman can grant to man. Exile, severance, silence, cold and dark as the -winters of the land of his birth, could not alter that. Whenever he -chose to think of her she must be his in remembrance still. - -Once the Princess ventured to say again to her a word which came from -her heart. They were standing on the terrace watching the blush of -evening glow on the virginal snows of the mountains. - -'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' she murmured. 'Wanda, mine, -do never you think of those words--you who let so many suns rise and -set, and find your wrath unchanged?' - -'If it were _only_ that!' she answered bitterly. 'It is so much -else--so much else! Crimes deep as yonder water, high as yonder hills, -I could have forgiven, but--a baseness--never! Nay, there are pardons -that would only be as base as what they pardoned.' - -So it seemed to her. - -When again and again her heart was thrilled with its old tenderness, -her mind was haunted by a million memories of dead delights, she strove -against herself, and trod down her temptation with the merciless -self-punishment of an ascetic. It humbled and stained her in her own -sight to feel that love could live within her without honour. - -'Forgive me,' said the Princess, 'but it always seems to me that -you--noble and generous and pure of mind as you are--yet have met ill -the supreme trial, the supreme test of your life. You believed that you -loved the man you wedded, but you loved your own pride more. If love be -not endless forbearance, endless compassion, endless pity and sympathy, -what is it but the mere fever and instincts of carnal passions? What -raises it above the self-indulgence of the senses if not its sacrifice -of will and its long-suffering? You have said so yourself in other -days than these.' - -'And what,' she thought passionately as she heard, 'what would it be -but the basest indulgence of the senses to let oneself love and be -beloved by what one scorned?--to stoop and kiss the lips that lied for -mere sake of their sweetness?--to gather in one's arms the coward, the -traitor, and persuade oneself that one forgave because one grew blind -with amorous remembrance?' - -'Is it well,' pursued her companion with soft solemnity, 'to let anyone -who is so near to you live his own life when that life may be one of -sin? You send him from you, and how can you tell into what extremes of -evil or of folly despair may not drive him? A man cast forth from his -home is like a ship cut loose from its anchor and rudderless. Whatever -may have been his weakness, his offences, they cannot absolve you from -your duty to watch over your husband's soul, to be his first and most -faithful friend, to stand between him and his temptations and perils. -That is the nobler side of marriage. When the light of love is faded, -and its joys are over, its duties and its mercies remain. Because -one of the twain has failed in these the other is not acquitted of -obligation. Pardon me if I seem to censure. Look in your own heart and -judge if I err.' - -'You do not know! You do not know! If I forgave him I should never -forgive myself!' - -She turned her head from the roseate and happy light that spoke to her -of other days, and went with a swift uneven step into the house, now -darkened by the passing of the day. - -She flung his memory from her as so much unholiness. Had passion not -yet lived in her, the coldness of unforgiving sorrow might not have -seemed to her so sovereign a duty. - -Some weeks after she had seen the letter in Greswold's hands a small -hamlet was burnt down during a high north wind. It belonged to her. -Hearing of the calamity she went thither at once. It was some two and -a half German miles from the castle. She drove, herself, four young -Hungarian horses, whose fretting graces and tempestuous gallop gave -her the only pleasure which she was now capable of enjoying. They were -harnessed to a carriage light and strong, built on purpose to scour -rapidly rough forest roads and steep hill-sides. When she had visited -the melancholy scene, given what consolation she could, and distributed -money to the homeless peasants, promising to rebuild the houses with -her own timber and shingles--for the conflagration had been the fault -of no one, but of the wild wind which had scattered the burning embers -of a hearth-fire on a neighbouring wood-stack--her horses were rested, -and she began her homeward drive as the pale afternoon grew grey and -the twilight fell on the little grassy vale, now charred and smoking -with the smouldering ruins of the châlets. - -'Our Countess never leaves us alone in any trouble,' said the women -gathered about the stone statue of S. Florian, their most trusted -patron, who, despite their prayers, had refused to save them from the -flames. The hamlet was not far from the Maurer glaciers, and was shut -in by a complete wall of mountains; it was green, fresh, beautifully -cool in summer. Now, in the late spring, it was still dreary, and -patches of snow still lay on its sward; it was set high on the mountain -side, and dense forests sloped down from it, seldom traversed, and dark -early in the afternoon. Her groom lit the lamps of her carriage as she -entered the deep woods, through which the road was little more than a -timber-track. The long gallops and the steep inclines coming thither -had calmed and pacified her young horses. They gave her no trouble to -control them, as they trotted rapidly along the shadowy forest ways. -In other parts of the country the sun had not then set, but here the -gloom was grey, like that of a cloudy dawn. Yet it was not so dark but -that she perceived ahead of her, as her horses turned a curve in the -moss-grown path, a figure, whose height and outline made her heart -stand still. As the animals went past him in their swinging trot the -blaze of the lamps fell full upon him. He turned and retreated quickly -into the undergrowth beneath the drooping boughs of the Siberian pines, -but she saw him, he saw her. Mechanically he uncovered his head and -bowed low; she drove onward with a sense of suffocation at her throat -and a chill like ice in her veins. She had recognised him in that -moment of time. He was changed, aged, and there were threads of grey in -his hair. He wore a forester's dress and had a gun on his shoulder. - -Where they had met, in these woods that lay under the snow saddle of -the Reggen Thörl, it was still twenty English miles away from the burg. -It was late when she reached home, but her people were used to those -long night drives, and even the Princess had become resigned to them. -On the plea of fatigue she went to her own rooms and there remained. A -faintness and sense of confusion stayed with her. She had not thought -that merely meeting him thus would affect her. She had underrated, the -power of the past. - -When she had deemed him far away in other countries he was there in her -own lands, not twenty miles from her. The knowledge of his vicinity -moved her with a mingled sense of unendurable pain, partial anger, -reviving love. It seemed horrible to have passed him by as any stranger -would have passed, without a sign or word. Yet he was dead to her, -whether oceans were between them or only a few leagues of hill and -grass and forest. - -She did not sleep, she did not even lie down that night. He seemed -always before her; in the stillness of her chamber she heard his voice, -and she started up thinking he touched her. - -He had looked aged, ill, weary, unhappy; the sight of him bore -conviction to her that he, like herself, found no compensation, no -consolation. Perchance her monitress had been right; she had been -cruel. Perchance, whatever sin his present or his future life might -hold would lie, directly indeed at his own door, but indirectly at -hers. She had always held that high and spiritual view of marriage -which, rising above mere sensual indulgence, regarded the bond of souls -as sacred, and made the life on earth mere passage and preparation -for eternity. She had loved to believe that she ennobled, purified, -exalted his life by union with hers. Was she now false to her own creed -when she left him alone, unfriended, unpardoned, to drift to any solace -in vice, or any distraction in evil, which might be his fate? The -sensitiveness and apprehension of her conscience before the possibility -of a neglected duty made of her meditations a very martyrdom. All her -life long she had been resolute and serene in action, deciding quickly, -and carrying resolve into action without hesitation; but here, in the -supreme crisis of her fate, she was irresolute and wrung by continual -doubt. Had it only been any other crime than this!--this which cankered -all the honour of her race, and was rank with the abhorred putridity of -fraud! - -The spring passed into summer, and the children played amidst masses of -roses and sweet ranks of lilies, stretching down the green grass alleys -of the gardens. More than once she went to the same hamlet, where now -châlets were arising, made of pine and elm, cut in the past winter in -her own woods. But of him she saw no more. She could not bend her will -to ask of him of any of her household, not even of Greswold. Whether he -lingered amidst her mountains, or whether he had but come thither in a -momentary impulse, she knew not. - -The infinite yearning of affection, which is wholly outside the -instincts of the passions, awoke in her once more. She began to doubt -her own reading of obligation and of duty. Had her counsellors been -right--had she met the supreme test of her character and had failed -before it? - -Was it true that a great love must be as exhaustless as the ocean in -its mercy and as profound in its comprehension? - -Had his sin to her released her from her duties towards him? Because -he had been disloyal was she absolved from loyalty to him? Ought she -sooner to have said to him,--'Nay, no crime, no untruth, no failure in -yourself shall divide you from me; the darker be your soul the greater -need hath it to lean on mine?' - -In the violent scorn of her revolted pride, of her indignant honour, -had she forgotten a lowlier yet harder duty left undone? - -In her contempt and dread of yielding to mere amorous weakness had she -stifled and denied the cry of pity, the cry of conscience? - - To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite, To forgive wrongs - darker than death or night, To defy power which seems - omnipotent, To love, and live to hope till hope creates From - its own wreck the thing it contemplates, Neither to change, - nor falter, nor repent. - -This, perchance, had been the higher diviner way which she had -missed--this the obligation from the passion of the past which she had -left unfulfilled, unaccepted. - -Resolutely she had gone on upon her joyless path, not doubting that -her course was right. It had seemed to her that there was no other way -possible; that, stretching her hand to him across the gulf of shame -that severed them, she would do nothing to raise him, but only fall -herself, degraded to his likeness. - -So it had always seemed to her. - -Now alone the misgiving arose in her whether she had mistaken arrogance -for duty; whether, cleaving so closely to the traditions of honour, she -had forgotten the obligations of mercy. Had it been any other thing, -any other sin, she thought, rather than this, which struck at the very -root of all the trusts, of all the faiths, which she had most venerated -as the legacy of her fathers!---- - -Sometimes it seemed to her as though, were that time of torture to be -lived through again, she would not send him from her; she would say to -him: - -'What we love once we love for ever. Shall there be joy in heaven over -those who repent, yet no forgiveness for them upon earth?' - -Sometimes it seemed to lier as though even now, after these years, she -still ought to summon him and say this. But time passed on and passed -away, and it remained unsaid. - -She rode often through the same woods, now in full leaf, with sunny -waters tumbling and sparkling through their flower-filled moss, but he -crossed her path no more. He might have come thither, she thought, in -some brief hope of possible reconciliation to her, and then his courage -might have failed him, and he might have returned to whatsoever distant -climate held him, whatsoever manner of life consoled him. That he might -dwell amidst the hills, unseen of men, for her sake, never once seemed -to her possible. Egon Vàsàrhely might have done that; but not he--he -loved the world. - -The summer weighed wearily upon her. The light, the fragrance, the -gaiety of nature hurt her. In winter all the earth seemed of accord -with herself; it was silent, stern, solitary. The keen winds, the -glittering snow, the air that was like a bath of ice, the sense of -absolute isolation and seclusion which the winter brought with it were -precious to her. Not even the pretty figures of the children running -through the bowers of blossom and of foliage could make the summer -otherwise than oppressive and mournful to her. - -Sometimes she thought of how it had been on other summer nights, when -he had wandered with her through the white lines of the lilies by the -starlight, or sent the melodies of Schumann and of Beethoven out upon -the dewy, balmy air. Then she could bear no more to look upon the -moonlit gardens. - -The love she had borne him stirred at those times beneath the -gravestones of scorn and wrath and almost hatred which she had heaped -upon it, to keep it buried far down for evermore. All the echoes of -passion came to her at those moments; she despised herself because -she felt that she would give her soul to feel his lips on hers again. -She was ashamed that the mere sight of him could thus have moved her. -Again and again she recalled noble acts, beautiful thoughts, which -had been his; again and again she recalled the early hours of their -love with burning cheeks and longing heart. She could have scourged -herself to banish those memories, those desires. They were terrible -and irresistible to her as the visions that assailed the saints of the -Thebaïd. Her whole soul softened to him, yearned for him, forgave him. -Then she would shrink in disdain from her own weakness, and pace her -chamber like a wounded lioness. - - - - -CHAPTER XLII. - - -The first flush of autumn came upon the woods. Soon it would be three -years since Olga Brancka had driven thither, and her work had held good -and never been undone. Bela and Gela had grown tall and slender as the -young fir trees; and Bela often said to his brother: 'I was ten years -old on Easter Day. That is quite old. If ever I am to find him I am old -enough now.' - -He had not forgotten. He never forgot. Every day he wearied his little -brain with thinking what he could do. Every night he asked Heaven to -help him. He had read a Bohemian ballad which had fascinated him; the -story of how, in the days of chivalry, Wratislaw, the son of Berka, -when but twelve years old, had made, all by himself and on foot, -a pilgrimage from Prague to Tartary, to release his brother from -captivity. Bela knew very well that the world had changed since then, -and that if some things were easier some were harder now than then. But -if Wratislaw had done so much at twelve, why should he, who was ten, -not do something? - -He thought himself quite old. He had a big pony, and Folko was ridden -by his little brothers. He had been taught to shoot at a target and -a running mark; he had become skilful at climbing with crampons and -managing a boat. When he rode he had long boots that pulled up to his -knees. He could drive three ponies, harnessed in the Russian way, with -skill and surety. Perhaps, he thought, the Bohemian boy had not been -able to do half as much as this. The ballad spoke of him as a little -weakling, and yet he had found his way from Prague, in her dusky -plains, to burning Tartary. - -Almost he was ready to set forth on a Quixotic search without any clue -to where his father dwelt, but his educated sense checked him with -the remembrance that, wide as the world was, it would be of no avail -to begin a harebrained pilgrimage with no fixed goal. Even Wratislaw, -who was his ideal, had been certain that his brother languished in -the Tartar tents before he had set his fair face to the southeast. So -he remained patient in his impatience, and strove with all his might -to perfect himself in all bodily exercises and manly habits, that he -might be the better fitted to go on his errand whenever he should have -any thread of guidance. No one guessed the resolves and the hopes -which fermented like new wine in his pretty golden-haired head. His -attendants thought each year that he grew gentler and more serious, and -his tutors found him at once more docile and more absent-minded. But no -one imagined that he was bent on any unusual enterprise. - -His father had not been recognised by the groom who had accompanied his -mistress in the drive through the woods of the Reggen Thörl; and no -rumour of the near presence of Sabran had reached any of the household. -Greswold alone knew that amidst the solitudes of the avalanche and -the glacier, in the chill of the air where the eagle and the vulture -alone made their home, in a life of absolute isolation, asceticism, and -physical denial of every kind, the man who had sinned against her spent -his exile, in such self-chosen expiation as was possible to one who had -neither the faith nor the humility needful to make him seek refuge -and atonement in any religious service. He dwelt in the loneliness -of the ice-slopes, leading the life of a common hunter, shunning all -men, accepting each monotonous and joyless day as portion of his just -punishment; in the perils of winter on the mountains doing what he -could to save human or animal life; knowing no solace save such as -existed for him in the sense of being near all that he had lost, and -the power of watching the distant movements of his wife and children at -such rare hours as he ventured to approach the hills of Hohenszalras -and turn his telescope on the gardens of his lost home. A hunter or -two, a guide or two of the Umbal and the Trojerthal had his confidence, -but the loyalty which is the common virtue of all mountaineers made -them preserve it faithfully. For the rest, in these unfrequented -places, avoidance of all those who might have recognised him was easy; -he was clothed like the men of the hills, and lived like them in a -châlet, high perched on a ledge of rock at a great altitude in the wild -and almost inaccessible region of the Hintere Umbalthörl. Of the future -he never dared to think; he took each day as it came; the best he hoped -for was a mountaineer's death some hour or another, amidst the clear -serene blue ice, the everlasting snows. - -When he had gone out from the chamber of his wife, banished and -accursed, all his spirit had died in him, and nothing had seemed clear -in his memory except that love which had been so insufficient to wash -out his sin. The world would no doubt have welcomed him; he was not -too old for its distractions and its ambitions to be still possible -for him; but he had no courage left to take them up, no energy to make -another future for himself. His whole life was consumed in a vain -regret, as vain a desire, as vain a penitence. Had he had the faith of -those men who dwelt under the willows of the Holy Isle he would have -joined them. But he had no belief; he had only a futile, heart-broken, -hopeless repentance, which availed him nothing and could atone for -nothing. - -Perhaps, he thought, if she had known that, it might have changed her. -But he did not dare to approach her by any written appeal. It seemed -to him as if any words from him would only appear but added falsehood, -added insult. He never, even in his own thoughts, reproached her for -her separation from him. He recognised that no other path was open to -her. The pure daylight of her nature could find no mate in the dusk -and shadow of his own; the loyalty of truth could not unite with the -servitude and cowardice of falsehood. He knew it, and never rebelled -against his chastisement. - -Whilst still it was dawn one morning, his young son, just awaking, -heard a pebble thrown at his window. He sprang out of bed and ran and -looked out. Old Otto stood below. - -'My little lord,' he said softly; 'if you can come to me in the woods, -when you are dressed, I have something to tell you.' - -'Of him?' cried Bela. - -The huntsman made a sign of assent. - -The child, excited to intense emotion, hardly knew how his servant -dressed him, or how he swallowed his breakfast. After their morning -meal he could always run in the woods, as he chose, before beginning -his studies, and he sped as fast as his feet could bear him to the -trysting-place. - -'My lord, your father has been seen on the other side of Glöckner by my -underling, Fritz,' said Otto, gravely; 'and I have heard, too, that the -villagers have seen him in Pregratten. I made bold to tell you, Count -Bela, for I had given you my word.' - -Bela's whole form shook with excitement. - -'I knew if he had died I should have known it!' he said, with a hushed -ecstasy. 'Tell me more, tell me more, quick!' - -'There is no more to tell, my little lord,' said Otto. 'Fritz will -swear that he saw your father, though there was a stretch of glaciers -and many fathoms of ice between them. He says there was no mistaking -the way he sighted his rifle and fired. And I have heard by gossip, -too, from the folks of the Hintere Umbalthörl that there can be no -manner of doubt of the fact that His Excellency has dwelt there, for a -time at least.' - -Bela gave a deep breath. - -'Then he lives, and I can find him!' - -'Yes, he lives; the Lord be praised! 'said Otto. - -When he went to the house the boy told no one his precious secret. He -studied ill, and was punished, but he did not heed it. His heart was -full of joy; his brain teemed with projects. - -'I will go and bring him back!' he kept saying to himself; and no force -could hold his thoughts to his Homer or his Euclid. - -He would tell no one, he resolved, not even Gela; and he would go -alone, all alone, as the Bohemian boy had gone. - -'What ails Bela to-day? He is not like himself,' said his mother to -Greswold, who assured her he was well, but added that he was often -careless. - -The child shut his secret up in his own breast, and though he longed -to tell Gela he did not. He had been tempted to confide in Otto, but -resisted even that desire, knowing that Otto was stern where duty -pointed, and had been always forbidden to let the little nobles wander -alone to the mountains. He had his father's power of reticence, his -mother's strength of self-control. - -He knew what hill work was like. The elder boys often went climbing, -with their guides, on fine days from May to September, and had a -little tent which was set up for them at a fair altitude, whence -Greswold taught them to take observations and measurements. But the -mountaineering for the season was now over; it was now S. Michael's -Day, and avalanches fell and snow-storms had begun on the higher -slopes. He knew that if anyone saw him he would be stopped and taken -back. For that reason he said nothing to Gela, who could never be -persuaded to a disobedience; and he rose in the dark, before the hour -at which his attendant came to dress him, got his clothes on as best he -could, slipped the sword Vàsàrhely had given him in his belt, and took -his crampons and alpenstock in his hand. - -He had kneeled and said his prayers, fervently though quickly. - -'A soldier cannot pray _very_ long if he hear the trumpets sounding,' -he had thought, as he rose. He felt neither irresolution nor fear; he -was strong with ardour and an exalted sense of right-doing. - -He had the little knapsack which, in the long forest walks with his -tutor, he was used to carry packed with simple food for a morning meal -when they halted under the pines. He had put some bread and cakes into -this overnight, and he had filled his little silver flask with milk, -as he had seen the flasks of the gentlemen filled with wine in those -grand days when the Kaiser and the Court had hunted with his father. -Thus equipped he managed to escape from the house by a side door, left -open by some of the under-servants, who had just risen. He knew the -quick way to reach the Glöckner slopes, for he had been taken there by -Otto to learn mountaineering, and for his age he climbed well. His eye -was sure, his step firm, and he knew not fear. He never thought of the -misery his absence might cause; he was absorbed in his self-imposed -mission. - -'I will bring him back,' he thought, 'and then she will smile again.' - -He had been trained in the lore of the high hills too well not to know -that it would take him several days to reach the Hintere Umbalthörl; -but he said to himself that this must be as it would. He would climb -on and on, sleep in any hut he could, and find what food he might. The -Bohemian boy had crossed many mountains and seas and deserts before he -had ransomed his brother. - -It was a fine morning, with light pleasant winds. There was a clear -blue in the sky, though north-east there was a brown haze, such as -hunters fear, upon the hills. - -'It will rain or snow to-morrow,' thought Bela, who had been made wise -in the signs of the weather. But even that prevision did not deter him; -he had his liberty and he meant to use it. He had been well trained to -all bodily exercises, and he could walk long and fast without fatigue. -His slender fair limbs were as strong as steel, and his health was -perfect. He knew all the tracks of the home-lying woods, and he wanted -no one to guide him. He got, with promptitude and address, out of sight -of the terraces and towers of Hohenszalras, and soon entered what was -called the Schwarzenwald, a dense pine-wood ascending abruptly the -mountain side from the gardens; the only place where the wildness of -the hills came in unbroken contact and close proximity to the lawns and -flowers of the south side of the schloss, the lower spurs of the Gross -Glöckner descending there so steep and stern that they enclosed the -parterres with a gigantic rampart of granite. - -The contrast of the rose gardens with these huge overhanging heights -had always so pleased the tastes of the Szalras châtelaines, that they -had never allowed any attempts to be made to change or modify the -savage grandeur and sombre wilds of the black wood. - -He was already a trained pedestrian, and he covered five miles without -pausing to breathe himself. Then he thought he had come far enough -to make it safe to pause and eat. He drank his milk and opened his -knapsack. There was turf still about him, and a few trees, but he had -come into the rocky region. Huge walls of red and grey marbles leaned -over him; white limestone crags faced him. Precipices, black with pines -and firs, shelved downward. He was still on his mother's land, but in a -part unknown to him. - -Once rested, he climbed up manfully, straining his little velvet -breeches and soaking his silver-buckled shoes in the wet moss as he -went; for in the Schwarzenwald regular paths soon ceased. There was -the barest track visible, made by sheep, and pushing its upward way -under branches, over boulders, and through wimpling burns. It was the -loneliest part of all the woods and hills; descending as it did to -the rose gardens of the burg, the hunters and shepherds seldom passed -through it. Steep and solitary, crowned with bare rocks, and leading -only to the glacier slopes, few steps ever went over its short grass -save those of woodland animals and of shepherds' flocks. At this time -of the year even the latter were not near. They had been already -brought down to their stables from the green stretches of pasture -between the rocks. Bela met no one; not even one of his own peasantry. - -He climbed and climbed uninterrupted, at first enjoying his solitude -rapturously, his triumph boisterously, and then going on more solemnly, -being a little awed by the sense of utter silence round him, in which -no sound was heard except of rippling water, of blowing boughs, and -afar off some faint tinkle of a church bell from a distant hamlet. - -His spirits were exalted and full of enthusiasm. Joined to his boldness -and ardour he had the German love of the mystical and marvellous. All -the vast white range of the Glöckner to him was as a fairyland opening -on enchanted empires all his own. All the forenoon he was happy. - -His brain, was busy with many pictures as he went. He saw his search -successful and his father found; he saw his happy return, and the -crowd of the glad household which would flock to meet his steps; he -thought how he would kneel down at her feet, and never rise until his -prayer should be heard, and his mother smile again; he thought how he -would cry out to her, 'Oh, mother, mother! I have brought him home!' -and how she would look, and the light and the warmth come back into -her face. It was so little to do--only to climb amidst these kindly -familiar mountains that had been always above him and around him since -first his eyes had opened. Wratislaw had gone over lands, and seas, and -deserts, and braved the jaws of lions, and the steel of foemen, and the -dragon's breath of the hot sand wind; he himself had so little to do; -only to climb some rough uneven ground, some green steep pastures, some -smooth fields of ice. He felt sad to think it was such a little thing. - -Far down below he could hear the great bells of the burg chiming and -clanging, and he knew that they were giving the alarm for him; he saw -men small as mice grouping together here, and running apart there; he -knew they were coming out to search for him. He resolved to be very -wary. He had got so long a start that he was high on the hills ere he -heard the alarm-bells ring. He knew that he must avoid being seen -by anyone he met, or, known as he was to the whole country-side, his -liberty would soon be at an end. But the huts of the cattle-keepers -were empty, and the chances of meeting a mountaineer were few. Hundreds -of men might come upward in search of him, and yet miss him amidst -those endless walls of stone, those innumerable peaks and paths and -precipices, each one the fellow of the other. - -He climbed the grassy slopes, the steep stone ways, as he had learned -to do with Otto, and though he was still for from the sides of Glöckner -he was yet soon on very high ground. A great mountain, green at the -base, snow-covered half the way down, frowned above him; it was but one -of the spurs of the Glöcknerwand, but he believed it to be the king of -the Austrian Alps itself. He met no one; the mountains were solitary; -the first breath of autumn had scared the cattle-keepers downward -with their flocks and herds. Sometimes, very far off, he saw a lonely -figure, a pedlar, or a hunter, or a shepherd, or some _alm_ still -tenanted by its flock, but they were mere specks on the immensity of -the glacier slopes and the domes of snow. The solitude enchanted him at -first; he had never been alone before. He drank from a stream, ate more -bread, and held on firmly and fearlessly. The thought that his father -was there beyond him, amidst those dazzling peaks, those lowering -clouds, seemed to shoe his little feet with fire. He felt weaker, for -his bread had nourished him but little, and he had not found a hut of -any kind as he had expected to do. But he toiled on, the slope of the -same mountain always facing him, always seeming to recede and to grow -higher and higher the further and further he went. - -The wall of granite which he was on, nine miles or more above and -beyond his home, was known as the Adler Spitze. He had been near -it in other days, but he did not recognise it now; all these stern -slopes and steeps, all these domes and roof-like ridges of snow and -ice, so resemble each other that a longer apprenticeship to the hills -than his had been is needed to distinguish them one from another. The -Adler Spitze was a dangerous and seldom traversed peak; its sides were -bristling with jagged rocks, and its chasms were many and deep. More -than one death had been caused by it in late years, and near its summit -his mother, had caused to be erected a refuge, one of the highest of -the district, where a keeper was forever on the watch for belated -travellers. These were, however, very few, for the mountain had gained -a bad name amongst the hunters and pedlars and muleteers who alone -traversed these hills, and was left almost entirely to the birds of -prey, which were numerous there and had given it its name. - -When the pine-woods ceased, and there was only around him mere naked -rock, with a little moss growing on it here and there, Bela knew -that he had come very high indeed. And he had his wish: he was quite -alone. There was nothing to be seen here except the dusky forest, -shelving downward, and vast slopes of naked grey stone, with large -loose rocks scattered over them, as if giants had been playing there at -pitch-and-toss. There was too much mist in the north and west, which -faced him, for the opposite mountains to be seen, for it was still -early in the day. He did not now feel the joy and excitement he had -expected. He had climbed to the glacier region indeed, but the scene -around was dreary, and the vast expanse of vapour surrounding him -looked chill and melancholy. - -In the excitement and exultation of his thoughts he had forgotten -many things which he knew very well, trained to the hills as he was; -he had forgotten that it might rain or snow before he reached any -halting-place, that fogs came on at that season with fatal suddenness, -that if the sun were obscured the cold would soon become great, that -if a mist came down he would be unable to find any road, and that men -had been often killed on those heights who had known every inch of the -hills. - -Something of his buoyancy and certainty of success began to pale and -grow dull as the isolation lost its sense of novelty, and that intense -silence of the glacier world, which is at all times so solemn, began to -strike awe into his intrepid soul. He had often been as high, but there -had been always on his ear his brother's voice, and his guide's laugh, -and the merry sounds of the men chattering together as they climbed. -Now there was no sound anywhere, save now and then a splitting cracking -noise, which he knew was ice giving way under the noon-day heat of -the sun. 'It must be just as still as this in the grave,' he thought, -with a chill in his warm eager leaping young blood. A little tuft of -edelweiss growing in a crevice, and an _alpenlerche_ winging its way -through the blue air, seemed to him like friends. - -He wished now that Gela were with him. - -'But it would have been of no use to ask him,' he thought sadly. 'He -never will disobey, even to make good come of it.' - -A white mist had settled over all the lower world, one of the autumn -fogs which come from the lower clouds enwrapped all the lakes and -pastures and forests of Hohenszalras. Nothing could better baffle and -distract his pursuers; perplexed and blinded, they would be wholly at -a loss to trace his steps. It did not occur to him that the fog on -the lower lands might mean also storm and snow, and the darkness and -dampness of ice-cold vapours, in the upper air where he was. - -It had become rough, hard, toilsome work; he was bruised, and almost -lame, and very tired. But the spirit in him was not crushed; he kept -always thinking: 'If it did not hurt, it would be nothing to do it.' - -He had now got above all grass; the ground was loose shingle where it -was not bare granite, limestone, or marble, on all of which it was -difficult to keep a hold. There was snow not very far above him. The -air here was intensely cold. He had not thought to bring any furs -with him. His limbs were sorely cramped, his feet began to feel numb, -his fingers were so chilled he could hardly grip his alpenstock; the -hard slopes gave scarcely any footing to his climbing-irons; there -were clouds about him enveloping him, freezing him in their icy mist. -He began to think piteously of his brother, of his home, and of the -warm-cushioned nooks by the study fire, but he would not give in; he -toiled on, cutting and hurting his hands and knees as he groped on his -upward way. He reminded himself of Wratislaw, of Cassabianca, and all -the boy-heroes he had ever read of; he would not yield in endurance to -any one of them. - -But, looking up, he knew by the colour of the sky that it was about to -snow; the heavens were of a leaden uniform grey, and seemed to meet -and touch the mountain. Then Bela knew that in all likelihood he would -never see Gela or his home again. - -He choked down the sob that rose in his throat, and tried to think -what he could do to save himself. The ascent was now so steep that he -could make no upward way, and could barely keep himself from sliding -downwards. He caught at a projecting boulder and pulled himself with -great effort up on to it; there he could sit in a cramped position and -take breath. When he looked down he saw no forests, no land, no rocks, -nothing but a sea of fog, which had gathered thick and grey beneath -him. In autumn and spring the mountain weather changes in ten minutes -from fair to foul. - -The odd stupor that comes from long exposure at a great altitude in -cold and vapour was stealing over him. Strange noises sounded in his -ears, and his feet and hands tingled. He began to fear that he should -get no further on his way, and he had not listened so often to the -tales told by huntsmen without knowing clearly enough the dangers -which await those who are out on the mountain side in bad weather when -daylight goes. - -As he sat there, gazing dizzily into the ocean of vapour below him, -and upward to the huge walls of granite and of snow, he saw coming -and descending towards him from out the clouds a huge dark bird; the -immense wings seemed wide as heaven itself as it circled and swept the -air. - -Bela's heart stood still: it was a male eagle, a golden eagle, and he -knew it. - -The child's aching eyes watched the monarch of the upper air with a -horrible fascination. It looked black as night against the steely sky, -the snow-covered peaks. - -He sat erect, and cried aloud to it in half delirious indignant -reproof. 'Oh, you great bird! you are treacherous, you are thankless! -_We_ have spared you and yours always, and now you will kill me! Oh, -do you not hear? The Szalras have always spared you! Do you not hear?' -But the shouts of his young voice died away against the granite walls -around him, and the king-bird paused not, but came nearer, and nearer, -and nearer. - -It circled round and round, and each circle narrowed, till it was -poised immediately above his head, motionless, balancing itself upon -its outstretched pinions. He could see its eyes bent on him, see the -giant claws drawn up against its belly, see the hooked yellow beak. -The eagle was lord of the air, and he had intruded on its royalty: in -another moment he felt that it would descend on him and bear him off in -its talons or batter him to death with the blows of its wings. He drew -his little sword and waited for it; his eyes did not shrink, his body -did not cower; he looked upward with his toy-blade drawn in as true a -courage as that of Leonidas. - -'If only I could take him home once--once--I would not mind dying here -afterwards,' he thought, in his dreamy exultation; '_Gott und mein -Schwert!_' he muttered, and waited still, calmly. Yet to die with his -errand undone--that seemed cruel. - -The huge dark mass balanced itself one moment, more, then measuring its -prey rushed through the air towards him. But, ere it had seized him, -a shot flashed through the shadows, and rang through the silence; the -bird dropped dead in a ring of blood on the naked stone of the mountain -side. - -Bela sprang up, and tottering on the slippery shelving rock threw his -arms outward with a loud cry. - -'I came to find you!' he shouted, in his rapturous joy; then cold and -fatigue and past terror conquered him. He swooned at his father's feet. - -Sabran had not known that it was his son whom he saved. He had seen -a child menaced by a bird of prey, and so had fired. When the boy -staggered to him with that cry of welcome, he was for the moment -stunned with amazement and gratitude and inexpressible emotion; the -next he raised the little brave body in his arms. - -'Oh! tell me where your mother kissed you last, that I may set my lips -there!' he murmured to the child: but Bela heard not. - -He was cold, inanimate, and senseless. He had gained his goal, but he -had no sight or sense to know it. His father looked around him with -terror for his sake. The snow had begun to fall, the darkness was -deepening, the mists were creeping upward; he, who for three years had -dwelt a mountaineer amidst these mountains, knew the danger of being -belated amidst them in autumn, when, at a stroke, autumn became winter; -sometimes in a single night. He himself had his dwelling far from there -upon the Isel water, under the Umbal glacier. If he had to carry the -boy it would be useless to dream of reaching the rude place which he -had made his home: the weight of a tall child of ten years old is no -light burden, and he knew that even if Bela regained his consciousness -he would be incapable of exertion in the cold, which would intensify -with every hour. But he wasted no moments in hesitation. He knew what -the white fall of those softly-descending feathers from above, what -the darkness and wetness of the dense fog down below, meant, out on -the spurs of Glöckner after sunset. Lives were lost here every year; -herds that had stayed on the Alps too late were surprised and destroyed -by early snow-storms; pedlars and carriers were belated, and sent to -a last sleep by that sudden plunge of autumn into frost. He knew his -way inch by inch, and he knew that there was, some mile or so beyond -him, the Wandahutte, erected in a dangerous pass by his wife, as a -thanksgiving in the first months of their marriage. There he would find -a rude bed, food, wine, and shelter for the night. He set himself to -reach it. - -It was hard to climb with the child, held by one arm, and thrown across -one shoulder, as shepherds throw a disabled lamb. His other hand -gripped his alpenstock; he had left his rifle under a ledge of rock, as -a useless load. He had stripped off the hunter's jacket that he wore, -and wrapped it round Bela, whose body and limbs felt frozen. Down -below in the valleys fruit trees had still their plums and pears, and -asters and dahlias still flowered, but at this elevation the cold was -piercing and the snow froze as it fell. - -A high wind also had risen, as the day declined, and blew the white -powder of the snow in whirling clouds: the terrible _tourmente_ of -the Alps which every traveller dreads. In the confusion of it he knew -that he might walk round and round on the same road all night, making -no progress. Soon it grew dark, though not quite four o'clock. He had -no light with him, for he had not intended to be out at night; he had -but come thither, as he often came, to see the distant gleam of the -Szalrassee, the far-off outline of the Hohenszalrasburg. He had been -reascending and returning when he had seen a child menaced by an eagle, -and had fired. Had he been by himself he would have found the hut -speedily, but weighted with the burden of Bela's inert body he made -little way, and staggered often on the slippery frozen steep. He had no -hands free to wield his hatchet and cut his way by steps over the ice -which had formed in all the fissures of the rocks. - -The mountains had been his only friends in his exile. He had returned -to them, he had dwelt amongst them, he had borne his sorrows through -their help, and strengthened himself with their strength. But they -menaced him sorely now. For himself he cared not, but his heart ached -for the child, whose courage and affection had brought him thither to -meet his death. - -'My poor Bela!' he murmured, as the boy's fair head hung over his -shoulder, 'why did you come to me? I give you nothing but evil. Safety, -comfort, happiness, honour, all come from _her._' - -The whole heavens seemed to open, so dense a storm of snow now poured -upon him. There were strange deep noises ever and again, as from the -very bowels of the hills; a thousand times had he rejoiced to match -his strength against the mountains and to conquer, but now they were -his masters. All around him were the bastions and walls and domes of -the great ice peaks; the huge glaciers hung above like frozen seas -suspended; he could not behold them but he felt their presence and -their awe. - -'The snow is in my blood and my blood is yours, and now it claims us,' -he muttered to the senseless ear of the child. He and the child had -loved the snow, met it with welcome, sported with it in triumph; and -now it killed them. They would lie down in it, and be one with it for -ever. - -But although these fancies drifted in his brain, he strove with all his -might to keep in movement, to ascend ever in the easterly direction of -the refuge which he sought to gain. So far as he could, weighted with -his burden and blinded by the darkness, he continued to climb, gripping -the hard slopes with his feet and his alpenstock. He had given his coat -to the child; the cold made every vein in his own body numb; his limbs -pricked and seemed to swell; he had only his woollen shirt, above his -linen one, and his velvet breeches between him and the frozen air, that -could slay a hundred sheep massed together in their warmth and wool. -He knew that the hut was but a mile, or little more, from the place -where he had shot the eagle; but half a mile in the snowstorm and the -darkness was longer than forty miles in sunshine and fair weather. He -could not be even sure that he went aright; he could see nothing; the -sky was covered with the low dense clouds; he could only guess. All -the slender signs and landmarks, that would even in mere twilight have -served to guide his steps, were now hidden. A thick woolly impenetrable -gloom enshrouded him; he felt as though he were muffled and suffocated -by it, and the fatal drowsiness--the fatal desire to lie down and be -at rest--with which frost kills, stole on him. - -With all the manhood in him he resisted it for the child's sake. - -He had been climbing and wandering three short hours only, and he -had believed that it was midnight at the least. Bela still hung like -a lifeless thing over his shoulder, but he felt that his limbs were -warmer, and his heart beat feebly, but with regularity. - -'God grant me power to save him, for his mother's sake,' thought -Sabran; 'then there may come what will.' - -He struggled anew against the mortal sleepiness, the increasing -numbness, that grew upon himself. Suddenly, as he turned, without -knowing it, the corner of a wall of rock he saw a starry light. He knew -that it was the lamp of the refuge which, by his wife's command, was -lit at twilight every evening the whole year round. It was now but a -few roods off; he could see even the outline of the cabin itself, black -against its background of snow. But he had taken the wrong path to it. -Between him and it there yawned a wide crevasse in the glacier on which -he now stood. - -He shouted loud, but the wind was louder than his voice. The keeper in -the refuge could not hear. He paused doubtfully. To retrace his steps -and seek the right path would be certain destruction; it would take him -many miles about, and there was no chance even in the darkness that he -would ever find it; his strength, too, was failing him, and the child -was still unconscious. There was but one way of escape, to leap the -fissure. It was wider than any man could be sure to clear, and if he -fell within it he would fall into jagged ice a thousand fathoms down. -By daylight he had often looked down into its awful depths, blue in -their darkness, set with jagged teeth of ice like a trap's jaws. - -The leap might be death or life. - -He hesitated a few instants, then drew quite close to the edge, and -cast aside his pole, for the chasm was too wide for that to help him, -and he needed both hands free to hold the boy more firmly. The lamp -from the hut shed light enough to guide him; the snow fell fast, the -wind was violent. He paused another moment on the brink, drew the child -closer to him and clasped him with both arms; then, gathering all his -force into his limbs, he leaped. - -He cleared the fissure, but staggered on the slippery ice beyond. He -fell heavily, but still held his son so that Bela fell uppermost and -dropped upon him. - -Crushed by his weight, Sabran sank at full length on the white crystal -ground; alone he would have leaped as surely as the chamois. - -The shock awoke Bela from his trance; he opened his blue eyes giddily. - -'It is you!' he murmured feebly, as he felt himself lying on his -father's breast. - -'It is I!' said Sabran. 'My child, if you can move, try and creep to -that hut and call. I cannot.' - -The child, without a sound, trembling sorely, and with a sense of -confusion making his head dizzy, obeyed, drew himself slowly up, and -dragged his tired, aching, cramped limbs over the snow. - -'You are brave,' murmured his father, whose eyes followed him. 'You are -your mother's son.' - -Bela reached the door of the hut and beat on it with his little frozen -hands, and then fell down against it. - -'It is I--Count Bela!' he managed to cry aloud. 'Come to my father; -quick!' - -The door was flung aside, and the keepers of the hut rushed out at the -first cry. They had been asleep. They were old jägers, past the work -of the forests, but still strong. Having lighted the beacon without, -they had drunk a little wine, and chattered, and then dosed. Terrified -at their own negligence and at the sight of their lady's son, they -staggered out into the night, and together they bore the body of Sabran -into the refuge. He was unable to rise. - -'You cannot move!' sobbed the child, raining kisses on his hands. - -'I am stiff from the cold; nothing more,' said his father, faintly. - -Then he looked at the men. - -'One of you, if it be possible, go to the Burg. Tell the Countess von -Szalras that her son is safe. You need not speak of me. Bring the -physician here when it is morning; but say nothing of me to-night. Give -me a little of your wine----' - -His lips were blue, he felt faint; in his own heart he said to himself, -'I am hurt unto death.' - -Bela had thrown his arms about him, and, trembling like a leaf, clung -there and sobbed aloud deliriously. - -'You are hurt, you are hurt, and all for me!' he sobbed, as he saw his -father placed on the truckle bed set aside for any belated wanderer on -the hills. - -Sabran smiled on him. - -'My child, do not grieve so; it is nothing; a mere momentary wrench; -do not even think of it. No, no! I am not in pain.' - -The wine revived him, and restored his strength, and he sought to -conceal his injury for the boy's sake. - -'Warm some of this wine and give it to my son,' he said to the keeper -of the hut; 'then undress him, wrap him warmly, and make him sleep -before the fire.' - -'You are hurt, you are ill!' moaned Bela. 'I came to find you to take -you back. Our mother has never been the same;--she has never smiled----' - -'Hush!' said Sabran, almost sternly. 'Do not speak of your mother -before these men, her servants. You came to seek me, my poor little -boy? That was good of you, and it was good to remember me. It is three -years----' - -Bela clung to him and put his lips to his father's ear, that the men -might not hear. - -'The others have always prayed for you,' he murmured, 'because we were -all told. But me, I have loved you always. I have never thought of -anything else. And I have tried to be good, oh! I _have_ tried!' - -A great suffering came on his father's face as he heard the innocent -words, and a great tenderness. - -'When I am dead, as I shall be so soon, will he remember, too?' he -thought. - -Aloud he said: - -'My child, it is very sweet to me to hear your voice again. But if you -love me now, obey me. You will have fever and ague if you do not drink -some warm wine, let yourself be undressed, and lie down before the -fire. Do not be afraid. You will see me when you awake. I shall not -stir.' - -He thought as he spoke: - -'No, I shall never stir again; they will bear me away to my grave, that -is all. I am like a felled tree. All is over. Well, perchance, so best: -when I am dead she may forgive--she may love the children.' - -When at last Bela, sobbing piteously, had reluctantly obeyed, and -when, despite all his struggles, nature, frozen, weary, and worn out, -compelled him to close his eager eyes in heavy dreamless slumber, -Sabran with a glance called the keeper to him. - -'Now the child sleeps,' he said, 'get my clothes off me, if you can. -Touch me gently. I think my back is broken.' - - - - -CHAPTER XLIII. - - -It was twelve o'clock in the night. Wanda von Szalras paced the -Rittersaal with feverish steps and limbs which, whilst they quivered -with fear, knew no fatigue. It had been nine in the morning when -Greswold and the servants, having searched in vain, came at last to her -with the tidings that her first-born son was lost; his bed empty, his -clothes gone, his little sword away from its place. All the day she had -sought herself, and organised the search of others with all the energy -and courage of her race. She had not given way to the despair which had -seized her, but in her own soul she had said: 'Does fate chastise me -thus for my own cruelty? I have shrunk from their sweet faces because -they were like his. For two long months I exiled them, I thrust them -from my presence and my heart. I have been ashamed of them. Does God -punish me through them? Shall I lose my children, too? Can I forgive -myself? Have I not even wished them unborn? Oh, my Bela, my darling, my -first-born! Yes, you are his, but more than all, you are mine!' - -When night closed in, and all the many separate search-parties -returned, bringing no news of him, she thought that she would lose her -reason. All had been done that could be done; the men on the estates -were scattered far and wide. It was known that there were snow-storms -on the heights; the white fury had even at eventide descended to the -lower ground, and the terraces and gardens shone white as the lights of -the heavens fell upon them. Every now and then there came the report -of a gun on the hills; the men were firing in hope that the child, if -lost, might hear the shots. The evening passed on and midnight came, -and no one knew where Bela was in those vast forests, those immense -hills, all hidden in the impenetrable darkness. She saw him at every -moment lying white and cold in some hollow in the snow; she saw the -cruel winds blow his curls, his fair limbs stiffen. Every year the -winter and the mountains took their toll of lives. - -She had known nothing of the purport of the child's disappearance; -she had been left to every vague conjecture with which her mind could -torture her. The whole household and all the woodsmen and huntsmen had -scoured the hills far and wide, and the whole day and night had gone by -with no tidings, no result. Sleep had visited no eyes at Hohenszalras; -from its terraces the snow-storm and hurricanes beating around the head -of Glöckner were discernible by the agitation of the clouds that hid -one-half the heights. - -Gela had stayed up beside her, his little pale face pressed to the -window frame, his terrified eyes staring into the gloom which near at -hand grew red with the beacon fires. - -As midnight tolled from the clock tower he came to her, and touched her -hand. - -'Mother,' he whispered, 'I dared not say it before, but I must say it -now. I think--I think--Bela is gone to try and bring _him_ home.' - -'Him!' she echoed, while a thrill ran like fire and ice together -through her, from head to foot. 'You mean--your father?' - -'Yes.' - -She was silent. Her breast heaved. - -'What makes you say that?' she asked, at last. - -'Bela thought of nothing else all this year and last year, too,' said -Gela, in a hushed voice. 'He was always talking of it. When he was -smaller he thought of riding all over the world. Yesterday he was so -strange, and when we went to bed he kissed me ever so many times; and -he prayed a long, long while. And for nothing less would he have taken -the sword, I think. And--and I heard the men saying to-day that our -father was somewhere near; and I think that Bela might have heard that, -and so have gone to bring him home.' - -'To bring him home!' - -The words, uttered in his son's soft, grave, flute-like voice, pierced -her heart. She could not speak. - -'Will he rob me even of my first-born?' she thought, bitterly. - -At that moment Greswold entered. Gela, looking in his face, gave a -shout of joy. - -'You have found my Bela!' he cried, flinging his arms about the old man. - -'Yes, your brother is safe, quite safe! My Lady hears?' - -She heard, and the first tears that she had ever shed for years rushed -to her eyes. She drew Gela, with a passionate gesture, to her side, -and falling on her knees beside the Imperial throne in the Kittersaal, -praised God. - -Then, when she rose, she cried in very ecstasy: - -'Fetch him; bring him at once!--oh, my child! Who found him? Who has -him now? If a peasant saved his life, he and his shall have the finest -of all my land in Iselthal in grant for ever and for ever!----' - -Greswold looked at her timidly; then said: - -'May I speak to your Excellency alone?' - -She touched Gela's hair tenderly. - -'Go, my darling, and bear the good news to our reverend mother. You -know how she has suffered.' - -The boy obeyed and left the hall. She turned to Greswold. - -'Tell me all, now.' - -The old man hesitated, then took his courage up and answered. - -'My Lady--his father found your son.' - -She put her hand out and clenched the arm of the throne as if to save -herself from falling. - -'His father!' she echoed. 'How came he there? Answer me, with the -truth, the whole truth.' - -'My Countess,' said Greswold, while his voice shook, 'your husband has -dwelt amidst the Glöckner slopes almost for the last three years. When -he left here he remained absent awhile, but not long. He has lived in -utter solitude. Few knew it. The few who did kept his secret. I was one -of these. He had corresponded with me ever since he left your house. -You may remember being angered?' - -She made a gesture of assent. - -'Go on,' she murmured. 'He found my child, you say?' - -'He found Count Bela; yes. It seems he had come as near here as some -nine miles eastward; near the hut which your Excellency built, not -very long after your marriage, on the crest of the Adler Spitze, in -consequence of the fatal accident to the Bavarian pedlars. He knew -nothing of Count Bela's loss, but there he saw a young boy threatened -by an eagle, and shot the bird. The fog was even then coming on upon -the heights. He found his son insensible from fatigue, and cold, and -terror, and bore him in his arms until he reached the refuge. He had -been near it all the time, but as the mist deepened and the snow fell -he lost his way, and must have gone round and round on the same path -for hours. We were, in sheer despair, mounting towards the Adler -Spitze, though we did not believe the child could have possibly got so -far, when we met one of the keepers descending with the news. The storm -is at its height; we could only grope our way, and we missed it many -times, so that we have been four mortal hours and more coming downward -those seven miles. The keeper said that my lord desired you should hear -at once of the safety of the child, but not of his own presence in the -hut. But I felt that your Excellency should be told of all.' - -'You were right. I thank you. You have been ever faithful to me and -mine.' - -She stretched out her hand to him in dismissal, and sought a refuge in -her oratory. - -She felt that she must be alone. - -She almost forgot the safety of her first-born in the sense that -his father was near her. She fell on her knees before the Christ of -Andermeyer and praised heaven for her child's preservation, and with a -passion of tears besought guidance in her struggle with what now seemed -to her the long and cruel hardness of her heart. - -To hear thus of him whom once she had adored, blinded her to all save -the memories of the past, which thronged upon her. If he had repented -so greatly was it not her obligation to meet his penitence with pardon? -It would be bitter to her to live out her life beside one whose word -she would for ever doubt, whose disloyalty had cut to the roots of the -pride and purity of her race. Nevermore between them could there be -the undoubting faith, the unblemished trust, which are the glorious -noonday of a cloudless love. She might forgive, but never, never, she -thought, would she be able to command forget fulness. - -But for that very reason, maybe, would her duty lie this way. - -The knowledge of those lonely desolate years, passed so near her, -whilst he kept the dignity and the humility of silence, touched all the -generosity of her nature. She knew that he had suffered; she believed -that, though he had betrayed her, he had loved and honoured her in -honesty and truth. One lie had poisoned his life, as a rusted nail -driven through an oak tree in its prime corrodes and kills it. But he -had not been a liar always. She had made his life her own in bygone -years: was she not bound now to redeem it, to raise it, to shelter it -on her heart and in her home? Was not the very shrinking scorn she felt -for his past a reason the more that she should bend her pride to union -with him? She had thought of her life ever as the poet of the flower: - - the ever sacred cup - Of the pure lily hath between my hands, - Felt safe unsoiled, nor lost one grain of gold. - -Had there been egotism in the purity of it, self-love beneath love of -honour? Had she treasured the 'grain of gold' in her hands rather with -the Pharisee's arrogance of purity than with the true humility of the -acolyte? - -She kneeled there before the carven Christ in an anguish of doubt. - -He had given her back her first-born. Should she be less generous to -him? - -Should she for ever arrogate the right of judgment against him, or -should she stretch the palm of pardon even across that great gulf of -wrong dividing them as by a bottomless pit? - -Tears came like dew to her parched heart. It was the first time that -she had ever wept since the night when she had exiled him. Three long -barren years had drifted by; years cold and dark and joyless as the -winter days which bound the earth under bands of iron, and let no -living thing or creeping herb rejoice or procreate. - -When she rose from her knees her mind was made up, a great peace had -descended on her soul. She had forgiven her own dishonour. She had laid -her heart bare before God and plucked her pride up from its bleeding -roots. - -All the early hours of her love recurred to her with an aching -remembrance, which had lost its shame and was sweet in its very pain. -His crime was still dark as the night in her eyes, but her conscience -and her awakening tenderness spoke together and pleaded for her pardon. - -What was love if not one long forgiveness? What raised it higher than -the senses if not its infinite patience and endurance of all wrong? -What was its hope of eternal life if it had not gathered strength in it -enough to rise above human arrogance and human vengeance? - -'Oh, my love, my love!' she cried aloud. 'We will live our lives out -together!' - -Her resolve was taken when she left her oratory and traversed her -apartments to those of the Princess Ottilie, who met her with eager -words of joy, herself tremulous and feeble after the anxious terrors of -the past day. Some look on Wanda's face checked the utterance of her -gladness. - -'Is it not true?' she said in sudden fear. 'Is the child not found?' - -'Yes; his father has found him,' she answered simply. 'Dear mother, -long you have condemned me; judged me unchristian, unmerciful, harsh. I -know not whether you were right, or I. God knows, we cannot. But give -me your blessing ere I go out into the night. I go to him; I will bring -him here.' - -The other gazed at her doubting, incredulous, touched to a great hope. - -'Bring him?' she echoed, 'your child?' - -'My husband.' - -'You will do that?--ah! mercy is ever blessed; the grace of Heaven will -be with you!' - -She sighed as she raised her head. - -'Who can tell? Perhaps my harshness will make heaven harsh to me.' - -When she came forth again from her own rooms she was clothed in a -fur-lined riding-habit. - -'Bid them saddle a horse used to the hills,' she said, 'and let Otto -and two other men be ready to go with me.' - -'It is a fearful night,' Greswold ventured to suggest. 'It will be as -bad a dawn. It snows even here. We met the keeper almost midway up the -Adler Spitze, yet it took us four hours to make the descent.' - -She did not even seem to hear him. - -'May I follow?' he asked her humbly. She gave a sign of assent, and -stood motionless and mute; her thoughts were far away. - -When the horse was brought she went out into the night. The storm of -the upper hills had descended to the lower; the wind was blowing icily -and strong, the snow was falling fast, but on the lower lands it did -not freeze as it fell, and riding was possible, though at a slow pace -from the great darkness. She knew every step of the way through her own -woods and up to the spurs of the Glöckner. She rode on till the ascent -grew too steep for any animal; then she abandoned the horse to one of -her attendants, took her alpenstock and went on her way towards the -Adler Spitze on foot, the men with their lanterns lighting the ground -in front of her. It was wild weather and grew wilder the nearer it grew -to dawn. There was danger, at every step from slippery frozen ground, -from thin ice that might break over bottomless abysses. The snow was -driven in her face, and the wind tore madly at her clothes. But she was -used to the mountains and held on steadily, refusing the rope which -Otto entreated her to take and permit him to fasten to his loins. They -kept to the right paths, for their strong lights enabled them to see -whither they went. Once they crept along a narrow ledge where a man -could barely stand. The ascent was long and weary in the teeth of the -weather; it tried even the stout jägers; but she scarcely felt the -force of the wind, the chill of the black frost. - -No woman but one used as she was to measure her strength with her -native Alps could have lived through that night, which tried hardly -even the hunters born and bred amidst the snow summits. By day the -ascent hither was difficult and dangerous after the summer months, but -after nightfall the sturdiest mountaineer dreamed not of facing it. But -on those heights above her, in the dark yonder, beneath the clouds, -were her husband and her child. That knowledge sufficed to nerve her -limbs to preternatural power, and the men who followed her were loyal -and devoted to her service; they would have lain down to die at her -word. - -When her body seemed to sink with the burden of fatigue and cold, she -looked up into the blackness of the air, and thought that those she -sought were there, and fancied that already she heard their voices. -Then she gathered new strength and crept onward and upward, her hands -and feet clinging to the bare rock, the smooth ice, as a swallow clings -to a house wall. - -She had issued from a battle more bitter with her own soul; and had -conquered. - -At last they neared the refuge built by and named from her, and set -amidst the desolation of the snow-fields. She signed to her men to stay -without, and walking onward alone drew near the heavy door. - -She opened it a little way, paused a moment, drawing her breath with -effort; then looked into the cabin. It was a mere hut of two chambers -made of pitch pine, and lighted by a single window. There was no light -but from the pallid day without, which had barely broken. Before the -fire of burning logs was a nest of hay, and in it lay the child, -sleeping a deep and healthful sleep, his hands folded on his breast, -his face flushed with warmth and recovered life, his long lashes dark -upon his cheeks. - -His father was stretched still as a statue on the truckle-bed of the -keeper who watched beside him. - -The day had now broken, clear, pale, cold; the faint rose of sunrise -was behind the snow peaks of the Glöckner, and an _alpenflühevogel_ -was trilling and tripping on the frozen ground. From a distant unseen -hamlet far below there came a faint sound of morning bells. - -She thrust the door further open and entered. She made a gesture to -the keeper, who started up with a low obeisance, to go without. She -fastened the latch upon him; then, without waking the sleeping child, -went up to her husband's bed. His eyes were closed; he did not notice -the opening and shutting of the door; he was still and white as the -snow without; he looked weary and exhausted. - -At sight of him all the great love she had once borne him sprang up in -all its normal strength; her heart swelled with unspeakable emotion; -she stood and gazed on him with thirsty eyes tired of their long denial. - -Stirred by some vague sense of her presence near him he looked up and -saw her; all his blood rushed into his face. He could not speak. She -stooped towards him and laid her hand gently upon his. - -'I am come to thank you.' - -Her voice trembled. - -He gave a restless sigh. - -'Ah! for the child's sake,' he murmured. 'You do not come for me!----' - -She hesitated a moment, then she gathered all her strength and all her -mercy. - -'I come for you,' she answered in low clear tones. 'I will forget all -else except that I once loved you.' - -His face grew transfigured with a great joy. - -He could not speak; he gazed at her. - -'You were my lover, you are my children's father. You shall return to -us,' she murmured, while her voice seemed to him heard in some dream -of Heaven. 'Your sin was great, yes; but love pardons all sins, nay, -effaces them, washes them out, makes them as though they were not. -I know that now. What have not been my own sins?--my coldness, my -harshness, my cruel, unyielding--pride? Nay, sometimes I have thought -of late my fault was darker than your own; more hateful in God's sight.' - -'Noblest of all women always!' he said faintly. 'If it be true, if it -be true, stoop down and kiss me once again.' - -She stooped, and touched his lips with hers. - -The child slept on in his nest of hay before the burning wood. The -silence of the high hills reigned around them. The light of the risen -day came through the small square window of the hut. Outside the bird -still sang. - -He looked up in her eyes, and his own eyes smiled with celestial joy. - -'I am happy!' he said simply. 'I have lived amongst your hills almost -ever since that night, that I might see your shadow as you passed, hear -the feet of your horses in the woods. The men were faithful; they never -told. Kiss me once more. You believe, say you believe, _now_, that I -did love you though I wronged you so?' - -'I do believe,' she answered him. 'I think God cannot pardon me that I -ever doubted!' - -Then, as she saw that he still lay quite motionless, not turning -towards her, though his eyes sought hers, a sudden terror smote dully -at her heart. - -'Are you hurt? Cannot you move?' she whispered. 'Look at me; speak to -me! It is dawn already; you shall come home at once.' - -He smiled. - -'Nay, love, I shall not move again. My spine is hurt, not broken, I -believe--but hurt beyond help; paralysis has begun. My angel, grieve -not for me, I shall die happy. You love me still! Ah, it is best thus; -were I to live, my sin and shame might still torture you, still part -us, but when I am dead you will forget them. You are so generous, you -are so great, you will forget them. You will only remember that we were -happy once, happy through many a long sweet year, and that I loved -you;--loved you in all truth, though I betrayed you!' - -The hunters bore him gently down in the cool pale noontide along the -peaceful mountain side homeward to Hohenszalras, and there, after -eleven days, he died. - -The white marble in its carven semblance of him lies above his grave -in the Silver Chapel; but in the heart of his wife he lives for ever, -and with him lives a sleepless and an eternal remorse. - -THE END. - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Ouida - - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52137 *** diff --git a/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm b/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 4c83f34..0000000 --- a/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8382 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Wanda, vol. 3, by Ouida. - </title> - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.p6 {margin-top: 6em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - clear: both; -} - -hr.tb {width: 45%;} -hr.chap {width: 65%} -hr.full {width: 95%;} - -hr.r5 {width: 5%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;} -hr.r65 {width: 65%; margin-top: 3em; margin-bottom: 3em;} - - -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -a:link {color: #000099; text-decoration: none; } - -v:link {color: #000099; text-decoration: none; } - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -.figleft { - float: left; - clear: left; - margin-left: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 1em; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -.figright { - float: right; - clear: right; - margin-left: 1em; - margin-bottom: - 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 0; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -/* Footnotes */ -.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} - -.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} - -.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} - -.fnanchor { - vertical-align: super; - font-size: .8em; - text-decoration: - none; -} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52137 ***</div> - - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="500" alt="" /> -</div> - -<h1>WANDA</h1> - -<h3>BY</h3> - -<h2>OUIDA</h2> - - -<p class="center"> -<i>'Doch!—alles was dazu mich trieb</i>;<br /> -<i>Gott!—war so gut, ach, war so lieb!'</i><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 20%;">Goethe</span><br /> -</p> - - - -<h4>IN THREE VOLUMES</h4> - -<h4>VOL. III.</h4> - - -<h5>LONDON</h5> - -<h5>CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY</h5> - -<h5>1883</h5> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h3><a name="WANDA" id="WANDA">WANDA.</a></h3> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX.</a></h4> - - -<p>When they came home from their tour amidst the mines of Galicia and -the plains of Hungary, and from their reception amongst the adoring -townsfolk of restored Idrac, the autumn was far advanced, and the long -rains and the wild winds of October had risen, making of every brook a -torrent.</p> - -<p>On their return she found intelligence from Paris that a friend of -her father's, and her own godfather, the Duc de Noira, had died, -bequeathing her his gallery of pictures, and his art collection of -the eighteenth century, which were both famous. The Duc had been a -Legitimist and a hermit. He had been unmarried, and had spent all the -latter years of his life in amassing treasures of art, for which he had -no heir of his own blood to care a jot. The bequest was a very precious -one, and her presence in Paris was requested. Regretful for herself -to leave Hohenszalras, she perceived that to Sabran the tidings were -welcome. Moved by an unselfish impulse she said at once:</p> - -<p>'Go alone; go instead of me; your presence will be the same as mine. -Paris will amuse you more if you are by yourself, and you will be so -happy amongst all those Lancrets and Fragonards, those Reiseiners -and Gauthières. The collection is a marvel, but entirely of the Beau -Siècle. You never saw it? No! I think the Duc never opened his doors -to anyone save to half a dozen old tried friends, and he had a horror -of turning his <i>salons</i> into showrooms. If you think well, we will -leave it all as it is, buying the house if we can. All that eighteenth -century <i>bibeloterie</i> would not suit this place, and I should like to -keep it all as he kept it; that is the only true respect to show to a -legacy.'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated; he was tempted, yet he was half reluctant to yield to -the temptation. He felt that he would willingly be by himself awhile, -yet he loved his wife too passionately to quit her without pain. His -own conscience made her presence at times oppress and trouble him, yet -he had never lost the half-religious adoration with which she had first -inspired him. He suggested a compromise—why should they not winter in -Paris?</p> - -<p>She was about to dissent, for of all seasons in the Tauern she loved -the winter best; but when she looked at him she saw such eager -anticipation on his face that she suppressed her own wishes unuttered.</p> - -<p>'We will go, if you like,' she said, without any hesitation or -reluctance visible. 'I dare say we can find some pretty house. Aunt -Ottilie will be pleased; there is nothing here which cannot do without -us for a time, we have such trusty stewards; only I think it would be -more change for you if you went alone.'</p> - -<p>'No!' he said; 'separation is a sort of death; do not let us tempt fate -by it. Life is so short at its longest; it is ingratitude to lose an -hour that we can spend together.'</p> - -<p>'There was never such a lover since Petrarca,' she said, with a smile. -'Nay, you eclipse him: he was never tried by marriage.'</p> - -<p>But though he jested at it, his great love for her seemed like a -beautiful light about her life. What did his state-secret matter? What -did it matter what cause had led him to avoid political life?—he loved -her so well.</p> - -<p>The following month they were in Paris, having found an hotel in the -Boulevard St. Germain, standing in a great sunny garden; and when they -were fairly installed there, the Princess and the children and the -horses followed them, and their arrival made an event of great interest -and importance in the city which of all others in the world it is -hardest thus to impress.</p> - -<p>The Countess von Szalras, a notability always, was celebrated just -then as the inheritress of the coveted Noira collection, which it had -been fondly hoped would have gone to the hammer: and Sabran, popular -always, and not forgotten here, where most things and people are -forgotten in a week, was courted, flattered, and welcomed by men and -by women; and as he rode down the Allée des Acacias, or entered the -Mirlitons, he felt himself at home. His beautiful wife, his beautiful -children, his incomparable horses, his marvellous good fortune were the -talk of all those who had already left their country-houses for the -winter <i>rentrée</i>, and attained a publicity, beginning with the great -Szalras pearls and ending with the babies' white donkeys, which was the -greatest of all possible offences to her; she abhorred and contemned -publicity with the sensitiveness of a delicate temper and the contempt -of a scornful patrician.</p> - -<p>To Sabran it was not so offensive; there was the Slav in him, which -loved display, and was not ill-pleased by notoriety. All this -admiration around them made him feel that his life after all had been -a great success, that he had drawn prizes in the lottery of fate which -all men envied him; it helped him to forget Egon Vàsàrhely. He had -never so nearly felt affection for Bela as when lines of men and women -stood still to watch the handsome child gallop on his pony down the -avenues of the Bois.</p> - -<p>'Life is after all like baccara or billiards,' he said to himself. -'It is of no use winning unless there be a <i>galerie</i> to look on and -applaud.'</p> - -<p>And then he felt ashamed of the poorness and triviality of the thought, -which was not one he would have expressed to his wife. That very -morning, when she had read a long flattery of herself in a journal of -fashion, she had cast the sheet from her with disgust on every line of -her face.</p> - -<p>'We are safe from <i>that</i>, at least, in the Iselthal,' she had said. -'Cannot you make them understand that we are not public artists to -need <i>réclames</i>, nor yet sovereigns to be compelled to submit to the -microscope? Is this the meaning of civilisation—to make privacy -impossible, to oblige every one to live under a lens?'</p> - -<p>He had affected to agree with her, but in his heart he had not done so. -He liked the fumes of the incense. So did his child.</p> - -<p>'They will put this in the papers!' said Bela, when the snow came and -he had his sledge out for the first time with four little Hungarian -ponies.</p> - -<p>'That is the poison of cities!' said Wanda, as she heard him. 'Who can -have been so foolish as to tell him of the papers?'</p> - -<p>'Your heir, my dear, will never want for reporters of any flattery,' -said his father. 'It is as well he should run the gauntlet of them -early.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened, and said to his brother a little later: 'I like Paris. -Paris prints everything we do, and the people read the print, and then -they want to see us.'</p> - -<p>'What good is that?' said Gela. 'I like home. They all of them <i>know</i> -us; they don't want to <i>see</i> us. That is much better.'</p> - -<p>'No, it isn't,' said Bela. 'One drives all day long at home, and there -is nothing but the trees; here the trees are all people, and the people -talk of us, and the people want to <i>be</i> us.'</p> - -<p>'But they love us at home,' said Gela.</p> - -<p>'That does not matter,' said Bela with hauteur.</p> - -<p>Wanda called the children to her.</p> - -<p>'Bela,' she said gently, 'do you know that once, not so very long ago, -there was a little boy here in Paris very much like you, with golden -hair and velvet coat like yours, and he was called the Dauphin, and -when he went out with his servants, as you do, the people envied him, -and talked of him, and put in print what he did each day? The people -wanted to <i>be</i> him, as you say, but they did not love him—poor little -child!—because they envied him so. And in a very little while—a -very, very little while—because it was envy and not love, they put -the Dauphin in prison, and they cut off his golden hair, and gave -him nothing but bread and water and filthy straw, and locked him up -all alone till he died. That is the use of being envied in Paris—or -anywhere else. Gela is right. It is better when people love us.'</p> - -<p>The next day, as Bela drove in his sledge down the white avenues -through the staring crowds, his little fair face was very grave under -its curls; he thought of the Dauphin.</p> - -<p>When the weather opened, Wanda took him and his brother to Versailles -and Trianon, and told them more of that saddest of all earthly -histories of fallen greatness. Gela sobbed aloud; Bela was silent and -grew pale.</p> - -<p>'I hate Paris,' he said very slowly, as they went back to it in the red -close of the wintry afternoon.</p> - -<p>'Do not hate Paris. Do not hate anything or anyone,' said his mother -softly; 'but love your own home and your own people, and be grateful -for them.'</p> - -<p>Bela lifted his little cap and made the sign of the Cross, as he did -when he saw anything holy. 'I am the Dauphin at home,' he thought; and -he felt the tears in his eyes, though he never would cry as Gela did.</p> - -<p>So she gave them her simples as antidotes to the city's poison, and -occupied herself with her children, with the poor around her, with the -various details of her distant estates, and paid but little heed to -that artificial world which, when she heeded it, offended and irritated -her. To please Sabran she went to a few great houses and to the opera, -and gave many entertainments herself, happy that he was happy in it, -but not otherwise interested in the life around her, or moved by the -homage of it.</p> - -<p>'It is much more my jewels than it is myself that they stare at,' she -assured him, when he told her of the admiration which she elicited -wherever she appeared. 'Believe me, if you put my pearls or my -diamonds on Madame Chose or Baroness Niemand, they would gather and -gaze quite as much.'</p> - -<p>He laughed.</p> - -<p>'Last night I think you wore no ornaments except a few tea-roses, and I -saw them follow you just the same. It is very odd that you never seem -to understand that you are a beautiful woman.'</p> - -<p>'I am glad to be so in your eyes, if I never shall be in my own. As for -that popularity of society, it never commended itself to me. It has too -strong a savour of the mob.'</p> - -<p>'When you are so proud to the world why are you so humble to me?'</p> - -<p>She was silent a moment, then said:</p> - -<p>'I think when one loves any other very much, one becomes for him -altogether unlike what one is to the world. As for being proud, I have -never fairly made out whether my pride is humility or my humility -pride, and none of my confessors have ever been able to tell me. I -assure you I have searched my heart in vain.'</p> - -<p>A shadow passed over his face; he thought that there even would be -pride enough to send him out for ever from her side if she knew——</p> - -<p>One day she suggested to him that he should visit Romaris.</p> - -<p>'Now you are near for so long a time, surely you should go,' she urged. -'It is not well never to see your poor people. The priest is a good -man, indeed; but he cannot altogether make up for your absence.'</p> - -<p>He answered with some irritation that they were not his people. All -the land had been parcelled out, and nothing remained to the name of -Sabran except a strip of the sea-shore and one old half ruined tower: -he could not see that he had any duties or obligations there. She did -not insist, because she never pursued a theme which appeared unwelcome; -but in herself she wondered at the dislike which was in him towards his -Breton hamlet, wondered that he did not wish one of his sons to bear -its title, wondered that he did not desire the children to see once, -at least, the sea-nest of his forefathers. It was more effort to her -than usual to restrain herself from pressing questions upon him. But -she did forbear; and as a consolation to her conscience sent to the -Curé of Romaris a sum of money for the poor, which was so large that it -astounded and bewildered the holy man by the weight of responsibility -it laid on him.</p> - -<p>The indifference shocked her the more because of the profound -conviction, in which she had been reared, of the duties of the noble -to his poorer brethren, and the ties of mutual affection which bound -together her and her people's interests.</p> - -<p>'The weapon of our order against the Socialist is duty,' she had once -said to him.</p> - -<p>He, more sceptical, had told her that no weapon, not even that anointed -one, can turn aside the devilish hate of envy. But she held to her -creed, and strove to rear her children in its tenets. It always seemed -to her that the Cross before which the fiend shrinks cowering in -'Faust' is but a symbol of the power of a noble life to force even -hatred to its knees.</p> - -<p>She did not care for this season in Paris, but she did not let him -perceive any dissatisfaction in her. She made her own interests out of -the arts and charity; she bought the Hôtel Noira, and left everything -as the Duc had left it; she found pleasure in intercourse with her -royal exiled friends, and left her husband his own entire liberty of -action.</p> - -<p>'Are you never jealous?' said her royal friend to her once. 'He is so -much liked—so much made love to—I wonder you are not jealous!'</p> - -<p>'I?' she echoed: and it seemed to her friend as if in that one pronoun -she had said volumes. 'Jealous!'</p> - -<p>She repeated the word as she drove home alone that day, and almost -wondered what it meant. Who could be to him what she was? Who could -dethrone her from that 'great white throne' to which his adoration had -raised her? If his senses ever strayed, his soul would never swerve -from its loyalty.</p> - -<p>When she reached home that afternoon she found a card, on which was -written with a pencil, in German:</p> - -<p>'So sorry not to find you. I am in Paris to see my doctor. Zdenka has -taken my service at Court. I will come to you to-morrow.'</p> - -<p>The card was Madame Brancka's.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXX" id="CHAPTER_XXX">CHAPTER XXX.</a></h4> - - -<p>Sabran, that same afternoon, as he had walked down the Rue de la Paix, -had been signalled and stopped by a pretty woman wrapped to the eyes -in blue fox furs, who was being driven in a low carriage by Hungarian -horses, glorious in silver chains and trappings.</p> - -<p>'My dear Réné,' had cried Madame Olga, 'do you not know me, that -you compel me to flourish my parasol? Yes: I am come to Paris. My -sister-in-law, Zdenka, will do my waiting. I wanted to consult my -physician; I am very unwell, though you look so incredulous. So Wanda -has all the Noira collection? What a fortunate woman she is. The -eighteenth century is the least suited to her taste. She will heartily -despise all those shepherdesses <i>en panier</i> and those smiling deities -on lacquer. How could the Duc leave such frivolities to so serious a -person? What is her doubled rose-leaf amidst all her good luck? She -must have one. I suppose it is you? Well, you will find me at home in -an hour. I am only a stone's throw from your hotel. Have you brought -all the homespun virtues with you from Hohenszalras? I am afraid they -will wither in the air of the boulevards. <i>Au revoir!</i></p> - -<p>And then she had laughed again and kissed her finger-tips to him, and -driven away wrapped up in her shining furs, and he was conscious of a -stinging sense of excitement, annoyance, pleasure, and confusion, as if -he had drunk some irritant and heady wine.</p> - -<p>He had gone on to his clubs with an uneasy sense of something -perilous and distasteful having come into his life, yet also with a -consciousness of a certain zest added to the reductions of this his -favourite city. He did not go to the Hôtel Brancka in the next hour, -and was sensible of having to exercise a certain control over himself -to refrain from doing so.</p> - -<p>'Did you know that Olga was in Paris?' she said, in some surprise, to -him when they met in the evening.</p> - -<p>'I believe she arrived this morning,' he answered, with a certain -effort. 'I met her an hour or two ago. She came unexpectedly; she had -not even told her servants to open her hotel.'</p> - -<p>'Is Stefan with her?'</p> - -<p>'I believe not.'</p> - -<p>'But surely it is her term of waiting in Vienna?'</p> - -<p>He gave a gesture of indifference.</p> - -<p>'I believed it was. I think it was. She will be sure to write to you -this evening, so she said. We cannot escape her, you see; she is our -fate.'</p> - -<p>'We can go back to Hohenszalras.'</p> - -<p>'That would be too absurd. We cannot spend our lives running away from -Madame Brancka. We have a hundred engagements here. Besides, your Noira -affair is not one half settled as yet, and it is only now that Paris is -really agreeable. We will go back in May, after Chantilly.'</p> - -<p>'As you like,' she said, with a smile of ready acquiescence.</p> - -<p>She was only there for his sake. She, would not spoil his contentment -by showing that she made a sacrifice. She was never really happy away -from her mountains, but she did not wish him to suspect that.</p> - -<p>The Hôtel Brancka was a charming little temple of luxury, ordered -after the last mode, and as <i>pimpant</i> as its mistress. It had cost -enormous sums of money, and its walls had been painted by famous -artists with fantastic and voluptuous subjects, which had not been paid -for at the present.</p> - -<p>In finance, indeed, she was much like a king of recent time, who never -had any money to give, but always said to his mistresses, 'Order -whatever you like; the Civil List will always pay my bills.' She had -never any money, but she knew that her brother-in-law, like the king's -ministers, would always pay her bills.</p> - -<p>'One expects to hear the "Decamerone" read here,' said Wanda, with some -disdain, as she glanced around her on her first visit.</p> - -<p>'At Hohenszalras one would never dare to read anything but the -"Imitationis Christi,"' said Madame Olga, with contempt of another sort.</p> - -<p>The little hotel was but a few streets distance off their own grand and -spacious residence, which had undergone scarcely any change since the -days of Louis XV. They saw the Countess Brancka very often, could not -choose but see her when she chose, and that was almost perpetually.</p> - -<p>He had honestly, and even intensely, desired not to be subjected to her -vicinity. But it was difficult to resist its seduction when she lived -within a few yards of him, when she met him at every turn, when the -changing scenes of society were like those of a kaleidoscope, always -composed of the same pieces. The closeness of her relationship to his -wife made an avoidance of her, which would have been easy with a mere -acquaintance, wholly out of possibility. She pleaded her 'poverty' very -prettily, as a plea to borrow their riding-horses, use their boxes -at the Opéra and the Théâtre Français, and be constantly, under one -pretext or another, seeking their advice. Wanda, who knew the enormous -extravagance of both the Branckas, and the inroads which their debts -made on even the magnificent fortunes of Egon Vàsàrhely, had not as -much patience as usual in her before these plaintive pretences.</p> - -<p>'<i>Wanda me boude</i>', said Madame Brancka, with touching reproachfulness, -and sought a refuge and a confidant in the sympathy of Sabran, which -was not given very cordially, yet could not be altogether refused. Not -only were they in the same world, but she made a thousand claims on -their friendship, on their relationship. Stefan Brancka was in Hungary. -She wanted Sabran's advice about her horses, about her tradespeople, -about her disputes with the artists who had decorated her house; she -sent for him without ceremony, and, with insistence, made him ride with -her, drive with her, dance with her, made him take her to see certain -diversions which were not wholly fitted for a woman of her rank, and so -rapidly and imperceptibly gained ascendency over him that before making -any engagement he involuntarily paused to learn whether she had any -claim on his time. It caused his wife the same vague impatience which -she had felt when Olga Brancka had persisted in going out with him on -hunting excursions at home. But she thrust away her observation of it -as unworthy of her.</p> - -<p>'If she tire him,' she thought, 'he will very soon put her aside.'</p> - -<p>But he did not do so.</p> - -<p>Once she said to him, with a little irony, 'You do not dislike Olga so -very much now?' and to her surprise he coloured and answered quickly, -'I am not sure that I do not hate her.'</p> - -<p>'She certainly does not hate you,' said Wanda, a little contemptuously.</p> - -<p>'Who knows?' he said gloomily; 'who could ever be sure of anything with -a woman like that?'</p> - -<p>'Mutability has a charm for some persons,' said his wife, with an -irritation for which she despised herself.</p> - -<p>'Not for me,' said Sabran, quickly. 'My opinion of Madame Olga is -precisely what it has always been.'</p> - -<p>'Are you very sincere to her, then?' said Wanda, and as she spoke, -regretted it. What was Olga Brancka that she should for a moment bring -any shadow of dissension between them?</p> - -<p>'Sincere!' he echoed, with a certain embarrassment. 'Who would she -expect to be so? I told you once before that you pay her in a coin of -which she could not decipher the superscription!'</p> - -<p>Wanda smiled, but she was pained by his tone. 'You are not the first -man, I suppose, who amuses himself with what he despises,' she -answered. 'But I do not think it is a very noble sport, or a very -healthy one. Forgive me, dear, if I seem to preach to you.'</p> - -<p>'Preach on for ever, my beloved divine. You can never weary me,' said -Sabran, and he stooped and kissed her.</p> - -<p>She did not return his caress.</p> - -<p>That day as she drove with the Princess in the Bois, Bela and Gela -facing her, she saw him in the side alley riding with the Countess -Brancka. A physical pain seemed to contract her heart for a moment.</p> - -<p>'Olga is very <i>accaparante</i>,' said the Princess, perceiving them also. -'Not content with borrowing your Arabs, she must have your husband also -as her cavalier.'</p> - -<p>'If she amuse him I am her debtor,' said Wanda, very calmly.</p> - -<p>'Amuse! Can a man who has lived with you be amused by her?'</p> - -<p>'I am not amusing,' said his wife, with a smile which was not mirthful. -'Men are like Bela and Gela; they cannot always be serious.'</p> - -<p>Then she told her coachman to leave the Bois and drive out into the -country. She did not care to meet those riders at every turn in the -avenues.</p> - -<p>'My dear Réné,' said the Princess, when she happened to see him alone. -'Can you find no one in all Paris to divert yourself with except Stefan -Brancka's wife? I thought you disliked her.'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated.</p> - -<p>'She is related to us,' he said a little feebly. 'One sees her of -necessity a hundred times a week.'</p> - -<p>'For our misfortune,' said the Princess, sententiously. 'But she is not -altogether friendless in Paris. Can she find no one but you to ride -with her?'</p> - -<p>'Has Wanda been complaining to you?'</p> - -<p>'My dear Marquis,' replied Madame Ottilie, with dignity. 'Your wife is -not a person to complain; you must understand her singularly little -after all, if you suppose that. But I think, if you would calculate the -hours you have of late passed in Madame Brancka's society, you would -be surprised to see how large a sum they make up of your time. It is -not for me to presume to dictate to you; you are your own master, of -course: only I do not think that Olga Brancka, whom I have known from -her childhood, is worth a single half-hour's annoyance to Wanda.'</p> - -<p>Sabran rose, and his lips parted to speak, but he hesitated what to -say, and the Princess, who was not without tact, left him to receive -herself some sisters of S. Vincent de Paul. His conscience was not -wholly clear. He was conscious of a pungent, irresistible, even whilst -undesired, attraction that this Russian woman possessed for him; it was -something of the same potent yet detestable influence which Cochonette -had exercised over him. Olga Brancka had the secret of amusing men and -of exciting their baser natures; she had a trick of talk which sparkled -like wine, and, without being actually wit, illumined and diverted -her companions. She was a mistress of all the arts of provocation, -and had a cruel power of making all scruples of conscience and all -honesties and gravities of purpose seem absurd. She made no disguise of -her admiration of Sabran, and conveyed the sense of it in a thousand -delicate and subtle modes of flattery. He read her very accurately, and -had neither esteem nor regard for her, and yet she had an attraction -for him. Her boudoir, all wadded softly with golden satin like a -jewel-box, with its perpetual odour of roses and its faint light -coloured like the roses, was a little temple of all the graces, in -which men were neither wise nor calm. She had a power of turning their -very souls inside out like a glove, and after she had done so they were -never worth quite as much again. The fascination which Sabran possessed -for her was that he never gave up his soul to her as the others did; he -was always beyond her reach; she was always conscious that she was shut -out from his inmost thoughts.</p> - -<p>The sort of passion she had conceived for him grew, because it was -fanned by many things—by his constancy to his wife, by his personal -beauty, by her vague enmity to Wanda, by the sense of guilt and of -indecency which would attach in the world's sight to such a passion. -Her palate in pleasure was at once hardened and fastidious; it required -strong food, and her audacity in search of it was not easily daunted. -She knew, too, that he had some secret which his wife did not share; -she was resolved to penetrate it. She had tried all other means; there -only now remained one——to surprise or to beguile it from himself. To -this end, cautious and patient as a cat, she had resumed her intimacy -with them as relations, and with all the delicate arts of which she was -a proficient, strove to make her companionship agreeable and necessary -to him. Before long he became sensible of a certain unwholesome charm -in her society. He went with her to the opera, he took her to pass -hours amidst the Noira collection, he rode with her often; now and then -he dined with her alone, or almost alone, in a small oval room of pure -Japanese, where great silvery birds and white lilies seemed to float on -a golden field, and the dishes were silver lotus leaves, and the lamps -burned in pale green translucent gourds hanging on silver stalks.</p> - -<p>An artificial woman is nothing without her <i>mise en scène</i>; -transplanted amidst natural landscape and out-of-door life she is -apt to become either ridiculous or tiresome. Madame Brancka in Paris -was in her own playhouse; she looked well, and was in her own manner -irresistible. At Hohenszalras she had been as out of keeping with -all her atmosphere as her enamel buttons, her jewelled alpenstock, -her cravat of pointe d'Alençon, and her softly-tinted cheeks had been -out of place in the drenching rain-storms and mountain-winds of the -Archduchy of Austria.</p> - -<p>He knew very well that the attraction she possessed for him was of -no higher sort than that which the theatre had; he seemed to be -always present at a perfect comedy played with exquisite grace amidst -unusually perfect decorations. But there was a certain artificial bias -in his own temperament which made him at home there. His whole life -after all had been an actor's. His wife had said rightly: 'Men cannot -be always serious.' It was just his idler, falser moods which Olga -Brancka suited, and his very fear of her gave a thrill of greater power -to his amusement. When the Princess, his devoted friend, reproved him, -he was unpleasantly aroused from his unwise indulgence in a perilous -pursuit. To pain his wife would be to commit a monstrous crime, a -crime of blackest ingratitude. He knew that; he was ever alive to the -enormity of his debt to her, he was for ever dissatisfied with himself -for being unable to become more worthy of her.</p> - -<p>'She jealous!' he thought. It seemed to him impossible, yet his vanity -could not repress a throb of exultation; it almost seemed to him -that in making her more human it would make her more near his level. -Jealous! It was not a word which was in any keeping with her; jealousy -was a wild, coarse, undisciplined, suspicious passion, far removed from -the calmness and the strength of her nature.</p> - -<p>At that moment she entered the room, coming from a drive in the -forenoon. It was still cold. She had a cloak of black sables reaching -to her feet; it still rested on her shoulders. Her head was uncovered; -she had never looked taller, fairer, more stately; the black furs -seemed like some northern robes of coronation. Beneath them gleamed the -great gold clasps of a belt, and gold lions' heads fastening her olive -velvet gown.</p> - -<p>'Jealous!' he thought, 'this queen amongst women!' His heart sank. -'She would never say anything,' he thought; 'she would leave me.' -Almost he expected her to divine his thoughts. He was relieved when she -spoke to him of some mere trifle of the day. Like many men he could -not be frank, because frankness would have seemed like insult to his -wife. He could not explain to her the mingled aversion and attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him, the curious stinging irritation -which she produced on his nerves and his senses, so that he despised -her, disliked her, and yet could not wholly resist the charm of her -unwholesome magic. How could he say this to his wife? How could he -hope to make her understand, or if she understood, persuade her not to -resent as the bitterest of affronts this power which another woman, -and that woman nearly connected with her, possessed? Besides, even if -he went so far, if he leaned so much on the nobility of her nature as -to venture to do this, he knew very well that she would in reason say -to him, 'Let us go away from where this danger exists.' He did not -desire to go away. He was glad of this old life of pleasure, which let -him forget his secret sorrow. Amidst the excitations of Paris he could -push away the remembrance that another man knew the shame of his life. -The calm and the solitude of Hohenszalras, which had been delightful -to him once, had grown irksome when he had begun to cling to them for -fear lest any other should remember as Vàsàrhely had remembered. Here -in Paris, where he had always been popular, admired, well known, he was -as it were in his own kingdom, and the magnificence with which he could -now live there brought him troops of friends. He hoped that his wife -would not be unwilling to pass a season there in every year, and he -stifled as it rose his consciousness that she would assent to whatever -he wished, however painful or unwelcome to herself.</p> - -<p>'It is really very unwholesome for you to be married to such a saint -as Wanda,' his tormentor said to him one day. 'You do not know what a -little opposition and contradiction would do for you.'</p> - -<p>They were visiting the Hôtel Noira, studying the probable effects of -a new method of lighting the gallery which he contemplated, and she -continued abruptly:</p> - -<p>'Wanda has been buying very largely in Paris, has she not? And she has -bought this hotel of the Noira heirs, I believe? You mean to keep it -altogether as it is; and of course you will come and live in it?'</p> - -<p>'Whenever she pleases,' he answered, intent on a Lancret not well hung.</p> - -<p>'Whenever you please,' said Madame Brancka. 'Why will you pretend -that Wanda has any separate will of her own? It is marvellous to see -so resolute a person as she was as obediently bent as a willow-wand. -But all this French property will constitute quite a fortune apart. I -suppose it will all be settled on your third son, as Gela is to have -Idrac? Will not you give him your title? Count Victor de Sabran will -sound very pretty, and you might rebuild Romaris.'</p> - -<p>He turned from her with impatience.</p> - -<p>'Are we so very old that you want to parcel out our succession amongst -babies? No; I do not intend to give my name to any of Wanda's children. -There is an Imperial permission for them all to bear hers.'</p> - -<p>'You are not very loyal to your forefathers,' said Madame Brancka. -'Wanda might well spare them one of her boys. If not, what is the use -of accumulating all this property in France?'</p> - -<p>'All that she buys is done out of respect for the Duc de Noira,' said -Sabran, curtly. 'If she bear me twenty sons they will all have her -name. It was settled so on the marriage-deeds and ratified by the -Kaiser.'</p> - -<p>'Are prince-consorts always deposed from any throne they have of their -own?' said Madame Olga, in the tone that he hated. 'If I were you I -should rebuild Romaris. I wonder so devoted a wife has not done so -years ago.'</p> - -<p>'There is nothing at Romaris to rebuild.'</p> - -<p>'Decidedly,' thought his companion, 'he hates Romaris, and has no love -of his own race. Did he drown Vassia Kazán in the sea there?'</p> - -<p>Unsparingly she renewed the subject to Wanda herself.</p> - -<p>'You should settle the French properties on little Victor, and give him -the Sabran title,' she urged to her. 'I told Réné the other day that -I thought it very strange he should not care to have one of his sons -named after him.'</p> - -<p>Wanda answered coldly enough: 'In my will, if I die before him, -everything goes to the Marquis de Sabran. He will make what division -he pleases between his children, subject of course to Bela's rights of -primogeniture.'</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka was silent for a moment from surprise.</p> - -<p>'It is odd that he should not care for Romaris,' she said, after a long -pause. 'You have much more trust in him, Wanda, than it is wise to put -in any man that lives.'</p> - -<p>'Whom one trusts with oneself, one may well trust with everything -else,' said her sister-in-law in a tone which closed discussion. But -when she was left alone the thorn remained in her. She thought with -perplexity:</p> - -<p>'No, he does not care for Romaris. He dislikes its very name. He would -never hear of one of the children bearing it. There must be something -he does not say.'</p> - -<p>She remembered sadly what the Duc de Noira had once said to her:</p> - -<p>'In morals as in metals, my dear, you cannot work gold without -supporting it by alloy.'</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka had patience and skill perfect enough to refrain -altogether from those hints and tentatives by which a less clever woman -would have attempted to approach and surprise the key to those hidden -facts which she believed to be the theme of his correspondence with -Vàsàrhely and the cause of his rejection of the Russian appointment. -A less clever woman would have alarmed him, and betrayed herself by -perpetual allusions to the matter. But she never did this: she treated -him with an alternation of subtle compliment and ironical, malice, such -as was most certain to allure and perplex any man, and he never by the -most distant suspicion imagined that she knew anything which he desired -unknown. She was a woman of strong nerve, and her equanimity in his -and his wife's presence was wholly undisturbed by her consciousness -that she had dispatched the anonymous suggestion as a seed of discord -to Hohenszalras. She knew indeed that it was not what people of her -rank and breeding did do, that it was not honest warfare, that it was -what even the very easy morality of her own world would have condemned -with disgust; but she bore the sin of it very lightly. If she had been -driven to excuse it, she would have characterised it as mere mischief. -If her sister-in-law had shown her the letter, she would have glanced -over it with a tranquil face and an air of utter unconcern. If she -could not have done this sort of thing she would have thought herself -a very poor creature. 'I believe you could be as wicked as the Scotch -Lady Macbeth,' Stefan Brancka had said once to her; and she had -answered with much contempt: 'At least I promise you I should not walk -in my sleep if I were so. Your Lady Macbeth was a grotesque barbarian.'</p> - -<p>A great deal of the sin of this world, which is not at all like Lady -Macbeth's, comes from the want of excitement felt by persons, only too -numerous, who have exhausted excitement in its usual shapes. She had -done so; she required what was detestable to arouse her, because she -had lived at such high pressure that any healthy diversion was vapid -and stupid to her. The destruction, if she could achieve it, of her -sister-in-law's happiness, offered her in prospect such an excitement; -and the whim she had taken for passion grew out of waywardness till -it nearly became passion in truth. She never precisely weighed or -considered its possible consequences, but she endeavoured to arouse -a response in him with all the unscrupulous skill of a mistress in -coquetry. When moved by Madame Ottilie's warning he strove honestly to -avoid her, and often excused himself from obedience to her summons, -the opposition only stimulated her endeavours, and made a smarting -mortification and anger against him supply a double motor-power for his -subjection. If she could have believed that she succeeded in making his -wife anxious, she might have been content; but Wanda always received -her with the same serenity and courtesy, which, if it covered disdain, -covered it unimpeachably with admirable grace.</p> - -<p>'If one broke her heart, she would only make one a grand courtesy with -a bland smile,' thought Olga Brancka, irritably and impatiently. 'There -are people who die standing. Wanda would do that.'</p> - -<p>That ill weeds grow apace is a true old saw, never truer than of -vindictive and envious passions. Sheer and causeless jealousy of her -sister-in-law had been alive in her many years, and now, by being fed -and unresisted, so grew that it became almost a restless hatred. It was -far more her enmity to his wife than any other sentiment which inspired -her with a fantastic and unhealthy desire to attract and detach Sabran -from his allegiance. Joined to it now there was a sense of some mystery -in him that baffled her, and which was to such a woman the most pungent -of all stimulants. In all her <i>câlineries</i> and all her railleries she -never lost sight of this one purpose, of surprising from him the -secret which she believed existed. But he was always on his guard with -her; even when most influenced by her atmosphere and her magnetism -he did not once lose his self-control and his habitual coolness. At -moments when she was most nearly triumphing, the remembrance of his -wife came over him like a breath of sweet pure air that passes through -a hot-house, and restored him to self-possession and to loyalty. She -began to fear that all the ability with which she had procured her -exemption from Court duties, and had induced her husband to remain in -Vienna, was all vain, and she grew bolder and more reckless in her use -of stratagems and solicitations to keep Sabran beside her in these -early spring days given over to racing and sporting, and at all the -evening entertainments at which the great world met, and whither she -carried with so much effect her gleaming sapphires and her black pearls.</p> - -<p>'Black pearls argue a perverted taste,' said the Princess Ottilie once -to her, and she unabashed answered:</p> - -<p>'It is perverted tastes that make any noise in the world or possess -any flavour. White pearls are much more beautiful, no doubt, but then -they are everywhere, from the Crown jewel-cases to the peasant's necks; -but my black pearls! you cannot find their match—and how white one's -throat looks with them. I only want a green rose.'</p> - -<p>'Chemicals can supply any deformity,' said the Princess, drily. 'Doing -so is called science, I believe.'</p> - -<p>'Do you call me a deformity?' she asked, with some annoyance.</p> - -<p>'You are an elaborate production of the laboratory,' said the Princess, -calmly. 'I am sure you will admit yourself that nature has had very -little to do with you.'</p> - -<p>'My pearls are black by a freak of nature,' said Madame Olga. 'Perhaps -I am the same.'</p> - -<p>The Princess made a little gesture signifying that politeness forbade -her from assent, but she thought: 'Yes; you were never a white pearl, -but you have steeped yourself in acids and solutions of all degrees of -poison till you are darker than you need have been, and you think your -darkness light, and some men think so too.'</p> - -<p>Sabran had grown to look for that necklace of black pearls with -eagerness in the society to which they both belonged. Few evenings -found him where Madame Brancka was not. She had known his Paris of the -Second Empire; she had known Compiègne and Pierrefonds as he had known -them; she knew all the friendships and the bywords of his old life, -and all the <i>dessous des cartes</i> of that which was now around them. She -amused him. She comprehended all he said, half uttered. She remembered -all he recalled. At Hohenszalras he had not found any charm in this, -but here he did find one. She suited Paris; she knew it profoundly, -she liked all its pastimes, she understood all its sports and all -its slang. She hunted at Chantilly, betted at La Marche, plunged at -baccara, shot and fenced well and gaily, had the theatres and all their -jargon at her fingers' ends; all this made her no mean aspirant to -the post of mistress of his thoughts. All which had seemed tiresome, -artificial, even ridiculous, amidst the grand forests and healthful air -of the Iselthal became in Paris agreeable and even bewitching. Once he -said almost angrily to his wife:</p> - -<p>'You, who ride so superbly, should surely show yourself at the Duc's -hunts. What is the use of long gallops in the Bois before anyone else -is out of bed?'</p> - -<p>'I never rode for show yet,' said Wanda, in surprise. 'And you know I -never would join in any sort of chase.'</p> - -<p>'Surely such humanitarianism is exaggeration,' he said impatiently. -'Olga Brancka rides every day they meet at Chantilly, and she is by no -means of your form in the saddle.'</p> - -<p>'I have never yet imitated Olga,' said his wife, a little coldly; but -she did not object when day after day her finest horses were lent to -Madame Brancka. She never by a word or a hint reminded him that he -was not absolute master of all which belonged to her. Only when her -sister-in-law wanted to take Bela and his pony to Chantilly, she made -her will strongly felt in refusal.</p> - -<p>The child, whose fancy had been fired by what he had heard of the ducal -hunting, of the great hounds and the stately gatherings, like pictures -of the Valois time, was passionately angered at being forbidden to go, -and made his mother's heart ache with his flashing eyes and his flaming -cheeks. 'Cannot she leave even the children alone?' she thought, with -more bitterness than she had ever felt against anyone.</p> - -<p>A few nights later they were both at the Grand Opéra, in the box which -was allotted to the name of the Countess von Szalras. She was herself -not very well; she was pale, she sat a little away from the light. -Her gown was of white velvet; she had no ornament except a cluster of -gardenias and stephanotis, and her habitual necklace of pearls. Olga -Brancka, in a costume of many shaded reds, marvellously embroidered -in gold cords, was as gorgeous as a tropical bird, and sat with her -arms upon the front of the box, playing with a fan of red feathers, or -looking through her glass round the house. He talked most with her, but -he looked most at his wife. There was no woman, in a full and brilliant -house, who could compare with her. A thrill of the pride of possession -passed through him. The malicious eyes of the other, glancing towards -him over her shoulder, read his thoughts. She smiled provokingly.</p> - -<p>'<i>Le mari amoureux!</i>' she murmured. 'Really I did not believe in the -existence of that type. But it is quite admirable that it should exist. -Its example is very much wanted in Paris.'</p> - -<p>He felt himself colour like a youth, but it was with irritation; he was -at a loss for an answer. To have defended his admiration of his wife -at the sword's point would have been easy; to defend it from a woman's -ridicule was more difficult. Wanda did not hear; she was listening -to the song of Dinorah, and was dreamily regretting the solitude of -Hohenszalras, and thinking of what pleasure it would be to return. All -the news that Greswold and her stewards sent her thence was precious to -her; no details seemed to her insignificant or without interest; and -her own letters in return were full of minute attention to the welfare -of everyone and of everything she had left there. She was roused from -her home reverie by the voice of her sister-in-law, raised more highly -and saying impatiently:</p> - -<p>'Why should you object, Réné, when I say that I wish it?'</p> - -<p>'What do you wish?' said Wanda, who always felt a singular annoyance -whenever she heard him thus familiarly addressed. 'Whatever you may -wish, I am sure M. de Sabran can require no second bidding to procure -it for you, if it be within the limits of the possible.'</p> - -<p>'I wish to see a Breton Pardon,' said Olga Brancka, with a gesture of -her fan towards the stage. 'There is one next week in his own country; -I want him to invite me—us—to Romaris.'</p> - -<p>Wanda, who knew that he always shrank from the mention of Romaris, -interposed to save him from persecution.</p> - -<p>'There is nothing at Romaris to invite us to,' she said for him. -'Neither you nor I can live in a cabin or a fishing-boat; especially -can we not in March weather.'</p> - -<p>'You can live in a hut on your Alps,' returned the other, 'and I do -not dislike tent life in the Karpathians. If he sent his major-domo -down, he would soon make the sands and rocks blossom like the rose, and -villages would arise as fast as they did before the great Katherine. -Why not? It would be charming. Has he no feeling for the cradle of his -ancestors? We must put him through a course of Lamartine.'</p> - -<p>'An unfortunate allusion; he lived to lose Milly,' said Sabran, finding -himself forced to say something. 'In midsummer, Mesdames, you might -perhaps rough it, <i>tant bien que mal</i>; but now!—there is nothing to -be seen except fog and surf at sea, and mud and pools inland. Even -a Pardon would not reconcile you; not even the Breton jackets with -scriptural stories embroidered on them, nor the bagpipes.'</p> - -<p>'Positively, you will not take us?'</p> - -<p>'I must disobey even your wishes in the Ides of March.'</p> - -<p>'But whether in March or July—why do you never go yourself?'</p> - -<p>'There is nothing to go there for,' he answered, almost losing his -patience; 'a people to whom I am only a name, a strip of shore on which -I only own a few wind-tormented oak-trees!'</p> - -<p>'Only imagine the duties that Wanda would evolve in your place out of -those people and those oaks!'</p> - -<p>'I have not Wanda's virtues,' he said, half sadly, half jestingly.</p> - -<p>'We have none of us, or the Millennium would have arrived. I cannot -understand your dislike to your melancholy sea-shore. Most of your -countrymen are for ever home-sick away from their <i>landes</i> and their -<i>dolmen.</i> You seem to feel no throb for the <i>mater patria</i>, even when -listening to Dinorah, which sets every other Breton's heart beating.'</p> - -<p>'My heart is Austrian,' said Sabran, with a bow towards his wife.</p> - -<p>'That is very pretty, and what you are also obliged to say,' -interrupted Madame Brancka. 'But why hate Romaris? For my part, I -believe you see ghosts there.'</p> - -<p>His wife said, with a quick reproach in her words: 'The ghosts of men -who knew how to live and to die nobly? He would not be afraid to meet -them.'</p> - -<p>The simplicity of the words and the trustfulness of them sank into his -soul. A pang of terrible consciousness went through him like poisoned -steel. As his wife's eyes sought his the lights swam round with him, -the music was only a confused murmur on his ear; he heard as if from -afar off the voice of Olga Brancka saying: 'My dear Wanda, you are -always so exalted!'</p> - -<p>At that moment some one knocked at the door: he was glad to rise and -open it to admit Count Kaulnitz and two other gentlemen.</p> - -<p>Hardly anything else which his wife could have said would have hurt -him quite so much.</p> - -<p>As he sat there in the brilliant illumination and the hot-house -warmth, with her delicate profile clear as a cameo against the light, -a sensation of physical cold passed through him. He saw himself as he -was, an actor, a traitor, a perjured and dishonoured man. What right -had he there more than any galley-slave at the hulks?—he, Vassia Kazán?</p> - -<p>Well tutored by the ways of the world, he laughed, and spoke, and -criticised the rendering of the opera with his usual readiness of -grace; but Olga Brancka had marked the fleeting expression of his face, -and said to herself: 'Whatever the secret be, the key of it lies in the -sands of Romaris.'</p> - -<p>As she took his arm, when they left the box, she murmured to him: 'I -shall go to Romaris, and you will take me.'</p> - -<p>'I think not,' he said curtly, without his usual suavity. 'I am the -servant of all your sex, it is true, but like all servants I am only -willing to be commanded by my mistress.'</p> - -<p>'O most faithful of lovers, I understand!' she said, with a -contemptuous laugh. 'And she never commands you, she only obeys. You -are very fortunate, even though you do have ghosts at your ruined tower -by the sea.'</p> - -<p>'Yes, I am fortunate, indeed,' he answered gravely, and his eyes -glanced towards his wife, who was standing a stair or two below -conversing with her cousin Kaulnitz.</p> - -<p>'Even though you had to abandon Russia,' murmured Olga Brancka, -dreamily. She could feel that a certain thrill passed through him. -He was startled and alarmed. Was it possible that Egon Vàsàrhely had -betrayed him?</p> - -<p>'Paris is much more agreeable than St. Petersburg,' he answered -carelessly. 'I am no loser. Wanda would have been unhappy, and, what -would have been worse, she would never have said so.'</p> - -<p>'No, she would never have said so. She is like the Sioux, the Stoics, -and the people who died in lace ruffles in '89. I beg your pardon, -those are your people, I forgot; the people whose ghosts forbid you to -entertain us at Romaris.'</p> - -<p>'I would brave an army of ghosts to please Madame Brancka,' said -Sabran, with his usual gallantry.</p> - -<p>'Call me <i>Cousinette</i>, at the least,' she murmured, as they descended -the last stair.</p> - -<p>'<i>Bon soir</i>, madame!' he said, as he closed the door of her carriage.</p> - -<p>'Are you coming with me?' said Wanda, as she went to hers.</p> - -<p>He hesitated. 'I think I will go for an hour to the clubs,' he -answered. He kissed her hand. As he drew the fur rug over her skirts, -she thought his face was very pale as she saw it by the lamplight. She -wished to ask him if he were quite well, but she restrained herself, -knowing how intolerable such importunities are to men. Instead, she -smiled at him, as she said, '<i>Amusez-vous bien</i>,' and left him to -divert himself as he chose.</p> - -<p>'How little women understand men, and how poorly they love them when -they do not leave them alone!' she thought, as her carriage rolled -homeward. She never troubled him, never interrogated him, never even -tried to conjecture what he did when away from her. Sometimes, when -he returned at sunrise, she had already risen, and had said a prayer -with her children, written her letters, or visited her horses, but she -always met him with a smile and without a question.</p> - -<p>It hurt her with an ever-deepening wound to perceive the attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him. She did not for a moment believe -that it was love, but she saw that it was an influence which had -audacity enough to compete with her own, a sort, of fascination which, -commencing with dislike, increased to an unhealthy and morbid potency. -She could not bring herself to speak of it to him. She was not one of -those women who reproach and implore. It would have seemed to her as -if both he and she would have lost all dignity in each other's sight -if once they had stooped to what society calls jestingly 'a scene.' He -guessed aright that if she had really believed herself displaced in his -heart she would have left him without a word. She was too conscious of -his entire worship of her to be moved to anything like that jealous -passion which would have seemed to her the last depths of humiliation; -but she was pained, fretted, stirred to a scornful wonder by the power -this frivolous woman possessed of usurping his time and giving colour -to his thoughts.</p> - -<p>It hurt her to think he feared her too much to tell her of any trouble, -any folly, any memory. She reproached herself with having perhaps -alienated his confidence by the gravity of her temper, the seriousness -of her opinions. It would be hard to think that frivolous shallow women -could inspire men with more confidence than a deeper nature could -do, but perhaps it might be so. He had sometimes said to her, half -jestingly: 'You should dwell among the angels; the human world is unfit -for you!' Was it that which alarmed him?</p> - -<p>With that subtle sense of what is in the air around which so often -makes us aware of what is never spoken in our hearing, she was sensible -that the great world in which they lived began to speak of the intimacy -between her husband and the wife of her cousin Stefan. She became -sensible that the world was in general disposed to resent for her, to -pity her, and to censure them, whilst it coupled their names together. -The very suspicion brought her an intolerable shame. When she was -quite alone, thinking of it, her face burned with angry blushes. No -one hinted it to her, no one breathed it to her, no one even expressed -it by a glance in her presence; yet she was as well aware of what they -were saying as though she had been in a hundred salons when they talked -of her.</p> - -<p>She knew the character of Olga Brancka, also, too well not to know that -her own mortification would be the sweetest triumph for one of whose -latent envy she had long been conscious. Ever since she had become the -sole owner of the vast fortunes of the Szalras she had felt for ever -upon her the evil eye of a foiled covetousness. The other had been very -young, and had waited long and patiently, but her hour had now come.</p> - -<p>She said nothing to her husband, and she preserved to her cousin's -wife the same perfect courtesy of manner; but in her own soul she -began to suffer keenly, more from a sense of littleness in him than any -mere personal feeling. To blame him, to entreat him, to seek to detach -him—all these things were impossible to her.</p> - -<p>'If all our years of union do not hold him, what will?' she thought; -and the great natural hauteur of her temper could never have let her -bend to the solicitation of a constancy denied to her.</p> - -<p>One night, when they had no engagements but a ball, to which they could -go at midnight, he did not come in to dinner. Always before, when he -had not returned to dine, he had sent her a message to beg her not to -wait. This evening there was no message. She and the Princess dined -alone.</p> - -<p>'He was never discourteous before,' said the Princess, who disliked -such omissions.</p> - -<p>'It is his own house,' said Wanda. 'He has a right to come or not to -come as he likes, without ceremony.'</p> - -<p>'There can never be too much ceremony,' said the Princess. 'It -preserves amiability, self-respect, and good manners. It is the silver -sheath which saves them from friction. It is the distinguishing mark -between the gentleman and the boor. When politeness is only for the -street or the salon, it is but a poor thing. He has always been so -scrupulous in these matters.'</p> - -<p>As Wanda later crossed the head of the grand staircase, to go and dress -for the ball, she heard her <i>maître d'hôtel</i> in the hall below speak to -the groom of the chambers.</p> - -<p>'Are the Marquis's horses in, do you know?' asked the former; and the -latter answered:</p> - -<p>'Yes, hours ago; they are to go for him at the Union at eleven, but -they left him at the Hôtel Brancka.'</p> - -<p>Then the two officials laughed a little under their breath. Their -words and their laughter came upwards distinctly to her ear. Her first -impulse was a natural and passionate one of bitter burning pain and -wonder. A sensation wholly new to her, of hatred and of impotence -combined, seemed to choke her.</p> - -<p>'Is this what they call jealousy?' she thought, and the mere thought -checked her emotion and changed it to humiliation.</p> - -<p>'I—I—contend with her!' she said in her soul. With a blindness before -her eyes she retraced her steps, and went to the sleeping-rooms of her -children. They were all asleep as they had been for hours. She sat down -beside the bed of the little Ottilie; and gazed on the soft flushed -loveliness of the child, bright as a rose in the dew.</p> - -<p>She kissed the child's cheek without waking her, and sat still there -some time in the faint twilight and the perfect silence, only stirred -by the light breathing of the sleepers; the repose, the innocence, the -silence soothed and tranquillised her.</p> - -<p>'What matter a breath of folly?' she thought. 'He is their father; he -is my love; we have all our lives to spend together.'</p> - -<p>Then she rose and went to her chamber, and had herself clothed in a -court dress of white taffetas and white velvet, embroidered with silver -lilies.</p> - -<p>'Make me look well,' she said to her women. 'Put on all my diamonds.'</p> - -<p>When he entered, near midnight, repentant, self-conscious, almost -confused, she stopped his excuses with a smile.</p> - -<p>'I heard the servants say you dined with my cousin's wife. Why not, if -it please you? But I wonder she allows you to dine without <i>un bout de -toilette.</i> Will you not make haste to dress? We shall be late.'</p> - -<p>The words were perfectly simple and kind, but as she spoke them, so -royal did she look, standing there in the blaze of her jewels, with -her lily-laden train, that he felt abashed, ashamed, angered against -himself, yet more angered against his temptress.</p> - -<p>The old lines of Marlowe came to his mind and his lips:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'O! thou art fairer than the evening air<br /> -Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.' -</p> - -<p>'I am not young enough to merit that quotation,' she said, with a -smile; 'ten years ago perhaps——'</p> - -<p>Her heart contracted as she spoke; she was conscious that she had -wished to look well in his eyes that night. The sense that she was -stooping to measure weapons with such an opponent as Olga Brancka smote -her with a sense of humiliation, which did not leave her throughout the -after hours in which she carried her jewels through the gorgeous crowd -of the ball at the Austrian Embassy.</p> - -<p>'If I lower myself to such a contest as that,' she thought, 'I shall -lose all self-respect and all his reverence. I shall seem scarcely to -him higher than an importunate mistress.'</p> - -<p>Now and again there came to her a passionate anger against himself, a -hardening of her heart to him, since he could thus be guilty of this -inexcusable and insensate folly. But she would not harbour these; she -would not judge him; she would not blame him. Her marriage vows were -not mere dead letters to her. She conceived that obedience and silence -were her clearest duties. Only one thing was outside her duty and -beyond her force—she could not stoop to rivalry with Olga Brancka.</p> - -<p>All at once she took a resolution of which few women would have been -capable. She resolved to leave them.</p> - -<p>Three days after the ball she said very quietly to him:</p> - -<p>'If you do not object, I will go home and take the children. It is time -they were at Hohenszalras. Bela, above all, is not improved by what he -sees and hears here; his studies are broken and his fancy is excited. -In a very little while he would learn quite to despise his country -pleasures, and forget all his own people. I will take them home.'</p> - -<p>He looked at her quickly in surprise.</p> - -<p>'I do not think I can leave Paris immediately,' he said, with -hesitation. 'I have many engagements. Of course you can send the -children.'</p> - -<p>'I said I should go, not you. I long to see my own woods in their -first leaf,' she answered, with a smile. 'It will be better for you to -remain. No one ought to be allowed to suppose that you are bound to my -side. That is neither for your dignity nor mine.'</p> - -<p>'Has anyone suggested——' he began, and paused in embarrassment, for -he remembered the incessant taunts and innuendoes of Olga Brancka.</p> - -<p>'I do not listen to suggestions of that sort,' she replied tranquilly. -'You wish to remain here, and I wish to return home. We are both at -liberty to do what we like. My love, she added, with a grave tenderness -in her voice, 'have I so poor an opinion of you that I dare not leave -you alone? I think I should hardly care for a fealty which was only to -be retained by my constant presence. That is not my ideal.'</p> - -<p>He coloured; he was uncertain what to reply: before her he felt -unworthy and disloyal. A vast sense of her immeasurable nobility swept -over him, and made him conscious of his own unworthiness.</p> - -<p>'Whatever you wish, I wish,' he murmured, and was aware that this could -not be what she would gladly have heard him say. 'I will follow you -soon. Your heart is always in your highlands. I know that you are too -grand a creature to be happy in cities. I have the baser leaven in me -that is not above them. The forests and the mountains do not say to me -all that they do to you.'</p> - -<p>'Men want the movement of the world, no doubt,' she said, without -showing any trace of disappointment. 'I only care for the subjective -life; I am very German, you see. The woods interest me, and the world -does not.'</p> - -<p>No more passed between them on the subject, but she gave orders to her -people to make arrangements for her departure and her children's in two -days' time, and sent out her cards of farewell.</p> - -<p>'Do you think you are wise?' the Princess ventured to say to her.</p> - -<p>She answered:</p> - -<p>'I know what you mean, dear mother; yes, I think so. To struggle for -influence with another, and that other Olga! I should indeed despise -myself if I could stoop so low. If he miss me he can follow me. If he -do not—then he has no need of me.'</p> - -<p>'I confess I do not understand you,' said Madame Ottilie; 'to surrender -so meekly!'</p> - -<p>'I surrender nothing,' she said, almost sternly. 'I know what I have -seen again and again in society. The woman jealous and anxious, losing -ground in his esteem and her own every hour, and rendering alike -herself and him actors in a ludicrous comedy for the mockery of the -world around them—a world which never has any sympathy for such a -struggle. Indeed, why should it have? for if the jealousy of a lover be -poetic, the jealousy of a wife is only ridiculous. I <i>am</i> his wife; I -am not his gaoler. I refuse to admit to others or to him or to myself -that any other could be wholly to him what I am; and I should lose that -place I hold, lose it in his eyes and my own, if I once admitted my -dethronement possible.'</p> - -<p>She spoke with more force and anger than was common with her, and her -auditor admired while she still failed to comprehend her.</p> - -<p>'Is there a more pitiable spectacle,' she continued, 'than that of a -wife contending with others for that charm in her husband's sight which -no philtres and no prayers can renew when once it has fled for ever? -Women are so unwise. Love is like a bird's song—beautiful and eloquent -when heard in forest freedom, harsh and worthless in repetition when -sung from behind prison bars. You cannot secure love by vigilance, -by environment, by captivity. What use is it to keep the person of a -man beside you, if his soul be truant from you? You all say that Olga -Brancka has power over him. If she have, let her use it and exhaust it, -it will not last long; but I will not sink to her level by contesting -it with her. For what can you take me?'</p> - -<p>In her glance the leonine wrath of the Szalras flashed for a moment; -her face was pale, she paced the room with a hasty and uneven step. -The Princess sought a timid refuge in silence There were certain -heights in the nature and impulses of her niece of which she, a dweller -on a lower plain, never caught sight. There were times when the haughty -reserve and the admirable patience of this stronger character made a -union which awed her, and altogether escaped her comprehension.</p> - -<p>In two days' time she left Paris, the Princess and the children -accompanying her.</p> - -<p>He felt his heart misgive him as he let her go. What was Olga Brancka, -what was Paris, what was all the world compared to her? As he kissed -her hands in farewell before her servants at the <i>Gare de l'Est</i>, -the impulse came over him to throw himself into the carriage beside -her, and return with her to the old, fair, still, peaceful life of -Hohenszalras. But he resisted it; he heard in memory the mocking of -Olga Brancka's voice saying to him:</p> - -<p>'<i>Ah, quel mari amoureux!</i>'</p> - -<p>He had his establishment, his engagements, his horses, his friends, his -wagers; he would seem ridiculous to all Paris if he could not endure -a few weeks' separation from his wife. A great banquet at his house -was arranged to take place in a few days' time, at which only great -Legitimist nobles would be present, and at which the toast of '<i>Le -Roi!</i>' would be drunk with solemn honours. What would they say of him -if he failed to receive them because he had followed his wife into -Austria? With a thousand sophisms he reconciled himself to remaining -there without her, and would not face the consciousness within him that -the real motive of his staying on through the coming weeks in Paris -was that Olga Brancka was there. For herself, she parted, with him -tenderly, kindly, without any trace of doubt in him or of purpose in -her departure.</p> - -<p>'You will come when you wish,' were her last words to him. 'You know -well dear, that Hohenszalras without you will seem like a sadly empty -eagle's nest.'</p> - -<p>All his offences against her were heavy on him as he returned to the -great house no longer graced by her presence. He would have given -twenty years of his life to have been able to undo what he had done -when he had taken a name not his own. He was sensible of great talents -in him which might have brought him to renown had he been willing -to face hardship and laborious effort. Even as he had been at his -birth—even as Vassia Kazán—he might have achieved such eminence -as would have made him her equal in honest honour. But he had won -the world and her by a lie, and the act was irrevocable. Chance and -circumstance may be controlled or altered, but the fate which men -make for themselves always abides with them for good or ill: a spirit -either of good or ill which once incarnated by their incantations never -departs from them till death.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI" id="CHAPTER_XXXI">CHAPTER XXXI.</a></h4> - - -<p>'Are you actually left alone?' said Madame Olga gaily to him that -evening, when they met at an embassy. 'I thought Wanda was an Una, who -never let her lion loose?'</p> - -<p>'The remembrance of her would recall him if she did,' he answered -quickly and coldly. 'She does not believe in chains because she does -not need them.'</p> - -<p>'Most knightly of men!' she said, with a little laugh. 'It must be very -fatiguing to have to play the part you so affect, even in absence. Our -metaphors are involved, but your loyalty seems one and indivisible. I -suppose you are left on parole?'</p> - -<p>The departure of his wife had disconcerted and disappointed her; as -he, to realise his position, had required to have the world about him -as spectator of it, so she felt all her triumph over him powerless and -pointless if Wanda von Szalras were not there to suffer by the sight -of it. He had remained; that was much; but she felt that the absence -of his wife had made him colder to herself, that the blank left made a -void between them, that remembrance might be more potent with him than -vicinity; and his consciousness that he was trusted might have more -power than any interference or opposition would have had. She became -sensible that she had less charm for him; that he was less easily -moved by her mockery and attracted by her wit. His earlier animosity -to her still flashed fire now and then, and with this sense of revived -resistance in him her own feeling, which had been born of caprice, took -giant growth as a passion. She grew cruel in it. If she could only know -his secret she thought she would crush him with it, grind him under her -foot, torture him. There was a touch of the tigress under her feverish -and artificial life.</p> - -<p>'<i>Il faut brusquer la chose</i>,' she said savagely to herself, when he -had been alone in Paris about a fortnight, and each day had convinced -her that he grew more wary of her, more unwilling to surrender himself -to the fascination which she exercised upon his baser nature. When -she attempted jests at his wife he stopped her sternly, and she felt -that she lost ground with him. Yet she had still a power upon him; an -unhealthy and fatal power. When he looked at her he thought often of -two lines:—</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'O Venus! shöne Frau meine,<br /> -Ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.' -</p> - -<p>'Wanda writes to you every day?' she asked once.</p> - -<p>'She writes often,' he answered.</p> - -<p>'And what does she say of me?'</p> - -<p>'Nothing!'</p> - -<p>'Nothing? What does she write about? Of the priest's sermons and the -horses' coughs, of how much wood has been cut, and how many shoes the -children wear, of how she sorrows for you, and says Latin prayers for -you twice a day?'</p> - -<p>His face darkened.</p> - -<p>'Madame my cousin,' he said irritably, 'will you understand that men do -not like their religion spoken lightly of? My wife is my religion.'</p> - -<p>Then Madame Olga laughed with silvery, hysterical laughter, and clapped -her hands as if she were applauding a good comedy, and cried shrilly: -'<i>Oh! la bonne blague!</i>'</p> - -<p>But she knew very well that it was not '<i>blague.</i>' She knew very well, -too, that though he was subjugated by a certain sorcery when in her -presence, when absent, his good taste condemned, and his good sense -escaped, her. She was one of those women who have a thousand means of -usurping a man's time, and are not scrupulous if some of those measures -are bold ones. All her admirers tacitly left the field open to one -for whom she made no scruple of her preference; and, under pretext of -her relationship to him, she contrived many ways to bring him beside -her. Every day he said to himself that he would go home on the morrow; -but each day bore its diversions, its claims, its interests, and each -day found him in Paris, sometimes driving her to the Cascade, to St. -Germain, to Versailles, sometimes escorting her to the tribune of a -race-course, or a <i>première</i> at a theatre, sometimes dining with her -in her pretty room, the table strewn with rose-leaves, and the windows -open upon flowering orange trees.</p> - -<p>When he wrote home he wrote eloquent, witty, clever letters; but he did -not speak in them of the woman with whom he spent so much of his time, -and his wife as she read them wished that they had been less clever, -and had said more. She began to fear lest she had done unwisely. She -did not repent, for it seemed to her that she could have done nothing -else with any self-esteem; but she dreaded lest she had over-estimated -the power of her own memory upon him. Yet even so, she thought, it -was better that he should degrade himself and her in her absence than -her presence; and she still felt a certainty—baseless, perhaps—that -he would yet pause in time before he actually gave her a rival in her -cousin's wife.</p> - -<p>'If it were any other,' she thought, 'he might fall; but with Olga, -never! never!'</p> - -<p>And she prayed for him half the night, till her prayer seemed to beat -against the very gates of heaven. But in the day, to her children, to -the Princess, to the household, she seemed always tranquil, cheerful, -and at ease. She applied herself arduously to all those duties which -her great estates had always brought with them, and in occupation -and exertion strove to keep her anxiety at bay, and attain that -self-control which enabled her to write in return to him letters which -had no shade of reproach in them, no hint of distrust.</p> - -<p>It was now June.</p> - -<p>The Paris of the world of fashion was soon about to take wing, to -disperse itself to country-houses, sea-shores, and foreign baths; to -change its place, but to take with it wheresoever it should go all its -agitation, its weariness, its fever, its delirium, and its intrigues. -Olga Brancka saw the close of the season approach with regret yet -expectation. She knew that Sabran must escape her or succumb to her; -and she had a bitter, enraged sense that the power of his wife was -stronger over him than her own. '<i>Il faut brusquer la chose</i>,' she -said again and again to herself. She grew reckless, imprudent, and -was tempted to discard even that external decency which her station -in the world had made her assume. She would have compromised herself -for him with any publicity he might have chosen to exact. But she had -never been able to beguile him into any sort of declaration. When he -most felt the danger of her attraction, when he was nearest forgetting -honour and decency, nearest submitting, the memory of his wife saved -him. He recovered his coolness; he drew back from the abyss. Once or -twice she was tempted to throw the name of Vassia Kazán between them -and watch its effect; but she refrained—she knew so little!</p> - -<p>'You will not take me to Romaris?' she said, for the hundredth time, -one evening, as they rode towards St. Germain's.</p> - -<p>He laughed.</p> - -<p>'<i>Cousinette</i>! if you and I went off to Finisterre you will confess -that we should make a pretty paragraph for the papers, and Count -Stefan would have a very good right to run me through the lungs.'</p> - -<p>'Stefan!' she echoed, with contempt. 'It would be the first time he -ever——Besides, you have had duels; you are not afraid of them; and, -yet again, besides I do not see what harm we should do if we looked at -your <i>chouans</i> and <i>chasse-marées</i> for a few days. No one need even -know it.'</p> - -<p>She spoke quite innocently, but her black eyes watched him with the -'Teufelinne' cunning and passion. He caught the look. He put his hand -in the breast-pocket of his coat, where a letter of his wife's was -lying.</p> - -<p>'It is out of the question,' he said, almost rudely. 'I have no wish to -furnish <i>Figaro</i> with so good a jest. Romaris,' he added, with a smile, -'is of course at your service, like all I possess, if you are so bent -upon seeing its desolation. But you must pardon my receiving you by -deputy, in the person of the curé, who is seventy years old and is the -son of a fisherman.'</p> - -<p>She cut her mare across the ears with a fierce gesture and galloped -away from him. Sabran as he galloped after her thought with a vague -apprehension, 'Why does she dwell on Romaris? Does she suspect that I -abhor the place? Can she have seen anything in my looks or in my words -that has raised any doubts in her?' But he told himself that this was -impossible. As she rode her heart swelled with rage and mortification. -There were many men in the world who would have been happy to go at -her call to Breton wilds, or any other solitude; and he refused her, -bluntly, coldly, because away there in the heart of Austria a woman, -who was the mother of his children, span, and read, and said her -prayers, and led her stupid, blameless, stately life! He escaped her -just because that woman lived! All that hot, cruel caprice which she -called love fastened upon him, and swore that it would not be denied. -She had a sense of a grand white figure which stood for ever betwixt -him and her. She brought herself almost to believe that it was Wanda -von Szalras who wronged her.</p> - -<p>Two nights later she was present at the last night of a gay comic -opera which had made all Paris laugh ever since the first fogs of -winter; a dazzling little opera, with a stage crowded by Louis Treize -costumes, and music that went as trippingly as a shepherdess's feet -in a pastoral. Sabran went to her box after a dinner-party which -he had given to a score of men. She looked well, in a gown of many -shades of yellow, which few women could have braved, but which suited -her night-like eyes and her pearly skin; she had deep yellow roses, -natural ones, in her bosom and hair.</p> - -<p>'I am flattered that you wear my yellow roses,' he murmured.</p> - -<p>'If you had sent me white ones you would have outraged the spirit of -Wanda.'</p> - -<p>He made an impatient movement.</p> - -<p>'When are you going home?' she said, suddenly.</p> - -<p>'Soon!' he answered, with the same impatience.</p> - -<p>'Soon means anything, from an hour to a year. Besides, you have said it -for the last six weeks.'</p> - -<p>'Do you go to Noisettiers?'</p> - -<p>'Of course I go to Noisettiers; you can come there if you please. I am -more hospitable than you.'</p> - -<p>He was silent. Noisettiers was a little place on the Norman -coast, which Stefan Brancka had given to her on his marriage; a -pleasure-house, with Swiss roofs, Cairene windows, Italian balconies -and a Persian court, which was bowered amongst lime-trees and filbert -trees, near Villeville, and had been the scene of much riotous -midsummer gaiety when she had filled it with Parisians and Russians.</p> - -<p>'You are always too good to me,' murmured Sabran, in the meaningless -compliment of usage, as other men entered her box. But she knew by the -coldness of his eyes, by the slightness of his smile, that he would no -more go to Noisettiers than to Romaris.</p> - -<p>'If Wanda had only remained here,' she thought angrily, opening and -shutting her tortoiseshell fan, 'he would have done whatever I had -chosen. Men are mere children; thwart them and they pine.</p> - -<p>'I suppose,' she said aloud to him, 'you will have your own -house-parties at Hohenszalras, as stiff as a minuet, crammed with -grand dukes and grand duchesses, all decorum and dignity, all ennui -and etiquette? By-the-by, are you restored again to the Emperor's good -graces?'</p> - -<p>'It is not likely that I shall be so,' replied Sabran, who always -dreaded the subject. 'If ever I be so fortunate I shall owe it to the -influence Wanda possesses.'</p> - -<p>'Why did you offend him?' she said, bending her inquisitive glance upon -him.</p> - -<p>'All sovereigns are offended when not obeyed. We have discussed this so -often. Need we discuss it again in a theatre?'</p> - -<p>'You are very impenetrable,' she said. 'Your rule of conduct -must follow the lines of M. de. Nothomb's '<i>il ne faut jamais se -brouiller, ni se familiariser, avec qui que ce soit: c'est le secret -de durer.</i>'</p> - -<p>'M. de Nothomb only meant his rule to apply to his own sex,' replied -Sabran. 'With yours, unless a man be either <i>familiarisé</i> or -<i>brouillé</i>, his life must be dull and his experience small.'</p> - -<p>'Which will you be with me?' she said, with significance. 'The choice -is open.'</p> - -<p>He understood that the words contained a menace.</p> - -<p>'I am your cousin and your humble servitor,' he said with gallantry, -giving his place up to a young Spanish noble.</p> - -<p>'Take me home,' she said to him an hour later, before the last scene of -the opera. 'Come to supper. I told them to have ortolans and bisque. -One is always hungry after a theatre, and we must have a last long -talk, since you go to your duties and I to my sea-bathing.'</p> - -<p>He desired to refuse; he dreaded her inquisitiveness and her -solicitation; but she had a magic about her, she subdued him to her -side even while he mentally resisted it. The fleshly charm of the -'Teufelinne' was potent as he wrapped her cloak about her and touched -the yellow roses as he fastened it. Almost in silence he entered her -carriage, and drove beside her to her house. She was silent also, -affecting to yawn and be tired, but by the gleam of the lamp he saw -her great black eyes glowing in the darkness, as he had seen those -of a jaguar in the forests of America glow, as it watched to seize a -sleeping lizard or unweary capybara.</p> - -<p>The few streets were soon traversed by her rapid Russian horses, and -together they entered the little hotel, with its strong perfume of -orange flowers and jessamine from the garden about it. The midsummer -stars were brilliant overhead; he looked up at them, pausing on the -threshold.</p> - -<p>'You are thinking how they shine on Wanda?' she said, with the laugh he -hated. 'Probably they do nothing of the kind. I dare say she is wrapped -in fog and cloud: those are the joys of the heights.'</p> - -<p>The little supper was perfectly prepared, and served with a fine claret -and some tokayer; the lights burned mellowly in the transparent gourds; -the windows were open, the moonlight touched the great gold birds, the -silver lilies on the walls. She had studied how to live and how to -please. She held that love was born as much out of scenic effects as of -the senses. In her own way she was a true artist. She had left him a -few moments to change her attire to a tea-gown, which was one cloud and -cascade of lace from head to foot; the yellow roses still nestled at -her breast.</p> - -<p>Stretched on a divan of oriental stuff, she put out her hand for a -cigar he lighted for her, and said with a little smile:</p> - -<p>'You cannot say I do not know how to live.'</p> - -<p>A brutal response rose to his lips; she did not know how to bridle her -life: but he could not say it. He murmured a compliment, and added: -'What a supreme artist the theatre has lost by your being born with a -Countess's <i>couronne!</i>'</p> - -<p>'Yes,' she said, with her eyes on the rings of smoke that her crimson -lips parted to send upward. 'Sometimes when Stefan does not give me -liberty, or Egon does not pay my accounts, I make them both tremble by -a threat that I will go on the stage. I should certainly draw all Paris -and all Vienna too. But perhaps it is too late; in a few more years I -shall have to marry my daughters. Can you realise that? I am sure I -cannot. Now it will suit Wanda perfectly to do that, and <i>her</i> daughter -is not three years old; she is always so fortunate.'</p> - -<p>He listened impatiently.</p> - -<p>'If we left Wanda's name alone it might be better. Did you bring me to -supper to talk of her?'</p> - -<p>'No; she is your Madonna, I know. One must not be sacrilegious, but one -cannot always worship. You do not touch the tokayer; it came from the -Kaiser; you are always so abstemious—you irritate me.'</p> - -<p>She poured out some of the wine, into a jewel-like goblet of Venice, -and gave it him and made him drink it. She sat up on her divan and -leaned towards him; the breeze from the garden stirred the laces of her -gown and made the golden roses nod.</p> - -<p>Wine openeth the heart of man,' she cried gaily. 'Open yours and tell -me frankly why you refused to go to Russia? We are not in a theatre -now.'</p> - -<p>'Are we not?' he said, with the smile which she feared as her greatest -foe. 'Whether or not, I fear I must refuse to please you; the matter -lies between me and—the Emperor.'</p> - -<p>She remarked the hesitation which made him pause before the last word.</p> - -<p>'Between him and Egon,' she thought; but after all, what was the secret -to her except as a means of influence over him. She believed that she -had here present subtler and surer methods of influence which could -attain their end without coercion.</p> - -<p>She ceased to pursue the theme, and grew gentle and winning; she felt -that he was on the defensive. He had come weakly enough into the very -heart of temptation, but he was on his guard against her sorceries. -Lying back amongst her cushions she amused him with that gay and -discursive chatter of which she had the secret, and which imperceptibly -induced him to relax his vigilance and to feel her charm. There was -that about, her which made all scruples seem ridiculous; there was -a contagion of levity and mockery in her which awakened in him the -cynicism of earlier years, and made him only heed the marvellous force -of seduction of which she was mistress.</p> - -<p>'You ought to be ambitious,' she continued softly. 'I think you might -achieve any eminence if you chose to seek it.'</p> - -<p>'Surely I have enough blessings from fortune not to tempt it by that -last infirmity?'</p> - -<p>'You mean you have married a very rich aristocrat,' she said drily. -'Oh, yes; you have made one of the finest marriages in Europe; but -that is not quite the same thing as "winning off your own hand." It is -a lucky <i>coup</i>, like breaking the bank at <i>roulette</i>, but it cannot -give you the same feeling that a successful soldier or a successful -politician has, nor the same eminence. Indeed, I am not sure that your -wife's possession of every possible good and great thing has not -prevented you gathering laurels for yourself. You have dropped into a -nest lined with rose-leaves; to have fallen on the rocks might have -been better. Do you know,' she added, with a little smile, 'if I had -been your wife I should have given you no rest until you had become the -foremost man of the empire. I should not have cared about horses and -peasants and children; but I should have loved <i>you.</i>'</p> - -<p>He moved uneasily, conscious of the implied satire upon his wife, -conscious also of a vibration of intense passion in the last words. He -remained silent.</p> - -<p>He knew well that had she been his wife, she would have been as false -to him as she was false to Stefan Brancka. But the words sent a thrill -through him half of emotion, half of repugnance. There was little light -on the divan where she reclined, the dewy darkness of the garden was -behind her; he could see the outlines of her form, the glister of rings -on her hands, and jewels at her throat, the shine of her eyes watching -him ardently.</p> - -<p>His heart beat with a certain excitation; he vaguely felt that some -hour of fate had come.</p> - -<p>They were as utterly alone as though they had been in a desert; no one -of her household would have ventured to approach that room without a -summons from her. A little drummer in silver beat twelve strokes upon -his drum, which was a clock. A nightingale was singing in the Cape -jessamine beneath one of the casements. The light was low and soft, -so faint that the moonbeams could be seen where they strayed over the -cranes and lilies on the wall. She said to herself once more: '<i>Il faut -brusquer la chose.</i>' If she let him go now he would escape her for ever.</p> - -<p>Ever and again there came to him the memory of his wife, but he shrank -from it as he would have shrunk from seeing her in a gambling den. It -seemed almost a profanity to remember her here. He longed to rise and -get away, yet he desired to remain. He knew that every moment increased -his danger, and yet he prolonged those moments with irresistible -pleasure. Every gesture, glance, and breath of this woman was -provocative and alluring, yet he thought as he felt her power always -the same thing—'<i>ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.</i>' Willingly he would have -embraced her and then killed her, that she might no more haunt him and -do no more harm on earth.</p> - -<p>As he sat with his face half averted from her she gazed at him with her -burning, covetous eyes; the droop of his eyelids, the curves of his -lips, the fairness of his features all seemed to her more beautiful -than they had ever done; the very disquiet and coldness that were in -them only allured her the more. She leaned nearer still and took his -wrist in her fingers.</p> - -<p>'Come to Noisettiers,' she murmured.</p> - -<p>'No,' he said, sharply and sternly, but he did not withdraw his hand.</p> - -<p>'Why not?' she said, with her whole person swayed towards him as by -an irresistible impulse. 'Why do you affect to be of ice? You are not -indifferent to me. You only obey what you think a law of honour. Why do -you try to do that? There is only one law—love.'</p> - -<p>He strove to draw away from him, but feebly, the clinging of her warm -fingers. The caress of her breath on his cheek, the scent of the roses -in her breast intoxicated him for the instant. She bent nearer and -nearer, and still held him closely in her slender hands, which were as -strong as steel.</p> - -<p>'You love me?' she murmured, so low that it scarce stirred the air, -and yet had all the potency of hell in it. A shudder went over him;. -the baseness of voluptuous impulse and the revulsion of conscious -shamefulness shook his strength as though it were a reed in the wind. -For a moment his arms enclosed her, his heart beat against hers; then -he thrust her away from him and rose to his feet.</p> - -<p>'Love, you? No, a thousand times, no!' he said with unutterable scorn. -'You are a shameless temptress; you can rouse the beast that lies hid -in all men. I despise you, I detest you—I could kiss you and kill you -in a breath; but love!—how dare you speak the word? Mine is hers; I am -hers: if I sinned to her with you I would strangle you when I awoke!'</p> - -<p>All the fierceness and the barbaric strength of the blood of desert -and of steppe broke up in him from underneath the courtesy and calm -of many long years of culture. He was born of men who had slain their -mistresses for a glance, and ravished; their captives in war, and -yielded them to no release but death, and his hereditary instincts -broke the bonds of custom and of habit, and spoke in him now as a wild -animal breaks its bars and leaps up in frank brutality of wrath. He -thrust her backward and backward from him, rose to his feet, wrenched -aside with rude hand the eastern stuffs that hung before the door, and -left her presence and her house before any power of voice or movement -had come back to her.</p> - -<p>As he pushed past the waiting servants in the vestibule, and went -through the courtyard and the gateway, he looked up once again at the -stars shining overhead.</p> - -<p>'Wanda! Wanda!' he said with a deep breath, as men may call in their -extremity on God.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII" id="CHAPTER_XXXII">CHAPTER XXXII.</a></h4> - - -<p>Within half an hour he had given a few orders to his major-domo, -and had taken a special train to overtake the express, already for -on its way that night towards Strasburg. No steam could fly as fast -as his own wishes flew. Never had he felt happier than as the train -rushed across the windy level country of the north-east, bearing him -back to the peace and tenderness and honour which waited for him at -Hohenszalrasburg. He was content with himself, and the future smiled on -him. He slept soundly all that night, undisturbed by the panting and -oscillating of the carriage, and visited by tranquil dreams. He did not -break the journey till he reached S. Johann. The weather in the German -lands was wild and rough. The sound of the winds and rushing rains -brought the remembrance of that year of the floods which had been the -sweetest of his life. Amidst the Austrian Alps the cold was still keen, -and the brisk buoyant air and the strength, that seems always to come -on winds that blow over glaciers and snow-fields were welcome to him, -like a familiar and trusty friend. The servants who met him in answer -to his message, the horses who knew him and whinnied with pleasure, the -summits of the Glöckner, on which a noon-day sun was shining, all were -delightful to him: he thought of the Catullian 'laugh in the dimples of -home.'</p> - -<p>Their ways of life renewed themselves as if they had never been -broken. She divined what had passed, but she never spoke of it. She -was happy in his return, and never disturbed its happiness by inquiry -or allusion. He entered with eagerness into plans and projects which -had of recent years ceased to interest him, and he resumed his old -occupations and pursuits with almost boyish ardour. His restlessness -was appeased, and if a dull apprehension beat at his heart with -warning now and then, it was scarcely heeded in his deep sense of the -intense and forbearing love his wife bore to him. She never asked him -how he had escaped from Olga Brancka. She was satisfied that if he -had been faithless to herself, he would not have returned with such -single-hearted contentment and such lover-like fervour.</p> - -<p>'You are the only woman in the world who can forbear from putting -questions,' said Madame Ottilie to her.</p> - -<p>She answered smiling:</p> - -<p>'I remember Psyche's lamp.'</p> - -<p>'That is very pretty,' said the Princess, 'and I do believe you would -never have cared for the lamp. But, all the same, if the god had been -as honest as he ought to have been, would he have minded the light?'</p> - -<p>'I do not think that enters into the story,' said Wanda. 'He did not -resent the light either; he resented the inquisitiveness.'</p> - -<p>'You are the only woman who has none,' said the Princess, taking up her -netting, and at times she called her niece Pschye, little imagining the -terrible suitability of the name, and the secret that was hidden in -darkness from that noble confidence of the last of the Szalras.</p> - -<p>The remembrance of that night of base temptation left a sense of -uneasiness and of insecurity upon Sabran, but the influence his -temptress had possessed with him was of that kind which fades instantly -in absence. He honestly abhorred the memory of her, and never spoke -her name.</p> - -<p>His wife, to whom the utter degradation of her cousin's wife would -never have seemed possible in a woman nobly born and nurtured, never -imagined the truth or anything similar to it.</p> - -<p>Another woman would have tormented herself and him with innuendo or -direct reference to what had passed in those weeks when she had not -been beside him, and on which he was absolutely silent. But she put all -baseness of curiosity from her; she was content to know that her own -influence in absence had been strong enough to bring him back to his -allegiance. She would not have wished to hear, had he offered to reveal -them, all the various, conflicts of good and evil which had gone on in -his mind, all the subtle changes by which her own power had been for a -moment obscured, only to regain still stronger and purer ascendency. -She was indulgent because she knew human nature well, and expected no -miracles. That he had returned of his own accord, and was content so to -return, was all she desired to know. If to attain that equanimity had -cost her many a struggle, the fact was shut in her own soul and could -concern no other. She esteemed it a poor love which could not bear to -be sometimes shut out in silence.</p> - -<p>'For a man to be manly he must be free,' she thought; 'and how can he -be free if there be someone to whom he must confess every trifle? He -owes allegiance to no one but his own conscience.'</p> - -<p>If in their intercourse she had found his honour less scrupulous, his -code less fine than her own; if she had been ever pained by a certain -levity and looseness of principle betrayed by him at times, she always -strove not to attach too much importance to these. The creeds of a man -of pleasure were necessarily different, she told herself, to those of -a woman reared in austere tenets, and guarded by natural pride and -purity of disposition. Whenever the fear crossed her that he might not -be always faithful to her she put it away from her thoughts. 'What I -have to do,' she thought, 'is to be true to him, not to question or to -doubt him: a man's faithfulness has always such a different reading to -a woman's.'</p> - -<p>Sabran never quite understood the perfect indulgence to him which she -combined with the greatest severity to herself. He thought that the -same measure she gave she would exact. The' serenity and grandeur of -her character made it seem to him impossible that she would ever have -compassion for weakness or for falsehood. He fancied, wrongly, that -a woman less noble herself would be more indulgent than she would be -to error. He did not realise that it is only a great nature which can -wholly understand the full force of the words <i>aimer c'est pardonner.</i> -And then again, he said to himself, she might have pardoned a fault, a -crime even, of high passion, of bold mutiny against moral, law, but how -could she ever pardon a meanness, a treason, a lie?</p> - -<p>So he let the months slide away, and did not say to her whilst he still -might have said it himself, 'I am not what you think me.'</p> - -<p>But he was impressed and profoundly affected by that mute magnanimity, -which never vaunted itself or claimed any praise for itself by any hint -or suggestion. He felt disgust at his own folly in ever having cared to -be a single instant in the presence of the woman of whose libertinage -and inconstancy his yellow roses had been the fitting symbol. When -he had cast her from him, rejected and despised, the glamour she had -thrown over him had fallen like scales from the eyes of one blind. -Her memory made the beauty of his wife's nature and thoughts seem to -him more than ever things for reverence and worship. More than ever -his soul shrank within him when he recollected the treachery and the -deception with which, he had rewarded this noblest of friends.</p> - -<p>Ah! why when she had stretched out her hand to him in that supreme gift -of herself, in, that golden sunset hour after the autumn floods of -Idrac, had he not had courage to kneel at her feet and tell her all? -Perchance she might have still have loved him, might have still stooped -to him!</p> - -<p>He strove his utmost to conceal these anxious self-reproaches from her, -lest she should imagine that his hours of gloom were caused by any -lingering shadows of the fatal folly which had been forced on him, like -a drug by Olga Brancka. The sorceress had failed, and he had flung down -and shivered in atoms the glass out of which she had bidden him drink; -she was to him as utterly forgotten, as though she were in her grave; -but not so easily could he banish the memory of his own treachery to -his wife. The very forbearance of her made him the more conscious of -guilt, when he remembered that one man lived who knew that he was -unworthy even to kiss the hem of her garment. He had been faithful to -her in the present, and so could greet her with clean hands and honest -lips; but in the past he had betrayed her foully; he had done her what -in her sight, if ever she knew it would be the darkest dishonour the -treachery of ä human life could hold.</p> - -<p>The sense of crime, which had slept quiet and mute in his conscience so -many years, was now awake and seldom to be stilled.</p> - -<p>The time passed serenely; the autumn brought its hardy sports, the -winter its vigorous pastimes. With the new year she gave him another -son; she named him after Egon Vàsàrhely, without opposition from Sabran.</p> - -<p>'He is worthier to give them a name than I,' he thought bitterly.</p> - -<p>They did not care to move from the green Iselthal. Of Olga Brancka they -heard but rarely. Now and then she sent a little witty flippant note to -Hohenszalras, dated from Paris or Trouville, or Biarritz, or Vienna, or -Monaco, or St. Petersburg, according to the season and her caprices. -Of these little meaningless notes Wanda did not speak to her husband. -She could not bring herself to talk to him of the woman who had so -nearly wrecked their peace, and it seemed to her that the old saw was -wise: 'Let sleeping dogs lie.' It appeared to her, too, that theirs and -Madame Brancka's paths in life would henceforth very seldom, if ever, -meet.</p> - -<p>Sabran believed that her overtures towards him had sprung from one -of those insane unhealthy passions which sometimes are created by -their very sense of their own immorality; he fancied it had died of -its own fire. He did not credit her with the tenacity and endurance -she really possessed. He had little doubt that long ere now some dandy -of the boulevards, some soldier of the palace, had supplanted him in -that brazier of heated senses which she called by courtesy her heart. -He mistook, as the cleverest men often do mistake, in underrating the -cruelty of women.</p> - -<p>The summer was a soft and sunny one, and they enjoyed it in simple and -healthful pleasures of the open air and of the affections. The children -throve and never ailed a day. Sabran had lost all desire to return -to the excitations and passions of the world; his wife was more than -content in the joys of her home; and if above her a storm brooded, if -in his heart there fretted ceaselessly the chafing sense of a gross -treachery, of an incessant peril, she was as ignorant of what menaced -her as the child to whom she had given birth. With present security -also, the sense of dread often wore away from him.</p> - -<p>The months sped on swiftly and serenely for the mistress of -Hohenszalras, the only shadows cast on them coming from accidents -to her poor people through flood or avalanche, and the occasional -waywardness and turbulence of her eldest born. Bela had not been the -better for his sojourn in a great city, where parasites are never -lacking to the heir of wealth, and where his companions had been -small coquettes and dandies <i>pétris du monde</i> at six years old. The -bright vigorous hardihood of the child had escaped the contagion of -affectation, but he had arrived at an inordinate sense of his own -importance and dignity, despite the memory of the Dauphin which often -came to him. He grew quite beyond the management of his governantes, -and though he never disobeyed his mother, gave little heed to anyone -else's authority. Of Sabran he was alone afraid; but at the same time -he preserved for him that silent intense admiration which a young child -sometimes nourishes for a man by whom he is little noticed, but who is -his ideal of all power, force, and achievement, and of whom he hears -heroic tales.</p> - -<p>He was now seven years old. It was time to think of a tutor for him, -since he was beyond the control of the women entrusted with his -education. When she spoke of it to his father, he answered at once:</p> - -<p>'Take Greswold. He has the best temper in the world to govern a child, -and he is a great scholar.'</p> - -<p>'But he is a physician,' she objected.</p> - -<p>'He has studied the mind no less than the body. He adores the boy, -and will influence him as a stranger could not. Speak to him; he will -be only too happy. As no one is ever ill here,' he added with a smile, -'his present position is a sinecure; he can very well combine another -office with it.'</p> - -<p>'I wanted you to take Bela in your hands,' he said later to the old -doctor, 'because I say to you what I should not care to say to a -stranger. The boy has all my faults in him. As he exactly resembles me -physically so he does morally. There is in him, too, I am afraid, a -tendency to tyranny that I have never had. I am not cruel to anything, -though I am indifferent to most things; he would be cruel if he were -allowed; perhaps it is mere masterfulness which may be conquered by -time. I imagine he has also my fatal facility. I call it fatal because -it renders acquisition and proficiency so easy that it prevents -laboriousness and depth of knowledge. You are much wiser than I am, -and will know how to educate the child much better than I can tell -you how to do. Only remember two things: first, that he is cursed by -certain hereditary passions coming to him from me which must be checked -and calmed, or he will grow up with a character dangerous to himself, -and odious to others in the great position he will one day occupy. -Secondly, that if any child of mine ever bring any kind of sorrow upon -her, I shall be of all men the most wretched. You have always been my -good friend. Be yet more so in preventing my suffering from the pain of -seeing my own moral deformities face me and accuse me in the life of -her eldest son.'</p> - -<p>The old physician listened with emotion and with surprise. Of the moral -defects Sabran spoke of, he had seen none. Since his marriage his -tenderness to his wife, his kindliness to his dependants, his courage -in field sports, and his courtesy as a host had been all that anyone -had seen in him; whilst his abstinence from all interference with and -all appropriation of his wife's vast possessions had aroused a yet -deeper esteem in all who surrounded him. As he heard, over the old -man's mind drifted the memories of all he had observed at the time of -Sabran's accident in the forest and subsequent prostration of nerve and -will. But he thrust these vague suspicions away, for he was blameless -in his loyalty to the house he served, and honoured as his master the -husband of the Countess von Szalras.</p> - -<p>'I will do my uttermost to deserve so precious a trust,' he said, -with deep feeling. 'I think that you exaggerate childish foibles, and -attach too much importance to them. The little Count Bela is imperious -and high-spirited, nothing more; and in this great household, where -everyone salutes him as the heir, it is difficult to keep him wholly -unspoiled by adulation and consciousness of his own future power. But a -great pride has been always the mark of the race of Szalras, although -my lady has so chastened hers that you may well believe the line she -springs from has been always faultless as—if one may say so of any -mortal—one may say she herself is. It is not from you alone that the -child inherits his arrogance, if arrogant he be. As for his facility, -it is like a fairy's wand, a caduceus of the gods; it may be used -for good unspeakable. At least believe this, my dear lord, what any -human teacher can do I will do, thankful to pay my debt so easily. I -have always,' he added less gravely, 'had my own theories as to the -education of young princes, and like all theorists believe everyone -else who has had any doctrine on that subject to be wrong. I shall be -charmed to have so happy an occasion in which to put my theories to the -test. I think nature and learning together, the woods and the study, -should be the preparation for the world.'</p> - -<p>'I have entire confidence in your judgment,' said Sabran. 'Above all, -try and keep the boy from pride. Train him, as Madame de Genlis -trained the d'Orléans boys, for any reverse of fortune. He is born with -that temper which would make any humiliation, any loss of position, -unbearable to him; and who can say——'</p> - -<p>He paused abruptly: what he thought was, who could say that in future -years Egon Vàsàrhely might not tell his son of that secret shame which -hung over Hohenszalras, a cloud unseen, but big with tempest? Greswold -looked at him in a surprise which he could not conceal, and Sabran left -his presence hastily, under excuse of visiting some stallions arrived -that morning from Tunis; he was afraid of the interrogations which -the old man might be led in all innocence to make. Greswold looked -after him with some anxiety; he had become sincerely attached to his -lord, whose life he had saved in Pregratten; but the unevenness of his -spirits, the unhappiness which evidently came over him at times in -the midst of his serene and fortunate life, the strangeness of a few -words which from time to time he let fall, had not escaped the quick -perception of the wise physician, and gave him at intervals a vague, -uncertain feeling of apprehension.</p> - -<p>'Pride!' he thought now. 'If the little Count were not proud he would -be no Szalras; and if his father have not also that superb sin he must -be a greater philosopher than I have ever thought him, and no fit mate -for our lady. What should overtake the child? If war or revolution -ruin him when he grows up that will be no humiliation; he will be none -the less Bela von Szalras, and if he be like my lady he will be quite -content with being that. Nevertheless, one must try and teach him -humility—that is, one must try and make the stork creep and the oak -bend!'</p> - -<p>Sabran, as he examined his Eastern horses and conversed about them with -Ulrich, was haunted by the thoughts which his own words had called -up in him. It was possible, it was always possible, that if she ever -knew, she might divorce him, and the children would become bastards. -The Law would certainly give her her divorce, and the Church also. The -most severe of judges, the most austere of pontiffs, would not hold her -bound to a man who had so grossly deceived her.</p> - -<p>By his own act he had rendered it possible for her, if she knew, to -sever herself entirely from him, and make his sons nameless. Of course -he had always known this. But in the first ardours of his passion, -the first ecstasies of his triumph, he had scarcely thought of it. -He had been certain that Vassia Kazán was dead to the whole world. -Then, as the years had rolled on, the security of his position, the -calmness of his happiness, had lulled all this remembrance in him. But -now tranquillity had departed from him, and there were hours when an -intense dread possessed him.</p> - -<p>True, he did justice to the veracity and honour of his foe. He believed -that Vàsàrhely would never speak whilst he himself was living; but then -again he himself might die at any moment, a gun accident, a false step -on a glacier, a thrust from a boar or a bear, ten thousand hazards -might kill him in full health, and were he dead his antagonist might -be tempted to break his word. Vàsàrhely had always loved her; would it -not be a temptation beyond the power of humanity to resist, when by a -word he could show to her that she had been betrayed and outraged by a -traitor?</p> - -<p>And then the children?</p> - -<p>Though were he himself dead, she would in all likelihood never do aught -that would let the world know his sin, yet she would surely change to -his offspring, most probably would hate them when she saw in their -lives only the evidence of her own dishonour, and knew that in their -veins was the blood of a man born a serf.</p> - -<p>'Born a serf! I!' he thought, incredulous of his own memories, of his -own knowledge, as he left the haras and mounted a young half-broken -English horse, and rode out into the silent, fragrant forest ways. -Almost to himself it seemed a dream that he had ever been a little -peasant on the Volga plains. Almost to himself it seemed an impossible -fable that he had been the natural son of Paul Zabaroff and a poor -maiden who had deemed herself honoured when she had been bidden to bear -drink to the <i>barine</i> in his bedchamber. He had once said that he was -that best of all actors, one who believes in the part he plays; and at -all times, and above all since his marriage, he had been identified -in his own persuasions, and his own instincts and habits, with that -character of a great noble, which, when he paused to remember, he knew -was but assumed. Patrician in all his temper and tone, it seemed to -him, when he did so remember, incredible that he could be actually only -a son of hazard, without name, right, or station in the world. Was he -even the husband of Wanda von Szalras? Law and Church would both deny -it were his fraud once known.</p> - -<p>It was not very often that these gloomy terrors seized him—his temper -was elastic and his mind sanguine; but when they did so they overcame -him utterly; he felt like Orestes pursued by the Furies. What smote him -most deeply and hardly of all was his consciousness of the wrong done -to his wife.</p> - -<p>He rode fast and recklessly in the soft, grey atmosphere of the still -day, making his young horse leap brawling stream and fallen tree-trunk, -and dash headlong through the dusky greenery of the forests.</p> - -<p>When he returned Wanda was seated on the lawn under the great yews -and cedars by the keep. She kissed her hand to him as he rode in the -distance up the avenue.</p> - -<p>A little while later he joined her in her garden retreat, calm and -even gay. With her greeting his terror seemed to have faded away; his -home was here, he possessed her entire devotion—what was there to -fear? Never had the serenity of his life here appeared more precise -to him; never had the respect and honour which surrounded him seemed -more needful as the bulwarks of a contented career. What could the -furnace of ambition, the fatigue of exhausted pleasure give, that could -equal this profound sense of peace, this cultured leisure, and this -untainted atmosphere. The moral loveliness of his wife seemed to him -almost more than mortal in its absolute and unconscious rejection of -all things mean or base. 'The world would find the spring by following -her,' seemed to him to have been written for her—the spring of hope, -of faith, of strength, of purity. Perhaps a better man might have less -intensely perceived and worshipped that spiritual beauty.</p> - -<p>'Shall we have any house-parties this year or not?' she asked him as he -joined her. 'I fear you must feel lonely here after your crowded days -in Paris last year?'</p> - -<p>'No,' he said quickly. 'Let us be without people. We had enough of the -world in Paris, too much of it. How can I be lonely whilst I have you? -And the weather for once is superb, and promises to remain so.'</p> - -<p>'I do not know how it seems to you,' she replied, 'but when I came -from the glare and the asphalte of Paris, these deep shadows, these -cool fresh greens, these cloud-bathed mountains seemed to me to have -the very calm of eternity in them. They seemed to say to me in such -reproach, "Why will you wander? What can you find nobler and gladder -than we are?" I want the children to grow up with that love of country -in them; it is such a refuge, such an abiding, innocent joy. What does -the old English poet say: 'It is to go from the world as it is man's to -the world as it is God's.'</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'Well, then, I now do plainly see<br /> -This busy world and I shall ne'er agree,' -</p> - -<p>he said, with a smile. 'Cowley was a very wise man; wiser than -Socrates, when all is counted. But, then, Cowley forgot, and you, -perhaps, forget that one must be born with that wiser, holier love in -one; like any other poetic faculty or insight, it is scarcely to be -taught, certainly not to be acquired. I hope your children may inherit -it from you. There is no surer safeguard, no simpler happiness!'</p> - -<p>'But since you are content, may it not be acquired?'</p> - -<p>'Ah, my beloved!' he said with a sigh. 'Do not compare the retreat of -the soldier tired of his wounds, of the gambler wearied by his losses, -with the poet or the saint who is at peace with himself and sees all -his life long what he at least believes to be the smile of God. Loyola -and Francis d'Assisi are not the same thing, are not on the same plane.'</p> - -<p>'What matter what brought them,' she said softly, 'if they reach the -same goal?'</p> - -<p>'You think any sin may be forgiven?' he said irrelevantly, with his -face averted.</p> - -<p>'That is a very wide question. I do not think S. Augustine himself -could answer it in a word or in a moment. Forgiveness, I think, would -surely depend on repentance.'</p> - -<p>'Repentance in secret—would that avail?'</p> - -<p>'Scarcely—would it?—if it did not attain some sacrifice. It would -have to prove its sincerity to be accepted.'</p> - -<p>'You believe in public penance?' said Sabran, with some impatience and -contempt.</p> - -<p>'Not necessarily public,' she said, with a sense of perplexity at the -turn his words had taken. 'But of what use is it for one to say he -repents unless in some measure he makes atonement?'</p> - -<p>'But where atonement is impossible?'</p> - -<p>'That could never be.'</p> - -<p>'Yes. There are crimes whose consequences can never be undone. What -then? Is he who did them shut out from all hope?'</p> - -<p>'I am no casuist,' she said, vaguely troubled. 'But if no atonement -were possible I still think——nay, I am sure—-a sincere and intense -regret which is, after all, what we mean by repentance, must be -accepted, must be enough.'</p> - -<p>'Enough to efface it in the eyes of one who had never sinned?'</p> - -<p>'Where is there such an one? I thought you spoke of heaven.'</p> - -<p>'I spoke of earth. It is all we can be sure to have to do with; it is -our one poor heritage.'</p> - -<p>'I hope it is but an ante-chamber which we pass through, and fill with -beautiful things, or befoul with dust and blood, at our own will.'</p> - -<p>'Hardly at our own will. In your ante-chamber a capricious tyrant -waits us all at birth. Some come in chained; some free.'</p> - -<p>They were seated at her favourite garden-seat, where the great yews -spread before the keep, and far down below the Szalrassee rippled -away in shining silver and emerald hues, bearing the Holy Isle upon -its waters, and parting the mountains as with a field of light. The -impression which had pursued her once or twice before came to her -now. Was there any error in his own life, any cruel, crooked twist -of circumstance concealed from her? An exceeding tenderness and pity -yearned in her towards him as the thought arose. Was he, with all -his talent, power, pride, grace, and strength, conscious of fault or -failure, weighted with any burden? It seemed impossible. Yet to her -fine instinct, her accurate ear, there was in these generalities the -more painful, the more passionate, tone of personal remorse. She might -have spoken, might once more have said to him what she had once said, -and invited him to place a fearless confidence in her affection; but -she remembered Olga Brancka; she shrank from seeking an avowal which -might be so painful to him and her alike.</p> - -<p>At that moment the pretty figure of the Princess Ottilie appeared in -the distance, a lace hood over her head, a broad red sunshade held -above that, and Sabran rose to go forward and offer her his arm.</p> - -<p>'You are always lovers still, and one is afraid of interrupting you,' -she said, as she took one of the gilded wicker chairs. 'I have had a -letter from Olga Brancka; the post is come in. She says she will honour -you in the autumn on her way to waiting at Gödöllö.'</p> - -<p>'It is impossible!' cried Sabran, who grew first red, then pale.</p> - -<p>'Nothing is impossible with Olga,' said the Princess, drily. 'I see -even yet you are not acquainted with her many qualities, which include -among them a will of steel.'</p> - -<p>'She cannot come here,' he said in haste under his breath.</p> - -<p>Wanda looked at him a moment.</p> - -<p>'My aunt shall tell her that it will not suit us. She can go to Gödöllö -by way of Gratz,' she said quietly.</p> - -<p>The Princess shifted her sunshade.</p> - -<p>'What effect do you think that will have? She will cross your -mountains, and she will call up a snowstorm by incantation, so that you -will be compelled to take her in. You who know so much of the world, -Réné, can you inform me how it is that women possess tenacity of will -in precise proportion to the frivolity of their lives? All these -butterflies have a volition of iron.'</p> - -<p>'It is egotism,' he replied with effort, unable to recover his -astonishment and disgust. 'Intensely selfish people are always very -decided as to what they wish. That is in itself a great force; they do -not waste their energies in considering the good of others.'</p> - -<p>'Olga's energies are certainly not wasted in that direction,' said -Madame Ottilie.</p> - -<p>Sabran rose and went in for his letters. It was intolerable to him -to hear the name of this woman, whom he had only escaped by brutal -violence, spoken in the presence of his wife; and even to him, hardened -to the vices of the world though experience had made him, it had never -occurred as possible that she would have the audacity to come thither; -he had too hastily taken it for granted that conscience would have -kept her clear of their path for ever, unless the hazards of society -should have brought them perforce together. The most secretive of men -is always more sincere than an insincere and crafty woman, and he -was overwhelmed for the moment at the infamy and the hardihood of a -character which he had flattered himself he had understood at a glance. -He forgot the truth that 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.'</p> - -<p>'There is not a <i>déclassée</i> in Paris who would not have more decency!' -he thought bitterly. He stood in the Rittersaal and affected to be -occupied with his letters; but his eyes only followed their lines, his -mind was absent. He saw no way to prevent her continued intimacy with -them, if she were vile enough to persist in enforcing it. He could not -tell Egon Vàsàrhely or Stefan Brancka; a man cannot betray a woman, -however base she may be. He could not tell his wife of that hateful -hour, which seemed burnt into his brain as aquafortis bites into metal. -He shuddered as he thought of her here, in this house which had known -so many centuries of honour. He cursed the weak and culpable folly -which had first led him into her snares. If he had not dallied with -this Delilah, she would have been vile of purpose and of nature in -vain. He had escaped her indeed at the last; he had indeed remained -faithful in act to his wife; but had it been such fidelity of the soul -and the mind as she deserved? Would not even the semi-betrayal bring -its punishment soon or late? Could he ever endure to see her beside the -woman who so nearly had tempted him? He felt that he would sooner kill -the other, as he had threatened, rather than let her set foot across -the sacred threshold of Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'I knew what she was,' he thought with endless self-accusation. 'Why -did I ever loiter an hour by her side, why did I ever look once at her -hateful eyes?'</p> - -<p>If she had been a stranger he would have braved his wife's scorn of -himself and told her all, but when it was her cousin's wife—one who -even had once been in a still nearer relationship to her—he could -not do it. It seemed to him as if such nearness of shame would be so -horrible to her that he would be included in her righteous hatred of it.</p> - -<p>Moreover, long habit had made him reticent, and silence always seemed -to him safety.</p> - -<p>After some meditation he took his way to the library and there wrote a -brief letter. He said in it, with no preamble, ceremony, or courtesy, -that he begged to decline for himself and his wife the honour of the -Countess Brancka's presence at Hohenszalras. He sealed it with his -arms, and sent a special messenger with it to Matrey. He said nothing -of what he had done to his wife or her aunt.</p> - -<p>He knew that if his antagonist were so disposed she could make feud -between him and her husband for the insult which that curt rejection -of her offered visit bore with it. But that did not weigh on him; he -would have been glad to have a man to deal with in the matter. All -he cared to do was to preserve his home from the pollution of her -presence. Moreover, he knew that it would not be like the <i>finesse</i> and -secrecy of Olga Brancka to do aught so simple or so frank as to seek -the support of her lord.</p> - -<p>Meantime, the Princess was saying to his wife:</p> - -<p>'Will you receive Olga? She will not give up her wishes; she will force -her way to you.'</p> - -<p>'How can I refuse to receive Stefan's wife?'</p> - -<p>'It would be difficult, but you would be justified. She endeavoured to -draw your husband into an intrigue.'</p> - -<p>'Are we sure? Let us be charitable.'</p> - -<p>'My dear Wanda, you are a truer Christian than I am.'</p> - -<p>'Justice existed before Christianity, if you do not think me profane to -say so. I try to be just.'</p> - -<p>'Justice is blind,' said the Princess, drily. 'I never understood very -well how, being so, she can see her own scales.'</p> - -<p>Wanda made no reply. She had not been blind, but she would have never -said to any living being all that she had suffered in those weeks -when he had stayed behind her in Paris. That he had returned to her -blameless she was certain; she had put far behind her for ever the -remembrance of those the only hours of anxiety and pain which he had -given her since their marriage.</p> - -<p>The Princess, communing with herself, wrote a letter to the Countess -Brancka, chill and austere, in which she conveyed in delicate, but -sufficiently clear, language, her sense that the same roof should -not shelter her and Sabran, especially when the roof was that of -Hohenszalras. She sent it because she believed it to be her duty to do -so, but she had little faith in its efficacy. She would have written -also to Stefan Brancka, but she knew him to be a weak, indulgent, -careless man, still young, who had been lenient to his wife's follies -and frailties, and who was only kept from ruin by the strong hand -of his brother. If she told him what was after all mere conjecture, -he might only laugh; if he did not laugh he might kill Sabran in a -duel, were his Magyar blood fired by suspicion. No one could be ever -sure what Count Stefan would or would not do; the only thing sure was -that he would be never wise. To his wife herself he was absolutely -indifferent, but this did not prevent him from having occasional moods -of furious resentment against her. He was too unstable and too perilous -a person to resort to in any difficulty.</p> - -<p>In a few days she received her answer, though Sabran received none. It -was brief and playful and pathetic.</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>'Beloved and reverend Mother,—You never like me, you always -lecture me, but I am glad that you honour me by remembrance, -even if it be to upbraid. I know not of what mysterious -crime you suspect me, nor do I understand your allusions -to M. de Sabran. I have always found him charming, and I -think if he had not married so rich a woman he would have -been eminent in some way; but content slays ambition. Salute -Wanda lovingly and the pretty children. How is your little -Ottilie? My Mila and Marie are grown out of knowledge. We -shall soon have to be thinking of their <i>dots</i>—alas! where -will these come from? Stefan and I have been the prey of -unjust stewards and extortionate tradesfolk till scarce -anything is left except the mine at Schermnitz. Pity me a -little, and pray for me much.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 55%;">'Your ever devoted</p> -<p style="margin-left: 70%; font-size: 0.8em;">'OLGA.'</p></blockquote> - -<p>Princess Ottilie was a holy woman, and knew that rage was a sin against -herself and heaven, but when she had read this note she tore it in a -hundred pieces, and stamped her small foot upon it, trembling with -passion the while.</p> - -<p>Two months went on; the Countess Olga wrote no more; they deemed -themselves delivered from her threatened presence. She had not replied -to his refusal to permit her to come thither, and Sabran felt relieved -from an intolerable position. Had she persisted, he had decided to -make full confession to his wife rather than permit her to receive -ignorantly the insult of such a visit.</p> - -<p>It was now the end of September, and the weather remained fine and -open. He spent a great deal of his time out of doors, and took his old -interest in the forests, the stud, and the hunting. The letter of Olga -Brancka had brought close to him again the peril from which he had so -hardly escaped in Paris, and the peace and sweetness of his home-life -seemed the more precious to him by contrast. The high intelligence, -the serene temper of his wife, and her profound affection seemed to -him treasures for which he could be never grateful enough to fate and -fortune; their days passed in tranquil and sunny happiness; but ever -and again a word, a look, the merest trifle, sufficed to awake the -sleeping snake of remorse which was, dormant in his breast.</p> - -<p>One day he took Bela with him when he rode—a rare honour for the -child, who rode superbly. His pony kept fair pace with his father's -English hunter, and even the leaping did not scare either it or its -rider.</p> - -<p>'Bravo, Bela!' said Sabran, when they at last drew rein; 'you ride like -a centaur. Is your education advanced enough to know what centaurs -were?'</p> - -<p>'Oh! they were what I should love to be,' replied Bela rapturously. -'They were joined on to the horse!'</p> - -<p>Sabran laughed. 'Well, a good rider is one with his horse, so you may -come very near your ideal. Ulrich has taught you an admirable seat. You -are worthy of your mother in the saddle.'</p> - -<p>Bela coloured with pleasure.</p> - -<p>'In the study you are not so, I fear?' Sabran continued. 'You do not -like learning, do you?'</p> - -<p>'I like some sorts,' said the child with a little timidity; 'I like -history, knowing what the people did in the other ages. Now the Herr -Professor lets us do our lessons out of doors, I do not mind them at -all. As for Gela, he likes nothing but books and pictures,' he added, -with a sense of his one grief against his brother.</p> - -<p>'Happy Gela! whatever his fate in life he will never be alone,' said -his father, as he dismounted to let his hunter take breathing space. -The child leapt lightly from his saddle, took his little silver folding -cup out of his pocket, and drank at a spring, one of the innumerable -springs rushing over the mossy stones and flower-filled grass.</p> - -<p>'One is never alone with horses?' he said shyly, for he never lost his -awe of Sabran.</p> - -<p>'Unless one be ill; then a horse is sorry consolation, and books and -art are faithful companions.'</p> - -<p>'I have never been ill,' said Bela, with a little wonder at himself. 'I -do not know what it is like.'</p> - -<p>'It is to be dependent upon others. A hero or a king grows as helpless -as a lame beggar when he is ill; you will not escape the common lot; -and when you stay in your bed, and your pony in his stall, then you -will be glad of Gela and his books.'</p> - -<p>'Oh! I do love Gela always,' said the child hastily and generously; -'and the Herr Professor says he is ever—ever—so much cleverer than I -am; a million times more clever!'</p> - -<p>'You are clever enough,' said Sabran. 'If you do not let yourself -be vain and overbearing you will do well. Try and remember that if -your pony made a false slip to-day and you fell badly, all your good -health would vanish at a stroke, and all your greatness would serve you -nothing. You would envy any one of the boys going with whole limbs up -into the hills, and, perhaps, all your mother's love and wealth could -do nothing to mend your bones again.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened with a grave face; when women, even his fearless mother, -spoke to him in such a way, he was apt to think with disdain that -they over-rated danger because they were women; and when his tutor so -addressed him, he was also apt to think that it was because the good -professor was a bookworm and cared for weeds, stones, and butterflies. -But when his father said so, he was awed; he had heard Ulrich and -Otto tell a hundred stories of their lord's prowess and courage and -magnificent strength, for the deeds of Sabran in the floods and on -the mountains had become almost legendary in their heroism to all the -mountaineers of the Hohe Tauern, and all the dwellers on the Danube -forest.</p> - -<p>'But ought one not to be brave?' he said with hesitation. 'You are.'</p> - -<p>'We ought to be brave, certainly, or we are not fit to live; but we -must not be vain of being brave, nor rely upon it too much. Courage is -a mere gift of '—he was about to say 'chance,' but seeing the blue -eyes of the child fastened upon him, changed the word and said 'a gift -of God.'</p> - -<p>'What a handsome boy he is,' he thought, as he looked thus at his -little son. 'And how wise it is to leave children wholly to their -mothers when their mothers are wise!'</p> - -<p>'I will remember,' said Bela thoughtfully; 'when I am a man I want to -be just what you are.'</p> - -<p>Sabran turned away at the innocent words. 'Be what your mother's people -were, and I shall be content,' he said gravely.</p> - -<p>'But your people too,' said Bela; 'they were very great and very good. -The Herr Professor reads us things out of that big book on Mexico, and -the Marquis Xavier was a saint,' he says. Gela likes the book better -than I because it is all about birds, and beasts, and flowers; but the -part about the Indians, and the Incas, that pleases me; and then there -are the Breton stories too that are in real history, they are quite -beautiful, and I would die like that.'</p> - -<p>Bela's tongue once loosened seldom paused of its own accord; his eyes -were dark and animated, his face was eager and proud.</p> - -<p>'The Marquis Xavier was a saint, indeed,' said his father abruptly. -'Revere his name. All my children should revere his name and memory. -But lean most to your mother's people; you are Austrian born, and the -chief of your duties and possessions will be in Austria. I think you -would die heroically, my boy, but you will find that it is harder to -live so. The horses are rested, let us ride home; it grows late for -you.'</p> - -<p>Bela, whose mind was quick in intuition, felt that his father did not -care to talk about Mexico or Bretagne.</p> - -<p>'I will ask the Herr Professor if I did wrong to speak to him of the -big book,' he said to himself as he mounted his pony; he was very -anxious to please his father, but he was afraid he had missed the way. -'I suppose it is because they were only saints, and the Szalras were -all soldiers,' he thought on reflection, soldiers being by far the -foremost in his esteem.</p> - -<p>'He says it is harder to live well than to die well,' said Bela over -his bread and milk that night to his brother.</p> - -<p>'I suppose that is because dying is over so soon,' said the meditative -Gela; 'and you know it must take an <i>enormous</i> time to live to be -old—quite old—like Aunt Ottilie.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die very grandly,' said Bela with shining eyes, 'and -have all the world remember me for ever and for ever, as they do great -Rudolph.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die saving somebody,' said Gela, 'just as Uncle Bela -saved the pilgrims; that would please our mother best.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die in battle,' said the living Bela; 'and that would -please our mother, because so many of us have always died so fighting -the French, or the Prussians, or the Turks. When I am a man I shall die -like Wallenstein.'</p> - -<p>'But Wallenstein was killed in a room,' said Gela, who was very -accurate.</p> - -<p>'You are always so particular!' said Bela impatiently, who had himself -only a vague idea of Wallenstein, as of someone who had gone on -fighting without stopping for thirty years.</p> - -<p>'The Herr Professor says it is just being particular which makes -the difference between the scholar and the sciolist,' said Gela -solemnly, his pretty rosy lips closing carefully over the long word -<i>halbgelehrte.</i></p> - -<p>This night after the ride he and she dined quite alone. As he sat -in the Rittersaal and looked at the long line of knights, the many -blazoned shields, the weapons borne in gallant warfare, a sudden -sensation came to him of the vile thing that he did in being in this -place. It seemed to him that those armoured figures should grow animate -and descend and drive him out. Bela, then sleeping happily, dreaming -of the glories of his ride, had raised with his innocent words a -torturing spirit in his father's breast. What had he brought to this -haughty and chivalrous race?—the servile Slav, the barbaric Persian, -blood, and all the dishonour that their creed would hold the basest -upon earth. Besides, to lie to <i>her</i> children! Even the blue eyes -of the boy had made him embarrassed and humiliated, as if she were -judging him through her first-born's gaze. What would it be when that -child, grown to man's estate, should speak to him of his people, of his -forefathers?</p> - -<p>For the first time it occurred to him that these boys would inevitably, -as they grew older, ask him many questions, wish to know many things. -He could turn aside a child's inquisitive interest, but it would be -more painful, less easy, to refuse to supply a grown youth's legitimate -interrogations. All these children would some time or another make many -inquiries of him that his wife, out of delicate sympathy, never had -intruded upon him. The fallen fortunes of the Sabran race had always -seemed to her one of those blameless misfortunes for which the best -respect is shown by silence. But her sons would naturally, one day or -another, be more interested in learning more of those from whom they -were descended.</p> - -<p>The lie in reply would be easy and secure. There were all the -traditions and recollections of the Sabrans of Romaris to be gathered -from the tongues of the people in Finisterre, and the private papers -of their race which he possessed. He could answer well enough, but it -would be a lie, and a lie seemed to him now a disgrace? Before his -marriage he had looked on falsehood as a necessary part of the world's -furniture, but he had not lived all these years beside a noble nature, -to which even a prevarication was impossible, without growing ashamed -of his former laxities.</p> - -<p>'There is not a dead man amongst all those knights who bore these arms -that should not rise to punish and disown me!' he thought with poignant -hatred of his past.</p> - -<p>When he went to his room the impulse once more came over him to tell -his wife all; to throw himself on her mercy, and let her do the worst -she would; but he had a certain fear of her which acted like a spell on -that moral cowardice, which his Slav temperament and his hidden secret -combined to bind in a dead weight on the physical courage and natural -pride of his character.</p> - -<p>He resolved to do his uttermost as they grew older to rear his sons to -worthiness of that great race whose name they bore; to uproot in them -by all means in his power any falser or darker faults they might have -inherited from him. He promised himself so to watch over his own words -and deeds that as they grew to manhood they should find no palliative -or example of wrong-doing in his life. The closeness of his peril, the -folly of his dalliance with Olga Brancka, had left him distrustful -and diffident of his own powers to resist evil. He said to himself -that he would seek the world no more; his wife was happiest in her own -dominion, amidst her own people; he would court neither pleasure nor -ambition again. Here he had peace; here he loved and was beloved; here -he would abide, and let courts and cities hold those less blessed than -he.</p> - -<p>In the morning he awoke refreshed and tranquil; a beautiful sunrise was -tinging with rose the snows of the opposite Venediger peaks; the flush -of early autumn was upon the lower woods, but no snow had fallen even -on the mountains. The lake was deeply green as a laurel leaf, and its -waters rolled briskly under a strong breeze. It was a brilliant day for -the hills, and the <i>jägermeister</i> and his men were in waiting, for he -had arranged over night to go chamois-hunting on those steep alps and -glaciers which towered above the hindmost forests of Hohenszalras. He -did not very often give rein to his natural love of field sports, for -he knew that his wife liked to feel that the innocent creatures of the -mountains were safe wherever she ruled. But there was real sport to be -had here, with every variety of danger accompanying to excuse it, and -Otto and his men were proud of their lord's prowess and perseverance -on the high hills, and only sorrowed that he so often let his rifles -lie unused in the gun-room. He went out whilst the day was still red -and young, like a rose yet in bud, and climbed easily and willingly the -steep paths and precipitous slopes which led to the glaciers.</p> - -<p>'Count Bela wants sadly to come with us one of these days,' said Otto, -with a broad smile. 'He can use his crampons right manfully; will not -the Countess soon let me teach him to shoot?'</p> - -<p>'I think not willingly, Otto,' said Sabran. 'She thinks children's -hands are best free of bloodshed; and so do I. It can do a child no -good to see the dying agony of an innocent creature. Teach Herr Bela to -climb as much as you like, but leave powder and shot alone.'</p> - -<p>'I am sure the Herr Marquis himself must have been a line shot very -early?'</p> - -<p>'I was at a semi-military college,' said Sabran, thinking of those days -at the Lycée Clovis when he had sought the <i>salle d'armes</i> with such -eagerness, as being the scene of those lessons which would most surely -enable him to meet men as their equal or their master.</p> - -<p>'If only Count Bela might be taught to shoot at a mark?' said the old -huntsman, wistfully.</p> - -<p>'You know very well, Otto, that your lady decides everything for her -children, and that all her decisions I uphold,' said his master. 'Be -sure they are wiser than either yours or mine would be. She can teach -him herself, too; she can hit a running mark as well as you or I. Do -you remember the day when you arrested me in these woods?'</p> - -<p>'Ah, my lord!' said Otto, with a rolling oath; 'never can I pardon -myself, though you have so mercifully pardoned me!'</p> - -<p>'And my good rifle is still lying in the bed of the lake,' said Sabran, -glancing backward at the Szalrassee, now many hundred feet below them, -a mere green ribbon shining through the deeper green of fir and pine -woods.</p> - -<p>'Yes, my lord!' answered the man, cheerily. 'The good English rifle -indeed was lost; but it seems to me that the Herr Marquis did not make -wholly a bad exchange!'</p> - -<p>'No, indeed,' said his master, as he paused and looked down to where -the towers and spires of Hohenszalras glimmered like mere points of -glittering metal in the sunshine far below.</p> - -<p>They were now at the highest altitude at which <i>gemsbocks</i> are found, -and the business of the day commenced as they sighted what looked like -a mere brown speck against the greyness of the opposite glacier. Before -the day was done Sabran had shot to his own gun eight chamois on the -heights, and some score of ptarmigan and black-cock on the lower level. -He saw more than one <i>kuttengeier</i> and <i>lammergeier</i>, but, in deference -to the traditions of the Szalras, did not fire on them. The healthful -fatigue, the rarefied air, the buoyant exhilaration which comes with -the atmosphere of the great heights, made him feel happy, and gave -him back all his confidence in the present and the future. When he -rested on a ledge of rock, listening to Otto's hunter's tales, and -making a frugal meal of some hard biscuit and a draught of Voslauer, he -wondered at himself for having so recently been beguiled by the febrile -excitations of Paris, or having desired the fret and wear of a public -career. What could be better than this life was? To have sought to -leave it was folly and ingratitude. The peace and the calm of the great -mountains which she loved so well seemed to descend into his soul.</p> - -<p>It was twilight when they reached the lower slopes of the hills, -the jägers loaded with game, he and Otto walking in front of them. -From the still far-off islet oh the lake, and from the belfry of the -Schloss, the Ave Maria was chiming; the deep-toned bells of the latter -ringing the Emperor's Hymn.</p> - -<p>Talking gaily with Otto, with that frank kindliness which endeared him -to all these mountaineers, he approached the house slowly, fatigued -with the pleasant tire of a healthy and vigorous man after a long day's -pastime on the hills, and entered by a back entrance, which led through -the stables into the wing of the building where his own private rooms -were situated. He took his bath and dressed himself for the evening, -then went on his way across the vast house to the white salon, where -his wife and her aunt were usually to be found at the time of the -children's hour before dinner. With some words on his lips to claim her -praise for having spared the vultures, he pushed aside the <i>portière</i> -and entered, but the words died on his tongue, half spoken.</p> - -<p>His wife was there, but before the hearth, seated with her profile -turned towards him, also was Olga Brancka. His wife, who was standing, -came towards him.</p> - -<p>'My cousin Olga took us by surprise an hour ago. The telegram must have -missed us which she says she sent yesterday from Salzburg.'</p> - -<p>Her eyes had a cold gaze as she spoke; her sense of the duties of -hospitality and of high breeding had alone compelled her to give any -form of welcome to her guest. Madame Brancka, playing with a feather -screen, looked up with a little quiet self-satisfied smile.</p> - -<p>'Unexpected guests are the most welcome. When there is an old proverb, -pretty if musty, all ready made for you, Réné, why do you not repeat -it? I am truly sorry, though, that my telegram miscarried. I suspect it -comes from Wanda's old-fashioned prejudice against having a wire of her -own here from Lienz. I dare say they never send you half your messages.'</p> - -<p>Sabran had mechanically bowed over the hand she held out to him, but -he scarcely touched it with his own. He was deadly pale. The amazement -that her effrontery produced on him was stupefaction. Versed in the -ways of women and of the world though he was, he was speechless and -helpless before this incredible audacity. She looked at him, she -smiled, she spoke, like the most innocent and unconscious creature. -For a moment an impulse seized him to unmask her then and there, and -hound her out of his wife's presence; the next he knew that it was -impossible to do so. Men cannot betray women in that way, nor was he -even wholly free enough from blame himself to have the right to do so. -But an intense rage, the more intense because perforce mute, seized -him against this intruder by his hearth. Only to see her beside his -wife was an intolerable suffering and shame. When he recovered himself -a little, feeling his wife's gaze upon him, he said with some plain -incredulity in his contemptuous words:</p> - -<p>'The failure of messages is often caused by the senders of them; the -people are extremely careful at Lienz. I do not think the fault lies -<i>there.</i> We can, however, only regret the want of due warning, for the -reason that we can give no fit or flattering reception of an honoured -guest. You come from Paris?'</p> - -<p>For the first time a slight sudden flush rose upon Olga Brancka's -cheek, callous though she was. She felt the irony and the disdain. She -perceived that she had in him an inexorable foe, beyond all allurement -and all entreaty.</p> - -<p>'I passed by Paris,' she answered, easily enough. 'Of course I had to -see my tailors, like everyone else in September. I have been first to -Noissetiers, then to London, then to Homburg, then to Russia. I do not -know where I have not been since we met. And you good people have been -vegetating beneath your forests all that time? I was curious to come -and see you in your felicity. Hohenszalrasburg used to be called the -vulture's nest; it appears to have become a dove's!'</p> - -<p>'I spared a whole family of <i>lammergeier</i> to-day in deference to your -forest law,' he said, turning to his wife, whilst to himself he thought -what a far worse beast of prey was sitting here, smoothing her glossy -feathers in the warmth of his own hearth. She noticed the extreme -pallor of his face, the sound of anger and emotion forcibly restrained; -she imagined something of what he felt, though she could guess neither -its intensity nor its extent. She had done herself violence in meeting -with courtesy and tranquillity the woman who now sat between them, but -she could not measure or imagine the guilt and the audacity of her.</p> - -<p>When, that evening, as twilight came on, she had heard the sound of -wheels beneath the terraces, and in a little while had been informed -by Hubert that the Countess Brancka had arrived, her first movement -had been to refuse to receive her, her next to remember that to one -who had been Gela's wife, and now was Stefan Brancka's, the doors of -Hohenszalras could not be shut without an open quarrel and scandal, -which would regale the world and make feud inevitable between her -husband and the whole race of Vàsàrhely. The Vàsàrhely knew the -worthlessness of Stefan's wife, but for the honour of their name they -would never admit that they did so; they would never fail to defend -her. Moreover, hospitality of a high and antique type had always been -the first of obligations upon all those whom she descended from and -represented. They would not have refused to harbour their worst foe -if he had demanded asylum. They would not have turned away sovereign -or beggar from their gates. Those days were gone, indeed, but their -high and generous temper lived in her. In the brief space in which -Hubert, having made the announcement, waited for her commands, she -had struggled with her own repugnance and conquered it. She had told -herself that to turn Stefan's wife from her doors would be the mere -vulgar melodrama of a common and undignified anger. After all she knew -nothing; therefore she traversed the house to receive her unasked -guest, and gave her welcome without any pretence of cordiality or -friendship, but with a perfect and unhesitating politeness void of all -offence.</p> - -<p>She was thankful that the Princess Ottilie was again in the south of -France with her sister-in-law of Lilienhöhe, so that her indignation, -her interrogation, and her quick regard were spared to them. Now that -her niece was no longer alone, the Princess did not think it her -bounden duty to endure these northern winds, blowing from Poland and -the Baltic over the old duchy of Austria, which she had at all times so -peculiarly detested, though she had been born a thousand miles nearer -the Baltic herself.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka had been profuse in her apologies and expressions of -regret, but she had at once let her carriage, hired at S. Johann, with -its four post-horses changed at Matrey, be taken to the stables, and -had gone herself to her old apartments, where in little time her two -maids had altered her heavy furs and travelling clothes to the costume -of consummate simplicity and elegance in which she now sat, putting -forth her small feet in rose satin shoes to the warmth from the great -Hirschvogel stove, which, with its burnished and enamelled colour, -illumined one side of the white salon.</p> - -<p>Sabran and his wife both remained standing, he leaning his arm on the -scroll work of the great stove, she playing with the delicate ears of -one of the hounds. Madame Brancka alone sat and leaned back in her -low seat, quite content; she was aware that she was unwelcome, and -that her presence was an embarrassment and worse. But the sense of -the wrong and cruel position in which she placed them was sweet and -pungent to her; she was refreshed by the very sense of dilemma and of -danger which surrounded her. She had her vengeance in her hand, and -she would not exhaust it quickly, but tasted its savour with the slow -care and patient appetite of the connoisseur in such things. She had a -Chinese-like skill in patiently drawing out the prolonged pangs of an -ingeniously invented martyrdom.</p> - -<p>'Why do you both stand?' she said, looking up at him between her -half-closed lids. 'Are you standing to imply to me as we do with -monarchs, 'This house is yours whilst you are in it?' I am much -obliged, but I should sell it at once if it were really mine. It is a -splendid, barbaric solitude, like Taróc. We have not been to Taróc this -year. Stefan says Egon lives altogether with his troopers and grows -very morose. You hear from him sometimes, I suppose?'</p> - -<p>To Sabran it seemed as if her half shut black eyes shot forth actual -sparks of fire, as she spoke the name which he could never hear without -an inward spasm of fear.</p> - -<p>'Of course I hear from Egon,' said his wife. 'But he writes very -briefly; he was never much of a penman. He prefers a rifle, a sword, a -riding-whip.'</p> - -<p>'I hear you have called the last child after him? Where are the boys? -They cannot be in bed. Let me see them. It is surely their hour to be -here. Réné, ring, and send for them.'</p> - -<p>His brow contracted.</p> - -<p>'No; it is late,' he said abruptly. 'They would only weary you; they -are barbaric, like the house.'</p> - -<p>He felt an extreme reluctance to bring his children into her presence, -to see her speak to them, touch them; he was longing passionately to -seize her and thrust her out of the doors. As she sat there in the full -light of the many wax candles burning around, sparkling, imperturbable, -like a coquette of a vaudeville, with her rose satin, and her white -taffetas, and her lace ruff, and her pink coral necklace and ear-rings, -and a little pink coral hand upholding her curls in the most studied -disorder, she seemed to him the loath-liest thing that he had ever -seen. He hated her more intensely than he had ever hated anyone in all -his life; even more than he had hated the traitress who had sold him to -the Prussians.</p> - -<p>'Pray let me see the children; I know you never dine till eight,' -she was persisting to his wife, who knew well that she was entirely -indifferent to the children, but who was not unwilling for their -entrance to break the constraint of what was to her an intolerable -trial. She did ring, and ordered their presence. They soon came, -making their obeisances with the pretty grave courtliness which they -were taught from infancy; the boys in white velvet dresses, while their -sister, in a frock of old Venetian point, looked like a Stuart child -painted by Vandyck.</p> - -<p>'<i>Ah, quels amours!</i>' cried Olga Brancka, with admirable effusion, as -they kissed her hand. Sabran turned away abruptly, and muttering a -word as to some orders he had to give the stud-groom, left the chamber -without ceremony, as she, with an ardour wholly unknown to her own -daughters, lifted the little Ottilie on her knee and kissed the child's -rose-leaf cheek.</p> - -<p>'What lovely creatures they are,' she said in German; 'and how they -have grown since they left Paris. They are all the image of Réné; he -must be very proud. They have all his eyes—those deep dark-blue eyes, -like jewels, like the depths of the sea.'</p> - -<p>'You are very poetic,' said Wanda; 'but I should be glad if you would -speak their praises in some tongue they do not understand. The boys may -not be hurt; but Lili, as we call her, is a little vain already, though -she is so young.'</p> - -<p>'Would you deny her the birthright of her sex?' said Madame Brancka, -clasping her coral necklace round the child's throat. 'Surely she will -have lectures enough from her godmother against all feminine foibles. -By the way, where is the Princess?'</p> - -<p>'My aunt is with the Lilienhöhe.'</p> - -<p>'I am grieved not to have the pleasure,' murmured Madame Brancka, -indifferently, letting Ottilie glide from her lap.</p> - -<p>'Give back the necklace, <i>liebling</i>,' said Wanda, as she unclasped it.</p> - -<p>'No, no; I entreat you—let her keep it. It is leagues too large, but -she likes it, and when she grows up she will wear it and think of me.'</p> - -<p>'Pray take it,' said Wanda, lifting it from the child's little breast. -'You are too kind; but they must not be given what they admire. It -teaches them bad habits.'</p> - -<p>'What severe rules!' cried Madame Brancka. 'Are these poor babies -brought up on S. Chrysostom and S. Basil? Is Lili already doomed to the -cloister? You are too austere; you should have been an abbess instead -of having all these golden-curled cupidons about you. Where is the -youngest one, Egon's namesake?'</p> - -<p>'He is in his cot,' said Gela, who was always very direct in his -replies, and who found himself addressed by her.</p> - -<p>Meantime Bela took hold of his mother's hand and whispered to her, -'<i>Mütterchen</i>, she is rude to you. Send her away.'</p> - -<p>'My darling,' answered Wanda, 'when people laugh in our own house we -must let them do it, even if it be at ourselves. And, Bela, to whisper -is <i>very</i> rude.'</p> - -<p>'Egon is so little,' continued Gela, plaintively. 'He cannot read; I do -not think he ever will read!'</p> - -<p>'But you could not when you were as small as he?'</p> - -<p>'Could I not?' said Gela, doubtfully, to whom that time seemed many -centuries back.</p> - -<p>'And Lili, can she read?' said Madame Olga, suppressing a yawn.</p> - -<p>'Oh yes,' said Gela; 'at least, two-letter words she can; and me, I -read to her.'</p> - -<p>'What model children!' cried Madame Brancka, with a little laugh. 'And -the naughty boy who was in a rage because he was not permitted to go to -Chantilly? That was Bela, was it not? Bela, do you remember how cruel -your mother was, and how you cried?'</p> - -<p>Bela looked at her, with his blue eyes growing as stern and cold as his -father's.</p> - -<p>'My mother is always right,' he said gallantly. 'She knows what I ought -to do. I do not think I cried, <i>meine gnädige Frau</i>; I never cry.'</p> - -<p>'Even the naughty boy has become an angel! What a wonderful -disciplinarian you are, Wanda! If your children were not so handsome -they would be insufferable with their goodness. They are very handsome; -they are just like Sabran, and yet they are not at all a Russian type.'</p> - -<p>'Why should they be Russian? We have no Russian blood,' said their -mother, in surprise.</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka laughed a little confusedly, and fluttered her feather -screen.</p> - -<p>'I do not know what I was thinking of. Réné always reminds me of my old -friend Paul Zabaroff; they are very alike.'</p> - -<p>'I have seen the present Prince Zabaroff,' said Wanda, wondering what -the purpose of her guest's words were. 'He was not, as I remember him, -much like M. de Sabran.'</p> - -<p>'Oh, of course he was not equal to your Apollo,' said Madame Brancka, -winding Ottilie's long hair round her fingers.</p> - -<p>'You have had enough of them; they must not worry you,' said their -mother, and she dismissed the children with a word.</p> - -<p>'In what marvellous control you keep them,' said Madame Olga. 'Now, my -children never obeyed me, let me scream at them as I would.'</p> - -<p>'I do not think screaming has much effect on anyone, young or old.'</p> - -<p>'It paralyses a man. But I suppose a child can always out-scream one?'</p> - -<p>'Probably. A child never respects any person who loses their calmness. -As for men, you are better versed in their follies than I.'</p> - -<p>'But do you and Réné absolutely never quarrel?'</p> - -<p>'Quarrel! My dear Olga, how very <i>bürgerlich</i> an idea.'</p> - -<p>'Do you suppose only the bourgeois quarrel?' said Madame Brancka. -'Really you live in your enchanted forest until you forget what the -world is like,' and she began an interminable history of the scenes -between a friend of hers and her husband and her family, a quarrel -which had ended in <i>conseils judiciaires</i> and separation. 'It is a -cruel thing that there is not one law of divorce for all the world,' -she said with a sigh, as she ended the unsavoury relation. 'If Stefan -and I could only set each other free, we should have done it years and -years ago.'</p> - -<p>'I did not know your griefs against Stefan were so great?'</p> - -<p>'Oh, I have no great griefs against him; he is <i>bon enfant</i>: but we -are both ruined, and we both detest each other; we do not know very -well why.'</p> - -<p>'Poor Mila and Marie!'</p> - -<p>'What has it to do with them? They are happy at Sacré Cœur, and -when they come out they will marry. Egon will be sure to portion them; -we cannot. We are not like you, who will be able to give a couple of -millions to Lili without hurting her brothers.'</p> - -<p>'Lili's <i>dot</i> is far enough in the future,' said Lili's mother, who, -very weary of the conversation, saw with relief the doors open, and -heard Hubert announce that dinner could be served. By an opposite door -Sabran entered also, a moment later. The dinner was tedious to both him -and her; they alike found it an almost intolerable penance. Their guest -alone was gay, ironical, at her ease, and never at a loss for a topic. -Sabran looked at her now and then with absolute wonder coming over -him as to whether he had not dreamed of that evening in Paris, alone -beside her, with the smell of the jasmine and orange-buds, and the -moonbeams crossing her white throat, her auburn curls. Was it possible -that a woman lived with such incredible self-control, insolence, -shamelessness? There was not a shadow of consciousness in her regard, -not a moment of uneasiness in her manner. Except the one passing faint -flush which had come on her face at his words of greeting, there was -not a single sign that she was other than the most innocent of women. -The impatience, the disgust, the amazement which were in him were too -strong for his worldly tact and composure altogether to conquer them; -his eyes were downcast, his words were studied or irrelevant, his -discomposure was evident; he felt as reluctant to meet the gaze of his -wife as of his enemy. In vain did he endeavour to sustain equably the -airy nothings of the usual dinner-table conversation. He was sensible -of an effort too great for art to cover it; he felt that there was a -strange sound in his voice, he fancied the very men waiting upon him -must be conscious of his embarrassment. If he could have turned her out -of the house he would have been at peace, for, after all, her offences -were much greater than his own; but to be compelled to sit motionless -whilst she called his wife caressing names, broke her bread, and would -sleep under her roof, was absolute torture to him.</p> - -<p>When they went back again to the white room he sat down at the piano, -glad to find a temporary refuge in music from the embarrassment of her -presence.</p> - -<p>'He cannot have spoken to Wanda?' she thought, uneasy for the first -time, as she glanced at Sabran, who was playing with his usual -<i>maestria</i> a concerto of Schubert's. With the plea that her long post -journey had fatigued her, she asked leave to retire when half an hour -had elapsed, filled with scientific and intricate melody, which had -spared them the effort of further conversation. Her host and hostess -accompanied her to the guest-chambers, with the courtesy which was an -antique custom of the Schloss, as of all Austrian country-houses. Their -leave-taking on the threshold was cold, but studied in politeness; the -door closed on her, and Sabran and his wife returned along the corridor -together.</p> - -<p>His heart beat heavily with apprehension: he dreaded her next word. To -his relief, to his surprise, she said simply to him:</p> - -<p>'It is very early. I will go and write to Rothwand about the mines. -Will you come and tell me again all you said about them? I have half -forgotten. Or if you would rather do nothing to-night, I have other -letters to look over, and I will go to my own room.'</p> - -<p>'I will come there,' he said; and though he was well used to her -strong self-control and forbearance, he felt amazed at the force -of these now, and was moved to a passionate gratitude. 'Any other -woman,' he thought, 'would have torn me asunder to know what there has -been between me and her guest. She does not even speak; and yet God -knows how she loves me! She trusts me, and she will not weary me, nor -importune me, nor seem to suspect me with doubt. Who shall be worthy of -that? How can I rid her house of this insult? The other shall go; she -shall go if I put her out with public shame before my servants. Would -to heaven that to kill such as she is were no more murder than to slay -a vicious beast or a poisonous worm!'</p> - -<p>He followed his wife into the octagon-room, where all her private -papers were. There were details of a mine in Galicia which were -disquieting and troublesome; on the previous day they had agreed -together what to do, but before she had answered her inspector, -fresh details had come in by the post-bag, whilst he had been -chamois-hunting. She sat down and handed him these fresh reports.</p> - -<p>'I do not think there is anything that will alter your decisions,' she -said. 'But read them, and tell me, and I will then write.'</p> - -<p>He drew the documents from her, and began to peruse them, but his hand -shook a little as he held the papers; his eyes were not clear, his mind -was not free. He laid them down and looked at her; she was seated near -him. She was paler than usual and her face was grave, but she seemed -quite absorbed in what she did, as she added figures together, and made -a quick <i>précis</i> of the reports she had received. Her left hand lay on -the table as she wrote; on the great diamond of the <i>bague d'alliance</i>, -the only gift which he had presumed to offer her on their marriage, the -light was sparkling; it looked like a cluster of dewdrops on a lily. He -took that hand on a sudden impulse of infinite reverence, and raised it -to his lips.</p> - -<p>She looked at him, and a mist of tears came into her eyes which were -tears of pleasure, of relief, of restrained emotion comforted; the -gesture gave her all the reassurance that she cared, to have; she was -sure then that Olga Brancka had never made him false to his honour and -hers. She said nothing to him of what was foremost in the minds of -both. She held the value of silence high. She thought that there were -things of which merely to speak seemed a species of dishonour. A single -word ill-said is so often the 'little rift within the lute which makes -the music dumb.'</p> - -<p>She went to rest content; but he was none the less ill at ease, -disturbed, offended, and violently offended, at the presence of his -temptress under the roof of Hohenszalras. It was an outrage to all he -loved and respected; an outrage to which he was determined to put an -end. The only possible way to do so was to see his guest himself alone. -He could not visit her in her apartments; he could not summon her to -his; if he waited for chance, he might wait for days. The insolence -which had brought her here would probably, he reasoned, keep her here -some time, and he was resolved that she should not pass another night -in the same house with his wife and his children.</p> - -<p>Long after Wanda had gone to sleep he sat alone, thinking and -perplexing himself with many a scheme, each of which he dismissed as -impracticable and likely to draw that attention from his household -which he most desired to avoid. He slept ill, scarcely at all, and rose -before daybreak. When he was dressed he sent his man to ask Greswold to -come to him. The old physician, who usually got up before the sun, soon -obeyed his summons, and anxiously inquired what need there was of him.</p> - -<p>'Dear Professor,' said Sabran, with that gracious kindliness which -always won his listener's heart, 'you were my earliest friend here; you -are the tutor of my sons; you are an old man, a wise man, and a prudent -man. I want you to understand something without my explaining it; I do -not desire or intend the Countess Brancka to be the guest of my wife -for another day.'</p> - -<p>Greswold looked up quickly: he knew the character of Stefan Brancka's -wife, he guessed the rest.</p> - -<p>'What can I do?' he said simply. 'Pray command me.'</p> - -<p>'Do this,' said Sabran. 'Make some excuse to see her; say that the -chaplain, or that my wife, has sent you, say anything you choose to get -admitted to her rooms in the visitors' gallery. When you see her alone, -say to her frankly, brutally if you like, that <i>I</i> say she must leave -Hohenszalras. She can make any excuse she pleases, invent any despatch -to recall herself; but she must go. I do not pretend to put any gloss -upon it; I do not wish to do so. I want her to know that I do not -permit her to remain under the same roof with my wife.'</p> - -<p>The old physician's face grew grave and troubled; he foresaw difficulty -and pain for those whom he loved, and to whom he owed his bread.</p> - -<p>'I am to give her no explanation?' he said doubtfully.</p> - -<p>'She will need none,' said Sabran, curtly.</p> - -<p>Greswold was mute. After a pause of some moments he said with -hesitation:</p> - -<p>'By all I have heard of the Countess Brancka, I am much afraid she will -not be moved by such a message, delivered by anyone so insignificant -as myself; but what you desire me to do I will do, only I pray you do -not blame me if I fail. You are, of course, indifferent to her certain -indignation, to her possible violence?'</p> - -<p>'I am indifferent to everything,' said Sabran, with rising impatience, -'except to the outrage which her presence here is to the Countess von -Szalras.'</p> - -<p>'Allow me one question, my Marquis,' said Greswold. 'Is our lady, your -wife, aware that the presence of her cousin's wife is an indignity to -herself?'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated.</p> - -<p>'Yes and no,' he answered at last. 'She knew something in Paris, but -she does not know or imagine all, nor a tithe part; of what Madame -Brancka is.'</p> - -<p>'I go at once,' said the old man, without more words, 'though of course -the lady will not be awake for some hours. I will ask to see her -maids. I shall learn then when I can with any chance of success get -admittance. You will not write a word by me? Would it not offend her -less?'</p> - -<p>'I desire to offend her,' said Sabran, with a vibration of intense -passion in his voice. 'No; I will not write to her. She is a woman who -has studied Talleyrand; she would hang you if she had a single line -from your pen. If I wrote, God knows what evil she would not twist out -of it. She hates me and she hates my wife. It must be war to the knife.'</p> - -<p>Greswold bowed and went out, asking no more.</p> - -<p>Sabran passed the next three hours in a state of almost uncontrollable -impatience.</p> - -<p>It was the pleasant custom at Hohenszalras for everyone to have their -first meal in their own apartments at any hour that they chose, but he -and Wanda usually breakfasted together by choice in the little Saxe -room, when the weather was cold. The cold without made the fire-glow -dancing on the embroidered roses, and the gay Watteau panels, and -the carpet of lamb-skins, and the coquettish Meissen shepherds and -shepherdesses, seem all the warmer and more cheerful by contrast. Here -he had been received on the first morning of his visit to Hohenszalras; -here they had breakfasted in the early days after their marriage; here -they had a thousand happy memories.</p> - -<p>Into that room he could not go this morning. He sent his valet with -a message to his wife, saying that he would remain in his own room, -being fatigued from the sport of the previous day. When they brought -him his breakfast he could not touch it. He drank a little strong -coffee and a great glass of iced water; he could take nothing else. He -paced up and down his own chambers in almost unendurable suspense. If -he had been wholly innocent he would have been less agitated; but he -could not pardon himself the mad imprudences and follies with which he -had pandered to the vanities and provoked the passions of this hateful -woman. If she refused to go he almost resolved to tell all as it had -passed to his wife, not sparing himself. The three or four hours that -went by after Greswold had left him appeared to him like whole, long, -tedious days.</p> - -<p>The men came as usual to him for his orders as to horses, sport, or -other matters, but he could not attend to them; he hardly even heard -what they said, and dismissed them impatiently. When at last the heavy, -slow tread of the old physician sounded in the corridor, he went -eagerly to his door, and himself admitted Greswold.</p> - -<p>The Professor spread out his hands with a deprecating gesture.</p> - -<p>'I have done my best. But may I never pass such a quarter of an hour -again! She will not go.'</p> - -<p>'She will not?' Sabran's face flushed darkly, his eyes kindled with -deep wrath. 'She defies me, then?'</p> - -<p>'She evidently deems herself strong enough to defy you. She laughed -at me; she spoke to me as though I were one of the scullions or the -sweepers; she menaced me as if we were still in the Middle Ages. In a -word, she is not to be moved by me. She bade me tell you that if you -wish her out of your wife's house you must have the courage to say so -yourself.'</p> - -<p>'Courage!' echoed Sabran. 'It is not courage that will be any match -for her; it is not courage that will rid one of her; she knows the -difficulty in which I am. I cannot betray her to her husband. No man -can ever do that. I cannot risk a quarrel, a scandal, a duel with the -relatives of my wife. I cannot put her out of the house as I might do -if she had no relationship with the Vàsàrhely and the Szalras. She -knows that; she relies upon it.'</p> - -<p>'My lord,' said the physician very gently, 'will you pardon me one -question? Is the offence done to the Countess von Szalras by Madame -Brancka altogether on her side? Are you wholly (pardon me the word) -blameless?'</p> - -<p>'Not altogether,' said Sabran, frankly, with a deep colour on his face. -'I have been culpable of folly, but in the sense you mean I have been -quite guiltless. If I had been guilty in that sense, I would not have -returned to Hohenszalras!'</p> - -<p>'I thank you for so much confidence in me,' said Greswold. 'I only -wanted to know so far, because I would suggest that you should send -for Prince Egon and simply tell him as much as you have told me. Egon -Vàsàrhely is the soul of honour, and he has great authority over the -members of his own family. He will make his sister-in-law leave here -without any scandal.'</p> - -<p>'There are reasons why I cannot take Prince Vàsàrhely into my -confidence in this matter,' said Sabran, with hesitation. 'That is not -to be thought of for a moment. Is there no other way?'</p> - -<p>'See her yourself. She imagines you will not, perhaps she thinks you -dare not, say these things to her yourself.'</p> - -<p>'See her alone? What will my wife suppose?'</p> - -<p>'Would it not be better frankly to say to my lady that you have need -to see her so? Pardon me, my dear lord, but I am quite sure that the -straight way is the best to take with our Countess Wanda. The only -thing which she might very bitterly resent, which she might perhaps -never forgive, would be concealment, insincerity, want of good faith. -If you will allow me to counsel you, I would most strongly advocate -your saying honestly to her that you know that of Madame Brancka which -makes you hold her an unfit guest here, and that you are about to see -that lady alone to induce her to leave the castle without open rupture.'</p> - -<p>Sabran listened, stung sharply in his conscience by every one of the -simple and honest words. When Greswold spoke of his wife as ready to -pardon any offences except those of falseness and concealment his soul -shrank as the flesh shrinks from the touch of caustic.</p> - -<p>'You are right,' he said with effort. 'But, my dear Greswold, though -I am not absolutely guilty, as you were led for a moment to think, I -am not altogether absolutely blameless. I was sensible of the fatal -attraction of an unscrupulous person. I was never faithless to my wife, -either in spirit or act, but you know there are miserable sensual -temptations which counterfeit passion, though they do not possess it; -there are unspeakable follies from which men at no age are safe. I -do not wish to be a coward like the father of mankind, and throw the -blame upon a woman; but it is certain that the old answer is often -still the true one, "The woman tempted me." I am not wholly innocent; -I played with fire and was surprised, like an idiot, when it burnt me. -I would say as much as this to my wife (and it is the whole truth) if -it were only myself who would be hurt or lowered by the telling of it; -but I cannot do her such dishonour as I should seem to do by the mere -relation of it. She esteems me as so much stronger and wiser than I am; -she has so very noble an ideal of me; how can I pull all that down with -my own hands, and say to her, "I am as weak and unstable as any one of -them"?'</p> - -<p>Greswold listened and smiled a little.</p> - -<p>'Perhaps the Countess knows more than you think, dear sir; she is -capable of immense self-control, and her feeling for you is not the -ordinary selfish love of ordinary women. If I were you I should tell -her everything. Speak to her as you speak to me.'</p> - -<p>'I cannot!'</p> - -<p>'That is for you to judge, sir,' said the old physician.</p> - -<p>'I cannot!' repeated Sabran, with a look of infinite distress. 'I -cannot tell my wife that any other woman has had influence over me, -even for five seconds. I think it is S. Augustine who says that it is -possible, in the endeavour to be truthful, to convey an entirely false -impression. An utterly false impression would be conveyed to her if I -made her suppose that any other than herself had ever been loved by me -in any measure since my marriage; and how should one make such a mind -as hers comprehend all the baseness and fever and folly of a man's mere -caprice of the senses? It would be impossible.'</p> - -<p>Greswold was silent.</p> - -<p>'You do not see how difficult even such a confession as that would be,' -Sabran insisted, with irritation. 'Were you in my place you would feel -as I feel.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps,' said Greswold. 'But I believe not. I believe, sir, that you -underrate the knowledge of the world and of humanity which the Countess -von Szalras possesses, and that you also underrate the extent of her -sympathy and the elasticity of her pardon.'</p> - -<p>Sabran sighed restlessly.</p> - -<p>'I do not know what to do. One thing only I know—the wife of Stefan -Brancka shall not remain here.'</p> - -<p>'Then, sir, you must be the one to say so or to write it. She will heed -no one except yourself. Perhaps it is natural. I am nothing more in the -sight of a great lady like that than Hubert or Otto would be. She does -not think I am of fit station to go to her as your ambassador.'</p> - -<p>'You would disown her if she were your daughter!' said Sabran, with -bitter contempt. 'Well, I will see her; I will say a word to the -Countess von Szalras first.'</p> - -<p>'Say all,' suggested Greswold.</p> - -<p>Sabran shook his head and passed quickly through the suite of sleeping -and dressing chambers to the little Saxe salon, where he thought it -possible that Wanda might still be. He found her there alone. She had -opened one of the casements and was speaking with a gardener. The -autumnal scent of wet earth and fallen leaves came into the room; the -air without was cold, but sunbeams were piercing the mist; the darkness -of the cedars and the yews made the airy and brilliant grace of the -eighteenth-century room seem all the brighter. She herself, in a sacque -of brocaded silk, with quantities of old French lace falling down it, -seemed of the time of those gracious ladies that were painted on the -panels. She turned as she heard his step, a red rose in her fingers -which she had just gathered from the boughs about the windows.</p> - -<p>'The last rose of the year, I am afraid, for I never count those of the -hothouses,' she said, as she brought it to him.</p> - -<p>He kissed her hand as he took it from her; he suddenly perceived the -expression of distress and of preoccupation on his face.</p> - -<p>'Is there anything the matter?' she asked; 'did you overstrain yourself -yesterday on the hills?'</p> - -<p>'No, no,' he said quickly; then added, with hesitation: 'Wanda, I have -to see Madame Brancka alone this morning. Will you be angered, or will -you trust me?'</p> - -<p>For a moment her eyebrows drew together, and the haughtier, colder look -that he dreaded came on her face; the look which came there when her -children disobeyed or her stewards offended her, The look which told -how, beneath the womanly sweetness and serenity of her temper, were the -imperious habit and the instincts of authority inherited from centuries -of dominant nobility. In another instant or two she had controlled her -impulse of displeasure. She said gravely, but very gently:</p> - -<p>'Of course I trust you. You know best what you wish, what you are -called on to do. Never think that you need give explanation, or ask -permission to or of me. That is not the man's part in marriage.'</p> - -<p>'But I would not have you suspect—'</p> - -<p>'I never suspect,' she said, more haughtily. 'Suspicion degrades -two people. Listen, my love. In Paris I saw, I heard more than you -thought. The world never leaves one in ignorance or in peace. I neither -suspected you nor spied upon you. I left you free. You returned to me, -and I knew then that I had done wisely. I could never comprehend the -passion and pleasure that some women take in hawks only kept by a hood, -in hounds only held by a leash. What is allegiance worth unless it be -voluntary? For the rest, if the wife of my cousin be a worse woman than -I think, do not tell me so. I do not desire to know it. She was the -idol of my dead brother's youth; she once entered this house as his -bride. Her honour is ours.'</p> - -<p>A flush passed over her husband's face. 'You are the noblest woman that -lives,' he said, in a hushed and reverent voice. He stooped almost -timidly and kissed her; then he bowed very low, as though she were a -queen and he her courtier, and left her.</p> - -<p>'That devil shall leave her house before another night is down!' he -said in his own thoughts, as he took his way across the great building -to Olga Brancka's apartments. He had the red autumn rose, she had -gathered in his hand as he went. Instinctively he slipped it within -his coat as he drew near the doors of the guests' corridor; it was too -sacred for him to have it made the subject of sneer or of a smile.</p> - -<p>Wanda remained in the little Watteau room. A certain sense of fear—a -thing so unfamiliar, so almost unknown to her—came upon her as the -flowered satin of the door-hangings fell behind him, and his steps -passed away down the passages without. The bright pictured panels of -the shepherds in court suits, and the milkmaids in hoops and paniers, -smiling amidst the sunny landscapes of their artificial Arcadia; the -gay and courtly figures of the Meissen china, and the huge bowls filled -with the gorgeous deep-hued flowers of the autumn season; the singing -of a little wren perched on a branch of a yew, the distant trot of -ponies' feet as the children rode along the unseen avenues, the happy -barking of dogs that were going with them, the smell of wet grass -and of leaves freshly dropped, the swish of a gardener's birch-broom -sweeping the turf beneath the cedars—all these remained on her mind -for ever afterwards, with that cruel distinctness which always paints -the scene of our last happy hours in such undying colours on the memory -of the brain. She never, from that day, willingly entered the pretty -chamber, with its air of coquetry and stateliness, and its little gay -court of porcelain people. She had gathered there the last rose of the -year.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXIII">CHAPTER XXXIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>He was so passionately angered against the invader of his domestic -peace, he was so profoundly touched by the nobility and faith of -his wife, that he went to Olga Brancka's presence without fear or -hesitation, possessed only by a man's natural and honest indignation at -an insult passed upon what he most venerated upon earth.</p> - -<p>One of his own servants, who was seated in the corridor, in readiness -for the Countess Brancka's orders, flung wide the door which opened -into the vestibule of the suite of guest-chambers allotted to this most -hated guest, and said to his master:</p> - -<p>'The most noble lady bade me say that she waited for your Excellency.'</p> - -<p>'The brazen wretch!' murmured Sabran, as he crossed the ante-chamber, -and entered the small saloon adjoining it; a room hung with Flemish -tapestries, and looking out on the Szalrassee.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka was seated in one of the long low tapestried chairs; she -did not move or speak as he approached; she only looked up with a smile -in her eyes. He wished she would have risen in fury; it would have -made his errand easier. It was difficult to say to her in cold blood -that which he had to say. But he loathed her so utterly as he saw her -indolent and graceful posture, and the calm smile in her eyes, that he -was indifferent how he should hurt her, what outrage he should offer -to her. He went straight up to where she sat, and without any preface -said, almost brutally:</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka, you affected not to understand my message through -Greswold; you will not misunderstand me now when I repeat that you must -leave the house of my wife before another night.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, with nonchalance, moving the Indian bangles on -her wrist, and gazing calmly into the air. 'I am to leave the house of -your wife—of my cousin, who was once my sister-in-law? And will you -tell me why?'</p> - -<p>Sabran flushed with passion.</p> - -<p>'You have a short memory, I believe, Countess; at least your lovers -have said so in Paris,' he answered recklessly. 'But I think if your -remembrance could carry you back to the last evening I had the honour -to see you in your hotel, you will not force me to the brutality and -coarseness of further explanation.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' she said tranquilly once more, in an unvaried tone, clasping her -hands behind her head and leaning both backward against the cushions -of her chair, whilst her eyes still smiled with an abstracted gaze. -'How scrupulous you are about trifles. Why not about great things, -my friend? What does Holy Writ tell us? One strains at a gnat and -swallows a camel. I have heard a professor of Hebrew say that the Latin -translation is not correct, but——'</p> - -<p>'Madame,' said Sabran sternly, controlling his rage with difficulty, -'pardon me, but I can have no trifling. I give you time and occasion to -make any excuses that you please; but once for all, you will leave here -before nightfall.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, for the third time; 'and if I do not choose to -comply with your desire, how do you intend to enforce it?'</p> - -<p>'That will be my affair.'</p> - -<p>'You will make a scene with my husband? That will be theatrical and -useless. Stefan is one of those men who are always swearing at their -wives in private, but in public never admit that their wives are -otherwise than saints. Those men do not mind being cheated, but they -will never let others say that they are so: <i>amour-propre d'homme.</i>'</p> - -<p>Sabran could have struck her. He reined in his wrath with more -difficulty every moment.</p> - -<p>'I have no doubt your psychology is correct, and has taught you all the -weaknesses of our idiotic sex,' he said bitterly. 'But you must pardon -me if I cannot spare time to listen to your experiences. The Countess -von Szalras is aware that I have come to visit you, and I tell you -frankly that I will not stay more than ten minutes in your rooms.'</p> - -<p>'You have told her?'</p> - -<p>A wicked gleam flashed from under her half-shut eyelids.</p> - -<p>'I would have told her—told her all,' said Sabran, 'but she stopped -me with my words unspoken. What think you she said, madame, of you, -who are the vilest enemy, the only enemy, she has? That if you had -graver faults than she knew she wished not to hear them. You were her -relative, and once had been her brother's wife.'</p> - -<p>His voice had sternness and strong emotion in it. He looked to see her -touched to some shame, some humiliation. But she only laughed a little -languidly, not changing her attitude.</p> - -<p>'Poor Wanda!' she said softly, 'she was always so exaggerated—so -terribly <i>moyen âge</i> and heroic!'</p> - -<p>The veins swelled on his forehead with his endeavour to keep down his -rage. He did not wish to honour this woman by bringing his wife's name -into their contention, and he strove not to forget the sex of his -antagonist.</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka,' he said, with a coldness and calmness which it cost -him hard to preserve, 'this conversation is of no use that I can see. -I came to tell you a hard fact—simply this, that you must leave -Hohenszalras within the next few hours. As the master of this house, I -insist on it.'</p> - -<p>'But how will you accomplish it?'</p> - -<p>'I will compel you to go,' said Sabran, between his teeth, 'if I -disgrace you publicly before all my household. The fault will not be -mine. I have endeavoured to spare you; but if you be so dead to all -feeling and decency as to think it possible that the same roof can -shelter you and my wife, I must undeceive you, however roughly.'</p> - -<p>She heard him patiently and smiled a little. 'Disgrace <i>me?</i>' she -echoed gently. 'Count Brancka will kill you.'</p> - -<p>Sabran signified by a gesture that the possibility was profoundly -indifferent to him. He turned to leave her.</p> - -<p>'Understand me plainly,' he said, as he moved away. 'I leave it at -your option to invent any summons, any excuse, as your reason for -your departure; but if you do not announce your departure for this -afternoon, I shall do what I have said. I have the honour to wish you -good-morning.'</p> - -<p>'Wait a moment,' said Madame Brancka, still very softly. 'Are you -judicious to make an enemy of me?'</p> - -<p>'I much prefer you as an enemy,' said Sabran, curtly; and he added, -with contemptuous irony, 'your friendship is far more perilous than -your animosity; your compliments are like the Borgia's banquets.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, once again, 'you are ungrateful like all -men, and you are not very wise either. You forget that I am the -sister-in-law of Egon Vàsàrhely.'</p> - -<p>Sabran could never hear that name mentioned without a certain inward -tremor, a self-consciousness which he could not entirely conceal. But -he was infuriated, and he answered with reckless scorn:</p> - -<p>'Prince Vàsàrhely is a man of honour. He would disown you if he knew -that you offer yourself with the shamelessness of a <i>déclassée</i>, and -that you outrage a noble and unsuspecting woman, by forcing yourself -into her home when you have failed in tempting her husband to offer her -the last dishonour.'</p> - -<p>Her face paled under the unveiled and unsparing insults, but she did -not lose her equanimity.</p> - -<p>'We are very like a scene of Sardou's,' she said, with her unchangeable -smile. 'You would have made your fortune on the boards of the Français. -Why did you not go there instead of calling yourself Marquis de Sabran? -It would have been wiser.'</p> - -<p>He felt as if a knife had been plunged through his loins; all the -colour left his face. Had Vàsàrhely told <i>her</i>? No! it was impossible. -They were mere chance words of a woman eager to insult, not knowing -what she said. He affected not to hear, and with a bow to her he moved -once more to leave the chamber. But her voice again arrested him.</p> - -<p>'Tell me one thing before you go,' she said, very gently. 'Does Wanda -know that you are Vassia Kazán?'</p> - -<p>She spoke with perfect moderation and simplicity, not altering her -posture as she lay back in her tapestried chair, but she watched -him with trepidation. She was not altogether sure of facts she -had half-guessed, half-gathered. She had pieced details together -with infinite skill, but she could not be absolutely certain of her -conclusions. She watched him with eager avidity beneath her smiling -calmness. If he showed no consciousness her cast was wrong; she would -miss her vengeance; she would remain in his power. But at a glance she -saw her shaft had pierced straight home. He had strong control and even -strong power of dissimulation in need; but that name thrown at him -stunned him as a stone might have done. His face grew livid, he stood -motionless, he had no falsehood ready, he was taken off his guard: all -he realised was that his ruin was in the grasp of his mortal foe. His -hold on her was lost. His authority, his strength, his dignity, all -fell before those two hateful words, 'Vassia Kazán!'</p> - -<p>'He has told her!' he thought, and the blood surged in his brain -and made him dazed and giddy. He had not told her. By private -investigation, by keen wit, by careful and cruel comparison of various -information, she had arrived at the conclusion that Vassia Kazán and -he who had come from Mexico as the grandson of the Marquis Xavier de -Sabran were one and the same. Certain she could not be, but she was -near enough to certainty to dare to cast her stone at a venture. If it -missed—she was a woman. He could not kill or harm a woman, or call her -to account.</p> - -<p>Even now, if he had preserved his composure and turned on her with a -calm challenge, she would have been powerless.</p> - -<p>But he had lost the habit of falsehood; self-consciousness made him -weak; he believed that Egon Vàsàrhely had betrayed him. His lips were -mute, his tongue seemed to cleave to his mouth. A less keen-sighted -woman would have read confession on his face. She was satisfied.</p> - -<p>'You have not answered my question,' she said quietly. 'Does Wanda know -it? Does such a saintly woman "compound a felony"? I believe a false -name is a sort of felony, is it not?'</p> - -<p>He breathed heavily; his eyes had a terrible look in them; he put his -hand on his heart. For a moment the longing assailed him to spring -upon her and throttle her as a man may a dangerous beast. He could not -speak, a leaden weight seemed to shut his lips.</p> - -<p>He never doubted that she knew his whole history from Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>'It was an ingenious device,' she pursued, in her honeyed, even tones, -'but it was scarcely wise. Things are always found out some time or -another—at least, men's secrets are. A woman can keep hers. My dear -friend, you are really a criminal. It is very strange that Wanda of all -people should have made such a misalliance, and had such an imposture -passed off on her! I belong to her family; I ought to abhor you; and -yet I can imagine your temptation if I cannot forgive it. Still it was -a foolish thing to do, not worthy a man of your wit; and in France, -I believe, the punishment for such an assumption is some years' -imprisonment; and here, you know (perhaps you do not know?), your -marriage would be null and void if she chose.'</p> - -<p>He made a movement towards her, and for the moment, though she was a -woman of great courage, her spirit quailed before the look she met.</p> - -<p>'Hold your peace!' he said savagely. 'Speak truth, if you can. What has -Vàsàrhely told you?'</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely had told her nothing, but she looked him full in the face -with perfect serenity, and answered—'All!'</p> - -<p>He never doubted her, he could not doubt her; what she said was met by -too full confirmation from his memory and his conscience.</p> - -<p>'He gave me his word,' he muttered.</p> - -<p>She smiled. 'His word to <i>you,</i> when he is in love with your wife? The -miracle is that he has not told her. She would divorce you, and after a -decent interval I dare say she would marry him, if only <i>pour balayer -la chose.</i> For a man so devoted to her as you are, you have certainly -contrived to outrage and injure her in the most complete manner. <i>Mon -beau Marquis!</i> to think how fooled we all were all the time by you. How -haughty you were, how fastidious, how patrician!'</p> - -<p>He leaned against the high column of the enamelled stove and covered -his eyes with his hands. He was unnerved, unstrung, half-paralysed. The -blow had fallen on him without preparation or defence being possible to -him. His thoughts were all in confusion; one thing alone he knew—he, -and all he loved, were in the power of a merciless woman, who would no -more spare them than the <i>sloughi</i> astride the antelope will let go its -quivering flesh.</p> - -<p>She looked at him, and a contemptuous wonder came upon her that a man -could be so easily beaten, so easily betrayed into tacit confession. -She ignored the power of conscience, for she did not know it herself.</p> - -<p>She thought, with scorn: 'Why did he not deny, deny boldly, as I should -have done in his place? He would have twisted my weapon out of my -hand at once. I know so little, and I could prove nothing! But he is -unnerved at once, just because it is true! Men are all imbeciles. If he -had only denied and questioned me he must have found that Egon had told -me nothing.'</p> - -<p>And she watched him with derision.</p> - -<p>In truth, she knew so little; she had scarce more to guide her than -coincidence and conjecture. She longed to know everything from himself, -but strong as was her curiosity, her prudence and her cruelty were -stronger still, and she admirably assumed a knowledge that she had not, -guided in all her dagger-strokes by the suffering she caused.</p> - -<p>Yet her passion for him which, unslaked, was as ardent as ever, became -not the less, but the greater, because she had him in her power. She -was one of those women to whom love is only delightful if it possess -the means to torture. Besides, it was not himself whom she hated, -it was his wife. To make him faithless to his wife would be a more -exquisite triumph than to betray him to her.</p> - -<p>'He would be wax—in my hands,' she thought. A vision of the future -passed before her, with her dominion absolute over him, her knowledge -of his shame holding him down with a chain never to be broken. She -would compel him to wound, to deceive, to torment his wife; she would -dictate his every word, his every act; she would make him ridiculous to -the world, so servile should be his obedience to her, so great should -be his terror of her anger. He should be her lover, weak as water in -all semblance, because the puppet of her pleasure. This would be a -vengeance worthy of herself when she should see him kneel at her feet -for permission for every slightest act, and she should scourge him as -with whips, knowing he dare not rise; when she should say softly in his -ear a thousand times a year: 'You are Vassia Kazán!'</p> - -<p>She was silent a few moments, lost in the witchery of the vision she -conjured up; then she looked up at him and said very caressingly, in -her sweetest voice:</p> - -<p>'Why are you so dejected? Your secret may be safe with me. You -know—you know—I was willing ever to be your friend; I am not less -willing now. I told you that you were unwise to make an enemy of me. -Wanda's regard would not outlive such a trial, but perhaps mine may, -if you be discerning enough, grateful enough to trust to it. I know -your crime, for a crime it is, and a foul one: we must not attempt to -palliate it. When we last met you offended, you outraged me. Only a few -moments since you insulted me as though I were the lowest creature on -the Paris asphalte. Yet all this I—I—should be tempted to forgive if -you love me as I believe that you do. I love <i>you</i>, not as that cold, -calm, unerring woman yonder may, but as those only can who know and -care for no heaven but earth. Réné—Vassia—who, knowing your sin, your -shame, your birth, your treachery, would say to you what I say? Not -Wanda!'</p> - -<p>He seemed not to hear, he did not hear. He leaned his forehead upon his -arms; he was sunk in the apathy of an intense woe; only the name of his -wife reached him, and he shivered a little as with cold.</p> - -<p>At his silence, his indifference, her eyes grew alight with flame; but -she controlled herself; she rose and clasped her hands upon his arm.</p> - -<p>'Listen,' she murmured, 'I love you, I love you! I care nothing what -you were born, what sins you have sinned; I love you! Love me, and -she shall never know. I will silence Egon. I will bury your secret as -though it were one that would cost me my life were it known.'</p> - -<p>Only at the touch of her hands did he arouse himself to any -consciousness of what she was saying, of how she tempted him. Then he -shook off her clasp with a rude gesture; he looked down on her with -the bitterest of scorn: not for a single instant did he dream of -purchasing her silence so.</p> - -<p>'You are even viler than I thought,' he said in his throat, with a -dreary laugh of mockery. 'How long would you spare me if I sinned -against her with you? Go, do your worst, say your worst! But if you -stay beneath my wife's roof to-night, I will drive you out of the -house before all her people, if it be my last act of authority in -Hohenszalras!'</p> - -<p>'I love you!' she murmured, and almost knelt to him; but he thrust her -away from him, and stood erect, his arms folded on his chest.</p> - -<p>'How dare you speak of love to me? You force me to employ the language -of the gutter. If Egon Vàsàrhely have put me in your power, use it, -like the incarnate fiend you are. I ask no mercy of you, but if you -dare to speak of love to me I will strangle you where you stand. Since -you call me the wolf of the steppes you shall feel my grip.'</p> - -<p>She fell a few steps backward and stretched her hand behind her, and -rung a little silver bell. Absorbed in his own bitterness of thought he -did not hear the sound or see the movement. She had already, between -Greswold's visit to her and his master's, written a little letter:</p> - -<blockquote> -<p> -'Loved Wanda,—Will you be so good as to -come to me for a moment at once?—Yours,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 70%; font-size: 0.8em;">'OLGA.'</span><br /> -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p>She had said to one of her women, who was in the next apartment: 'When -I ring you will take that note at once to my cousin, the Countess, -yourself, without coming to me.' She had had no fear of leaving the -woman in the adjoining room, who was a Russian, wholly ignorant of the -French tongue, which she herself always used.</p> - -<p>She recoiled from him, frightened for the moment, but only for that; -she had nerves of steel, and many men had cursed her and menaced her -for the ruin of their lives, and she had lived on none the worse. -'<i>On crie—et puis c'est fini</i>,' she was wont to say, with her airy -cynicism. Something in his look, in his voice, told her that here it -would not finish thus.</p> - -<p>'He will shoot himself if he do not strangle me; and he will escape -so,' she thought, and a faint sort of fear touched her. She was alone -before him; she had said enough to drive him out of all calmness and -all reason. She had left him nothing to hope for; she had made him -believe that she knew all his fatal past. If he had struck her down -into the dumbness of death he would have been scarcely guilty.</p> - -<p>But it was only for a moment that such a dread as this passed over her.</p> - -<p>'Pshaw! we are people of the world,' she thought. 'Society is with us -even in our solitude. Those violent crimes are not ours: we strike -otherwise than with our hands.'</p> - -<p>And, reassured, she sank down into her chair again, a delicate figure -in a cloud of muslin of the Deccan and old lace of Flanders, and -clasped her fingers gracefully behind her head, and waited.</p> - -<p>He did not move; his eyes were fastened on her, glittering and cold as -ice, and full of unspeakable hatred. He was deadly pale. She thought -she had never seen his face more beautiful than in that intense mute -wrath which was like the iron frost of his own land.</p> - -<p>'When he goes he will go and kill himself,' she mused, and she listened -with passionate eagerness for the passing of steps down the corridor.</p> - -<p>But he did not stir; he was absorbed in wondering how he could deal -with this woman so that his wife should be spared. Was there any way -save that vile way to which she had tempted him? He could see none. -From a passion rejected and despised there can be no chance of mercy. -He had ceased altogether to think of himself.</p> - -<p>To take his own life did not pass over his thoughts then. It would have -spared Wanda nothing. His shame, told when he were dead, would hurt -her almost more than when he were living. He had too much courage to -evade so the consequences of his own acts. In the confusion of his mind -only this one thing was present to it—the memory of his wife. All that -he had dreaded of disgrace, of divorce, of banishment, of ruin, were -nothing to him; what he thought of was the loss of her herself, her -adoration, her honour, her sweet obedience, her perfect faith. Would -ever he touch even her hand again if once she knew?</p> - -<p>His remorse and his grief for his wife overwhelmed and destroyed every -personal remembrance. If to spare her he could have undergone any -extremity of torture he would have welcomed it with rapture. But it is -not thus that a false step can be retrieved; not thus that a false word -can be effaced. It, and the fate it brings, must be faced to the bitter -end.</p> - -<p>He had no illusions; he was certain that the woman who would have -tempted him to be false to her would spare her nothing. He would not -even stoop to solicit a respite for her from Olga Brancka. He knew the -only price at which it could be obtained.</p> - -<p>He stood there, leaning his shoulders on the high cornice of the -stove, his arms crossed upon his chest, repressing every expression or -gesture that could have delighted his enemy by revelation of what he -suffered. In himself he felt paralysed; he felt as though neither his -brain nor his limbs would ever serve him again. He had the sensation -of having fallen from a great height; the same numbness and exhaustion -which he had felt when he had dropped down the frozen side of the -Umbal glacier. Both he and she were silent; he from the stupefaction -of horror, she from the eagerness with which she was listening for the -coming of Wanda von Szalras.</p> - -<p>After a short interval of her thirsty and cruel anxiety, the page, who -was in waiting outside, entered with a note for his master.</p> - -<p>Sabran strove to recover his composure as he stretched his hand out and -took the letter off the salver. It contained only two lines from his -wife:</p> - -<p>'Olga asks me to come to her. Do you wish me to do so?'</p> - -<p>A convulsion passed over his face.</p> - -<p>'Oh! most faithful of all friends!' he thought with a pang, touched to -the quick by those simple words of a woman whose fidelity was to be -repaid by shame.</p> - -<p>'Where is the Countess?' he asked of the young servant, who answered -that she was in the library.</p> - -<p>'Say that I will be with her there in a few moments.'</p> - -<p>The page withdrew.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka was mute; there was a great anger in her veiled eyes. Her -last stroke had missed, through the loyalty of the woman whom she hated.</p> - -<p>He took a step towards her.</p> - -<p>'You dared to send for her then?'</p> - -<p>She laughed aloud, and with insolence.</p> - -<p>'Dare? Is that a word to be used by a Russian <i>moujik</i>, as you are, to -me, the daughter of Fedor Demetrivitch Serriatine? Certainly, I sent -for your wife, my cousin. Who should know what I know, if not she? Egon -might make you what promises he would; he is a man and a fool. I make -none. If you prevent my seeing Wanda, I shall write to her; if you -stop her letters, I shall telegraph to her; if you stop the telegrams, -I will put your story in the Paris journals, where the Marquis de -Sabran is as well known as the Arc de l'Étoile. You were born a serf, -you shall feel the knout. It would have been well for you if you had -smarted under it in your youth.'</p> - -<p>So absorbed was he in the memory of his wife, and in the thought of -the misery about to fall upon her innocent life, that the insults to -himself struck on him harmless, as hail on iron.</p> - -<p>'Spare your threats,' he said coldly. 'No one shall tell her but -myself. You know her present condition; it will most likely kill her.'</p> - -<p>'Oh, no,' said the Countess Brancka, with a little smile. 'Her nerves -are of iron. She will divorce you, that is all.'</p> - -<p>'She will be in her right,' he said, with the same coldness. Then, -without another word, he turned and left her chamber.</p> - -<p>'For a bastard, he crows well!' she said, loud enough to be heard by -him, in the old twelfth-century French of the words she quoted.</p> - -<p>Sabran went onward with a quick step; if he had paused, if he had -looked back, he felt that he would have murdered her.</p> - -<p>'Talk of the cruelty of men! What beast that lives,' he thought, 'has -the slow unsparing brutality of a jealous woman?'</p> - -<p>He went on, without pausing once, across the great house. So much he -could spare his wife, he could save her from her enemy's triumph in -her suffering; he could do as men did in the Indian Mutiny, plunge the -knife himself into the heart that loved him, and spare her further -outrage.</p> - -<p>When he reached the door of the library, he stopped and drew a deep -breath. He would have gone to his death with calmness and a smile; but -here he had no courage. A sickening spasm of pain seemed to suffocate -him. He knew that he met only his just punishment. If he could only -have suffered alone he would not have rebelled against his doom. But to -smite her!——</p> - -<p>With greater courage than is needed in the battle-field he turned -the handle of the door and entered. She was seated at one of the -writing-tables with a mass of correspondence before her, to which she -had been vainly striving to give her attention. Her thoughts had been -with him and Olga Brancka. She looked up with the light on her face -which always came there when she saw him after any absence, long or -short. But that light was clouded as she perceived the change in his -look in his carriage, in his very features, which were aged, and drawn, -and bloodless. She rose with an exclamation of alarm, as he came to her -across the length of the noble room, where he had first seen her seated -by her own hearth, and heard her welcome him a stranger and unknown -beneath her roof.</p> - -<p>'Wanda! Wanda!' he said, and his voice seemed strangled, his lips -seemed dumb.</p> - -<p>'My God, what is it?' she cried faintly. 'Are the children——'</p> - -<p>'No, no,'he muttered. 'The children are well. It is worse than death. -Wanda, I have come to tell you the sin of my life, the shame of it. Oh! -how will you ever believe that I loved you since I wronged you so?'</p> - -<p>A great sob broke down his words.</p> - -<p>She put her hand to her heart.</p> - -<p>'Tell me,' she said, in a low whisper, 'tell me everything. Why not -have trusted me? Tell me—I am strong.'</p> - -<p>Then he told her the whole history of his past, and spared nothing.</p> - -<p>She listened in unbroken silence, standing all the while, leaning one -hand upon the ebony table by her.</p> - -<p>When he had ceased to speak he buried his face in her skirts where -he knelt at her feet; he did not dare to look at her. She was still -silent; her breath came and went with shuddering effort. She drew her -velvet gown from him with a gesture of unspeakable horror.</p> - -<p>'You!—you!' she said, and could find no other word.</p> - -<p>Then all grew dark around her; she threw her arms out in the void, and -fell from her full height as a stone drops from a rock into the gulf -below; struck dumb and senseless for the first time in all the years -that she had lived.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXXIV">CHAPTER XXXIV.</a></h4> - - -<p>Twelve hours later she gave premature birth to a male child, dead. Once -in those hours when her physical agony lulled for a moment and her -consciousness returned, she said to her physician:</p> - -<p>'Tell him to send for Egon. Egon betrays no one.'</p> - -<p>They were the first words she had spoken. Greswold understood nothing; -but he saw that some great calamity had fallen on those he loved -and honoured, and that her lord never came nigh her chamber, but -only pacing to and fro the corridors and passages of the house, with -restless, ceaseless steps, paused ever and again to whisper—'Does she -live?'</p> - -<p>'Come to her,' said the old man once; but Sabran shuddered and turned -aside.</p> - -<p>'I dare not,' he answered, 'I dare not. If she die, it is I who shall -have killed her.'</p> - -<p>Greswold did not venture to ask what had happened; he knew it must -be some disaster of which the Countess Brancka was the origin or the -messenger.</p> - -<p>'My lady has spoken a few words,' he said later to his master. 'She -bade me tell you to send for Prince Vàsàrhely. She said he would betray -no one. I could ask nothing, for her agony returned.'</p> - -<p>Sabran was silent; the thought came to him for the first time that it -might be possible Olga Brancka had used the name of her brother-in-law -falsely.</p> - -<p>'Send for him yourself,' he said wearily; 'What she wishes must be -done. Nothing matters to me.'</p> - -<p>'I think the Prince is in Vienna,' said Greswold; and he sent an -urgent message thither, entreating Vàsàrhely's immediate presence at -Hohenszalras, in the name of his cousin.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka remained in her own apartments, uncertain what to do.</p> - -<p>'If Wanda die,' she thought, 'it will all have been of no use; he -will be neither divorced nor disgraced. Perhaps one might plead the -marriage invalid, and disinherit the children; but one would want so -much proof, and I have none. If he had not been so stunned and taken -off his guard, he might easily have defied me. Egon may know more, but -if Wanda dies he will not move. He would care for nothing on earth. He -will forget the children were Sabran's. He will only remember they were -hers!'</p> - -<p>No one who loved her could have been more anxious for Wanda von Szalras -to live than was this cruellest of her enemies, who passed the time -in a perpetual agitation, and, as her women brought her tidings from -hour to hour, testified so much genuine alternation of hope and terror, -that they were amazed to see so much feeling in one so indifferent -usually to all woes not her own. She was miserably dull; she had no one -to speak to; she had no lover, friend, rival, or foe to give her the -stimulant to life that was indispensable to her. Even she did not dare -to approach the man whose happiness she had ruined, any more than she -would have dared to touch a lion wounded to the death. Yet she could -not tear herself away from the scene of her vengeance.</p> - -<p>The whole house was hushed like a grave; the servants were full of -grief at the danger of a mistress they adored; even the young children, -understanding that their mother was in peril, did not play or laugh; -but sat unhappy and silent over their books, or wandered aimlessly -along the leafless gardens. They knew that there was something -terrible, though they knew not what.</p> - -<p>'What is death?' said Lili to her brothers.</p> - -<p>'It is to go and live with God, they <i>say</i>,' answered Bela, doubtfully.</p> - -<p>'But how can God be happy Himself,' said Gela, 'when He causes so much -sorrow?'</p> - -<p>'Our mother will never go away from us,' said the little Lili, who -listened. 'They may call her from heaven ever—ever so much; she will -not leave <i>us</i>.'</p> - -<p>Bela sighed; he had a heavy, hopeless impression of death as a thing -that was stronger than himself.</p> - -<p>'Pride can do naught against death, my little lord,' one of the -foresters had once said to him. 'You will find your master there one -day.'</p> - -<p>A day and a night passed; puerperal convulsions succeeded to the birth -of the dead boy, and Wanda was unconscious alike of her bodily and her -mental torture. The physicians, whom Greswold had summoned instantly, -were around her bed, grave and anxious. The only chance for her lay in -the magnificent health and strength with which nature had dowered her. -Her constitution might, they said, enable her to resist what weaker -women would have gone down under like boats in an ocean storm.</p> - -<p>It was towards dawn on the second day when Egon Vàsàrhely arrived.</p> - -<p>'She lives?' he said, as he entered.</p> - -<p>'That is all,' said Greswold, with tears in his voice.</p> - -<p>'Can I see her?'</p> - -<p>'It would be useless. She would not know your Excellency.'</p> - -<p>Sabran came forward from the further end of the Rittersaal, where the -lights were burning with a yellow glare as the grey light of the dawn -was stealing through the unshuttered windows.</p> - -<p>'Allow me the honour of a word with you, Prince;' he said. 'I -understand; you have come at her summons—not at mine.'</p> - -<p>Greswold withdrew and left them alone. Vàsàrhely was still wrapped in -the furs in which he had travelled. He stood erect and listened; his -face was very stern.</p> - -<p>'Did you give up my secret to your brother's wife?' said Sabran, -abruptly.</p> - -<p>'Can you ask that?' said Vàsàrhely. 'You had my word.'</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka knows all that you know. She said that you had -betrayed me to her. She would have told Wanda. I chose sooner to tell -her myself. The shock has killed the child. It may kill her. Your -sister-in-law is here. If she used your name falsely it is for you to -avenge it.'</p> - -<p>'Tell me what passed between you,' said Prince Egon. His face was dark -as night.</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated a moment. Even now he could not bring himself to -disclose the passion which his enemy had conceived for him. It was one -of those women's secrets which no gentleman can surrender to another.</p> - -<p>'You are aware,' he replied, 'that Madame Brancka has been always -envious of your cousin; always willing to hurt her. When she got -possession of the story of my past she used it without mercy. She -would have told my wife with brutality; I told her myself, hoping to -spare her something by my own confession. Madame Brancka affirmed to -me, twice or thrice over, that you had given her all the information -against me.'</p> - -<p>'How could you believe her? You had had my promise.'</p> - -<p>'How could I doubt her?'</p> - -<p>'It is natural you should know nothing of honour!' thought Vàsàrhely, -but he did not utter what he thought. He saw that, dark as had been the -crimes of Sabran against those of his race, the chastisement of them -was as great.</p> - -<p>He said simply:</p> - -<p>'You might sooner have doubted anything than have believed that I -should entrust the Countess Brancka with such a secret, and have given -her such a power to injure my cousin. How can she have learned your -history? Have you betrayed yourself?'</p> - -<p>'Never! Since she had it not from you, I cannot conceive how or where -she learned it. Not a soul lives that knows me as——'</p> - -<p>He paused; he could not bring himself to say the name he bore from -birth.</p> - -<p>'My brother is unfortunate,! said Vàsàrhely, curtly. 'He has wedded a -vile woman. Leave her to me.'</p> - -<p>He saluted Sabran with cold but careful ceremony, and went, to his -own apartments. Sabran passed to the corridor which led to his wife's -rooms, and there resumed his miserable restless walk to and fro before -her door. He dared not enter. In her conscious hours she had not asked -for him. He had ever present before his eyes that movement of horror, -of repulsion, with which she had drawn the hem of her gown from his -grasp.</p> - -<p>Now and again, when her attendants came in and out, he saw through -the opening of the door the bed on which she lay and the outline of -her form in the pale light of the lamp. He could not rest. He could -not even sit down or break a mouthful of bread. If she died, his sin -against her would have slain her as surely as though his hand had taken -her life. It was about six of the clock in the chilly dawn of the -autumnal day.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXV" id="CHAPTER_XXXV">CHAPTER XXXV.</a></h4> - - -<p>Egon Vàsàrhely passed the next three hours in mental conflict with -his own passions. It would have been precious to him—would have been -a blessed and sacred duty—to avenge the woman he adored. But he had -a harder task. For her sake he had to befriend the traitor who had -wronged her, and shelter him from the just opprobrium of the world. -Crueller combat with temptation none ever waged than he fought now -against his own truest instincts, his own dearest affections. She lay -there, perchance dying, of this treachery which had struck her down in -her happiest hours; and it seemed to him as if, through the silence of -the darkened and melancholy house, he heard her voice saying to him: -'For my sake, spare him—spare my children!'</p> - -<p>'I give you more than my life, my beloved!' he murmured, as he sat -alone, whilst the grey day widened over forest and mountain, and for -her sake prepared to shield the man who had deceived her from disgrace -and death.</p> - -<p>'The hound!' he thought. 'He should be branded as a perjurer and thief -throughout the world! Yet for her—for her—one must protect him.'</p> - -<p>An hour or two later he sent his name to the Countess Brancka, with -a request to be received by her. She was but then awaking, and heard -with astonishment and alarm of his arrival, so unlooked for and so -dreaded. It had never occurred to her as possible that he would come to -Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'Wanda must have sent for him!' she thought. 'Oh heavens! why could she -not die with the child!'</p> - -<p>It was impossible for her to avoid him; shut up here she could neither -deceive nor escape him. She could not go away without her departure -being known to the whole household. She was afraid of him, terribly -afraid; the Vàsàrhely had a hand of iron when they were offended or -injured. But she put a fair face on a bitter obligation, and, when she -was dressed, went with a pretty smile into the salon to receive him.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely gave her no greeting as he entered. A great fear took -possession of her as she saw the expression of his eyes. He was the -only living being of whom she was in awe. He approached her without any -observances of courtesy. He said, simply and sternly:</p> - -<p>'I hear that you have used my name falsely, to the husband of Wanda; -that you have dared to give me as your authority for accusations -against him. What is your excuse?'</p> - -<p>She was for the moment so bewildered and disturbed by his presence and -his charge that she lost all her ability and power of interminable -falsehood. She was silent, and he saw her bosom heave and her hands -tremble a little.</p> - -<p>'What is your excuse?' he said again. 'Why did you come into this house -to injure Wanda von Szalras? How did you dare to use my name to do her -that injury?'</p> - -<p>She tried to laugh a little, but she was nervous and thrown off her -guard.</p> - -<p>'I wished to do her a service! Since she has married an adventurer—an -impostor—she ought to know it and be free.'</p> - -<p>'What is your authority for calling the Marquis de Sabran an -adventurer? To him you employed my name as your authority. What truth -was beneath that lie?'</p> - -<p>She was silent. For the only time in her life she knew not what to -say. She had no facts in her hands. Her ground was too uncertain to -sustain her in a steady attitude.</p> - -<p>'You know that he is Vassia Kazán!' she said, with another little laugh.</p> - -<p>The face of Vàsàrhely revealed nothing.</p> - -<p>'Who is Vassia Kazán?' he repeated.</p> - -<p>'He is—the man who robbed you of Wanda.'</p> - -<p>'He could not rob me of what I never possessed. What grounds have you -for calling him by this name?'</p> - -<p>'I have reason to believe it.'</p> - -<p>'Reason to believe it! You told him that you heard this story from -myself.'</p> - -<p>'He never denied it.'</p> - -<p>'I am not concerned to discuss what he did or did not do. I come here -to know on what grounds you employed my name?'</p> - -<p>'Egon, I will tell you the truth!'</p> - -<p>'Can you?'</p> - -<p>'Yes; I can and I will. When I was at Taróc, three summers ago, I saw -a fragment of a letter in Sabran's writing. I saw the name of Vassia -Kazán. I put this and that together. I heard something from Russia; I -sent some people to Mexico. I had always had my suspicions. I do not -say I have any positive legal proof, but I am morally convinced that he -is no Marquis de Sabran, and that he was born a serf near the city of -Kazán. I have charged him with it, and he has as good as confessed it. -He was struck dumb with consciousness.'</p> - -<p>She watched the face of Vàsàrhely, but it might have been cast in -bronze for anything that it told her.</p> - -<p>'You saw a fragment of a letter, of which you knew nothing,' he said -coldly; 'you formed some vague suspicions; you descended to the use -of spies, and, because you have invented a theory of your own on your -so-called discoveries, you deem you have a title to ruin the happiness -of your cousin's home. And you father your work upon me! Often have I -pitied my brother, but never so deeply as now.'</p> - -<p>'If my so-called discoveries were false,' she interrupted, with -hardihood, 'why did he not say so? He was convicted by his own -admissions. If my charge had been baseless, would he have said that he -would tell his wife himself rather than let her learn it from me?'</p> - -<p>'I neither know nor care what he said,' answered Vàsàrhely. 'I have -only your version for it. You must pardon me if I do not attach -implicit credence to your word. What I do know is that you ventured to -use my name to give force and credibility to your accusations. Had you -really known for certainty such a history, you would, had you had any -decency or feeling, have consulted your husband and myself on the best -means of shielding our cousin's honour. But you have always envied and -hated her. What is her husband to you—what is it to you whether he be -a noble or a clown? You snatch at the first brand you think you see, -in the hope to scorch her honour with it. But when you used my name -falsely you did a dangerous thing for yourself. I shall waste no more -words upon you, but you will sign what I write now, or you will repent -it.'</p> - -<p>She affected to laugh.</p> - -<p>'My dear Egon, <i>quel ton de maître!</i> What authority have you over me? -Even if you invest yourself in your brother's, that counts for very -little, I assure you.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps so; but if my brother be too careless of his honour and too -credulous of your deceptions, he is yet man enough to resent such -infamy as you have been guilty of now. You will sign this.'</p> - -<p>He passed to her a few lines which he had already written and brought -with him. They ran thus:</p> - -<p>'I, Olga, Countess Brancka, do acknowledge that I most untruthfully -used the name of my husband's brother, the Prince Vàsàrhely, in an -endeavour to injure the gentleman known as the Marquis de Sabran; and I -hereby do ask the pardon of them both, and confess that in such pardon -I receive great leniency and forbearance.'</p> - -<p>'Sign it,' said Prince Egon.</p> - -<p>'Pshaw!' said Madame Brancka, and pushed it away with a loud laugh, -deigning no further answer.</p> - -<p>'Will you sign it or not?' asked Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>She replied by tearing it in shreds.</p> - -<p>'It is easily rewritten,' he said, unmoved. He went to a writing-table -that stood in the room, looked for paper and found it, and wrote out -the same formula.</p> - -<p>'Do not be foolish, Olga,' he said curtly, as he returned. 'You are a -clever woman, and always consult your own interests. I dare say you -have done a thousand things as base as your attempt to ruin my cousin's -happiness, but I do not suppose you have often done anything so unwise. -You will sign this at once, or you will regret it very greatly.'</p> - -<p>'Why should I sign it?' she said insolently. 'The man is what I say; he -could not deny it. If I only guessed at the truth, I guessed aright. I -wonder that you do not see <i>your</i> interests lie in exposing him. When -the world knows he is an impostor Wanda will divorce him and put the -children under other names in religious houses. Then you will be able -to marry her. I told him she would marry you <i>pour balayer la honte.</i>'</p> - -<p>For the moment she was alarmed at the fires that leapt from Vàsàrhely's -sombre eyes. It cost him much—as much as it had cost Sabran—not to -strike her where she stood. He paused a second to control himself, then -answered her coldly and calmly—</p> - -<p>'My cousin will never seek a divorce, nor shall I wed with a divorced -woman. Your hate misleads you; there is no blinder thing than hate. You -will sign this paper, or I shall telegraph for my brother.'</p> - -<p>'For Stefan!'</p> - -<p>All her boundless indifference to her husband, and her contempt for -him, were spoken in the accent she gave his name.</p> - -<p>'For Stefan. You are pleased to despise him because you can lead him -into mad follies, and can make him believe you are an innocent woman. -But Stefan is not altogether the ignoble dupe you think him. He is -a dupe, wiser men than he have been so; but he would not bear your -infidelity to him if he really knew it, nor would he bear other things -if he knew of them. Two years ago you took two hundred thousand -florins' worth of diamonds, in my name, from my jeweller Landsee in -the Graben. How should a tradesman suspect that a Countess Brancka was -dishonest? At the end of the year he brought his bill for that and -other things to me, whilst I was in Vienna. He had never, of course, -doubted that you went on my authority. Equally, of course, I did not -betray you, but paid the amount. When you do such things you should -not give written orders. They remain against you. Now, if Stefan knew -this, or if he knew that you had taken money from the richest of your -lovers, the young Duc de Blois, as I knew it so long as seven years -ago, you would no longer find him the malleable easily-cozened fool -you deem him. You would learn that he has Vàsàrhely blood in him. I -have only named two out of the many questionable facts I know against -you. They have been safe with me. I would never urge Stefan to a public -scandal. But, unless you sign this, and apologise for using my name to -the husband of my cousin, as you used it to Landsee of the Graben, I -shall tell my brother. He will not divorce you. That is not our way; -we do not go to lawyers to redress our wrongs. But he will compel you -to retire for your life into a religious house—as you would compel -the harmless children of Wanda; or he would imprison you himself in -one of our lonely places in the mountains, where you would cry in vain -for your lovers, and your friends, and your <i>menus plaisirs</i>, and none -would hear you. Do not mistake me. You have often called us barbaric; -you will find we can be so. As I say, we do not carry our wrongs to -lawyers. We can avenge ourselves.'</p> - -<p>She had lost all colour as he spoke. A nervous spasm of laughter -contracted her mouth, and remained on it like the ghastly <i>rictus</i> of -death. She knew him well enough to know that he meant every syllable -he said. The Vàsàrhely had had stern tragedies in their annals, and to -women impure and unfaithful had been merciless as Othello.</p> - -<p>She felt that she was vanquished; that she would have to obey him or -suffer worse things. But though she was aware of her own impotence, she -could not resist a retort that should sting him.</p> - -<p>'You are very chivalrous! I always knew you had an insane adoration -of your cousin, but I never should have thought you would have put -on sabre and spurs in her husband's defence. Will he reward you by -effacing himself? Will he end as he has begun, like the hero of a -melodrama at the Gymnase, and shoot himself at Wanda's feet? You would -marry a widow, though you would not marry a divorced woman!'</p> - -<p>'Some time ago, when we spoke of him,' he replied, still with stern -self-control, 'I told you that were his honour called in question I -would defend it as I would my brother's—not for his sake, for hers. -I would, for her sake, defend it so were he the guiltiest soul on -earth. He belongs to her. He is sacred to me. You mistake if you deem -her such a woman as yourself. She has loved him. She will love no -other whilst she lives. She has given herself to him. She will give -herself to no other, though she outlive him from this hour. You make -your calculations unwisely, for when you make them you suppose that -every man and every woman have your own dishonesty, your own passions, -your own baseness. You are short of sight, because you only see in the -circle of your own conceptions.'</p> - -<p>She understood that he knew the secret of the man he protected, but -that he would never admit that he did so; would never reveal it or let -any other reveal it. She understood that he had himself forborne from -its exposure, and would never, whilst he lived, allow any other to hold -it up to the derision of the world. She understood that, if need were, -Vàsàrhely would defend, as he said, the honour of his cousin's husband -at the point of the sword against all foes or mockers.</p> - -<p>'For her sake!' she cried, 'always for her sake! What can you both see -so marvellous in her? She has been a greater fool than any woman that -has ever lived, though she can read Greek and write in Latin! What -has she done with all her wisdom and her holiness? You know as well -as though it were written there upon the wall that he is what I say. -Why do you put your lance in rest for him? Why are you ready to shed -blood on his behalf? He is an impostor who has taken in first the world -and then the mistress of Hohenszalras. If you were the hero you have -always seemed to me you would tear his heart out of his breast, shoot -him like a wolf in these very woods! If her honour is yours, avenge her -dishonour!'</p> - -<p>She spoke with force and fire, and longing to behold the spirit of evil -roused in her hearer's soul and stung to action.</p> - -<p>But she might as well have tried to move the mountains from their base -as rouse either pain or rage in her brother-in-law. Vàsàrhely kept his -attitude of stern, cold, contemptuous disgust. Not a muscle of his face -changed. He said merely:</p> - -<p>'You have been told what I shall do if you do not sign this paper. The -choice is yours. If you desire to hear any more episodes of your past I -can tell you many.'</p> - -<p>Then she changed her attitude and her eloquence. She dissolved in -tears; she wept; she implored; she tried to kneel to him. But he was -inflexible.</p> - -<p>'You are a good actress,' he said simply. 'But you forget; it is Stefan -whom you can deceive, not me.'</p> - -<p>When she had vainly used all her resources of alternate entreaty -and invective, of cajolery and insolence, she sank into her chair, -exhausted, hysterical, nerveless.</p> - -<p>'I am ill; call my woman,' she said faintly.</p> - -<p>He replied:</p> - -<p>'You are no more ill than I am.'</p> - -<p>'You are brutal, Egon,' she said, raising herself, with flashing eyes -and hissing tongue.</p> - -<p>'What have you been to her?' said Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>He waited with cold, inflexible patience. When another half-hour had -gone by she signed the paper, and flung it with fury to him.</p> - -<p>'You know very well it is true!' she cried, as she leaned across the -table like a slender snake that darted. 'Would she lie dying of it if -it were only a lie?'</p> - -<p>'That I know not,' said Vàsàrhely, coldly. 'What I know is that your -carriage will be ready in an hour, and that you will go hence. If ever -you be tempted to speak of what has occurred here, you will remember -that my silence to Stefan and your own people is only conditional on -yours on another matter.'</p> - -<p>Then he left her.</p> - -<p>She was cowed, intimidated, vanquished. When the hour was over she went -through the two lines of bowing servants, and left Hohenszalras ere the -noon was past.</p> - -<p>'It is the first time in my life I ever failed,' she thought, as the -pinnacles and towers of the burg were lost to her sight. 'What do these -men see in that woman?'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXXVI">CHAPTER XXXVI.</a></h4> - - -<p>Vàsàrhely, when he left her, went straight to Sabran, who, seated on an -oaken bench in the corridor of his wife's apartments, knew not how the -hours passed, and seemed aged ten years in a day. Vàsàrhely motioned -him to pass into one of the empty chambers. There he gave him the lines -which Olga Brancka had signed.</p> - -<p>'You are safe from her,' he said. 'She cannot tell your story to the -world. She will not dare even to whisper it as a conjecture.'</p> - -<p>Sabran did not speak. This great debt owed to his greatest foe hurt him -even whilst it delivered him.</p> - -<p>'For the first time I have concealed the truth,' pursued Vàsàrhely. 'I -affected to disbelieve her story. There was no other way to save it -from publicity. That alone would not have sufficed, but I had means to -coerce her.'</p> - -<p>'You have been very generous.'</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely shrank from his praise as though from some insolence. He did -not look at Sabran; he spoke briefly between his closed teeth. All -his soul was full of longing to strike this man; to meet him in open -combat and to kill him; forcing him and his foul secret together down -underneath the sole sure cover of the grave. But the sense that so -near, within a few feet of them, she lay in peril of her life, made -even vengeance seem for the moment profane and blasphemous.</p> - -<p>'There will be always time,' he thought.</p> - -<p>That hushed and darkened chamber hard by awed his hatred into silence. -What would she wish? What would she command? Could he but know that, -how clear would be his path!</p> - -<p>He hesitated a moment, then turned away.</p> - -<p>'I shall wait here until the danger is past, or she is called to God,' -he said hoarsely.</p> - -<p>Then he walked away down the corridor slowly, like a man wounded with a -wound that bleeds within.</p> - -<p>Sabran stood awhile where he had left him, his eyes bent on the ground, -his heart sick with shame.</p> - -<p>'<i>He</i> was worthy of her!' he thought with the most bitter pang of his -life.</p> - -<p>Three more days and nights passed; they were to him like a hideous -nightmare; at times he thought with horror that he would lose his -reason. The dreadful stillness, the dreadful silence, the knowledge -that death was so near that bed which he dared not approach, the -impossibility of learning what memories of him, what hatred of him, -might not be haunting the stupor in which she lay, together made up a -torture to which her bitterest reproach, her deadliest punishment would -have seemed merciful.</p> - -<p>All through that exhaustion, in which they believed her mind was -without consciousness, the memory of all that he had told her was -alive in it, in that poignant remembrance which the confusion of a -dulled brain only makes but the more terrible, turning and changing -what it suffers from into a thousand shapes. In her worst agony this -consciousness never left her; she kept silence because in her uttermost -weakness she was strong enough not to give her woe to the ears of the -others, but in her heart there seemed a great knife plunged, a knife -rusted with blood that was dishonoured.</p> - -<p>When she knew that the child she bore was dead, she felt no sorrow, -she thought only—'Begotten of a serf, of a coward!'</p> - -<p>The intolerable outrage, the intolerable deception, were like flames of -fire that seemed to eat up her life; her love for him, for the hour at -least, had been stunned and ceased to speak. To the woman who came of -the races of Szalras and Vàsàrhely, the dishonour covered every other -memory.</p> - -<p>'All his life only one long lie!' she thought.</p> - -<p>Her race had been stainless through a thousand years of chivalry and -heroism, and she—its sole descendant—had sullied it with the blood of -a base-born impostor!</p> - -<p>Whilst she lay sunk in what they deemed a perfect apathy, the disgrace -done to her, to her name, to her ancestry, was ever present to her -mind: a spectre which no one saw save herself. Every other emotion was -for the time quenched in that. She felt as though the whole world had -struck her on the cheek and she was powerless to resent or to revenge -the blow. In hours of delirium she thought she saw all the men and -women of her race who had reigned there before her standing about her -bed, and saying: 'You held our honour, and what did you do with it? You -let it sink to the earth in the arms of a nameless coward.'</p> - -<p>One night she said suddenly: 'My cousin—is he here?'</p> - -<p>When they told her that he had remained at Hohenszalras she seemed -reassured. At sunrise she asked the same question. When they answered -with the same affirmative, she said: 'Bid him come to me.'</p> - -<p>They fetched him instantly. As he passed Sabran in the corridor he -paused.</p> - -<p>'Your wife has sent for me,' he said; 'have I your permission to see -her?'</p> - -<p>Sabran bent his head, but his heart beat thickly with the only jealousy -he had ever felt. She asked for Egon Vàsàrhely in her stupor of misery, -and he, her husband, had lost the right to enter her chamber, dared not -approach her presence!</p> - -<p>'Wanda, I am here!' said Vàsàrhely, softly, as he bent over her. She -looked at him with eyes full of unspeakable agony.</p> - -<p>'Is it true?' she murmured.</p> - -<p>'Yes!' he said bitterly between his teeth.</p> - -<p>'And you knew it?'</p> - -<p>'Too late! But Wanda—my beloved Wanda—trust to me. The world shall -never hear it.'</p> - -<p>Her eyes had closed, a shiver ran through all her frame. 'Olga?' she -muttered.</p> - -<p>'She is in my power. I will deal with her,' he answered. 'She will be -silent as the grave.'</p> - -<p>She gave a long shuddering sigh, and her head sank back upon her -pillows.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely fell on his knees beside her bed, and buried his face on her -hands.</p> - -<p>'My violated saint!' he murmured. 'Fear not; I will avenge you.'</p> - -<p>Low though the words were, they reached and moved her in her dim blind -weakness. She stretched out her hand, and touched his bowed head.</p> - -<p>'No, no—not <i>that.</i> He is my children's father. He must be sacred; -give me your word, Egon, there shall be no bloodshed between him and -you.'</p> - -<p>'I am your next friend,' he said, with intense appeal in his voice. -'You are insulted and dishonoured—your race is affronted and -stained—who should avenge that if not I, your kinsman? There is no -male of your house. It falls to me.'</p> - -<p>All the manhood and knighthood in him were athirst for the life of the -impostor who had dishonoured what he adored.</p> - -<p>'Promise me,' she said again.</p> - -<p>'Your brothers are dead,' he muttered. 'I may well stand in their -place. Their swords would have found him out ere he were an hour -older.'</p> - -<p>She raised herself with a supreme effort, and through the pallor and -misery of her face there came a momentary flash of anger, a momentary -flash of the old spirit of command.</p> - -<p>'My brothers are dead, and I forbid any other to meddle with my life. -If anyone slew him it would be I—I—in my own right.'</p> - -<p>Her voice had been for the instant stern and sustained, but physical -faintness overcame her; her lips grew grey, and the darkness of great -weakness came before her sight.</p> - -<p>'I forbid you! I forbid you!' she said, as her breath failed her.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely remained kneeling beside her bed. His shoulders trembled with -restrained emotion. Even now she shut him out of her life. She denied -him the right to be her champion and avenger.</p> - -<p>She moved her hand towards him as a blind woman would have done.</p> - -<p>'Give me your word.'</p> - -<p>'You are my law,' he answered. 'I will do nothing that you forbid.'</p> - -<p>She inclined her head with a feeble gesture of recognition of the -words. He rose slowly, kissed the white fingers that lay near him, and, -without speaking, left her presence.</p> - -<p>'Bloodshed, bloodshed!' she thought, in the vague feverish confusion -of half-conscious thought. 'Though rivers of blood rolled between him -and me what could they wash away of the shame that is with me for ever? -What could death do? Death could blot out nothing.'</p> - -<p>A sense of awful impotence lay upon her like a weight of iron. Do what -she would she could never change the past! Her sons must grow to youth -and manhood tainted and dishonoured in her sight. There were times when -all the martial and arrogant spirit in her was like flame in her veins, -and she thought: 'Could I but rise and kill him—I, myself!'</p> - -<p>It seemed to her that it would be but justice.</p> - -<p>When Vàsàrhely, coming out from her chamber, passed the impostor who -had done her this dishonour, it cost him the greatest self-sacrifice -of his life not to order him out yonder in the chilly twilight of the -leafless woods, to stand before him in that ordeal of combat which, in -the code of honour of the Magyar Prince, was the sole tribunal to which -a man of honour could appeal. But she had forbade him to avenge her. -He felt that he had no share in her life sufficient to give him title -to disobey her. His own love for her told him that this offender was -still dear enough to her for his life to be sacred in her sight.</p> - -<p>'If I had not loved her,' he thought, 'I could have avenged her without -suspicion; but what would it seem to her and to the world?—only that I -slew him out of jealous rancour! In her soul she loves him still. Her -hate will fade, her love will survive, traitor and hound though he be.'</p> - -<p>He motioned Sabran towards one of the empty chambers in the gallery. -When he had closed the door of it he spoke with a low, hoarse voice:</p> - -<p>'Sir, I have the right as her kinsman, I have the right her brothers -would have had, to publicly insult you, to publicly chastise you. But -she has commanded me to abstain; she will have no feud between us. I -obey her; so must you. I have but one thing to say to you. Once you -spoke of suicide. I forbid you to follow up your crimes by causing the -unending misery that death by your own hand would bring to her. You -have been coward enough. Have courage at least not to leave a woman -alone under the disgrace you have brought upon her.'</p> - -<p>'Alone!' echoed Sabran. 'She will never admit me to her presence again. -She will demand her divorce as soon as ever she has strength to -remember and to speak.'</p> - -<p>'Do you know her so ill after nine years of marriage? Whatever she -do it will be for you to accept it, and not evade your chastisement -by the poltroon's refuge of oblivion in the grave. You have said you -think yourself my debtor; all the quittance I desire is this. You will -obey me when I forbid you to entail on your wife the lifelong remorse -that your suicide—however you disguised it—would bring upon her. In -obeying her, by holding back my hand from avenging her, I make the -greatest sacrifice that she could have demanded. Make yours likewise. -It would be easy for you to escape chastisement in death. You must -forego that ease, and live. I leave you to your conscience and to her.'</p> - -<p>He opened the door and passed down the corridor, his steps echoing on -the oaken floor.</p> - -<p>In half an hour he had left the house, and gone on his lonely way to -Taróc.</p> - -<p>Sabran stood mute.</p> - -<p>He had lost the power to resent; he knew that if this man chose to -strike him across the eyes with his whip he would be within his right. -The insults cut him to the bone as though the lash were on him; but he -held his peace and bore them, not in submission, but in silence. His -profound humiliation, his absolute despair, had broken the nerve in -him. He felt that he had no title to look a gentleman in the face, no -power to defend himself, whatever outrages were heaped on him.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXXVII">CHAPTER XXXVII.</a></h4> - - -<p>In time the convulsions ceased, the stupor lightened; they began to -hope.</p> - -<p>The danger had been great, but it was well-nigh past; the vigour and -perfection of her strength had enabled her to keep her hold on life. -After those few words to her kinsman she spoke seldom, she appeared -sunk in silent thought; when the door opened she shrank with a sort of -apprehension. Greswold watching her said to himself: 'She is afraid -lest her husband should enter.'</p> - -<p>She never spoke of him or of the children.</p> - -<p>Sabran did not dare to ask to see her. When Greswold would fain have -urged him, he refused with vehemence.</p> - -<p>'I dare not—it would be to insult her more. Only if she summon -me—but that she will never do.'</p> - -<p>'He has been faithless to her,' thought the old man.</p> - -<p>All those weeks of her slow and painful restoration to life she was -mute, her lips only moving in reply to the questions of her physicians. -It seemed to her strange that when her spiritual and mental life -had been poisoned to their source, her bodily life should be able -mechanically to gather force, and resume its functions. Had matter so -far more resistance than the soul?</p> - -<p>Her women were frightened at the look upon her face; it had the -rigidity, the changelessness of marble, and all the blood seemed gone -out of it for ever.</p> - -<p>In after days her heart would speak; remembered happiness, lost -beliefs, ruined love, would in their turn have place in her misery; but -now all she was sensible of was the unbearable insult, the ineffaceable -outrage. She was like a queen who beholds the virgin soil of her -kingdom invaded and wasted by a traitor.</p> - -<p>Any other thing she would have pardoned—infidelity, indifference, -cruelty, any sins of manhood's caprice or passion—but who should -pardon this? The sin was not alone against herself; it was against -every law of decency and truth that ever she had been taught to hold -sacred; it was against all those great dead, who lay with the cross -on their breasts and their swords by their side, from whom she had -received and treasured the traditions of honour, the purity of a race.</p> - -<p>It was those dead knights whom he had smote upon the mouth and mocked, -crying to them:. 'Lo! your place is mine; my sons will reign in your -stead. I have tainted your race for ever; for ever my blood flows with -yours.'</p> - -<p>The greatness of a great race is a thing far higher than mere pride. -Its instincts are noble and supreme, its obligations are no less than -its privileges; it is a great light which streams backward through -the darkness of the ages, and if by that light you guide not your -footsteps, then are you thrice accursed holding as you do that lamp of -honour in your hands.</p> - -<p>So had she always thought; and now he had dashed the lamp in the dust.</p> - -<p>Her convalescence came in due course; but the silence, almost absolute -silence, which she preserved on the full recovery of her consciousness -alarmed her physicians, who had no clue to the cause. Greswold alone, -who divined that there was some wrong or disaster which severed her -from her husband, guessed that this immutable speechlessness was but -the cover and guard of some great sorrow. No tears ever dimmed her -eyes or relieved her bursting heart; she lay still, absorbed in mute -and terrible retrospection. As her great weakness left her, there came -upon her features the colder darker look of her race, the look which he -who had betrayed her had always feared. She never spoke of him, nor of -the children. Her women would have ventured to bring the children to -her, unbidden, but Greswold forbade them; he knew that for the devoted -tenderness she bore them to be thus utterly still and changed, some -shock must have befallen her so great that the instincts of maternity -were momentarily quenched in her, as water springs are dried up by -earthquake.</p> - -<p>'She never speaks of me, nor of them?' asked Sabran with agony every -day of Greswold, and the old man answered him:</p> - -<p>'She never speaks at all. She replies to our questions as to her -health, she asks briefly for what she needs; no more.'</p> - -<p>'The children are innocent!' he said wearily, and his heart had never -gone forth to them so much as it did now, when they were shut out like -himself from the arms of their mother.</p> - -<p>Yet he understood how she shrank from them—might well almost abhor -them—seeing in them, as Vàsàrhely saw, the living proofs of her -surrender to a coward and a traitor.</p> - -<p>'What can he have done?' mused Greswold. 'Infidelity, perhaps, she -would not forgive; but it would not make her thus blind and deaf to the -children.'</p> - -<p>He passed his days in utter wretchedness; he wandered in the wintry -woods for hours, or sat in weary waiting outside her door. He cared -nothing what his household thought or guessed. He had forgotten every -living creature save herself. When he saw his young sons in the -distance he avoided them; he dreaded their guileless questions, the -stab of their unconscious words. Again and again he was tempted to blow -out his brains, or fling himself from the ice walls that towered above -him; but the sense that it would seem to her the last cowardice—the -last shame—restrained him.</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to him that the tie between them was so strong, the -memories of their past passion so sweet, that even his crime could not -part them. Then he remembered of what race she came, of what honour she -was the representative and guardian, and his heart sank within him, and -he knew that his offence was one beyond all pardon.</p> - -<p>The whole household dimly felt that some great grief had fallen on -their master. His attitude, his absence from his wife's room, the -arrival of Prince Vàsàrhely, the abrupt departure of the Countess -Brancka, all told them that some calamity had come, though they were -loyally silent one to the other, their service having been always one -of devotion and veneration for their mistress, since they were all -Tauern-born people, bred up by their fathers in loyalty to Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'The first who speaks of aught he suspects goes for ever,' old Hubert -had said to his numerous <i>dienerschaft</i> in the hearing of them all, -when one of the pages—he who had borne the note to his master in Olga -Brancka's rooms—ventured to hint that he thought some evil was abroad, -and would part their lord and lady. But all the faithful silence of -their attendants could not wholly conceal from the elder children -that something wrong, some greater sorrow even than their mother's -illness, was hanging over the old house. They were dull and vaguely -alarmed. They had not even the kindly presence of the Princess, who, -if she sometimes wearied them with admonitions, treated them with -tenderness, and atoned for her homilies by unending gifts. They were -very unhappy, though they said little, and wandered like little ghosts -among the wintry woods and in their spacious play-rooms. They were -tended, amused, provided for in all the same ways as usual. There were -all their pastimes and playthings; all their comforts and habits were -unaltered; but from the background of their sports and studies the -stately figure of their mother was missing, with her serene smile and -her happy power of checking all dispute or turbulence with a mere word -or a mere glance.</p> - -<p>The winter had come at a stroke, as it does without warning oftentimes -in the old Archduchy; the snow falling fast and thick, the waters -freezing in a night, the hills and valleys growing white and silent -between a sunset and a sunset.</p> - -<p>Their sledges carried them like lightning over the frozen roads, and -their little skates bore them swift as circling swallows over the ice. -It was the season Bela loved so well; but he had no joy in anything. -There was no twilight hour in the white-room at their mothers feet, -whilst she told them legends and stories: there was no moment in the -mornings when she came into their study and found their little puzzled -brains weary over a Latin declension or a crabbed page of history, and -made all clear to them by a few lucid graphic sentences; there was no -possible hope that, when the day was broad and bright over the wintry -land, she would call to them to bring the dogs and go with her and her -black horses through the glittering forests, where every bough was -heavy with the diamonds of the frost. To the little boys it seemed as -if the whole world had grown suddenly silent, and they were left all -alone in it.</p> - -<p>Their troops of attendants were no more consolation to them than his -crowd of courtiers is to a bereaved sovereign.</p> - -<p>Then, again, when Egon Vàsàrhely had by chance met them he had looked -at them strangely, and had always turned away without a greeting. 'And -when I was quite little he was so kind,' thought Bela, whose pride -seemed falling from him like a useless ragged garment.</p> - -<p>'It's all since Madame Olga came,' he said once to his brother. 'She is -a bad, bad woman. She was rude to our mother.'</p> - -<p>'I thought ladies were always good?' said Gela.</p> - -<p>'They are much wickeder than men,' said Bela, with premature wisdom. -'At least, when they <i>are</i> wicked. I heard a gentleman say so in Paris.'</p> - -<p>'What could she do when she was here, do you think?' asked Gela, with a -tremor.</p> - -<p>'I do not know,' said Bela, gravely and sadly. 'But I am sure that she -hated our mother.'</p> - -<p>He was sure that all the evil had come from her; he had heard of evil -spirits, the people believed in them, and had charms against them. She -was one of them. Had she not tempted him to disobedience and revolt, -with her pictures of the grand gaiety, the magnificent gatherings, the -heart-rousing 'Halali!' of the Chantilly hunt?</p> - -<p>Bela did not forget.</p> - -<p>He would have cut off his little right hand, now, never to have vexed -his mother.</p> - -<p>He was yet more sorrowful still for his father. Though they were not -allowed to approach their mother's apartments, he had disobeyed the -injunction more than once, and had seen Sabran walking to and fro that -long gallery, or seated with bent head and folded arms on one of the -oaken benches. With all his boldness Bela had not dared to approach -that melancholy figure; but it had haunted his dreams, and troubled -him sorely as he rode and drove, and played and did his lessons. The -snow had come on the second week of his mother's illness, and when he -visited his riding-pony in its loose box on these frosted days on which -he could not use it, he buried his face in its abundant mane, and wept -bitterly, though he boasted that he never cried.</p> - -<p>Eight weeks passed by after the departure of Olga Brancka before his -mother could leave her bed; and all that while, save for a brief -question now and again as to their health, put to her physician, she -had never mentioned the children once. 'She does not want us any more,' -said Bela, with the great tears dimming his bold eyes.</p> - -<p>In the ninth week she was lifted on to a great chair, placed beside -one of the windows, and she turned her weary gaze on to the snow world -without. What use was life? Why had it returned to her? All emotion of -maternity, all memory of love, were for the time killed in her. She was -only conscious of an intolerable indignity, for which neither God nor -man could give her consolation.</p> - -<p>She would have gone barefoot all the world over sooner than be again -in his presence, had not the imperious courage which was the strongest -instinct of her nature refused to confess itself unable to meet the man -who had wronged her. In the long dark night which these past two months -had seemed to her, she had brought herself to face the inevitable end. -She had nerved herself to be her own judge and his. Weaker women would -have made the world their judge; she did not. She did not even seek the -counsel of that Church of which she was a reverent daughter. Her priest -had no access to her.</p> - -<p>'God must see my torture, but no other shall,' she said in her heart, -nor should the world ever have her fate to make an hour's jesting -wonder of, as is its way with all calamity. It would be her lifelong -companion; a rusted iron for ever piercing deeper, and deeper into her -flesh; but she would dwell alone with it—unpitied. The men of her race -had always been their own lawgivers, their own avengers; she would be -hers.</p> - -<p>Once she bade them bring her pens and ink, and she began to use them. -Then she laid them down, and tore in two an unfinished letter. 'Only -cowards write to save themselves from pain,' she thought, and on the -tenth day after she had risen from her bed she said to Greswold:</p> - -<p>'Tell the women to leave me alone, and ask—my husband—to come here.'</p> - -<p>She said the last words as if they choked her in their utterance. Her -husband he was; nothing could change the past.</p> - -<p>The old man hesitated, and ventured to suggest that any exertion was -dangerous; would it be wise, he asked, to speak of what might agitate -her? And thereon he paused and stammered, knowing that it was not his -place to have observed that there was any estrangement between them.</p> - -<p>She looked at him with suspicion.</p> - -<p>'Have I spoken in my sleep or in my unconsciousness?' she thought.</p> - -<p>Aloud she said only:</p> - -<p>'Be so good as to go to him at once.'</p> - -<p>He bowed and went, and to himself mused:</p> - -<p>'Since she loves him, her heart will melt when she meets his eyes. -His sin after all cannot be beyond those which women have forgiven a -million times over since first creation began.'</p> - -<p>Yet in himself he was not sure of that. The Szalras had had many great -and many generous qualities, but forgiveness of offence had never been -among them.</p> - -<p>She remained still, her hands folded on her knees, her face set as -though it were cast in bronze. The great bedchamber, with its hangings -of pale blue plush and its silver-mounted furniture, was dim and -shadowy in the greyness of a midwinter afternoon. Doors opened, here -to the bath and dressing chambers, there to the oratory, yonder to the -apartments of Sabran. She looked across to the last, and a shudder -passed over her; a sense of sickness and revulsion came on her.</p> - -<p>She sat still and waited; she was too weak to go further than this -room. She was wrapped in a long loose gown of white satin, lined and -trimmed with sable. There were black bearskins beneath her feet; the -atmosphere was warmed by hot air, and fragrant with, some bowls full of -forced roses, which her women had placed, there at noon. The grey light -of the fading afternoon touched the silver scroll-work of the bed, and -the silver frame of one large mirror, and fell on her folded hands and -on the glister of their rings. Her head leaned backward against the -high carved ebony of her chair. Her face was stern and bitterly cold, -as that of Maria Theresa when she signed the loss of Silesia.</p> - -<p>He approached from his own apartments, and came timidly and with a slow -step forward. He did not dare to salute her, or go near to her; he -stood like a banished man, disgraced, a few yards from her seat.</p> - -<p>Two months had gone by since he had seen her. When he entered he read -on her features that he must leave all hope behind.</p> - -<p>Her whole frame shrank within her as she saw him there, but she gave -no sign of what she felt. Without looking at him she spoke, in a voice -quite firm though it was faint from feebleness.</p> - -<p>'I have but little to say to you, but that little is best said, not -written.'</p> - -<p>He did not reply; his eyes were watching her with a terrible appeal, a -very agony of longing. They had not rested on her for two months. She -had been near the gates of the grave, within the shadow of death. He -would have given his life for a word of pity, a touch, a regard—and he -dared not approach her!</p> - -<p>She did not look at him. After that first glance, in which there had -been so much of horror, of revulsion, she did not once look towards -him. Her face had the immutability of a mask of stone; so many wretched -days and haunted nights had she spent nerving herself for this -inevitable moment that no emotion was visible in her; into her agony -she had poured her pride, and it sustained her, as the plaster poured -into the dry bones at Pompeii makes the skeleton stand erect, the ashes -speak.</p> - -<p>'After that which you have told me,' she said, after a moment's silence -in which he fancied she must hear the throbbing of his heart, 'you must -know that my life cannot be lived out beside yours. The law gives you -many, rights, no doubt, but I believe you will not be so base as to -enforce them.'</p> - -<p>'I have no rights!' he muttered. 'I am a criminal before the law. The -law will free you from me, if you choose.'</p> - -<p>'I do not choose,' she said coldly; 'you understand me ill. I do not -carry my wrongs or my woes to others. What you have told me is known -only to Prince Vàsàrhely and to the Countess Brancka. He will be -silent; he has the power to make her so. The world need know nothing. -Can you think that I shall be its informant?'</p> - -<p>'If you divorce me——' he murmured.</p> - -<p>A quiver of bitter anger passed over her features, but she retained her -self-control.</p> - -<p>'Divorce? What could divorce do for me? Could it destroy the past? -Neither Church nor Law can undo what you have done. Divorce would make -me feel that in the past I had been your mistress, not your wife, that -is all.'</p> - -<p>She breathed heavily, and again pressed her hand on her breast.</p> - -<p>'Divorce!' she repeated. 'Neither priest nor judge can efface a past as -you clean a slate with a sponge! No power, human or divine, can free -<i>me</i>, purify <i>me</i>, wash your dishonoured blood from your children's -veins.'</p> - -<p>She almost lost her self-control; her lips trembled, her eyes were full -of flame, her brow was black with passion. With a violent effort she -restrained herself; invective or reproach seemed to her low and coarse -and vile.</p> - -<p>He was silent; his greatest fear, the torture of which had harassed him -sleeping and waking ever since he had placed his secret in her hands, -was banished at her words. She would seek no divorce—the children -would not be disgraced—the world of men would not learn his shame; -and yet as he heard a deeper despair than any he had ever known came -over him. She was but as those sovereigns of old who scorned the poor -tribunals of man's justice because they held in their own might the -power of so much heavier chastisement.</p> - -<p>'I shall not seek for a legal separation,' she resumed; 'that is to -say, I shall not, unless you force me to do so to protect myself from -you. If you fail to abide by the conditions I shall prescribe, then you -will compel me to resort to any means that may shelter me from your -demands. But I do not think you will endeavour to force on me conjugal -rights which you obtained over me by a fraud.'</p> - -<p>All that she desired was to end quickly the torture of this interview, -from which her courage had not permitted her to shrink. She had to -defend herself because she would not be defended by others, and she -only sought to strike swiftly and unerringly so as to spare herself -and him all needless or lingering throes. Her speech was brief, for -it seemed to her that no human language held expression deep and vast -enough to measure the wrong done to her, could she seek to give it -utterance.</p> - -<p>She would not have made a sound had any murderer stabbed her body; she -would not now show the death-wound of her soul and honour to this man -who had stabbed both to the quick. Other women would have made their -moan aloud, and cursed him. The daughter of the Szalras choked down her -heart in silence, and spoke as a judge speaks to one condemned by man -and God.</p> - -<p>'I wish no words between us,' she said, with renewed calmness. 'You -know your sin; all your life has been a lie. I will keep me and mine -back from vengeance; but do not mistake—God may pardon you, I never! -What I desired to say to you is that henceforth you shall wholly -abandon the name you stole; you shall assign the land of Romaris to the -people; you shall be known only as you have been known here of late, -as the Count von Idrac. The title was mine to give, I gave it you; no -wrong is done save to my fathers, who were brave men.'</p> - -<p>He remained silent; all excuse he might have offered seemed as if from -him to her it would be but added outrage. He was her betrayer, and she -had the power to avenge betrayal; naught that she could say or do could -seem unjust or undeserved beside the enormity of her irreparable wrongs.</p> - -<p>'The children?' he muttered faintly, in an unuttered supplication.</p> - -<p>'They are mine,' she said, always with the same unchanging calm that -was cold as the frozen earth without. 'You will not, I believe, seek to -enforce your title to dispute them with me?'</p> - -<p>He gave a gesture of denial.</p> - -<p>He, the wrong-doer, could not realise the gulf which his betrayal had -opened betwixt himself and her. On him all the ties of their past -passion were sweet, precious, unchanged in their dominion. He could not -realise that to her all these memories were abhorred, poisoned, stamped -with ineffable shame; he could not believe that she who had loved the -dust that his feet had brushed could now regard him as one leprous and -accursed. He was slow to understand that his sin had driven him out of -her life for evermore.</p> - -<p>Commonly it is the woman on whom the remembrance of love has an -enthralling power when love itself is traitor; commonly it is the man -on whom the past has little influence, and to whom its appeal is vainly -made; but here the position was reversed. He would have pleaded by it: -she refused to acknowledge it, and remained as adamant before it. His -nerve was too broken, his conscience was too heavily weighted for him -to attempt to rebel against her decisions or sway her judgment. If she -had bidden him go out and slay himself he would gladly have obeyed.</p> - -<p>'Once you said,' he murmured timidly, 'that repentance washes out all -crimes. Will you count my remorse as nothing?'</p> - -<p>'You would have known no remorse had your secret never been discovered!'</p> - -<p>He shrank as from a blow.</p> - -<p>'That is not true,' he said wearily. 'But how can I hope you will -believe me?'</p> - -<p>She answered nothing.</p> - -<p>'Once you told me that there was no sin you would not pardon me!' he -muttered.</p> - -<p>She replied:</p> - -<p>'We pardon sin; we do not pardon baseness.'</p> - -<p>She paused and put her hand to her heart; then she spoke again in that -cold, forced, measured voice, which seemed on his ear as hard and -pitiless as the strokes of an iron hammer, beating life out beneath it.</p> - -<p>'You will leave Hohenszalras; you will go where you will; you have the -revenues of Idrac. Any other financial arrangements that you may wish -to make I will direct my lawyers to carry out. If the revenues of Idrac -be insufficient to maintain you——'</p> - -<p>'Do not insult me—so,' he murmured, with a suffocated sound in his -voice, as though some hand were clutching at his throat.</p> - -<p>'Insult <i>you</i>!' she echoed, with a terrible scorn.</p> - -<p>She resumed, with the same inflexible calmness:</p> - -<p>'You must live as becomes the rank due to my husband. The world need -suspect nothing. There is no obligation to make it your confidante. If -anyone were wronged by the usurpation of the name you took it would -be otherwise, but as it is you will lose nothing in the eyes of men; -society will not flatter you the less. The world will only believe that -we are tired of one another, like so many. The blame will be placed on -me. You are a brilliant comedian, and can please and humour it. I am -known to be a cold, grave, eccentric woman, a recluse, of whom it will -deem it natural that you are weary. Since you allow that I have the -right to separate from you—to deal with you as with a criminal—you -will not seek to recall your existence to me. You will meet my -abstinence by the only amends you can make to me. Let me forget—as -far as I am able—let me forget that ever you have lived!'</p> - -<p>He staggered slightly, as if under some sword-stroke from an unseen -hand. A great faintness came upon him. He had been prepared for rage, -for reproach, for bitter tears, for passionate vengeance; but this -chill, passionless, disdainful severance from him for all eternity he -had never dreamed of: it crept like the cold of frost into his very -marrow; he was speechless and mute with shame. If she had dragged him -through all the tribunals of the world she would have hurt him and -humiliated him far less. Better all the hooting gibes of the whole -earth than this one voice, so cold, so inflexible, so full of utter -scorn!</p> - -<p>Despite her bodily weakness she rose to her full height, and for the -first time looked at him.</p> - -<p>'You have heard me,' she said; 'now go!'</p> - -<p>But instead, blindly, not knowing what he did, he fell at her feet.</p> - -<p>'But you loved me,' he cried, 'you loved me so well!'</p> - -<p>The tears were coursing down his cheeks.</p> - -<p>She drew the sables of her robe from his touch.</p> - -<p>'Do not recall <i>that</i>,' she said, with a bitter smile. 'Women of my -race have killed men before now for less outrage than yours has been -to me.'</p> - -<p>'Kill me!' he cried to her. 'I will kiss your hand.'</p> - -<p>She was mute.</p> - -<p>He clung to her gown with an almost convulsive supplication.</p> - -<p>'Believe, at least, that I loved <i>you</i>!' he cried, beside himself in -his misery and impotence. 'Believe that, at the least!—--'</p> - -<p>She turned from him.</p> - -<p>'Sir, I have been your dupe for ten long years; I can be so no more!'</p> - -<p>Under that intolerable insult he rose slowly, and his eyes grew blind, -and his limbs trembled, but he walked from her, and sought not again -either her pity or her pardon.</p> - -<p>On the threshold he looked back once. She stood erect, one hand resting -upon the carved work of her high oak chair; cold, stalely, motionless, -the furred velvets falling to her feet like a queen's robes.</p> - -<p>He looked, then passed the threshold and closed the door behind him. He -walked down the corridors blindly, not knowing whither he went.</p> - -<p>They were dusky, for the twilight of the winter's day had come. He did -not see a little figure which was coming towards him until the child -had stopped him with a timid outstretched hand.</p> - -<p>'Shall we never see her again?' said Bela, in a hushed voice. 'It is so -long!—so long! Oh, please do tell me!'</p> - -<p>Sabran paused, and looked down on the boy with blood-shot burning eyes. -For a moment or so he did not answer; then, with a sudden movement, he -drew his son to him, lifted him in his arms and kissed him passionately.</p> - -<p>'You will see her, not I—not I!' he said with a sob like a woman's. -'Bela, listen! Be obedient to her, adore her, have no will but hers; be -loyal, be truthful, be noble in all your words and all your thoughts, -and then in time perhaps—perhaps—she will pardon you for being also -mine!'</p> - -<p>The child, terrified, clung to him with all his force, dimly conscious -of some great agony near him, but far beyond his comprehension or -consolation.</p> - -<p>'I love you, I will always love you!' he said, with his hands clasped -around his father's throat.</p> - -<p>'Love your mother!' said Sabran, as he kissed the boy's soft cheeks, -made wet by his own tears; then he released the little frightened -form, and went himself away into the darkness.</p> - -<p>In a little time, with no word to any living soul there, he had -harnessed some horses with his own hands, and in the fast falling gloom -of the night had driven from Hohenszalras.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXVIII">CHAPTER XXXVIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>Bela heard the galloping hoofs of the horses, and ran with his fleet -feet, quick as a fawn's, down the grand staircase and out on to the -terrace, where the winds of the north were driving with icy cold and -furious force over a world of snow. With his golden hair streaming in -the blast, he strained his eyes into the gloom of the avenues below, -but the animals had vanished from sight. He turned sadly and went into -the Rittersaal.</p> - -<p>'Is that my father who has gone?' he said in a low voice to Hubert, who -was there. The old servant, with the tears in his eyes, told him that -it was. A groom had come to him to say that their lord had made ready -a sledge and driven away without a word to any one of them, while the -night was falling apace.</p> - -<p>Bela heard and said nothing; he had his mother's power of silence in -sorrow. He climbed the staircase silently, and went and listened in the -corridor where his father had waited and watched so long. His heart was -heavy, and ached with an indefinable dread. He did not seek Gela. It -seemed to him that this sorrow was his alone. He alone had heard his -father's farewell words; he alone had seen his father weep.</p> - -<p>All the selfishness and vanity of his little soul were broken up and -vanished, and the first grief he had ever known filled up their empty -place. He had adored his father with an unreasoning blind devotion, -like a dog's; and this intense affection had been increased rather than -repressed by the indifference with which he had been treated.</p> - -<p>His father was gone; he felt sure that it was for ever: if he could not -see his mother he thought he could not live. To the mind of a child -such gigantic and unutterable terrors rise up under the visitation of a -vague alarm. Abroad in the woods, or under any bodily pain or fear, he -was as brave as a lion whelp, but he had enough of the German mystic in -his blood to be imaginative and visionary when trouble touched him. The -sight of his father's grief had shaken his nerves, and filled him with -the first passionate pity he had ever known. A man so great, so strong, -so wonderful in prowess, so far aloof from himself as Sabran had always -seemed to his little son, to be so overwhelmed in such helpless sorrow, -appeared to Bela so terrible a thing that an intense fear took for the -first time possession of his little valiant soul. His father could slay -all the great beasts of the forests; could break in the horse fresh -from the freedom of the plains; could breast the stormy waters like -a petrel; could scale the highest heights of the mountains. And yet -someone—something—had had power to break down all his strength, and -make him flee in wretchedness.</p> - -<p>It could not be his mother who had done this thing? No, no! never, -never! It had been done because she was lying ill, helpless, perhaps -was dead.</p> - -<p>As that last dread came over him he lost all control over himself. -He knew what death was. A little girl he had been fond of in Paris -had died whilst he was her playmate, and he had seen her lying, so -waxen, so cold, so unresponsive, when he had laid his lilies on her -little breast. A great despair came over him, and made him reckless -what he did. In the desperation of terror blent with love, he started -up and ran to the door of his mother's apartments. It yielded to his -pressure; he ran across the ante chamber and the dressing-rooms, and -pulled aside the tapestry.</p> - -<p>Then he saw her; seated at the further side of the great bedchamber. -There was a feeble grey light from the western sky, to which the -casements of the chamber turned. It was very pale and dim, but by it he -saw her lying back, rigid and colourless, the white satin, the dusky -fur, the deep shadows gathered around her. There was that in her look -and in her attitude which made the child's heart grow cold, as his -father's had done.</p> - -<p>She was alone; for she had bade her women not come unless she summoned -them. Bela stood and gazed, his pulses beating loud and hard; then with -a cry he ran forward and sprang to her, and threw his arms about her.</p> - -<p>'Oh, mother, mother, you are not dead!' he cried. 'Oh, speak to me; do -speak to me! He is gone away for ever and ever, and if we cannot see -you we shall all die. Oh, do not look at me so! Pray, pray, do not. -Shall I fetch Lili?—-'</p> - -<p>In his vague terror he thought to disarm her by his little sister's -name. She had thrust him away from her, and was looking with cold and -cruel eyes on his face, that was so like the face of his father. She -was thinking:</p> - -<p>'You are the son of a serf, of a traitor, of a liar, of a bastard, -and yet you are <i>mine</i>! I bore you, and yet you are his. You are -shame incarnate. You are the living sign of my dishonour. You bear my -name—my untainted name—and yet you were begotten by him.'</p> - -<p>Bela dropped down at her feet as his father had done.</p> - -<p>'Oh, do not look at me so,' he sobbed. 'Oh, mother, what have I done? -I have tried to be good all this while. He is gone away, and he is so -unhappy, and he bade me never vex or disobey you, and I never will.'</p> - -<p>His voice was broken in his sobs, and he leaned his head upon her -knees, and clasped them with both his arms. She looked down on him, and -drew a deep shuddering breath. The holiest joy of a woman's life was, -for her, poisoned at the springs.</p> - -<p>Then, at the child's clinging embrace, at his piteous and innocent -grief, the motherhood in her welled up under the frost of her heart, -and all its long-suffering and infinite tenderness revived, and -overcame the horror that wrestled with it. She raised him up and -strained him to her breast.</p> - -<p>'You are mine, you are mine!' she murmured over him. 'I must forget all -else.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXXIX">CHAPTER XXXIX.</a></h4> - - -<p>He spring dawned once more on Hohenszalras, and the summer followed it. -The waters leapt, the woods rejoiced, the gardens blossomed, and the -children played; but the house was silent as a house in which the dead -are tying. There was indeed a corpse there—the corpse of buried joy, -of murdered love, of ruined honour.</p> - -<p>The household resumed its calm order, the routine of the days was -unbroken, the quiet yet stately life had been taken up in its course -as though it had never been altered; and wherever young children are -there will always be some shout of mirth, some sound of happy laughter -somewhere; the children laugh as the birds sing, though those amidst -them bury their dead.</p> - -<p>But the house was as a house of mourning, and the sense of death was -there as utterly as though he who was gone had been laid in his grave -amidst the silver figures and the marble tombs in the Chapel of the -Knights. No one ever heard a sigh from her lips, or ever saw the tears -beneath her eyelids; but the sense of her bereavement, as one terrible, -inconsolable, eternal, weighed like a pall on all those who were about -her; the lowliest peasant on her estates understood that the sanctity -of some untold woe had built up a wall of granite between her and all -the living world.</p> - -<p>She had always been grateful to fate for her old home set amidst the -silence of the mountains, but she had never been so thankful for it -as now. It shielded her from all the observation and interrogation of -the world; no one came thither unbidden, unless she chose, no visitant -would ever break that absolute solitude which was the sole approach -to peace that she would ever know. Even her relatives could not pass -the icy barrier of her cold denial. They wearied her for a while with -written importunities and suggestions, hinted wonder, delicately -expressed questions. But they made no way into her confidence; they -soon left her to herself and to her children. They said angrily to -themselves that she had been always whimsical and a solitary; they -had been certain that soon or late that ill-advised union would be -dissolved in some way, private or public. They were all people haughty, -sensitive, abhorrent of scandal; they were content that the separation -should be by mutual consent and noiseless.</p> - -<p>She had had letters from Egon Vàsàrhely full of delicate tenderness; in -the last he had asked with humility if he might visit Hohenszalras. She -had written in return to him:</p> - -<p>'You have my gratitude and my affection, but until we are quite old we -will not meet. Leave me alone; you can do naught for me.'</p> - -<p>He obeyed; he understood the loyalty to one disloyal which made her -refuse to meet him, of whose loyalty she was so sure.</p> - -<p>He sent a magnificent present to the child who was his namesake, and -wrote to her no more save upon formal anniversaries.</p> - -<p>The screen of her dark forests protected her from all the cruel comment -and examination of the men and women of her world. She knew them well -enough to know that when she ceased to appear amidst them, when she -ceased to contribute to their entertainment, when she ceased to bid -them to her houses, she would soon cease also to be remembered by them; -even their wonder would live but for a day. If they blamed her in their -ignorance, their blame would be as indifferent as their praise had -been.</p> - -<p>She had been told by her lawyers that her husband had refused to touch -a coin of the revenues of Idrac, and had once visited them to sign a -power of procuration, whereby they could receive those revenues and set -them aside in accumulation for his son Gela. That was all she heard. -Whither he had gone she was ignorant. She did not make any effort to -learn. On the night following his departure a peasant had been sent -with the sleigh and horses home to Hohenszalras. The solicitors of -Salzburg had seen him a week or two later at their ancient offices -under the Calvarienburg: that was all. She had bade him let it be -forgotten that he had ever lived beside her. He had obeyed her.</p> - -<p>The days, and weeks, and months went on, and his place knew him no -more. The jägers, seated round their fires in their forest-huts, spoke -longingly and wonderingly of his absence. The hunters, when they -brought down a steinbock with unusual effort or skill, said that it had -been a shot that would have been worthy of his praise. His old friend -wept for him with the slow sad tears of age, and the child Bela prayed -for his return every night that he knelt down before his crucifix. But -his name never passed his wife's lips, and was never written by her -hand. She had given her all with the superb generosity of a sovereign; -she had in her wrongs the intense abiding unutterable disgust of a -sovereign betrayed and outraged. When she let grief have its way, it -was when no eyes beheld her, when the night was down and solitude -sheltered her.</p> - -<p>She had never spoken of what had befallen her to any human ear; not -even to her priest's. The horror of it was buried in her own breast; -its sepulchre all the waste and ashes of her perished joys.</p> - -<p>When the Princess Ottilie, weeping, entreated to be told the worst, she -answered briefly:</p> - -<p>'He betrayed me. How, matters nothing.'</p> - -<p>More than that she never said. The Princess supposed that she spoke -of the disloyalty of the passions, and dared not urge her to more -confidence. 'I warned him that she would never forgive if he were -faithless,' she thought, and wept for hours at her orisons, her gentle -soul resenting the inflexibility of this mute immutable bitterness of -offended love.</p> - -<p>Too proud and too delicate to intrude undesired into any confidence, -and too tenderhearted to utter censure aloud to one she loved, the -Princess showed in a thousand ways without speech that she considered -there were cruelty and egotism in her unexplained separation from -her husband. Believing as she did that his offence was that conjugal -infidelity which, however blameable, is one of those injuries which -all women who love forgive, and which those who do not love endure in -silence from patience and dignity, herself offended at her exclusion -from all knowledge of the facts, she said but little; but her whole -attitude was one of restrained reproach.</p> - -<p>'With time she will change,' she said to herself. But time passed on, -and she could see no change, nor any hope of it.</p> - -<p>The grave severe beauty of their mother had a vague terror for her -children. She never now smiled at their mirth, laughed at their sports, -or joined in their pastimes. She was almost always silent. Bela longed -to throw his arms about her knees, and cry out to her: 'Mother, -mother, where is <i>he?</i>' But he did not venture to do so. Without his -reasoning upon it, the child instinctively felt that her frozen calm -covered depths of suffering which he did not dare disturb. He had been -so completely terrified once, that the remembrance of that hour lay -like ice upon his bright courage. Even the younger ones felt something -of the same fear. Their mother remembered them, cared for them, was -heedful that their needs of body and of brain were perfectly supplied. -But they felt, as young children feel what they cannot explain, that -they were outside her life, insufficient for her, even fraught with -intense pain to her. Often when she stooped to kiss them a shudder -passed over her; often when they came into her presence she looked away -from them, as though the sight of them stung and blinded her. They -never heard an angry word from her lips, but even repeated anger would -have kept them at less distance from her than did that mute majesty of -a grief they could not comprehend.</p> - -<p>She was more severe to all her dependants; she never became unjust, -but she was often stern; the children at the schools saw her smile no -more. Santa Claus still filled their stockings on Christmas Eve; but of -the stately figure which moved amidst them, robed in black, they grew -afraid. She seldom went to them or to her peasantry. Bela and Gela were -sent with her winter gifts. In the summer the sennerins never now saw -her enter their high huts and drink a cup of milk, talking with them of -their herds and flocks.</p> - -<p>She was tranquil as of old. She fulfilled the duties of her properties, -and attended to all the demands made upon her by her people; her -liberalities were unchanged, her justice was unwarped, her mind was -clear and keen. But she never smiled, even on her young daughter; and -the little Lili said once to her brothers:</p> - -<p>'Do you know, I think our mother is changing to marble. She will soon -be of stone, like the statues in the chapel. When I touch her I feel -cold.'</p> - -<p>Bela was angered.</p> - -<p>'You are ungrateful, you little child,' he said to his sister. 'Who -loves us, who cares for us, who thinks of us, as our mother does? If -her lips are cold, perhaps her heart is broken. We are only children; -we can do so little.'</p> - -<p>He had treasured the words of his father in his soul. He had never -told them, except to Gela, but they were always present to him. He -alone had seen and heard enough to understand that some dire disaster -had shattered in pieces the beautiful life which his parents had led -together. He had received an indelible impression from the two scenes -of that evening. Without comprehending, he had felt that something -had befallen them, which struck at their honour no less than at -their peace. He had a clear conception of what honour was; it was -the first tuition that Wanda von Szalras gave her children. Vague as -his understanding of their grief had been, it had been sufficient -to strike at that pride winch was inborn in him. He was like the -Dauphin of whom he had thought in Paris. He had seen his father driven -from his throne; he had seen his mother in the sackcloth and ashes -of affliction. He was humiliated, bewildered, softened; he, who had -believed himself omnipotent because all the people of the Iselthal ran -to do his bidding, felt how helpless he was in truth. He was shut out -from his mother's confidence; he had been powerless to console her or -to retain his father; there was something even in himself from which -his mother shrank. What had his father said? 'She will in time pardon -you for being mine.' What had been the meaning of those strange words? -And where had his father gone?</p> - -<p>When the summer came and Bela rode through the glad green woods, his -heart was heavy. Would his father never ride there any more? Bela -had often watched, himself unseen, the fiery horse that bore the -man he loved come plunging and leaping through bough and brake till -it passed him as though the wind bore it. He had always thought as -he had watched, 'When I grow up I will be just what he is'; and now -that splendid and gracious figure which had been always present on -the horizon of his child's mind, magnified and glorified like the -illuminated figures in the painted chronicles, was no more there—had -faded utterly away in the dusk and the snow of that wintry twilight.</p> - -<p>A thousand times was the question to his mother on his lips: 'Will he -never come back? Shall we never see him again?' But he dared not speak -it when he saw that look of a revulsion they could not comprehend -always upon her face.</p> - -<p>'He bade me never vex her,' Bela thought, and obeyed.</p> - -<p>'I wonder if ever he think of us,' he said once to Gela, as their -ponies walked down one of the grassy rides of the home woods.</p> - -<p>'Perhaps he is dead,' said Gela, in a hushed, wistful voice.</p> - -<p>'How dare you say that, Gela?' said his brother, angry from an -intolerable pain. 'If he were—were—<i>that</i>, we should be told it. -There would be masses in the chapel. We should have black clothes. Oh -no! he is not dead. I should know it, I am sure I should know it. He -would send down some angel to tell me.'</p> - -<p>'Why do you care so much for him?' said Gela, very low. 'It must be he -who has made our mother so changed, so unhappy; and it is she whom we -should love most. You say even he told you so.'</p> - -<p>Bela's lips unclosed to loose an angry answer. He was thinking; 'It is -she who sent him away, she who made him weep.' But his loyalty checked -it; he would not utter what he thought, even to his brother.</p> - -<p>'I think he would not wish us to talk of it,' he said gravely and -sadly. 'We will pray for him; that is all we can do.'</p> - -<p>'And for her,' said Gela, under his breath.</p> - -<p>They were both mute, and let the bridles lie on their ponies' necks as -they rode home quietly and sorrowfully in the still summer afternoon to -the great house, which, with all its thousand casements gleaming in the -sun, seemed to them so silent, so empty, so deserted now. Bela looked -up at the banner, with its deep red and its blazoned gold streaming on -a westerly wind. 'The flag would be half-mast high if it were <i>that</i>,' -he thought, his heart wrung by the dread which Gela had suggested to -him. He had seen the banner lowered when Prince Lilienhöhe had died.</p> - -<p>On the lawn under the terrace the other children were playing with -little painted balloons; the boys did not go to them, but riding round -to the stables entered the house by the side entrance. Gela went to his -violin, which he loved better than any toy, and studied seriously. -Bela wandered wearily over the building, tormented by the doubt which -his brother had put in his thoughts. They were always enjoined to keep -to their own wing of the house; but he often broke the rule, as he did -most others. He walked listlessly along the innumerable galleries, and -up and down the grand staircases, his St. Hubert hound following his -steps. His face was very pale, his little hands were folded behind -his back, his head was bent. He knew that the Latin and Greek for the -morrow were all unprepared, but he could not think of them. He was -thinking only: 'If it should be, if it should be?'</p> - -<p>He came at last to the door of the library. It was there that his -mother now spent most of her time. She took long rides alone, always -alone; and often chose for them the wildest weather. When she was -indoors, she passed her time in unremitting application to all the -business of her estates. He opened the great oak door very softly, and -saw her seated at the table; Donau and Neva, who now were old, were -lying near her feet. She was studying some papers. The sunset glow came -through the painted casements and warmed all the light about her, but -by its contrast, her attitude, her expression, her features, looked -only the graver, the colder, the more colourless. Her gown was black, -her pearls were about her throat, her profile was severe, her cheek, -turned to the light, was pale and thin. She did not see the little -gallant figure of her son in his white summer riding-clothes, and with -his golden hair cut across his brows, looking like a boy's portrait by -Reynolds.</p> - -<p>He stood a moment irresolute; then he went across the long room and -stood before her, and bowed as he knew he ought to do. She started and -turned her head and saw the pallor of the child's face. She put out her -hand to him; it was very thin, and the rings were large upon it. He -saw a contraction on her features as of pain; it was but of a moment, -because he looked so like his father.—</p> - -<p>'What is it, Bela?' she said to him. 'You ought not to come here.'</p> - -<p>His lower lip quivered. He hesitated; then, gathering all his courage, -said timidly:</p> - -<p>'May I ask you just one thing?'</p> - -<p>'Surely, my child—are you afraid of me?'</p> - -<p>It struck her, with a sudden sense of contrition, that she had made the -children afraid of her. She had never thought of it before.</p> - -<p>Bela hesitated once more, then said boldly: Gela said to day <i>he</i> might -be dead. Oh, if he ever die, will you please tell me? I shall think of -it day and night.'</p> - -<p>Her face changed terribly; the darker passions of her nature were -spoken on it.</p> - -<p>'I have forbidden you to speak of your father, if it be him you mean,' -she said sternly and very coldly.</p> - -<p>But Bela, though frightened, clung to his one thought.</p> - -<p>'But he may die!' he said piteously. 'Will you tell me? Please, will -you tell me? He might be dead now—we never hear.'</p> - -<p>She leaned her arm upon the table, and covered her eyes with her hand. -She was silent. She strove with herself so as not to treat the child -with harshness. Though he hurt her so cruelly, he was right. She -honoured him for his courage.</p> - -<p>'If you will only tell me that,' said the boy, with tears in his -throat, 'I will never ask anything else—never—never!'</p> - -<p>'Why do you cling so to his memory?' she said, with a sudden impatience -of jealousy. 'He never took heed of you.'</p> - -<p>'I was so little,' said Bela, with a sigh. 'But I loved him—oh! I have -always loved him—and I was the last to see him that night.'</p> - -<p>'I know!' she said harshly, ashamed meanwhile of her own harshness, for -how could the child suspect the torture his words were to her? What -had his father given her beautiful boy?—disgraced descent, sullied -blood, the heritage of falsehood and of dishonour. Yet the boy loved -his memory better than he loved her presence. And the time had been, -not so long passed, when she would have recognised the preference with -fond and generous delight.</p> - -<p>Bela stood beside her, his eyes watching her with timid interrogation, -with longing appeal. The look upon his face went to her heart. She knew -not what to say to him. She had hoped he would be always silent, and -forget, as children usually forget.</p> - -<p>'You are right to feel so,' she said to him at last, with a violent -effort. 'Cherish his memory, and pray for him always; but do not speak -of him to me. When you are grown to manhood, if I be living then, you -shall hear what has parted your father and me; you shall judge us -yourself. But there are many years to that; many weary years for me. -I shall endeavour that they shall be happy ones for you; but you must -never ask me, never speak, of him. I gave you that command that night; -but you are very young, you have forgotten.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened with a sinking heart. He gathered from her words that -his father's absence was, as he had feared, for ever.</p> - -<p>'I had not forgotten,' he said in a whisper, for the moment was -terrible to him. 'But if—if what Gela said should ever be, will you -tell me that? I will not disobey again, but pray—pray—tell me <i>that.</i>'</p> - -<p>His mother's face seemed to him to grow colder and colder, paler and -paler, till she scarcely looked a living woman.</p> - -<p>'I will tell you—if I know,' she said, with a pause between each slow -spoken word. Then the only smile that had come upon her lips for many -months came there; a smile sadder than tears, more bitter than all -scorn.</p> - -<p>'He will outlive me, fear not,' she said, as she put out her hand to -the child. 'Now leave me, my dear; I am occupied.'</p> - -<p>Bela touched her hand with his lips, which, despite his will, quivered -as he did so. He felt that he had failed, that he had disobeyed and -hurt her, that he had been unable to show one tenth of all the feelings -which choked him with their force and longing. He hung his head as -he went sorrowfully away. 'She may not know! She may not know!' he -thought, with terror.</p> - -<p>He looked back at her timidly as he closed the door. She had resumed -her writing; the red sunset light fell on her black gown, on her -stately head, on her profile, cut clear as on a cameo.</p> - -<p>He dared not return.</p> - -<p>The mother whom he had known in other years, on whose knee he had -rested his head as she told him tales in the twilight hour, whose hand -had caressed his curls, whose smile had rewarded his stammering Latin -or his hardly achieved line of handwriting, who had stooped over him -in his drowsy dreams, and made him think of angels, the mother who had -said to Egon Vàsàrhely: 'This is my Bela: love him a little for my -sake,' seemed as far from him as though she were lying in her tomb.</p> - -<p>She, when the tapestry had fallen behind the slender figure of her -little son, continued to write on. It was hard, dry matter that she -wrote of; the condition of her miners amongst the silver ore of the -north-east. She forced her mind to it, she compelled her will and -her hand; that was all. These things depended on her; she would not -neglect them, she strove to find in them that distraction which lighter -natures seek in pleasure. But in vain she now endeavoured to compel her -attention to the details she was following and correcting; soon they -became to her so confused that they were unintelligible; for once her -intelligence refused to obey her will. The child's words haunted her. -She laid down her pen, pushed aside the reports and the letter in which -she was replying to them, and rising paced to and fro the long polished -floor of the library.</p> - -<p>It was here that he had first bowed before her on that night when -Hohenszalras had sheltered him from the storm.</p> - -<p>'We had a mass of thanksgiving!' she thought.</p> - -<p>The child's words haunted her. Not to know even <i>that</i> when they had -passed nine years together in the closest of all human ties! For the -first time the misgiving came to her, had she been too harsh? No; it -would have been impossible to have done less; many would have done far -more in chastisement of the fraud upon their honour and good faith. -Yet as she recalled their many hours of joy it seemed as if she had -remembered these too little. Then again she scouted her own weakness. -What had been all his life beside her save one elaborate lie?</p> - -<p>The broad shafts of the blazing sunset slanted across the inlaid woods -of the floor which she paced; the windows were open, the birds sang in -the rose boughs and ivy without. The summers would come thus, one after -another, with their intolerable light, and the intolerable laughter of -the unconscious children; and she would carry her burden through them, -though the day was for ever dark for her.</p> - -<p>Time had been when she had thought that she should die if he were lost -to her; but she lived on and marvelled at herself. Her very soul seemed -to have gone from her with the destruction of her love. Her body seemed -to her but a mere shell, an inanimate pulseless thing. The only thing -that seemed alive in her was shame.</p> - -<p>She paced now up and down the long room while the sunset died and the -grey evening dulled the painted panes of the casements. The boy's -question had pierced through her frozen serenity. It was true that she -had no knowledge where his father was; he might be dead, he might be -killed by his own hand—she knew nothing. She had bidden him let her -forget that he had ever lived beside her, and he had obeyed her. He -might be in the world of men, careless and content, consoled by others, -or he might be in his grave.</p> - -<p>All she knew was that he never touched the revenues of Idrac.</p> - -<p>She paused on the same spot where he had stood before her first, with -his fair beauty, his courtier's smile, his easy grace, the very prince -of gentlemen; and her hands clenched the folds of her gown as she -thought—'the first of actors! Nothing more.'</p> - -<p>And she, Wanda von Szalras, had been the dupe of that inimitable -mimicry and mockery!</p> - -<p>The thought was like a rusted iron, eating deeper and deeper into her -heart each day. When her consciousness, her memory, would have said -otherwise, would have told her that in much he was loyal and sincere, -though in one great thing he had been false, she would not trust -herself to hearken to the suggestion. 'Let me see clearly, though I die -of what I see!' she said in her soul. She would be blind no more. She -hated herself that she had been ever blind.</p> - -<p>She had been always his dupe, from the first sonorous phrases she had -heard him utter in the French Chamber to the last sentence with which -he had left her when he went from her to the presence of Olga Brancka. -So she believed. Here she did him wrong; but how was she to tell that? -To her it seemed but one long-sustained comedy, one brilliant and -hateful imposture.</p> - -<p>Sometimes his cry to her rang in her ears: 'Believe at least that I -did love you!' and some subtle true instinct in her whispered to her -that he had there been sincere, that in passion and devotion at least -he had never been false. But she thrust the thought away; it seemed but -another form of self-deception.</p> - -<p>The dull slow evening passed as usual; it was late in summer and the -night came early. She dined in company with Madame Ottilie and sat with -her as usual afterwards. The room seemed full of his voice, of his -laughter, of the music of which he had had such mastery.</p> - -<p>She never opened her lips to say to the Princess Ottilie: 'But for you -he would have passed from my life a mere stranger, seen but once.' -But the tender conscience of the Princess made her feel the bitterest -reproach every time that the eyes of her niece met her own, every time -that she passed the blank space in the picture gallery where once had -hung the portrait of Sabran, painted in court dress by Mackart. The -portrait was locked away in a dark closet that opened out from the -oratory of his wife. With its emblazoned arms and marquis's coronet on -the frame, it had seemed such a perpetual record of his sin that she -had had it taken from the wall and shut in darkness, feeling that it -could not hang in its falsehood amidst the portraits of her people. But -often she opened the door of her oratory and let the light stream upon -the portrait where it leaned against the closet wall. It seemed then as -if he stood living before her, looking as he had looked so often at the -banquets and balls of the Hofburg, when she had felt so much pride in -his personal beauty, his grace of bearing, his supreme distinction.</p> - -<p>'Who could have dreamed that it was but a perfect comedy,' she thought, -'as much a comedy as Got's or Bressant's!'</p> - -<p>Then her conscience smote her with a sense that she did him injustice -when she thought so. In all things save his one crime he had been -as true a gentleman as any of the great nobles of the empire. His -intelligence, his bearing, his habits, his person, were all those of a -patrician of the highest culture. The fraud of his name apart, there -had been nothing in him that the most fastidious aristocrats would -have disowned. He had inherited the qualities of a race of princes, -though he had been descended unlawfully from them. His title had been -a borrowed thing, unlawfully worn; but his supreme distinction of -manner, his tact, his bodily grace, that large and temperate view of -men and things which marks a gentleman, these had all been inborn and -natural to him. He had been no mere actor when he had moved through -a throne-room by her side. Her calmer reason told her this, but her -instincts of candour and of pride made her deny that where there was -one fraud there could be any truth.</p> - -<p>She span on now at her ivory wheel because it was mere mechanical work, -which left thought free. The Princess, in lieu of slumbering, looked at -her ever and again. Suddenly she gathered her courage and spoke.</p> - -<p>'Wanda, you are a Christian woman,' she said slowly and softly. 'Is it -Christian never to forgive?'</p> - -<p>Her face did not change as she turned the spinning-wheel.</p> - -<p>'What is forgiveness?' she said coldly. 'Is it abstinence from -vengeance? I have abstained.'</p> - -<p>'It is far more than that!'</p> - -<p>'Then I do not reach it.'</p> - -<p>'No; you do not. That is why I presumed to ask you, is it in consonance -with your tenets, with your duties?'</p> - -<p>'I think so.'</p> - -<p>'Then change your creed,' said the Princess.</p> - -<p>A sombre wrath shone in her eyes as she looked up one moment.</p> - -<p>'I have the blood in me of men who were not always Christians, but who, -even when Pagan, knew what honour was. There are some things which are -so vile that one must be vile oneself before one can forgive them.'</p> - -<p>The Princess sighed.</p> - -<p>'I am in ignorance of the nature of your wrongs; but this I know—they -erred who gave you absolution at Eastertide, whilst you still bore -bitterness in your soul.'</p> - -<p>'Would I lay bare my soul and his shame now to any priest?' thought -Wanda; but she repressed the answer. She said simply: 'Dear mother, -believe me, I have been more merciful than many would have been.'</p> - -<p>'You mean that you have not sought for a divorce? Nay, that is not -mercy; that is decency, dignity, self-respect. When they of a great -race go to the public with their wrongs they drag their escutcheon in -the mud for the pleasure of the crowd. That you have not done; that is -not mercy. You do but follow your instincts; you are a gentlewoman.'</p> - -<p>A momentary impulse came over her, as she heard, to tell her companion -his sin and her own shame; the woman's weakness, desiring sympathy -and comprehension, assailed her for an instant. But she resisted and -repressed it. The Princess Ottilie was aged and feeble. She had had no -slight share in bringing about this union, which was now so cruelly -broken; she had been ever proud of her penetration and devoted to his -defence. To learn the truth would be a shock so terrible to her that -it must needs be veiled from her for ever. Besides, his wife felt as -though the relation would blister her lips were she to make it even to -her oldest friend.</p> - -<p>Had she known all, the elder woman would have been even more bitter -in her hatred, even more inflexible in her sense of outrage than she -herself; but she could not purchase sympathy at such a price. She chose -rather to be herself condemned.</p> - -<p>Offended, the Princess rose slowly to go to her own apartments. The -tears welled painfully in her eyes.</p> - -<p>'You were so happy, he was so devoted,' she murmured. 'Can all that -have crumbled like a house of sand?'</p> - -<p>Wanda von Szalras said bitterly:</p> - -<p>'What did I say once, the day of my betrothal? That I leaned on a reed. -The reed has withered, that is all. You see, I can stand without it.'</p> - -<p>She conducted her aunt to her bedchamber with the usual courteous -observances; then returned and sat long alone in the silent chamber.</p> - -<p>'Forgive! what is the obligation of forgiveness?' she thought. 'It is -the obligation to pardon offences, infidelity, unkindness, cruelty, but -not dishonour. To forgive dishonour is to be dishonoured. So would my -fathers have said.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XL" id="CHAPTER_XL">CHAPTER XL.</a></h4> - - -<p>Bela that dawn was awakened by his mother standing beside his bed. She -stooped and touched his curls with her lips.</p> - -<p>'I was harsh to you yesterday, my child,' she said to him. 'I come to -tell you now that you were quite right to have the thought you had. You -are his son; you must not forget him.'</p> - -<p>Bela lifted up his beautiful flushed face and his eye brilliant from -sleep.</p> - -<p>'I am glad I may remember,' he said simply; then he added, with his -cheeks burning: 'When I am a man I will go and find him and bring him -back.'</p> - -<p>His mother turned away her face.</p> - -<p>When his manhood should come and he should hear the story of his -father's sin, what would he say? Would not all his soul cry out aloud -and curse the impostor who had begotten him?</p> - -<p>The eyes of Bela followed the dark form of his mother as she passed -from his room.</p> - -<p>'She is very unhappy,' he thought wistfully. 'If I could find him -<i>now</i>, would it make her happy again, I wonder?'</p> - -<p>And the chivalry that was in his blood stirred in his childish veins.</p> - -<p>'But you said that she sent him away?' whispered Gela, when Bela got -upon his brother's bed and confided his thoughts to him.</p> - -<p>'I did think so; but I might mistake,' said Bela. 'Perhaps he went -because he was obliged, and that it is which grieves her.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps,' said Gela, meditatively.</p> - -<p>'If I only knew where to go to find him I would go all over the world,' -said Bela, with passion. 'I would ride Folko to the earth's very, very, -end to reach him.'</p> - -<p>'You could not get over the seas so,' said Gela; 'and he may be over -the seas.'</p> - -<p>'And we have never even seen the sea!' said Bela, to whom the suggested -distance seemed more terrible than he had ever imagined. 'What can we -do, Gela, do you think? you are clever about everything.'</p> - -<p>Gela was silent a moment.</p> - -<p>'Let us pray for him with all our might,' he said solemnly; and the two -little boys knelt down by the bedside in their little nightshirts and -prayed together for their father.</p> - -<p>When Bela rose his face was very troubled, but very resolute. He drew -out of its sheath a small sword with a handle of gold, which Egon -Vàsàrhely had sent him years before. 'One must pray first,' he thought, -'but afterwards one must help oneself. God does not care for cowards.'</p> - -<p>In the day he went out all alone and found Otto; the children were -allowed to go over the home woods at their pleasure. The <i>jägermeister</i> -was very dear to Bela, for he told such wondrous tales of sport and -danger, and spoke with such reverent affection of his lost lord.</p> - -<p>'Where <i>can</i> he be, Otto?' said the child now, in a low hushed voice, -as they sat under the green oak boughs.</p> - -<p>'Ah, my little Count, if only I knew!' said Otto. 'I would walk a -thousand miles to him, and take him the first blackcock that shall fall -to my gun this autumn.'</p> - -<p>'You really say the truth? You do not know?' said Bela, with stern -questioning eyes.</p> - -<p>'Would I tell a lie, my little lord?' said the old hunter, -reproachfully. 'Since your father drove away that cruel night none of -us have set eyes on him, or ever heard a word. If Her Excellency do not -know, how should we?'</p> - -<p>'I mean to find him,' said the child, solemnly.</p> - -<p>The old man sighed.</p> - -<p>'How should you do that? Our hills are between us and all the rest of -the world. Perhaps he is gone because he was tired of being here.'</p> - -<p>'No,' said Bela, who remembered his father's farewell to him, of which -he could never bring himself to speak to any living creature.</p> - -<p>Otto was silent too: he could not tell the child what all the household -believed—that his father had found too great a charm in the presence -of the Countess Brancka.</p> - -<p>The weeks and months stole on their course, which in the forest-heart -of the old Archduchy seems so leisurely beside the feverish haste of -the mad world. The ways of life went on unchanged; the children throve, -and studied, and played, and grew apace; the health of the Princess -became more delicate, and her strength more feeble; the seasons -succeeded each other with monotony; no sound from the cities of men -that lay beyond the ramparts of the glaciers broke the silence and the -calm of Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>Wanda herself would not have known that one year was different to -another had she not been forced to count time by the inches which it -added to the stature of her offspring, and the recurrence of the days -of their patron saints. They grew as fast as reeds in peaceful waters, -and forced her to recognise that the years were dropping into the past. -Time for her was shod with lead, and crept tamely, like a cripple upon -broken ground. For the children's sake she lived; but for them she -knew not why she rose to these long, colourless, lonely hours. But -her corporeal life ailed nothing, whilst her spiritual life was sick -unto death. Almost she could have wished for the lassitude of weakness -to dull her pain; her bodily strength seemed to intensify what she -suffered.</p> - -<p>In the frosted brilliant winter time she still drove her fiery horses -over the snow that was like marble, plunging into the recesses of the -woods, seeing above her the ramparts, and bastions, and pinnacles of -the great ice-range of the Glöckner glaciers. The intense cold, the -rushing air, the whiteness as of a virgin earth, the sense of profound -solitude, did her good, cooled the sense of shame that seemed burnt -into her life, soothed the anguish of a love fooled, betrayed, and -widowed. She felt with horror that the longer she kneeled beside -the altar, the longer she prayed before the great Christ in her -chapel, the more passionately she rebelled against the fate that had -overtaken her. But, alone in the rarefied air, with the vastness of -the mountains about her, with the cold wind pouring like spring water -down a thirsty throat in its merciful coldness, with the white peaks -meeting the starry skies, and the waters hushed in their shroud of ice, -she gathered some kind of peace, some power of endurance: consolation -neither earth nor heaven could give to her.</p> - -<p>Of him she never heard. She could only have heard through her lawyers, -and they knew nothing. Neither in Paris nor in Vienna was he seen. By -a letter she received from the priest of Romaris she had learned that -he was not there. She had sent one of her men of business thither with -money and plans, to build on the site of the old house of the Sabrans a -Maison de Dieu for the aged and sick fishermen of the coast and their -widows.' It will be a <i>chapelle expiatoire</i>,' she had thought bitterly, -and she had endowed it richly, so that it should be independent of -all those who should come after her. In all the occupations entailed -by this and similar projects she was as attentive as of yore to all -demands made on her.</p> - -<p>When she perused a lawyer's long preamble, or corrected an architect's -estimates and drawings, she was the same woman as she had been ere her -betrayer had crossed the threshold of her home. Her character had been -built on lines too strong, on a base too firm, for the earthquake of -calamity, the whirlwind of passion, to undo it. But in her heart there -was utter shipwreck. She had given herself and all that was hers with -magnificent generosity; and she had received in return betrayal and a -dishonour under which day and night all the patrician in her writhed -and suffered.</p> - -<p>When in the autumn of that year Cardinal Vàsàrhely, travelling in great -state from Buda Pesth, arrived at Hohenszalras—a guest whom none -could deny, a judge whom none could evade—he did not spare her open -interrogation, searching censure, stern rebuke.</p> - -<p>The Lilienhöhe she had excused herself from receiving; the Kaulnitz she -had also refused; others as nearly related to her had encountered the -same resistance to their overtures; but Cardinal Vàsàrhely came to take -up his residence at the Holy Isle, with the weight of authority and the -sanctity of the Church.</p> - -<p>He visited his niece for the sole purpose of remonstrance. When he -found himself met by a respectful but firm refusal to acquaint him -with the reasons for her conduct, he did not, either, spare her the -stately wrath of the incensed ecclesiastic. He was a man of noble -presence, and of austere if arrogant life. He spoke with all the weight -of his sixty years and of his eminence in the service of the Church. -His eyes were bent on her in stern scrutiny as he stood drawn up to all -his great height beside her in the library.</p> - -<p>'If your griefs against your husband,' he urged, 'are of sufficient -gravity to justify you in desiring eternal separation from him, you -should not lean merely upon your own strength. You should seek the -support of your spiritual counsellors. Although the Holy Church has -never sanctioned the concubinage which the laws of men have called by -the name of divorce; yet, as you are aware, my daughter, in extreme -cases the Holy Father has himself deigned to unloose an unworthy bond, -to annul an unsuitable marriage. In your case, if the offences of your -lord have been so grave, I make no doubt that by my intercession with -His Sanctity it would be possible to dissolve an union which has become -unholy.'</p> - -<p>She met his gaze calmly and coldly.</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence is very good to interest yourself in my sorrows,' she -replied; 'but for the intercession with our Holy Father which you -offer, I will not trouble you. Whatever the offences of my husband be -against me, they can concern me alone. I have summoned no one to hear -them. I seek no one's judgment. As regards the power of the Supreme -Pontiff to bind and loose, I would bow to it in all matters spiritual, -but I cannot admit that even he can release me from an earthly tie -which I voluntarily assumed.'</p> - -<p>A rebuking wrath flashed from the eagle eyes of the great Churchman.</p> - -<p>'I did not think that Wanda von Szalras would heretically deny the Pope -his power over all souls!' he said sternly. 'Are you not aware that -when the Holy Father deigns in his mercifulness to decree a marriage as -null and void, it becomes so from that instant? It is as though it had -never been; the union is effaced, the woman is decreed pure.'</p> - -<p>'And the children,' she said bitterly; 'can the Holy Father efface -<i>them?</i>'</p> - -<p>The Cardinal was affronted and appalled.</p> - -<p>'You would call in question the infallible omnipotence of the Head of -the Church!' he said with horror.</p> - -<p>'The days of miracles are past,' she said coldly. 'I shall not entreat -for them to be wrought for me. I trust your Eminence will pardon me if -I say that no human, nay, no heavenly, permission could legitimate -adultery in my sight or in my person.'</p> - -<p>'You merit excommunication, my daughter,' said the haughty prelate, -his brow black with wrath. He saw no reason why this marriage, which -had offended all her house, should not be annulled by the all-powerful -verdict of the Vatican. Such cases were rare, but it would be possible -to include hers amongst them. The children could be consigned to -religious houses, brought up to religious lives, unknown to and -unknowing of the world.</p> - -<p>'If the man whom you chose to wed,' he continued sternly, 'has offended -or outraged you so greatly, let your relatives judge him and deal with -him. You were warned against the gift of your hand to a stranger with -an uncertain past behind him; he had not the eminence, the repute, the -character that should have been demanded in your husband. But you were -inflexible in your resolve then, as you are now in your silence.'</p> - -<p>'I know of no one living to whom I owe any account,' she said with -haughty decision; 'no one to whom I was bound to lay bare my mind and -heart then, or to whom I am so bound now.'</p> - -<p>'You are so bound every time you kneel in the confessional.'</p> - -<p>'To reveal my own sins, perchance, not his.'</p> - -<p>'Your soul should be as an open book before your priest.'</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence will pardon me. I bow willingly and reverently to the -Church in all matters spiritual, but in the rule of my own conduct I -admit no guide but my conscience. My sorrows are all my own. No priest -or layman shall intrude upon them.'</p> - -<p>She spoke with peremptory and unyielding decision; the old spirit of -her race was aroused in her, which in times bygone had bearded popes -and monarchs, and braved the thunders of excommunication. They had been -pious sons of Rome, but yet ofttimes rebellious ones; when their honour -called one way and the priests pointed the other, they had lifted their -swords in the sunlight and gone whither honour bade.</p> - -<p>The Churchman knew that power of secular revolt which had been always -latent in the Szalras blood; he knew now that, armed with the weapons -of the Church though he was, he might as well seek to bow the mountains -down as bend her will. He took for granted that her wrongs were great -enough to entitle her to freedom; he had thought that she might wed -again with his nephew, who had loved her so long; their mighty fortunes -would have fitly met; this hateful union with a foreigner, a sceptic, -a debauchee, would have become a thing of the past, washed away into -absolute non-existence;—so he had dreamed, and he found himself -confronted with a woman's illogical inconsistency and obstinacy.</p> - -<p>He was deeply incensed. He assailed her for many days with all the -subtle arguments of the ecclesiastical armoury, but he made no -impression. She utterly refused to tell why she had exiled her husband -from her house, and she as utterly refused to take any measures to -attain her own freedom. When he left her he said a word of rebuke -that long lingered in her memory. 'You are rebellious and almost -heretical, my daughter. You entrench yourself in your silence and your -pride, which you appear to forget are heinous sins when opposed to -your spiritual superiors. But this only I will remind you of: if you -deny the Church the power to annul the union of which its sacrament -sanctified the consummation, be at least consistent: do not absolve -yourself from its duties.'</p> - -<p>With that keen home thrust in parting he left her, giving his blessing -to the kneeling household; and six white mules, always kept there in -readiness for his visits, bore him away through the embrowning woods.</p> - -<p>When he reached his palace in Buda he summoned Egon Vàsàrhely and -related what had passed.</p> - -<p>His nephew heard in silence.</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence erred in your judgment of Wanda,' he said at length. -'She would never make her wrongs, whatever they be, public, nor seek -for dissolution of her marriage. She may repent it, but she will repent -it in solitude.'</p> - -<p>'If the marriage be so sacred in her eyes,' said the angry prelate, -'let her continue to live with her husband. She has been a law to -herself; she has parted from him; where is the wifely submission there? -Where the sanctity of the immutable bond?'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps some day she will bid him return,' said Vàsàrhely, whose -features were very grave and pale.</p> - -<p>'She could forget this fatal folly like a bad dream,' continued the -Cardinal, unheeding. 'She could begin a new life; she could wed with -you.'</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence mistakes,' said Vàsàrhely, abruptly. 'Though that man -were dead ten times over, Wanda would never wed with me—nor I with -her.'</p> - -<p>'You are both wiser than the wisdom and holier than the holiness of the -Church,' said the incensed ecclesiastic, with boundless scorn. He was -accustomed to bend human volition like a willow wand in his hand.</p> - -<p>When she herself had left the terrace where she had parted from the -prelate, having accompanied him there in that stately etiquette which, -though she had been dying, habit would have compelled her to observe in -every detail, she had turned with a sense of intolerable pain from the -sunshine of the September day.</p> - -<p>It was a pretty scene that stretched before her, the children standing -bareheaded, the household hushed and kneeling still where the mighty -dignitary of the Mother Church had given them his benediction; the gold -embroideries and rich colours of the liveries glowing in the light; -the white mules and the scarlet-clothed attendants of the Cardinal -passing down the avenue of oaks, with the immediate background of the -darksome yews, and, further, the flushed foliage of the forests and the -shine of the snow peaks; but to her it was fraught with unendurable -associations. The central figure was missing from it which for so many -years had graced all pageants and conducted all ceremonies there. It -was the sole time since the exile of her husband that there had been -any arrival or departure at Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>She had been compelled to receive the Cardinal with all due state and -observance, and the oppressiveness of his three days' sojourn had worn -and wearied her.</p> - -<p>'I would sooner receive five emperors than one Churchman,' she said to -the Princess. 'We are far from the days of the Apostles!'</p> - -<p>'Christ must be honoured in His Vicars,' said the Princess, coldly, and -with disapprobation chill on all her features.</p> - -<p>Wanda turned away as the white mules disappeared in a bend of the -avenue, and went into the house alone, whilst the children and the -household still lingered in the sunshine. She traversed the whole -length of the building to reach her octagon-room, where she was certain -to be alone. The interrogation and censure of her uncle had left on her -a harassed sense of being somewhere at fault: not to him, nor to the -Church he represented and invoked, but to her own Conscience.</p> - -<p>As she passed through one of the galleries she saw her youngest child -Egon, now nearly two years old, playing with his nurse, an old, grave -North German woman. They were the only living beings of the house who -had not been upon the terraces to receive the Cardinal's last blessing; -the one too young, the other too old to care. The child, with his fair -face and his light curls, was like the child Christ of Carlo Dolce, -yet there was the same resemblance in him to his father which pierced -her soul whenever she looked in the faces of her other offspring.</p> - -<p>She paused and stooped towards him now, where he played with a toy lamb -in the breadth of sunlight that fell warm and broad through the open -lattices of an oriel window, in the embrasure of which his attendant -was sitting. The baby looked up under his long dark lashes, and made a -little timid movement towards his nurse.</p> - -<p>'Is he afraid of me?' said Wanda, with the same vague sense of remorse -which she had felt before his eldest brother.</p> - -<p>'Oh no! he is not afraid, my lady,' said the old woman with him, -hurriedly. 'But he sees you so rarely now, and when they are so young -they are frightened at grave faces.'</p> - -<p>The nurse stopped herself, fearing she had said too much; but her -mistress listened without anger and with a sharp pang of self-reproach.</p> - -<p>'Come for him to my room when I ring,' she said; and she stooped again -and lifted the little boy in her arms.</p> - -<p>'Are you all afraid of me, my poor children,' she murmured to him. -'Surely I have never been cruel to you?'</p> - -<p>He did not understand; he was still frightened, but he put his arm -about her throat and hid his pretty face on her shoulder with a gesture -that was half terror, half confidence. She took him to her own room -and soothed and caressed and amused him, till he regained his natural -fearlessness and sat happy on her knee, playing with some Indian ivory -toys; then he grew tired, and leaned his head against her breast, and -fell asleep as prettily as a Star of Bethlehem shuts its white leaves -up at sunset.</p> - -<p>She watched him with an aching heart.</p> - -<p>She could look on none of her children without a throb of intolerable -shame. They were the symbols as they were the offspring of all her -hours of love. Another woman might have forgotten all except that they -were hers.</p> - -<p>She could not.</p> - -<p>From that day she had the younger children brought to her more often, -drove them out at times, and soon regained their affection, although -to them all a majesty and melancholy, as inseparable from her now as -shadows from the night, made her presence inspire them with a certain -awe; even Lili, the most willful of them all, in her pretty, gay, -childish vanity and naughtiness, never ventured to disobey or to weary -her.</p> - -<p>'When I am with her it is as if I were at Mass,' Lili said to her -brothers. 'You know what one feels when the Host comes and the bell -rings, and it is all so still, and only the Latin words——'</p> - -<p>'It is the presence of God that we feel at Mass,' said Gela, in a -hushed voice. 'And I think our mother has God with her very much. Only -He makes her sad.'</p> - -<p>'But she never does cry,' said her little daughter.</p> - -<p>'No,' said Gela, 'I think she is too sad for that. You know when it is -very, very cold the skies cannot rain. I think that it is just so cold -with her.'</p> - -<p>And Gela's own eyes filled, for he, the most thoughtful and the most -quick in perception of them all, adored his mother. When he could he -would sit in her presence for hours, mute and motionless, with a book -on his knees, glancing at her with his meditative eyes now and then in -rapt veneration.</p> - -<p>'When Bela grows up he will wander, I dare say, and perhaps be a great -soldier,' Gela thought at such times. 'But for me, I shall stay always -with our mother, and read every thing that is written, and do all I can -for the people, and care for nothing but for her and them.'</p> - -<p>She had not let loose in the presence of Cardinal Vàsàrhely the -burning wrath which had consumed her. And yet the valedictory words of -the prelate recurred to her with haunting persistency. He had said to -her: 'If you refuse to be released from your marriage, do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' Was it possible, she asked herself, that -she still owed allegiance to one who, whilst he had embraced her, had -dishonoured her?</p> - -<p>'As well,' she thought bitterly, 'as well say that the man and woman -chained and drowned together in the Noyades of Nantes were united in a -holy union!'</p> - -<blockquote> -<p> -'<i>Ego conjungo vos in matrimonium, in nomine Patris et Filii -et Spiritus Sancti.</i>' -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p>As she remembered those words of the Marriage Sacrament, uttered as she -had stood beside him in the midst of the incense, the colour, the pomp, -the gorgeous grandeur of the Court Chapel in Vienna, she felt that -they had bound on her eternal silence, perpetual constancy, even in a -sense continual submission; they forbade her to disgrace him before the -world; they made his shame hers, they required her to defend him so far -as in her lay from the punishment with which the laws would have met -his wrong-doing: but she could not bring herself to acknowledge that it -demanded more. Truth could not be forced to dwell beside falsehood. -Honour could not take the kiss of peace from dishonour.</p> - -<p>The natural veneration she bore to the speaker added to the weight of -the reproach implied in the Cardinal's words. Even beyond her pride -was her intense sense of the obligations of duty. She asked herself a -thousand times a week if she had indeed failed in these. Honour was -a yet higher thing than duty. Offended honour had its title to any -choice. Her race had never gone to others with their wrongs; they had -known how to avenge themselves by their own hand, in their own way. -If she had chosen to stab him in the throat which had lied to her she -would not, she thought, have gone outside her right. Yet she had been -merciful to him; she had neither exposed nor chastised him; she had -simply cut his life adrift from hers, which he had outraged.</p> - -<p>No man's repute is hurt by separation from his wife; he was in no worse -circumstance than he had been ere he had met her; she did not withdraw -her gifts. She had given a noble name to one nameless; she had granted -a feudal title to a bastard; she had enriched a man who previously -had owned nothing, save half a million of francs won at play and a -strip of sea-shore that was stolen. She withdrew none of her gifts; -she left the impostor to the full enjoyment of the world; she did -not even move a step to secure the world's sympathy with herself. All -she had done as her just vengeance was to withdraw herself from the -pollution of his touch, and to exile him from the home of her fathers. -Who could have done less? His children would in the future possess all -she had, though through him they destroyed the purity of her race for -ever: centuries would not wash out in her sight the stain that was in -their blood: but she did not disinherit them. She could not see that -she had failed anywhere in her duty; she had been more generous in her -judgment than many could have been. Wherever women spoke of her and of -her separation from her husband, there would they surely, with many a -bitter word, repay her all the affronts which she had put upon them by -her indifference and by what they had esteemed her arrogance. She knew -that in such a position as she had perforce created, unexplained, the -man is easily and constantly absolved of blame, the woman is always and -certainly condemned. Therefore she had never doubted that the future -would lie lightly on his shoulders, passed in sensual idleness, in -oblivion more or less easily attained. Could it be possible that though -she had been so cruelly betrayed her own obligations remained the same? -Had her marriage vows compelled her to endure even such offence as -this without alteration in her own obedience? Was she inconsistent in -sending her betrayer from her, whilst she still considered her bond to -him binding? Since she refused to take advantage of the release that -the Law and the Church would give her, was it unjustifiable to free -herself from his hourly presence, his daily contact? No! she could not -believe that it was so.</p> - -<p>On her name-day, in the following spring, addressing his felicitations -to her, Egon Vàsàrhely added words which had cost him much to write.</p> - -<p>'You know how dear, more dear than any earthly thing, you have been -ever to me,' he wrote, 'therefore you will pardon me what I am about to -say. If I had followed my own selfish desires I should have entreated -you to disgrace him publicly, begged you to shake off publicly all -bonds to a traitor; and I should have shot him dead, with or without -the formula of a quarrel; he himself knew that well. But for your own -sake I would say to you now, pardon him if you can. Though you are the -possessor of a position and of a character rare amongst women, yet even -you must suffer as a separated wife. The children as they grow older -will suffer from it likewise. You could divorce your husband; the Law -and the Church would set you free from an union contracted in ignorance -with a man guilty of a fraud. You would be free, and he would endure -his fit chastisement. But I understand why you refuse to do that. I -comprehend your feeling. Publicity would to you intensify disgrace. -Divorce could do nothing to heal your cruel wounds. Therefore I urge -on you forgiveness. It has cost me many months' bitter struggle to be -able to write this to you. His offence is vile. His past is hateful. -He himself merits nothing. But for your commands I would have set my -heel on his throat as on a snake's. But there may have been excuses -even for him; and since you acknowledge him as your husband you will, -in the end, be more at peace if you do not continue to insist on a -separation which will be food for the world's calumny. Besides, though -you know it not, you have not exiled him from your heart, though you -have sent him from your house. If you had not still loved him you would -have said to me—Slay him. I believe that he loved you, though he had -such foul guilt against you, and he must have some true qualities of -character and mind since he satisfied yours for many long years. Of -where he may be now I know not. Since I saw you I have not quitted my -own country. But I would say to you—wherever he be, send for him. You -will understand without words what it costs me to say to you—Since you -will not accept the freedom of the Law, summon him to you and cleanse -his soul in yours. I speak for you, not him. If I saw him lying dead -like a dog in a ditch, for myself, I should thank God. Sometimes I look -with stupor at my sword. Can it lie idle there and you be unavenged?'</p> - -<p>The letter touched her profoundly. She realised the grandeur of -generosity, the force of compelling duty, which had enabled Vàsàrhely -to write it, proudest of gentlemen as he was, most devoted of lovers as -he had been.</p> - -<p>She replied to him:</p> - -<p>'I have thought myself strong, but of late years I have found that -there are things beyond my strength; what you counsel is one of them. -Religion enjoins, indeed, forgiveness without limit; but there are -wrongs for which religion makes no provision, and of which it has no -comprehension. Nevertheless, I thank you for him and for myself.'</p> - -<p>Any crime, any folly, any violence or faithlessness, which yet should -have left his honour pure, she thought it would have been possible to -condone; the life of a woman who loves must ever be one long pardon. -But such shame as this of his ate into her very soul, as rust into -the pure metal. It was such shame that when her heart went out to what -she had once loved in the yearning of affection, she felt herself -disgraced, feeling that the dominion of the senses, the weakness of -remembered and desired joys made her oblivious of indignity, feeble as -an enamoured fool.</p> - -<p>Her friends, her priests, even her own conscience might say to her -'Forgive,' but she could not bend her will to do it. Forgiveness would -mean reconciliation, union, life spent together as in their days of -love. She could not bring herself to endure that perpetual contact, -that incessant communion. To her sight he was stained with a moral -leprosy. She could not consent to admit that one in spiritual health, -and clean of guilt, must dwell with one spiritually diseased.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLI" id="CHAPTER_XLI">CHAPTER XLI.</a></h4> - - -<p>Another year passed by, and of him she still heard nothing. As, once -before, his silence had told her of his passion more eloquently than -speech could have done, so now the same silence tended to soften her -wrath, to soothe her horror. She had expected him to take one of two -courses: either to assail her with written entreaties for pardon, and -ceaseless efforts to palliate his crime in her sight, or to go out into -the world of men to seek oblivion in pleasure, and perhaps absolution -in ambition.</p> - -<p>He had done neither.</p> - -<p>Once she, having occasion to go to the room which had been set aside -for the boys' studies, saw the old professor absorbed in the perusal -of a letter. Confused and startled he slipped it hurriedly beneath a -Latin exercise of Bela's, which lay with other papers on the table. The -children were out riding.</p> - -<p>His mistress looked at him, and her face grew a shade paler still.</p> - -<p>'You correspond with my husband?' she said abruptly, pausing, as she -always paused, before she said the latter words.</p> - -<p>Greswold flushed consciously, stammered a few unintelligible words, and -was silent.</p> - -<p>'You hear from him?' she continued with correct inference. 'You know -where he is?'</p> - -<p>'I have promised that I will not say. I pray your Excellency to pardon -me,' murmured the old man, the colour mounting upward to his grey locks.</p> - -<p>She was silent a moment; she knew not what emotion moved her, whether -wrath, or wonder, or offence; or whether even relief from long suspense.</p> - -<p>'Do not be angered, my lady,' pleaded Greswold, timidly. 'It is the -only way in which he can hear of you and of his children. Could your -Excellency believe that all these months, these years, he lived on -without any tidings?'</p> - -<p>'I think you have exceeded your duty,' she said coldly. 'I think that -you should have asked my permission.'</p> - -<p>The old man stood penitent, like a chidden child. He was afraid of her -interrogations; but she made none.</p> - -<p>'You will give me your word,' she pursued, 'never to speak of this -correspondence to Herr Bela or to any of the children.'</p> - -<p>Greswold bowed his assent. 'My lord has forbidden me also,' he said -eagerly.</p> - -<p>Her brows contracted.</p> - -<p>'You have committed an imprudence,' she said, in a tone which chilled -the old man to the marrow. 'Be heedful that no one knows of it.'</p> - -<p>She said no more; took the volume she had needed, and quitted the room.</p> - -<p>'Who shall tell the heart of a woman?' thought Greswold, left to -himself. 'She knows not whether the man she once adored be living or -dead, and she does not put to me one single question, does not even -seek to learn where he dwells or what he does! What could his sin be to -sweep all love away as fire makes a desert of a smiling meadow? And be -it what it would, of what use is human love if it have not enough of -the divine love in it to rejoice over the sinner who repents?'</p> - -<p>He knew not that the sin she might, she would, have forgiven, but that -the shame ate into the fair marble of her honour like a corroding acid.</p> - -<p>From that time he expected daily some fresh question, some allusion at -least to the confession which she had surprised from him. But she never -spoke to him again of it. If she placed a violent control upon herself, -because she did not think it fitting to speak of her husband to one -in her employ, or if her husband were absolutely dead to her memory -and her affections, he could not tell. He only knew that by no word or -sign did she appear to recall the brief conversation which had passed -between them.</p> - -<p>Although what he had done was innocent enough, the old physician, in -his scrupulous sense of duty, began to have a sense of guilt. Had he -any right to retain any hidden knowledge from the mistress whose roof -sheltered him, and whose bread he ate?</p> - -<p>But his loyalty to his pledged word, and to him whom the world of men -still called Sabran, obliged him to be mute.</p> - -<p>'After all,' he thought, 'if she knew it might be better, but my first -duty is to keep my word.'</p> - -<p>She never tempted him to break it. She was not callous and hardened -as he supposed. She felt a growing desire to learn where and how her -husband had taken up the broken threads of his severed life. She had -believed either that he would return to the unfettered existence that -could be dreamed away under the cedar groves of Mexico, with the senses -satisfied and the moral law set at naught, or that he would go amongst -the men and women of the great world, popular, pitied, and easily -consoled. She had seen that world exercise a potent fascination over -him, and if it were called to pronounce against her or against him, she -was well aware that he would bear away all its suffrages. He had always -humoured and flattered it; she never.</p> - -<p>He had passed from the sight of those who knew him as utterly as -though he had descended to his grave. No sound or hint told her of his -destiny. She still thought at times that he must have sought those -flowery recesses of the West which had given his youth their shelter. -It might well be that in his total ruin his instincts had urged him to -return to the free barbaric life of his early manhood, where none would -reproach him, none deride him, none know his secret or his sin. His -correspondence with Greswold suggested a doubt to her. Perhaps remorse -was with him and the weight of remembrance.</p> - -<p>When, too harshly, she had assumed that all his love and life had been -a lie, because one lie had been beneath it, she had told herself that -he would find solace in those vices and pastimes which, in his earlier -years, had been fatal to his ambition and to his perseverance. But -since he cared to hear of his children's welfare, it might well be that -their life together was nearer to his heart than she had credited. She -believed that, if he had been sunk in the kind of self-indulgence she -had imagined, he would have shunned all tidings, all memories, of his -lost home.</p> - -<p>Then again, with the inconsistency of all great suffering, an intense -indignation possessed her that he did dare to remember, did dare to -recall, that her offspring were also his. Even alone the hot flush of -an ever-increasing shame came to her face when she thought that she -had been for nine long years his, in the most absolute possession that -woman can grant to man. Exile, severance, silence, cold and dark as the -winters of the land of his birth, could not alter that. Whenever he -chose to think of her she must be his in remembrance still.</p> - -<p>Once the Princess ventured to say again to her a word which came from -her heart. They were standing on the terrace watching the blush of -evening glow on the virginal snows of the mountains.</p> - -<p>'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' she murmured. 'Wanda, mine, -do never you think of those words—you who let so many suns rise and -set, and find your wrath unchanged?'</p> - -<p>'If it were <i>only</i> that!' she answered bitterly. 'It is so much -else—so much else! Crimes deep as yonder water, high as yonder hills, -I could have forgiven, but—a baseness—never! Nay, there are pardons -that would only be as base as what they pardoned.'</p> - -<p>So it seemed to her.</p> - -<p>When again and again her heart was thrilled with its old tenderness, -her mind was haunted by a million memories of dead delights, she strove -against herself, and trod down her temptation with the merciless -self-punishment of an ascetic. It humbled and stained her in her own -sight to feel that love could live within her without honour.</p> - -<p>'Forgive me,' said the Princess, 'but it always seems to me that -you—noble and generous and pure of mind as you are—yet have met ill -the supreme trial, the supreme test of your life. You believed that you -loved the man you wedded, but you loved your own pride more. If love be -not endless forbearance, endless compassion, endless pity and sympathy, -what is it but the mere fever and instincts of carnal passions? What -raises it above the self-indulgence of the senses if not its sacrifice -of will and its long-suffering? You have said so yourself in other -days than these.'</p> - -<p>'And what,' she thought passionately as she heard, 'what would it be -but the basest indulgence of the senses to let oneself love and be -beloved by what one scorned?—to stoop and kiss the lips that lied for -mere sake of their sweetness?—to gather in one's arms the coward, the -traitor, and persuade oneself that one forgave because one grew blind -with amorous remembrance?'</p> - -<p>'Is it well,' pursued her companion with soft solemnity, 'to let anyone -who is so near to you live his own life when that life may be one of -sin? You send him from you, and how can you tell into what extremes of -evil or of folly despair may not drive him? A man cast forth from his -home is like a ship cut loose from its anchor and rudderless. Whatever -may have been his weakness, his offences, they cannot absolve you from -your duty to watch over your husband's soul, to be his first and most -faithful friend, to stand between him and his temptations and perils. -That is the nobler side of marriage. When the light of love is faded, -and its joys are over, its duties and its mercies remain. Because -one of the twain has failed in these the other is not acquitted of -obligation. Pardon me if I seem to censure. Look in your own heart and -judge if I err.'</p> - -<p>'You do not know! You do not know! If I forgave him I should never -forgive myself!'</p> - -<p>She turned her head from the roseate and happy light that spoke to her -of other days, and went with a swift uneven step into the house, now -darkened by the passing of the day.</p> - -<p>She flung his memory from her as so much unholiness. Had passion not -yet lived in her, the coldness of unforgiving sorrow might not have -seemed to her so sovereign a duty.</p> - -<p>Some weeks after she had seen the letter in Greswold's hands a small -hamlet was burnt down during a high north wind. It belonged to her. -Hearing of the calamity she went thither at once. It was some two and -a half German miles from the castle. She drove, herself, four young -Hungarian horses, whose fretting graces and tempestuous gallop gave -her the only pleasure which she was now capable of enjoying. They were -harnessed to a carriage light and strong, built on purpose to scour -rapidly rough forest roads and steep hill-sides. When she had visited -the melancholy scene, given what consolation she could, and distributed -money to the homeless peasants, promising to rebuild the houses with -her own timber and shingles—for the conflagration had been the fault -of no one, but of the wild wind which had scattered the burning embers -of a hearth-fire on a neighbouring wood-stack—her horses were rested, -and she began her homeward drive as the pale afternoon grew grey and -the twilight fell on the little grassy vale, now charred and smoking -with the smouldering ruins of the châlets.</p> - -<p>'Our Countess never leaves us alone in any trouble,' said the women -gathered about the stone statue of S. Florian, their most trusted -patron, who, despite their prayers, had refused to save them from the -flames. The hamlet was not far from the Maurer glaciers, and was shut -in by a complete wall of mountains; it was green, fresh, beautifully -cool in summer. Now, in the late spring, it was still dreary, and -patches of snow still lay on its sward; it was set high on the mountain -side, and dense forests sloped down from it, seldom traversed, and dark -early in the afternoon. Her groom lit the lamps of her carriage as she -entered the deep woods, through which the road was little more than a -timber-track. The long gallops and the steep inclines coming thither -had calmed and pacified her young horses. They gave her no trouble to -control them, as they trotted rapidly along the shadowy forest ways. -In other parts of the country the sun had not then set, but here the -gloom was grey, like that of a cloudy dawn. Yet it was not so dark but -that she perceived ahead of her, as her horses turned a curve in the -moss-grown path, a figure, whose height and outline made her heart -stand still. As the animals went past him in their swinging trot the -blaze of the lamps fell full upon him. He turned and retreated quickly -into the undergrowth beneath the drooping boughs of the Siberian pines, -but she saw him, he saw her. Mechanically he uncovered his head and -bowed low; she drove onward with a sense of suffocation at her throat -and a chill like ice in her veins. She had recognised him in that -moment of time. He was changed, aged, and there were threads of grey in -his hair. He wore a forester's dress and had a gun on his shoulder.</p> - -<p>Where they had met, in these woods that lay under the snow saddle of -the Reggen Thörl, it was still twenty English miles away from the burg. -It was late when she reached home, but her people were used to those -long night drives, and even the Princess had become resigned to them. -On the plea of fatigue she went to her own rooms and there remained. A -faintness and sense of confusion stayed with her. She had not thought -that merely meeting him thus would affect her. She had underrated, the -power of the past.</p> - -<p>When she had deemed him far away in other countries he was there in her -own lands, not twenty miles from her. The knowledge of his vicinity -moved her with a mingled sense of unendurable pain, partial anger, -reviving love. It seemed horrible to have passed him by as any stranger -would have passed, without a sign or word. Yet he was dead to her, -whether oceans were between them or only a few leagues of hill and -grass and forest.</p> - -<p>She did not sleep, she did not even lie down that night. He seemed -always before her; in the stillness of her chamber she heard his voice, -and she started up thinking he touched her.</p> - -<p>He had looked aged, ill, weary, unhappy; the sight of him bore -conviction to her that he, like herself, found no compensation, no -consolation. Perchance her monitress had been right; she had been -cruel. Perchance, whatever sin his present or his future life might -hold would lie, directly indeed at his own door, but indirectly at -hers. She had always held that high and spiritual view of marriage -which, rising above mere sensual indulgence, regarded the bond of souls -as sacred, and made the life on earth mere passage and preparation -for eternity. She had loved to believe that she ennobled, purified, -exalted his life by union with hers. Was she now false to her own creed -when she left him alone, unfriended, unpardoned, to drift to any solace -in vice, or any distraction in evil, which might be his fate? The -sensitiveness and apprehension of her conscience before the possibility -of a neglected duty made of her meditations a very martyrdom. All her -life long she had been resolute and serene in action, deciding quickly, -and carrying resolve into action without hesitation; but here, in the -supreme crisis of her fate, she was irresolute and wrung by continual -doubt. Had it only been any other crime than this!—this which cankered -all the honour of her race, and was rank with the abhorred putridity of -fraud!</p> - -<p>The spring passed into summer, and the children played amidst masses of -roses and sweet ranks of lilies, stretching down the green grass alleys -of the gardens. More than once she went to the same hamlet, where now -châlets were arising, made of pine and elm, cut in the past winter in -her own woods. But of him she saw no more. She could not bend her will -to ask of him of any of her household, not even of Greswold. Whether he -lingered amidst her mountains, or whether he had but come thither in a -momentary impulse, she knew not.</p> - -<p>The infinite yearning of affection, which is wholly outside the -instincts of the passions, awoke in her once more. She began to doubt -her own reading of obligation and of duty. Had her counsellors been -right—had she met the supreme test of her character and had failed -before it?</p> - -<p>Was it true that a great love must be as exhaustless as the ocean in -its mercy and as profound in its comprehension?</p> - -<p>Had his sin to her released her from her duties towards him? Because -he had been disloyal was she absolved from loyalty to him? Ought she -sooner to have said to him,—'Nay, no crime, no untruth, no failure in -yourself shall divide you from me; the darker be your soul the greater -need hath it to lean on mine?'</p> - -<p>In the violent scorn of her revolted pride, of her indignant honour, -had she forgotten a lowlier yet harder duty left undone?</p> - -<p>In her contempt and dread of yielding to mere amorous weakness had she -stifled and denied the cry of pity, the cry of conscience?</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite, To forgive wrongs -darker than death or night, To defy power which seems -omnipotent, To love, and live to hope till hope creates From -its own wreck the thing it contemplates, Neither to change, -nor falter, nor repent.</p></blockquote> - -<p>This, perchance, had been the higher diviner way which she had -missed—this the obligation from the passion of the past which she had -left unfulfilled, unaccepted.</p> - -<p>Resolutely she had gone on upon her joyless path, not doubting that -her course was right. It had seemed to her that there was no other way -possible; that, stretching her hand to him across the gulf of shame -that severed them, she would do nothing to raise him, but only fall -herself, degraded to his likeness.</p> - -<p>So it had always seemed to her.</p> - -<p>Now alone the misgiving arose in her whether she had mistaken arrogance -for duty; whether, cleaving so closely to the traditions of honour, she -had forgotten the obligations of mercy. Had it been any other thing, -any other sin, she thought, rather than this, which struck at the very -root of all the trusts, of all the faiths, which she had most venerated -as the legacy of her fathers!——</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to her as though, were that time of torture to be -lived through again, she would not send him from her; she would say to -him:</p> - -<p>'What we love once we love for ever. Shall there be joy in heaven over -those who repent, yet no forgiveness for them upon earth?'</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to lier as though even now, after these years, she -still ought to summon him and say this. But time passed on and passed -away, and it remained unsaid.</p> - -<p>She rode often through the same woods, now in full leaf, with sunny -waters tumbling and sparkling through their flower-filled moss, but he -crossed her path no more. He might have come thither, she thought, in -some brief hope of possible reconciliation to her, and then his courage -might have failed him, and he might have returned to whatsoever distant -climate held him, whatsoever manner of life consoled him. That he might -dwell amidst the hills, unseen of men, for her sake, never once seemed -to her possible. Egon Vàsàrhely might have done that; but not he—he -loved the world.</p> - -<p>The summer weighed wearily upon her. The light, the fragrance, the -gaiety of nature hurt her. In winter all the earth seemed of accord -with herself; it was silent, stern, solitary. The keen winds, the -glittering snow, the air that was like a bath of ice, the sense of -absolute isolation and seclusion which the winter brought with it were -precious to her. Not even the pretty figures of the children running -through the bowers of blossom and of foliage could make the summer -otherwise than oppressive and mournful to her.</p> - -<p>Sometimes she thought of how it had been on other summer nights, when -he had wandered with her through the white lines of the lilies by the -starlight, or sent the melodies of Schumann and of Beethoven out upon -the dewy, balmy air. Then she could bear no more to look upon the -moonlit gardens.</p> - -<p>The love she had borne him stirred at those times beneath the -gravestones of scorn and wrath and almost hatred which she had heaped -upon it, to keep it buried far down for evermore. All the echoes of -passion came to her at those moments; she despised herself because -she felt that she would give her soul to feel his lips on hers again. -She was ashamed that the mere sight of him could thus have moved her. -Again and again she recalled noble acts, beautiful thoughts, which -had been his; again and again she recalled the early hours of their -love with burning cheeks and longing heart. She could have scourged -herself to banish those memories, those desires. They were terrible -and irresistible to her as the visions that assailed the saints of the -Thebaïd. Her whole soul softened to him, yearned for him, forgave him. -Then she would shrink in disdain from her own weakness, and pace her -chamber like a wounded lioness.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLII" id="CHAPTER_XLII">CHAPTER XLII.</a></h4> - - -<p>The first flush of autumn came upon the woods. Soon it would be three -years since Olga Brancka had driven thither, and her work had held good -and never been undone. Bela and Gela had grown tall and slender as the -young fir trees; and Bela often said to his brother: 'I was ten years -old on Easter Day. That is quite old. If ever I am to find him I am old -enough now.'</p> - -<p>He had not forgotten. He never forgot. Every day he wearied his little -brain with thinking what he could do. Every night he asked Heaven to -help him. He had read a Bohemian ballad which had fascinated him; the -story of how, in the days of chivalry, Wratislaw, the son of Berka, -when but twelve years old, had made, all by himself and on foot, -a pilgrimage from Prague to Tartary, to release his brother from -captivity. Bela knew very well that the world had changed since then, -and that if some things were easier some were harder now than then. But -if Wratislaw had done so much at twelve, why should he, who was ten, -not do something?</p> - -<p>He thought himself quite old. He had a big pony, and Folko was ridden -by his little brothers. He had been taught to shoot at a target and -a running mark; he had become skilful at climbing with crampons and -managing a boat. When he rode he had long boots that pulled up to his -knees. He could drive three ponies, harnessed in the Russian way, with -skill and surety. Perhaps, he thought, the Bohemian boy had not been -able to do half as much as this. The ballad spoke of him as a little -weakling, and yet he had found his way from Prague, in her dusky -plains, to burning Tartary.</p> - -<p>Almost he was ready to set forth on a Quixotic search without any clue -to where his father dwelt, but his educated sense checked him with -the remembrance that, wide as the world was, it would be of no avail -to begin a harebrained pilgrimage with no fixed goal. Even Wratislaw, -who was his ideal, had been certain that his brother languished in -the Tartar tents before he had set his fair face to the southeast. So -he remained patient in his impatience, and strove with all his might -to perfect himself in all bodily exercises and manly habits, that he -might be the better fitted to go on his errand whenever he should have -any thread of guidance. No one guessed the resolves and the hopes -which fermented like new wine in his pretty golden-haired head. His -attendants thought each year that he grew gentler and more serious, and -his tutors found him at once more docile and more absent-minded. But no -one imagined that he was bent on any unusual enterprise.</p> - -<p>His father had not been recognised by the groom who had accompanied his -mistress in the drive through the woods of the Reggen Thörl; and no -rumour of the near presence of Sabran had reached any of the household. -Greswold alone knew that amidst the solitudes of the avalanche and -the glacier, in the chill of the air where the eagle and the vulture -alone made their home, in a life of absolute isolation, asceticism, and -physical denial of every kind, the man who had sinned against her spent -his exile, in such self-chosen expiation as was possible to one who had -neither the faith nor the humility needful to make him seek refuge -and atonement in any religious service. He dwelt in the loneliness -of the ice-slopes, leading the life of a common hunter, shunning all -men, accepting each monotonous and joyless day as portion of his just -punishment; in the perils of winter on the mountains doing what he -could to save human or animal life; knowing no solace save such as -existed for him in the sense of being near all that he had lost, and -the power of watching the distant movements of his wife and children at -such rare hours as he ventured to approach the hills of Hohenszalras -and turn his telescope on the gardens of his lost home. A hunter or -two, a guide or two of the Umbal and the Trojerthal had his confidence, -but the loyalty which is the common virtue of all mountaineers made -them preserve it faithfully. For the rest, in these unfrequented -places, avoidance of all those who might have recognised him was easy; -he was clothed like the men of the hills, and lived like them in a -châlet, high perched on a ledge of rock at a great altitude in the wild -and almost inaccessible region of the Hintere Umbalthörl. Of the future -he never dared to think; he took each day as it came; the best he hoped -for was a mountaineer's death some hour or another, amidst the clear -serene blue ice, the everlasting snows.</p> - -<p>When he had gone out from the chamber of his wife, banished and -accursed, all his spirit had died in him, and nothing had seemed clear -in his memory except that love which had been so insufficient to wash -out his sin. The world would no doubt have welcomed him; he was not -too old for its distractions and its ambitions to be still possible -for him; but he had no courage left to take them up, no energy to make -another future for himself. His whole life was consumed in a vain -regret, as vain a desire, as vain a penitence. Had he had the faith of -those men who dwelt under the willows of the Holy Isle he would have -joined them. But he had no belief; he had only a futile, heart-broken, -hopeless repentance, which availed him nothing and could atone for -nothing.</p> - -<p>Perhaps, he thought, if she had known that, it might have changed her. -But he did not dare to approach her by any written appeal. It seemed -to him as if any words from him would only appear but added falsehood, -added insult. He never, even in his own thoughts, reproached her for -her separation from him. He recognised that no other path was open to -her. The pure daylight of her nature could find no mate in the dusk -and shadow of his own; the loyalty of truth could not unite with the -servitude and cowardice of falsehood. He knew it, and never rebelled -against his chastisement.</p> - -<p>Whilst still it was dawn one morning, his young son, just awaking, -heard a pebble thrown at his window. He sprang out of bed and ran and -looked out. Old Otto stood below.</p> - -<p>'My little lord,' he said softly; 'if you can come to me in the woods, -when you are dressed, I have something to tell you.'</p> - -<p>'Of him?' cried Bela.</p> - -<p>The huntsman made a sign of assent.</p> - -<p>The child, excited to intense emotion, hardly knew how his servant -dressed him, or how he swallowed his breakfast. After their morning -meal he could always run in the woods, as he chose, before beginning -his studies, and he sped as fast as his feet could bear him to the -trysting-place.</p> - -<p>'My lord, your father has been seen on the other side of Glöckner by my -underling, Fritz,' said Otto, gravely; 'and I have heard, too, that the -villagers have seen him in Pregratten. I made bold to tell you, Count -Bela, for I had given you my word.'</p> - -<p>Bela's whole form shook with excitement.</p> - -<p>'I knew if he had died I should have known it!' he said, with a hushed -ecstasy. 'Tell me more, tell me more, quick!'</p> - -<p>'There is no more to tell, my little lord,' said Otto. 'Fritz will -swear that he saw your father, though there was a stretch of glaciers -and many fathoms of ice between them. He says there was no mistaking -the way he sighted his rifle and fired. And I have heard by gossip, -too, from the folks of the Hintere Umbalthörl that there can be no -manner of doubt of the fact that His Excellency has dwelt there, for a -time at least.'</p> - -<p>Bela gave a deep breath.</p> - -<p>'Then he lives, and I can find him!'</p> - -<p>'Yes, he lives; the Lord be praised! 'said Otto.</p> - -<p>When he went to the house the boy told no one his precious secret. He -studied ill, and was punished, but he did not heed it. His heart was -full of joy; his brain teemed with projects.</p> - -<p>'I will go and bring him back!' he kept saying to himself; and no force -could hold his thoughts to his Homer or his Euclid.</p> - -<p>He would tell no one, he resolved, not even Gela; and he would go -alone, all alone, as the Bohemian boy had gone.</p> - -<p>'What ails Bela to-day? He is not like himself,' said his mother to -Greswold, who assured her he was well, but added that he was often -careless.</p> - -<p>The child shut his secret up in his own breast, and though he longed -to tell Gela he did not. He had been tempted to confide in Otto, but -resisted even that desire, knowing that Otto was stern where duty -pointed, and had been always forbidden to let the little nobles wander -alone to the mountains. He had his father's power of reticence, his -mother's strength of self-control.</p> - -<p>He knew what hill work was like. The elder boys often went climbing, -with their guides, on fine days from May to September, and had a -little tent which was set up for them at a fair altitude, whence -Greswold taught them to take observations and measurements. But the -mountaineering for the season was now over; it was now S. Michael's -Day, and avalanches fell and snow-storms had begun on the higher -slopes. He knew that if anyone saw him he would be stopped and taken -back. For that reason he said nothing to Gela, who could never be -persuaded to a disobedience; and he rose in the dark, before the hour -at which his attendant came to dress him, got his clothes on as best he -could, slipped the sword Vàsàrhely had given him in his belt, and took -his crampons and alpenstock in his hand.</p> - -<p>He had kneeled and said his prayers, fervently though quickly.</p> - -<p>'A soldier cannot pray <i>very</i> long if he hear the trumpets sounding,' -he had thought, as he rose. He felt neither irresolution nor fear; he -was strong with ardour and an exalted sense of right-doing.</p> - -<p>He had the little knapsack which, in the long forest walks with his -tutor, he was used to carry packed with simple food for a morning meal -when they halted under the pines. He had put some bread and cakes into -this overnight, and he had filled his little silver flask with milk, -as he had seen the flasks of the gentlemen filled with wine in those -grand days when the Kaiser and the Court had hunted with his father. -Thus equipped he managed to escape from the house by a side door, left -open by some of the under-servants, who had just risen. He knew the -quick way to reach the Glöckner slopes, for he had been taken there by -Otto to learn mountaineering, and for his age he climbed well. His eye -was sure, his step firm, and he knew not fear. He never thought of the -misery his absence might cause; he was absorbed in his self-imposed -mission.</p> - -<p>'I will bring him back,' he thought, 'and then she will smile again.'</p> - -<p>He had been trained in the lore of the high hills too well not to know -that it would take him several days to reach the Hintere Umbalthörl; -but he said to himself that this must be as it would. He would climb -on and on, sleep in any hut he could, and find what food he might. The -Bohemian boy had crossed many mountains and seas and deserts before he -had ransomed his brother.</p> - -<p>It was a fine morning, with light pleasant winds. There was a clear -blue in the sky, though north-east there was a brown haze, such as -hunters fear, upon the hills.</p> - -<p>'It will rain or snow to-morrow,' thought Bela, who had been made wise -in the signs of the weather. But even that prevision did not deter him; -he had his liberty and he meant to use it. He had been well trained to -all bodily exercises, and he could walk long and fast without fatigue. -His slender fair limbs were as strong as steel, and his health was -perfect. He knew all the tracks of the home-lying woods, and he wanted -no one to guide him. He got, with promptitude and address, out of sight -of the terraces and towers of Hohenszalras, and soon entered what was -called the Schwarzenwald, a dense pine-wood ascending abruptly the -mountain side from the gardens; the only place where the wildness of -the hills came in unbroken contact and close proximity to the lawns and -flowers of the south side of the schloss, the lower spurs of the Gross -Glöckner descending there so steep and stern that they enclosed the -parterres with a gigantic rampart of granite.</p> - -<p>The contrast of the rose gardens with these huge overhanging heights -had always so pleased the tastes of the Szalras châtelaines, that they -had never allowed any attempts to be made to change or modify the -savage grandeur and sombre wilds of the black wood.</p> - -<p>He was already a trained pedestrian, and he covered five miles without -pausing to breathe himself. Then he thought he had come far enough -to make it safe to pause and eat. He drank his milk and opened his -knapsack. There was turf still about him, and a few trees, but he had -come into the rocky region. Huge walls of red and grey marbles leaned -over him; white limestone crags faced him. Precipices, black with pines -and firs, shelved downward. He was still on his mother's land, but in a -part unknown to him.</p> - -<p>Once rested, he climbed up manfully, straining his little velvet -breeches and soaking his silver-buckled shoes in the wet moss as he -went; for in the Schwarzenwald regular paths soon ceased. There was -the barest track visible, made by sheep, and pushing its upward way -under branches, over boulders, and through wimpling burns. It was the -loneliest part of all the woods and hills; descending as it did to -the rose gardens of the burg, the hunters and shepherds seldom passed -through it. Steep and solitary, crowned with bare rocks, and leading -only to the glacier slopes, few steps ever went over its short grass -save those of woodland animals and of shepherds' flocks. At this time -of the year even the latter were not near. They had been already -brought down to their stables from the green stretches of pasture -between the rocks. Bela met no one; not even one of his own peasantry.</p> - -<p>He climbed and climbed uninterrupted, at first enjoying his solitude -rapturously, his triumph boisterously, and then going on more solemnly, -being a little awed by the sense of utter silence round him, in which -no sound was heard except of rippling water, of blowing boughs, and -afar off some faint tinkle of a church bell from a distant hamlet.</p> - -<p>His spirits were exalted and full of enthusiasm. Joined to his boldness -and ardour he had the German love of the mystical and marvellous. All -the vast white range of the Glöckner to him was as a fairyland opening -on enchanted empires all his own. All the forenoon he was happy.</p> - -<p>His brain, was busy with many pictures as he went. He saw his search -successful and his father found; he saw his happy return, and the -crowd of the glad household which would flock to meet his steps; he -thought how he would kneel down at her feet, and never rise until his -prayer should be heard, and his mother smile again; he thought how he -would cry out to her, 'Oh, mother, mother! I have brought him home!' -and how she would look, and the light and the warmth come back into -her face. It was so little to do—only to climb amidst these kindly -familiar mountains that had been always above him and around him since -first his eyes had opened. Wratislaw had gone over lands, and seas, and -deserts, and braved the jaws of lions, and the steel of foemen, and the -dragon's breath of the hot sand wind; he himself had so little to do; -only to climb some rough uneven ground, some green steep pastures, some -smooth fields of ice. He felt sad to think it was such a little thing.</p> - -<p>Far down below he could hear the great bells of the burg chiming and -clanging, and he knew that they were giving the alarm for him; he saw -men small as mice grouping together here, and running apart there; he -knew they were coming out to search for him. He resolved to be very -wary. He had got so long a start that he was high on the hills ere he -heard the alarm-bells ring. He knew that he must avoid being seen -by anyone he met, or, known as he was to the whole country-side, his -liberty would soon be at an end. But the huts of the cattle-keepers -were empty, and the chances of meeting a mountaineer were few. Hundreds -of men might come upward in search of him, and yet miss him amidst -those endless walls of stone, those innumerable peaks and paths and -precipices, each one the fellow of the other.</p> - -<p>He climbed the grassy slopes, the steep stone ways, as he had learned -to do with Otto, and though he was still for from the sides of Glöckner -he was yet soon on very high ground. A great mountain, green at the -base, snow-covered half the way down, frowned above him; it was but one -of the spurs of the Glöcknerwand, but he believed it to be the king of -the Austrian Alps itself. He met no one; the mountains were solitary; -the first breath of autumn had scared the cattle-keepers downward -with their flocks and herds. Sometimes, very far off, he saw a lonely -figure, a pedlar, or a hunter, or a shepherd, or some <i>alm</i> still -tenanted by its flock, but they were mere specks on the immensity of -the glacier slopes and the domes of snow. The solitude enchanted him at -first; he had never been alone before. He drank from a stream, ate more -bread, and held on firmly and fearlessly. The thought that his father -was there beyond him, amidst those dazzling peaks, those lowering -clouds, seemed to shoe his little feet with fire. He felt weaker, for -his bread had nourished him but little, and he had not found a hut of -any kind as he had expected to do. But he toiled on, the slope of the -same mountain always facing him, always seeming to recede and to grow -higher and higher the further and further he went.</p> - -<p>The wall of granite which he was on, nine miles or more above and -beyond his home, was known as the Adler Spitze. He had been near -it in other days, but he did not recognise it now; all these stern -slopes and steeps, all these domes and roof-like ridges of snow and -ice, so resemble each other that a longer apprenticeship to the hills -than his had been is needed to distinguish them one from another. The -Adler Spitze was a dangerous and seldom traversed peak; its sides were -bristling with jagged rocks, and its chasms were many and deep. More -than one death had been caused by it in late years, and near its summit -his mother, had caused to be erected a refuge, one of the highest of -the district, where a keeper was forever on the watch for belated -travellers. These were, however, very few, for the mountain had gained -a bad name amongst the hunters and pedlars and muleteers who alone -traversed these hills, and was left almost entirely to the birds of -prey, which were numerous there and had given it its name.</p> - -<p>When the pine-woods ceased, and there was only around him mere naked -rock, with a little moss growing on it here and there, Bela knew -that he had come very high indeed. And he had his wish: he was quite -alone. There was nothing to be seen here except the dusky forest, -shelving downward, and vast slopes of naked grey stone, with large -loose rocks scattered over them, as if giants had been playing there at -pitch-and-toss. There was too much mist in the north and west, which -faced him, for the opposite mountains to be seen, for it was still -early in the day. He did not now feel the joy and excitement he had -expected. He had climbed to the glacier region indeed, but the scene -around was dreary, and the vast expanse of vapour surrounding him -looked chill and melancholy.</p> - -<p>In the excitement and exultation of his thoughts he had forgotten -many things which he knew very well, trained to the hills as he was; -he had forgotten that it might rain or snow before he reached any -halting-place, that fogs came on at that season with fatal suddenness, -that if the sun were obscured the cold would soon become great, that -if a mist came down he would be unable to find any road, and that men -had been often killed on those heights who had known every inch of the -hills.</p> - -<p>Something of his buoyancy and certainty of success began to pale and -grow dull as the isolation lost its sense of novelty, and that intense -silence of the glacier world, which is at all times so solemn, began to -strike awe into his intrepid soul. He had often been as high, but there -had been always on his ear his brother's voice, and his guide's laugh, -and the merry sounds of the men chattering together as they climbed. -Now there was no sound anywhere, save now and then a splitting cracking -noise, which he knew was ice giving way under the noon-day heat of -the sun. 'It must be just as still as this in the grave,' he thought, -with a chill in his warm eager leaping young blood. A little tuft of -edelweiss growing in a crevice, and an <i>alpenlerche</i> winging its way -through the blue air, seemed to him like friends.</p> - -<p>He wished now that Gela were with him.</p> - -<p>'But it would have been of no use to ask him,' he thought sadly. 'He -never will disobey, even to make good come of it.'</p> - -<p>A white mist had settled over all the lower world, one of the autumn -fogs which come from the lower clouds enwrapped all the lakes and -pastures and forests of Hohenszalras. Nothing could better baffle and -distract his pursuers; perplexed and blinded, they would be wholly at -a loss to trace his steps. It did not occur to him that the fog on -the lower lands might mean also storm and snow, and the darkness and -dampness of ice-cold vapours, in the upper air where he was.</p> - -<p>It had become rough, hard, toilsome work; he was bruised, and almost -lame, and very tired. But the spirit in him was not crushed; he kept -always thinking: 'If it did not hurt, it would be nothing to do it.'</p> - -<p>He had now got above all grass; the ground was loose shingle where it -was not bare granite, limestone, or marble, on all of which it was -difficult to keep a hold. There was snow not very far above him. The -air here was intensely cold. He had not thought to bring any furs -with him. His limbs were sorely cramped, his feet began to feel numb, -his fingers were so chilled he could hardly grip his alpenstock; the -hard slopes gave scarcely any footing to his climbing-irons; there -were clouds about him enveloping him, freezing him in their icy mist. -He began to think piteously of his brother, of his home, and of the -warm-cushioned nooks by the study fire, but he would not give in; he -toiled on, cutting and hurting his hands and knees as he groped on his -upward way. He reminded himself of Wratislaw, of Cassabianca, and all -the boy-heroes he had ever read of; he would not yield in endurance to -any one of them.</p> - -<p>But, looking up, he knew by the colour of the sky that it was about to -snow; the heavens were of a leaden uniform grey, and seemed to meet -and touch the mountain. Then Bela knew that in all likelihood he would -never see Gela or his home again.</p> - -<p>He choked down the sob that rose in his throat, and tried to think -what he could do to save himself. The ascent was now so steep that he -could make no upward way, and could barely keep himself from sliding -downwards. He caught at a projecting boulder and pulled himself with -great effort up on to it; there he could sit in a cramped position and -take breath. When he looked down he saw no forests, no land, no rocks, -nothing but a sea of fog, which had gathered thick and grey beneath -him. In autumn and spring the mountain weather changes in ten minutes -from fair to foul.</p> - -<p>The odd stupor that comes from long exposure at a great altitude in -cold and vapour was stealing over him. Strange noises sounded in his -ears, and his feet and hands tingled. He began to fear that he should -get no further on his way, and he had not listened so often to the -tales told by huntsmen without knowing clearly enough the dangers -which await those who are out on the mountain side in bad weather when -daylight goes.</p> - -<p>As he sat there, gazing dizzily into the ocean of vapour below him, -and upward to the huge walls of granite and of snow, he saw coming -and descending towards him from out the clouds a huge dark bird; the -immense wings seemed wide as heaven itself as it circled and swept the -air.</p> - -<p>Bela's heart stood still: it was a male eagle, a golden eagle, and he -knew it.</p> - -<p>The child's aching eyes watched the monarch of the upper air with a -horrible fascination. It looked black as night against the steely sky, -the snow-covered peaks.</p> - -<p>He sat erect, and cried aloud to it in half delirious indignant -reproof. 'Oh, you great bird! you are treacherous, you are thankless! -<i>We</i> have spared you and yours always, and now you will kill me! Oh, -do you not hear? The Szalras have always spared you! Do you not hear?' -But the shouts of his young voice died away against the granite walls -around him, and the king-bird paused not, but came nearer, and nearer, -and nearer.</p> - -<p>It circled round and round, and each circle narrowed, till it was -poised immediately above his head, motionless, balancing itself upon -its outstretched pinions. He could see its eyes bent on him, see the -giant claws drawn up against its belly, see the hooked yellow beak. -The eagle was lord of the air, and he had intruded on its royalty: in -another moment he felt that it would descend on him and bear him off in -its talons or batter him to death with the blows of its wings. He drew -his little sword and waited for it; his eyes did not shrink, his body -did not cower; he looked upward with his toy-blade drawn in as true a -courage as that of Leonidas.</p> - -<p>'If only I could take him home once—once—I would not mind dying here -afterwards,' he thought, in his dreamy exultation; '<i>Gott und mein -Schwert!</i>' he muttered, and waited still, calmly. Yet to die with his -errand undone—that seemed cruel.</p> - -<p>The huge dark mass balanced itself one moment, more, then measuring its -prey rushed through the air towards him. But, ere it had seized him, -a shot flashed through the shadows, and rang through the silence; the -bird dropped dead in a ring of blood on the naked stone of the mountain -side.</p> - -<p>Bela sprang up, and tottering on the slippery shelving rock threw his -arms outward with a loud cry.</p> - -<p>'I came to find you!' he shouted, in his rapturous joy; then cold and -fatigue and past terror conquered him. He swooned at his father's feet.</p> - -<p>Sabran had not known that it was his son whom he saved. He had seen -a child menaced by a bird of prey, and so had fired. When the boy -staggered to him with that cry of welcome, he was for the moment -stunned with amazement and gratitude and inexpressible emotion; the -next he raised the little brave body in his arms.</p> - -<p>'Oh! tell me where your mother kissed you last, that I may set my lips -there!' he murmured to the child: but Bela heard not.</p> - -<p>He was cold, inanimate, and senseless. He had gained his goal, but he -had no sight or sense to know it. His father looked around him with -terror for his sake. The snow had begun to fall, the darkness was -deepening, the mists were creeping upward; he, who for three years had -dwelt a mountaineer amidst these mountains, knew the danger of being -belated amidst them in autumn, when, at a stroke, autumn became winter; -sometimes in a single night. He himself had his dwelling far from there -upon the Isel water, under the Umbal glacier. If he had to carry the -boy it would be useless to dream of reaching the rude place which he -had made his home: the weight of a tall child of ten years old is no -light burden, and he knew that even if Bela regained his consciousness -he would be incapable of exertion in the cold, which would intensify -with every hour. But he wasted no moments in hesitation. He knew what -the white fall of those softly-descending feathers from above, what -the darkness and wetness of the dense fog down below, meant, out on -the spurs of Glöckner after sunset. Lives were lost here every year; -herds that had stayed on the Alps too late were surprised and destroyed -by early snow-storms; pedlars and carriers were belated, and sent to -a last sleep by that sudden plunge of autumn into frost. He knew his -way inch by inch, and he knew that there was, some mile or so beyond -him, the Wandahutte, erected in a dangerous pass by his wife, as a -thanksgiving in the first months of their marriage. There he would find -a rude bed, food, wine, and shelter for the night. He set himself to -reach it.</p> - -<p>It was hard to climb with the child, held by one arm, and thrown across -one shoulder, as shepherds throw a disabled lamb. His other hand -gripped his alpenstock; he had left his rifle under a ledge of rock, as -a useless load. He had stripped off the hunter's jacket that he wore, -and wrapped it round Bela, whose body and limbs felt frozen. Down -below in the valleys fruit trees had still their plums and pears, and -asters and dahlias still flowered, but at this elevation the cold was -piercing and the snow froze as it fell.</p> - -<p>A high wind also had risen, as the day declined, and blew the white -powder of the snow in whirling clouds: the terrible <i>tourmente</i> of -the Alps which every traveller dreads. In the confusion of it he knew -that he might walk round and round on the same road all night, making -no progress. Soon it grew dark, though not quite four o'clock. He had -no light with him, for he had not intended to be out at night; he had -but come thither, as he often came, to see the distant gleam of the -Szalrassee, the far-off outline of the Hohenszalrasburg. He had been -reascending and returning when he had seen a child menaced by an eagle, -and had fired. Had he been by himself he would have found the hut -speedily, but weighted with the burden of Bela's inert body he made -little way, and staggered often on the slippery frozen steep. He had no -hands free to wield his hatchet and cut his way by steps over the ice -which had formed in all the fissures of the rocks.</p> - -<p>The mountains had been his only friends in his exile. He had returned -to them, he had dwelt amongst them, he had borne his sorrows through -their help, and strengthened himself with their strength. But they -menaced him sorely now. For himself he cared not, but his heart ached -for the child, whose courage and affection had brought him thither to -meet his death.</p> - -<p>'My poor Bela!' he murmured, as the boy's fair head hung over his -shoulder, 'why did you come to me? I give you nothing but evil. Safety, -comfort, happiness, honour, all come from <i>her.</i>'</p> - -<p>The whole heavens seemed to open, so dense a storm of snow now poured -upon him. There were strange deep noises ever and again, as from the -very bowels of the hills; a thousand times had he rejoiced to match -his strength against the mountains and to conquer, but now they were -his masters. All around him were the bastions and walls and domes of -the great ice peaks; the huge glaciers hung above like frozen seas -suspended; he could not behold them but he felt their presence and -their awe.</p> - -<p>'The snow is in my blood and my blood is yours, and now it claims us,' -he muttered to the senseless ear of the child. He and the child had -loved the snow, met it with welcome, sported with it in triumph; and -now it killed them. They would lie down in it, and be one with it for -ever.</p> - -<p>But although these fancies drifted in his brain, he strove with all his -might to keep in movement, to ascend ever in the easterly direction of -the refuge which he sought to gain. So far as he could, weighted with -his burden and blinded by the darkness, he continued to climb, gripping -the hard slopes with his feet and his alpenstock. He had given his coat -to the child; the cold made every vein in his own body numb; his limbs -pricked and seemed to swell; he had only his woollen shirt, above his -linen one, and his velvet breeches between him and the frozen air, that -could slay a hundred sheep massed together in their warmth and wool. -He knew that the hut was but a mile, or little more, from the place -where he had shot the eagle; but half a mile in the snowstorm and the -darkness was longer than forty miles in sunshine and fair weather. He -could not be even sure that he went aright; he could see nothing; the -sky was covered with the low dense clouds; he could only guess. All -the slender signs and landmarks, that would even in mere twilight have -served to guide his steps, were now hidden. A thick woolly impenetrable -gloom enshrouded him; he felt as though he were muffled and suffocated -by it, and the fatal drowsiness—the fatal desire to lie down and be -at rest—with which frost kills, stole on him.</p> - -<p>With all the manhood in him he resisted it for the child's sake.</p> - -<p>He had been climbing and wandering three short hours only, and he -had believed that it was midnight at the least. Bela still hung like -a lifeless thing over his shoulder, but he felt that his limbs were -warmer, and his heart beat feebly, but with regularity.</p> - -<p>'God grant me power to save him, for his mother's sake,' thought -Sabran; 'then there may come what will.'</p> - -<p>He struggled anew against the mortal sleepiness, the increasing -numbness, that grew upon himself. Suddenly, as he turned, without -knowing it, the corner of a wall of rock he saw a starry light. He knew -that it was the lamp of the refuge which, by his wife's command, was -lit at twilight every evening the whole year round. It was now but a -few roods off; he could see even the outline of the cabin itself, black -against its background of snow. But he had taken the wrong path to it. -Between him and it there yawned a wide crevasse in the glacier on which -he now stood.</p> - -<p>He shouted loud, but the wind was louder than his voice. The keeper in -the refuge could not hear. He paused doubtfully. To retrace his steps -and seek the right path would be certain destruction; it would take him -many miles about, and there was no chance even in the darkness that he -would ever find it; his strength, too, was failing him, and the child -was still unconscious. There was but one way of escape, to leap the -fissure. It was wider than any man could be sure to clear, and if he -fell within it he would fall into jagged ice a thousand fathoms down. -By daylight he had often looked down into its awful depths, blue in -their darkness, set with jagged teeth of ice like a trap's jaws.</p> - -<p>The leap might be death or life.</p> - -<p>He hesitated a few instants, then drew quite close to the edge, and -cast aside his pole, for the chasm was too wide for that to help him, -and he needed both hands free to hold the boy more firmly. The lamp -from the hut shed light enough to guide him; the snow fell fast, the -wind was violent. He paused another moment on the brink, drew the child -closer to him and clasped him with both arms; then, gathering all his -force into his limbs, he leaped.</p> - -<p>He cleared the fissure, but staggered on the slippery ice beyond. He -fell heavily, but still held his son so that Bela fell uppermost and -dropped upon him.</p> - -<p>Crushed by his weight, Sabran sank at full length on the white crystal -ground; alone he would have leaped as surely as the chamois.</p> - -<p>The shock awoke Bela from his trance; he opened his blue eyes giddily.</p> - -<p>'It is you!' he murmured feebly, as he felt himself lying on his -father's breast.</p> - -<p>'It is I!' said Sabran. 'My child, if you can move, try and creep to -that hut and call. I cannot.'</p> - -<p>The child, without a sound, trembling sorely, and with a sense of -confusion making his head dizzy, obeyed, drew himself slowly up, and -dragged his tired, aching, cramped limbs over the snow.</p> - -<p>'You are brave,' murmured his father, whose eyes followed him. 'You are -your mother's son.'</p> - -<p>Bela reached the door of the hut and beat on it with his little frozen -hands, and then fell down against it.</p> - -<p>'It is I—Count Bela!' he managed to cry aloud. 'Come to my father; -quick!'</p> - -<p>The door was flung aside, and the keepers of the hut rushed out at the -first cry. They had been asleep. They were old jägers, past the work -of the forests, but still strong. Having lighted the beacon without, -they had drunk a little wine, and chattered, and then dosed. Terrified -at their own negligence and at the sight of their lady's son, they -staggered out into the night, and together they bore the body of Sabran -into the refuge. He was unable to rise.</p> - -<p>'You cannot move!' sobbed the child, raining kisses on his hands.</p> - -<p>'I am stiff from the cold; nothing more,' said his father, faintly.</p> - -<p>Then he looked at the men.</p> - -<p>'One of you, if it be possible, go to the Burg. Tell the Countess von -Szalras that her son is safe. You need not speak of me. Bring the -physician here when it is morning; but say nothing of me to-night. Give -me a little of your wine——'</p> - -<p>His lips were blue, he felt faint; in his own heart he said to himself, -'I am hurt unto death.'</p> - -<p>Bela had thrown his arms about him, and, trembling like a leaf, clung -there and sobbed aloud deliriously.</p> - -<p>'You are hurt, you are hurt, and all for me!' he sobbed, as he saw his -father placed on the truckle bed set aside for any belated wanderer on -the hills.</p> - -<p>Sabran smiled on him.</p> - -<p>'My child, do not grieve so; it is nothing; a mere momentary wrench; -do not even think of it. No, no! I am not in pain.'</p> - -<p>The wine revived him, and restored his strength, and he sought to -conceal his injury for the boy's sake.</p> - -<p>'Warm some of this wine and give it to my son,' he said to the keeper -of the hut; 'then undress him, wrap him warmly, and make him sleep -before the fire.'</p> - -<p>'You are hurt, you are ill!' moaned Bela. 'I came to find you to take -you back. Our mother has never been the same;—she has never smiled——'</p> - -<p>'Hush!' said Sabran, almost sternly. 'Do not speak of your mother -before these men, her servants. You came to seek me, my poor little -boy? That was good of you, and it was good to remember me. It is three -years——'</p> - -<p>Bela clung to him and put his lips to his father's ear, that the men -might not hear.</p> - -<p>'The others have always prayed for you,' he murmured, 'because we were -all told. But me, I have loved you always. I have never thought of -anything else. And I have tried to be good, oh! I <i>have</i> tried!'</p> - -<p>A great suffering came on his father's face as he heard the innocent -words, and a great tenderness.</p> - -<p>'When I am dead, as I shall be so soon, will he remember, too?' he -thought.</p> - -<p>Aloud he said:</p> - -<p>'My child, it is very sweet to me to hear your voice again. But if you -love me now, obey me. You will have fever and ague if you do not drink -some warm wine, let yourself be undressed, and lie down before the -fire. Do not be afraid. You will see me when you awake. I shall not -stir.'</p> - -<p>He thought as he spoke:</p> - -<p>'No, I shall never stir again; they will bear me away to my grave, that -is all. I am like a felled tree. All is over. Well, perchance, so best: -when I am dead she may forgive—she may love the children.'</p> - -<p>When at last Bela, sobbing piteously, had reluctantly obeyed, and -when, despite all his struggles, nature, frozen, weary, and worn out, -compelled him to close his eager eyes in heavy dreamless slumber, -Sabran with a glance called the keeper to him.</p> - -<p>'Now the child sleeps,' he said, 'get my clothes off me, if you can. -Touch me gently. I think my back is broken.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLIII" id="CHAPTER_XLIII">CHAPTER XLIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>It was twelve o'clock in the night. Wanda von Szalras paced the -Rittersaal with feverish steps and limbs which, whilst they quivered -with fear, knew no fatigue. It had been nine in the morning when -Greswold and the servants, having searched in vain, came at last to her -with the tidings that her first-born son was lost; his bed empty, his -clothes gone, his little sword away from its place. All the day she had -sought herself, and organised the search of others with all the energy -and courage of her race. She had not given way to the despair which had -seized her, but in her own soul she had said: 'Does fate chastise me -thus for my own cruelty? I have shrunk from their sweet faces because -they were like his. For two long months I exiled them, I thrust them -from my presence and my heart. I have been ashamed of them. Does God -punish me through them? Shall I lose my children, too? Can I forgive -myself? Have I not even wished them unborn? Oh, my Bela, my darling, my -first-born! Yes, you are his, but more than all, you are mine!'</p> - -<p>When night closed in, and all the many separate search-parties -returned, bringing no news of him, she thought that she would lose her -reason. All had been done that could be done; the men on the estates -were scattered far and wide. It was known that there were snow-storms -on the heights; the white fury had even at eventide descended to the -lower ground, and the terraces and gardens shone white as the lights of -the heavens fell upon them. Every now and then there came the report -of a gun on the hills; the men were firing in hope that the child, if -lost, might hear the shots. The evening passed on and midnight came, -and no one knew where Bela was in those vast forests, those immense -hills, all hidden in the impenetrable darkness. She saw him at every -moment lying white and cold in some hollow in the snow; she saw the -cruel winds blow his curls, his fair limbs stiffen. Every year the -winter and the mountains took their toll of lives.</p> - -<p>She had known nothing of the purport of the child's disappearance; -she had been left to every vague conjecture with which her mind could -torture her. The whole household and all the woodsmen and huntsmen had -scoured the hills far and wide, and the whole day and night had gone by -with no tidings, no result. Sleep had visited no eyes at Hohenszalras; -from its terraces the snow-storm and hurricanes beating around the head -of Glöckner were discernible by the agitation of the clouds that hid -one-half the heights.</p> - -<p>Gela had stayed up beside her, his little pale face pressed to the -window frame, his terrified eyes staring into the gloom which near at -hand grew red with the beacon fires.</p> - -<p>As midnight tolled from the clock tower he came to her, and touched her -hand.</p> - -<p>'Mother,' he whispered, 'I dared not say it before, but I must say it -now. I think—I think—Bela is gone to try and bring <i>him</i> home.'</p> - -<p>'Him!' she echoed, while a thrill ran like fire and ice together -through her, from head to foot. 'You mean—your father?'</p> - -<p>'Yes.'</p> - -<p>She was silent. Her breast heaved.</p> - -<p>'What makes you say that?' she asked, at last.</p> - -<p>'Bela thought of nothing else all this year and last year, too,' said -Gela, in a hushed voice. 'He was always talking of it. When he was -smaller he thought of riding all over the world. Yesterday he was so -strange, and when we went to bed he kissed me ever so many times; and -he prayed a long, long while. And for nothing less would he have taken -the sword, I think. And—and I heard the men saying to-day that our -father was somewhere near; and I think that Bela might have heard that, -and so have gone to bring him home.'</p> - -<p>'To bring him home!'</p> - -<p>The words, uttered in his son's soft, grave, flute-like voice, pierced -her heart. She could not speak.</p> - -<p>'Will he rob me even of my first-born?' she thought, bitterly.</p> - -<p>At that moment Greswold entered. Gela, looking in his face, gave a -shout of joy.</p> - -<p>'You have found my Bela!' he cried, flinging his arms about the old man.</p> - -<p>'Yes, your brother is safe, quite safe! My Lady hears?'</p> - -<p>She heard, and the first tears that she had ever shed for years rushed -to her eyes. She drew Gela, with a passionate gesture, to her side, -and falling on her knees beside the Imperial throne in the Kittersaal, -praised God.</p> - -<p>Then, when she rose, she cried in very ecstasy:</p> - -<p>'Fetch him; bring him at once!—oh, my child! Who found him? Who has -him now? If a peasant saved his life, he and his shall have the finest -of all my land in Iselthal in grant for ever and for ever!—--'</p> - -<p>Greswold looked at her timidly; then said:</p> - -<p>'May I speak to your Excellency alone?'</p> - -<p>She touched Gela's hair tenderly.</p> - -<p>'Go, my darling, and bear the good news to our reverend mother. You -know how she has suffered.'</p> - -<p>The boy obeyed and left the hall. She turned to Greswold.</p> - -<p>'Tell me all, now.'</p> - -<p>The old man hesitated, then took his courage up and answered.</p> - -<p>'My Lady—his father found your son.'</p> - -<p>She put her hand out and clenched the arm of the throne as if to save -herself from falling.</p> - -<p>'His father!' she echoed. 'How came he there? Answer me, with the -truth, the whole truth.'</p> - -<p>'My Countess,' said Greswold, while his voice shook, 'your husband has -dwelt amidst the Glöckner slopes almost for the last three years. When -he left here he remained absent awhile, but not long. He has lived in -utter solitude. Few knew it. The few who did kept his secret. I was one -of these. He had corresponded with me ever since he left your house. -You may remember being angered?'</p> - -<p>She made a gesture of assent.</p> - -<p>'Go on,' she murmured. 'He found my child, you say?'</p> - -<p>'He found Count Bela; yes. It seems he had come as near here as some -nine miles eastward; near the hut which your Excellency built, not -very long after your marriage, on the crest of the Adler Spitze, in -consequence of the fatal accident to the Bavarian pedlars. He knew -nothing of Count Bela's loss, but there he saw a young boy threatened -by an eagle, and shot the bird. The fog was even then coming on upon -the heights. He found his son insensible from fatigue, and cold, and -terror, and bore him in his arms until he reached the refuge. He had -been near it all the time, but as the mist deepened and the snow fell -he lost his way, and must have gone round and round on the same path -for hours. We were, in sheer despair, mounting towards the Adler -Spitze, though we did not believe the child could have possibly got so -far, when we met one of the keepers descending with the news. The storm -is at its height; we could only grope our way, and we missed it many -times, so that we have been four mortal hours and more coming downward -those seven miles. The keeper said that my lord desired you should hear -at once of the safety of the child, but not of his own presence in the -hut. But I felt that your Excellency should be told of all.'</p> - -<p>'You were right. I thank you. You have been ever faithful to me and -mine.'</p> - -<p>She stretched out her hand to him in dismissal, and sought a refuge in -her oratory.</p> - -<p>She felt that she must be alone.</p> - -<p>She almost forgot the safety of her first-born in the sense that -his father was near her. She fell on her knees before the Christ of -Andermeyer and praised heaven for her child's preservation, and with a -passion of tears besought guidance in her struggle with what now seemed -to her the long and cruel hardness of her heart.</p> - -<p>To hear thus of him whom once she had adored, blinded her to all save -the memories of the past, which thronged upon her. If he had repented -so greatly was it not her obligation to meet his penitence with pardon? -It would be bitter to her to live out her life beside one whose word -she would for ever doubt, whose disloyalty had cut to the roots of the -pride and purity of her race. Nevermore between them could there be -the undoubting faith, the unblemished trust, which are the glorious -noonday of a cloudless love. She might forgive, but never, never, she -thought, would she be able to command forget fulness.</p> - -<p>But for that very reason, maybe, would her duty lie this way.</p> - -<p>The knowledge of those lonely desolate years, passed so near her, -whilst he kept the dignity and the humility of silence, touched all the -generosity of her nature. She knew that he had suffered; she believed -that, though he had betrayed her, he had loved and honoured her in -honesty and truth. One lie had poisoned his life, as a rusted nail -driven through an oak tree in its prime corrodes and kills it. But he -had not been a liar always. She had made his life her own in bygone -years: was she not bound now to redeem it, to raise it, to shelter it -on her heart and in her home? Was not the very shrinking scorn she felt -for his past a reason the more that she should bend her pride to union -with him? She had thought of her life ever as the poet of the flower:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -<span style="margin-left: 25%;">the ever sacred cup</span><br /> -Of the pure lily hath between my hands<br /> -Felt safe unsoiled, nor lost one grain of gold. -</p> - -<p>Had there been egotism in the purity of it, self-love beneath love of -honour? Had she treasured the 'grain of gold' in her hands rather with -the Pharisee's arrogance of purity than with the true humility of the -acolyte?</p> - -<p>She kneeled there before the carven Christ in an anguish of doubt.</p> - -<p>He had given her back her first-born. Should she be less generous to -him?</p> - -<p>Should she for ever arrogate the right of judgment against him, or -should she stretch the palm of pardon even across that great gulf of -wrong dividing them as by a bottomless pit?</p> - -<p>Tears came like dew to her parched heart. It was the first time that -she had ever wept since the night when she had exiled him. Three long -barren years had drifted by; years cold and dark and joyless as the -winter days which bound the earth under bands of iron, and let no -living thing or creeping herb rejoice or procreate.</p> - -<p>When she rose from her knees her mind was made up, a great peace had -descended on her soul. She had forgiven her own dishonour. She had laid -her heart bare before God and plucked her pride up from its bleeding -roots.</p> - -<p>All the early hours of her love recurred to her with an aching -remembrance, which had lost its shame and was sweet in its very pain. -His crime was still dark as the night in her eyes, but her conscience -and her awakening tenderness spoke together and pleaded for her pardon.</p> - -<p>What was love if not one long forgiveness? What raised it higher than -the senses if not its infinite patience and endurance of all wrong? -What was its hope of eternal life if it had not gathered strength in it -enough to rise above human arrogance and human vengeance?</p> - -<p>'Oh, my love, my love!' she cried aloud. 'We will live our lives out -together!'</p> - -<p>Her resolve was taken when she left her oratory and traversed her -apartments to those of the Princess Ottilie, who met her with eager -words of joy, herself tremulous and feeble after the anxious terrors of -the past day. Some look on Wanda's face checked the utterance of her -gladness.</p> - -<p>'Is it not true?' she said in sudden fear. 'Is the child not found?'</p> - -<p>'Yes; his father has found him,' she answered simply. 'Dear mother, -long you have condemned me; judged me unchristian, unmerciful, harsh. I -know not whether you were right, or I. God knows, we cannot. But give -me your blessing ere I go out into the night. I go to him; I will bring -him here.'</p> - -<p>The other gazed at her doubting, incredulous, touched to a great hope.</p> - -<p>'Bring him?' she echoed, 'your child?'</p> - -<p>'My husband.'</p> - -<p>'You will do that?—ah! mercy is ever blessed; the grace of Heaven will -be with you!'</p> - -<p>She sighed as she raised her head.</p> - -<p>'Who can tell? Perhaps my harshness will make heaven harsh to me.'</p> - -<p>When she came forth again from her own rooms she was clothed in a -fur-lined riding-habit.</p> - -<p>'Bid them saddle a horse used to the hills,' she said, 'and let Otto -and two other men be ready to go with me.'</p> - -<p>'It is a fearful night,' Greswold ventured to suggest. 'It will be as -bad a dawn. It snows even here. We met the keeper almost midway up the -Adler Spitze, yet it took us four hours to make the descent.'</p> - -<p>She did not even seem to hear him.</p> - -<p>'May I follow?' he asked her humbly. She gave a sign of assent, and -stood motionless and mute; her thoughts were far away.</p> - -<p>When the horse was brought she went out into the night. The storm of -the upper hills had descended to the lower; the wind was blowing icily -and strong, the snow was falling fast, but on the lower lands it did -not freeze as it fell, and riding was possible, though at a slow pace -from the great darkness. She knew every step of the way through her own -woods and up to the spurs of the Glöckner. She rode on till the ascent -grew too steep for any animal; then she abandoned the horse to one of -her attendants, took her alpenstock and went on her way towards the -Adler Spitze on foot, the men with their lanterns lighting the ground -in front of her. It was wild weather and grew wilder the nearer it grew -to dawn. There was danger, at every step from slippery frozen ground, -from thin ice that might break over bottomless abysses. The snow was -driven in her face, and the wind tore madly at her clothes. But she was -used to the mountains and held on steadily, refusing the rope which -Otto entreated her to take and permit him to fasten to his loins. They -kept to the right paths, for their strong lights enabled them to see -whither they went. Once they crept along a narrow ledge where a man -could barely stand. The ascent was long and weary in the teeth of the -weather; it tried even the stout jägers; but she scarcely felt the -force of the wind, the chill of the black frost.</p> - -<p>No woman but one used as she was to measure her strength with her -native Alps could have lived through that night, which tried hardly -even the hunters born and bred amidst the snow summits. By day the -ascent hither was difficult and dangerous after the summer months, but -after nightfall the sturdiest mountaineer dreamed not of facing it. But -on those heights above her, in the dark yonder, beneath the clouds, -were her husband and her child. That knowledge sufficed to nerve her -limbs to preternatural power, and the men who followed her were loyal -and devoted to her service; they would have lain down to die at her -word.</p> - -<p>When her body seemed to sink with the burden of fatigue and cold, she -looked up into the blackness of the air, and thought that those she -sought were there, and fancied that already she heard their voices. -Then she gathered new strength and crept onward and upward, her hands -and feet clinging to the bare rock, the smooth ice, as a swallow clings -to a house wall.</p> - -<p>She had issued from a battle more bitter with her own soul; and had -conquered.</p> - -<p>At last they neared the refuge built by and named from her, and set -amidst the desolation of the snow-fields. She signed to her men to stay -without, and walking onward alone drew near the heavy door.</p> - -<p>She opened it a little way, paused a moment, drawing her breath with -effort; then looked into the cabin. It was a mere hut of two chambers -made of pitch pine, and lighted by a single window. There was no light -but from the pallid day without, which had barely broken. Before the -fire of burning logs was a nest of hay, and in it lay the child, -sleeping a deep and healthful sleep, his hands folded on his breast, -his face flushed with warmth and recovered life, his long lashes dark -upon his cheeks.</p> - -<p>His father was stretched still as a statue on the truckle-bed of the -keeper who watched beside him.</p> - -<p>The day had now broken, clear, pale, cold; the faint rose of sunrise -was behind the snow peaks of the Glöckner, and an <i>alpenflühevogel</i> -was trilling and tripping on the frozen ground. From a distant unseen -hamlet far below there came a faint sound of morning bells.</p> - -<p>She thrust the door further open and entered. She made a gesture to -the keeper, who started up with a low obeisance, to go without. She -fastened the latch upon him; then, without waking the sleeping child, -went up to her husband's bed. His eyes were closed; he did not notice -the opening and shutting of the door; he was still and white as the -snow without; he looked weary and exhausted.</p> - -<p>At sight of him all the great love she had once borne him sprang up in -all its normal strength; her heart swelled with unspeakable emotion; -she stood and gazed on him with thirsty eyes tired of their long denial.</p> - -<p>Stirred by some vague sense of her presence near him he looked up and -saw her; all his blood rushed into his face. He could not speak. She -stooped towards him and laid her hand gently upon his.</p> - -<p>'I am come to thank you.'</p> - -<p>Her voice trembled.</p> - -<p>He gave a restless sigh.</p> - -<p>'Ah! for the child's sake,' he murmured. 'You do not come for me!—--'</p> - -<p>She hesitated a moment, then she gathered all her strength and all her -mercy.</p> - -<p>'I come for you,' she answered in low clear tones. 'I will forget all -else except that I once loved you.'</p> - -<p>His face grew transfigured with a great joy.</p> - -<p>He could not speak; he gazed at her.</p> - -<p>'You were my lover, you are my children's father. You shall return to -us,' she murmured, while her voice seemed to him heard in some dream -of Heaven. 'Your sin was great, yes; but love pardons all sins, nay, -effaces them, washes them out, makes them as though they were not. -I know that now. What have not been my own sins?—my coldness, my -harshness, my cruel, unyielding—pride? Nay, sometimes I have thought -of late my fault was darker than your own; more hateful in God's sight.'</p> - -<p>'Noblest of all women always!' he said faintly. 'If it be true, if it -be true, stoop down and kiss me once again.'</p> - -<p>She stooped, and touched his lips with hers.</p> - -<p>The child slept on in his nest of hay before the burning wood. The -silence of the high hills reigned around them. The light of the risen -day came through the small square window of the hut. Outside the bird -still sang.</p> - -<p>He looked up in her eyes, and his own eyes smiled with celestial joy.</p> - -<p>'I am happy!' he said simply. 'I have lived amongst your hills almost -ever since that night, that I might see your shadow as you passed, hear -the feet of your horses in the woods. The men were faithful; they never -told. Kiss me once more. You believe, say you believe, <i>now</i>, that I -did love you though I wronged you so?'</p> - -<p>'I do believe,' she answered him. 'I think God cannot pardon me that I -ever doubted!'</p> - -<p>Then, as she saw that he still lay quite motionless, not turning -towards her, though his eyes sought hers, a sudden terror smote dully -at her heart.</p> - -<p>'Are you hurt? Cannot you move?' she whispered. 'Look at me; speak to -me! It is dawn already; you shall come home at once.'</p> - -<p>He smiled.</p> - -<p>'Nay, love, I shall not move again. My spine is hurt, not broken, I -believe—but hurt beyond help; paralysis has begun. My angel, grieve -not for me, I shall die happy. You love me still! Ah, it is best thus; -were I to live, my sin and shame might still torture you, still part -us, but when I am dead you will forget them. You are so generous, you -are so great, you will forget them. You will only remember that we were -happy once, happy through many a long sweet year, and that I loved -you;—loved you in all truth, though I betrayed you!'</p> - -<p>The hunters bore him gently down in the cool pale noontide along the -peaceful mountain side homeward to Hohenszalras, and there, after -eleven days, he died.</p> - -<p>The white marble in its carven semblance of him lies above his grave -in the Silver Chapel; but in the heart of his wife he lives for ever, -and with him lives a sleepless and an eternal remorse.</p> - -<h4>THE END.</h4> -<hr class="full" /> -<p style="margin-left: 20%; font-size: 0.8em;"> -CONTENTS<br /><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX">CHAPTER XXX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI">CHAPTER XXXI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII">CHAPTER XXXII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII">CHAPTER XXXIII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV">CHAPTER XXXIV.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV">CHAPTER XXXV.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI">CHAPTER XXXVI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII">CHAPTER XXXVII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII">CHAPTER XXXVIII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX">CHAPTER XXXIX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XL">CHAPTER XL.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLI">CHAPTER XLI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLII">CHAPTER XLII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII">CHAPTER XLIII.</a><br /> -</p> - - - - - - - -<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 52137 ***</div> - -</body> -</html> diff --git a/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index abf4ef5..0000000 --- a/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/old/52137-0.txt b/old/old/52137-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 0827188..0000000 --- a/old/old/52137-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8614 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Ouida - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3) - -Author: Ouida - -Release Date: May 23, 2016 [EBook #52137] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDA, VOL. 3 (OF 3) *** - - - - -Produced by Wanda Lee, Laura Natal Rodriguez and Marc -D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images -generouslly made available by the Internet Archive.) - - - - - -WANDA - -BY - -OUIDA - - - _'Doch!--alles was dazu mich trieb_; - _Gott!--war so gut, ach, war so lieb!'_ - Goethe - - - -IN THREE VOLUMES - -VOL. III. - - -LONDON - -CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY - -1883 - - - - -WANDA. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX. - - -When they came home from their tour amidst the mines of Galicia and -the plains of Hungary, and from their reception amongst the adoring -townsfolk of restored Idrac, the autumn was far advanced, and the long -rains and the wild winds of October had risen, making of every brook a -torrent. - -On their return she found intelligence from Paris that a friend of -her father's, and her own godfather, the Duc de Noira, had died, -bequeathing her his gallery of pictures, and his art collection of -the eighteenth century, which were both famous. The Duc had been a -Legitimist and a hermit. He had been unmarried, and had spent all the -latter years of his life in amassing treasures of art, for which he had -no heir of his own blood to care a jot. The bequest was a very precious -one, and her presence in Paris was requested. Regretful for herself -to leave Hohenszalras, she perceived that to Sabran the tidings were -welcome. Moved by an unselfish impulse she said at once: - -'Go alone; go instead of me; your presence will be the same as mine. -Paris will amuse you more if you are by yourself, and you will be so -happy amongst all those Lancrets and Fragonards, those Reiseiners -and Gauthières. The collection is a marvel, but entirely of the Beau -Siècle. You never saw it? No! I think the Duc never opened his doors -to anyone save to half a dozen old tried friends, and he had a horror -of turning his _salons_ into showrooms. If you think well, we will -leave it all as it is, buying the house if we can. All that eighteenth -century _bibeloterie_ would not suit this place, and I should like to -keep it all as he kept it; that is the only true respect to show to a -legacy.' - -Sabran hesitated; he was tempted, yet he was half reluctant to yield to -the temptation. He felt that he would willingly be by himself awhile, -yet he loved his wife too passionately to quit her without pain. His -own conscience made her presence at times oppress and trouble him, yet -he had never lost the half-religious adoration with which she had first -inspired him. He suggested a compromise--why should they not winter in -Paris? - -She was about to dissent, for of all seasons in the Tauern she loved -the winter best; but when she looked at him she saw such eager -anticipation on his face that she suppressed her own wishes unuttered. - -'We will go, if you like,' she said, without any hesitation or -reluctance visible. 'I dare say we can find some pretty house. Aunt -Ottilie will be pleased; there is nothing here which cannot do without -us for a time, we have such trusty stewards; only I think it would be -more change for you if you went alone.' - -'No!' he said; 'separation is a sort of death; do not let us tempt fate -by it. Life is so short at its longest; it is ingratitude to lose an -hour that we can spend together.' - -'There was never such a lover since Petrarca,' she said, with a smile. -'Nay, you eclipse him: he was never tried by marriage.' - -But though he jested at it, his great love for her seemed like a -beautiful light about her life. What did his state-secret matter? What -did it matter what cause had led him to avoid political life?--he loved -her so well. - -The following month they were in Paris, having found an hotel in the -Boulevard St. Germain, standing in a great sunny garden; and when they -were fairly installed there, the Princess and the children and the -horses followed them, and their arrival made an event of great interest -and importance in the city which of all others in the world it is -hardest thus to impress. - -The Countess von Szalras, a notability always, was celebrated just -then as the inheritress of the coveted Noira collection, which it had -been fondly hoped would have gone to the hammer: and Sabran, popular -always, and not forgotten here, where most things and people are -forgotten in a week, was courted, flattered, and welcomed by men and -by women; and as he rode down the Allée des Acacias, or entered the -Mirlitons, he felt himself at home. His beautiful wife, his beautiful -children, his incomparable horses, his marvellous good fortune were the -talk of all those who had already left their country-houses for the -winter _rentrée_, and attained a publicity, beginning with the great -Szalras pearls and ending with the babies' white donkeys, which was the -greatest of all possible offences to her; she abhorred and contemned -publicity with the sensitiveness of a delicate temper and the contempt -of a scornful patrician. - -To Sabran it was not so offensive; there was the Slav in him, which -loved display, and was not ill-pleased by notoriety. All this -admiration around them made him feel that his life after all had been -a great success, that he had drawn prizes in the lottery of fate which -all men envied him; it helped him to forget Egon Vàsàrhely. He had -never so nearly felt affection for Bela as when lines of men and women -stood still to watch the handsome child gallop on his pony down the -avenues of the Bois. - -'Life is after all like baccara or billiards,' he said to himself. -'It is of no use winning unless there be a _galerie_ to look on and -applaud.' - -And then he felt ashamed of the poorness and triviality of the thought, -which was not one he would have expressed to his wife. That very -morning, when she had read a long flattery of herself in a journal of -fashion, she had cast the sheet from her with disgust on every line of -her face. - -'We are safe from _that_, at least, in the Iselthal,' she had said. -'Cannot you make them understand that we are not public artists to -need _réclames_, nor yet sovereigns to be compelled to submit to the -microscope? Is this the meaning of civilisation--to make privacy -impossible, to oblige every one to live under a lens?' - -He had affected to agree with her, but in his heart he had not done so. -He liked the fumes of the incense. So did his child. - -'They will put this in the papers!' said Bela, when the snow came and -he had his sledge out for the first time with four little Hungarian -ponies. - -'That is the poison of cities!' said Wanda, as she heard him. 'Who can -have been so foolish as to tell him of the papers?' - -'Your heir, my dear, will never want for reporters of any flattery,' -said his father. 'It is as well he should run the gauntlet of them -early.' - -Bela listened, and said to his brother a little later: 'I like Paris. -Paris prints everything we do, and the people read the print, and then -they want to see us.' - -'What good is that?' said Gela. 'I like home. They all of them _know_ -us; they don't want to _see_ us. That is much better.' - -'No, it isn't,' said Bela. 'One drives all day long at home, and there -is nothing but the trees; here the trees are all people, and the people -talk of us, and the people want to _be_ us.' - -'But they love us at home,' said Gela. - -'That does not matter,' said Bela with hauteur. - -Wanda called the children to her. - -'Bela,' she said gently, 'do you know that once, not so very long ago, -there was a little boy here in Paris very much like you, with golden -hair and velvet coat like yours, and he was called the Dauphin, and -when he went out with his servants, as you do, the people envied him, -and talked of him, and put in print what he did each day? The people -wanted to _be_ him, as you say, but they did not love him--poor little -child!--because they envied him so. And in a very little while--a -very, very little while--because it was envy and not love, they put -the Dauphin in prison, and they cut off his golden hair, and gave -him nothing but bread and water and filthy straw, and locked him up -all alone till he died. That is the use of being envied in Paris--or -anywhere else. Gela is right. It is better when people love us.' - -The next day, as Bela drove in his sledge down the white avenues -through the staring crowds, his little fair face was very grave under -its curls; he thought of the Dauphin. - -When the weather opened, Wanda took him and his brother to Versailles -and Trianon, and told them more of that saddest of all earthly -histories of fallen greatness. Gela sobbed aloud; Bela was silent and -grew pale. - -'I hate Paris,' he said very slowly, as they went back to it in the red -close of the wintry afternoon. - -'Do not hate Paris. Do not hate anything or anyone,' said his mother -softly; 'but love your own home and your own people, and be grateful -for them.' - -Bela lifted his little cap and made the sign of the Cross, as he did -when he saw anything holy. 'I am the Dauphin at home,' he thought; and -he felt the tears in his eyes, though he never would cry as Gela did. - -So she gave them her simples as antidotes to the city's poison, and -occupied herself with her children, with the poor around her, with the -various details of her distant estates, and paid but little heed to -that artificial world which, when she heeded it, offended and irritated -her. To please Sabran she went to a few great houses and to the opera, -and gave many entertainments herself, happy that he was happy in it, -but not otherwise interested in the life around her, or moved by the -homage of it. - -'It is much more my jewels than it is myself that they stare at,' she -assured him, when he told her of the admiration which she elicited -wherever she appeared. 'Believe me, if you put my pearls or my -diamonds on Madame Chose or Baroness Niemand, they would gather and -gaze quite as much.' - -He laughed. - -'Last night I think you wore no ornaments except a few tea-roses, and I -saw them follow you just the same. It is very odd that you never seem -to understand that you are a beautiful woman.' - -'I am glad to be so in your eyes, if I never shall be in my own. As for -that popularity of society, it never commended itself to me. It has too -strong a savour of the mob.' - -'When you are so proud to the world why are you so humble to me?' - -She was silent a moment, then said: - -'I think when one loves any other very much, one becomes for him -altogether unlike what one is to the world. As for being proud, I have -never fairly made out whether my pride is humility or my humility -pride, and none of my confessors have ever been able to tell me. I -assure you I have searched my heart in vain.' - -A shadow passed over his face; he thought that there even would be -pride enough to send him out for ever from her side if she knew---- - -One day she suggested to him that he should visit Romaris. - -'Now you are near for so long a time, surely you should go,' she urged. -'It is not well never to see your poor people. The priest is a good -man, indeed; but he cannot altogether make up for your absence.' - -He answered with some irritation that they were not his people. All -the land had been parcelled out, and nothing remained to the name of -Sabran except a strip of the sea-shore and one old half ruined tower: -he could not see that he had any duties or obligations there. She did -not insist, because she never pursued a theme which appeared unwelcome; -but in herself she wondered at the dislike which was in him towards his -Breton hamlet, wondered that he did not wish one of his sons to bear -its title, wondered that he did not desire the children to see once, -at least, the sea-nest of his forefathers. It was more effort to her -than usual to restrain herself from pressing questions upon him. But -she did forbear; and as a consolation to her conscience sent to the -Curé of Romaris a sum of money for the poor, which was so large that it -astounded and bewildered the holy man by the weight of responsibility -it laid on him. - -The indifference shocked her the more because of the profound -conviction, in which she had been reared, of the duties of the noble -to his poorer brethren, and the ties of mutual affection which bound -together her and her people's interests. - -'The weapon of our order against the Socialist is duty,' she had once -said to him. - -He, more sceptical, had told her that no weapon, not even that anointed -one, can turn aside the devilish hate of envy. But she held to her -creed, and strove to rear her children in its tenets. It always seemed -to her that the Cross before which the fiend shrinks cowering in -'Faust' is but a symbol of the power of a noble life to force even -hatred to its knees. - -She did not care for this season in Paris, but she did not let him -perceive any dissatisfaction in her. She made her own interests out of -the arts and charity; she bought the Hôtel Noira, and left everything -as the Duc had left it; she found pleasure in intercourse with her -royal exiled friends, and left her husband his own entire liberty of -action. - -'Are you never jealous?' said her royal friend to her once. 'He is so -much liked--so much made love to--I wonder you are not jealous!' - -'I?' she echoed: and it seemed to her friend as if in that one pronoun -she had said volumes. 'Jealous!' - -She repeated the word as she drove home alone that day, and almost -wondered what it meant. Who could be to him what she was? Who could -dethrone her from that 'great white throne' to which his adoration had -raised her? If his senses ever strayed, his soul would never swerve -from its loyalty. - -When she reached home that afternoon she found a card, on which was -written with a pencil, in German: - -'So sorry not to find you. I am in Paris to see my doctor. Zdenka has -taken my service at Court. I will come to you to-morrow.' - -The card was Madame Brancka's. - - - - -CHAPTER XXX. - - -Sabran, that same afternoon, as he had walked down the Rue de la Paix, -had been signalled and stopped by a pretty woman wrapped to the eyes -in blue fox furs, who was being driven in a low carriage by Hungarian -horses, glorious in silver chains and trappings. - -'My dear Réné,' had cried Madame Olga, 'do you not know me, that -you compel me to flourish my parasol? Yes: I am come to Paris. My -sister-in-law, Zdenka, will do my waiting. I wanted to consult my -physician; I am very unwell, though you look so incredulous. So Wanda -has all the Noira collection? What a fortunate woman she is. The -eighteenth century is the least suited to her taste. She will heartily -despise all those shepherdesses _en panier_ and those smiling deities -on lacquer. How could the Duc leave such frivolities to so serious a -person? What is her doubled rose-leaf amidst all her good luck? She -must have one. I suppose it is you? Well, you will find me at home in -an hour. I am only a stone's throw from your hotel. Have you brought -all the homespun virtues with you from Hohenszalras? I am afraid they -will wither in the air of the boulevards. _Au revoir!_ - -And then she had laughed again and kissed her finger-tips to him, and -driven away wrapped up in her shining furs, and he was conscious of a -stinging sense of excitement, annoyance, pleasure, and confusion, as if -he had drunk some irritant and heady wine. - -He had gone on to his clubs with an uneasy sense of something -perilous and distasteful having come into his life, yet also with a -consciousness of a certain zest added to the reductions of this his -favourite city. He did not go to the Hôtel Brancka in the next hour, -and was sensible of having to exercise a certain control over himself -to refrain from doing so. - -'Did you know that Olga was in Paris?' she said, in some surprise, to -him when they met in the evening. - -'I believe she arrived this morning,' he answered, with a certain -effort. 'I met her an hour or two ago. She came unexpectedly; she had -not even told her servants to open her hotel.' - -'Is Stefan with her?' - -'I believe not.' - -'But surely it is her term of waiting in Vienna?' - -He gave a gesture of indifference. - -'I believed it was. I think it was. She will be sure to write to you -this evening, so she said. We cannot escape her, you see; she is our -fate.' - -'We can go back to Hohenszalras.' - -'That would be too absurd. We cannot spend our lives running away from -Madame Brancka. We have a hundred engagements here. Besides, your Noira -affair is not one half settled as yet, and it is only now that Paris is -really agreeable. We will go back in May, after Chantilly.' - -'As you like,' she said, with a smile of ready acquiescence. - -She was only there for his sake. She, would not spoil his contentment -by showing that she made a sacrifice. She was never really happy away -from her mountains, but she did not wish him to suspect that. - -The Hôtel Brancka was a charming little temple of luxury, ordered -after the last mode, and as _pimpant_ as its mistress. It had cost -enormous sums of money, and its walls had been painted by famous -artists with fantastic and voluptuous subjects, which had not been paid -for at the present. - -In finance, indeed, she was much like a king of recent time, who never -had any money to give, but always said to his mistresses, 'Order -whatever you like; the Civil List will always pay my bills.' She had -never any money, but she knew that her brother-in-law, like the king's -ministers, would always pay her bills. - -'One expects to hear the "Decamerone" read here,' said Wanda, with some -disdain, as she glanced around her on her first visit. - -'At Hohenszalras one would never dare to read anything but the -"Imitationis Christi,"' said Madame Olga, with contempt of another sort. - -The little hotel was but a few streets distance off their own grand and -spacious residence, which had undergone scarcely any change since the -days of Louis XV. They saw the Countess Brancka very often, could not -choose but see her when she chose, and that was almost perpetually. - -He had honestly, and even intensely, desired not to be subjected to her -vicinity. But it was difficult to resist its seduction when she lived -within a few yards of him, when she met him at every turn, when the -changing scenes of society were like those of a kaleidoscope, always -composed of the same pieces. The closeness of her relationship to his -wife made an avoidance of her, which would have been easy with a mere -acquaintance, wholly out of possibility. She pleaded her 'poverty' very -prettily, as a plea to borrow their riding-horses, use their boxes -at the Opéra and the Théâtre Français, and be constantly, under one -pretext or another, seeking their advice. Wanda, who knew the enormous -extravagance of both the Branckas, and the inroads which their debts -made on even the magnificent fortunes of Egon Vàsàrhely, had not as -much patience as usual in her before these plaintive pretences. - -'_Wanda me boude_', said Madame Brancka, with touching reproachfulness, -and sought a refuge and a confidant in the sympathy of Sabran, which -was not given very cordially, yet could not be altogether refused. Not -only were they in the same world, but she made a thousand claims on -their friendship, on their relationship. Stefan Brancka was in Hungary. -She wanted Sabran's advice about her horses, about her tradespeople, -about her disputes with the artists who had decorated her house; she -sent for him without ceremony, and, with insistence, made him ride with -her, drive with her, dance with her, made him take her to see certain -diversions which were not wholly fitted for a woman of her rank, and so -rapidly and imperceptibly gained ascendency over him that before making -any engagement he involuntarily paused to learn whether she had any -claim on his time. It caused his wife the same vague impatience which -she had felt when Olga Brancka had persisted in going out with him on -hunting excursions at home. But she thrust away her observation of it -as unworthy of her. - -'If she tire him,' she thought, 'he will very soon put her aside.' - -But he did not do so. - -Once she said to him, with a little irony, 'You do not dislike Olga so -very much now?' and to her surprise he coloured and answered quickly, -'I am not sure that I do not hate her.' - -'She certainly does not hate you,' said Wanda, a little contemptuously. - -'Who knows?' he said gloomily; 'who could ever be sure of anything with -a woman like that?' - -'Mutability has a charm for some persons,' said his wife, with an -irritation for which she despised herself. - -'Not for me,' said Sabran, quickly. 'My opinion of Madame Olga is -precisely what it has always been.' - -'Are you very sincere to her, then?' said Wanda, and as she spoke, -regretted it. What was Olga Brancka that she should for a moment bring -any shadow of dissension between them? - -'Sincere!' he echoed, with a certain embarrassment. 'Who would she -expect to be so? I told you once before that you pay her in a coin of -which she could not decipher the superscription!' - -Wanda smiled, but she was pained by his tone. 'You are not the first -man, I suppose, who amuses himself with what he despises,' she -answered. 'But I do not think it is a very noble sport, or a very -healthy one. Forgive me, dear, if I seem to preach to you.' - -'Preach on for ever, my beloved divine. You can never weary me,' said -Sabran, and he stooped and kissed her. - -She did not return his caress. - -That day as she drove with the Princess in the Bois, Bela and Gela -facing her, she saw him in the side alley riding with the Countess -Brancka. A physical pain seemed to contract her heart for a moment. - -'Olga is very _accaparante_,' said the Princess, perceiving them also. -'Not content with borrowing your Arabs, she must have your husband also -as her cavalier.' - -'If she amuse him I am her debtor,' said Wanda, very calmly. - -'Amuse! Can a man who has lived with you be amused by her?' - -'I am not amusing,' said his wife, with a smile which was not mirthful. -'Men are like Bela and Gela; they cannot always be serious.' - -Then she told her coachman to leave the Bois and drive out into the -country. She did not care to meet those riders at every turn in the -avenues. - -'My dear Réné,' said the Princess, when she happened to see him alone. -'Can you find no one in all Paris to divert yourself with except Stefan -Brancka's wife? I thought you disliked her.' - -Sabran hesitated. - -'She is related to us,' he said a little feebly. 'One sees her of -necessity a hundred times a week.' - -'For our misfortune,' said the Princess, sententiously. 'But she is not -altogether friendless in Paris. Can she find no one but you to ride -with her?' - -'Has Wanda been complaining to you?' - -'My dear Marquis,' replied Madame Ottilie, with dignity. 'Your wife is -not a person to complain; you must understand her singularly little -after all, if you suppose that. But I think, if you would calculate the -hours you have of late passed in Madame Brancka's society, you would -be surprised to see how large a sum they make up of your time. It is -not for me to presume to dictate to you; you are your own master, of -course: only I do not think that Olga Brancka, whom I have known from -her childhood, is worth a single half-hour's annoyance to Wanda.' - -Sabran rose, and his lips parted to speak, but he hesitated what to -say, and the Princess, who was not without tact, left him to receive -herself some sisters of S. Vincent de Paul. His conscience was not -wholly clear. He was conscious of a pungent, irresistible, even whilst -undesired, attraction that this Russian woman possessed for him; it was -something of the same potent yet detestable influence which Cochonette -had exercised over him. Olga Brancka had the secret of amusing men and -of exciting their baser natures; she had a trick of talk which sparkled -like wine, and, without being actually wit, illumined and diverted -her companions. She was a mistress of all the arts of provocation, -and had a cruel power of making all scruples of conscience and all -honesties and gravities of purpose seem absurd. She made no disguise of -her admiration of Sabran, and conveyed the sense of it in a thousand -delicate and subtle modes of flattery. He read her very accurately, and -had neither esteem nor regard for her, and yet she had an attraction -for him. Her boudoir, all wadded softly with golden satin like a -jewel-box, with its perpetual odour of roses and its faint light -coloured like the roses, was a little temple of all the graces, in -which men were neither wise nor calm. She had a power of turning their -very souls inside out like a glove, and after she had done so they were -never worth quite as much again. The fascination which Sabran possessed -for her was that he never gave up his soul to her as the others did; he -was always beyond her reach; she was always conscious that she was shut -out from his inmost thoughts. - -The sort of passion she had conceived for him grew, because it was -fanned by many things--by his constancy to his wife, by his personal -beauty, by her vague enmity to Wanda, by the sense of guilt and of -indecency which would attach in the world's sight to such a passion. -Her palate in pleasure was at once hardened and fastidious; it required -strong food, and her audacity in search of it was not easily daunted. -She knew, too, that he had some secret which his wife did not share; -she was resolved to penetrate it. She had tried all other means; there -only now remained one----to surprise or to beguile it from himself. To -this end, cautious and patient as a cat, she had resumed her intimacy -with them as relations, and with all the delicate arts of which she was -a proficient, strove to make her companionship agreeable and necessary -to him. Before long he became sensible of a certain unwholesome charm -in her society. He went with her to the opera, he took her to pass -hours amidst the Noira collection, he rode with her often; now and then -he dined with her alone, or almost alone, in a small oval room of pure -Japanese, where great silvery birds and white lilies seemed to float on -a golden field, and the dishes were silver lotus leaves, and the lamps -burned in pale green translucent gourds hanging on silver stalks. - -An artificial woman is nothing without her _mise en scène_; -transplanted amidst natural landscape and out-of-door life she is -apt to become either ridiculous or tiresome. Madame Brancka in Paris -was in her own playhouse; she looked well, and was in her own manner -irresistible. At Hohenszalras she had been as out of keeping with -all her atmosphere as her enamel buttons, her jewelled alpenstock, -her cravat of pointe d'Alençon, and her softly-tinted cheeks had been -out of place in the drenching rain-storms and mountain-winds of the -Archduchy of Austria. - -He knew very well that the attraction she possessed for him was of -no higher sort than that which the theatre had; he seemed to be -always present at a perfect comedy played with exquisite grace amidst -unusually perfect decorations. But there was a certain artificial bias -in his own temperament which made him at home there. His whole life -after all had been an actor's. His wife had said rightly: 'Men cannot -be always serious.' It was just his idler, falser moods which Olga -Brancka suited, and his very fear of her gave a thrill of greater power -to his amusement. When the Princess, his devoted friend, reproved him, -he was unpleasantly aroused from his unwise indulgence in a perilous -pursuit. To pain his wife would be to commit a monstrous crime, a -crime of blackest ingratitude. He knew that; he was ever alive to the -enormity of his debt to her, he was for ever dissatisfied with himself -for being unable to become more worthy of her. - -'She jealous!' he thought. It seemed to him impossible, yet his vanity -could not repress a throb of exultation; it almost seemed to him -that in making her more human it would make her more near his level. -Jealous! It was not a word which was in any keeping with her; jealousy -was a wild, coarse, undisciplined, suspicious passion, far removed from -the calmness and the strength of her nature. - -At that moment she entered the room, coming from a drive in the -forenoon. It was still cold. She had a cloak of black sables reaching -to her feet; it still rested on her shoulders. Her head was uncovered; -she had never looked taller, fairer, more stately; the black furs -seemed like some northern robes of coronation. Beneath them gleamed the -great gold clasps of a belt, and gold lions' heads fastening her olive -velvet gown. - -'Jealous!' he thought, 'this queen amongst women!' His heart sank. -'She would never say anything,' he thought; 'she would leave me.' -Almost he expected her to divine his thoughts. He was relieved when she -spoke to him of some mere trifle of the day. Like many men he could -not be frank, because frankness would have seemed like insult to his -wife. He could not explain to her the mingled aversion and attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him, the curious stinging irritation -which she produced on his nerves and his senses, so that he despised -her, disliked her, and yet could not wholly resist the charm of her -unwholesome magic. How could he say this to his wife? How could he -hope to make her understand, or if she understood, persuade her not to -resent as the bitterest of affronts this power which another woman, -and that woman nearly connected with her, possessed? Besides, even if -he went so far, if he leaned so much on the nobility of her nature as -to venture to do this, he knew very well that she would in reason say -to him, 'Let us go away from where this danger exists.' He did not -desire to go away. He was glad of this old life of pleasure, which let -him forget his secret sorrow. Amidst the excitations of Paris he could -push away the remembrance that another man knew the shame of his life. -The calm and the solitude of Hohenszalras, which had been delightful -to him once, had grown irksome when he had begun to cling to them for -fear lest any other should remember as Vàsàrhely had remembered. Here -in Paris, where he had always been popular, admired, well known, he was -as it were in his own kingdom, and the magnificence with which he could -now live there brought him troops of friends. He hoped that his wife -would not be unwilling to pass a season there in every year, and he -stifled as it rose his consciousness that she would assent to whatever -he wished, however painful or unwelcome to herself. - -'It is really very unwholesome for you to be married to such a saint -as Wanda,' his tormentor said to him one day. 'You do not know what a -little opposition and contradiction would do for you.' - -They were visiting the Hôtel Noira, studying the probable effects of -a new method of lighting the gallery which he contemplated, and she -continued abruptly: - -'Wanda has been buying very largely in Paris, has she not? And she has -bought this hotel of the Noira heirs, I believe? You mean to keep it -altogether as it is; and of course you will come and live in it?' - -'Whenever she pleases,' he answered, intent on a Lancret not well hung. - -'Whenever you please,' said Madame Brancka. 'Why will you pretend -that Wanda has any separate will of her own? It is marvellous to see -so resolute a person as she was as obediently bent as a willow-wand. -But all this French property will constitute quite a fortune apart. I -suppose it will all be settled on your third son, as Gela is to have -Idrac? Will not you give him your title? Count Victor de Sabran will -sound very pretty, and you might rebuild Romaris.' - -He turned from her with impatience. - -'Are we so very old that you want to parcel out our succession amongst -babies? No; I do not intend to give my name to any of Wanda's children. -There is an Imperial permission for them all to bear hers.' - -'You are not very loyal to your forefathers,' said Madame Brancka. -'Wanda might well spare them one of her boys. If not, what is the use -of accumulating all this property in France?' - -'All that she buys is done out of respect for the Duc de Noira,' said -Sabran, curtly. 'If she bear me twenty sons they will all have her -name. It was settled so on the marriage-deeds and ratified by the -Kaiser.' - -'Are prince-consorts always deposed from any throne they have of their -own?' said Madame Olga, in the tone that he hated. 'If I were you I -should rebuild Romaris. I wonder so devoted a wife has not done so -years ago.' - -'There is nothing at Romaris to rebuild.' - -'Decidedly,' thought his companion, 'he hates Romaris, and has no love -of his own race. Did he drown Vassia Kazán in the sea there?' - -Unsparingly she renewed the subject to Wanda herself. - -'You should settle the French properties on little Victor, and give him -the Sabran title,' she urged to her. 'I told Réné the other day that -I thought it very strange he should not care to have one of his sons -named after him.' - -Wanda answered coldly enough: 'In my will, if I die before him, -everything goes to the Marquis de Sabran. He will make what division -he pleases between his children, subject of course to Bela's rights of -primogeniture.' - -Madame Brancka was silent for a moment from surprise. - -'It is odd that he should not care for Romaris,' she said, after a long -pause. 'You have much more trust in him, Wanda, than it is wise to put -in any man that lives.' - -'Whom one trusts with oneself, one may well trust with everything -else,' said her sister-in-law in a tone which closed discussion. But -when she was left alone the thorn remained in her. She thought with -perplexity: - -'No, he does not care for Romaris. He dislikes its very name. He would -never hear of one of the children bearing it. There must be something -he does not say.' - -She remembered sadly what the Duc de Noira had once said to her: - -'In morals as in metals, my dear, you cannot work gold without -supporting it by alloy.' - -Madame Brancka had patience and skill perfect enough to refrain -altogether from those hints and tentatives by which a less clever woman -would have attempted to approach and surprise the key to those hidden -facts which she believed to be the theme of his correspondence with -Vàsàrhely and the cause of his rejection of the Russian appointment. -A less clever woman would have alarmed him, and betrayed herself by -perpetual allusions to the matter. But she never did this: she treated -him with an alternation of subtle compliment and ironical, malice, such -as was most certain to allure and perplex any man, and he never by the -most distant suspicion imagined that she knew anything which he desired -unknown. She was a woman of strong nerve, and her equanimity in his -and his wife's presence was wholly undisturbed by her consciousness -that she had dispatched the anonymous suggestion as a seed of discord -to Hohenszalras. She knew indeed that it was not what people of her -rank and breeding did do, that it was not honest warfare, that it was -what even the very easy morality of her own world would have condemned -with disgust; but she bore the sin of it very lightly. If she had been -driven to excuse it, she would have characterised it as mere mischief. -If her sister-in-law had shown her the letter, she would have glanced -over it with a tranquil face and an air of utter unconcern. If she -could not have done this sort of thing she would have thought herself -a very poor creature. 'I believe you could be as wicked as the Scotch -Lady Macbeth,' Stefan Brancka had said once to her; and she had -answered with much contempt: 'At least I promise you I should not walk -in my sleep if I were so. Your Lady Macbeth was a grotesque barbarian.' - -A great deal of the sin of this world, which is not at all like Lady -Macbeth's, comes from the want of excitement felt by persons, only too -numerous, who have exhausted excitement in its usual shapes. She had -done so; she required what was detestable to arouse her, because she -had lived at such high pressure that any healthy diversion was vapid -and stupid to her. The destruction, if she could achieve it, of her -sister-in-law's happiness, offered her in prospect such an excitement; -and the whim she had taken for passion grew out of waywardness till -it nearly became passion in truth. She never precisely weighed or -considered its possible consequences, but she endeavoured to arouse -a response in him with all the unscrupulous skill of a mistress in -coquetry. When moved by Madame Ottilie's warning he strove honestly to -avoid her, and often excused himself from obedience to her summons, -the opposition only stimulated her endeavours, and made a smarting -mortification and anger against him supply a double motor-power for his -subjection. If she could have believed that she succeeded in making his -wife anxious, she might have been content; but Wanda always received -her with the same serenity and courtesy, which, if it covered disdain, -covered it unimpeachably with admirable grace. - -'If one broke her heart, she would only make one a grand courtesy with -a bland smile,' thought Olga Brancka, irritably and impatiently. 'There -are people who die standing. Wanda would do that.' - -That ill weeds grow apace is a true old saw, never truer than of -vindictive and envious passions. Sheer and causeless jealousy of her -sister-in-law had been alive in her many years, and now, by being fed -and unresisted, so grew that it became almost a restless hatred. It was -far more her enmity to his wife than any other sentiment which inspired -her with a fantastic and unhealthy desire to attract and detach Sabran -from his allegiance. Joined to it now there was a sense of some mystery -in him that baffled her, and which was to such a woman the most pungent -of all stimulants. In all her _câlineries_ and all her railleries she -never lost sight of this one purpose, of surprising from him the -secret which she believed existed. But he was always on his guard with -her; even when most influenced by her atmosphere and her magnetism -he did not once lose his self-control and his habitual coolness. At -moments when she was most nearly triumphing, the remembrance of his -wife came over him like a breath of sweet pure air that passes through -a hot-house, and restored him to self-possession and to loyalty. She -began to fear that all the ability with which she had procured her -exemption from Court duties, and had induced her husband to remain in -Vienna, was all vain, and she grew bolder and more reckless in her use -of stratagems and solicitations to keep Sabran beside her in these -early spring days given over to racing and sporting, and at all the -evening entertainments at which the great world met, and whither she -carried with so much effect her gleaming sapphires and her black pearls. - -'Black pearls argue a perverted taste,' said the Princess Ottilie once -to her, and she unabashed answered: - -'It is perverted tastes that make any noise in the world or possess -any flavour. White pearls are much more beautiful, no doubt, but then -they are everywhere, from the Crown jewel-cases to the peasant's necks; -but my black pearls! you cannot find their match--and how white one's -throat looks with them. I only want a green rose.' - -'Chemicals can supply any deformity,' said the Princess, drily. 'Doing -so is called science, I believe.' - -'Do you call me a deformity?' she asked, with some annoyance. - -'You are an elaborate production of the laboratory,' said the Princess, -calmly. 'I am sure you will admit yourself that nature has had very -little to do with you.' - -'My pearls are black by a freak of nature,' said Madame Olga. 'Perhaps -I am the same.' - -The Princess made a little gesture signifying that politeness forbade -her from assent, but she thought: 'Yes; you were never a white pearl, -but you have steeped yourself in acids and solutions of all degrees of -poison till you are darker than you need have been, and you think your -darkness light, and some men think so too.' - -Sabran had grown to look for that necklace of black pearls with -eagerness in the society to which they both belonged. Few evenings -found him where Madame Brancka was not. She had known his Paris of the -Second Empire; she had known Compiègne and Pierrefonds as he had known -them; she knew all the friendships and the bywords of his old life, -and all the _dessous des cartes_ of that which was now around them. She -amused him. She comprehended all he said, half uttered. She remembered -all he recalled. At Hohenszalras he had not found any charm in this, -but here he did find one. She suited Paris; she knew it profoundly, -she liked all its pastimes, she understood all its sports and all -its slang. She hunted at Chantilly, betted at La Marche, plunged at -baccara, shot and fenced well and gaily, had the theatres and all their -jargon at her fingers' ends; all this made her no mean aspirant to -the post of mistress of his thoughts. All which had seemed tiresome, -artificial, even ridiculous, amidst the grand forests and healthful air -of the Iselthal became in Paris agreeable and even bewitching. Once he -said almost angrily to his wife: - -'You, who ride so superbly, should surely show yourself at the Duc's -hunts. What is the use of long gallops in the Bois before anyone else -is out of bed?' - -'I never rode for show yet,' said Wanda, in surprise. 'And you know I -never would join in any sort of chase.' - -'Surely such humanitarianism is exaggeration,' he said impatiently. -'Olga Brancka rides every day they meet at Chantilly, and she is by no -means of your form in the saddle.' - -'I have never yet imitated Olga,' said his wife, a little coldly; but -she did not object when day after day her finest horses were lent to -Madame Brancka. She never by a word or a hint reminded him that he -was not absolute master of all which belonged to her. Only when her -sister-in-law wanted to take Bela and his pony to Chantilly, she made -her will strongly felt in refusal. - -The child, whose fancy had been fired by what he had heard of the ducal -hunting, of the great hounds and the stately gatherings, like pictures -of the Valois time, was passionately angered at being forbidden to go, -and made his mother's heart ache with his flashing eyes and his flaming -cheeks. 'Cannot she leave even the children alone?' she thought, with -more bitterness than she had ever felt against anyone. - -A few nights later they were both at the Grand Opéra, in the box which -was allotted to the name of the Countess von Szalras. She was herself -not very well; she was pale, she sat a little away from the light. -Her gown was of white velvet; she had no ornament except a cluster of -gardenias and stephanotis, and her habitual necklace of pearls. Olga -Brancka, in a costume of many shaded reds, marvellously embroidered -in gold cords, was as gorgeous as a tropical bird, and sat with her -arms upon the front of the box, playing with a fan of red feathers, or -looking through her glass round the house. He talked most with her, but -he looked most at his wife. There was no woman, in a full and brilliant -house, who could compare with her. A thrill of the pride of possession -passed through him. The malicious eyes of the other, glancing towards -him over her shoulder, read his thoughts. She smiled provokingly. - -'_Le mari amoureux!_' she murmured. 'Really I did not believe in the -existence of that type. But it is quite admirable that it should exist. -Its example is very much wanted in Paris.' - -He felt himself colour like a youth, but it was with irritation; he was -at a loss for an answer. To have defended his admiration of his wife -at the sword's point would have been easy; to defend it from a woman's -ridicule was more difficult. Wanda did not hear; she was listening -to the song of Dinorah, and was dreamily regretting the solitude of -Hohenszalras, and thinking of what pleasure it would be to return. All -the news that Greswold and her stewards sent her thence was precious to -her; no details seemed to her insignificant or without interest; and -her own letters in return were full of minute attention to the welfare -of everyone and of everything she had left there. She was roused from -her home reverie by the voice of her sister-in-law, raised more highly -and saying impatiently: - -'Why should you object, Réné, when I say that I wish it?' - -'What do you wish?' said Wanda, who always felt a singular annoyance -whenever she heard him thus familiarly addressed. 'Whatever you may -wish, I am sure M. de Sabran can require no second bidding to procure -it for you, if it be within the limits of the possible.' - -'I wish to see a Breton Pardon,' said Olga Brancka, with a gesture of -her fan towards the stage. 'There is one next week in his own country; -I want him to invite me--us--to Romaris.' - -Wanda, who knew that he always shrank from the mention of Romaris, -interposed to save him from persecution. - -'There is nothing at Romaris to invite us to,' she said for him. -'Neither you nor I can live in a cabin or a fishing-boat; especially -can we not in March weather.' - -'You can live in a hut on your Alps,' returned the other, 'and I do -not dislike tent life in the Karpathians. If he sent his major-domo -down, he would soon make the sands and rocks blossom like the rose, and -villages would arise as fast as they did before the great Katherine. -Why not? It would be charming. Has he no feeling for the cradle of his -ancestors? We must put him through a course of Lamartine.' - -'An unfortunate allusion; he lived to lose Milly,' said Sabran, finding -himself forced to say something. 'In midsummer, Mesdames, you might -perhaps rough it, _tant bien que mal_; but now!--there is nothing to -be seen except fog and surf at sea, and mud and pools inland. Even -a Pardon would not reconcile you; not even the Breton jackets with -scriptural stories embroidered on them, nor the bagpipes.' - -'Positively, you will not take us?' - -'I must disobey even your wishes in the Ides of March.' - -'But whether in March or July--why do you never go yourself?' - -'There is nothing to go there for,' he answered, almost losing his -patience; 'a people to whom I am only a name, a strip of shore on which -I only own a few wind-tormented oak-trees!' - -'Only imagine the duties that Wanda would evolve in your place out of -those people and those oaks!' - -'I have not Wanda's virtues,' he said, half sadly, half jestingly. - -'We have none of us, or the Millennium would have arrived. I cannot -understand your dislike to your melancholy sea-shore. Most of your -countrymen are for ever home-sick away from their _landes_ and their -_dolmen._ You seem to feel no throb for the _mater patria_, even when -listening to Dinorah, which sets every other Breton's heart beating.' - -'My heart is Austrian,' said Sabran, with a bow towards his wife. - -'That is very pretty, and what you are also obliged to say,' -interrupted Madame Brancka. 'But why hate Romaris? For my part, I -believe you see ghosts there.' - -His wife said, with a quick reproach in her words: 'The ghosts of men -who knew how to live and to die nobly? He would not be afraid to meet -them.' - -The simplicity of the words and the trustfulness of them sank into his -soul. A pang of terrible consciousness went through him like poisoned -steel. As his wife's eyes sought his the lights swam round with him, -the music was only a confused murmur on his ear; he heard as if from -afar off the voice of Olga Brancka saying: 'My dear Wanda, you are -always so exalted!' - -At that moment some one knocked at the door: he was glad to rise and -open it to admit Count Kaulnitz and two other gentlemen. - -Hardly anything else which his wife could have said would have hurt -him quite so much. - -As he sat there in the brilliant illumination and the hot-house -warmth, with her delicate profile clear as a cameo against the light, -a sensation of physical cold passed through him. He saw himself as he -was, an actor, a traitor, a perjured and dishonoured man. What right -had he there more than any galley-slave at the hulks?--he, Vassia Kazán? - -Well tutored by the ways of the world, he laughed, and spoke, and -criticised the rendering of the opera with his usual readiness of -grace; but Olga Brancka had marked the fleeting expression of his face, -and said to herself: 'Whatever the secret be, the key of it lies in the -sands of Romaris.' - -As she took his arm, when they left the box, she murmured to him: 'I -shall go to Romaris, and you will take me.' - -'I think not,' he said curtly, without his usual suavity. 'I am the -servant of all your sex, it is true, but like all servants I am only -willing to be commanded by my mistress.' - -'O most faithful of lovers, I understand!' she said, with a -contemptuous laugh. 'And she never commands you, she only obeys. You -are very fortunate, even though you do have ghosts at your ruined tower -by the sea.' - -'Yes, I am fortunate, indeed,' he answered gravely, and his eyes -glanced towards his wife, who was standing a stair or two below -conversing with her cousin Kaulnitz. - -'Even though you had to abandon Russia,' murmured Olga Brancka, -dreamily. She could feel that a certain thrill passed through him. -He was startled and alarmed. Was it possible that Egon Vàsàrhely had -betrayed him? - -'Paris is much more agreeable than St. Petersburg,' he answered -carelessly. 'I am no loser. Wanda would have been unhappy, and, what -would have been worse, she would never have said so.' - -'No, she would never have said so. She is like the Sioux, the Stoics, -and the people who died in lace ruffles in '89. I beg your pardon, -those are your people, I forgot; the people whose ghosts forbid you to -entertain us at Romaris.' - -'I would brave an army of ghosts to please Madame Brancka,' said -Sabran, with his usual gallantry. - -'Call me _Cousinette_, at the least,' she murmured, as they descended -the last stair. - -'_Bon soir_, madame!' he said, as he closed the door of her carriage. - -'Are you coming with me?' said Wanda, as she went to hers. - -He hesitated. 'I think I will go for an hour to the clubs,' he -answered. He kissed her hand. As he drew the fur rug over her skirts, -she thought his face was very pale as she saw it by the lamplight. She -wished to ask him if he were quite well, but she restrained herself, -knowing how intolerable such importunities are to men. Instead, she -smiled at him, as she said, '_Amusez-vous bien_,' and left him to -divert himself as he chose. - -'How little women understand men, and how poorly they love them when -they do not leave them alone!' she thought, as her carriage rolled -homeward. She never troubled him, never interrogated him, never even -tried to conjecture what he did when away from her. Sometimes, when -he returned at sunrise, she had already risen, and had said a prayer -with her children, written her letters, or visited her horses, but she -always met him with a smile and without a question. - -It hurt her with an ever-deepening wound to perceive the attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him. She did not for a moment believe -that it was love, but she saw that it was an influence which had -audacity enough to compete with her own, a sort, of fascination which, -commencing with dislike, increased to an unhealthy and morbid potency. -She could not bring herself to speak of it to him. She was not one of -those women who reproach and implore. It would have seemed to her as -if both he and she would have lost all dignity in each other's sight -if once they had stooped to what society calls jestingly 'a scene.' He -guessed aright that if she had really believed herself displaced in his -heart she would have left him without a word. She was too conscious of -his entire worship of her to be moved to anything like that jealous -passion which would have seemed to her the last depths of humiliation; -but she was pained, fretted, stirred to a scornful wonder by the power -this frivolous woman possessed of usurping his time and giving colour -to his thoughts. - -It hurt her to think he feared her too much to tell her of any trouble, -any folly, any memory. She reproached herself with having perhaps -alienated his confidence by the gravity of her temper, the seriousness -of her opinions. It would be hard to think that frivolous shallow women -could inspire men with more confidence than a deeper nature could -do, but perhaps it might be so. He had sometimes said to her, half -jestingly: 'You should dwell among the angels; the human world is unfit -for you!' Was it that which alarmed him? - -With that subtle sense of what is in the air around which so often -makes us aware of what is never spoken in our hearing, she was sensible -that the great world in which they lived began to speak of the intimacy -between her husband and the wife of her cousin Stefan. She became -sensible that the world was in general disposed to resent for her, to -pity her, and to censure them, whilst it coupled their names together. -The very suspicion brought her an intolerable shame. When she was -quite alone, thinking of it, her face burned with angry blushes. No -one hinted it to her, no one breathed it to her, no one even expressed -it by a glance in her presence; yet she was as well aware of what they -were saying as though she had been in a hundred salons when they talked -of her. - -She knew the character of Olga Brancka, also, too well not to know that -her own mortification would be the sweetest triumph for one of whose -latent envy she had long been conscious. Ever since she had become the -sole owner of the vast fortunes of the Szalras she had felt for ever -upon her the evil eye of a foiled covetousness. The other had been very -young, and had waited long and patiently, but her hour had now come. - -She said nothing to her husband, and she preserved to her cousin's -wife the same perfect courtesy of manner; but in her own soul she -began to suffer keenly, more from a sense of littleness in him than any -mere personal feeling. To blame him, to entreat him, to seek to detach -him--all these things were impossible to her. - -'If all our years of union do not hold him, what will?' she thought; -and the great natural hauteur of her temper could never have let her -bend to the solicitation of a constancy denied to her. - -One night, when they had no engagements but a ball, to which they could -go at midnight, he did not come in to dinner. Always before, when he -had not returned to dine, he had sent her a message to beg her not to -wait. This evening there was no message. She and the Princess dined -alone. - -'He was never discourteous before,' said the Princess, who disliked -such omissions. - -'It is his own house,' said Wanda. 'He has a right to come or not to -come as he likes, without ceremony.' - -'There can never be too much ceremony,' said the Princess. 'It -preserves amiability, self-respect, and good manners. It is the silver -sheath which saves them from friction. It is the distinguishing mark -between the gentleman and the boor. When politeness is only for the -street or the salon, it is but a poor thing. He has always been so -scrupulous in these matters.' - -As Wanda later crossed the head of the grand staircase, to go and dress -for the ball, she heard her _maître d'hôtel_ in the hall below speak to -the groom of the chambers. - -'Are the Marquis's horses in, do you know?' asked the former; and the -latter answered: - -'Yes, hours ago; they are to go for him at the Union at eleven, but -they left him at the Hôtel Brancka.' - -Then the two officials laughed a little under their breath. Their -words and their laughter came upwards distinctly to her ear. Her first -impulse was a natural and passionate one of bitter burning pain and -wonder. A sensation wholly new to her, of hatred and of impotence -combined, seemed to choke her. - -'Is this what they call jealousy?' she thought, and the mere thought -checked her emotion and changed it to humiliation. - -'I--I--contend with her!' she said in her soul. With a blindness before -her eyes she retraced her steps, and went to the sleeping-rooms of her -children. They were all asleep as they had been for hours. She sat down -beside the bed of the little Ottilie; and gazed on the soft flushed -loveliness of the child, bright as a rose in the dew. - -She kissed the child's cheek without waking her, and sat still there -some time in the faint twilight and the perfect silence, only stirred -by the light breathing of the sleepers; the repose, the innocence, the -silence soothed and tranquillised her. - -'What matter a breath of folly?' she thought. 'He is their father; he -is my love; we have all our lives to spend together.' - -Then she rose and went to her chamber, and had herself clothed in a -court dress of white taffetas and white velvet, embroidered with silver -lilies. - -'Make me look well,' she said to her women. 'Put on all my diamonds.' - -When he entered, near midnight, repentant, self-conscious, almost -confused, she stopped his excuses with a smile. - -'I heard the servants say you dined with my cousin's wife. Why not, if -it please you? But I wonder she allows you to dine without _un bout de -toilette._ Will you not make haste to dress? We shall be late.' - -The words were perfectly simple and kind, but as she spoke them, so -royal did she look, standing there in the blaze of her jewels, with -her lily-laden train, that he felt abashed, ashamed, angered against -himself, yet more angered against his temptress. - -The old lines of Marlowe came to his mind and his lips: - - 'O! thou art fairer than the evening air - Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.' - -'I am not young enough to merit that quotation,' she said, with a -smile; 'ten years ago perhaps----' - -Her heart contracted as she spoke; she was conscious that she had -wished to look well in his eyes that night. The sense that she was -stooping to measure weapons with such an opponent as Olga Brancka smote -her with a sense of humiliation, which did not leave her throughout the -after hours in which she carried her jewels through the gorgeous crowd -of the ball at the Austrian Embassy. - -'If I lower myself to such a contest as that,' she thought, 'I shall -lose all self-respect and all his reverence. I shall seem scarcely to -him higher than an importunate mistress.' - -Now and again there came to her a passionate anger against himself, a -hardening of her heart to him, since he could thus be guilty of this -inexcusable and insensate folly. But she would not harbour these; she -would not judge him; she would not blame him. Her marriage vows were -not mere dead letters to her. She conceived that obedience and silence -were her clearest duties. Only one thing was outside her duty and -beyond her force--she could not stoop to rivalry with Olga Brancka. - -All at once she took a resolution of which few women would have been -capable. She resolved to leave them. - -Three days after the ball she said very quietly to him: - -'If you do not object, I will go home and take the children. It is time -they were at Hohenszalras. Bela, above all, is not improved by what he -sees and hears here; his studies are broken and his fancy is excited. -In a very little while he would learn quite to despise his country -pleasures, and forget all his own people. I will take them home.' - -He looked at her quickly in surprise. - -'I do not think I can leave Paris immediately,' he said, with -hesitation. 'I have many engagements. Of course you can send the -children.' - -'I said I should go, not you. I long to see my own woods in their -first leaf,' she answered, with a smile. 'It will be better for you to -remain. No one ought to be allowed to suppose that you are bound to my -side. That is neither for your dignity nor mine.' - -'Has anyone suggested----' he began, and paused in embarrassment, for -he remembered the incessant taunts and innuendoes of Olga Brancka. - -'I do not listen to suggestions of that sort,' she replied tranquilly. -'You wish to remain here, and I wish to return home. We are both at -liberty to do what we like. My love, she added, with a grave tenderness -in her voice, 'have I so poor an opinion of you that I dare not leave -you alone? I think I should hardly care for a fealty which was only to -be retained by my constant presence. That is not my ideal.' - -He coloured; he was uncertain what to reply: before her he felt -unworthy and disloyal. A vast sense of her immeasurable nobility swept -over him, and made him conscious of his own unworthiness. - -'Whatever you wish, I wish,' he murmured, and was aware that this could -not be what she would gladly have heard him say. 'I will follow you -soon. Your heart is always in your highlands. I know that you are too -grand a creature to be happy in cities. I have the baser leaven in me -that is not above them. The forests and the mountains do not say to me -all that they do to you.' - -'Men want the movement of the world, no doubt,' she said, without -showing any trace of disappointment. 'I only care for the subjective -life; I am very German, you see. The woods interest me, and the world -does not.' - -No more passed between them on the subject, but she gave orders to her -people to make arrangements for her departure and her children's in two -days' time, and sent out her cards of farewell. - -'Do you think you are wise?' the Princess ventured to say to her. - -She answered: - -'I know what you mean, dear mother; yes, I think so. To struggle for -influence with another, and that other Olga! I should indeed despise -myself if I could stoop so low. If he miss me he can follow me. If he -do not--then he has no need of me.' - -'I confess I do not understand you,' said Madame Ottilie; 'to surrender -so meekly!' - -'I surrender nothing,' she said, almost sternly. 'I know what I have -seen again and again in society. The woman jealous and anxious, losing -ground in his esteem and her own every hour, and rendering alike -herself and him actors in a ludicrous comedy for the mockery of the -world around them--a world which never has any sympathy for such a -struggle. Indeed, why should it have? for if the jealousy of a lover be -poetic, the jealousy of a wife is only ridiculous. I _am_ his wife; I -am not his gaoler. I refuse to admit to others or to him or to myself -that any other could be wholly to him what I am; and I should lose that -place I hold, lose it in his eyes and my own, if I once admitted my -dethronement possible.' - -She spoke with more force and anger than was common with her, and her -auditor admired while she still failed to comprehend her. - -'Is there a more pitiable spectacle,' she continued, 'than that of a -wife contending with others for that charm in her husband's sight which -no philtres and no prayers can renew when once it has fled for ever? -Women are so unwise. Love is like a bird's song--beautiful and eloquent -when heard in forest freedom, harsh and worthless in repetition when -sung from behind prison bars. You cannot secure love by vigilance, -by environment, by captivity. What use is it to keep the person of a -man beside you, if his soul be truant from you? You all say that Olga -Brancka has power over him. If she have, let her use it and exhaust it, -it will not last long; but I will not sink to her level by contesting -it with her. For what can you take me?' - -In her glance the leonine wrath of the Szalras flashed for a moment; -her face was pale, she paced the room with a hasty and uneven step. -The Princess sought a timid refuge in silence There were certain -heights in the nature and impulses of her niece of which she, a dweller -on a lower plain, never caught sight. There were times when the haughty -reserve and the admirable patience of this stronger character made a -union which awed her, and altogether escaped her comprehension. - -In two days' time she left Paris, the Princess and the children -accompanying her. - -He felt his heart misgive him as he let her go. What was Olga Brancka, -what was Paris, what was all the world compared to her? As he kissed -her hands in farewell before her servants at the _Gare de l'Est_, -the impulse came over him to throw himself into the carriage beside -her, and return with her to the old, fair, still, peaceful life of -Hohenszalras. But he resisted it; he heard in memory the mocking of -Olga Brancka's voice saying to him: - -'_Ah, quel mari amoureux!_' - -He had his establishment, his engagements, his horses, his friends, his -wagers; he would seem ridiculous to all Paris if he could not endure -a few weeks' separation from his wife. A great banquet at his house -was arranged to take place in a few days' time, at which only great -Legitimist nobles would be present, and at which the toast of '_Le -Roi!_' would be drunk with solemn honours. What would they say of him -if he failed to receive them because he had followed his wife into -Austria? With a thousand sophisms he reconciled himself to remaining -there without her, and would not face the consciousness within him that -the real motive of his staying on through the coming weeks in Paris -was that Olga Brancka was there. For herself, she parted, with him -tenderly, kindly, without any trace of doubt in him or of purpose in -her departure. - -'You will come when you wish,' were her last words to him. 'You know -well dear, that Hohenszalras without you will seem like a sadly empty -eagle's nest.' - -All his offences against her were heavy on him as he returned to the -great house no longer graced by her presence. He would have given -twenty years of his life to have been able to undo what he had done -when he had taken a name not his own. He was sensible of great talents -in him which might have brought him to renown had he been willing -to face hardship and laborious effort. Even as he had been at his -birth--even as Vassia Kazán--he might have achieved such eminence -as would have made him her equal in honest honour. But he had won -the world and her by a lie, and the act was irrevocable. Chance and -circumstance may be controlled or altered, but the fate which men -make for themselves always abides with them for good or ill: a spirit -either of good or ill which once incarnated by their incantations never -departs from them till death. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXI. - - -'Are you actually left alone?' said Madame Olga gaily to him that -evening, when they met at an embassy. 'I thought Wanda was an Una, who -never let her lion loose?' - -'The remembrance of her would recall him if she did,' he answered -quickly and coldly. 'She does not believe in chains because she does -not need them.' - -'Most knightly of men!' she said, with a little laugh. 'It must be very -fatiguing to have to play the part you so affect, even in absence. Our -metaphors are involved, but your loyalty seems one and indivisible. I -suppose you are left on parole?' - -The departure of his wife had disconcerted and disappointed her; as -he, to realise his position, had required to have the world about him -as spectator of it, so she felt all her triumph over him powerless and -pointless if Wanda von Szalras were not there to suffer by the sight -of it. He had remained; that was much; but she felt that the absence -of his wife had made him colder to herself, that the blank left made a -void between them, that remembrance might be more potent with him than -vicinity; and his consciousness that he was trusted might have more -power than any interference or opposition would have had. She became -sensible that she had less charm for him; that he was less easily -moved by her mockery and attracted by her wit. His earlier animosity -to her still flashed fire now and then, and with this sense of revived -resistance in him her own feeling, which had been born of caprice, took -giant growth as a passion. She grew cruel in it. If she could only know -his secret she thought she would crush him with it, grind him under her -foot, torture him. There was a touch of the tigress under her feverish -and artificial life. - -'_Il faut brusquer la chose_,' she said savagely to herself, when he -had been alone in Paris about a fortnight, and each day had convinced -her that he grew more wary of her, more unwilling to surrender himself -to the fascination which she exercised upon his baser nature. When -she attempted jests at his wife he stopped her sternly, and she felt -that she lost ground with him. Yet she had still a power upon him; an -unhealthy and fatal power. When he looked at her he thought often of -two lines:-- - - 'O Venus! shöne Frau meine, - Ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.' - -'Wanda writes to you every day?' she asked once. - -'She writes often,' he answered. - -'And what does she say of me?' - -'Nothing!' - -'Nothing? What does she write about? Of the priest's sermons and the -horses' coughs, of how much wood has been cut, and how many shoes the -children wear, of how she sorrows for you, and says Latin prayers for -you twice a day?' - -His face darkened. - -'Madame my cousin,' he said irritably, 'will you understand that men do -not like their religion spoken lightly of? My wife is my religion.' - -Then Madame Olga laughed with silvery, hysterical laughter, and clapped -her hands as if she were applauding a good comedy, and cried shrilly: -'_Oh! la bonne blague!_' - -But she knew very well that it was not '_blague._' She knew very well, -too, that though he was subjugated by a certain sorcery when in her -presence, when absent, his good taste condemned, and his good sense -escaped, her. She was one of those women who have a thousand means of -usurping a man's time, and are not scrupulous if some of those measures -are bold ones. All her admirers tacitly left the field open to one -for whom she made no scruple of her preference; and, under pretext of -her relationship to him, she contrived many ways to bring him beside -her. Every day he said to himself that he would go home on the morrow; -but each day bore its diversions, its claims, its interests, and each -day found him in Paris, sometimes driving her to the Cascade, to St. -Germain, to Versailles, sometimes escorting her to the tribune of a -race-course, or a _première_ at a theatre, sometimes dining with her -in her pretty room, the table strewn with rose-leaves, and the windows -open upon flowering orange trees. - -When he wrote home he wrote eloquent, witty, clever letters; but he did -not speak in them of the woman with whom he spent so much of his time, -and his wife as she read them wished that they had been less clever, -and had said more. She began to fear lest she had done unwisely. She -did not repent, for it seemed to her that she could have done nothing -else with any self-esteem; but she dreaded lest she had over-estimated -the power of her own memory upon him. Yet even so, she thought, it -was better that he should degrade himself and her in her absence than -her presence; and she still felt a certainty--baseless, perhaps--that -he would yet pause in time before he actually gave her a rival in her -cousin's wife. - -'If it were any other,' she thought, 'he might fall; but with Olga, -never! never!' - -And she prayed for him half the night, till her prayer seemed to beat -against the very gates of heaven. But in the day, to her children, to -the Princess, to the household, she seemed always tranquil, cheerful, -and at ease. She applied herself arduously to all those duties which -her great estates had always brought with them, and in occupation -and exertion strove to keep her anxiety at bay, and attain that -self-control which enabled her to write in return to him letters which -had no shade of reproach in them, no hint of distrust. - -It was now June. - -The Paris of the world of fashion was soon about to take wing, to -disperse itself to country-houses, sea-shores, and foreign baths; to -change its place, but to take with it wheresoever it should go all its -agitation, its weariness, its fever, its delirium, and its intrigues. -Olga Brancka saw the close of the season approach with regret yet -expectation. She knew that Sabran must escape her or succumb to her; -and she had a bitter, enraged sense that the power of his wife was -stronger over him than her own. '_Il faut brusquer la chose_,' she -said again and again to herself. She grew reckless, imprudent, and -was tempted to discard even that external decency which her station -in the world had made her assume. She would have compromised herself -for him with any publicity he might have chosen to exact. But she had -never been able to beguile him into any sort of declaration. When he -most felt the danger of her attraction, when he was nearest forgetting -honour and decency, nearest submitting, the memory of his wife saved -him. He recovered his coolness; he drew back from the abyss. Once or -twice she was tempted to throw the name of Vassia Kazán between them -and watch its effect; but she refrained--she knew so little! - -'You will not take me to Romaris?' she said, for the hundredth time, -one evening, as they rode towards St. Germain's. - -He laughed. - -'_Cousinette_! if you and I went off to Finisterre you will confess -that we should make a pretty paragraph for the papers, and Count -Stefan would have a very good right to run me through the lungs.' - -'Stefan!' she echoed, with contempt. 'It would be the first time he -ever----Besides, you have had duels; you are not afraid of them; and, -yet again, besides I do not see what harm we should do if we looked at -your _chouans_ and _chasse-marées_ for a few days. No one need even -know it.' - -She spoke quite innocently, but her black eyes watched him with the -'Teufelinne' cunning and passion. He caught the look. He put his hand -in the breast-pocket of his coat, where a letter of his wife's was -lying. - -'It is out of the question,' he said, almost rudely. 'I have no wish to -furnish _Figaro_ with so good a jest. Romaris,' he added, with a smile, -'is of course at your service, like all I possess, if you are so bent -upon seeing its desolation. But you must pardon my receiving you by -deputy, in the person of the curé, who is seventy years old and is the -son of a fisherman.' - -She cut her mare across the ears with a fierce gesture and galloped -away from him. Sabran as he galloped after her thought with a vague -apprehension, 'Why does she dwell on Romaris? Does she suspect that I -abhor the place? Can she have seen anything in my looks or in my words -that has raised any doubts in her?' But he told himself that this was -impossible. As she rode her heart swelled with rage and mortification. -There were many men in the world who would have been happy to go at -her call to Breton wilds, or any other solitude; and he refused her, -bluntly, coldly, because away there in the heart of Austria a woman, -who was the mother of his children, span, and read, and said her -prayers, and led her stupid, blameless, stately life! He escaped her -just because that woman lived! All that hot, cruel caprice which she -called love fastened upon him, and swore that it would not be denied. -She had a sense of a grand white figure which stood for ever betwixt -him and her. She brought herself almost to believe that it was Wanda -von Szalras who wronged her. - -Two nights later she was present at the last night of a gay comic -opera which had made all Paris laugh ever since the first fogs of -winter; a dazzling little opera, with a stage crowded by Louis Treize -costumes, and music that went as trippingly as a shepherdess's feet -in a pastoral. Sabran went to her box after a dinner-party which -he had given to a score of men. She looked well, in a gown of many -shades of yellow, which few women could have braved, but which suited -her night-like eyes and her pearly skin; she had deep yellow roses, -natural ones, in her bosom and hair. - -'I am flattered that you wear my yellow roses,' he murmured. - -'If you had sent me white ones you would have outraged the spirit of -Wanda.' - -He made an impatient movement. - -'When are you going home?' she said, suddenly. - -'Soon!' he answered, with the same impatience. - -'Soon means anything, from an hour to a year. Besides, you have said it -for the last six weeks.' - -'Do you go to Noisettiers?' - -'Of course I go to Noisettiers; you can come there if you please. I am -more hospitable than you.' - -He was silent. Noisettiers was a little place on the Norman -coast, which Stefan Brancka had given to her on his marriage; a -pleasure-house, with Swiss roofs, Cairene windows, Italian balconies -and a Persian court, which was bowered amongst lime-trees and filbert -trees, near Villeville, and had been the scene of much riotous -midsummer gaiety when she had filled it with Parisians and Russians. - -'You are always too good to me,' murmured Sabran, in the meaningless -compliment of usage, as other men entered her box. But she knew by the -coldness of his eyes, by the slightness of his smile, that he would no -more go to Noisettiers than to Romaris. - -'If Wanda had only remained here,' she thought angrily, opening and -shutting her tortoiseshell fan, 'he would have done whatever I had -chosen. Men are mere children; thwart them and they pine. - -'I suppose,' she said aloud to him, 'you will have your own -house-parties at Hohenszalras, as stiff as a minuet, crammed with -grand dukes and grand duchesses, all decorum and dignity, all ennui -and etiquette? By-the-by, are you restored again to the Emperor's good -graces?' - -'It is not likely that I shall be so,' replied Sabran, who always -dreaded the subject. 'If ever I be so fortunate I shall owe it to the -influence Wanda possesses.' - -'Why did you offend him?' she said, bending her inquisitive glance upon -him. - -'All sovereigns are offended when not obeyed. We have discussed this so -often. Need we discuss it again in a theatre?' - -'You are very impenetrable,' she said. 'Your rule of conduct -must follow the lines of M. de. Nothomb's '_il ne faut jamais se -brouiller, ni se familiariser, avec qui que ce soit: c'est le secret -de durer._' - -'M. de Nothomb only meant his rule to apply to his own sex,' replied -Sabran. 'With yours, unless a man be either _familiarisé_ or -_brouillé_, his life must be dull and his experience small.' - -'Which will you be with me?' she said, with significance. 'The choice -is open.' - -He understood that the words contained a menace. - -'I am your cousin and your humble servitor,' he said with gallantry, -giving his place up to a young Spanish noble. - -'Take me home,' she said to him an hour later, before the last scene of -the opera. 'Come to supper. I told them to have ortolans and bisque. -One is always hungry after a theatre, and we must have a last long -talk, since you go to your duties and I to my sea-bathing.' - -He desired to refuse; he dreaded her inquisitiveness and her -solicitation; but she had a magic about her, she subdued him to her -side even while he mentally resisted it. The fleshly charm of the -'Teufelinne' was potent as he wrapped her cloak about her and touched -the yellow roses as he fastened it. Almost in silence he entered her -carriage, and drove beside her to her house. She was silent also, -affecting to yawn and be tired, but by the gleam of the lamp he saw -her great black eyes glowing in the darkness, as he had seen those -of a jaguar in the forests of America glow, as it watched to seize a -sleeping lizard or unweary capybara. - -The few streets were soon traversed by her rapid Russian horses, and -together they entered the little hotel, with its strong perfume of -orange flowers and jessamine from the garden about it. The midsummer -stars were brilliant overhead; he looked up at them, pausing on the -threshold. - -'You are thinking how they shine on Wanda?' she said, with the laugh he -hated. 'Probably they do nothing of the kind. I dare say she is wrapped -in fog and cloud: those are the joys of the heights.' - -The little supper was perfectly prepared, and served with a fine claret -and some tokayer; the lights burned mellowly in the transparent gourds; -the windows were open, the moonlight touched the great gold birds, the -silver lilies on the walls. She had studied how to live and how to -please. She held that love was born as much out of scenic effects as of -the senses. In her own way she was a true artist. She had left him a -few moments to change her attire to a tea-gown, which was one cloud and -cascade of lace from head to foot; the yellow roses still nestled at -her breast. - -Stretched on a divan of oriental stuff, she put out her hand for a -cigar he lighted for her, and said with a little smile: - -'You cannot say I do not know how to live.' - -A brutal response rose to his lips; she did not know how to bridle her -life: but he could not say it. He murmured a compliment, and added: -'What a supreme artist the theatre has lost by your being born with a -Countess's _couronne!_' - -'Yes,' she said, with her eyes on the rings of smoke that her crimson -lips parted to send upward. 'Sometimes when Stefan does not give me -liberty, or Egon does not pay my accounts, I make them both tremble by -a threat that I will go on the stage. I should certainly draw all Paris -and all Vienna too. But perhaps it is too late; in a few more years I -shall have to marry my daughters. Can you realise that? I am sure I -cannot. Now it will suit Wanda perfectly to do that, and _her_ daughter -is not three years old; she is always so fortunate.' - -He listened impatiently. - -'If we left Wanda's name alone it might be better. Did you bring me to -supper to talk of her?' - -'No; she is your Madonna, I know. One must not be sacrilegious, but one -cannot always worship. You do not touch the tokayer; it came from the -Kaiser; you are always so abstemious--you irritate me.' - -She poured out some of the wine, into a jewel-like goblet of Venice, -and gave it him and made him drink it. She sat up on her divan and -leaned towards him; the breeze from the garden stirred the laces of her -gown and made the golden roses nod. - -Wine openeth the heart of man,' she cried gaily. 'Open yours and tell -me frankly why you refused to go to Russia? We are not in a theatre -now.' - -'Are we not?' he said, with the smile which she feared as her greatest -foe. 'Whether or not, I fear I must refuse to please you; the matter -lies between me and--the Emperor.' - -She remarked the hesitation which made him pause before the last word. - -'Between him and Egon,' she thought; but after all, what was the secret -to her except as a means of influence over him. She believed that she -had here present subtler and surer methods of influence which could -attain their end without coercion. - -She ceased to pursue the theme, and grew gentle and winning; she felt -that he was on the defensive. He had come weakly enough into the very -heart of temptation, but he was on his guard against her sorceries. -Lying back amongst her cushions she amused him with that gay and -discursive chatter of which she had the secret, and which imperceptibly -induced him to relax his vigilance and to feel her charm. There was -that about, her which made all scruples seem ridiculous; there was -a contagion of levity and mockery in her which awakened in him the -cynicism of earlier years, and made him only heed the marvellous force -of seduction of which she was mistress. - -'You ought to be ambitious,' she continued softly. 'I think you might -achieve any eminence if you chose to seek it.' - -'Surely I have enough blessings from fortune not to tempt it by that -last infirmity?' - -'You mean you have married a very rich aristocrat,' she said drily. -'Oh, yes; you have made one of the finest marriages in Europe; but -that is not quite the same thing as "winning off your own hand." It is -a lucky _coup_, like breaking the bank at _roulette_, but it cannot -give you the same feeling that a successful soldier or a successful -politician has, nor the same eminence. Indeed, I am not sure that your -wife's possession of every possible good and great thing has not -prevented you gathering laurels for yourself. You have dropped into a -nest lined with rose-leaves; to have fallen on the rocks might have -been better. Do you know,' she added, with a little smile, 'if I had -been your wife I should have given you no rest until you had become the -foremost man of the empire. I should not have cared about horses and -peasants and children; but I should have loved _you._' - -He moved uneasily, conscious of the implied satire upon his wife, -conscious also of a vibration of intense passion in the last words. He -remained silent. - -He knew well that had she been his wife, she would have been as false -to him as she was false to Stefan Brancka. But the words sent a thrill -through him half of emotion, half of repugnance. There was little light -on the divan where she reclined, the dewy darkness of the garden was -behind her; he could see the outlines of her form, the glister of rings -on her hands, and jewels at her throat, the shine of her eyes watching -him ardently. - -His heart beat with a certain excitation; he vaguely felt that some -hour of fate had come. - -They were as utterly alone as though they had been in a desert; no one -of her household would have ventured to approach that room without a -summons from her. A little drummer in silver beat twelve strokes upon -his drum, which was a clock. A nightingale was singing in the Cape -jessamine beneath one of the casements. The light was low and soft, -so faint that the moonbeams could be seen where they strayed over the -cranes and lilies on the wall. She said to herself once more: '_Il faut -brusquer la chose._' If she let him go now he would escape her for ever. - -Ever and again there came to him the memory of his wife, but he shrank -from it as he would have shrunk from seeing her in a gambling den. It -seemed almost a profanity to remember her here. He longed to rise and -get away, yet he desired to remain. He knew that every moment increased -his danger, and yet he prolonged those moments with irresistible -pleasure. Every gesture, glance, and breath of this woman was -provocative and alluring, yet he thought as he felt her power always -the same thing--'_ihr seyd eine Teufelinne._' Willingly he would have -embraced her and then killed her, that she might no more haunt him and -do no more harm on earth. - -As he sat with his face half averted from her she gazed at him with her -burning, covetous eyes; the droop of his eyelids, the curves of his -lips, the fairness of his features all seemed to her more beautiful -than they had ever done; the very disquiet and coldness that were in -them only allured her the more. She leaned nearer still and took his -wrist in her fingers. - -'Come to Noisettiers,' she murmured. - -'No,' he said, sharply and sternly, but he did not withdraw his hand. - -'Why not?' she said, with her whole person swayed towards him as by -an irresistible impulse. 'Why do you affect to be of ice? You are not -indifferent to me. You only obey what you think a law of honour. Why do -you try to do that? There is only one law--love.' - -He strove to draw away from him, but feebly, the clinging of her warm -fingers. The caress of her breath on his cheek, the scent of the roses -in her breast intoxicated him for the instant. She bent nearer and -nearer, and still held him closely in her slender hands, which were as -strong as steel. - -'You love me?' she murmured, so low that it scarce stirred the air, -and yet had all the potency of hell in it. A shudder went over him;. -the baseness of voluptuous impulse and the revulsion of conscious -shamefulness shook his strength as though it were a reed in the wind. -For a moment his arms enclosed her, his heart beat against hers; then -he thrust her away from him and rose to his feet. - -'Love, you? No, a thousand times, no!' he said with unutterable scorn. -'You are a shameless temptress; you can rouse the beast that lies hid -in all men. I despise you, I detest you--I could kiss you and kill you -in a breath; but love!--how dare you speak the word? Mine is hers; I am -hers: if I sinned to her with you I would strangle you when I awoke!' - -All the fierceness and the barbaric strength of the blood of desert -and of steppe broke up in him from underneath the courtesy and calm -of many long years of culture. He was born of men who had slain their -mistresses for a glance, and ravished; their captives in war, and -yielded them to no release but death, and his hereditary instincts -broke the bonds of custom and of habit, and spoke in him now as a wild -animal breaks its bars and leaps up in frank brutality of wrath. He -thrust her backward and backward from him, rose to his feet, wrenched -aside with rude hand the eastern stuffs that hung before the door, and -left her presence and her house before any power of voice or movement -had come back to her. - -As he pushed past the waiting servants in the vestibule, and went -through the courtyard and the gateway, he looked up once again at the -stars shining overhead. - -'Wanda! Wanda!' he said with a deep breath, as men may call in their -extremity on God. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXII. - - -Within half an hour he had given a few orders to his major-domo, -and had taken a special train to overtake the express, already for -on its way that night towards Strasburg. No steam could fly as fast -as his own wishes flew. Never had he felt happier than as the train -rushed across the windy level country of the north-east, bearing him -back to the peace and tenderness and honour which waited for him at -Hohenszalrasburg. He was content with himself, and the future smiled on -him. He slept soundly all that night, undisturbed by the panting and -oscillating of the carriage, and visited by tranquil dreams. He did not -break the journey till he reached S. Johann. The weather in the German -lands was wild and rough. The sound of the winds and rushing rains -brought the remembrance of that year of the floods which had been the -sweetest of his life. Amidst the Austrian Alps the cold was still keen, -and the brisk buoyant air and the strength, that seems always to come -on winds that blow over glaciers and snow-fields were welcome to him, -like a familiar and trusty friend. The servants who met him in answer -to his message, the horses who knew him and whinnied with pleasure, the -summits of the Glöckner, on which a noon-day sun was shining, all were -delightful to him: he thought of the Catullian 'laugh in the dimples of -home.' - -Their ways of life renewed themselves as if they had never been -broken. She divined what had passed, but she never spoke of it. She -was happy in his return, and never disturbed its happiness by inquiry -or allusion. He entered with eagerness into plans and projects which -had of recent years ceased to interest him, and he resumed his old -occupations and pursuits with almost boyish ardour. His restlessness -was appeased, and if a dull apprehension beat at his heart with -warning now and then, it was scarcely heeded in his deep sense of the -intense and forbearing love his wife bore to him. She never asked him -how he had escaped from Olga Brancka. She was satisfied that if he -had been faithless to herself, he would not have returned with such -single-hearted contentment and such lover-like fervour. - -'You are the only woman in the world who can forbear from putting -questions,' said Madame Ottilie to her. - -She answered smiling: - -'I remember Psyche's lamp.' - -'That is very pretty,' said the Princess, 'and I do believe you would -never have cared for the lamp. But, all the same, if the god had been -as honest as he ought to have been, would he have minded the light?' - -'I do not think that enters into the story,' said Wanda. 'He did not -resent the light either; he resented the inquisitiveness.' - -'You are the only woman who has none,' said the Princess, taking up her -netting, and at times she called her niece Pschye, little imagining the -terrible suitability of the name, and the secret that was hidden in -darkness from that noble confidence of the last of the Szalras. - -The remembrance of that night of base temptation left a sense of -uneasiness and of insecurity upon Sabran, but the influence his -temptress had possessed with him was of that kind which fades instantly -in absence. He honestly abhorred the memory of her, and never spoke -her name. - -His wife, to whom the utter degradation of her cousin's wife would -never have seemed possible in a woman nobly born and nurtured, never -imagined the truth or anything similar to it. - -Another woman would have tormented herself and him with innuendo or -direct reference to what had passed in those weeks when she had not -been beside him, and on which he was absolutely silent. But she put all -baseness of curiosity from her; she was content to know that her own -influence in absence had been strong enough to bring him back to his -allegiance. She would not have wished to hear, had he offered to reveal -them, all the various, conflicts of good and evil which had gone on in -his mind, all the subtle changes by which her own power had been for a -moment obscured, only to regain still stronger and purer ascendency. -She was indulgent because she knew human nature well, and expected no -miracles. That he had returned of his own accord, and was content so to -return, was all she desired to know. If to attain that equanimity had -cost her many a struggle, the fact was shut in her own soul and could -concern no other. She esteemed it a poor love which could not bear to -be sometimes shut out in silence. - -'For a man to be manly he must be free,' she thought; 'and how can he -be free if there be someone to whom he must confess every trifle? He -owes allegiance to no one but his own conscience.' - -If in their intercourse she had found his honour less scrupulous, his -code less fine than her own; if she had been ever pained by a certain -levity and looseness of principle betrayed by him at times, she always -strove not to attach too much importance to these. The creeds of a man -of pleasure were necessarily different, she told herself, to those of -a woman reared in austere tenets, and guarded by natural pride and -purity of disposition. Whenever the fear crossed her that he might not -be always faithful to her she put it away from her thoughts. 'What I -have to do,' she thought, 'is to be true to him, not to question or to -doubt him: a man's faithfulness has always such a different reading to -a woman's.' - -Sabran never quite understood the perfect indulgence to him which she -combined with the greatest severity to herself. He thought that the -same measure she gave she would exact. The' serenity and grandeur of -her character made it seem to him impossible that she would ever have -compassion for weakness or for falsehood. He fancied, wrongly, that -a woman less noble herself would be more indulgent than she would be -to error. He did not realise that it is only a great nature which can -wholly understand the full force of the words _aimer c'est pardonner._ -And then again, he said to himself, she might have pardoned a fault, a -crime even, of high passion, of bold mutiny against moral, law, but how -could she ever pardon a meanness, a treason, a lie? - -So he let the months slide away, and did not say to her whilst he still -might have said it himself, 'I am not what you think me.' - -But he was impressed and profoundly affected by that mute magnanimity, -which never vaunted itself or claimed any praise for itself by any hint -or suggestion. He felt disgust at his own folly in ever having cared to -be a single instant in the presence of the woman of whose libertinage -and inconstancy his yellow roses had been the fitting symbol. When -he had cast her from him, rejected and despised, the glamour she had -thrown over him had fallen like scales from the eyes of one blind. -Her memory made the beauty of his wife's nature and thoughts seem to -him more than ever things for reverence and worship. More than ever -his soul shrank within him when he recollected the treachery and the -deception with which, he had rewarded this noblest of friends. - -Ah! why when she had stretched out her hand to him in that supreme gift -of herself, in, that golden sunset hour after the autumn floods of -Idrac, had he not had courage to kneel at her feet and tell her all? -Perchance she might have still have loved him, might have still stooped -to him! - -He strove his utmost to conceal these anxious self-reproaches from her, -lest she should imagine that his hours of gloom were caused by any -lingering shadows of the fatal folly which had been forced on him, like -a drug by Olga Brancka. The sorceress had failed, and he had flung down -and shivered in atoms the glass out of which she had bidden him drink; -she was to him as utterly forgotten, as though she were in her grave; -but not so easily could he banish the memory of his own treachery to -his wife. The very forbearance of her made him the more conscious of -guilt, when he remembered that one man lived who knew that he was -unworthy even to kiss the hem of her garment. He had been faithful to -her in the present, and so could greet her with clean hands and honest -lips; but in the past he had betrayed her foully; he had done her what -in her sight, if ever she knew it would be the darkest dishonour the -treachery of ä human life could hold. - -The sense of crime, which had slept quiet and mute in his conscience so -many years, was now awake and seldom to be stilled. - -The time passed serenely; the autumn brought its hardy sports, the -winter its vigorous pastimes. With the new year she gave him another -son; she named him after Egon Vàsàrhely, without opposition from Sabran. - -'He is worthier to give them a name than I,' he thought bitterly. - -They did not care to move from the green Iselthal. Of Olga Brancka they -heard but rarely. Now and then she sent a little witty flippant note to -Hohenszalras, dated from Paris or Trouville, or Biarritz, or Vienna, or -Monaco, or St. Petersburg, according to the season and her caprices. -Of these little meaningless notes Wanda did not speak to her husband. -She could not bring herself to talk to him of the woman who had so -nearly wrecked their peace, and it seemed to her that the old saw was -wise: 'Let sleeping dogs lie.' It appeared to her, too, that theirs and -Madame Brancka's paths in life would henceforth very seldom, if ever, -meet. - -Sabran believed that her overtures towards him had sprung from one -of those insane unhealthy passions which sometimes are created by -their very sense of their own immorality; he fancied it had died of -its own fire. He did not credit her with the tenacity and endurance -she really possessed. He had little doubt that long ere now some dandy -of the boulevards, some soldier of the palace, had supplanted him in -that brazier of heated senses which she called by courtesy her heart. -He mistook, as the cleverest men often do mistake, in underrating the -cruelty of women. - -The summer was a soft and sunny one, and they enjoyed it in simple and -healthful pleasures of the open air and of the affections. The children -throve and never ailed a day. Sabran had lost all desire to return -to the excitations and passions of the world; his wife was more than -content in the joys of her home; and if above her a storm brooded, if -in his heart there fretted ceaselessly the chafing sense of a gross -treachery, of an incessant peril, she was as ignorant of what menaced -her as the child to whom she had given birth. With present security -also, the sense of dread often wore away from him. - -The months sped on swiftly and serenely for the mistress of -Hohenszalras, the only shadows cast on them coming from accidents -to her poor people through flood or avalanche, and the occasional -waywardness and turbulence of her eldest born. Bela had not been the -better for his sojourn in a great city, where parasites are never -lacking to the heir of wealth, and where his companions had been -small coquettes and dandies _pétris du monde_ at six years old. The -bright vigorous hardihood of the child had escaped the contagion of -affectation, but he had arrived at an inordinate sense of his own -importance and dignity, despite the memory of the Dauphin which often -came to him. He grew quite beyond the management of his governantes, -and though he never disobeyed his mother, gave little heed to anyone -else's authority. Of Sabran he was alone afraid; but at the same time -he preserved for him that silent intense admiration which a young child -sometimes nourishes for a man by whom he is little noticed, but who is -his ideal of all power, force, and achievement, and of whom he hears -heroic tales. - -He was now seven years old. It was time to think of a tutor for him, -since he was beyond the control of the women entrusted with his -education. When she spoke of it to his father, he answered at once: - -'Take Greswold. He has the best temper in the world to govern a child, -and he is a great scholar.' - -'But he is a physician,' she objected. - -'He has studied the mind no less than the body. He adores the boy, -and will influence him as a stranger could not. Speak to him; he will -be only too happy. As no one is ever ill here,' he added with a smile, -'his present position is a sinecure; he can very well combine another -office with it.' - -'I wanted you to take Bela in your hands,' he said later to the old -doctor, 'because I say to you what I should not care to say to a -stranger. The boy has all my faults in him. As he exactly resembles me -physically so he does morally. There is in him, too, I am afraid, a -tendency to tyranny that I have never had. I am not cruel to anything, -though I am indifferent to most things; he would be cruel if he were -allowed; perhaps it is mere masterfulness which may be conquered by -time. I imagine he has also my fatal facility. I call it fatal because -it renders acquisition and proficiency so easy that it prevents -laboriousness and depth of knowledge. You are much wiser than I am, -and will know how to educate the child much better than I can tell -you how to do. Only remember two things: first, that he is cursed by -certain hereditary passions coming to him from me which must be checked -and calmed, or he will grow up with a character dangerous to himself, -and odious to others in the great position he will one day occupy. -Secondly, that if any child of mine ever bring any kind of sorrow upon -her, I shall be of all men the most wretched. You have always been my -good friend. Be yet more so in preventing my suffering from the pain of -seeing my own moral deformities face me and accuse me in the life of -her eldest son.' - -The old physician listened with emotion and with surprise. Of the moral -defects Sabran spoke of, he had seen none. Since his marriage his -tenderness to his wife, his kindliness to his dependants, his courage -in field sports, and his courtesy as a host had been all that anyone -had seen in him; whilst his abstinence from all interference with and -all appropriation of his wife's vast possessions had aroused a yet -deeper esteem in all who surrounded him. As he heard, over the old -man's mind drifted the memories of all he had observed at the time of -Sabran's accident in the forest and subsequent prostration of nerve and -will. But he thrust these vague suspicions away, for he was blameless -in his loyalty to the house he served, and honoured as his master the -husband of the Countess von Szalras. - -'I will do my uttermost to deserve so precious a trust,' he said, -with deep feeling. 'I think that you exaggerate childish foibles, and -attach too much importance to them. The little Count Bela is imperious -and high-spirited, nothing more; and in this great household, where -everyone salutes him as the heir, it is difficult to keep him wholly -unspoiled by adulation and consciousness of his own future power. But a -great pride has been always the mark of the race of Szalras, although -my lady has so chastened hers that you may well believe the line she -springs from has been always faultless as--if one may say so of any -mortal--one may say she herself is. It is not from you alone that the -child inherits his arrogance, if arrogant he be. As for his facility, -it is like a fairy's wand, a caduceus of the gods; it may be used -for good unspeakable. At least believe this, my dear lord, what any -human teacher can do I will do, thankful to pay my debt so easily. I -have always,' he added less gravely, 'had my own theories as to the -education of young princes, and like all theorists believe everyone -else who has had any doctrine on that subject to be wrong. I shall be -charmed to have so happy an occasion in which to put my theories to the -test. I think nature and learning together, the woods and the study, -should be the preparation for the world.' - -'I have entire confidence in your judgment,' said Sabran. 'Above all, -try and keep the boy from pride. Train him, as Madame de Genlis -trained the d'Orléans boys, for any reverse of fortune. He is born with -that temper which would make any humiliation, any loss of position, -unbearable to him; and who can say----' - -He paused abruptly: what he thought was, who could say that in future -years Egon Vàsàrhely might not tell his son of that secret shame which -hung over Hohenszalras, a cloud unseen, but big with tempest? Greswold -looked at him in a surprise which he could not conceal, and Sabran left -his presence hastily, under excuse of visiting some stallions arrived -that morning from Tunis; he was afraid of the interrogations which -the old man might be led in all innocence to make. Greswold looked -after him with some anxiety; he had become sincerely attached to his -lord, whose life he had saved in Pregratten; but the unevenness of his -spirits, the unhappiness which evidently came over him at times in -the midst of his serene and fortunate life, the strangeness of a few -words which from time to time he let fall, had not escaped the quick -perception of the wise physician, and gave him at intervals a vague, -uncertain feeling of apprehension. - -'Pride!' he thought now. 'If the little Count were not proud he would -be no Szalras; and if his father have not also that superb sin he must -be a greater philosopher than I have ever thought him, and no fit mate -for our lady. What should overtake the child? If war or revolution -ruin him when he grows up that will be no humiliation; he will be none -the less Bela von Szalras, and if he be like my lady he will be quite -content with being that. Nevertheless, one must try and teach him -humility--that is, one must try and make the stork creep and the oak -bend!' - -Sabran, as he examined his Eastern horses and conversed about them with -Ulrich, was haunted by the thoughts which his own words had called -up in him. It was possible, it was always possible, that if she ever -knew, she might divorce him, and the children would become bastards. -The Law would certainly give her her divorce, and the Church also. The -most severe of judges, the most austere of pontiffs, would not hold her -bound to a man who had so grossly deceived her. - -By his own act he had rendered it possible for her, if she knew, to -sever herself entirely from him, and make his sons nameless. Of course -he had always known this. But in the first ardours of his passion, -the first ecstasies of his triumph, he had scarcely thought of it. -He had been certain that Vassia Kazán was dead to the whole world. -Then, as the years had rolled on, the security of his position, the -calmness of his happiness, had lulled all this remembrance in him. But -now tranquillity had departed from him, and there were hours when an -intense dread possessed him. - -True, he did justice to the veracity and honour of his foe. He believed -that Vàsàrhely would never speak whilst he himself was living; but then -again he himself might die at any moment, a gun accident, a false step -on a glacier, a thrust from a boar or a bear, ten thousand hazards -might kill him in full health, and were he dead his antagonist might -be tempted to break his word. Vàsàrhely had always loved her; would it -not be a temptation beyond the power of humanity to resist, when by a -word he could show to her that she had been betrayed and outraged by a -traitor? - -And then the children? - -Though were he himself dead, she would in all likelihood never do aught -that would let the world know his sin, yet she would surely change to -his offspring, most probably would hate them when she saw in their -lives only the evidence of her own dishonour, and knew that in their -veins was the blood of a man born a serf. - -'Born a serf! I!' he thought, incredulous of his own memories, of his -own knowledge, as he left the haras and mounted a young half-broken -English horse, and rode out into the silent, fragrant forest ways. -Almost to himself it seemed a dream that he had ever been a little -peasant on the Volga plains. Almost to himself it seemed an impossible -fable that he had been the natural son of Paul Zabaroff and a poor -maiden who had deemed herself honoured when she had been bidden to bear -drink to the _barine_ in his bedchamber. He had once said that he was -that best of all actors, one who believes in the part he plays; and at -all times, and above all since his marriage, he had been identified -in his own persuasions, and his own instincts and habits, with that -character of a great noble, which, when he paused to remember, he knew -was but assumed. Patrician in all his temper and tone, it seemed to -him, when he did so remember, incredible that he could be actually only -a son of hazard, without name, right, or station in the world. Was he -even the husband of Wanda von Szalras? Law and Church would both deny -it were his fraud once known. - -It was not very often that these gloomy terrors seized him--his temper -was elastic and his mind sanguine; but when they did so they overcame -him utterly; he felt like Orestes pursued by the Furies. What smote him -most deeply and hardly of all was his consciousness of the wrong done -to his wife. - -He rode fast and recklessly in the soft, grey atmosphere of the still -day, making his young horse leap brawling stream and fallen tree-trunk, -and dash headlong through the dusky greenery of the forests. - -When he returned Wanda was seated on the lawn under the great yews -and cedars by the keep. She kissed her hand to him as he rode in the -distance up the avenue. - -A little while later he joined her in her garden retreat, calm and -even gay. With her greeting his terror seemed to have faded away; his -home was here, he possessed her entire devotion--what was there to -fear? Never had the serenity of his life here appeared more precise -to him; never had the respect and honour which surrounded him seemed -more needful as the bulwarks of a contented career. What could the -furnace of ambition, the fatigue of exhausted pleasure give, that could -equal this profound sense of peace, this cultured leisure, and this -untainted atmosphere. The moral loveliness of his wife seemed to him -almost more than mortal in its absolute and unconscious rejection of -all things mean or base. 'The world would find the spring by following -her,' seemed to him to have been written for her--the spring of hope, -of faith, of strength, of purity. Perhaps a better man might have less -intensely perceived and worshipped that spiritual beauty. - -'Shall we have any house-parties this year or not?' she asked him as he -joined her. 'I fear you must feel lonely here after your crowded days -in Paris last year?' - -'No,' he said quickly. 'Let us be without people. We had enough of the -world in Paris, too much of it. How can I be lonely whilst I have you? -And the weather for once is superb, and promises to remain so.' - -'I do not know how it seems to you,' she replied, 'but when I came -from the glare and the asphalte of Paris, these deep shadows, these -cool fresh greens, these cloud-bathed mountains seemed to me to have -the very calm of eternity in them. They seemed to say to me in such -reproach, "Why will you wander? What can you find nobler and gladder -than we are?" I want the children to grow up with that love of country -in them; it is such a refuge, such an abiding, innocent joy. What does -the old English poet say: 'It is to go from the world as it is man's to -the world as it is God's.' - - 'Well, then, I now do plainly see - This busy world and I shall ne'er agree,' - -he said, with a smile. 'Cowley was a very wise man; wiser than -Socrates, when all is counted. But, then, Cowley forgot, and you, -perhaps, forget that one must be born with that wiser, holier love in -one; like any other poetic faculty or insight, it is scarcely to be -taught, certainly not to be acquired. I hope your children may inherit -it from you. There is no surer safeguard, no simpler happiness!' - -'But since you are content, may it not be acquired?' - -'Ah, my beloved!' he said with a sigh. 'Do not compare the retreat of -the soldier tired of his wounds, of the gambler wearied by his losses, -with the poet or the saint who is at peace with himself and sees all -his life long what he at least believes to be the smile of God. Loyola -and Francis d'Assisi are not the same thing, are not on the same plane.' - -'What matter what brought them,' she said softly, 'if they reach the -same goal?' - -'You think any sin may be forgiven?' he said irrelevantly, with his -face averted. - -'That is a very wide question. I do not think S. Augustine himself -could answer it in a word or in a moment. Forgiveness, I think, would -surely depend on repentance.' - -'Repentance in secret--would that avail?' - -'Scarcely--would it?--if it did not attain some sacrifice. It would -have to prove its sincerity to be accepted.' - -'You believe in public penance?' said Sabran, with some impatience and -contempt. - -'Not necessarily public,' she said, with a sense of perplexity at the -turn his words had taken. 'But of what use is it for one to say he -repents unless in some measure he makes atonement?' - -'But where atonement is impossible?' - -'That could never be.' - -'Yes. There are crimes whose consequences can never be undone. What -then? Is he who did them shut out from all hope?' - -'I am no casuist,' she said, vaguely troubled. 'But if no atonement -were possible I still think----nay, I am sure---a sincere and intense -regret which is, after all, what we mean by repentance, must be -accepted, must be enough.' - -'Enough to efface it in the eyes of one who had never sinned?' - -'Where is there such an one? I thought you spoke of heaven.' - -'I spoke of earth. It is all we can be sure to have to do with; it is -our one poor heritage.' - -'I hope it is but an antechamber which we pass through, and fill with -beautiful things, or befoul with dust and blood, at our own will.' - -'Hardly at our own will. In your ante-chamber a capricious tyrant -waits us all at birth. Some come in chained; some free.' - -They were seated at her favourite garden-seat, where the great yews -spread before the keep, and far down below the Szalrassee rippled -away in shining silver and emerald hues, bearing the Holy Isle upon -its waters, and parting the mountains as with a field of light. The -impression which had pursued her once or twice before came to her -now. Was there any error in his own life, any cruel, crooked twist -of circumstance concealed from her? An exceeding tenderness and pity -yearned in her towards him as the thought arose. Was he, with all -his talent, power, pride, grace, and strength, conscious of fault or -failure, weighted with any burden? It seemed impossible. Yet to her -fine instinct, her accurate ear, there was in these generalities the -more painful, the more passionate, tone of personal remorse. She might -have spoken, might once more have said to him what she had once said, -and invited him to place a fearless confidence in her affection; but -she remembered Olga Brancka; she shrank from seeking an avowal which -might be so painful to him and her alike. - -At that moment the pretty figure of the Princess Ottilie appeared in -the distance, a lace hood over her head, a broad red sunshade held -above that, and Sabran rose to go forward and offer her his arm. - -'You are always lovers still, and one is afraid of interrupting you,' -she said, as she took one of the gilded wicker chairs. 'I have had a -letter from Olga Brancka; the post is come in. She says she will honour -you in the autumn on her way to waiting at Gödöllö.' - -'It is impossible!' cried Sabran, who grew first red, then pale. - -'Nothing is impossible with Olga,' said the Princess, drily. 'I see -even yet you are not acquainted with her many qualities, which include -among them a will of steel.' - -'She cannot come here,' he said in haste under his breath. - -Wanda looked at him a moment. - -'My aunt shall tell her that it will not suit us. She can go to Gödöllö -by way of Gratz,' she said quietly. - -The Princess shifted her sunshade. - -'What effect do you think that will have? She will cross your -mountains, and she will call up a snowstorm by incantation, so that you -will be compelled to take her in. You who know so much of the world, -Réné, can you inform me how it is that women possess tenacity of will -in precise proportion to the frivolity of their lives? All these -butterflies have a volition of iron.' - -'It is egotism,' he replied with effort, unable to recover his -astonishment and disgust. 'Intensely selfish people are always very -decided as to what they wish. That is in itself a great force; they do -not waste their energies in considering the good of others.' - -'Olga's energies are certainly not wasted in that direction,' said -Madame Ottilie. - -Sabran rose and went in for his letters. It was intolerable to him -to hear the name of this woman, whom he had only escaped by brutal -violence, spoken in the presence of his wife; and even to him, hardened -to the vices of the world though experience had made him, it had never -occurred as possible that she would have the audacity to come thither; -he had too hastily taken it for granted that conscience would have -kept her clear of their path for ever, unless the hazards of society -should have brought them perforce together. The most secretive of men -is always more sincere than an insincere and crafty woman, and he -was overwhelmed for the moment at the infamy and the hardihood of a -character which he had flattered himself he had understood at a glance. -He forgot the truth that 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.' - -'There is not a _déclassée_ in Paris who would not have more decency!' -he thought bitterly. He stood in the Rittersaal and affected to be -occupied with his letters; but his eyes only followed their lines, his -mind was absent. He saw no way to prevent her continued intimacy with -them, if she were vile enough to persist in enforcing it. He could not -tell Egon Vàsàrhely or Stefan Brancka; a man cannot betray a woman, -however base she may be. He could not tell his wife of that hateful -hour, which seemed burnt into his brain as aquafortis bites into metal. -He shuddered as he thought of her here, in this house which had known -so many centuries of honour. He cursed the weak and culpable folly -which had first led him into her snares. If he had not dallied with -this Delilah, she would have been vile of purpose and of nature in -vain. He had escaped her indeed at the last; he had indeed remained -faithful in act to his wife; but had it been such fidelity of the soul -and the mind as she deserved? Would not even the semi-betrayal bring -its punishment soon or late? Could he ever endure to see her beside the -woman who so nearly had tempted him? He felt that he would sooner kill -the other, as he had threatened, rather than let her set foot across -the sacred threshold of Hohenszalras. - -'I knew what she was,' he thought with endless self-accusation. 'Why -did I ever loiter an hour by her side, why did I ever look once at her -hateful eyes?' - -If she had been a stranger he would have braved his wife's scorn of -himself and told her all, but when it was her cousin's wife--one who -even had once been in a still nearer relationship to her--he could -not do it. It seemed to him as if such nearness of shame would be so -horrible to her that he would be included in her righteous hatred of it. - -Moreover, long habit had made him reticent, and silence always seemed -to him safety. - -After some meditation he took his way to the library and there wrote a -brief letter. He said in it, with no preamble, ceremony, or courtesy, -that he begged to decline for himself and his wife the honour of the -Countess Brancka's presence at Hohenszalras. He sealed it with his -arms, and sent a special messenger with it to Matrey. He said nothing -of what he had done to his wife or her aunt. - -He knew that if his antagonist were so disposed she could make feud -between him and her husband for the insult which that curt rejection -of her offered visit bore with it. But that did not weigh on him; he -would have been glad to have a man to deal with in the matter. All -he cared to do was to preserve his home from the pollution of her -presence. Moreover, he knew that it would not be like the _finesse_ and -secrecy of Olga Brancka to do aught so simple or so frank as to seek -the support of her lord. - -Meantime, the Princess was saying to his wife: - -'Will you receive Olga? She will not give up her wishes; she will force -her way to you.' - -'How can I refuse to receive Stefan's wife?' - -'It would be difficult, but you would be justified. She endeavoured to -draw your husband into an intrigue.' - -'Are we sure? Let us be charitable.' - -'My dear Wanda, you are a truer Christian than I am.' - -'Justice existed before Christianity, if you do not think me profane to -say so. I try to be just.' - -'Justice is blind,' said the Princess, drily. 'I never understood very -well how, being so, she can see her own scales.' - -Wanda made no reply. She had not been blind, but she would have never -said to any living being all that she had suffered in those weeks -when he had stayed behind her in Paris. That he had returned to her -blameless she was certain; she had put far behind her for ever the -remembrance of those the only hours of anxiety and pain which he had -given her since their marriage. - -The Princess, communing with herself, wrote a letter to the Countess -Brancka, chill and austere, in which she conveyed in delicate, but -sufficiently clear, language, her sense that the same roof should -not shelter her and Sabran, especially when the roof was that of -Hohenszalras. She sent it because she believed it to be her duty to do -so, but she had little faith in its efficacy. She would have written -also to Stefan Brancka, but she knew him to be a weak, indulgent, -careless man, still young, who had been lenient to his wife's follies -and frailties, and who was only kept from ruin by the strong hand -of his brother. If she told him what was after all mere conjecture, -he might only laugh; if he did not laugh he might kill Sabran in a -duel, were his Magyar blood fired by suspicion. No one could be ever -sure what Count Stefan would or would not do; the only thing sure was -that he would be never wise. To his wife herself he was absolutely -indifferent, but this did not prevent him from having occasional moods -of furious resentment against her. He was too unstable and too perilous -a person to resort to in any difficulty. - -In a few days she received her answer, though Sabran received none. It -was brief and playful and pathetic. - - 'Beloved and reverend Mother,--You never like me, you always - lecture me, but I am glad that you honour me by remembrance, - even if it be to upbraid. I know not of what mysterious - crime you suspect me, nor do I understand your allusions - to M. de Sabran. I have always found him charming, and I - think if he had not married so rich a woman he would have - been eminent in some way; but content slays ambition. Salute - Wanda lovingly and the pretty children. How is your little - Ottilie? My Mila and Marie are grown out of knowledge. We - shall soon have to be thinking of their _dots_--alas! where - will these come from? Stefan and I have been the prey of - unjust stewards and extortionate tradesfolk till scarce - anything is left except the mine at Schermnitz. Pity me a - little, and pray for me much. - - 'Your ever devoted - 'OLGA.' - -Princess Ottilie was a holy woman, and knew that rage was a sin against -herself and heaven, but when she had read this note she tore it in a -hundred pieces, and stamped her small foot upon it, trembling with -passion the while. - -Two months went on; the Countess Olga wrote no more; they deemed -themselves delivered from her threatened presence. She had not replied -to his refusal to permit her to come thither, and Sabran felt relieved -from an intolerable position. Had she persisted, he had decided to -make full confession to his wife rather than permit her to receive -ignorantly the insult of such a visit. - -It was now the end of September, and the weather remained fine and -open. He spent a great deal of his time out of doors, and took his old -interest in the forests, the stud, and the hunting. The letter of Olga -Brancka had brought close to him again the peril from which he had so -hardly escaped in Paris, and the peace and sweetness of his home-life -seemed the more precious to him by contrast. The high intelligence, -the serene temper of his wife, and her profound affection seemed to -him treasures for which he could be never grateful enough to fate and -fortune; their days passed in tranquil and sunny happiness; but ever -and again a word, a look, the merest trifle, sufficed to awake the -sleeping snake of remorse which was, dormant in his breast. - -One day he took Bela with him when he rode--a rare honour for the -child, who rode superbly. His pony kept fair pace with his father's -English hunter, and even the leaping did not scare either it or its -rider. - -'Bravo, Bela!' said Sabran, when they at last drew rein; 'you ride like -a centaur. Is your education advanced enough to know what centaurs -were?' - -'Oh! they were what I should love to be,' replied Bela rapturously. -'They were joined on to the horse!' - -Sabran laughed. 'Well, a good rider is one with his horse, so you may -come very near your ideal. Ulrich has taught you an admirable seat. You -are worthy of your mother in the saddle.' - -Bela coloured with pleasure. - -'In the study you are not so, I fear?' Sabran continued. 'You do not -like learning, do you?' - -'I like some sorts,' said the child with a little timidity; 'I like -history, knowing what the people did in the other ages. Now the Herr -Professor lets us do our lessons out of doors, I do not mind them at -all. As for Gela, he likes nothing but books and pictures,' he added, -with a sense of his one grief against his brother. - -'Happy Gela! whatever his fate in life he will never be alone,' said -his father, as he dismounted to let his hunter take breathing space. -The child leapt lightly from his saddle, took his little silver folding -cup out of his pocket, and drank at a spring, one of the innumerable -springs rushing over the mossy stones and flower-filled grass. - -'One is never alone with horses?' he said shyly, for he never lost his -awe of Sabran. - -'Unless one be ill; then a horse is sorry consolation, and books and -art are faithful companions.' - -'I have never been ill,' said Bela, with a little wonder at himself. 'I -do not know what it is like.' - -'It is to be dependent upon others. A hero or a king grows as helpless -as a lame beggar when he is ill; you will not escape the common lot; -and when you stay in your bed, and your pony in his stall, then you -will be glad of Gela and his books.' - -'Oh! I do love Gela always,' said the child hastily and generously; -'and the Herr Professor says he is ever--ever--so much cleverer than I -am; a million times more clever!' - -'You are clever enough,' said Sabran. 'If you do not let yourself -be vain and overbearing you will do well. Try and remember that if -your pony made a false slip to-day and you fell badly, all your good -health would vanish at a stroke, and all your greatness would serve you -nothing. You would envy any one of the boys going with whole limbs up -into the hills, and, perhaps, all your mother's love and wealth could -do nothing to mend your bones again.' - -Bela listened with a grave face; when women, even his fearless mother, -spoke to him in such a way, he was apt to think with disdain that -they over-rated danger because they were women; and when his tutor so -addressed him, he was also apt to think that it was because the good -professor was a bookworm and cared for weeds, stones, and butterflies. -But when his father said so, he was awed; he had heard Ulrich and -Otto tell a hundred stories of their lord's prowess and courage and -magnificent strength, for the deeds of Sabran in the floods and on -the mountains had become almost legendary in their heroism to all the -mountaineers of the Hohe Tauern, and all the dwellers on the Danube -forest. - -'But ought one not to be brave?' he said with hesitation. 'You are.' - -'We ought to be brave, certainly, or we are not fit to live; but we -must not be vain of being brave, nor rely upon it too much. Courage is -a mere gift of '--he was about to say 'chance,' but seeing the blue -eyes of the child fastened upon him, changed the word and said 'a gift -of God.' - -'What a handsome boy he is,' he thought, as he looked thus at his -little son. 'And how wise it is to leave children wholly to their -mothers when their mothers are wise!' - -'I will remember,' said Bela thoughtfully; 'when I am a man I want to -be just what you are.' - -Sabran turned away at the innocent words. 'Be what your mother's people -were, and I shall be content,' he said gravely. - -'But your people too,' said Bela; 'they were very great and very good. -The Herr Professor reads us things out of that big book on Mexico, and -the Marquis Xavier was a saint,' he says. Gela likes the book better -than I because it is all about birds, and beasts, and flowers; but the -part about the Indians, and the Incas, that pleases me; and then there -are the Breton stories too that are in real history, they are quite -beautiful, and I would die like that.' - -Bela's tongue once loosened seldom paused of its own accord; his eyes -were dark and animated, his face was eager and proud. - -'The Marquis Xavier was a saint, indeed,' said his father abruptly. -'Revere his name. All my children should revere his name and memory. -But lean most to your mother's people; you are Austrian born, and the -chief of your duties and possessions will be in Austria. I think you -would die heroically, my boy, but you will find that it is harder to -live so. The horses are rested, let us ride home; it grows late for -you.' - -Bela, whose mind was quick in intuition, felt that his father did not -care to talk about Mexico or Bretagne. - -'I will ask the Herr Professor if I did wrong to speak to him of the -big book,' he said to himself as he mounted his pony; he was very -anxious to please his father, but he was afraid he had missed the way. -'I suppose it is because they were only saints, and the Szalras were -all soldiers,' he thought on reflection, soldiers being by far the -foremost in his esteem. - -'He says it is harder to live well than to die well,' said Bela over -his bread and milk that night to his brother. - -'I suppose that is because dying is over so soon,' said the meditative -Gela; 'and you know it must take an _enormous_ time to live to be -old--quite old--like Aunt Ottilie.' - -'I should like to die very grandly,' said Bela with shining eyes, 'and -have all the world remember me for ever and for ever, as they do great -Rudolph.' - -'I should like to die saving somebody,' said Gela, 'just as Uncle Bela -saved the pilgrims; that would please our mother best.' - -'I should like to die in battle,' said the living Bela; 'and that would -please our mother, because so many of us have always died so fighting -the French, or the Prussians, or the Turks. When I am a man I shall die -like Wallenstein.' - -'But Wallenstein was killed in a room,' said Gela, who was very -accurate. - -'You are always so particular!' said Bela impatiently, who had himself -only a vague idea of Wallenstein, as of someone who had gone on -fighting without stopping for thirty years. - -'The Herr Professor says it is just being particular which makes -the difference between the scholar and the sciolist,' said Gela -solemnly, his pretty rosy lips closing carefully over the long word -_halbgelehrte._ - -This night after the ride he and she dined quite alone. As he sat -in the Rittersaal and looked at the long line of knights, the many -blazoned shields, the weapons borne in gallant warfare, a sudden -sensation came to him of the vile thing that he did in being in this -place. It seemed to him that those armoured figures should grow animate -and descend and drive him out. Bela, then sleeping happily, dreaming -of the glories of his ride, had raised with his innocent words a -torturing spirit in his father's breast. What had he brought to this -haughty and chivalrous race?--the servile Slav, the barbaric Persian, -blood, and all the dishonour that their creed would hold the basest -upon earth. Besides, to lie to _her_ children! Even the blue eyes -of the boy had made him embarrassed and humiliated, as if she were -judging him through her first-born's gaze. What would it be when that -child, grown to man's estate, should speak to him of his people, of his -forefathers? - -For the first time it occurred to him that these boys would inevitably, -as they grew older, ask him many questions, wish to know many things. -He could turn aside a child's inquisitive interest, but it would be -more painful, less easy, to refuse to supply a grown youth's legitimate -interrogations. All these children would some time or another make many -inquiries of him that his wife, out of delicate sympathy, never had -intruded upon him. The fallen fortunes of the Sabran race had always -seemed to her one of those blameless misfortunes for which the best -respect is shown by silence. But her sons would naturally, one day or -another, be more interested in learning more of those from whom they -were descended. - -The lie in reply would be easy and secure. There were all the -traditions and recollections of the Sabrans of Romaris to be gathered -from the tongues of the people in Finisterre, and the private papers -of their race which he possessed. He could answer well enough, but it -would be a lie, and a lie seemed to him now a disgrace? Before his -marriage he had looked on falsehood as a necessary part of the world's -furniture, but he had not lived all these years beside a noble nature, -to which even a prevarication was impossible, without growing ashamed -of his former laxities. - -'There is not a dead man amongst all those knights who bore these arms -that should not rise to punish and disown me!' he thought with poignant -hatred of his past. - -When he went to his room the impulse once more came over him to tell -his wife all; to throw himself on her mercy, and let her do the worst -she would; but he had a certain fear of her which acted like a spell on -that moral cowardice, which his Slav temperament and his hidden secret -combined to bind in a dead weight on the physical courage and natural -pride of his character. - -He resolved to do his uttermost as they grew older to rear his sons to -worthiness of that great race whose name they bore; to uproot in them -by all means in his power any falser or darker faults they might have -inherited from him. He promised himself so to watch over his own words -and deeds that as they grew to manhood they should find no palliative -or example of wrong-doing in his life. The closeness of his peril, the -folly of his dalliance with Olga Brancka, had left him distrustful -and diffident of his own powers to resist evil. He said to himself -that he would seek the world no more; his wife was happiest in her own -dominion, amidst her own people; he would court neither pleasure nor -ambition again. Here he had peace; here he loved and was beloved; here -he would abide, and let courts and cities hold those less blessed than -he. - -In the morning he awoke refreshed and tranquil; a beautiful sunrise was -tinging with rose the snows of the opposite Venediger peaks; the flush -of early autumn was upon the lower woods, but no snow had fallen even -on the mountains. The lake was deeply green as a laurel leaf, and its -waters rolled briskly under a strong breeze. It was a brilliant day for -the hills, and the _jägermeister_ and his men were in waiting, for he -had arranged over night to go chamois-hunting on those steep alps and -glaciers which towered above the hindmost forests of Hohenszalras. He -did not very often give rein to his natural love of field sports, for -he knew that his wife liked to feel that the innocent creatures of the -mountains were safe wherever she ruled. But there was real sport to be -had here, with every variety of danger accompanying to excuse it, and -Otto and his men were proud of their lord's prowess and perseverance -on the high hills, and only sorrowed that he so often let his rifles -lie unused in the gun-room. He went out whilst the day was still red -and young, like a rose yet in bud, and climbed easily and willingly the -steep paths and precipitous slopes which led to the glaciers. - -'Count Bela wants sadly to come with us one of these days,' said Otto, -with a broad smile. 'He can use his crampons right manfully; will not -the Countess soon let me teach him to shoot?' - -'I think not willingly, Otto,' said Sabran. 'She thinks children's -hands are best free of bloodshed; and so do I. It can do a child no -good to see the dying agony of an innocent creature. Teach Herr Bela to -climb as much as you like, but leave powder and shot alone.' - -'I am sure the Herr Marquis himself must have been a line shot very -early?' - -'I was at a semi-military college,' said Sabran, thinking of those days -at the Lycée Clovis when he had sought the _salle d'armes_ with such -eagerness, as being the scene of those lessons which would most surely -enable him to meet men as their equal or their master. - -'If only Count Bela might be taught to shoot at a mark?' said the old -huntsman, wistfully. - -'You know very well, Otto, that your lady decides everything for her -children, and that all her decisions I uphold,' said his master. 'Be -sure they are wiser than either yours or mine would be. She can teach -him herself, too; she can hit a running mark as well as you or I. Do -you remember the day when you arrested me in these woods?' - -'Ah, my lord!' said Otto, with a rolling oath; 'never can I pardon -myself, though you have so mercifully pardoned me!' - -'And my good rifle is still lying in the bed of the lake,' said Sabran, -glancing backward at the Szalrassee, now many hundred feet below them, -a mere green ribbon shining through the deeper green of fir and pine -woods. - -'Yes, my lord!' answered the man, cheerily. 'The good English rifle -indeed was lost; but it seems to me that the Herr Marquis did not make -wholly a bad exchange!' - -'No, indeed,' said his master, as he paused and looked down to where -the towers and spires of Hohenszalras glimmered like mere points of -glittering metal in the sunshine far below. - -They were now at the highest altitude at which _gemsbocks_ are found, -and the business of the day commenced as they sighted what looked like -a mere brown speck against the greyness of the opposite glacier. Before -the day was done Sabran had shot to his own gun eight chamois on the -heights, and some score of ptarmigan and black-cock on the lower level. -He saw more than one _kuttengeier_ and _lammergeier_, but, in deference -to the traditions of the Szalras, did not fire on them. The healthful -fatigue, the rarefied air, the buoyant exhilaration which comes with -the atmosphere of the great heights, made him feel happy, and gave -him back all his confidence in the present and the future. When he -rested on a ledge of rock, listening to Otto's hunter's tales, and -making a frugal meal of some hard biscuit and a draught of Voslauer, he -wondered at himself for having so recently been beguiled by the febrile -excitations of Paris, or having desired the fret and wear of a public -career. What could be better than this life was? To have sought to -leave it was folly and ingratitude. The peace and the calm of the great -mountains which she loved so well seemed to descend into his soul. - -It was twilight when they reached the lower slopes of the hills, -the jägers loaded with game, he and Otto walking in front of them. -From the still far-off islet oh the lake, and from the belfry of the -Schloss, the Ave Maria was chiming; the deep-toned bells of the latter -ringing the Emperor's Hymn. - -Talking gaily with Otto, with that frank kindliness which endeared him -to all these mountaineers, he approached the house slowly, fatigued -with the pleasant tire of a healthy and vigorous man after a long day's -pastime on the hills, and entered by a back entrance, which led through -the stables into the wing of the building where his own private rooms -were situated. He took his bath and dressed himself for the evening, -then went on his way across the vast house to the white salon, where -his wife and her aunt were usually to be found at the time of the -children's hour before dinner. With some words on his lips to claim her -praise for having spared the vultures, he pushed aside the _portière_ -and entered, but the words died on his tongue, half spoken. - -His wife was there, but before the hearth, seated with her profile -turned towards him, also was Olga Brancka. His wife, who was standing, -came towards him. - -'My cousin Olga took us by surprise an hour ago. The telegram must have -missed us which she says she sent yesterday from Salzburg.' - -Her eyes had a cold gaze as she spoke; her sense of the duties of -hospitality and of high breeding had alone compelled her to give any -form of welcome to her guest. Madame Brancka, playing with a feather -screen, looked up with a little quiet self-satisfied smile. - -'Unexpected guests are the most welcome. When there is an old proverb, -pretty if musty, all ready made for you, Réné, why do you not repeat -it? I am truly sorry, though, that my telegram miscarried. I suspect it -comes from Wanda's old-fashioned prejudice against having a wire of her -own here from Lienz. I dare say they never send you half your messages.' - -Sabran had mechanically bowed over the hand she held out to him, but -he scarcely touched it with his own. He was deadly pale. The amazement -that her effrontery produced on him was stupefaction. Versed in the -ways of women and of the world though he was, he was speechless and -helpless before this incredible audacity. She looked at him, she -smiled, she spoke, like the most innocent and unconscious creature. -For a moment an impulse seized him to unmask her then and there, and -hound her out of his wife's presence; the next he knew that it was -impossible to do so. Men cannot betray women in that way, nor was he -even wholly free enough from blame himself to have the right to do so. -But an intense rage, the more intense because perforce mute, seized -him against this intruder by his hearth. Only to see her beside his -wife was an intolerable suffering and shame. When he recovered himself -a little, feeling his wife's gaze upon him, he said with some plain -incredulity in his contemptuous words: - -'The failure of messages is often caused by the senders of them; the -people are extremely careful at Lienz. I do not think the fault lies -_there._ We can, however, only regret the want of due warning, for the -reason that we can give no fit or flattering reception of an honoured -guest. You come from Paris?' - -For the first time a slight sudden flush rose upon Olga Brancka's -cheek, callous though she was. She felt the irony and the disdain. She -perceived that she had in him an inexorable foe, beyond all allurement -and all entreaty. - -'I passed by Paris,' she answered, easily enough. 'Of course I had to -see my tailors, like everyone else in September. I have been first to -Noissetiers, then to London, then to Homburg, then to Russia. I do not -know where I have not been since we met. And you good people have been -vegetating beneath your forests all that time? I was curious to come -and see you in your felicity. Hohenszalrasburg used to be called the -vulture's nest; it appears to have become a dove's!' - -'I spared a whole family of _lammergeier_ to-day in deference to your -forest law,' he said, turning to his wife, whilst to himself he thought -what a far worse beast of prey was sitting here, smoothing her glossy -feathers in the warmth of his own hearth. She noticed the extreme -pallor of his face, the sound of anger and emotion forcibly restrained; -she imagined something of what he felt, though she could guess neither -its intensity nor its extent. She had done herself violence in meeting -with courtesy and tranquillity the woman who now sat between them, but -she could not measure or imagine the guilt and the audacity of her. - -When, that evening, as twilight came on, she had heard the sound of -wheels beneath the terraces, and in a little while had been informed -by Hubert that the Countess Brancka had arrived, her first movement -had been to refuse to receive her, her next to remember that to one -who had been Gela's wife, and now was Stefan Brancka's, the doors of -Hohenszalras could not be shut without an open quarrel and scandal, -which would regale the world and make feud inevitable between her -husband and the whole race of Vàsàrhely. The Vàsàrhely knew the -worthlessness of Stefan's wife, but for the honour of their name they -would never admit that they did so; they would never fail to defend -her. Moreover, hospitality of a high and antique type had always been -the first of obligations upon all those whom she descended from and -represented. They would not have refused to harbour their worst foe -if he had demanded asylum. They would not have turned away sovereign -or beggar from their gates. Those days were gone, indeed, but their -high and generous temper lived in her. In the brief space in which -Hubert, having made the announcement, waited for her commands, she -had struggled with her own repugnance and conquered it. She had told -herself that to turn Stefan's wife from her doors would be the mere -vulgar melodrama of a common and undignified anger. After all she knew -nothing; therefore she traversed the house to receive her unasked -guest, and gave her welcome without any pretence of cordiality or -friendship, but with a perfect and unhesitating politeness void of all -offence. - -She was thankful that the Princess Ottilie was again in the south of -France with her sister-in-law of Lilienhöhe, so that her indignation, -her interrogation, and her quick regard were spared to them. Now that -her niece was no longer alone, the Princess did not think it her -bounden duty to endure these northern winds, blowing from Poland and -the Baltic over the old duchy of Austria, which she had at all times so -peculiarly detested, though she had been born a thousand miles nearer -the Baltic herself. - -Olga Brancka had been profuse in her apologies and expressions of -regret, but she had at once let her carriage, hired at S. Johann, with -its four post-horses changed at Matrey, be taken to the stables, and -had gone herself to her old apartments, where in little time her two -maids had altered her heavy furs and travelling clothes to the costume -of consummate simplicity and elegance in which she now sat, putting -forth her small feet in rose satin shoes to the warmth from the great -Hirschvogel stove, which, with its burnished and enamelled colour, -illumined one side of the white salon. - -Sabran and his wife both remained standing, he leaning his arm on the -scroll work of the great stove, she playing with the delicate ears of -one of the hounds. Madame Brancka alone sat and leaned back in her -low seat, quite content; she was aware that she was unwelcome, and -that her presence was an embarrassment and worse. But the sense of -the wrong and cruel position in which she placed them was sweet and -pungent to her; she was refreshed by the very sense of dilemma and of -danger which surrounded her. She had her vengeance in her hand, and -she would not exhaust it quickly, but tasted its savour with the slow -care and patient appetite of the connoisseur in such things. She had a -Chinese-like skill in patiently drawing out the prolonged pangs of an -ingeniously invented martyrdom. - -'Why do you both stand?' she said, looking up at him between her -half-closed lids. 'Are you standing to imply to me as we do with -monarchs, 'This house is yours whilst you are in it?' I am much -obliged, but I should sell it at once if it were really mine. It is a -splendid, barbaric solitude, like Taróc. We have not been to Taróc this -year. Stefan says Egon lives altogether with his troopers and grows -very morose. You hear from him sometimes, I suppose?' - -To Sabran it seemed as if her half shut black eyes shot forth actual -sparks of fire, as she spoke the name which he could never hear without -an inward spasm of fear. - -'Of course I hear from Egon,' said his wife. 'But he writes very -briefly; he was never much of a penman. He prefers a rifle, a sword, a -riding-whip.' - -'I hear you have called the last child after him? Where are the boys? -They cannot be in bed. Let me see them. It is surely their hour to be -here. Réné, ring, and send for them.' - -His brow contracted. - -'No; it is late,' he said abruptly. 'They would only weary you; they -are barbaric, like the house.' - -He felt an extreme reluctance to bring his children into her presence, -to see her speak to them, touch them; he was longing passionately to -seize her and thrust her out of the doors. As she sat there in the full -light of the many wax candles burning around, sparkling, imperturbable, -like a coquette of a vaudeville, with her rose satin, and her white -taffetas, and her lace ruff, and her pink coral necklace and ear-rings, -and a little pink coral hand upholding her curls in the most studied -disorder, she seemed to him the loath-liest thing that he had ever -seen. He hated her more intensely than he had ever hated anyone in all -his life; even more than he had hated the traitress who had sold him to -the Prussians. - -'Pray let me see the children; I know you never dine till eight,' -she was persisting to his wife, who knew well that she was entirely -indifferent to the children, but who was not unwilling for their -entrance to break the constraint of what was to her an intolerable -trial. She did ring, and ordered their presence. They soon came, -making their obeisances with the pretty grave courtliness which they -were taught from infancy; the boys in white velvet dresses, while their -sister, in a frock of old Venetian point, looked like a Stuart child -painted by Vandyck. - -'_Ah, quels amours!_' cried Olga Brancka, with admirable effusion, as -they kissed her hand. Sabran turned away abruptly, and muttering a -word as to some orders he had to give the stud-groom, left the chamber -without ceremony, as she, with an ardour wholly unknown to her own -daughters, lifted the little Ottilie on her knee and kissed the child's -rose-leaf cheek. - -'What lovely creatures they are,' she said in German; 'and how they -have grown since they left Paris. They are all the image of Réné; he -must be very proud. They have all his eyes--those deep dark-blue eyes, -like jewels, like the depths of the sea.' - -'You are very poetic,' said Wanda; 'but I should be glad if you would -speak their praises in some tongue they do not understand. The boys may -not be hurt; but Lili, as we call her, is a little vain already, though -she is so young.' - -'Would you deny her the birthright of her sex?' said Madame Brancka, -clasping her coral necklace round the child's throat. 'Surely she will -have lectures enough from her godmother against all feminine foibles. -By the way, where is the Princess?' - -'My aunt is with the Lilienhöhe.' - -'I am grieved not to have the pleasure,' murmured Madame Brancka, -indifferently, letting Ottilie glide from her lap. - -'Give back the necklace, _liebling_,' said Wanda, as she unclasped it. - -'No, no; I entreat you--let her keep it. It is leagues too large, but -she likes it, and when she grows up she will wear it and think of me.' - -'Pray take it,' said Wanda, lifting it from the child's little breast. -'You are too kind; but they must not be given what they admire. It -teaches them bad habits.' - -'What severe rules!' cried Madame Brancka. 'Are these poor babies -brought up on S. Chrysostom and S. Basil? Is Lili already doomed to the -cloister? You are too austere; you should have been an abbess instead -of having all these golden-curled cupidons about you. Where is the -youngest one, Egon's namesake?' - -'He is in his cot,' said Gela, who was always very direct in his -replies, and who found himself addressed by her. - -Meantime Bela took hold of his mother's hand and whispered to her, -'_Mütterchen_, she is rude to you. Send her away.' - -'My darling,' answered Wanda, 'when people laugh in our own house we -must let them do it, even if it be at ourselves. And, Bela, to whisper -is _very_ rude.' - -'Egon is so little,' continued Gela, plaintively. 'He cannot read; I do -not think he ever will read!' - -'But you could not when you were as small as he?' - -'Could I not?' said Gela, doubtfully, to whom that time seemed many -centuries back. - -'And Lili, can she read?' said Madame Olga, suppressing a yawn. - -'Oh yes,' said Gela; 'at least, two-letter words she can; and me, I -read to her.' - -'What model children!' cried Madame Brancka, with a little laugh. 'And -the naughty boy who was in a rage because he was not permitted to go to -Chantilly? That was Bela, was it not? Bela, do you remember how cruel -your mother was, and how you cried?' - -Bela looked at her, with his blue eyes growing as stern and cold as his -father's. - -'My mother is always right,' he said gallantly. 'She knows what I ought -to do. I do not think I cried, _meine gnädige Frau_; I never cry.' - -'Even the naughty boy has become an angel! What a wonderful -disciplinarian you are, Wanda! If your children were not so handsome -they would be insufferable with their goodness. They are very handsome; -they are just like Sabran, and yet they are not at all a Russian type.' - -'Why should they be Russian? We have no Russian blood,' said their -mother, in surprise. - -Madame Brancka laughed a little confusedly, and fluttered her feather -screen. - -'I do not know what I was thinking of. Réné always reminds me of my old -friend Paul Zabaroff; they are very alike.' - -'I have seen the present Prince Zabaroff,' said Wanda, wondering what -the purpose of her guest's words were. 'He was not, as I remember him, -much like M. de Sabran.' - -'Oh, of course he was not equal to your Apollo,' said Madame Brancka, -winding Ottilie's long hair round her fingers. - -'You have had enough of them; they must not worry you,' said their -mother, and she dismissed the children with a word. - -'In what marvellous control you keep them,' said Madame Olga. 'Now, my -children never obeyed me, let me scream at them as I would.' - -'I do not think screaming has much effect on anyone, young or old.' - -'It paralyses a man. But I suppose a child can always out-scream one?' - -'Probably. A child never respects any person who loses their calmness. -As for men, you are better versed in their follies than I.' - -'But do you and Réné absolutely never quarrel?' - -'Quarrel! My dear Olga, how very _bürgerlich_ an idea.' - -'Do you suppose only the bourgeois quarrel?' said Madame Brancka. -'Really you live in your enchanted forest until you forget what the -world is like,' and she began an interminable history of the scenes -between a friend of hers and her husband and her family, a quarrel -which had ended in _conseils judiciaires_ and separation. 'It is a -cruel thing that there is not one law of divorce for all the world,' -she said with a sigh, as she ended the unsavoury relation. 'If Stefan -and I could only set each other free, we should have done it years and -years ago.' - -'I did not know your griefs against Stefan were so great?' - -'Oh, I have no great griefs against him; he is _bon enfant_: but we -are both ruined, and we both detest each other; we do not know very -well why.' - -'Poor Mila and Marie!' - -'What has it to do with them? They are happy at Sacré Cœur, and -when they come out they will marry. Egon will be sure to portion them; -we cannot. We are not like you, who will be able to give a couple of -millions to Lili without hurting her brothers.' - -'Lili's _dot_ is far enough in the future,' said Lili's mother, who, -very weary of the conversation, saw with relief the doors open, and -heard Hubert announce that dinner could be served. By an opposite door -Sabran entered also, a moment later. The dinner was tedious to both him -and her; they alike found it an almost intolerable penance. Their guest -alone was gay, ironical, at her ease, and never at a loss for a topic. -Sabran looked at her now and then with absolute wonder coming over -him as to whether he had not dreamed of that evening in Paris, alone -beside her, with the smell of the jasmine and orange-buds, and the -moonbeams crossing her white throat, her auburn curls. Was it possible -that a woman lived with such incredible self-control, insolence, -shamelessness? There was not a shadow of consciousness in her regard, -not a moment of uneasiness in her manner. Except the one passing faint -flush which had come on her face at his words of greeting, there was -not a single sign that she was other than the most innocent of women. -The impatience, the disgust, the amazement which were in him were too -strong for his worldly tact and composure altogether to conquer them; -his eyes were downcast, his words were studied or irrelevant, his -discomposure was evident; he felt as reluctant to meet the gaze of his -wife as of his enemy. In vain did he endeavour to sustain equably the -airy nothings of the usual dinner-table conversation. He was sensible -of an effort too great for art to cover it; he felt that there was a -strange sound in his voice, he fancied the very men waiting upon him -must be conscious of his embarrassment. If he could have turned her out -of the house he would have been at peace, for, after all, her offences -were much greater than his own; but to be compelled to sit motionless -whilst she called his wife caressing names, broke her bread, and would -sleep under her roof, was absolute torture to him. - -When they went back again to the white room he sat down at the piano, -glad to find a temporary refuge in music from the embarrassment of her -presence. - -'He cannot have spoken to Wanda?' she thought, uneasy for the first -time, as she glanced at Sabran, who was playing with his usual -_maestria_ a concerto of Schubert's. With the plea that her long post -journey had fatigued her, she asked leave to retire when half an hour -had elapsed, filled with scientific and intricate melody, which had -spared them the effort of further conversation. Her host and hostess -accompanied her to the guest-chambers, with the courtesy which was an -antique custom of the Schloss, as of all Austrian country-houses. Their -leave-taking on the threshold was cold, but studied in politeness; the -door closed on her, and Sabran and his wife returned along the corridor -together. - -His heart beat heavily with apprehension: he dreaded her next word. To -his relief, to his surprise, she said simply to him: - -'It is very early. I will go and write to Rothwand about the mines. -Will you come and tell me again all you said about them? I have half -forgotten. Or if you would rather do nothing to-night, I have other -letters to look over, and I will go to my own room.' - -'I will come there,' he said; and though he was well used to her -strong self-control and forbearance, he felt amazed at the force -of these now, and was moved to a passionate gratitude. 'Any other -woman,' he thought, 'would have torn me asunder to know what there has -been between me and her guest. She does not even speak; and yet God -knows how she loves me! She trusts me, and she will not weary me, nor -importune me, nor seem to suspect me with doubt. Who shall be worthy of -that? How can I rid her house of this insult? The other shall go; she -shall go if I put her out with public shame before my servants. Would -to heaven that to kill such as she is were no more murder than to slay -a vicious beast or a poisonous worm!' - -He followed his wife into the octagon-room, where all her private -papers were. There were details of a mine in Galicia which were -disquieting and troublesome; on the previous day they had agreed -together what to do, but before she had answered her inspector, -fresh details had come in by the post-bag, whilst he had been -chamois-hunting. She sat down and handed him these fresh reports. - -'I do not think there is anything that will alter your decisions,' she -said. 'But read them, and tell me, and I will then write.' - -He drew the documents from her, and began to peruse them, but his hand -shook a little as he held the papers; his eyes were not clear, his mind -was not free. He laid them down and looked at her; she was seated near -him. She was paler than usual and her face was grave, but she seemed -quite absorbed in what she did, as she added figures together, and made -a quick _précis_ of the reports she had received. Her left hand lay on -the table as she wrote; on the great diamond of the _bague d'alliance_, -the only gift which he had presumed to offer her on their marriage, the -light was sparkling; it looked like a cluster of dewdrops on a lily. He -took that hand on a sudden impulse of infinite reverence, and raised it -to his lips. - -She looked at him, and a mist of tears came into her eyes which were -tears of pleasure, of relief, of restrained emotion comforted; the -gesture gave her all the reassurance that she cared, to have; she was -sure then that Olga Brancka had never made him false to his honour and -hers. She said nothing to him of what was foremost in the minds of -both. She held the value of silence high. She thought that there were -things of which merely to speak seemed a species of dishonour. A single -word ill-said is so often the 'little rift within the lute which makes -the music dumb.' - -She went to rest content; but he was none the less ill at ease, -disturbed, offended, and violently offended, at the presence of his -temptress under the roof of Hohenszalras. It was an outrage to all he -loved and respected; an outrage to which he was determined to put an -end. The only possible way to do so was to see his guest himself alone. -He could not visit her in her apartments; he could not summon her to -his; if he waited for chance, he might wait for days. The insolence -which had brought her here would probably, he reasoned, keep her here -some time, and he was resolved that she should not pass another night -in the same house with his wife and his children. - -Long after Wanda had gone to sleep he sat alone, thinking and -perplexing himself with many a scheme, each of which he dismissed as -impracticable and likely to draw that attention from his household -which he most desired to avoid. He slept ill, scarcely at all, and rose -before daybreak. When he was dressed he sent his man to ask Greswold to -come to him. The old physician, who usually got up before the sun, soon -obeyed his summons, and anxiously inquired what need there was of him. - -'Dear Professor,' said Sabran, with that gracious kindliness which -always won his listener's heart, 'you were my earliest friend here; you -are the tutor of my sons; you are an old man, a wise man, and a prudent -man. I want you to understand something without my explaining it; I do -not desire or intend the Countess Brancka to be the guest of my wife -for another day.' - -Greswold looked up quickly: he knew the character of Stefan Brancka's -wife, he guessed the rest. - -'What can I do?' he said simply. 'Pray command me.' - -'Do this,' said Sabran. 'Make some excuse to see her; say that the -chaplain, or that my wife, has sent you, say anything you choose to get -admitted to her rooms in the visitors' gallery. When you see her alone, -say to her frankly, brutally if you like, that _I_ say she must leave -Hohenszalras. She can make any excuse she pleases, invent any despatch -to recall herself; but she must go. I do not pretend to put any gloss -upon it; I do not wish to do so. I want her to know that I do not -permit her to remain under the same roof with my wife.' - -The old physician's face grew grave and troubled; he foresaw difficulty -and pain for those whom he loved, and to whom he owed his bread. - -'I am to give her no explanation?' he said doubtfully. - -'She will need none,' said Sabran, curtly. - -Greswold was mute. After a pause of some moments he said with -hesitation: - -'By all I have heard of the Countess Brancka, I am much afraid she will -not be moved by such a message, delivered by anyone so insignificant -as myself; but what you desire me to do I will do, only I pray you do -not blame me if I fail. You are, of course, indifferent to her certain -indignation, to her possible violence?' - -'I am indifferent to everything,' said Sabran, with rising impatience, -'except to the outrage which her presence here is to the Countess von -Szalras.' - -'Allow me one question, my Marquis,' said Greswold. 'Is our lady, your -wife, aware that the presence of her cousin's wife is an indignity to -herself?' - -Sabran hesitated. - -'Yes and no,' he answered at last. 'She knew something in Paris, but -she does not know or imagine all, nor a tithe part; of what Madame -Brancka is.' - -'I go at once,' said the old man, without more words, 'though of course -the lady will not be awake for some hours. I will ask to see her -maids. I shall learn then when I can with any chance of success get -admittance. You will not write a word by me? Would it not offend her -less?' - -'I desire to offend her,' said Sabran, with a vibration of intense -passion in his voice. 'No; I will not write to her. She is a woman who -has studied Talleyrand; she would hang you if she had a single line -from your pen. If I wrote, God knows what evil she would not twist out -of it. She hates me and she hates my wife. It must be war to the knife.' - -Greswold bowed and went out, asking no more. - -Sabran passed the next three hours in a state of almost uncontrollable -impatience. - -It was the pleasant custom at Hohenszalras for everyone to have their -first meal in their own apartments at any hour that they chose, but he -and Wanda usually breakfasted together by choice in the little Saxe -room, when the weather was cold. The cold without made the fire-glow -dancing on the embroidered roses, and the gay Watteau panels, and -the carpet of lamb-skins, and the coquettish Meissen shepherds and -shepherdesses, seem all the warmer and more cheerful by contrast. Here -he had been received on the first morning of his visit to Hohenszalras; -here they had breakfasted in the early days after their marriage; here -they had a thousand happy memories. - -Into that room he could not go this morning. He sent his valet with -a message to his wife, saying that he would remain in his own room, -being fatigued from the sport of the previous day. When they brought -him his breakfast he could not touch it. He drank a little strong -coffee and a great glass of iced water; he could take nothing else. He -paced up and down his own chambers in almost unendurable suspense. If -he had been wholly innocent he would have been less agitated; but he -could not pardon himself the mad imprudences and follies with which he -had pandered to the vanities and provoked the passions of this hateful -woman. If she refused to go he almost resolved to tell all as it had -passed to his wife, not sparing himself. The three or four hours that -went by after Greswold had left him appeared to him like whole, long, -tedious days. - -The men came as usual to him for his orders as to horses, sport, or -other matters, but he could not attend to them; he hardly even heard -what they said, and dismissed them impatiently. When at last the heavy, -slow tread of the old physician sounded in the corridor, he went -eagerly to his door, and himself admitted Greswold. - -The Professor spread out his hands with a deprecating gesture. - -'I have done my best. But may I never pass such a quarter of an hour -again! She will not go.' - -'She will not?' Sabran's face flushed darkly, his eyes kindled with -deep wrath. 'She defies me, then?' - -'She evidently deems herself strong enough to defy you. She laughed -at me; she spoke to me as though I were one of the scullions or the -sweepers; she menaced me as if we were still in the Middle Ages. In a -word, she is not to be moved by me. She bade me tell you that if you -wish her out of your wife's house you must have the courage to say so -yourself.' - -'Courage!' echoed Sabran. 'It is not courage that will be any match -for her; it is not courage that will rid one of her; she knows the -difficulty in which I am. I cannot betray her to her husband. No man -can ever do that. I cannot risk a quarrel, a scandal, a duel with the -relatives of my wife. I cannot put her out of the house as I might do -if she had no relationship with the Vàsàrhely and the Szalras. She -knows that; she relies upon it.' - -'My lord,' said the physician very gently, 'will you pardon me one -question? Is the offence done to the Countess von Szalras by Madame -Brancka altogether on her side? Are you wholly (pardon me the word) -blameless?' - -'Not altogether,' said Sabran, frankly, with a deep colour on his face. -'I have been culpable of folly, but in the sense you mean I have been -quite guiltless. If I had been guilty in that sense, I would not have -returned to Hohenszalras!' - -'I thank you for so much confidence in me,' said Greswold. 'I only -wanted to know so far, because I would suggest that you should send -for Prince Egon and simply tell him as much as you have told me. Egon -Vàsàrhely is the soul of honour, and he has great authority over the -members of his own family. He will make his sister-in-law leave here -without any scandal.' - -'There are reasons why I cannot take Prince Vàsàrhely into my -confidence in this matter,' said Sabran, with hesitation. 'That is not -to be thought of for a moment. Is there no other way?' - -'See her yourself. She imagines you will not, perhaps she thinks you -dare not, say these things to her yourself.' - -'See her alone? What will my wife suppose?' - -'Would it not be better frankly to say to my lady that you have need -to see her so? Pardon me, my dear lord, but I am quite sure that the -straight way is the best to take with our Countess Wanda. The only -thing which she might very bitterly resent, which she might perhaps -never forgive, would be concealment, insincerity, want of good faith. -If you will allow me to counsel you, I would most strongly advocate -your saying honestly to her that you know that of Madame Brancka which -makes you hold her an unfit guest here, and that you are about to see -that lady alone to induce her to leave the castle without open rupture.' - -Sabran listened, stung sharply in his conscience by every one of the -simple and honest words. When Greswold spoke of his wife as ready to -pardon any offences except those of falseness and concealment his soul -shrank as the flesh shrinks from the touch of caustic. - -'You are right,' he said with effort. 'But, my dear Greswold, though -I am not absolutely guilty, as you were led for a moment to think, I -am not altogether absolutely blameless. I was sensible of the fatal -attraction of an unscrupulous person. I was never faithless to my wife, -either in spirit or act, but you know there are miserable sensual -temptations which counterfeit passion, though they do not possess it; -there are unspeakable follies from which men at no age are safe. I -do not wish to be a coward like the father of mankind, and throw the -blame upon a woman; but it is certain that the old answer is often -still the true one, "The woman tempted me." I am not wholly innocent; -I played with fire and was surprised, like an idiot, when it burnt me. -I would say as much as this to my wife (and it is the whole truth) if -it were only myself who would be hurt or lowered by the telling of it; -but I cannot do her such dishonour as I should seem to do by the mere -relation of it. She esteems me as so much stronger and wiser than I am; -she has so very noble an ideal of me; how can I pull all that down with -my own hands, and say to her, "I am as weak and unstable as any one of -them"?' - -Greswold listened and smiled a little. - -'Perhaps the Countess knows more than you think, dear sir; she is -capable of immense self-control, and her feeling for you is not the -ordinary selfish love of ordinary women. If I were you I should tell -her everything. Speak to her as you speak to me.' - -'I cannot!' - -'That is for you to judge, sir,' said the old physician. - -'I cannot!' repeated Sabran, with a look of infinite distress. 'I -cannot tell my wife that any other woman has had influence over me, -even for five seconds. I think it is S. Augustine who says that it is -possible, in the endeavour to be truthful, to convey an entirely false -impression. An utterly false impression would be conveyed to her if I -made her suppose that any other than herself had ever been loved by me -in any measure since my marriage; and how should one make such a mind -as hers comprehend all the baseness and fever and folly of a man's mere -caprice of the senses? It would be impossible.' - -Greswold was silent. - -'You do not see how difficult even such a confession as that would be,' -Sabran insisted, with irritation. 'Were you in my place you would feel -as I feel.' - -'Perhaps,' said Greswold. 'But I believe not. I believe, sir, that you -underrate the knowledge of the world and of humanity which the Countess -von Szalras possesses, and that you also underrate the extent of her -sympathy and the elasticity of her pardon.' - -Sabran sighed restlessly. - -'I do not know what to do. One thing only I know--the wife of Stefan -Brancka shall not remain here.' - -'Then, sir, you must be the one to say so or to write it. She will heed -no one except yourself. Perhaps it is natural. I am nothing more in the -sight of a great lady like that than Hubert or Otto would be. She does -not think I am of fit station to go to her as your ambassador.' - -'You would disown her if she were your daughter!' said Sabran, with -bitter contempt. 'Well, I will see her; I will say a word to the -Countess von Szalras first.' - -'Say all,' suggested Greswold. - -Sabran shook his head and passed quickly through the suite of sleeping -and dressing chambers to the little Saxe salon, where he thought it -possible that Wanda might still be. He found her there alone. She had -opened one of the casements and was speaking with a gardener. The -autumnal scent of wet earth and fallen leaves came into the room; the -air without was cold, but sunbeams were piercing the mist; the darkness -of the cedars and the yews made the airy and brilliant grace of the -eighteenth-century room seem all the brighter. She herself, in a sacque -of brocaded silk, with quantities of old French lace falling down it, -seemed of the time of those gracious ladies that were painted on the -panels. She turned as she heard his step, a red rose in her fingers -which she had just gathered from the boughs about the windows. - -'The last rose of the year, I am afraid, for I never count those of the -hothouses,' she said, as she brought it to him. - -He kissed her hand as he took it from her; he suddenly perceived the -expression of distress and of preoccupation on his face. - -'Is there anything the matter?' she asked; 'did you overstrain yourself -yesterday on the hills?' - -'No, no,' he said quickly; then added, with hesitation: 'Wanda, I have -to see Madame Brancka alone this morning. Will you be angered, or will -you trust me?' - -For a moment her eyebrows drew together, and the haughtier, colder look -that he dreaded came on her face; the look which came there when her -children disobeyed or her stewards offended her, The look which told -how, beneath the womanly sweetness and serenity of her temper, were the -imperious habit and the instincts of authority inherited from centuries -of dominant nobility. In another instant or two she had controlled her -impulse of displeasure. She said gravely, but very gently: - -'Of course I trust you. You know best what you wish, what you are -called on to do. Never think that you need give explanation, or ask -permission to or of me. That is not the man's part in marriage.' - -'But I would not have you suspect--' - -'I never suspect,' she said, more haughtily. 'Suspicion degrades -two people. Listen, my love. In Paris I saw, I heard more than you -thought. The world never leaves one in ignorance or in peace. I neither -suspected you nor spied upon you. I left you free. You returned to me, -and I knew then that I had done wisely. I could never comprehend the -passion and pleasure that some women take in hawks only kept by a hood, -in hounds only held by a leash. What is allegiance worth unless it be -voluntary? For the rest, if the wife of my cousin be a worse woman than -I think, do not tell me so. I do not desire to know it. She was the -idol of my dead brother's youth; she once entered this house as his -bride. Her honour is ours.' - -A flush passed over her husband's face. 'You are the noblest woman that -lives,' he said, in a hushed and reverent voice. He stooped almost -timidly and kissed her; then he bowed very low, as though she were a -queen and he her courtier, and left her. - -'That devil shall leave her house before another night is down!' he -said in his own thoughts, as he took his way across the great building -to Olga Brancka's apartments. He had the red autumn rose, she had -gathered in his hand as he went. Instinctively he slipped it within -his coat as he drew near the doors of the guests' corridor; it was too -sacred for him to have it made the subject of sneer or of a smile. - -Wanda remained in the little Watteau room. A certain sense of fear--a -thing so unfamiliar, so almost unknown to her--came upon her as the -flowered satin of the door-hangings fell behind him, and his steps -passed away down the passages without. The bright pictured panels of -the shepherds in court suits, and the milkmaids in hoops and paniers, -smiling amidst the sunny landscapes of their artificial Arcadia; the -gay and courtly figures of the Meissen china, and the huge bowls filled -with the gorgeous deep-hued flowers of the autumn season; the singing -of a little wren perched on a branch of a yew, the distant trot of -ponies' feet as the children rode along the unseen avenues, the happy -barking of dogs that were going with them, the smell of wet grass -and of leaves freshly dropped, the swish of a gardener's birch-broom -sweeping the turf beneath the cedars--all these remained on her mind -for ever afterwards, with that cruel distinctness which always paints -the scene of our last happy hours in such undying colours on the memory -of the brain. She never, from that day, willingly entered the pretty -chamber, with its air of coquetry and stateliness, and its little gay -court of porcelain people. She had gathered there the last rose of the -year. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIII. - - -He was so passionately angered against the invader of his domestic -peace, he was so profoundly touched by the nobility and faith of -his wife, that he went to Olga Brancka's presence without fear or -hesitation, possessed only by a man's natural and honest indignation at -an insult passed upon what he most venerated upon earth. - -One of his own servants, who was seated in the corridor, in readiness -for the Countess Brancka's orders, flung wide the door which opened -into the vestibule of the suite of guest-chambers allotted to this most -hated guest, and said to his master: - -'The most noble lady bade me say that she waited for your Excellency.' - -'The brazen wretch!' murmured Sabran, as he crossed the antechamber, -and entered the small saloon adjoining it; a room hung with Flemish -tapestries, and looking out on the Szalrassee. - -Olga Brancka was seated in one of the long low tapestried chairs; she -did not move or speak as he approached; she only looked up with a smile -in her eyes. He wished she would have risen in fury; it would have -made his errand easier. It was difficult to say to her in cold blood -that which he had to say. But he loathed her so utterly as he saw her -indolent and graceful posture, and the calm smile in her eyes, that he -was indifferent how he should hurt her, what outrage he should offer -to her. He went straight up to where she sat, and without any preface -said, almost brutally: - -'Madame Brancka, you affected not to understand my message through -Greswold; you will not misunderstand me now when I repeat that you must -leave the house of my wife before another night.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, with nonchalance, moving the Indian bangles on -her wrist, and gazing calmly into the air. 'I am to leave the house of -your wife--of my cousin, who was once my sister-in-law? And will you -tell me why?' - -Sabran flushed with passion. - -'You have a short memory, I believe, Countess; at least your lovers -have said so in Paris,' he answered recklessly. 'But I think if your -remembrance could carry you back to the last evening I had the honour -to see you in your hotel, you will not force me to the brutality and -coarseness of further explanation.' - -'Ah!' she said tranquilly once more, in an unvaried tone, clasping her -hands behind her head and leaning both backward against the cushions -of her chair, whilst her eyes still smiled with an abstracted gaze. -'How scrupulous you are about trifles. Why not about great things, -my friend? What does Holy Writ tell us? One strains at a gnat and -swallows a camel. I have heard a professor of Hebrew say that the Latin -translation is not correct, but----' - -'Madame,' said Sabran sternly, controlling his rage with difficulty, -'pardon me, but I can have no trifling. I give you time and occasion to -make any excuses that you please; but once for all, you will leave here -before nightfall.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, for the third time; 'and if I do not choose to -comply with your desire, how do you intend to enforce it?' - -'That will be my affair.' - -'You will make a scene with my husband? That will be theatrical and -useless. Stefan is one of those men who are always swearing at their -wives in private, but in public never admit that their wives are -otherwise than saints. Those men do not mind being cheated, but they -will never let others say that they are so: _amour-propre d'homme._' - -Sabran could have struck her. He reined in his wrath with more -difficulty every moment. - -'I have no doubt your psychology is correct, and has taught you all the -weaknesses of our idiotic sex,' he said bitterly. 'But you must pardon -me if I cannot spare time to listen to your experiences. The Countess -von Szalras is aware that I have come to visit you, and I tell you -frankly that I will not stay more than ten minutes in your rooms.' - -'You have told her?' - -A wicked gleam flashed from under her half-shut eyelids. - -'I would have told her--told her all,' said Sabran, 'but she stopped -me with my words unspoken. What think you she said, madame, of you, -who are the vilest enemy, the only enemy, she has? That if you had -graver faults than she knew she wished not to hear them. You were her -relative, and once had been her brother's wife.' - -His voice had sternness and strong emotion in it. He looked to see her -touched to some shame, some humiliation. But she only laughed a little -languidly, not changing her attitude. - -'Poor Wanda!' she said softly, 'she was always so exaggerated--so -terribly _moyen âge_ and heroic!' - -The veins swelled on his forehead with his endeavour to keep down his -rage. He did not wish to honour this woman by bringing his wife's name -into their contention, and he strove not to forget the sex of his -antagonist. - -'Madame Brancka,' he said, with a coldness and calmness which it cost -him hard to preserve, 'this conversation is of no use that I can see. -I came to tell you a hard fact--simply this, that you must leave -Hohenszalras within the next few hours. As the master of this house, I -insist on it.' - -'But how will you accomplish it?' - -'I will compel you to go,' said Sabran, between his teeth, 'if I -disgrace you publicly before all my household. The fault will not be -mine. I have endeavoured to spare you; but if you be so dead to all -feeling and decency as to think it possible that the same roof can -shelter you and my wife, I must undeceive you, however roughly.' - -She heard him patiently and smiled a little. 'Disgrace _me?_' she -echoed gently. 'Count Brancka will kill you.' - -Sabran signified by a gesture that the possibility was profoundly -indifferent to him. He turned to leave her. - -'Understand me plainly,' he said, as he moved away. 'I leave it at -your option to invent any summons, any excuse, as your reason for -your departure; but if you do not announce your departure for this -afternoon, I shall do what I have said. I have the honour to wish you -good-morning.' - -'Wait a moment,' said Madame Brancka, still very softly. 'Are you -judicious to make an enemy of me?' - -'I much prefer you as an enemy,' said Sabran, curtly; and he added, -with contemptuous irony, 'your friendship is far more perilous than -your animosity; your compliments are like the Borgia's banquets.' - -'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, once again, 'you are ungrateful like all -men, and you are not very wise either. You forget that I am the -sister-in-law of Egon Vàsàrhely.' - -Sabran could never hear that name mentioned without a certain inward -tremor, a self-consciousness which he could not entirely conceal. But -he was infuriated, and he answered with reckless scorn: - -'Prince Vàsàrhely is a man of honour. He would disown you if he knew -that you offer yourself with the shamelessness of a _déclassée_, and -that you outrage a noble and unsuspecting woman, by forcing yourself -into her home when you have failed in tempting her husband to offer her -the last dishonour.' - -Her face paled under the unveiled and unsparing insults, but she did -not lose her equanimity. - -'We are very like a scene of Sardou's,' she said, with her unchangeable -smile. 'You would have made your fortune on the boards of the Français. -Why did you not go there instead of calling yourself Marquis de Sabran? -It would have been wiser.' - -He felt as if a knife had been plunged through his loins; all the -colour left his face. Had Vàsàrhely told _her_? No! it was impossible. -They were mere chance words of a woman eager to insult, not knowing -what she said. He affected not to hear, and with a bow to her he moved -once more to leave the chamber. But her voice again arrested him. - -'Tell me one thing before you go,' she said, very gently. 'Does Wanda -know that you are Vassia Kazán?' - -She spoke with perfect moderation and simplicity, not altering her -posture as she lay back in her tapestried chair, but she watched -him with trepidation. She was not altogether sure of facts she -had half-guessed, half-gathered. She had pieced details together -with infinite skill, but she could not be absolutely certain of her -conclusions. She watched him with eager avidity beneath her smiling -calmness. If he showed no consciousness her cast was wrong; she would -miss her vengeance; she would remain in his power. But at a glance she -saw her shaft had pierced straight home. He had strong control and even -strong power of dissimulation in need; but that name thrown at him -stunned him as a stone might have done. His face grew livid, he stood -motionless, he had no falsehood ready, he was taken off his guard: all -he realised was that his ruin was in the grasp of his mortal foe. His -hold on her was lost. His authority, his strength, his dignity, all -fell before those two hateful words, 'Vassia Kazán!' - -'He has told her!' he thought, and the blood surged in his brain -and made him dazed and giddy. He had not told her. By private -investigation, by keen wit, by careful and cruel comparison of various -information, she had arrived at the conclusion that Vassia Kazán and -he who had come from Mexico as the grandson of the Marquis Xavier de -Sabran were one and the same. Certain she could not be, but she was -near enough to certainty to dare to cast her stone at a venture. If it -missed--she was a woman. He could not kill or harm a woman, or call her -to account. - -Even now, if he had preserved his composure and turned on her with a -calm challenge, she would have been powerless. - -But he had lost the habit of falsehood; self-consciousness made him -weak; he believed that Egon Vàsàrhely had betrayed him. His lips were -mute, his tongue seemed to cleave to his mouth. A less keen-sighted -woman would have read confession on his face. She was satisfied. - -'You have not answered my question,' she said quietly. 'Does Wanda know -it? Does such a saintly woman "compound a felony"? I believe a false -name is a sort of felony, is it not?' - -He breathed heavily; his eyes had a terrible look in them; he put his -hand on his heart. For a moment the longing assailed him to spring -upon her and throttle her as a man may a dangerous beast. He could not -speak, a leaden weight seemed to shut his lips. - -He never doubted that she knew his whole history from Vàsàrhely. - -'It was an ingenious device,' she pursued, in her honeyed, even tones, -'but it was scarcely wise. Things are always found out some time or -another--at least, men's secrets are. A woman can keep hers. My dear -friend, you are really a criminal. It is very strange that Wanda of all -people should have made such a misalliance, and had such an imposture -passed off on her! I belong to her family; I ought to abhor you; and -yet I can imagine your temptation if I cannot forgive it. Still it was -a foolish thing to do, not worthy a man of your wit; and in France, -I believe, the punishment for such an assumption is some years' -imprisonment; and here, you know (perhaps you do not know?), your -marriage would be null and void if she chose.' - -He made a movement towards her, and for the moment, though she was a -woman of great courage, her spirit quailed before the look she met. - -'Hold your peace!' he said savagely. 'Speak truth, if you can. What has -Vàsàrhely told you?' - -Vàsàrhely had told her nothing, but she looked him full in the face -with perfect serenity, and answered--'All!' - -He never doubted her, he could not doubt her; what she said was met by -too full confirmation from his memory and his conscience. - -'He gave me his word,' he muttered. - -She smiled. 'His word to _you,_ when he is in love with your wife? The -miracle is that he has not told her. She would divorce you, and after a -decent interval I dare say she would marry him, if only _pour balayer -la chose._ For a man so devoted to her as you are, you have certainly -contrived to outrage and injure her in the most complete manner. _Mon -beau Marquis!_ to think how fooled we all were all the time by you. How -haughty you were, how fastidious, how patrician!' - -He leaned against the high column of the enamelled stove and covered -his eyes with his hands. He was unnerved, unstrung, half-paralysed. The -blow had fallen on him without preparation or defence being possible to -him. His thoughts were all in confusion; one thing alone he knew--he, -and all he loved, were in the power of a merciless woman, who would no -more spare them than the _sloughi_ astride the antelope will let go its -quivering flesh. - -She looked at him, and a contemptuous wonder came upon her that a man -could be so easily beaten, so easily betrayed into tacit confession. -She ignored the power of conscience, for she did not know it herself. - -She thought, with scorn: 'Why did he not deny, deny boldly, as I should -have done in his place? He would have twisted my weapon out of my -hand at once. I know so little, and I could prove nothing! But he is -unnerved at once, just because it is true! Men are all imbeciles. If he -had only denied and questioned me he must have found that Egon had told -me nothing.' - -And she watched him with derision. - -In truth, she knew so little; she had scarce more to guide her than -coincidence and conjecture. She longed to know everything from himself, -but strong as was her curiosity, her prudence and her cruelty were -stronger still, and she admirably assumed a knowledge that she had not, -guided in all her dagger-strokes by the suffering she caused. - -Yet her passion for him which, unslaked, was as ardent as ever, became -not the less, but the greater, because she had him in her power. She -was one of those women to whom love is only delightful if it possess -the means to torture. Besides, it was not himself whom she hated, -it was his wife. To make him faithless to his wife would be a more -exquisite triumph than to betray him to her. - -'He would be wax--in my hands,' she thought. A vision of the future -passed before her, with her dominion absolute over him, her knowledge -of his shame holding him down with a chain never to be broken. She -would compel him to wound, to deceive, to torment his wife; she would -dictate his every word, his every act; she would make him ridiculous to -the world, so servile should be his obedience to her, so great should -be his terror of her anger. He should be her lover, weak as water in -all semblance, because the puppet of her pleasure. This would be a -vengeance worthy of herself when she should see him kneel at her feet -for permission for every slightest act, and she should scourge him as -with whips, knowing he dare not rise; when she should say softly in his -ear a thousand times a year: 'You are Vassia Kazán!' - -She was silent a few moments, lost in the witchery of the vision she -conjured up; then she looked up at him and said very caressingly, in -her sweetest voice: - -'Why are you so dejected? Your secret may be safe with me. You -know--you know--I was willing ever to be your friend; I am not less -willing now. I told you that you were unwise to make an enemy of me. -Wanda's regard would not outlive such a trial, but perhaps mine may, -if you be discerning enough, grateful enough to trust to it. I know -your crime, for a crime it is, and a foul one: we must not attempt to -palliate it. When we last met you offended, you outraged me. Only a few -moments since you insulted me as though I were the lowest creature on -the Paris asphalte. Yet all this I--I--should be tempted to forgive if -you love me as I believe that you do. I love _you_, not as that cold, -calm, unerring woman yonder may, but as those only can who know and -care for no heaven but earth. Réné--Vassia--who, knowing your sin, your -shame, your birth, your treachery, would say to you what I say? Not -Wanda!' - -He seemed not to hear, he did not hear. He leaned his forehead upon his -arms; he was sunk in the apathy of an intense woe; only the name of his -wife reached him, and he shivered a little as with cold. - -At his silence, his indifference, her eyes grew alight with flame; but -she controlled herself; she rose and clasped her hands upon his arm. - -'Listen,' she murmured, 'I love you, I love you! I care nothing what -you were born, what sins you have sinned; I love you! Love me, and -she shall never know. I will silence Egon. I will bury your secret as -though it were one that would cost me my life were it known.' - -Only at the touch of her hands did he arouse himself to any -consciousness of what she was saying, of how she tempted him. Then he -shook off her clasp with a rude gesture; he looked down on her with -the bitterest of scorn: not for a single instant did he dream of -purchasing her silence so. - -'You are even viler than I thought,' he said in his throat, with a -dreary laugh of mockery. 'How long would you spare me if I sinned -against her with you? Go, do your worst, say your worst! But if you -stay beneath my wife's roof to-night, I will drive you out of the -house before all her people, if it be my last act of authority in -Hohenszalras!' - -'I love you!' she murmured, and almost knelt to him; but he thrust her -away from him, and stood erect, his arms folded on his chest. - -'How dare you speak of love to me? You force me to employ the language -of the gutter. If Egon Vàsàrhely have put me in your power, use it, -like the incarnate fiend you are. I ask no mercy of you, but if you -dare to speak of love to me I will strangle you where you stand. Since -you call me the wolf of the steppes you shall feel my grip.' - -She fell a few steps backward and stretched her hand behind her, and -rung a little silver bell. Absorbed in his own bitterness of thought he -did not hear the sound or see the movement. She had already, between -Greswold's visit to her and his master's, written a little letter: - - 'Loved Wanda,--Will you be so good as to - come to me for a moment at once?--Yours, - 'OLGA.' - -She had said to one of her women, who was in the next apartment: 'When -I ring you will take that note at once to my cousin, the Countess, -yourself, without coming to me.' She had had no fear of leaving the -woman in the adjoining room, who was a Russian, wholly ignorant of the -French tongue, which she herself always used. - -She recoiled from him, frightened for the moment, but only for that; -she had nerves of steel, and many men had cursed her and menaced her -for the ruin of their lives, and she had lived on none the worse. -'_On crie--et puis c'est fini_,' she was wont to say, with her airy -cynicism. Something in his look, in his voice, told her that here it -would not finish thus. - -'He will shoot himself if he do not strangle me; and he will escape -so,' she thought, and a faint sort of fear touched her. She was alone -before him; she had said enough to drive him out of all calmness and -all reason. She had left him nothing to hope for; she had made him -believe that she knew all his fatal past. If he had struck her down -into the dumbness of death he would have been scarcely guilty. - -But it was only for a moment that such a dread as this passed over her. - -'Pshaw! we are people of the world,' she thought. 'Society is with us -even in our solitude. Those violent crimes are not ours: we strike -otherwise than with our hands.' - -And, reassured, she sank down into her chair again, a delicate figure -in a cloud of muslin of the Deccan and old lace of Flanders, and -clasped her fingers gracefully behind her head, and waited. - -He did not move; his eyes were fastened on her, glittering and cold as -ice, and full of unspeakable hatred. He was deadly pale. She thought -she had never seen his face more beautiful than in that intense mute -wrath which was like the iron frost of his own land. - -'When he goes he will go and kill himself,' she mused, and she listened -with passionate eagerness for the passing of steps down the corridor. - -But he did not stir; he was absorbed in wondering how he could deal -with this woman so that his wife should be spared. Was there any way -save that vile way to which she had tempted him? He could see none. -From a passion rejected and despised there can be no chance of mercy. -He had ceased altogether to think of himself. - -To take his own life did not pass over his thoughts then. It would have -spared Wanda nothing. His shame, told when he were dead, would hurt -her almost more than when he were living. He had too much courage to -evade so the consequences of his own acts. In the confusion of his mind -only this one thing was present to it--the memory of his wife. All that -he had dreaded of disgrace, of divorce, of banishment, of ruin, were -nothing to him; what he thought of was the loss of her herself, her -adoration, her honour, her sweet obedience, her perfect faith. Would -ever he touch even her hand again if once she knew? - -His remorse and his grief for his wife overwhelmed and destroyed every -personal remembrance. If to spare her he could have undergone any -extremity of torture he would have welcomed it with rapture. But it is -not thus that a false step can be retrieved; not thus that a false word -can be effaced. It, and the fate it brings, must be faced to the bitter -end. - -He had no illusions; he was certain that the woman who would have -tempted him to be false to her would spare her nothing. He would not -even stoop to solicit a respite for her from Olga Brancka. He knew the -only price at which it could be obtained. - -He stood there, leaning his shoulders on the high cornice of the -stove, his arms crossed upon his chest, repressing every expression or -gesture that could have delighted his enemy by revelation of what he -suffered. In himself he felt paralysed; he felt as though neither his -brain nor his limbs would ever serve him again. He had the sensation -of having fallen from a great height; the same numbness and exhaustion -which he had felt when he had dropped down the frozen side of the -Umbal glacier. Both he and she were silent; he from the stupefaction -of horror, she from the eagerness with which she was listening for the -coming of Wanda von Szalras. - -After a short interval of her thirsty and cruel anxiety, the page, who -was in waiting outside, entered with a note for his master. - -Sabran strove to recover his composure as he stretched his hand out and -took the letter off the salver. It contained only two lines from his -wife: - -'Olga asks me to come to her. Do you wish me to do so?' - -A convulsion passed over his face. - -'Oh! most faithful of all friends!' he thought with a pang, touched to -the quick by those simple words of a woman whose fidelity was to be -repaid by shame. - -'Where is the Countess?' he asked of the young servant, who answered -that she was in the library. - -'Say that I will be with her there in a few moments.' - -The page withdrew. - -Olga Brancka was mute; there was a great anger in her veiled eyes. Her -last stroke had missed, through the loyalty of the woman whom she hated. - -He took a step towards her. - -'You dared to send for her then?' - -She laughed aloud, and with insolence. - -'Dare? Is that a word to be used by a Russian _moujik_, as you are, to -me, the daughter of Fedor Demetrivitch Serriatine? Certainly, I sent -for your wife, my cousin. Who should know what I know, if not she? Egon -might make you what promises he would; he is a man and a fool. I make -none. If you prevent my seeing Wanda, I shall write to her; if you -stop her letters, I shall telegraph to her; if you stop the telegrams, -I will put your story in the Paris journals, where the Marquis de -Sabran is as well known as the Arc de l'Étoile. You were born a serf, -you shall feel the knout. It would have been well for you if you had -smarted under it in your youth.' - -So absorbed was he in the memory of his wife, and in the thought of -the misery about to fall upon her innocent life, that the insults to -himself struck on him harmless, as hail on iron. - -'Spare your threats,' he said coldly. 'No one shall tell her but -myself. You know her present condition; it will most likely kill her.' - -'Oh, no,' said the Countess Brancka, with a little smile. 'Her nerves -are of iron. She will divorce you, that is all.' - -'She will be in her right,' he said, with the same coldness. Then, -without another word, he turned and left her chamber. - -'For a bastard, he crows well!' she said, loud enough to be heard by -him, in the old twelfth-century French of the words she quoted. - -Sabran went onward with a quick step; if he had paused, if he had -looked back, he felt that he would have murdered her. - -'Talk of the cruelty of men! What beast that lives,' he thought, 'has -the slow unsparing brutality of a jealous woman?' - -He went on, without pausing once, across the great house. So much he -could spare his wife, he could save her from her enemy's triumph in -her suffering; he could do as men did in the Indian Mutiny, plunge the -knife himself into the heart that loved him, and spare her further -outrage. - -When he reached the door of the library, he stopped and drew a deep -breath. He would have gone to his death with calmness and a smile; but -here he had no courage. A sickening spasm of pain seemed to suffocate -him. He knew that he met only his just punishment. If he could only -have suffered alone he would not have rebelled against his doom. But to -smite her!---- - -With greater courage than is needed in the battle-field he turned -the handle of the door and entered. She was seated at one of the -writing-tables with a mass of correspondence before her, to which she -had been vainly striving to give her attention. Her thoughts had been -with him and Olga Brancka. She looked up with the light on her face -which always came there when she saw him after any absence, long or -short. But that light was clouded as she perceived the change in his -look in his carriage, in his very features, which were aged, and drawn, -and bloodless. She rose with an exclamation of alarm, as he came to her -across the length of the noble room, where he had first seen her seated -by her own hearth, and heard her welcome him a stranger and unknown -beneath her roof. - -'Wanda! Wanda!' he said, and his voice seemed strangled, his lips -seemed dumb. - -'My God, what is it?' she cried faintly. 'Are the children----' - -'No, no,'he muttered. 'The children are well. It is worse than death. -Wanda, I have come to tell you the sin of my life, the shame of it. Oh! -how will you ever believe that I loved you since I wronged you so?' - -A great sob broke down his words. - -She put her hand to her heart. - -'Tell me,' she said, in a low whisper, 'tell me everything. Why not -have trusted me? Tell me--I am strong.' - -Then he told her the whole history of his past, and spared nothing. - -She listened in unbroken silence, standing all the while, leaning one -hand upon the ebony table by her. - -When he had ceased to speak he buried his face in her skirts where -he knelt at her feet; he did not dare to look at her. She was still -silent; her breath came and went with shuddering effort. She drew her -velvet gown from him with a gesture of unspeakable horror. - -'You!--you!' she said, and could find no other word. - -Then all grew dark around her; she threw her arms out in the void, and -fell from her full height as a stone drops from a rock into the gulf -below; struck dumb and senseless for the first time in all the years -that she had lived. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIV. - - -Twelve hours later she gave premature birth to a male child, dead. Once -in those hours when her physical agony lulled for a moment and her -consciousness returned, she said to her physician: - -'Tell him to send for Egon. Egon betrays no one.' - -They were the first words she had spoken. Greswold understood nothing; -but he saw that some great calamity had fallen on those he loved -and honoured, and that her lord never came nigh her chamber, but -only pacing to and fro the corridors and passages of the house, with -restless, ceaseless steps, paused ever and again to whisper--'Does she -live?' - -'Come to her,' said the old man once; but Sabran shuddered and turned -aside. - -'I dare not,' he answered, 'I dare not. If she die, it is I who shall -have killed her.' - -Greswold did not venture to ask what had happened; he knew it must -be some disaster of which the Countess Brancka was the origin or the -messenger. - -'My lady has spoken a few words,' he said later to his master. 'She -bade me tell you to send for Prince Vàsàrhely. She said he would betray -no one. I could ask nothing, for her agony returned.' - -Sabran was silent; the thought came to him for the first time that it -might be possible Olga Brancka had used the name of her brother-in-law -falsely. - -'Send for him yourself,' he said wearily; 'What she wishes must be -done. Nothing matters to me.' - -'I think the Prince is in Vienna,' said Greswold; and he sent an -urgent message thither, entreating Vàsàrhely's immediate presence at -Hohenszalras, in the name of his cousin. - -Olga Brancka remained in her own apartments, uncertain what to do. - -'If Wanda die,' she thought, 'it will all have been of no use; he -will be neither divorced nor disgraced. Perhaps one might plead the -marriage invalid, and disinherit the children; but one would want so -much proof, and I have none. If he had not been so stunned and taken -off his guard, he might easily have defied me. Egon may know more, but -if Wanda dies he will not move. He would care for nothing on earth. He -will forget the children were Sabran's. He will only remember they were -hers!' - -No one who loved her could have been more anxious for Wanda von Szalras -to live than was this cruellest of her enemies, who passed the time -in a perpetual agitation, and, as her women brought her tidings from -hour to hour, testified so much genuine alternation of hope and terror, -that they were amazed to see so much feeling in one so indifferent -usually to all woes not her own. She was miserably dull; she had no one -to speak to; she had no lover, friend, rival, or foe to give her the -stimulant to life that was indispensable to her. Even she did not dare -to approach the man whose happiness she had ruined, any more than she -would have dared to touch a lion wounded to the death. Yet she could -not tear herself away from the scene of her vengeance. - -The whole house was hushed like a grave; the servants were full of -grief at the danger of a mistress they adored; even the young children, -understanding that their mother was in peril, did not play or laugh; -but sat unhappy and silent over their books, or wandered aimlessly -along the leafless gardens. They knew that there was something -terrible, though they knew not what. - -'What is death?' said Lili to her brothers. - -'It is to go and live with God, they _say_,' answered Bela, doubtfully. - -'But how can God be happy Himself,' said Gela, 'when He causes so much -sorrow?' - -'Our mother will never go away from us,' said the little Lili, who -listened. 'They may call her from heaven ever--ever so much; she will -not leave _us_.' - -Bela sighed; he had a heavy, hopeless impression of death as a thing -that was stronger than himself. - -'Pride can do naught against death, my little lord,' one of the -foresters had once said to him. 'You will find your master there one -day.' - -A day and a night passed; puerperal convulsions succeeded to the birth -of the dead boy, and Wanda was unconscious alike of her bodily and her -mental torture. The physicians, whom Greswold had summoned instantly, -were around her bed, grave and anxious. The only chance for her lay in -the magnificent health and strength with which nature had dowered her. -Her constitution might, they said, enable her to resist what weaker -women would have gone down under like boats in an ocean storm. - -It was towards dawn on the second day when Egon Vàsàrhely arrived. - -'She lives?' he said, as he entered. - -'That is all,' said Greswold, with tears in his voice. - -'Can I see her?' - -'It would be useless. She would not know your Excellency.' - -Sabran came forward from the further end of the Rittersaal, where the -lights were burning with a yellow glare as the grey light of the dawn -was stealing through the unshuttered windows. - -'Allow me the honour of a word with you, Prince;' he said. 'I -understand; you have come at her summons--not at mine.' - -Greswold withdrew and left them alone. Vàsàrhely was still wrapped in -the furs in which he had travelled. He stood erect and listened; his -face was very stern. - -'Did you give up my secret to your brother's wife?' said Sabran, -abruptly. - -'Can you ask that?' said Vàsàrhely. 'You had my word.' - -'Madame Brancka knows all that you know. She said that you had -betrayed me to her. She would have told Wanda. I chose sooner to tell -her myself. The shock has killed the child. It may kill her. Your -sister-in-law is here. If she used your name falsely it is for you to -avenge it.' - -'Tell me what passed between you,' said Prince Egon. His face was dark -as night. - -Sabran hesitated a moment. Even now he could not bring himself to -disclose the passion which his enemy had conceived for him. It was one -of those women's secrets which no gentleman can surrender to another. - -'You are aware,' he replied, 'that Madame Brancka has been always -envious of your cousin; always willing to hurt her. When she got -possession of the story of my past she used it without mercy. She -would have told my wife with brutality; I told her myself, hoping to -spare her something by my own confession. Madame Brancka affirmed to -me, twice or thrice over, that you had given her all the information -against me.' - -'How could you believe her? You had had my promise.' - -'How could I doubt her?' - -'It is natural you should know nothing of honour!' thought Vàsàrhely, -but he did not utter what he thought. He saw that, dark as had been the -crimes of Sabran against those of his race, the chastisement of them -was as great. - -He said simply: - -'You might sooner have doubted anything than have believed that I -should entrust the Countess Brancka with such a secret, and have given -her such a power to injure my cousin. How can she have learned your -history? Have you betrayed yourself?' - -'Never! Since she had it not from you, I cannot conceive how or where -she learned it. Not a soul lives that knows me as----' - -He paused; he could not bring himself to say the name he bore from -birth. - -'My brother is unfortunate,! said Vàsàrhely, curtly. 'He has wedded a -vile woman. Leave her to me.' - -He saluted Sabran with cold but careful ceremony, and went, to his -own apartments. Sabran passed to the corridor which led to his wife's -rooms, and there resumed his miserable restless walk to and fro before -her door. He dared not enter. In her conscious hours she had not asked -for him. He had ever present before his eyes that movement of horror, -of repulsion, with which she had drawn the hem of her gown from his -grasp. - -Now and again, when her attendants came in and out, he saw through -the opening of the door the bed on which she lay and the outline of -her form in the pale light of the lamp. He could not rest. He could -not even sit down or break a mouthful of bread. If she died, his sin -against her would have slain her as surely as though his hand had taken -her life. It was about six of the clock in the chilly dawn of the -autumnal day. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXV. - - -Egon Vàsàrhely passed the next three hours in mental conflict with -his own passions. It would have been precious to him--would have been -a blessed and sacred duty--to avenge the woman he adored. But he had -a harder task. For her sake he had to befriend the traitor who had -wronged her, and shelter him from the just opprobrium of the world. -Crueller combat with temptation none ever waged than he fought now -against his own truest instincts, his own dearest affections. She lay -there, perchance dying, of this treachery which had struck her down in -her happiest hours; and it seemed to him as if, through the silence of -the darkened and melancholy house, he heard her voice saying to him: -'For my sake, spare him--spare my children!' - -'I give you more than my life, my beloved!' he murmured, as he sat -alone, whilst the grey day widened over forest and mountain, and for -her sake prepared to shield the man who had deceived her from disgrace -and death. - -'The hound!' he thought. 'He should be branded as a perjurer and thief -throughout the world! Yet for her--for her--one must protect him.' - -An hour or two later he sent his name to the Countess Brancka, with -a request to be received by her. She was but then awaking, and heard -with astonishment and alarm of his arrival, so unlooked for and so -dreaded. It had never occurred to her as possible that he would come to -Hohenszalras. - -'Wanda must have sent for him!' she thought. 'Oh heavens! why could she -not die with the child!' - -It was impossible for her to avoid him; shut up here she could neither -deceive nor escape him. She could not go away without her departure -being known to the whole household. She was afraid of him, terribly -afraid; the Vàsàrhely had a hand of iron when they were offended or -injured. But she put a fair face on a bitter obligation, and, when she -was dressed, went with a pretty smile into the salon to receive him. - -Vàsàrhely gave her no greeting as he entered. A great fear took -possession of her as she saw the expression of his eyes. He was the -only living being of whom she was in awe. He approached her without any -observances of courtesy. He said, simply and sternly: - -'I hear that you have used my name falsely, to the husband of Wanda; -that you have dared to give me as your authority for accusations -against him. What is your excuse?' - -She was for the moment so bewildered and disturbed by his presence and -his charge that she lost all her ability and power of interminable -falsehood. She was silent, and he saw her bosom heave and her hands -tremble a little. - -'What is your excuse?' he said again. 'Why did you come into this house -to injure Wanda von Szalras? How did you dare to use my name to do her -that injury?' - -She tried to laugh a little, but she was nervous and thrown off her -guard. - -'I wished to do her a service! Since she has married an adventurer--an -impostor--she ought to know it and be free.' - -'What is your authority for calling the Marquis de Sabran an -adventurer? To him you employed my name as your authority. What truth -was beneath that lie?' - -She was silent. For the only time in her life she knew not what to -say. She had no facts in her hands. Her ground was too uncertain to -sustain her in a steady attitude. - -'You know that he is Vassia Kazán!' she said, with another little laugh. - -The face of Vàsàrhely revealed nothing. - -'Who is Vassia Kazán?' he repeated. - -'He is--the man who robbed you of Wanda.' - -'He could not rob me of what I never possessed. What grounds have you -for calling him by this name?' - -'I have reason to believe it.' - -'Reason to believe it! You told him that you heard this story from -myself.' - -'He never denied it.' - -'I am not concerned to discuss what he did or did not do. I come here -to know on what grounds you employed my name?' - -'Egon, I will tell you the truth!' - -'Can you?' - -'Yes; I can and I will. When I was at Taróc, three summers ago, I saw -a fragment of a letter in Sabran's writing. I saw the name of Vassia -Kazán. I put this and that together. I heard something from Russia; I -sent some people to Mexico. I had always had my suspicions. I do not -say I have any positive legal proof, but I am morally convinced that he -is no Marquis de Sabran, and that he was born a serf near the city of -Kazán. I have charged him with it, and he has as good as confessed it. -He was struck dumb with consciousness.' - -She watched the face of Vàsàrhely, but it might have been cast in -bronze for anything that it told her. - -'You saw a fragment of a letter, of which you knew nothing,' he said -coldly; 'you formed some vague suspicions; you descended to the use -of spies, and, because you have invented a theory of your own on your -so-called discoveries, you deem you have a title to ruin the happiness -of your cousin's home. And you father your work upon me! Often have I -pitied my brother, but never so deeply as now.' - -'If my so-called discoveries were false,' she interrupted, with -hardihood, 'why did he not say so? He was convicted by his own -admissions. If my charge had been baseless, would he have said that he -would tell his wife himself rather than let her learn it from me?' - -'I neither know nor care what he said,' answered Vàsàrhely. 'I have -only your version for it. You must pardon me if I do not attach -implicit credence to your word. What I do know is that you ventured to -use my name to give force and credibility to your accusations. Had you -really known for certainty such a history, you would, had you had any -decency or feeling, have consulted your husband and myself on the best -means of shielding our cousin's honour. But you have always envied and -hated her. What is her husband to you--what is it to you whether he be -a noble or a clown? You snatch at the first brand you think you see, -in the hope to scorch her honour with it. But when you used my name -falsely you did a dangerous thing for yourself. I shall waste no more -words upon you, but you will sign what I write now, or you will repent -it.' - -She affected to laugh. - -'My dear Egon, _quel ton de maître!_ What authority have you over me? -Even if you invest yourself in your brother's, that counts for very -little, I assure you.' - -'Perhaps so; but if my brother be too careless of his honour and too -credulous of your deceptions, he is yet man enough to resent such -infamy as you have been guilty of now. You will sign this.' - -He passed to her a few lines which he had already written and brought -with him. They ran thus: - -'I, Olga, Countess Brancka, do acknowledge that I most untruthfully -used the name of my husband's brother, the Prince Vàsàrhely, in an -endeavour to injure the gentleman known as the Marquis de Sabran; and I -hereby do ask the pardon of them both, and confess that in such pardon -I receive great leniency and forbearance.' - -'Sign it,' said Prince Egon. - -'Pshaw!' said Madame Brancka, and pushed it away with a loud laugh, -deigning no further answer. - -'Will you sign it or not?' asked Vàsàrhely. - -She replied by tearing it in shreds. - -'It is easily rewritten,' he said, unmoved. He went to a writing-table -that stood in the room, looked for paper and found it, and wrote out -the same formula. - -'Do not be foolish, Olga,' he said curtly, as he returned. 'You are a -clever woman, and always consult your own interests. I dare say you -have done a thousand things as base as your attempt to ruin my cousin's -happiness, but I do not suppose you have often done anything so unwise. -You will sign this at once, or you will regret it very greatly.' - -'Why should I sign it?' she said insolently. 'The man is what I say; he -could not deny it. If I only guessed at the truth, I guessed aright. I -wonder that you do not see _your_ interests lie in exposing him. When -the world knows he is an impostor Wanda will divorce him and put the -children under other names in religious houses. Then you will be able -to marry her. I told him she would marry you _pour balayer la honte._' - -For the moment she was alarmed at the fires that leapt from Vàsàrhely's -sombre eyes. It cost him much--as much as it had cost Sabran--not to -strike her where she stood. He paused a second to control himself, then -answered her coldly and calmly-- - -'My cousin will never seek a divorce, nor shall I wed with a divorced -woman. Your hate misleads you; there is no blinder thing than hate. You -will sign this paper, or I shall telegraph for my brother.' - -'For Stefan!' - -All her boundless indifference to her husband, and her contempt for -him, were spoken in the accent she gave his name. - -'For Stefan. You are pleased to despise him because you can lead him -into mad follies, and can make him believe you are an innocent woman. -But Stefan is not altogether the ignoble dupe you think him. He is -a dupe, wiser men than he have been so; but he would not bear your -infidelity to him if he really knew it, nor would he bear other things -if he knew of them. Two years ago you took two hundred thousand -florins' worth of diamonds, in my name, from my jeweller Landsee in -the Graben. How should a tradesman suspect that a Countess Brancka was -dishonest? At the end of the year he brought his bill for that and -other things to me, whilst I was in Vienna. He had never, of course, -doubted that you went on my authority. Equally, of course, I did not -betray you, but paid the amount. When you do such things you should -not give written orders. They remain against you. Now, if Stefan knew -this, or if he knew that you had taken money from the richest of your -lovers, the young Duc de Blois, as I knew it so long as seven years -ago, you would no longer find him the malleable easily-cozened fool -you deem him. You would learn that he has Vàsàrhely blood in him. I -have only named two out of the many questionable facts I know against -you. They have been safe with me. I would never urge Stefan to a public -scandal. But, unless you sign this, and apologise for using my name to -the husband of my cousin, as you used it to Landsee of the Graben, I -shall tell my brother. He will not divorce you. That is not our way; -we do not go to lawyers to redress our wrongs. But he will compel you -to retire for your life into a religious house--as you would compel -the harmless children of Wanda; or he would imprison you himself in -one of our lonely places in the mountains, where you would cry in vain -for your lovers, and your friends, and your _menus plaisirs_, and none -would hear you. Do not mistake me. You have often called us barbaric; -you will find we can be so. As I say, we do not carry our wrongs to -lawyers. We can avenge ourselves.' - -She had lost all colour as he spoke. A nervous spasm of laughter -contracted her mouth, and remained on it like the ghastly _rictus_ of -death. She knew him well enough to know that he meant every syllable -he said. The Vàsàrhely had had stern tragedies in their annals, and to -women impure and unfaithful had been merciless as Othello. - -She felt that she was vanquished; that she would have to obey him or -suffer worse things. But though she was aware of her own impotence, she -could not resist a retort that should sting him. - -'You are very chivalrous! I always knew you had an insane adoration -of your cousin, but I never should have thought you would have put -on sabre and spurs in her husband's defence. Will he reward you by -effacing himself? Will he end as he has begun, like the hero of a -melodrama at the Gymnase, and shoot himself at Wanda's feet? You would -marry a widow, though you would not marry a divorced woman!' - -'Some time ago, when we spoke of him,' he replied, still with stern -self-control, 'I told you that were his honour called in question I -would defend it as I would my brother's--not for his sake, for hers. -I would, for her sake, defend it so were he the guiltiest soul on -earth. He belongs to her. He is sacred to me. You mistake if you deem -her such a woman as yourself. She has loved him. She will love no -other whilst she lives. She has given herself to him. She will give -herself to no other, though she outlive him from this hour. You make -your calculations unwisely, for when you make them you suppose that -every man and every woman have your own dishonesty, your own passions, -your own baseness. You are short of sight, because you only see in the -circle of your own conceptions.' - -She understood that he knew the secret of the man he protected, but -that he would never admit that he did so; would never reveal it or let -any other reveal it. She understood that he had himself forborne from -its exposure, and would never, whilst he lived, allow any other to hold -it up to the derision of the world. She understood that, if need were, -Vàsàrhely would defend, as he said, the honour of his cousin's husband -at the point of the sword against all foes or mockers. - -'For her sake!' she cried, 'always for her sake! What can you both see -so marvellous in her? She has been a greater fool than any woman that -has ever lived, though she can read Greek and write in Latin! What -has she done with all her wisdom and her holiness? You know as well -as though it were written there upon the wall that he is what I say. -Why do you put your lance in rest for him? Why are you ready to shed -blood on his behalf? He is an impostor who has taken in first the world -and then the mistress of Hohenszalras. If you were the hero you have -always seemed to me you would tear his heart out of his breast, shoot -him like a wolf in these very woods! If her honour is yours, avenge her -dishonour!' - -She spoke with force and fire, and longing to behold the spirit of evil -roused in her hearer's soul and stung to action. - -But she might as well have tried to move the mountains from their base -as rouse either pain or rage in her brother-in-law. Vàsàrhely kept his -attitude of stern, cold, contemptuous disgust. Not a muscle of his face -changed. He said merely: - -'You have been told what I shall do if you do not sign this paper. The -choice is yours. If you desire to hear any more episodes of your past I -can tell you many.' - -Then she changed her attitude and her eloquence. She dissolved in -tears; she wept; she implored; she tried to kneel to him. But he was -inflexible. - -'You are a good actress,' he said simply. 'But you forget; it is Stefan -whom you can deceive, not me.' - -When she had vainly used all her resources of alternate entreaty -and invective, of cajolery and insolence, she sank into her chair, -exhausted, hysterical, nerveless. - -'I am ill; call my woman,' she said faintly. - -He replied: - -'You are no more ill than I am.' - -'You are brutal, Egon,' she said, raising herself, with flashing eyes -and hissing tongue. - -'What have you been to her?' said Vàsàrhely. - -He waited with cold, inflexible patience. When another half-hour had -gone by she signed the paper, and flung it with fury to him. - -'You know very well it is true!' she cried, as she leaned across the -table like a slender snake that darted. 'Would she lie dying of it if -it were only a lie?' - -'That I know not,' said Vàsàrhely, coldly. 'What I know is that your -carriage will be ready in an hour, and that you will go hence. If ever -you be tempted to speak of what has occurred here, you will remember -that my silence to Stefan and your own people is only conditional on -yours on another matter.' - -Then he left her. - -She was cowed, intimidated, vanquished. When the hour was over she went -through the two lines of bowing servants, and left Hohenszalras ere the -noon was past. - -'It is the first time in my life I ever failed,' she thought, as the -pinnacles and towers of the burg were lost to her sight. 'What do these -men see in that woman?' - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVI. - - -Vàsàrhely, when he left her, went straight to Sabran, who, seated on an -oaken bench in the corridor of his wife's apartments, knew not how the -hours passed, and seemed aged ten years in a day. Vàsàrhely motioned -him to pass into one of the empty chambers. There he gave him the lines -which Olga Brancka had signed. - -'You are safe from her,' he said. 'She cannot tell your story to the -world. She will not dare even to whisper it as a conjecture.' - -Sabran did not speak. This great debt owed to his greatest foe hurt him -even whilst it delivered him. - -'For the first time I have concealed the truth,' pursued Vàsàrhely. 'I -affected to disbelieve her story. There was no other way to save it -from publicity. That alone would not have sufficed, but I had means to -coerce her.' - -'You have been very generous.' - -Vàsàrhely shrank from his praise as though from some insolence. He did -not look at Sabran; he spoke briefly between his closed teeth. All -his soul was full of longing to strike this man; to meet him in open -combat and to kill him; forcing him and his foul secret together down -underneath the sole sure cover of the grave. But the sense that so -near, within a few feet of them, she lay in peril of her life, made -even vengeance seem for the moment profane and blasphemous. - -'There will be always time,' he thought. - -That hushed and darkened chamber hard by awed his hatred into silence. -What would she wish? What would she command? Could he but know that, -how clear would be his path! - -He hesitated a moment, then turned away. - -'I shall wait here until the danger is past, or she is called to God,' -he said hoarsely. - -Then he walked away down the corridor slowly, like a man wounded with a -wound that bleeds within. - -Sabran stood awhile where he had left him, his eyes bent on the ground, -his heart sick with shame. - -'_He_ was worthy of her!' he thought with the most bitter pang of his -life. - -Three more days and nights passed; they were to him like a hideous -nightmare; at times he thought with horror that he would lose his -reason. The dreadful stillness, the dreadful silence, the knowledge -that death was so near that bed which he dared not approach, the -impossibility of learning what memories of him, what hatred of him, -might not be haunting the stupor in which she lay, together made up a -torture to which her bitterest reproach, her deadliest punishment would -have seemed merciful. - -All through that exhaustion, in which they believed her mind was -without consciousness, the memory of all that he had told her was -alive in it, in that poignant remembrance which the confusion of a -dulled brain only makes but the more terrible, turning and changing -what it suffers from into a thousand shapes. In her worst agony this -consciousness never left her; she kept silence because in her uttermost -weakness she was strong enough not to give her woe to the ears of the -others, but in her heart there seemed a great knife plunged, a knife -rusted with blood that was dishonoured. - -When she knew that the child she bore was dead, she felt no sorrow, -she thought only--'Begotten of a serf, of a coward!' - -The intolerable outrage, the intolerable deception, were like flames of -fire that seemed to eat up her life; her love for him, for the hour at -least, had been stunned and ceased to speak. To the woman who came of -the races of Szalras and Vàsàrhely, the dishonour covered every other -memory. - -'All his life only one long lie!' she thought. - -Her race had been stainless through a thousand years of chivalry and -heroism, and she--its sole descendant--had sullied it with the blood of -a base-born impostor! - -Whilst she lay sunk in what they deemed a perfect apathy, the disgrace -done to her, to her name, to her ancestry, was ever present to her -mind: a spectre which no one saw save herself. Every other emotion was -for the time quenched in that. She felt as though the whole world had -struck her on the cheek and she was powerless to resent or to revenge -the blow. In hours of delirium she thought she saw all the men and -women of her race who had reigned there before her standing about her -bed, and saying: 'You held our honour, and what did you do with it? You -let it sink to the earth in the arms of a nameless coward.' - -One night she said suddenly: 'My cousin--is he here?' - -When they told her that he had remained at Hohenszalras she seemed -reassured. At sunrise she asked the same question. When they answered -with the same affirmative, she said: 'Bid him come to me.' - -They fetched him instantly. As he passed Sabran in the corridor he -paused. - -'Your wife has sent for me,' he said; 'have I your permission to see -her?' - -Sabran bent his head, but his heart beat thickly with the only jealousy -he had ever felt. She asked for Egon Vàsàrhely in her stupor of misery, -and he, her husband, had lost the right to enter her chamber, dared not -approach her presence! - -'Wanda, I am here!' said Vàsàrhely, softly, as he bent over her. She -looked at him with eyes full of unspeakable agony. - -'Is it true?' she murmured. - -'Yes!' he said bitterly between his teeth. - -'And you knew it?' - -'Too late! But Wanda--my beloved Wanda--trust to me. The world shall -never hear it.' - -Her eyes had closed, a shiver ran through all her frame. 'Olga?' she -muttered. - -'She is in my power. I will deal with her,' he answered. 'She will be -silent as the grave.' - -She gave a long shuddering sigh, and her head sank back upon her -pillows. - -Vàsàrhely fell on his knees beside her bed, and buried his face on her -hands. - -'My violated saint!' he murmured. 'Fear not; I will avenge you.' - -Low though the words were, they reached and moved her in her dim blind -weakness. She stretched out her hand, and touched his bowed head. - -'No, no--not _that._ He is my children's father. He must be sacred; -give me your word, Egon, there shall be no bloodshed between him and -you.' - -'I am your next friend,' he said, with intense appeal in his voice. -'You are insulted and dishonoured--your race is affronted and -stained--who should avenge that if not I, your kinsman? There is no -male of your house. It falls to me.' - -All the manhood and knighthood in him were athirst for the life of the -impostor who had dishonoured what he adored. - -'Promise me,' she said again. - -'Your brothers are dead,' he muttered. 'I may well stand in their -place. Their swords would have found him out ere he were an hour -older.' - -She raised herself with a supreme effort, and through the pallor and -misery of her face there came a momentary flash of anger, a momentary -flash of the old spirit of command. - -'My brothers are dead, and I forbid any other to meddle with my life. -If anyone slew him it would be I--I--in my own right.' - -Her voice had been for the instant stern and sustained, but physical -faintness overcame her; her lips grew grey, and the darkness of great -weakness came before her sight. - -'I forbid you! I forbid you!' she said, as her breath failed her. - -Vàsàrhely remained kneeling beside her bed. His shoulders trembled with -restrained emotion. Even now she shut him out of her life. She denied -him the right to be her champion and avenger. - -She moved her hand towards him as a blind woman would have done. - -'Give me your word.' - -'You are my law,' he answered. 'I will do nothing that you forbid.' - -She inclined her head with a feeble gesture of recognition of the -words. He rose slowly, kissed the white fingers that lay near him, and, -without speaking, left her presence. - -'Bloodshed, bloodshed!' she thought, in the vague feverish confusion -of half-conscious thought. 'Though rivers of blood rolled between him -and me what could they wash away of the shame that is with me for ever? -What could death do? Death could blot out nothing.' - -A sense of awful impotence lay upon her like a weight of iron. Do what -she would she could never change the past! Her sons must grow to youth -and manhood tainted and dishonoured in her sight. There were times when -all the martial and arrogant spirit in her was like flame in her veins, -and she thought: 'Could I but rise and kill him--I, myself!' - -It seemed to her that it would be but justice. - -When Vàsàrhely, coming out from her chamber, passed the impostor who -had done her this dishonour, it cost him the greatest self-sacrifice -of his life not to order him out yonder in the chilly twilight of the -leafless woods, to stand before him in that ordeal of combat which, in -the code of honour of the Magyar Prince, was the sole tribunal to which -a man of honour could appeal. But she had forbade him to avenge her. -He felt that he had no share in her life sufficient to give him title -to disobey her. His own love for her told him that this offender was -still dear enough to her for his life to be sacred in her sight. - -'If I had not loved her,' he thought, 'I could have avenged her without -suspicion; but what would it seem to her and to the world?--only that I -slew him out of jealous rancour! In her soul she loves him still. Her -hate will fade, her love will survive, traitor and hound though he be.' - -He motioned Sabran towards one of the empty chambers in the gallery. -When he had closed the door of it he spoke with a low, hoarse voice: - -'Sir, I have the right as her kinsman, I have the right her brothers -would have had, to publicly insult you, to publicly chastise you. But -she has commanded me to abstain; she will have no feud between us. I -obey her; so must you. I have but one thing to say to you. Once you -spoke of suicide. I forbid you to follow up your crimes by causing the -unending misery that death by your own hand would bring to her. You -have been coward enough. Have courage at least not to leave a woman -alone under the disgrace you have brought upon her.' - -'Alone!' echoed Sabran. 'She will never admit me to her presence again. -She will demand her divorce as soon as ever she has strength to -remember and to speak.' - -'Do you know her so ill after nine years of marriage? Whatever she -do it will be for you to accept it, and not evade your chastisement -by the poltroon's refuge of oblivion in the grave. You have said you -think yourself my debtor; all the quittance I desire is this. You will -obey me when I forbid you to entail on your wife the lifelong remorse -that your suicide--however you disguised it--would bring upon her. In -obeying her, by holding back my hand from avenging her, I make the -greatest sacrifice that she could have demanded. Make yours likewise. -It would be easy for you to escape chastisement in death. You must -forego that ease, and live. I leave you to your conscience and to her.' - -He opened the door and passed down the corridor, his steps echoing on -the oaken floor. - -In half an hour he had left the house, and gone on his lonely way to -Taróc. - -Sabran stood mute. - -He had lost the power to resent; he knew that if this man chose to -strike him across the eyes with his whip he would be within his right. -The insults cut him to the bone as though the lash were on him; but he -held his peace and bore them, not in submission, but in silence. His -profound humiliation, his absolute despair, had broken the nerve in -him. He felt that he had no title to look a gentleman in the face, no -power to defend himself, whatever outrages were heaped on him. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVII. - - -In time the convulsions ceased, the stupor lightened; they began to -hope. - -The danger had been great, but it was well-nigh past; the vigour and -perfection of her strength had enabled her to keep her hold on life. -After those few words to her kinsman she spoke seldom, she appeared -sunk in silent thought; when the door opened she shrank with a sort of -apprehension. Greswold watching her said to himself: 'She is afraid -lest her husband should enter.' - -She never spoke of him or of the children. - -Sabran did not dare to ask to see her. When Greswold would fain have -urged him, he refused with vehemence. - -'I dare not--it would be to insult her more. Only if she summon -me--but that she will never do.' - -'He has been faithless to her,' thought the old man. - -All those weeks of her slow and painful restoration to life she was -mute, her lips only moving in reply to the questions of her physicians. -It seemed to her strange that when her spiritual and mental life -had been poisoned to their source, her bodily life should be able -mechanically to gather force, and resume its functions. Had matter so -far more resistance than the soul? - -Her women were frightened at the look upon her face; it had the -rigidity, the changelessness of marble, and all the blood seemed gone -out of it for ever. - -In after days her heart would speak; remembered happiness, lost -beliefs, ruined love, would in their turn have place in her misery; but -now all she was sensible of was the unbearable insult, the ineffaceable -outrage. She was like a queen who beholds the virgin soil of her -kingdom invaded and wasted by a traitor. - -Any other thing she would have pardoned--infidelity, indifference, -cruelty, any sins of manhood's caprice or passion--but who should -pardon this? The sin was not alone against herself; it was against -every law of decency and truth that ever she had been taught to hold -sacred; it was against all those great dead, who lay with the cross -on their breasts and their swords by their side, from whom she had -received and treasured the traditions of honour, the purity of a race. - -It was those dead knights whom he had smote upon the mouth and mocked, -crying to them:. 'Lo! your place is mine; my sons will reign in your -stead. I have tainted your race for ever; for ever my blood flows with -yours.' - -The greatness of a great race is a thing far higher than mere pride. -Its instincts are noble and supreme, its obligations are no less than -its privileges; it is a great light which streams backward through -the darkness of the ages, and if by that light you guide not your -footsteps, then are you thrice accursed holding as you do that lamp of -honour in your hands. - -So had she always thought; and now he had dashed the lamp in the dust. - -Her convalescence came in due course; but the silence, almost absolute -silence, which she preserved on the full recovery of her consciousness -alarmed her physicians, who had no clue to the cause. Greswold alone, -who divined that there was some wrong or disaster which severed her -from her husband, guessed that this immutable speechlessness was but -the cover and guard of some great sorrow. No tears ever dimmed her -eyes or relieved her bursting heart; she lay still, absorbed in mute -and terrible retrospection. As her great weakness left her, there came -upon her features the colder darker look of her race, the look which he -who had betrayed her had always feared. She never spoke of him, nor of -the children. Her women would have ventured to bring the children to -her, unbidden, but Greswold forbade them; he knew that for the devoted -tenderness she bore them to be thus utterly still and changed, some -shock must have befallen her so great that the instincts of maternity -were momentarily quenched in her, as water springs are dried up by -earthquake. - -'She never speaks of me, nor of them?' asked Sabran with agony every -day of Greswold, and the old man answered him: - -'She never speaks at all. She replies to our questions as to her -health, she asks briefly for what she needs; no more.' - -'The children are innocent!' he said wearily, and his heart had never -gone forth to them so much as it did now, when they were shut out like -himself from the arms of their mother. - -Yet he understood how she shrank from them--might well almost abhor -them--seeing in them, as Vàsàrhely saw, the living proofs of her -surrender to a coward and a traitor. - -'What can he have done?' mused Greswold. 'Infidelity, perhaps, she -would not forgive; but it would not make her thus blind and deaf to the -children.' - -He passed his days in utter wretchedness; he wandered in the wintry -woods for hours, or sat in weary waiting outside her door. He cared -nothing what his household thought or guessed. He had forgotten every -living creature save herself. When he saw his young sons in the -distance he avoided them; he dreaded their guileless questions, the -stab of their unconscious words. Again and again he was tempted to blow -out his brains, or fling himself from the ice walls that towered above -him; but the sense that it would seem to her the last cowardice--the -last shame--restrained him. - -Sometimes it seemed to him that the tie between them was so strong, the -memories of their past passion so sweet, that even his crime could not -part them. Then he remembered of what race she came, of what honour she -was the representative and guardian, and his heart sank within him, and -he knew that his offence was one beyond all pardon. - -The whole household dimly felt that some great grief had fallen on -their master. His attitude, his absence from his wife's room, the -arrival of Prince Vàsàrhely, the abrupt departure of the Countess -Brancka, all told them that some calamity had come, though they were -loyally silent one to the other, their service having been always one -of devotion and veneration for their mistress, since they were all -Tauern-born people, bred up by their fathers in loyalty to Hohenszalras. - -'The first who speaks of aught he suspects goes for ever,' old Hubert -had said to his numerous _dienerschaft_ in the hearing of them all, -when one of the pages--he who had borne the note to his master in Olga -Brancka's rooms--ventured to hint that he thought some evil was abroad, -and would part their lord and lady. But all the faithful silence of -their attendants could not wholly conceal from the elder children -that something wrong, some greater sorrow even than their mother's -illness, was hanging over the old house. They were dull and vaguely -alarmed. They had not even the kindly presence of the Princess, who, -if she sometimes wearied them with admonitions, treated them with -tenderness, and atoned for her homilies by unending gifts. They were -very unhappy, though they said little, and wandered like little ghosts -among the wintry woods and in their spacious play-rooms. They were -tended, amused, provided for in all the same ways as usual. There were -all their pastimes and playthings; all their comforts and habits were -unaltered; but from the background of their sports and studies the -stately figure of their mother was missing, with her serene smile and -her happy power of checking all dispute or turbulence with a mere word -or a mere glance. - -The winter had come at a stroke, as it does without warning oftentimes -in the old Archduchy; the snow falling fast and thick, the waters -freezing in a night, the hills and valleys growing white and silent -between a sunset and a sunset. - -Their sledges carried them like lightning over the frozen roads, and -their little skates bore them swift as circling swallows over the ice. -It was the season Bela loved so well; but he had no joy in anything. -There was no twilight hour in the white-room at their mothers feet, -whilst she told them legends and stories: there was no moment in the -mornings when she came into their study and found their little puzzled -brains weary over a Latin declension or a crabbed page of history, and -made all clear to them by a few lucid graphic sentences; there was no -possible hope that, when the day was broad and bright over the wintry -land, she would call to them to bring the dogs and go with her and her -black horses through the glittering forests, where every bough was -heavy with the diamonds of the frost. To the little boys it seemed as -if the whole world had grown suddenly silent, and they were left all -alone in it. - -Their troops of attendants were no more consolation to them than his -crowd of courtiers is to a bereaved sovereign. - -Then, again, when Egon Vàsàrhely had by chance met them he had looked -at them strangely, and had always turned away without a greeting. 'And -when I was quite little he was so kind,' thought Bela, whose pride -seemed falling from him like a useless ragged garment. - -'It's all since Madame Olga came,' he said once to his brother. 'She is -a bad, bad woman. She was rude to our mother.' - -'I thought ladies were always good?' said Gela. - -'They are much wickeder than men,' said Bela, with premature wisdom. -'At least, when they _are_ wicked. I heard a gentleman say so in Paris.' - -'What could she do when she was here, do you think?' asked Gela, with a -tremor. - -'I do not know,' said Bela, gravely and sadly. 'But I am sure that she -hated our mother.' - -He was sure that all the evil had come from her; he had heard of evil -spirits, the people believed in them, and had charms against them. She -was one of them. Had she not tempted him to disobedience and revolt, -with her pictures of the grand gaiety, the magnificent gatherings, the -heart-rousing 'Halali!' of the Chantilly hunt? - -Bela did not forget. - -He would have cut off his little right hand, now, never to have vexed -his mother. - -He was yet more sorrowful still for his father. Though they were not -allowed to approach their mother's apartments, he had disobeyed the -injunction more than once, and had seen Sabran walking to and fro that -long gallery, or seated with bent head and folded arms on one of the -oaken benches. With all his boldness Bela had not dared to approach -that melancholy figure; but it had haunted his dreams, and troubled -him sorely as he rode and drove, and played and did his lessons. The -snow had come on the second week of his mother's illness, and when he -visited his riding-pony in its loose box on these frosted days on which -he could not use it, he buried his face in its abundant mane, and wept -bitterly, though he boasted that he never cried. - -Eight weeks passed by after the departure of Olga Brancka before his -mother could leave her bed; and all that while, save for a brief -question now and again as to their health, put to her physician, she -had never mentioned the children once. 'She does not want us any more,' -said Bela, with the great tears dimming his bold eyes. - -In the ninth week she was lifted on to a great chair, placed beside -one of the windows, and she turned her weary gaze on to the snow world -without. What use was life? Why had it returned to her? All emotion of -maternity, all memory of love, were for the time killed in her. She was -only conscious of an intolerable indignity, for which neither God nor -man could give her consolation. - -She would have gone barefoot all the world over sooner than be again -in his presence, had not the imperious courage which was the strongest -instinct of her nature refused to confess itself unable to meet the man -who had wronged her. In the long dark night which these past two months -had seemed to her, she had brought herself to face the inevitable end. -She had nerved herself to be her own judge and his. Weaker women would -have made the world their judge; she did not. She did not even seek the -counsel of that Church of which she was a reverent daughter. Her priest -had no access to her. - -'God must see my torture, but no other shall,' she said in her heart, -nor should the world ever have her fate to make an hour's jesting -wonder of, as is its way with all calamity. It would be her lifelong -companion; a rusted iron for ever piercing deeper, and deeper into her -flesh; but she would dwell alone with it--unpitied. The men of her race -had always been their own lawgivers, their own avengers; she would be -hers. - -Once she bade them bring her pens and ink, and she began to use them. -Then she laid them down, and tore in two an unfinished letter. 'Only -cowards write to save themselves from pain,' she thought, and on the -tenth day after she had risen from her bed she said to Greswold: - -'Tell the women to leave me alone, and ask--my husband--to come here.' - -She said the last words as if they choked her in their utterance. Her -husband he was; nothing could change the past. - -The old man hesitated, and ventured to suggest that any exertion was -dangerous; would it be wise, he asked, to speak of what might agitate -her? And thereon he paused and stammered, knowing that it was not his -place to have observed that there was any estrangement between them. - -She looked at him with suspicion. - -'Have I spoken in my sleep or in my unconsciousness?' she thought. - -Aloud she said only: - -'Be so good as to go to him at once.' - -He bowed and went, and to himself mused: - -'Since she loves him, her heart will melt when she meets his eyes. -His sin after all cannot be beyond those which women have forgiven a -million times over since first creation began.' - -Yet in himself he was not sure of that. The Szalras had had many great -and many generous qualities, but forgiveness of offence had never been -among them. - -She remained still, her hands folded on her knees, her face set as -though it were cast in bronze. The great bedchamber, with its hangings -of pale blue plush and its silver-mounted furniture, was dim and -shadowy in the greyness of a midwinter afternoon. Doors opened, here -to the bath and dressing chambers, there to the oratory, yonder to the -apartments of Sabran. She looked across to the last, and a shudder -passed over her; a sense of sickness and revulsion came on her. - -She sat still and waited; she was too weak to go further than this -room. She was wrapped in a long loose gown of white satin, lined and -trimmed with sable. There were black bearskins beneath her feet; the -atmosphere was warmed by hot air, and fragrant with, some bowls full of -forced roses, which her women had placed, there at noon. The grey light -of the fading afternoon touched the silver scroll-work of the bed, and -the silver frame of one large mirror, and fell on her folded hands and -on the glister of their rings. Her head leaned backward against the -high carved ebony of her chair. Her face was stern and bitterly cold, -as that of Maria Theresa when she signed the loss of Silesia. - -He approached from his own apartments, and came timidly and with a slow -step forward. He did not dare to salute her, or go near to her; he -stood like a banished man, disgraced, a few yards from her seat. - -Two months had gone by since he had seen her. When he entered he read -on her features that he must leave all hope behind. - -Her whole frame shrank within her as she saw him there, but she gave -no sign of what she felt. Without looking at him she spoke, in a voice -quite firm though it was faint from feebleness. - -'I have but little to say to you, but that little is best said, not -written.' - -He did not reply; his eyes were watching her with a terrible appeal, a -very agony of longing. They had not rested on her for two months. She -had been near the gates of the grave, within the shadow of death. He -would have given his life for a word of pity, a touch, a regard--and he -dared not approach her! - -She did not look at him. After that first glance, in which there had -been so much of horror, of revulsion, she did not once look towards -him. Her face had the immutability of a mask of stone; so many wretched -days and haunted nights had she spent nerving herself for this -inevitable moment that no emotion was visible in her; into her agony -she had poured her pride, and it sustained her, as the plaster poured -into the dry bones at Pompeii makes the skeleton stand erect, the ashes -speak. - -'After that which you have told me,' she said, after a moment's silence -in which he fancied she must hear the throbbing of his heart, 'you must -know that my life cannot be lived out beside yours. The law gives you -many, rights, no doubt, but I believe you will not be so base as to -enforce them.' - -'I have no rights!' he muttered. 'I am a criminal before the law. The -law will free you from me, if you choose.' - -'I do not choose,' she said coldly; 'you understand me ill. I do not -carry my wrongs or my woes to others. What you have told me is known -only to Prince Vàsàrhely and to the Countess Brancka. He will be -silent; he has the power to make her so. The world need know nothing. -Can you think that I shall be its informant?' - -'If you divorce me----' he murmured. - -A quiver of bitter anger passed over her features, but she retained her -self-control. - -'Divorce? What could divorce do for me? Could it destroy the past? -Neither Church nor Law can undo what you have done. Divorce would make -me feel that in the past I had been your mistress, not your wife, that -is all.' - -She breathed heavily, and again pressed her hand on her breast. - -'Divorce!' she repeated. 'Neither priest nor judge can efface a past as -you clean a slate with a sponge! No power, human or divine, can free -_me_, purify _me_, wash your dishonoured blood from your children's -veins.' - -She almost lost her self-control; her lips trembled, her eyes were full -of flame, her brow was black with passion. With a violent effort she -restrained herself; invective or reproach seemed to her low and coarse -and vile. - -He was silent; his greatest fear, the torture of which had harassed him -sleeping and waking ever since he had placed his secret in her hands, -was banished at her words. She would seek no divorce--the children -would not be disgraced--the world of men would not learn his shame; -and yet as he heard a deeper despair than any he had ever known came -over him. She was but as those sovereigns of old who scorned the poor -tribunals of man's justice because they held in their own might the -power of so much heavier chastisement. - -'I shall not seek for a legal separation,' she resumed; 'that is to -say, I shall not, unless you force me to do so to protect myself from -you. If you fail to abide by the conditions I shall prescribe, then you -will compel me to resort to any means that may shelter me from your -demands. But I do not think you will endeavour to force on me conjugal -rights which you obtained over me by a fraud.' - -All that she desired was to end quickly the torture of this interview, -from which her courage had not permitted her to shrink. She had to -defend herself because she would not be defended by others, and she -only sought to strike swiftly and unerringly so as to spare herself -and him all needless or lingering throes. Her speech was brief, for -it seemed to her that no human language held expression deep and vast -enough to measure the wrong done to her, could she seek to give it -utterance. - -She would not have made a sound had any murderer stabbed her body; she -would not now show the death-wound of her soul and honour to this man -who had stabbed both to the quick. Other women would have made their -moan aloud, and cursed him. The daughter of the Szalras choked down her -heart in silence, and spoke as a judge speaks to one condemned by man -and God. - -'I wish no words between us,' she said, with renewed calmness. 'You -know your sin; all your life has been a lie. I will keep me and mine -back from vengeance; but do not mistake--God may pardon you, I never! -What I desired to say to you is that henceforth you shall wholly -abandon the name you stole; you shall assign the land of Romaris to the -people; you shall be known only as you have been known here of late, -as the Count von Idrac. The title was mine to give, I gave it you; no -wrong is done save to my fathers, who were brave men.' - -He remained silent; all excuse he might have offered seemed as if from -him to her it would be but added outrage. He was her betrayer, and she -had the power to avenge betrayal; naught that she could say or do could -seem unjust or undeserved beside the enormity of her irreparable wrongs. - -'The children?' he muttered faintly, in an unuttered supplication. - -'They are mine,' she said, always with the same unchanging calm that -was cold as the frozen earth without. 'You will not, I believe, seek to -enforce your title to dispute them with me?' - -He gave a gesture of denial. - -He, the wrong-doer, could not realise the gulf which his betrayal had -opened betwixt himself and her. On him all the ties of their past -passion were sweet, precious, unchanged in their dominion. He could not -realise that to her all these memories were abhorred, poisoned, stamped -with ineffable shame; he could not believe that she who had loved the -dust that his feet had brushed could now regard him as one leprous and -accursed. He was slow to understand that his sin had driven him out of -her life for evermore. - -Commonly it is the woman on whom the remembrance of love has an -enthralling power when love itself is traitor; commonly it is the man -on whom the past has little influence, and to whom its appeal is vainly -made; but here the position was reversed. He would have pleaded by it: -she refused to acknowledge it, and remained as adamant before it. His -nerve was too broken, his conscience was too heavily weighted for him -to attempt to rebel against her decisions or sway her judgment. If she -had bidden him go out and slay himself he would gladly have obeyed. - -'Once you said,' he murmured timidly, 'that repentance washes out all -crimes. Will you count my remorse as nothing?' - -'You would have known no remorse had your secret never been discovered!' - -He shrank as from a blow. - -'That is not true,' he said wearily. 'But how can I hope you will -believe me?' - -She answered nothing. - -'Once you told me that there was no sin you would not pardon me!' he -muttered. - -She replied: - -'We pardon sin; we do not pardon baseness.' - -She paused and put her hand to her heart; then she spoke again in that -cold, forced, measured voice, which seemed on his ear as hard and -pitiless as the strokes of an iron hammer, beating life out beneath it. - -'You will leave Hohenszalras; you will go where you will; you have the -revenues of Idrac. Any other financial arrangements that you may wish -to make I will direct my lawyers to carry out. If the revenues of Idrac -be insufficient to maintain you----' - -'Do not insult me--so,' he murmured, with a suffocated sound in his -voice, as though some hand were clutching at his throat. - -'Insult _you_!' she echoed, with a terrible scorn. - -She resumed, with the same inflexible calmness: - -'You must live as becomes the rank due to my husband. The world need -suspect nothing. There is no obligation to make it your confidante. If -anyone were wronged by the usurpation of the name you took it would -be otherwise, but as it is you will lose nothing in the eyes of men; -society will not flatter you the less. The world will only believe that -we are tired of one another, like so many. The blame will be placed on -me. You are a brilliant comedian, and can please and humour it. I am -known to be a cold, grave, eccentric woman, a recluse, of whom it will -deem it natural that you are weary. Since you allow that I have the -right to separate from you--to deal with you as with a criminal--you -will not seek to recall your existence to me. You will meet my -abstinence by the only amends you can make to me. Let me forget--as -far as I am able--let me forget that ever you have lived!' - -He staggered slightly, as if under some sword-stroke from an unseen -hand. A great faintness came upon him. He had been prepared for rage, -for reproach, for bitter tears, for passionate vengeance; but this -chill, passionless, disdainful severance from him for all eternity he -had never dreamed of: it crept like the cold of frost into his very -marrow; he was speechless and mute with shame. If she had dragged him -through all the tribunals of the world she would have hurt him and -humiliated him far less. Better all the hooting gibes of the whole -earth than this one voice, so cold, so inflexible, so full of utter -scorn! - -Despite her bodily weakness she rose to her full height, and for the -first time looked at him. - -'You have heard me,' she said; 'now go!' - -But instead, blindly, not knowing what he did, he fell at her feet. - -'But you loved me,' he cried, 'you loved me so well!' - -The tears were coursing down his cheeks. - -She drew the sables of her robe from his touch. - -'Do not recall _that_,' she said, with a bitter smile. 'Women of my -race have killed men before now for less outrage than yours has been -to me.' - -'Kill me!' he cried to her. 'I will kiss your hand.' - -She was mute. - -He clung to her gown with an almost convulsive supplication. - -'Believe, at least, that I loved _you_!' he cried, beside himself in -his misery and impotence. 'Believe that, at the least!----' - -She turned from him. - -'Sir, I have been your dupe for ten long years; I can be so no more!' - -Under that intolerable insult he rose slowly, and his eyes grew blind, -and his limbs trembled, but he walked from her, and sought not again -either her pity or her pardon. - -On the threshold he looked back once. She stood erect, one hand resting -upon the carved work of her high oak chair; cold, stalely, motionless, -the furred velvets falling to her feet like a queen's robes. - -He looked, then passed the threshold and closed the door behind him. He -walked down the corridors blindly, not knowing whither he went. - -They were dusky, for the twilight of the winter's day had come. He did -not see a little figure which was coming towards him until the child -had stopped him with a timid outstretched hand. - -'Shall we never see her again?' said Bela, in a hushed voice. 'It is so -long!--so long! Oh, please do tell me!' - -Sabran paused, and looked down on the boy with blood-shot burning eyes. -For a moment or so he did not answer; then, with a sudden movement, he -drew his son to him, lifted him in his arms and kissed him passionately. - -'You will see her, not I--not I!' he said with a sob like a woman's. -'Bela, listen! Be obedient to her, adore her, have no will but hers; be -loyal, be truthful, be noble in all your words and all your thoughts, -and then in time perhaps--perhaps--she will pardon you for being also -mine!' - -The child, terrified, clung to him with all his force, dimly conscious -of some great agony near him, but far beyond his comprehension or -consolation. - -'I love you, I will always love you!' he said, with his hands clasped -around his father's throat. - -'Love your mother!' said Sabran, as he kissed the boy's soft cheeks, -made wet by his own tears; then he released the little frightened -form, and went himself away into the darkness. - -In a little time, with no word to any living soul there, he had -harnessed some horses with his own hands, and in the fast falling gloom -of the night had driven from Hohenszalras. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVIII. - - -Bela heard the galloping hoofs of the horses, and ran with his fleet -feet, quick as a fawn's, down the grand staircase and out on to the -terrace, where the winds of the north were driving with icy cold and -furious force over a world of snow. With his golden hair streaming in -the blast, he strained his eyes into the gloom of the avenues below, -but the animals had vanished from sight. He turned sadly and went into -the Rittersaal. - -'Is that my father who has gone?' he said in a low voice to Hubert, who -was there. The old servant, with the tears in his eyes, told him that -it was. A groom had come to him to say that their lord had made ready -a sledge and driven away without a word to any one of them, while the -night was falling apace. - -Bela heard and said nothing; he had his mother's power of silence in -sorrow. He climbed the staircase silently, and went and listened in the -corridor where his father had waited and watched so long. His heart was -heavy, and ached with an indefinable dread. He did not seek Gela. It -seemed to him that this sorrow was his alone. He alone had heard his -father's farewell words; he alone had seen his father weep. - -All the selfishness and vanity of his little soul were broken up and -vanished, and the first grief he had ever known filled up their empty -place. He had adored his father with an unreasoning blind devotion, -like a dog's; and this intense affection had been increased rather than -repressed by the indifference with which he had been treated. - -His father was gone; he felt sure that it was for ever: if he could not -see his mother he thought he could not live. To the mind of a child -such gigantic and unutterable terrors rise up under the visitation of a -vague alarm. Abroad in the woods, or under any bodily pain or fear, he -was as brave as a lion whelp, but he had enough of the German mystic in -his blood to be imaginative and visionary when trouble touched him. The -sight of his father's grief had shaken his nerves, and filled him with -the first passionate pity he had ever known. A man so great, so strong, -so wonderful in prowess, so far aloof from himself as Sabran had always -seemed to his little son, to be so overwhelmed in such helpless sorrow, -appeared to Bela so terrible a thing that an intense fear took for the -first time possession of his little valiant soul. His father could slay -all the great beasts of the forests; could break in the horse fresh -from the freedom of the plains; could breast the stormy waters like -a petrel; could scale the highest heights of the mountains. And yet -someone--something--had had power to break down all his strength, and -make him flee in wretchedness. - -It could not be his mother who had done this thing? No, no! never, -never! It had been done because she was lying ill, helpless, perhaps -was dead. - -As that last dread came over him he lost all control over himself. -He knew what death was. A little girl he had been fond of in Paris -had died whilst he was her playmate, and he had seen her lying, so -waxen, so cold, so unresponsive, when he had laid his lilies on her -little breast. A great despair came over him, and made him reckless -what he did. In the desperation of terror blent with love, he started -up and ran to the door of his mother's apartments. It yielded to his -pressure; he ran across the ante chamber and the dressing-rooms, and -pulled aside the tapestry. - -Then he saw her; seated at the further side of the great bedchamber. -There was a feeble grey light from the western sky, to which the -casements of the chamber turned. It was very pale and dim, but by it he -saw her lying back, rigid and colourless, the white satin, the dusky -fur, the deep shadows gathered around her. There was that in her look -and in her attitude which made the child's heart grow cold, as his -father's had done. - -She was alone; for she had bade her women not come unless she summoned -them. Bela stood and gazed, his pulses beating loud and hard; then with -a cry he ran forward and sprang to her, and threw his arms about her. - -'Oh, mother, mother, you are not dead!' he cried. 'Oh, speak to me; do -speak to me! He is gone away for ever and ever, and if we cannot see -you we shall all die. Oh, do not look at me so! Pray, pray, do not. -Shall I fetch Lili?---' - -In his vague terror he thought to disarm her by his little sister's -name. She had thrust him away from her, and was looking with cold and -cruel eyes on his face, that was so like the face of his father. She -was thinking: - -'You are the son of a serf, of a traitor, of a liar, of a bastard, -and yet you are _mine_! I bore you, and yet you are his. You are -shame incarnate. You are the living sign of my dishonour. You bear my -name--my untainted name--and yet you were begotten by him.' - -Bela dropped down at her feet as his father had done. - -'Oh, do not look at me so,' he sobbed. 'Oh, mother, what have I done? -I have tried to be good all this while. He is gone away, and he is so -unhappy, and he bade me never vex or disobey you, and I never will.' - -His voice was broken in his sobs, and he leaned his head upon her -knees, and clasped them with both his arms. She looked down on him, and -drew a deep shuddering breath. The holiest joy of a woman's life was, -for her, poisoned at the springs. - -Then, at the child's clinging embrace, at his piteous and innocent -grief, the motherhood in her welled up under the frost of her heart, -and all its long-suffering and infinite tenderness revived, and -overcame the horror that wrestled with it. She raised him up and -strained him to her breast. - -'You are mine, you are mine!' she murmured over him. 'I must forget all -else.' - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIX. - - -He spring dawned once more on Hohenszalras, and the summer followed it. -The waters leapt, the woods rejoiced, the gardens blossomed, and the -children played; but the house was silent as a house in which the dead -are tying. There was indeed a corpse there--the corpse of buried joy, -of murdered love, of ruined honour. - -The household resumed its calm order, the routine of the days was -unbroken, the quiet yet stately life had been taken up in its course -as though it had never been altered; and wherever young children are -there will always be some shout of mirth, some sound of happy laughter -somewhere; the children laugh as the birds sing, though those amidst -them bury their dead. - -But the house was as a house of mourning, and the sense of death was -there as utterly as though he who was gone had been laid in his grave -amidst the silver figures and the marble tombs in the Chapel of the -Knights. No one ever heard a sigh from her lips, or ever saw the tears -beneath her eyelids; but the sense of her bereavement, as one terrible, -inconsolable, eternal, weighed like a pall on all those who were about -her; the lowliest peasant on her estates understood that the sanctity -of some untold woe had built up a wall of granite between her and all -the living world. - -She had always been grateful to fate for her old home set amidst the -silence of the mountains, but she had never been so thankful for it -as now. It shielded her from all the observation and interrogation of -the world; no one came thither unbidden, unless she chose, no visitant -would ever break that absolute solitude which was the sole approach -to peace that she would ever know. Even her relatives could not pass -the icy barrier of her cold denial. They wearied her for a while with -written importunities and suggestions, hinted wonder, delicately -expressed questions. But they made no way into her confidence; they -soon left her to herself and to her children. They said angrily to -themselves that she had been always whimsical and a solitary; they -had been certain that soon or late that ill-advised union would be -dissolved in some way, private or public. They were all people haughty, -sensitive, abhorrent of scandal; they were content that the separation -should be by mutual consent and noiseless. - -She had had letters from Egon Vàsàrhely full of delicate tenderness; in -the last he had asked with humility if he might visit Hohenszalras. She -had written in return to him: - -'You have my gratitude and my affection, but until we are quite old we -will not meet. Leave me alone; you can do naught for me.' - -He obeyed; he understood the loyalty to one disloyal which made her -refuse to meet him, of whose loyalty she was so sure. - -He sent a magnificent present to the child who was his namesake, and -wrote to her no more save upon formal anniversaries. - -The screen of her dark forests protected her from all the cruel comment -and examination of the men and women of her world. She knew them well -enough to know that when she ceased to appear amidst them, when she -ceased to contribute to their entertainment, when she ceased to bid -them to her houses, she would soon cease also to be remembered by them; -even their wonder would live but for a day. If they blamed her in their -ignorance, their blame would be as indifferent as their praise had -been. - -She had been told by her lawyers that her husband had refused to touch -a coin of the revenues of Idrac, and had once visited them to sign a -power of procuration, whereby they could receive those revenues and set -them aside in accumulation for his son Gela. That was all she heard. -Whither he had gone she was ignorant. She did not make any effort to -learn. On the night following his departure a peasant had been sent -with the sleigh and horses home to Hohenszalras. The solicitors of -Salzburg had seen him a week or two later at their ancient offices -under the Calvarienburg: that was all. She had bade him let it be -forgotten that he had ever lived beside her. He had obeyed her. - -The days, and weeks, and months went on, and his place knew him no -more. The jägers, seated round their fires in their forest-huts, spoke -longingly and wonderingly of his absence. The hunters, when they -brought down a steinbock with unusual effort or skill, said that it had -been a shot that would have been worthy of his praise. His old friend -wept for him with the slow sad tears of age, and the child Bela prayed -for his return every night that he knelt down before his crucifix. But -his name never passed his wife's lips, and was never written by her -hand. She had given her all with the superb generosity of a sovereign; -she had in her wrongs the intense abiding unutterable disgust of a -sovereign betrayed and outraged. When she let grief have its way, it -was when no eyes beheld her, when the night was down and solitude -sheltered her. - -She had never spoken of what had befallen her to any human ear; not -even to her priest's. The horror of it was buried in her own breast; -its sepulchre all the waste and ashes of her perished joys. - -When the Princess Ottilie, weeping, entreated to be told the worst, she -answered briefly: - -'He betrayed me. How, matters nothing.' - -More than that she never said. The Princess supposed that she spoke -of the disloyalty of the passions, and dared not urge her to more -confidence. 'I warned him that she would never forgive if he were -faithless,' she thought, and wept for hours at her orisons, her gentle -soul resenting the inflexibility of this mute immutable bitterness of -offended love. - -Too proud and too delicate to intrude undesired into any confidence, -and too tenderhearted to utter censure aloud to one she loved, the -Princess showed in a thousand ways without speech that she considered -there were cruelty and egotism in her unexplained separation from -her husband. Believing as she did that his offence was that conjugal -infidelity which, however blameable, is one of those injuries which -all women who love forgive, and which those who do not love endure in -silence from patience and dignity, herself offended at her exclusion -from all knowledge of the facts, she said but little; but her whole -attitude was one of restrained reproach. - -'With time she will change,' she said to herself. But time passed on, -and she could see no change, nor any hope of it. - -The grave severe beauty of their mother had a vague terror for her -children. She never now smiled at their mirth, laughed at their sports, -or joined in their pastimes. She was almost always silent. Bela longed -to throw his arms about her knees, and cry out to her: 'Mother, -mother, where is _he?_' But he did not venture to do so. Without his -reasoning upon it, the child instinctively felt that her frozen calm -covered depths of suffering which he did not dare disturb. He had been -so completely terrified once, that the remembrance of that hour lay -like ice upon his bright courage. Even the younger ones felt something -of the same fear. Their mother remembered them, cared for them, was -heedful that their needs of body and of brain were perfectly supplied. -But they felt, as young children feel what they cannot explain, that -they were outside her life, insufficient for her, even fraught with -intense pain to her. Often when she stooped to kiss them a shudder -passed over her; often when they came into her presence she looked away -from them, as though the sight of them stung and blinded her. They -never heard an angry word from her lips, but even repeated anger would -have kept them at less distance from her than did that mute majesty of -a grief they could not comprehend. - -She was more severe to all her dependants; she never became unjust, -but she was often stern; the children at the schools saw her smile no -more. Santa Claus still filled their stockings on Christmas Eve; but of -the stately figure which moved amidst them, robed in black, they grew -afraid. She seldom went to them or to her peasantry. Bela and Gela were -sent with her winter gifts. In the summer the sennerins never now saw -her enter their high huts and drink a cup of milk, talking with them of -their herds and flocks. - -She was tranquil as of old. She fulfilled the duties of her properties, -and attended to all the demands made upon her by her people; her -liberalities were unchanged, her justice was unwarped, her mind was -clear and keen. But she never smiled, even on her young daughter; and -the little Lili said once to her brothers: - -'Do you know, I think our mother is changing to marble. She will soon -be of stone, like the statues in the chapel. When I touch her I feel -cold.' - -Bela was angered. - -'You are ungrateful, you little child,' he said to his sister. 'Who -loves us, who cares for us, who thinks of us, as our mother does? If -her lips are cold, perhaps her heart is broken. We are only children; -we can do so little.' - -He had treasured the words of his father in his soul. He had never -told them, except to Gela, but they were always present to him. He -alone had seen and heard enough to understand that some dire disaster -had shattered in pieces the beautiful life which his parents had led -together. He had received an indelible impression from the two scenes -of that evening. Without comprehending, he had felt that something -had befallen them, which struck at their honour no less than at -their peace. He had a clear conception of what honour was; it was -the first tuition that Wanda von Szalras gave her children. Vague as -his understanding of their grief had been, it had been sufficient -to strike at that pride winch was inborn in him. He was like the -Dauphin of whom he had thought in Paris. He had seen his father driven -from his throne; he had seen his mother in the sackcloth and ashes -of affliction. He was humiliated, bewildered, softened; he, who had -believed himself omnipotent because all the people of the Iselthal ran -to do his bidding, felt how helpless he was in truth. He was shut out -from his mother's confidence; he had been powerless to console her or -to retain his father; there was something even in himself from which -his mother shrank. What had his father said? 'She will in time pardon -you for being mine.' What had been the meaning of those strange words? -And where had his father gone? - -When the summer came and Bela rode through the glad green woods, his -heart was heavy. Would his father never ride there any more? Bela -had often watched, himself unseen, the fiery horse that bore the -man he loved come plunging and leaping through bough and brake till -it passed him as though the wind bore it. He had always thought as -he had watched, 'When I grow up I will be just what he is'; and now -that splendid and gracious figure which had been always present on -the horizon of his child's mind, magnified and glorified like the -illuminated figures in the painted chronicles, was no more there--had -faded utterly away in the dusk and the snow of that wintry twilight. - -A thousand times was the question to his mother on his lips: 'Will he -never come back? Shall we never see him again?' But he dared not speak -it when he saw that look of a revulsion they could not comprehend -always upon her face. - -'He bade me never vex her,' Bela thought, and obeyed. - -'I wonder if ever he think of us,' he said once to Gela, as their -ponies walked down one of the grassy rides of the home woods. - -'Perhaps he is dead,' said Gela, in a hushed, wistful voice. - -'How dare you say that, Gela?' said his brother, angry from an -intolerable pain. 'If he were--were--_that_, we should be told it. -There would be masses in the chapel. We should have black clothes. Oh -no! he is not dead. I should know it, I am sure I should know it. He -would send down some angel to tell me.' - -'Why do you care so much for him?' said Gela, very low. 'It must be he -who has made our mother so changed, so unhappy; and it is she whom we -should love most. You say even he told you so.' - -Bela's lips unclosed to loose an angry answer. He was thinking; 'It is -she who sent him away, she who made him weep.' But his loyalty checked -it; he would not utter what he thought, even to his brother. - -'I think he would not wish us to talk of it,' he said gravely and -sadly. 'We will pray for him; that is all we can do.' - -'And for her,' said Gela, under his breath. - -They were both mute, and let the bridles lie on their ponies' necks as -they rode home quietly and sorrowfully in the still summer afternoon to -the great house, which, with all its thousand casements gleaming in the -sun, seemed to them so silent, so empty, so deserted now. Bela looked -up at the banner, with its deep red and its blazoned gold streaming on -a westerly wind. 'The flag would be half-mast high if it were _that_,' -he thought, his heart wrung by the dread which Gela had suggested to -him. He had seen the banner lowered when Prince Lilienhöhe had died. - -On the lawn under the terrace the other children were playing with -little painted balloons; the boys did not go to them, but riding round -to the stables entered the house by the side entrance. Gela went to his -violin, which he loved better than any toy, and studied seriously. -Bela wandered wearily over the building, tormented by the doubt which -his brother had put in his thoughts. They were always enjoined to keep -to their own wing of the house; but he often broke the rule, as he did -most others. He walked listlessly along the innumerable galleries, and -up and down the grand staircases, his St. Hubert hound following his -steps. His face was very pale, his little hands were folded behind -his back, his head was bent. He knew that the Latin and Greek for the -morrow were all unprepared, but he could not think of them. He was -thinking only: 'If it should be, if it should be?' - -He came at last to the door of the library. It was there that his -mother now spent most of her time. She took long rides alone, always -alone; and often chose for them the wildest weather. When she was -indoors, she passed her time in unremitting application to all the -business of her estates. He opened the great oak door very softly, and -saw her seated at the table; Donau and Neva, who now were old, were -lying near her feet. She was studying some papers. The sunset glow came -through the painted casements and warmed all the light about her, but -by its contrast, her attitude, her expression, her features, looked -only the graver, the colder, the more colourless. Her gown was black, -her pearls were about her throat, her profile was severe, her cheek, -turned to the light, was pale and thin. She did not see the little -gallant figure of her son in his white summer riding-clothes, and with -his golden hair cut across his brows, looking like a boy's portrait by -Reynolds. - -He stood a moment irresolute; then he went across the long room and -stood before her, and bowed as he knew he ought to do. She started and -turned her head and saw the pallor of the child's face. She put out her -hand to him; it was very thin, and the rings were large upon it. He -saw a contraction on her features as of pain; it was but of a moment, -because he looked so like his father.-- - -'What is it, Bela?' she said to him. 'You ought not to come here.' - -His lower lip quivered. He hesitated; then, gathering all his courage, -said timidly: - -'May I ask you just one thing?' - -'Surely, my child--are you afraid of me?' - -It struck her, with a sudden sense of contrition, that she had made the -children afraid of her. She had never thought of it before. - -Bela hesitated once more, then said boldly: Gela said to day _he_ might -be dead. Oh, if he ever die, will you please tell me? I shall think of -it day and night.' - -Her face changed terribly; the darker passions of her nature were -spoken on it. - -'I have forbidden you to speak of your father, if it be him you mean,' -she said sternly and very coldly. - -But Bela, though frightened, clung to his one thought. - -'But he may die!' he said piteously. 'Will you tell me? Please, will -you tell me? He might be dead now--we never hear.' - -She leaned her arm upon the table, and covered her eyes with her hand. -She was silent. She strove with herself so as not to treat the child -with harshness. Though he hurt her so cruelly, he was right. She -honoured him for his courage. - -'If you will only tell me that,' said the boy, with tears in his -throat, 'I will never ask anything else--never--never!' - -'Why do you cling so to his memory?' she said, with a sudden impatience -of jealousy. 'He never took heed of you.' - -'I was so little,' said Bela, with a sigh. 'But I loved him--oh! I have -always loved him--and I was the last to see him that night.' - -'I know!' she said harshly, ashamed meanwhile of her own harshness, for -how could the child suspect the torture his words were to her? What -had his father given her beautiful boy?--disgraced descent, sullied -blood, the heritage of falsehood and of dishonour. Yet the boy loved -his memory better than he loved her presence. And the time had been, -not so long passed, when she would have recognised the preference with -fond and generous delight. - -Bela stood beside her, his eyes watching her with timid interrogation, -with longing appeal. The look upon his face went to her heart. She knew -not what to say to him. She had hoped he would be always silent, and -forget, as children usually forget. - -'You are right to feel so,' she said to him at last, with a violent -effort. 'Cherish his memory, and pray for him always; but do not speak -of him to me. When you are grown to manhood, if I be living then, you -shall hear what has parted your father and me; you shall judge us -yourself. But there are many years to that; many weary years for me. -I shall endeavour that they shall be happy ones for you; but you must -never ask me, never speak, of him. I gave you that command that night; -but you are very young, you have forgotten.' - -Bela listened with a sinking heart. He gathered from her words that -his father's absence was, as he had feared, for ever. - -'I had not forgotten,' he said in a whisper, for the moment was -terrible to him. 'But if--if what Gela said should ever be, will you -tell me that? I will not disobey again, but pray--pray--tell me _that._' - -His mother's face seemed to him to grow colder and colder, paler and -paler, till she scarcely looked a living woman. - -'I will tell you--if I know,' she said, with a pause between each slow -spoken word. Then the only smile that had come upon her lips for many -months came there; a smile sadder than tears, more bitter than all -scorn. - -'He will outlive me, fear not,' she said, as she put out her hand to -the child. 'Now leave me, my dear; I am occupied.' - -Bela touched her hand with his lips, which, despite his will, quivered -as he did so. He felt that he had failed, that he had disobeyed and -hurt her, that he had been unable to show one tenth of all the feelings -which choked him with their force and longing. He hung his head as -he went sorrowfully away. 'She may not know! She may not know!' he -thought, with terror. - -He looked back at her timidly as he closed the door. She had resumed -her writing; the red sunset light fell on her black gown, on her -stately head, on her profile, cut clear as on a cameo. - -He dared not return. - -The mother whom he had known in other years, on whose knee he had -rested his head as she told him tales in the twilight hour, whose hand -had caressed his curls, whose smile had rewarded his stammering Latin -or his hardly achieved line of handwriting, who had stooped over him -in his drowsy dreams, and made him think of angels, the mother who had -said to Egon Vàsàrhely: 'This is my Bela: love him a little for my -sake,' seemed as far from him as though she were lying in her tomb. - -She, when the tapestry had fallen behind the slender figure of her -little son, continued to write on. It was hard, dry matter that she -wrote of; the condition of her miners amongst the silver ore of the -north-east. She forced her mind to it, she compelled her will and -her hand; that was all. These things depended on her; she would not -neglect them, she strove to find in them that distraction which lighter -natures seek in pleasure. But in vain she now endeavoured to compel her -attention to the details she was following and correcting; soon they -became to her so confused that they were unintelligible; for once her -intelligence refused to obey her will. The child's words haunted her. -She laid down her pen, pushed aside the reports and the letter in which -she was replying to them, and rising paced to and fro the long polished -floor of the library. - -It was here that he had first bowed before her on that night when -Hohenszalras had sheltered him from the storm. - -'We had a mass of thanksgiving!' she thought. - -The child's words haunted her. Not to know even _that_ when they had -passed nine years together in the closest of all human ties! For the -first time the misgiving came to her, had she been too harsh? No; it -would have been impossible to have done less; many would have done far -more in chastisement of the fraud upon their honour and good faith. -Yet as she recalled their many hours of joy it seemed as if she had -remembered these too little. Then again she scouted her own weakness. -What had been all his life beside her save one elaborate lie? - -The broad shafts of the blazing sunset slanted across the inlaid woods -of the floor which she paced; the windows were open, the birds sang in -the rose boughs and ivy without. The summers would come thus, one after -another, with their intolerable light, and the intolerable laughter of -the unconscious children; and she would carry her burden through them, -though the day was for ever dark for her. - -Time had been when she had thought that she should die if he were lost -to her; but she lived on and marvelled at herself. Her very soul seemed -to have gone from her with the destruction of her love. Her body seemed -to her but a mere shell, an inanimate pulseless thing. The only thing -that seemed alive in her was shame. - -She paced now up and down the long room while the sunset died and the -grey evening dulled the painted panes of the casements. The boy's -question had pierced through her frozen serenity. It was true that she -had no knowledge where his father was; he might be dead, he might be -killed by his own hand--she knew nothing. She had bidden him let her -forget that he had ever lived beside her, and he had obeyed her. He -might be in the world of men, careless and content, consoled by others, -or he might be in his grave. - -All she knew was that he never touched the revenues of Idrac. - -She paused on the same spot where he had stood before her first, with -his fair beauty, his courtier's smile, his easy grace, the very prince -of gentlemen; and her hands clenched the folds of her gown as she -thought--'the first of actors! Nothing more.' - -And she, Wanda von Szalras, had been the dupe of that inimitable -mimicry and mockery! - -The thought was like a rusted iron, eating deeper and deeper into her -heart each day. When her consciousness, her memory, would have said -otherwise, would have told her that in much he was loyal and sincere, -though in one great thing he had been false, she would not trust -herself to hearken to the suggestion. 'Let me see clearly, though I die -of what I see!' she said in her soul. She would be blind no more. She -hated herself that she had been ever blind. - -She had been always his dupe, from the first sonorous phrases she had -heard him utter in the French Chamber to the last sentence with which -he had left her when he went from her to the presence of Olga Brancka. -So she believed. Here she did him wrong; but how was she to tell that? -To her it seemed but one long-sustained comedy, one brilliant and -hateful imposture. - -Sometimes his cry to her rang in her ears: 'Believe at least that I -did love you!' and some subtle true instinct in her whispered to her -that he had there been sincere, that in passion and devotion at least -he had never been false. But she thrust the thought away; it seemed but -another form of self-deception. - -The dull slow evening passed as usual; it was late in summer and the -night came early. She dined in company with Madame Ottilie and sat with -her as usual afterwards. The room seemed full of his voice, of his -laughter, of the music of which he had had such mastery. - -She never opened her lips to say to the Princess Ottilie: 'But for you -he would have passed from my life a mere stranger, seen but once.' -But the tender conscience of the Princess made her feel the bitterest -reproach every time that the eyes of her niece met her own, every time -that she passed the blank space in the picture gallery where once had -hung the portrait of Sabran, painted in court dress by Mackart. The -portrait was locked away in a dark closet that opened out from the -oratory of his wife. With its emblazoned arms and marquis's coronet on -the frame, it had seemed such a perpetual record of his sin that she -had had it taken from the wall and shut in darkness, feeling that it -could not hang in its falsehood amidst the portraits of her people. But -often she opened the door of her oratory and let the light stream upon -the portrait where it leaned against the closet wall. It seemed then as -if he stood living before her, looking as he had looked so often at the -banquets and balls of the Hofburg, when she had felt so much pride in -his personal beauty, his grace of bearing, his supreme distinction. - -'Who could have dreamed that it was but a perfect comedy,' she thought, -'as much a comedy as Got's or Bressant's!' - -Then her conscience smote her with a sense that she did him injustice -when she thought so. In all things save his one crime he had been -as true a gentleman as any of the great nobles of the empire. His -intelligence, his bearing, his habits, his person, were all those of a -patrician of the highest culture. The fraud of his name apart, there -had been nothing in him that the most fastidious aristocrats would -have disowned. He had inherited the qualities of a race of princes, -though he had been descended unlawfully from them. His title had been -a borrowed thing, unlawfully worn; but his supreme distinction of -manner, his tact, his bodily grace, that large and temperate view of -men and things which marks a gentleman, these had all been inborn and -natural to him. He had been no mere actor when he had moved through -a throne-room by her side. Her calmer reason told her this, but her -instincts of candour and of pride made her deny that where there was -one fraud there could be any truth. - -She span on now at her ivory wheel because it was mere mechanical work, -which left thought free. The Princess, in lieu of slumbering, looked at -her ever and again. Suddenly she gathered her courage and spoke. - -'Wanda, you are a Christian woman,' she said slowly and softly. 'Is it -Christian never to forgive?' - -Her face did not change as she turned the spinning-wheel. - -'What is forgiveness?' she said coldly. 'Is it abstinence from -vengeance? I have abstained.' - -'It is far more than that!' - -'Then I do not reach it.' - -'No; you do not. That is why I presumed to ask you, is it in consonance -with your tenets, with your duties?' - -'I think so.' - -'Then change your creed,' said the Princess. - -A sombre wrath shone in her eyes as she looked up one moment. - -'I have the blood in me of men who were not always Christians, but who, -even when Pagan, knew what honour was. There are some things which are -so vile that one must be vile oneself before one can forgive them.' - -The Princess sighed. - -'I am in ignorance of the nature of your wrongs; but this I know--they -erred who gave you absolution at Eastertide, whilst you still bore -bitterness in your soul.' - -'Would I lay bare my soul and his shame now to any priest?' thought -Wanda; but she repressed the answer. She said simply: 'Dear mother, -believe me, I have been more merciful than many would have been.' - -'You mean that you have not sought for a divorce? Nay, that is not -mercy; that is decency, dignity, self-respect. When they of a great -race go to the public with their wrongs they drag their escutcheon in -the mud for the pleasure of the crowd. That you have not done; that is -not mercy. You do but follow your instincts; you are a gentlewoman.' - -A momentary impulse came over her, as she heard, to tell her companion -his sin and her own shame; the woman's weakness, desiring sympathy -and comprehension, assailed her for an instant. But she resisted and -repressed it. The Princess Ottilie was aged and feeble. She had had no -slight share in bringing about this union, which was now so cruelly -broken; she had been ever proud of her penetration and devoted to his -defence. To learn the truth would be a shock so terrible to her that -it must needs be veiled from her for ever. Besides, his wife felt as -though the relation would blister her lips were she to make it even to -her oldest friend. - -Had she known all, the elder woman would have been even more bitter -in her hatred, even more inflexible in her sense of outrage than she -herself; but she could not purchase sympathy at such a price. She chose -rather to be herself condemned. - -Offended, the Princess rose slowly to go to her own apartments. The -tears welled painfully in her eyes. - -'You were so happy, he was so devoted,' she murmured. 'Can all that -have crumbled like a house of sand?' - -Wanda von Szalras said bitterly: - -'What did I say once, the day of my betrothal? That I leaned on a reed. -The reed has withered, that is all. You see, I can stand without it.' - -She conducted her aunt to her bedchamber with the usual courteous -observances; then returned and sat long alone in the silent chamber. - -'Forgive! what is the obligation of forgiveness?' she thought. 'It is -the obligation to pardon offences, infidelity, unkindness, cruelty, but -not dishonour. To forgive dishonour is to be dishonoured. So would my -fathers have said.' - - - - -CHAPTER XL. - - -Bela that dawn was awakened by his mother standing beside his bed. She -stooped and touched his curls with her lips. - -'I was harsh to you yesterday, my child,' she said to him. 'I come to -tell you now that you were quite right to have the thought you had. You -are his son; you must not forget him.' - -Bela lifted up his beautiful flushed face and his eye brilliant from -sleep. - -'I am glad I may remember,' he said simply; then he added, with his -cheeks burning: 'When I am a man I will go and find him and bring him -back.' - -His mother turned away her face. - -When his manhood should come and he should hear the story of his -father's sin, what would he say? Would not all his soul cry out aloud -and curse the impostor who had begotten him? - -The eyes of Bela followed the dark form of his mother as she passed -from his room. - -'She is very unhappy,' he thought wistfully. 'If I could find him -_now_, would it make her happy again, I wonder?' - -And the chivalry that was in his blood stirred in his childish veins. - -'But you said that she sent him away?' whispered Gela, when Bela got -upon his brother's bed and confided his thoughts to him. - -'I did think so; but I might mistake,' said Bela. 'Perhaps he went -because he was obliged, and that it is which grieves her.' - -'Perhaps,' said Gela, meditatively. - -'If I only knew where to go to find him I would go all over the world,' -said Bela, with passion. 'I would ride Folko to the earth's very, very, -end to reach him.' - -'You could not get over the seas so,' said Gela; 'and he may be over -the seas.' - -'And we have never even seen the sea!' said Bela, to whom the suggested -distance seemed more terrible than he had ever imagined. 'What can we -do, Gela, do you think? you are clever about everything.' - -Gela was silent a moment. - -'Let us pray for him with all our might,' he said solemnly; and the two -little boys knelt down by the bedside in their little nightshirts and -prayed together for their father. - -When Bela rose his face was very troubled, but very resolute. He drew -out of its sheath a small sword with a handle of gold, which Egon -Vàsàrhely had sent him years before. 'One must pray first,' he thought, -'but afterwards one must help oneself. God does not care for cowards.' - -In the day he went out all alone and found Otto; the children were -allowed to go over the home woods at their pleasure. The _jägermeister_ -was very dear to Bela, for he told such wondrous tales of sport and -danger, and spoke with such reverent affection of his lost lord. - -'Where _can_ he be, Otto?' said the child now, in a low hushed voice, -as they sat under the green oak boughs. - -'Ah, my little Count, if only I knew!' said Otto. 'I would walk a -thousand miles to him, and take him the first blackcock that shall fall -to my gun this autumn.' - -'You really say the truth? You do not know?' said Bela, with stern -questioning eyes. - -'Would I tell a lie, my little lord?' said the old hunter, -reproachfully. 'Since your father drove away that cruel night none of -us have set eyes on him, or ever heard a word. If Her Excellency do not -know, how should we?' - -'I mean to find him,' said the child, solemnly. - -The old man sighed. - -'How should you do that? Our hills are between us and all the rest of -the world. Perhaps he is gone because he was tired of being here.' - -'No,' said Bela, who remembered his father's farewell to him, of which -he could never bring himself to speak to any living creature. - -Otto was silent too: he could not tell the child what all the household -believed--that his father had found too great a charm in the presence -of the Countess Brancka. - -The weeks and months stole on their course, which in the forest-heart -of the old Archduchy seems so leisurely beside the feverish haste of -the mad world. The ways of life went on unchanged; the children throve, -and studied, and played, and grew apace; the health of the Princess -became more delicate, and her strength more feeble; the seasons -succeeded each other with monotony; no sound from the cities of men -that lay beyond the ramparts of the glaciers broke the silence and the -calm of Hohenszalras. - -Wanda herself would not have known that one year was different to -another had she not been forced to count time by the inches which it -added to the stature of her offspring, and the recurrence of the days -of their patron saints. They grew as fast as reeds in peaceful waters, -and forced her to recognise that the years were dropping into the past. -Time for her was shod with lead, and crept tamely, like a cripple upon -broken ground. For the children's sake she lived; but for them she -knew not why she rose to these long, colourless, lonely hours. But -her corporeal life ailed nothing, whilst her spiritual life was sick -unto death. Almost she could have wished for the lassitude of weakness -to dull her pain; her bodily strength seemed to intensify what she -suffered. - -In the frosted brilliant winter time she still drove her fiery horses -over the snow that was like marble, plunging into the recesses of the -woods, seeing above her the ramparts, and bastions, and pinnacles of -the great ice-range of the Glöckner glaciers. The intense cold, the -rushing air, the whiteness as of a virgin earth, the sense of profound -solitude, did her good, cooled the sense of shame that seemed burnt -into her life, soothed the anguish of a love fooled, betrayed, and -widowed. She felt with horror that the longer she kneeled beside -the altar, the longer she prayed before the great Christ in her -chapel, the more passionately she rebelled against the fate that had -overtaken her. But, alone in the rarefied air, with the vastness of -the mountains about her, with the cold wind pouring like spring water -down a thirsty throat in its merciful coldness, with the white peaks -meeting the starry skies, and the waters hushed in their shroud of ice, -she gathered some kind of peace, some power of endurance: consolation -neither earth nor heaven could give to her. - -Of him she never heard. She could only have heard through her lawyers, -and they knew nothing. Neither in Paris nor in Vienna was he seen. By -a letter she received from the priest of Romaris she had learned that -he was not there. She had sent one of her men of business thither with -money and plans, to build on the site of the old house of the Sabrans a -Maison de Dieu for the aged and sick fishermen of the coast and their -widows.' It will be a _chapelle expiatoire_,' she had thought bitterly, -and she had endowed it richly, so that it should be independent of -all those who should come after her. In all the occupations entailed -by this and similar projects she was as attentive as of yore to all -demands made on her. - -When she perused a lawyer's long preamble, or corrected an architect's -estimates and drawings, she was the same woman as she had been ere her -betrayer had crossed the threshold of her home. Her character had been -built on lines too strong, on a base too firm, for the earthquake of -calamity, the whirlwind of passion, to undo it. But in her heart there -was utter shipwreck. She had given herself and all that was hers with -magnificent generosity; and she had received in return betrayal and a -dishonour under which day and night all the patrician in her writhed -and suffered. - -When in the autumn of that year Cardinal Vàsàrhely, travelling in great -state from Buda Pesth, arrived at Hohenszalras--a guest whom none -could deny, a judge whom none could evade--he did not spare her open -interrogation, searching censure, stern rebuke. - -The Lilienhöhe she had excused herself from receiving; the Kaulnitz she -had also refused; others as nearly related to her had encountered the -same resistance to their overtures; but Cardinal Vàsàrhely came to take -up his residence at the Holy Isle, with the weight of authority and the -sanctity of the Church. - -He visited his niece for the sole purpose of remonstrance. When he -found himself met by a respectful but firm refusal to acquaint him -with the reasons for her conduct, he did not, either, spare her the -stately wrath of the incensed ecclesiastic. He was a man of noble -presence, and of austere if arrogant life. He spoke with all the weight -of his sixty years and of his eminence in the service of the Church. -His eyes were bent on her in stern scrutiny as he stood drawn up to all -his great height beside her in the library. - -'If your griefs against your husband,' he urged, 'are of sufficient -gravity to justify you in desiring eternal separation from him, you -should not lean merely upon your own strength. You should seek the -support of your spiritual counsellors. Although the Holy Church has -never sanctioned the concubinage which the laws of men have called by -the name of divorce; yet, as you are aware, my daughter, in extreme -cases the Holy Father has himself deigned to unloose an unworthy bond, -to annul an unsuitable marriage. In your case, if the offences of your -lord have been so grave, I make no doubt that by my intercession with -His Sanctity it would be possible to dissolve an union which has become -unholy.' - -She met his gaze calmly and coldly. - -'Your Eminence is very good to interest yourself in my sorrows,' she -replied; 'but for the intercession with our Holy Father which you -offer, I will not trouble you. Whatever the offences of my husband be -against me, they can concern me alone. I have summoned no one to hear -them. I seek no one's judgment. As regards the power of the Supreme -Pontiff to bind and loose, I would bow to it in all matters spiritual, -but I cannot admit that even he can release me from an earthly tie -which I voluntarily assumed.' - -A rebuking wrath flashed from the eagle eyes of the great Churchman. - -'I did not think that Wanda von Szalras would heretically deny the Pope -his power over all souls!' he said sternly. 'Are you not aware that -when the Holy Father deigns in his mercifulness to decree a marriage as -null and void, it becomes so from that instant? It is as though it had -never been; the union is effaced, the woman is decreed pure.' - -'And the children,' she said bitterly; 'can the Holy Father efface -_them?_' - -The Cardinal was affronted and appalled. - -'You would call in question the infallible omnipotence of the Head of -the Church!' he said with horror. - -'The days of miracles are past,' she said coldly. 'I shall not entreat -for them to be wrought for me. I trust your Eminence will pardon me if -I say that no human, nay, no heavenly, permission could legitimate -adultery in my sight or in my person.' - -'You merit excommunication, my daughter,' said the haughty prelate, -his brow black with wrath. He saw no reason why this marriage, which -had offended all her house, should not be annulled by the all-powerful -verdict of the Vatican. Such cases were rare, but it would be possible -to include hers amongst them. The children could be consigned to -religious houses, brought up to religious lives, unknown to and -unknowing of the world. - -'If the man whom you chose to wed,' he continued sternly, 'has offended -or outraged you so greatly, let your relatives judge him and deal with -him. You were warned against the gift of your hand to a stranger with -an uncertain past behind him; he had not the eminence, the repute, the -character that should have been demanded in your husband. But you were -inflexible in your resolve then, as you are now in your silence.' - -'I know of no one living to whom I owe any account,' she said with -haughty decision; 'no one to whom I was bound to lay bare my mind and -heart then, or to whom I am so bound now.' - -'You are so bound every time you kneel in the confessional.' - -'To reveal my own sins, perchance, not his.' - -'Your soul should be as an open book before your priest.' - -'Your Eminence will pardon me. I bow willingly and reverently to the -Church in all matters spiritual, but in the rule of my own conduct I -admit no guide but my conscience. My sorrows are all my own. No priest -or layman shall intrude upon them.' - -She spoke with peremptory and unyielding decision; the old spirit of -her race was aroused in her, which in times bygone had bearded popes -and monarchs, and braved the thunders of excommunication. They had been -pious sons of Rome, but yet ofttimes rebellious ones; when their honour -called one way and the priests pointed the other, they had lifted their -swords in the sunlight and gone whither honour bade. - -The Churchman knew that power of secular revolt which had been always -latent in the Szalras blood; he knew now that, armed with the weapons -of the Church though he was, he might as well seek to bow the mountains -down as bend her will. He took for granted that her wrongs were great -enough to entitle her to freedom; he had thought that she might wed -again with his nephew, who had loved her so long; their mighty fortunes -would have fitly met; this hateful union with a foreigner, a sceptic, -a debauchee, would have become a thing of the past, washed away into -absolute non-existence;--so he had dreamed, and he found himself -confronted with a woman's illogical inconsistency and obstinacy. - -He was deeply incensed. He assailed her for many days with all the -subtle arguments of the ecclesiastical armoury, but he made no -impression. She utterly refused to tell why she had exiled her husband -from her house, and she as utterly refused to take any measures to -attain her own freedom. When he left her he said a word of rebuke -that long lingered in her memory. 'You are rebellious and almost -heretical, my daughter. You entrench yourself in your silence and your -pride, which you appear to forget are heinous sins when opposed to -your spiritual superiors. But this only I will remind you of: if you -deny the Church the power to annul the union of which its sacrament -sanctified the consummation, be at least consistent: do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' - -With that keen home thrust in parting he left her, giving his blessing -to the kneeling household; and six white mules, always kept there in -readiness for his visits, bore him away through the embrowning woods. - -When he reached his palace in Buda he summoned Egon Vàsàrhely and -related what had passed. - -His nephew heard in silence. - -'Your Eminence erred in your judgment of Wanda,' he said at length. -'She would never make her wrongs, whatever they be, public, nor seek -for dissolution of her marriage. She may repent it, but she will repent -it in solitude.' - -'If the marriage be so sacred in her eyes,' said the angry prelate, -'let her continue to live with her husband. She has been a law to -herself; she has parted from him; where is the wifely submission there? -Where the sanctity of the immutable bond?' - -'Perhaps some day she will bid him return,' said Vàsàrhely, whose -features were very grave and pale. - -'She could forget this fatal folly like a bad dream,' continued the -Cardinal, unheeding. 'She could begin a new life; she could wed with -you.' - -'Your Eminence mistakes,' said Vàsàrhely, abruptly. 'Though that man -were dead ten times over, Wanda would never wed with me--nor I with -her.' - -'You are both wiser than the wisdom and holier than the holiness of the -Church,' said the incensed ecclesiastic, with boundless scorn. He was -accustomed to bend human volition like a willow wand in his hand. - -When she herself had left the terrace where she had parted from the -prelate, having accompanied him there in that stately etiquette which, -though she had been dying, habit would have compelled her to observe in -every detail, she had turned with a sense of intolerable pain from the -sunshine of the September day. - -It was a pretty scene that stretched before her, the children standing -bareheaded, the household hushed and kneeling still where the mighty -dignitary of the Mother Church had given them his benediction; the gold -embroideries and rich colours of the liveries glowing in the light; -the white mules and the scarlet-clothed attendants of the Cardinal -passing down the avenue of oaks, with the immediate background of the -darksome yews, and, further, the flushed foliage of the forests and the -shine of the snow peaks; but to her it was fraught with unendurable -associations. The central figure was missing from it which for so many -years had graced all pageants and conducted all ceremonies there. It -was the sole time since the exile of her husband that there had been -any arrival or departure at Hohenszalras. - -She had been compelled to receive the Cardinal with all due state and -observance, and the oppressiveness of his three days' sojourn had worn -and wearied her. - -'I would sooner receive five emperors than one Churchman,' she said to -the Princess. 'We are far from the days of the Apostles!' - -'Christ must be honoured in His Vicars,' said the Princess, coldly, and -with disapprobation chill on all her features. - -Wanda turned away as the white mules disappeared in a bend of the -avenue, and went into the house alone, whilst the children and the -household still lingered in the sunshine. She traversed the whole -length of the building to reach her octagon-room, where she was certain -to be alone. The interrogation and censure of her uncle had left on her -a harassed sense of being somewhere at fault: not to him, nor to the -Church he represented and invoked, but to her own Conscience. - -As she passed through one of the galleries she saw her youngest child -Egon, now nearly two years old, playing with his nurse, an old, grave -North German woman. They were the only living beings of the house who -had not been upon the terraces to receive the Cardinal's last blessing; -the one too young, the other too old to care. The child, with his fair -face and his light curls, was like the child Christ of Carlo Dolce, -yet there was the same resemblance in him to his father which pierced -her soul whenever she looked in the faces of her other offspring. - -She paused and stooped towards him now, where he played with a toy lamb -in the breadth of sunlight that fell warm and broad through the open -lattices of an oriel window, in the embrasure of which his attendant -was sitting. The baby looked up under his long dark lashes, and made a -little timid movement towards his nurse. - -'Is he afraid of me?' said Wanda, with the same vague sense of remorse -which she had felt before his eldest brother. - -'Oh no! he is not afraid, my lady,' said the old woman with him, -hurriedly. 'But he sees you so rarely now, and when they are so young -they are frightened at grave faces.' - -The nurse stopped herself, fearing she had said too much; but her -mistress listened without anger and with a sharp pang of self-reproach. - -'Come for him to my room when I ring,' she said; and she stooped again -and lifted the little boy in her arms. - -'Are you all afraid of me, my poor children,' she murmured to him. -'Surely I have never been cruel to you?' - -He did not understand; he was still frightened, but he put his arm -about her throat and hid his pretty face on her shoulder with a gesture -that was half terror, half confidence. She took him to her own room -and soothed and caressed and amused him, till he regained his natural -fearlessness and sat happy on her knee, playing with some Indian ivory -toys; then he grew tired, and leaned his head against her breast, and -fell asleep as prettily as a Star of Bethlehem shuts its white leaves -up at sunset. - -She watched him with an aching heart. - -She could look on none of her children without a throb of intolerable -shame. They were the symbols as they were the offspring of all her -hours of love. Another woman might have forgotten all except that they -were hers. - -She could not. - -From that day she had the younger children brought to her more often, -drove them out at times, and soon regained their affection, although -to them all a majesty and melancholy, as inseparable from her now as -shadows from the night, made her presence inspire them with a certain -awe; even Lili, the most willful of them all, in her pretty, gay, -childish vanity and naughtiness, never ventured to disobey or to weary -her. - -'When I am with her it is as if I were at Mass,' Lili said to her -brothers. 'You know what one feels when the Host comes and the bell -rings, and it is all so still, and only the Latin words----' - -'It is the presence of God that we feel at Mass,' said Gela, in a -hushed voice. 'And I think our mother has God with her very much. Only -He makes her sad.' - -'But she never does cry,' said her little daughter. - -'No,' said Gela, 'I think she is too sad for that. You know when it is -very, very cold the skies cannot rain. I think that it is just so cold -with her.' - -And Gela's own eyes filled, for he, the most thoughtful and the most -quick in perception of them all, adored his mother. When he could he -would sit in her presence for hours, mute and motionless, with a book -on his knees, glancing at her with his meditative eyes now and then in -rapt veneration. - -'When Bela grows up he will wander, I dare say, and perhaps be a great -soldier,' Gela thought at such times. 'But for me, I shall stay always -with our mother, and read every thing that is written, and do all I can -for the people, and care for nothing but for her and them.' - -She had not let loose in the presence of Cardinal Vàsàrhely the -burning wrath which had consumed her. And yet the valedictory words of -the prelate recurred to her with haunting persistency. He had said to -her: 'If you refuse to be released from your marriage, do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' Was it possible, she asked herself, that -she still owed allegiance to one who, whilst he had embraced her, had -dishonoured her? - -'As well,' she thought bitterly, 'as well say that the man and woman -chained and drowned together in the Noyades of Nantes were united in a -holy union!' - - '_Ego conjungo vos in matrimonium, in nomine Patris et Filii - et Spiritus Sancti._' - -As she remembered those words of the Marriage Sacrament, uttered as she -had stood beside him in the midst of the incense, the colour, the pomp, -the gorgeous grandeur of the Court Chapel in Vienna, she felt that -they had bound on her eternal silence, perpetual constancy, even in a -sense continual submission; they forbade her to disgrace him before the -world; they made his shame hers, they required her to defend him so far -as in her lay from the punishment with which the laws would have met -his wrong-doing: but she could not bring herself to acknowledge that it -demanded more. Truth could not be forced to dwell beside falsehood. -Honour could not take the kiss of peace from dishonour. - -The natural veneration she bore to the speaker added to the weight of -the reproach implied in the Cardinal's words. Even beyond her pride -was her intense sense of the obligations of duty. She asked herself a -thousand times a week if she had indeed failed in these. Honour was -a yet higher thing than duty. Offended honour had its title to any -choice. Her race had never gone to others with their wrongs; they had -known how to avenge themselves by their own hand, in their own way. -If she had chosen to stab him in the throat which had lied to her she -would not, she thought, have gone outside her right. Yet she had been -merciful to him; she had neither exposed nor chastised him; she had -simply cut his life adrift from hers, which he had outraged. - -No man's repute is hurt by separation from his wife; he was in no worse -circumstance than he had been ere he had met her; she did not withdraw -her gifts. She had given a noble name to one nameless; she had granted -a feudal title to a bastard; she had enriched a man who previously -had owned nothing, save half a million of francs won at play and a -strip of sea-shore that was stolen. She withdrew none of her gifts; -she left the impostor to the full enjoyment of the world; she did -not even move a step to secure the world's sympathy with herself. All -she had done as her just vengeance was to withdraw herself from the -pollution of his touch, and to exile him from the home of her fathers. -Who could have done less? His children would in the future possess all -she had, though through him they destroyed the purity of her race for -ever: centuries would not wash out in her sight the stain that was in -their blood: but she did not disinherit them. She could not see that -she had failed anywhere in her duty; she had been more generous in her -judgment than many could have been. Wherever women spoke of her and of -her separation from her husband, there would they surely, with many a -bitter word, repay her all the affronts which she had put upon them by -her indifference and by what they had esteemed her arrogance. She knew -that in such a position as she had perforce created, unexplained, the -man is easily and constantly absolved of blame, the woman is always and -certainly condemned. Therefore she had never doubted that the future -would lie lightly on his shoulders, passed in sensual idleness, in -oblivion more or less easily attained. Could it be possible that though -she had been so cruelly betrayed her own obligations remained the same? -Had her marriage vows compelled her to endure even such offence as -this without alteration in her own obedience? Was she inconsistent in -sending her betrayer from her, whilst she still considered her bond to -him binding? Since she refused to take advantage of the release that -the Law and the Church would give her, was it unjustifiable to free -herself from his hourly presence, his daily contact? No! she could not -believe that it was so. - -On her name-day, in the following spring, addressing his felicitations -to her, Egon Vàsàrhely added words which had cost him much to write. - -'You know how dear, more dear than any earthly thing, you have been -ever to me,' he wrote, 'therefore you will pardon me what I am about to -say. If I had followed my own selfish desires I should have entreated -you to disgrace him publicly, begged you to shake off publicly all -bonds to a traitor; and I should have shot him dead, with or without -the formula of a quarrel; he himself knew that well. But for your own -sake I would say to you now, pardon him if you can. Though you are the -possessor of a position and of a character rare amongst women, yet even -you must suffer as a separated wife. The children as they grow older -will suffer from it likewise. You could divorce your husband; the Law -and the Church would set you free from an union contracted in ignorance -with a man guilty of a fraud. You would be free, and he would endure -his fit chastisement. But I understand why you refuse to do that. I -comprehend your feeling. Publicity would to you intensify disgrace. -Divorce could do nothing to heal your cruel wounds. Therefore I urge -on you forgiveness. It has cost me many months' bitter struggle to be -able to write this to you. His offence is vile. His past is hateful. -He himself merits nothing. But for your commands I would have set my -heel on his throat as on a snake's. But there may have been excuses -even for him; and since you acknowledge him as your husband you will, -in the end, be more at peace if you do not continue to insist on a -separation which will be food for the world's calumny. Besides, though -you know it not, you have not exiled him from your heart, though you -have sent him from your house. If you had not still loved him you would -have said to me--Slay him. I believe that he loved you, though he had -such foul guilt against you, and he must have some true qualities of -character and mind since he satisfied yours for many long years. Of -where he may be now I know not. Since I saw you I have not quitted my -own country. But I would say to you--wherever he be, send for him. You -will understand without words what it costs me to say to you--Since you -will not accept the freedom of the Law, summon him to you and cleanse -his soul in yours. I speak for you, not him. If I saw him lying dead -like a dog in a ditch, for myself, I should thank God. Sometimes I look -with stupor at my sword. Can it lie idle there and you be unavenged?' - -The letter touched her profoundly. She realised the grandeur of -generosity, the force of compelling duty, which had enabled Vàsàrhely -to write it, proudest of gentlemen as he was, most devoted of lovers as -he had been. - -She replied to him: - -'I have thought myself strong, but of late years I have found that -there are things beyond my strength; what you counsel is one of them. -Religion enjoins, indeed, forgiveness without limit; but there are -wrongs for which religion makes no provision, and of which it has no -comprehension. Nevertheless, I thank you for him and for myself.' - -Any crime, any folly, any violence or faithlessness, which yet should -have left his honour pure, she thought it would have been possible to -condone; the life of a woman who loves must ever be one long pardon. -But such shame as this of his ate into her very soul, as rust into -the pure metal. It was such shame that when her heart went out to what -she had once loved in the yearning of affection, she felt herself -disgraced, feeling that the dominion of the senses, the weakness of -remembered and desired joys made her oblivious of indignity, feeble as -an enamoured fool. - -Her friends, her priests, even her own conscience might say to her -'Forgive,' but she could not bend her will to do it. Forgiveness would -mean reconciliation, union, life spent together as in their days of -love. She could not bring herself to endure that perpetual contact, -that incessant communion. To her sight he was stained with a moral -leprosy. She could not consent to admit that one in spiritual health, -and clean of guilt, must dwell with one spiritually diseased. - - - - -CHAPTER XLI. - - -Another year passed by, and of him she still heard nothing. As, once -before, his silence had told her of his passion more eloquently than -speech could have done, so now the same silence tended to soften her -wrath, to soothe her horror. She had expected him to take one of two -courses: either to assail her with written entreaties for pardon, and -ceaseless efforts to palliate his crime in her sight, or to go out into -the world of men to seek oblivion in pleasure, and perhaps absolution -in ambition. - -He had done neither. - -Once she, having occasion to go to the room which had been set aside -for the boys' studies, saw the old professor absorbed in the perusal -of a letter. Confused and startled he slipped it hurriedly beneath a -Latin exercise of Bela's, which lay with other papers on the table. The -children were out riding. - -His mistress looked at him, and her face grew a shade paler still. - -'You correspond with my husband?' she said abruptly, pausing, as she -always paused, before she said the latter words. - -Greswold flushed consciously, stammered a few unintelligible words, and -was silent. - -'You hear from him?' she continued with correct inference. 'You know -where he is?' - -'I have promised that I will not say. I pray your Excellency to pardon -me,' murmured the old man, the colour mounting upward to his grey locks. - -She was silent a moment; she knew not what emotion moved her, whether -wrath, or wonder, or offence; or whether even relief from long suspense. - -'Do not be angered, my lady,' pleaded Greswold, timidly. 'It is the -only way in which he can hear of you and of his children. Could your -Excellency believe that all these months, these years, he lived on -without any tidings?' - -'I think you have exceeded your duty,' she said coldly. 'I think that -you should have asked my permission.' - -The old man stood penitent, like a chidden child. He was afraid of her -interrogations; but she made none. - -'You will give me your word,' she pursued, 'never to speak of this -correspondence to Herr Bela or to any of the children.' - -Greswold bowed his assent. 'My lord has forbidden me also,' he said -eagerly. - -Her brows contracted. - -'You have committed an imprudence,' she said, in a tone which chilled -the old man to the marrow. 'Be heedful that no one knows of it.' - -She said no more; took the volume she had needed, and quitted the room. - -'Who shall tell the heart of a woman?' thought Greswold, left to -himself. 'She knows not whether the man she once adored be living or -dead, and she does not put to me one single question, does not even -seek to learn where he dwells or what he does! What could his sin be to -sweep all love away as fire makes a desert of a smiling meadow? And be -it what it would, of what use is human love if it have not enough of -the divine love in it to rejoice over the sinner who repents?' - -He knew not that the sin she might, she would, have forgiven, but that -the shame ate into the fair marble of her honour like a corroding acid. - -From that time he expected daily some fresh question, some allusion at -least to the confession which she had surprised from him. But she never -spoke to him again of it. If she placed a violent control upon herself, -because she did not think it fitting to speak of her husband to one -in her employ, or if her husband were absolutely dead to her memory -and her affections, he could not tell. He only knew that by no word or -sign did she appear to recall the brief conversation which had passed -between them. - -Although what he had done was innocent enough, the old physician, in -his scrupulous sense of duty, began to have a sense of guilt. Had he -any right to retain any hidden knowledge from the mistress whose roof -sheltered him, and whose bread he ate? - -But his loyalty to his pledged word, and to him whom the world of men -still called Sabran, obliged him to be mute. - -'After all,' he thought, 'if she knew it might be better, but my first -duty is to keep my word.' - -She never tempted him to break it. She was not callous and hardened -as he supposed. She felt a growing desire to learn where and how her -husband had taken up the broken threads of his severed life. She had -believed either that he would return to the unfettered existence that -could be dreamed away under the cedar groves of Mexico, with the senses -satisfied and the moral law set at naught, or that he would go amongst -the men and women of the great world, popular, pitied, and easily -consoled. She had seen that world exercise a potent fascination over -him, and if it were called to pronounce against her or against him, she -was well aware that he would bear away all its suffrages. He had always -humoured and flattered it; she never. - -He had passed from the sight of those who knew him as utterly as -though he had descended to his grave. No sound or hint told her of his -destiny. She still thought at times that he must have sought those -flowery recesses of the West which had given his youth their shelter. -It might well be that in his total ruin his instincts had urged him to -return to the free barbaric life of his early manhood, where none would -reproach him, none deride him, none know his secret or his sin. His -correspondence with Greswold suggested a doubt to her. Perhaps remorse -was with him and the weight of remembrance. - -When, too harshly, she had assumed that all his love and life had been -a lie, because one lie had been beneath it, she had told herself that -he would find solace in those vices and pastimes which, in his earlier -years, had been fatal to his ambition and to his perseverance. But -since he cared to hear of his children's welfare, it might well be that -their life together was nearer to his heart than she had credited. She -believed that, if he had been sunk in the kind of self-indulgence she -had imagined, he would have shunned all tidings, all memories, of his -lost home. - -Then again, with the inconsistency of all great suffering, an intense -indignation possessed her that he did dare to remember, did dare to -recall, that her offspring were also his. Even alone the hot flush of -an ever-increasing shame came to her face when she thought that she -had been for nine long years his, in the most absolute possession that -woman can grant to man. Exile, severance, silence, cold and dark as the -winters of the land of his birth, could not alter that. Whenever he -chose to think of her she must be his in remembrance still. - -Once the Princess ventured to say again to her a word which came from -her heart. They were standing on the terrace watching the blush of -evening glow on the virginal snows of the mountains. - -'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' she murmured. 'Wanda, mine, -do never you think of those words--you who let so many suns rise and -set, and find your wrath unchanged?' - -'If it were _only_ that!' she answered bitterly. 'It is so much -else--so much else! Crimes deep as yonder water, high as yonder hills, -I could have forgiven, but--a baseness--never! Nay, there are pardons -that would only be as base as what they pardoned.' - -So it seemed to her. - -When again and again her heart was thrilled with its old tenderness, -her mind was haunted by a million memories of dead delights, she strove -against herself, and trod down her temptation with the merciless -self-punishment of an ascetic. It humbled and stained her in her own -sight to feel that love could live within her without honour. - -'Forgive me,' said the Princess, 'but it always seems to me that -you--noble and generous and pure of mind as you are--yet have met ill -the supreme trial, the supreme test of your life. You believed that you -loved the man you wedded, but you loved your own pride more. If love be -not endless forbearance, endless compassion, endless pity and sympathy, -what is it but the mere fever and instincts of carnal passions? What -raises it above the self-indulgence of the senses if not its sacrifice -of will and its long-suffering? You have said so yourself in other -days than these.' - -'And what,' she thought passionately as she heard, 'what would it be -but the basest indulgence of the senses to let oneself love and be -beloved by what one scorned?--to stoop and kiss the lips that lied for -mere sake of their sweetness?--to gather in one's arms the coward, the -traitor, and persuade oneself that one forgave because one grew blind -with amorous remembrance?' - -'Is it well,' pursued her companion with soft solemnity, 'to let anyone -who is so near to you live his own life when that life may be one of -sin? You send him from you, and how can you tell into what extremes of -evil or of folly despair may not drive him? A man cast forth from his -home is like a ship cut loose from its anchor and rudderless. Whatever -may have been his weakness, his offences, they cannot absolve you from -your duty to watch over your husband's soul, to be his first and most -faithful friend, to stand between him and his temptations and perils. -That is the nobler side of marriage. When the light of love is faded, -and its joys are over, its duties and its mercies remain. Because -one of the twain has failed in these the other is not acquitted of -obligation. Pardon me if I seem to censure. Look in your own heart and -judge if I err.' - -'You do not know! You do not know! If I forgave him I should never -forgive myself!' - -She turned her head from the roseate and happy light that spoke to her -of other days, and went with a swift uneven step into the house, now -darkened by the passing of the day. - -She flung his memory from her as so much unholiness. Had passion not -yet lived in her, the coldness of unforgiving sorrow might not have -seemed to her so sovereign a duty. - -Some weeks after she had seen the letter in Greswold's hands a small -hamlet was burnt down during a high north wind. It belonged to her. -Hearing of the calamity she went thither at once. It was some two and -a half German miles from the castle. She drove, herself, four young -Hungarian horses, whose fretting graces and tempestuous gallop gave -her the only pleasure which she was now capable of enjoying. They were -harnessed to a carriage light and strong, built on purpose to scour -rapidly rough forest roads and steep hill-sides. When she had visited -the melancholy scene, given what consolation she could, and distributed -money to the homeless peasants, promising to rebuild the houses with -her own timber and shingles--for the conflagration had been the fault -of no one, but of the wild wind which had scattered the burning embers -of a hearth-fire on a neighbouring wood-stack--her horses were rested, -and she began her homeward drive as the pale afternoon grew grey and -the twilight fell on the little grassy vale, now charred and smoking -with the smouldering ruins of the châlets. - -'Our Countess never leaves us alone in any trouble,' said the women -gathered about the stone statue of S. Florian, their most trusted -patron, who, despite their prayers, had refused to save them from the -flames. The hamlet was not far from the Maurer glaciers, and was shut -in by a complete wall of mountains; it was green, fresh, beautifully -cool in summer. Now, in the late spring, it was still dreary, and -patches of snow still lay on its sward; it was set high on the mountain -side, and dense forests sloped down from it, seldom traversed, and dark -early in the afternoon. Her groom lit the lamps of her carriage as she -entered the deep woods, through which the road was little more than a -timber-track. The long gallops and the steep inclines coming thither -had calmed and pacified her young horses. They gave her no trouble to -control them, as they trotted rapidly along the shadowy forest ways. -In other parts of the country the sun had not then set, but here the -gloom was grey, like that of a cloudy dawn. Yet it was not so dark but -that she perceived ahead of her, as her horses turned a curve in the -moss-grown path, a figure, whose height and outline made her heart -stand still. As the animals went past him in their swinging trot the -blaze of the lamps fell full upon him. He turned and retreated quickly -into the undergrowth beneath the drooping boughs of the Siberian pines, -but she saw him, he saw her. Mechanically he uncovered his head and -bowed low; she drove onward with a sense of suffocation at her throat -and a chill like ice in her veins. She had recognised him in that -moment of time. He was changed, aged, and there were threads of grey in -his hair. He wore a forester's dress and had a gun on his shoulder. - -Where they had met, in these woods that lay under the snow saddle of -the Reggen Thörl, it was still twenty English miles away from the burg. -It was late when she reached home, but her people were used to those -long night drives, and even the Princess had become resigned to them. -On the plea of fatigue she went to her own rooms and there remained. A -faintness and sense of confusion stayed with her. She had not thought -that merely meeting him thus would affect her. She had underrated, the -power of the past. - -When she had deemed him far away in other countries he was there in her -own lands, not twenty miles from her. The knowledge of his vicinity -moved her with a mingled sense of unendurable pain, partial anger, -reviving love. It seemed horrible to have passed him by as any stranger -would have passed, without a sign or word. Yet he was dead to her, -whether oceans were between them or only a few leagues of hill and -grass and forest. - -She did not sleep, she did not even lie down that night. He seemed -always before her; in the stillness of her chamber she heard his voice, -and she started up thinking he touched her. - -He had looked aged, ill, weary, unhappy; the sight of him bore -conviction to her that he, like herself, found no compensation, no -consolation. Perchance her monitress had been right; she had been -cruel. Perchance, whatever sin his present or his future life might -hold would lie, directly indeed at his own door, but indirectly at -hers. She had always held that high and spiritual view of marriage -which, rising above mere sensual indulgence, regarded the bond of souls -as sacred, and made the life on earth mere passage and preparation -for eternity. She had loved to believe that she ennobled, purified, -exalted his life by union with hers. Was she now false to her own creed -when she left him alone, unfriended, unpardoned, to drift to any solace -in vice, or any distraction in evil, which might be his fate? The -sensitiveness and apprehension of her conscience before the possibility -of a neglected duty made of her meditations a very martyrdom. All her -life long she had been resolute and serene in action, deciding quickly, -and carrying resolve into action without hesitation; but here, in the -supreme crisis of her fate, she was irresolute and wrung by continual -doubt. Had it only been any other crime than this!--this which cankered -all the honour of her race, and was rank with the abhorred putridity of -fraud! - -The spring passed into summer, and the children played amidst masses of -roses and sweet ranks of lilies, stretching down the green grass alleys -of the gardens. More than once she went to the same hamlet, where now -châlets were arising, made of pine and elm, cut in the past winter in -her own woods. But of him she saw no more. She could not bend her will -to ask of him of any of her household, not even of Greswold. Whether he -lingered amidst her mountains, or whether he had but come thither in a -momentary impulse, she knew not. - -The infinite yearning of affection, which is wholly outside the -instincts of the passions, awoke in her once more. She began to doubt -her own reading of obligation and of duty. Had her counsellors been -right--had she met the supreme test of her character and had failed -before it? - -Was it true that a great love must be as exhaustless as the ocean in -its mercy and as profound in its comprehension? - -Had his sin to her released her from her duties towards him? Because -he had been disloyal was she absolved from loyalty to him? Ought she -sooner to have said to him,--'Nay, no crime, no untruth, no failure in -yourself shall divide you from me; the darker be your soul the greater -need hath it to lean on mine?' - -In the violent scorn of her revolted pride, of her indignant honour, -had she forgotten a lowlier yet harder duty left undone? - -In her contempt and dread of yielding to mere amorous weakness had she -stifled and denied the cry of pity, the cry of conscience? - - To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite, To forgive wrongs - darker than death or night, To defy power which seems - omnipotent, To love, and live to hope till hope creates From - its own wreck the thing it contemplates, Neither to change, - nor falter, nor repent. - -This, perchance, had been the higher diviner way which she had -missed--this the obligation from the passion of the past which she had -left unfulfilled, unaccepted. - -Resolutely she had gone on upon her joyless path, not doubting that -her course was right. It had seemed to her that there was no other way -possible; that, stretching her hand to him across the gulf of shame -that severed them, she would do nothing to raise him, but only fall -herself, degraded to his likeness. - -So it had always seemed to her. - -Now alone the misgiving arose in her whether she had mistaken arrogance -for duty; whether, cleaving so closely to the traditions of honour, she -had forgotten the obligations of mercy. Had it been any other thing, -any other sin, she thought, rather than this, which struck at the very -root of all the trusts, of all the faiths, which she had most venerated -as the legacy of her fathers!---- - -Sometimes it seemed to her as though, were that time of torture to be -lived through again, she would not send him from her; she would say to -him: - -'What we love once we love for ever. Shall there be joy in heaven over -those who repent, yet no forgiveness for them upon earth?' - -Sometimes it seemed to lier as though even now, after these years, she -still ought to summon him and say this. But time passed on and passed -away, and it remained unsaid. - -She rode often through the same woods, now in full leaf, with sunny -waters tumbling and sparkling through their flower-filled moss, but he -crossed her path no more. He might have come thither, she thought, in -some brief hope of possible reconciliation to her, and then his courage -might have failed him, and he might have returned to whatsoever distant -climate held him, whatsoever manner of life consoled him. That he might -dwell amidst the hills, unseen of men, for her sake, never once seemed -to her possible. Egon Vàsàrhely might have done that; but not he--he -loved the world. - -The summer weighed wearily upon her. The light, the fragrance, the -gaiety of nature hurt her. In winter all the earth seemed of accord -with herself; it was silent, stern, solitary. The keen winds, the -glittering snow, the air that was like a bath of ice, the sense of -absolute isolation and seclusion which the winter brought with it were -precious to her. Not even the pretty figures of the children running -through the bowers of blossom and of foliage could make the summer -otherwise than oppressive and mournful to her. - -Sometimes she thought of how it had been on other summer nights, when -he had wandered with her through the white lines of the lilies by the -starlight, or sent the melodies of Schumann and of Beethoven out upon -the dewy, balmy air. Then she could bear no more to look upon the -moonlit gardens. - -The love she had borne him stirred at those times beneath the -gravestones of scorn and wrath and almost hatred which she had heaped -upon it, to keep it buried far down for evermore. All the echoes of -passion came to her at those moments; she despised herself because -she felt that she would give her soul to feel his lips on hers again. -She was ashamed that the mere sight of him could thus have moved her. -Again and again she recalled noble acts, beautiful thoughts, which -had been his; again and again she recalled the early hours of their -love with burning cheeks and longing heart. She could have scourged -herself to banish those memories, those desires. They were terrible -and irresistible to her as the visions that assailed the saints of the -Thebaïd. Her whole soul softened to him, yearned for him, forgave him. -Then she would shrink in disdain from her own weakness, and pace her -chamber like a wounded lioness. - - - - -CHAPTER XLII. - - -The first flush of autumn came upon the woods. Soon it would be three -years since Olga Brancka had driven thither, and her work had held good -and never been undone. Bela and Gela had grown tall and slender as the -young fir trees; and Bela often said to his brother: 'I was ten years -old on Easter Day. That is quite old. If ever I am to find him I am old -enough now.' - -He had not forgotten. He never forgot. Every day he wearied his little -brain with thinking what he could do. Every night he asked Heaven to -help him. He had read a Bohemian ballad which had fascinated him; the -story of how, in the days of chivalry, Wratislaw, the son of Berka, -when but twelve years old, had made, all by himself and on foot, -a pilgrimage from Prague to Tartary, to release his brother from -captivity. Bela knew very well that the world had changed since then, -and that if some things were easier some were harder now than then. But -if Wratislaw had done so much at twelve, why should he, who was ten, -not do something? - -He thought himself quite old. He had a big pony, and Folko was ridden -by his little brothers. He had been taught to shoot at a target and -a running mark; he had become skilful at climbing with crampons and -managing a boat. When he rode he had long boots that pulled up to his -knees. He could drive three ponies, harnessed in the Russian way, with -skill and surety. Perhaps, he thought, the Bohemian boy had not been -able to do half as much as this. The ballad spoke of him as a little -weakling, and yet he had found his way from Prague, in her dusky -plains, to burning Tartary. - -Almost he was ready to set forth on a Quixotic search without any clue -to where his father dwelt, but his educated sense checked him with -the remembrance that, wide as the world was, it would be of no avail -to begin a harebrained pilgrimage with no fixed goal. Even Wratislaw, -who was his ideal, had been certain that his brother languished in -the Tartar tents before he had set his fair face to the southeast. So -he remained patient in his impatience, and strove with all his might -to perfect himself in all bodily exercises and manly habits, that he -might be the better fitted to go on his errand whenever he should have -any thread of guidance. No one guessed the resolves and the hopes -which fermented like new wine in his pretty golden-haired head. His -attendants thought each year that he grew gentler and more serious, and -his tutors found him at once more docile and more absent-minded. But no -one imagined that he was bent on any unusual enterprise. - -His father had not been recognised by the groom who had accompanied his -mistress in the drive through the woods of the Reggen Thörl; and no -rumour of the near presence of Sabran had reached any of the household. -Greswold alone knew that amidst the solitudes of the avalanche and -the glacier, in the chill of the air where the eagle and the vulture -alone made their home, in a life of absolute isolation, asceticism, and -physical denial of every kind, the man who had sinned against her spent -his exile, in such self-chosen expiation as was possible to one who had -neither the faith nor the humility needful to make him seek refuge -and atonement in any religious service. He dwelt in the loneliness -of the ice-slopes, leading the life of a common hunter, shunning all -men, accepting each monotonous and joyless day as portion of his just -punishment; in the perils of winter on the mountains doing what he -could to save human or animal life; knowing no solace save such as -existed for him in the sense of being near all that he had lost, and -the power of watching the distant movements of his wife and children at -such rare hours as he ventured to approach the hills of Hohenszalras -and turn his telescope on the gardens of his lost home. A hunter or -two, a guide or two of the Umbal and the Trojerthal had his confidence, -but the loyalty which is the common virtue of all mountaineers made -them preserve it faithfully. For the rest, in these unfrequented -places, avoidance of all those who might have recognised him was easy; -he was clothed like the men of the hills, and lived like them in a -châlet, high perched on a ledge of rock at a great altitude in the wild -and almost inaccessible region of the Hintere Umbalthörl. Of the future -he never dared to think; he took each day as it came; the best he hoped -for was a mountaineer's death some hour or another, amidst the clear -serene blue ice, the everlasting snows. - -When he had gone out from the chamber of his wife, banished and -accursed, all his spirit had died in him, and nothing had seemed clear -in his memory except that love which had been so insufficient to wash -out his sin. The world would no doubt have welcomed him; he was not -too old for its distractions and its ambitions to be still possible -for him; but he had no courage left to take them up, no energy to make -another future for himself. His whole life was consumed in a vain -regret, as vain a desire, as vain a penitence. Had he had the faith of -those men who dwelt under the willows of the Holy Isle he would have -joined them. But he had no belief; he had only a futile, heart-broken, -hopeless repentance, which availed him nothing and could atone for -nothing. - -Perhaps, he thought, if she had known that, it might have changed her. -But he did not dare to approach her by any written appeal. It seemed -to him as if any words from him would only appear but added falsehood, -added insult. He never, even in his own thoughts, reproached her for -her separation from him. He recognised that no other path was open to -her. The pure daylight of her nature could find no mate in the dusk -and shadow of his own; the loyalty of truth could not unite with the -servitude and cowardice of falsehood. He knew it, and never rebelled -against his chastisement. - -Whilst still it was dawn one morning, his young son, just awaking, -heard a pebble thrown at his window. He sprang out of bed and ran and -looked out. Old Otto stood below. - -'My little lord,' he said softly; 'if you can come to me in the woods, -when you are dressed, I have something to tell you.' - -'Of him?' cried Bela. - -The huntsman made a sign of assent. - -The child, excited to intense emotion, hardly knew how his servant -dressed him, or how he swallowed his breakfast. After their morning -meal he could always run in the woods, as he chose, before beginning -his studies, and he sped as fast as his feet could bear him to the -trysting-place. - -'My lord, your father has been seen on the other side of Glöckner by my -underling, Fritz,' said Otto, gravely; 'and I have heard, too, that the -villagers have seen him in Pregratten. I made bold to tell you, Count -Bela, for I had given you my word.' - -Bela's whole form shook with excitement. - -'I knew if he had died I should have known it!' he said, with a hushed -ecstasy. 'Tell me more, tell me more, quick!' - -'There is no more to tell, my little lord,' said Otto. 'Fritz will -swear that he saw your father, though there was a stretch of glaciers -and many fathoms of ice between them. He says there was no mistaking -the way he sighted his rifle and fired. And I have heard by gossip, -too, from the folks of the Hintere Umbalthörl that there can be no -manner of doubt of the fact that His Excellency has dwelt there, for a -time at least.' - -Bela gave a deep breath. - -'Then he lives, and I can find him!' - -'Yes, he lives; the Lord be praised! 'said Otto. - -When he went to the house the boy told no one his precious secret. He -studied ill, and was punished, but he did not heed it. His heart was -full of joy; his brain teemed with projects. - -'I will go and bring him back!' he kept saying to himself; and no force -could hold his thoughts to his Homer or his Euclid. - -He would tell no one, he resolved, not even Gela; and he would go -alone, all alone, as the Bohemian boy had gone. - -'What ails Bela to-day? He is not like himself,' said his mother to -Greswold, who assured her he was well, but added that he was often -careless. - -The child shut his secret up in his own breast, and though he longed -to tell Gela he did not. He had been tempted to confide in Otto, but -resisted even that desire, knowing that Otto was stern where duty -pointed, and had been always forbidden to let the little nobles wander -alone to the mountains. He had his father's power of reticence, his -mother's strength of self-control. - -He knew what hill work was like. The elder boys often went climbing, -with their guides, on fine days from May to September, and had a -little tent which was set up for them at a fair altitude, whence -Greswold taught them to take observations and measurements. But the -mountaineering for the season was now over; it was now S. Michael's -Day, and avalanches fell and snow-storms had begun on the higher -slopes. He knew that if anyone saw him he would be stopped and taken -back. For that reason he said nothing to Gela, who could never be -persuaded to a disobedience; and he rose in the dark, before the hour -at which his attendant came to dress him, got his clothes on as best he -could, slipped the sword Vàsàrhely had given him in his belt, and took -his crampons and alpenstock in his hand. - -He had kneeled and said his prayers, fervently though quickly. - -'A soldier cannot pray _very_ long if he hear the trumpets sounding,' -he had thought, as he rose. He felt neither irresolution nor fear; he -was strong with ardour and an exalted sense of right-doing. - -He had the little knapsack which, in the long forest walks with his -tutor, he was used to carry packed with simple food for a morning meal -when they halted under the pines. He had put some bread and cakes into -this overnight, and he had filled his little silver flask with milk, -as he had seen the flasks of the gentlemen filled with wine in those -grand days when the Kaiser and the Court had hunted with his father. -Thus equipped he managed to escape from the house by a side door, left -open by some of the under-servants, who had just risen. He knew the -quick way to reach the Glöckner slopes, for he had been taken there by -Otto to learn mountaineering, and for his age he climbed well. His eye -was sure, his step firm, and he knew not fear. He never thought of the -misery his absence might cause; he was absorbed in his self-imposed -mission. - -'I will bring him back,' he thought, 'and then she will smile again.' - -He had been trained in the lore of the high hills too well not to know -that it would take him several days to reach the Hintere Umbalthörl; -but he said to himself that this must be as it would. He would climb -on and on, sleep in any hut he could, and find what food he might. The -Bohemian boy had crossed many mountains and seas and deserts before he -had ransomed his brother. - -It was a fine morning, with light pleasant winds. There was a clear -blue in the sky, though north-east there was a brown haze, such as -hunters fear, upon the hills. - -'It will rain or snow to-morrow,' thought Bela, who had been made wise -in the signs of the weather. But even that prevision did not deter him; -he had his liberty and he meant to use it. He had been well trained to -all bodily exercises, and he could walk long and fast without fatigue. -His slender fair limbs were as strong as steel, and his health was -perfect. He knew all the tracks of the home-lying woods, and he wanted -no one to guide him. He got, with promptitude and address, out of sight -of the terraces and towers of Hohenszalras, and soon entered what was -called the Schwarzenwald, a dense pine-wood ascending abruptly the -mountain side from the gardens; the only place where the wildness of -the hills came in unbroken contact and close proximity to the lawns and -flowers of the south side of the schloss, the lower spurs of the Gross -Glöckner descending there so steep and stern that they enclosed the -parterres with a gigantic rampart of granite. - -The contrast of the rose gardens with these huge overhanging heights -had always so pleased the tastes of the Szalras châtelaines, that they -had never allowed any attempts to be made to change or modify the -savage grandeur and sombre wilds of the black wood. - -He was already a trained pedestrian, and he covered five miles without -pausing to breathe himself. Then he thought he had come far enough -to make it safe to pause and eat. He drank his milk and opened his -knapsack. There was turf still about him, and a few trees, but he had -come into the rocky region. Huge walls of red and grey marbles leaned -over him; white limestone crags faced him. Precipices, black with pines -and firs, shelved downward. He was still on his mother's land, but in a -part unknown to him. - -Once rested, he climbed up manfully, straining his little velvet -breeches and soaking his silver-buckled shoes in the wet moss as he -went; for in the Schwarzenwald regular paths soon ceased. There was -the barest track visible, made by sheep, and pushing its upward way -under branches, over boulders, and through wimpling burns. It was the -loneliest part of all the woods and hills; descending as it did to -the rose gardens of the burg, the hunters and shepherds seldom passed -through it. Steep and solitary, crowned with bare rocks, and leading -only to the glacier slopes, few steps ever went over its short grass -save those of woodland animals and of shepherds' flocks. At this time -of the year even the latter were not near. They had been already -brought down to their stables from the green stretches of pasture -between the rocks. Bela met no one; not even one of his own peasantry. - -He climbed and climbed uninterrupted, at first enjoying his solitude -rapturously, his triumph boisterously, and then going on more solemnly, -being a little awed by the sense of utter silence round him, in which -no sound was heard except of rippling water, of blowing boughs, and -afar off some faint tinkle of a church bell from a distant hamlet. - -His spirits were exalted and full of enthusiasm. Joined to his boldness -and ardour he had the German love of the mystical and marvellous. All -the vast white range of the Glöckner to him was as a fairyland opening -on enchanted empires all his own. All the forenoon he was happy. - -His brain, was busy with many pictures as he went. He saw his search -successful and his father found; he saw his happy return, and the -crowd of the glad household which would flock to meet his steps; he -thought how he would kneel down at her feet, and never rise until his -prayer should be heard, and his mother smile again; he thought how he -would cry out to her, 'Oh, mother, mother! I have brought him home!' -and how she would look, and the light and the warmth come back into -her face. It was so little to do--only to climb amidst these kindly -familiar mountains that had been always above him and around him since -first his eyes had opened. Wratislaw had gone over lands, and seas, and -deserts, and braved the jaws of lions, and the steel of foemen, and the -dragon's breath of the hot sand wind; he himself had so little to do; -only to climb some rough uneven ground, some green steep pastures, some -smooth fields of ice. He felt sad to think it was such a little thing. - -Far down below he could hear the great bells of the burg chiming and -clanging, and he knew that they were giving the alarm for him; he saw -men small as mice grouping together here, and running apart there; he -knew they were coming out to search for him. He resolved to be very -wary. He had got so long a start that he was high on the hills ere he -heard the alarm-bells ring. He knew that he must avoid being seen -by anyone he met, or, known as he was to the whole country-side, his -liberty would soon be at an end. But the huts of the cattle-keepers -were empty, and the chances of meeting a mountaineer were few. Hundreds -of men might come upward in search of him, and yet miss him amidst -those endless walls of stone, those innumerable peaks and paths and -precipices, each one the fellow of the other. - -He climbed the grassy slopes, the steep stone ways, as he had learned -to do with Otto, and though he was still for from the sides of Glöckner -he was yet soon on very high ground. A great mountain, green at the -base, snow-covered half the way down, frowned above him; it was but one -of the spurs of the Glöcknerwand, but he believed it to be the king of -the Austrian Alps itself. He met no one; the mountains were solitary; -the first breath of autumn had scared the cattle-keepers downward -with their flocks and herds. Sometimes, very far off, he saw a lonely -figure, a pedlar, or a hunter, or a shepherd, or some _alm_ still -tenanted by its flock, but they were mere specks on the immensity of -the glacier slopes and the domes of snow. The solitude enchanted him at -first; he had never been alone before. He drank from a stream, ate more -bread, and held on firmly and fearlessly. The thought that his father -was there beyond him, amidst those dazzling peaks, those lowering -clouds, seemed to shoe his little feet with fire. He felt weaker, for -his bread had nourished him but little, and he had not found a hut of -any kind as he had expected to do. But he toiled on, the slope of the -same mountain always facing him, always seeming to recede and to grow -higher and higher the further and further he went. - -The wall of granite which he was on, nine miles or more above and -beyond his home, was known as the Adler Spitze. He had been near -it in other days, but he did not recognise it now; all these stern -slopes and steeps, all these domes and roof-like ridges of snow and -ice, so resemble each other that a longer apprenticeship to the hills -than his had been is needed to distinguish them one from another. The -Adler Spitze was a dangerous and seldom traversed peak; its sides were -bristling with jagged rocks, and its chasms were many and deep. More -than one death had been caused by it in late years, and near its summit -his mother, had caused to be erected a refuge, one of the highest of -the district, where a keeper was forever on the watch for belated -travellers. These were, however, very few, for the mountain had gained -a bad name amongst the hunters and pedlars and muleteers who alone -traversed these hills, and was left almost entirely to the birds of -prey, which were numerous there and had given it its name. - -When the pine-woods ceased, and there was only around him mere naked -rock, with a little moss growing on it here and there, Bela knew -that he had come very high indeed. And he had his wish: he was quite -alone. There was nothing to be seen here except the dusky forest, -shelving downward, and vast slopes of naked grey stone, with large -loose rocks scattered over them, as if giants had been playing there at -pitch-and-toss. There was too much mist in the north and west, which -faced him, for the opposite mountains to be seen, for it was still -early in the day. He did not now feel the joy and excitement he had -expected. He had climbed to the glacier region indeed, but the scene -around was dreary, and the vast expanse of vapour surrounding him -looked chill and melancholy. - -In the excitement and exultation of his thoughts he had forgotten -many things which he knew very well, trained to the hills as he was; -he had forgotten that it might rain or snow before he reached any -halting-place, that fogs came on at that season with fatal suddenness, -that if the sun were obscured the cold would soon become great, that -if a mist came down he would be unable to find any road, and that men -had been often killed on those heights who had known every inch of the -hills. - -Something of his buoyancy and certainty of success began to pale and -grow dull as the isolation lost its sense of novelty, and that intense -silence of the glacier world, which is at all times so solemn, began to -strike awe into his intrepid soul. He had often been as high, but there -had been always on his ear his brother's voice, and his guide's laugh, -and the merry sounds of the men chattering together as they climbed. -Now there was no sound anywhere, save now and then a splitting cracking -noise, which he knew was ice giving way under the noon-day heat of -the sun. 'It must be just as still as this in the grave,' he thought, -with a chill in his warm eager leaping young blood. A little tuft of -edelweiss growing in a crevice, and an _alpenlerche_ winging its way -through the blue air, seemed to him like friends. - -He wished now that Gela were with him. - -'But it would have been of no use to ask him,' he thought sadly. 'He -never will disobey, even to make good come of it.' - -A white mist had settled over all the lower world, one of the autumn -fogs which come from the lower clouds enwrapped all the lakes and -pastures and forests of Hohenszalras. Nothing could better baffle and -distract his pursuers; perplexed and blinded, they would be wholly at -a loss to trace his steps. It did not occur to him that the fog on -the lower lands might mean also storm and snow, and the darkness and -dampness of ice-cold vapours, in the upper air where he was. - -It had become rough, hard, toilsome work; he was bruised, and almost -lame, and very tired. But the spirit in him was not crushed; he kept -always thinking: 'If it did not hurt, it would be nothing to do it.' - -He had now got above all grass; the ground was loose shingle where it -was not bare granite, limestone, or marble, on all of which it was -difficult to keep a hold. There was snow not very far above him. The -air here was intensely cold. He had not thought to bring any furs -with him. His limbs were sorely cramped, his feet began to feel numb, -his fingers were so chilled he could hardly grip his alpenstock; the -hard slopes gave scarcely any footing to his climbing-irons; there -were clouds about him enveloping him, freezing him in their icy mist. -He began to think piteously of his brother, of his home, and of the -warm-cushioned nooks by the study fire, but he would not give in; he -toiled on, cutting and hurting his hands and knees as he groped on his -upward way. He reminded himself of Wratislaw, of Cassabianca, and all -the boy-heroes he had ever read of; he would not yield in endurance to -any one of them. - -But, looking up, he knew by the colour of the sky that it was about to -snow; the heavens were of a leaden uniform grey, and seemed to meet -and touch the mountain. Then Bela knew that in all likelihood he would -never see Gela or his home again. - -He choked down the sob that rose in his throat, and tried to think -what he could do to save himself. The ascent was now so steep that he -could make no upward way, and could barely keep himself from sliding -downwards. He caught at a projecting boulder and pulled himself with -great effort up on to it; there he could sit in a cramped position and -take breath. When he looked down he saw no forests, no land, no rocks, -nothing but a sea of fog, which had gathered thick and grey beneath -him. In autumn and spring the mountain weather changes in ten minutes -from fair to foul. - -The odd stupor that comes from long exposure at a great altitude in -cold and vapour was stealing over him. Strange noises sounded in his -ears, and his feet and hands tingled. He began to fear that he should -get no further on his way, and he had not listened so often to the -tales told by huntsmen without knowing clearly enough the dangers -which await those who are out on the mountain side in bad weather when -daylight goes. - -As he sat there, gazing dizzily into the ocean of vapour below him, -and upward to the huge walls of granite and of snow, he saw coming -and descending towards him from out the clouds a huge dark bird; the -immense wings seemed wide as heaven itself as it circled and swept the -air. - -Bela's heart stood still: it was a male eagle, a golden eagle, and he -knew it. - -The child's aching eyes watched the monarch of the upper air with a -horrible fascination. It looked black as night against the steely sky, -the snow-covered peaks. - -He sat erect, and cried aloud to it in half delirious indignant -reproof. 'Oh, you great bird! you are treacherous, you are thankless! -_We_ have spared you and yours always, and now you will kill me! Oh, -do you not hear? The Szalras have always spared you! Do you not hear?' -But the shouts of his young voice died away against the granite walls -around him, and the king-bird paused not, but came nearer, and nearer, -and nearer. - -It circled round and round, and each circle narrowed, till it was -poised immediately above his head, motionless, balancing itself upon -its outstretched pinions. He could see its eyes bent on him, see the -giant claws drawn up against its belly, see the hooked yellow beak. -The eagle was lord of the air, and he had intruded on its royalty: in -another moment he felt that it would descend on him and bear him off in -its talons or batter him to death with the blows of its wings. He drew -his little sword and waited for it; his eyes did not shrink, his body -did not cower; he looked upward with his toy-blade drawn in as true a -courage as that of Leonidas. - -'If only I could take him home once--once--I would not mind dying here -afterwards,' he thought, in his dreamy exultation; '_Gott und mein -Schwert!_' he muttered, and waited still, calmly. Yet to die with his -errand undone--that seemed cruel. - -The huge dark mass balanced itself one moment, more, then measuring its -prey rushed through the air towards him. But, ere it had seized him, -a shot flashed through the shadows, and rang through the silence; the -bird dropped dead in a ring of blood on the naked stone of the mountain -side. - -Bela sprang up, and tottering on the slippery shelving rock threw his -arms outward with a loud cry. - -'I came to find you!' he shouted, in his rapturous joy; then cold and -fatigue and past terror conquered him. He swooned at his father's feet. - -Sabran had not known that it was his son whom he saved. He had seen -a child menaced by a bird of prey, and so had fired. When the boy -staggered to him with that cry of welcome, he was for the moment -stunned with amazement and gratitude and inexpressible emotion; the -next he raised the little brave body in his arms. - -'Oh! tell me where your mother kissed you last, that I may set my lips -there!' he murmured to the child: but Bela heard not. - -He was cold, inanimate, and senseless. He had gained his goal, but he -had no sight or sense to know it. His father looked around him with -terror for his sake. The snow had begun to fall, the darkness was -deepening, the mists were creeping upward; he, who for three years had -dwelt a mountaineer amidst these mountains, knew the danger of being -belated amidst them in autumn, when, at a stroke, autumn became winter; -sometimes in a single night. He himself had his dwelling far from there -upon the Isel water, under the Umbal glacier. If he had to carry the -boy it would be useless to dream of reaching the rude place which he -had made his home: the weight of a tall child of ten years old is no -light burden, and he knew that even if Bela regained his consciousness -he would be incapable of exertion in the cold, which would intensify -with every hour. But he wasted no moments in hesitation. He knew what -the white fall of those softly-descending feathers from above, what -the darkness and wetness of the dense fog down below, meant, out on -the spurs of Glöckner after sunset. Lives were lost here every year; -herds that had stayed on the Alps too late were surprised and destroyed -by early snow-storms; pedlars and carriers were belated, and sent to -a last sleep by that sudden plunge of autumn into frost. He knew his -way inch by inch, and he knew that there was, some mile or so beyond -him, the Wandahutte, erected in a dangerous pass by his wife, as a -thanksgiving in the first months of their marriage. There he would find -a rude bed, food, wine, and shelter for the night. He set himself to -reach it. - -It was hard to climb with the child, held by one arm, and thrown across -one shoulder, as shepherds throw a disabled lamb. His other hand -gripped his alpenstock; he had left his rifle under a ledge of rock, as -a useless load. He had stripped off the hunter's jacket that he wore, -and wrapped it round Bela, whose body and limbs felt frozen. Down -below in the valleys fruit trees had still their plums and pears, and -asters and dahlias still flowered, but at this elevation the cold was -piercing and the snow froze as it fell. - -A high wind also had risen, as the day declined, and blew the white -powder of the snow in whirling clouds: the terrible _tourmente_ of -the Alps which every traveller dreads. In the confusion of it he knew -that he might walk round and round on the same road all night, making -no progress. Soon it grew dark, though not quite four o'clock. He had -no light with him, for he had not intended to be out at night; he had -but come thither, as he often came, to see the distant gleam of the -Szalrassee, the far-off outline of the Hohenszalrasburg. He had been -reascending and returning when he had seen a child menaced by an eagle, -and had fired. Had he been by himself he would have found the hut -speedily, but weighted with the burden of Bela's inert body he made -little way, and staggered often on the slippery frozen steep. He had no -hands free to wield his hatchet and cut his way by steps over the ice -which had formed in all the fissures of the rocks. - -The mountains had been his only friends in his exile. He had returned -to them, he had dwelt amongst them, he had borne his sorrows through -their help, and strengthened himself with their strength. But they -menaced him sorely now. For himself he cared not, but his heart ached -for the child, whose courage and affection had brought him thither to -meet his death. - -'My poor Bela!' he murmured, as the boy's fair head hung over his -shoulder, 'why did you come to me? I give you nothing but evil. Safety, -comfort, happiness, honour, all come from _her._' - -The whole heavens seemed to open, so dense a storm of snow now poured -upon him. There were strange deep noises ever and again, as from the -very bowels of the hills; a thousand times had he rejoiced to match -his strength against the mountains and to conquer, but now they were -his masters. All around him were the bastions and walls and domes of -the great ice peaks; the huge glaciers hung above like frozen seas -suspended; he could not behold them but he felt their presence and -their awe. - -'The snow is in my blood and my blood is yours, and now it claims us,' -he muttered to the senseless ear of the child. He and the child had -loved the snow, met it with welcome, sported with it in triumph; and -now it killed them. They would lie down in it, and be one with it for -ever. - -But although these fancies drifted in his brain, he strove with all his -might to keep in movement, to ascend ever in the easterly direction of -the refuge which he sought to gain. So far as he could, weighted with -his burden and blinded by the darkness, he continued to climb, gripping -the hard slopes with his feet and his alpenstock. He had given his coat -to the child; the cold made every vein in his own body numb; his limbs -pricked and seemed to swell; he had only his woollen shirt, above his -linen one, and his velvet breeches between him and the frozen air, that -could slay a hundred sheep massed together in their warmth and wool. -He knew that the hut was but a mile, or little more, from the place -where he had shot the eagle; but half a mile in the snowstorm and the -darkness was longer than forty miles in sunshine and fair weather. He -could not be even sure that he went aright; he could see nothing; the -sky was covered with the low dense clouds; he could only guess. All -the slender signs and landmarks, that would even in mere twilight have -served to guide his steps, were now hidden. A thick woolly impenetrable -gloom enshrouded him; he felt as though he were muffled and suffocated -by it, and the fatal drowsiness--the fatal desire to lie down and be -at rest--with which frost kills, stole on him. - -With all the manhood in him he resisted it for the child's sake. - -He had been climbing and wandering three short hours only, and he -had believed that it was midnight at the least. Bela still hung like -a lifeless thing over his shoulder, but he felt that his limbs were -warmer, and his heart beat feebly, but with regularity. - -'God grant me power to save him, for his mother's sake,' thought -Sabran; 'then there may come what will.' - -He struggled anew against the mortal sleepiness, the increasing -numbness, that grew upon himself. Suddenly, as he turned, without -knowing it, the corner of a wall of rock he saw a starry light. He knew -that it was the lamp of the refuge which, by his wife's command, was -lit at twilight every evening the whole year round. It was now but a -few roods off; he could see even the outline of the cabin itself, black -against its background of snow. But he had taken the wrong path to it. -Between him and it there yawned a wide crevasse in the glacier on which -he now stood. - -He shouted loud, but the wind was louder than his voice. The keeper in -the refuge could not hear. He paused doubtfully. To retrace his steps -and seek the right path would be certain destruction; it would take him -many miles about, and there was no chance even in the darkness that he -would ever find it; his strength, too, was failing him, and the child -was still unconscious. There was but one way of escape, to leap the -fissure. It was wider than any man could be sure to clear, and if he -fell within it he would fall into jagged ice a thousand fathoms down. -By daylight he had often looked down into its awful depths, blue in -their darkness, set with jagged teeth of ice like a trap's jaws. - -The leap might be death or life. - -He hesitated a few instants, then drew quite close to the edge, and -cast aside his pole, for the chasm was too wide for that to help him, -and he needed both hands free to hold the boy more firmly. The lamp -from the hut shed light enough to guide him; the snow fell fast, the -wind was violent. He paused another moment on the brink, drew the child -closer to him and clasped him with both arms; then, gathering all his -force into his limbs, he leaped. - -He cleared the fissure, but staggered on the slippery ice beyond. He -fell heavily, but still held his son so that Bela fell uppermost and -dropped upon him. - -Crushed by his weight, Sabran sank at full length on the white crystal -ground; alone he would have leaped as surely as the chamois. - -The shock awoke Bela from his trance; he opened his blue eyes giddily. - -'It is you!' he murmured feebly, as he felt himself lying on his -father's breast. - -'It is I!' said Sabran. 'My child, if you can move, try and creep to -that hut and call. I cannot.' - -The child, without a sound, trembling sorely, and with a sense of -confusion making his head dizzy, obeyed, drew himself slowly up, and -dragged his tired, aching, cramped limbs over the snow. - -'You are brave,' murmured his father, whose eyes followed him. 'You are -your mother's son.' - -Bela reached the door of the hut and beat on it with his little frozen -hands, and then fell down against it. - -'It is I--Count Bela!' he managed to cry aloud. 'Come to my father; -quick!' - -The door was flung aside, and the keepers of the hut rushed out at the -first cry. They had been asleep. They were old jägers, past the work -of the forests, but still strong. Having lighted the beacon without, -they had drunk a little wine, and chattered, and then dosed. Terrified -at their own negligence and at the sight of their lady's son, they -staggered out into the night, and together they bore the body of Sabran -into the refuge. He was unable to rise. - -'You cannot move!' sobbed the child, raining kisses on his hands. - -'I am stiff from the cold; nothing more,' said his father, faintly. - -Then he looked at the men. - -'One of you, if it be possible, go to the Burg. Tell the Countess von -Szalras that her son is safe. You need not speak of me. Bring the -physician here when it is morning; but say nothing of me to-night. Give -me a little of your wine----' - -His lips were blue, he felt faint; in his own heart he said to himself, -'I am hurt unto death.' - -Bela had thrown his arms about him, and, trembling like a leaf, clung -there and sobbed aloud deliriously. - -'You are hurt, you are hurt, and all for me!' he sobbed, as he saw his -father placed on the truckle bed set aside for any belated wanderer on -the hills. - -Sabran smiled on him. - -'My child, do not grieve so; it is nothing; a mere momentary wrench; -do not even think of it. No, no! I am not in pain.' - -The wine revived him, and restored his strength, and he sought to -conceal his injury for the boy's sake. - -'Warm some of this wine and give it to my son,' he said to the keeper -of the hut; 'then undress him, wrap him warmly, and make him sleep -before the fire.' - -'You are hurt, you are ill!' moaned Bela. 'I came to find you to take -you back. Our mother has never been the same;--she has never smiled----' - -'Hush!' said Sabran, almost sternly. 'Do not speak of your mother -before these men, her servants. You came to seek me, my poor little -boy? That was good of you, and it was good to remember me. It is three -years----' - -Bela clung to him and put his lips to his father's ear, that the men -might not hear. - -'The others have always prayed for you,' he murmured, 'because we were -all told. But me, I have loved you always. I have never thought of -anything else. And I have tried to be good, oh! I _have_ tried!' - -A great suffering came on his father's face as he heard the innocent -words, and a great tenderness. - -'When I am dead, as I shall be so soon, will he remember, too?' he -thought. - -Aloud he said: - -'My child, it is very sweet to me to hear your voice again. But if you -love me now, obey me. You will have fever and ague if you do not drink -some warm wine, let yourself be undressed, and lie down before the -fire. Do not be afraid. You will see me when you awake. I shall not -stir.' - -He thought as he spoke: - -'No, I shall never stir again; they will bear me away to my grave, that -is all. I am like a felled tree. All is over. Well, perchance, so best: -when I am dead she may forgive--she may love the children.' - -When at last Bela, sobbing piteously, had reluctantly obeyed, and -when, despite all his struggles, nature, frozen, weary, and worn out, -compelled him to close his eager eyes in heavy dreamless slumber, -Sabran with a glance called the keeper to him. - -'Now the child sleeps,' he said, 'get my clothes off me, if you can. -Touch me gently. I think my back is broken.' - - - - -CHAPTER XLIII. - - -It was twelve o'clock in the night. Wanda von Szalras paced the -Rittersaal with feverish steps and limbs which, whilst they quivered -with fear, knew no fatigue. It had been nine in the morning when -Greswold and the servants, having searched in vain, came at last to her -with the tidings that her first-born son was lost; his bed empty, his -clothes gone, his little sword away from its place. All the day she had -sought herself, and organised the search of others with all the energy -and courage of her race. She had not given way to the despair which had -seized her, but in her own soul she had said: 'Does fate chastise me -thus for my own cruelty? I have shrunk from their sweet faces because -they were like his. For two long months I exiled them, I thrust them -from my presence and my heart. I have been ashamed of them. Does God -punish me through them? Shall I lose my children, too? Can I forgive -myself? Have I not even wished them unborn? Oh, my Bela, my darling, my -first-born! Yes, you are his, but more than all, you are mine!' - -When night closed in, and all the many separate search-parties -returned, bringing no news of him, she thought that she would lose her -reason. All had been done that could be done; the men on the estates -were scattered far and wide. It was known that there were snow-storms -on the heights; the white fury had even at eventide descended to the -lower ground, and the terraces and gardens shone white as the lights of -the heavens fell upon them. Every now and then there came the report -of a gun on the hills; the men were firing in hope that the child, if -lost, might hear the shots. The evening passed on and midnight came, -and no one knew where Bela was in those vast forests, those immense -hills, all hidden in the impenetrable darkness. She saw him at every -moment lying white and cold in some hollow in the snow; she saw the -cruel winds blow his curls, his fair limbs stiffen. Every year the -winter and the mountains took their toll of lives. - -She had known nothing of the purport of the child's disappearance; -she had been left to every vague conjecture with which her mind could -torture her. The whole household and all the woodsmen and huntsmen had -scoured the hills far and wide, and the whole day and night had gone by -with no tidings, no result. Sleep had visited no eyes at Hohenszalras; -from its terraces the snow-storm and hurricanes beating around the head -of Glöckner were discernible by the agitation of the clouds that hid -one-half the heights. - -Gela had stayed up beside her, his little pale face pressed to the -window frame, his terrified eyes staring into the gloom which near at -hand grew red with the beacon fires. - -As midnight tolled from the clock tower he came to her, and touched her -hand. - -'Mother,' he whispered, 'I dared not say it before, but I must say it -now. I think--I think--Bela is gone to try and bring _him_ home.' - -'Him!' she echoed, while a thrill ran like fire and ice together -through her, from head to foot. 'You mean--your father?' - -'Yes.' - -She was silent. Her breast heaved. - -'What makes you say that?' she asked, at last. - -'Bela thought of nothing else all this year and last year, too,' said -Gela, in a hushed voice. 'He was always talking of it. When he was -smaller he thought of riding all over the world. Yesterday he was so -strange, and when we went to bed he kissed me ever so many times; and -he prayed a long, long while. And for nothing less would he have taken -the sword, I think. And--and I heard the men saying to-day that our -father was somewhere near; and I think that Bela might have heard that, -and so have gone to bring him home.' - -'To bring him home!' - -The words, uttered in his son's soft, grave, flute-like voice, pierced -her heart. She could not speak. - -'Will he rob me even of my first-born?' she thought, bitterly. - -At that moment Greswold entered. Gela, looking in his face, gave a -shout of joy. - -'You have found my Bela!' he cried, flinging his arms about the old man. - -'Yes, your brother is safe, quite safe! My Lady hears?' - -She heard, and the first tears that she had ever shed for years rushed -to her eyes. She drew Gela, with a passionate gesture, to her side, -and falling on her knees beside the Imperial throne in the Kittersaal, -praised God. - -Then, when she rose, she cried in very ecstasy: - -'Fetch him; bring him at once!--oh, my child! Who found him? Who has -him now? If a peasant saved his life, he and his shall have the finest -of all my land in Iselthal in grant for ever and for ever!----' - -Greswold looked at her timidly; then said: - -'May I speak to your Excellency alone?' - -She touched Gela's hair tenderly. - -'Go, my darling, and bear the good news to our reverend mother. You -know how she has suffered.' - -The boy obeyed and left the hall. She turned to Greswold. - -'Tell me all, now.' - -The old man hesitated, then took his courage up and answered. - -'My Lady--his father found your son.' - -She put her hand out and clenched the arm of the throne as if to save -herself from falling. - -'His father!' she echoed. 'How came he there? Answer me, with the -truth, the whole truth.' - -'My Countess,' said Greswold, while his voice shook, 'your husband has -dwelt amidst the Glöckner slopes almost for the last three years. When -he left here he remained absent awhile, but not long. He has lived in -utter solitude. Few knew it. The few who did kept his secret. I was one -of these. He had corresponded with me ever since he left your house. -You may remember being angered?' - -She made a gesture of assent. - -'Go on,' she murmured. 'He found my child, you say?' - -'He found Count Bela; yes. It seems he had come as near here as some -nine miles eastward; near the hut which your Excellency built, not -very long after your marriage, on the crest of the Adler Spitze, in -consequence of the fatal accident to the Bavarian pedlars. He knew -nothing of Count Bela's loss, but there he saw a young boy threatened -by an eagle, and shot the bird. The fog was even then coming on upon -the heights. He found his son insensible from fatigue, and cold, and -terror, and bore him in his arms until he reached the refuge. He had -been near it all the time, but as the mist deepened and the snow fell -he lost his way, and must have gone round and round on the same path -for hours. We were, in sheer despair, mounting towards the Adler -Spitze, though we did not believe the child could have possibly got so -far, when we met one of the keepers descending with the news. The storm -is at its height; we could only grope our way, and we missed it many -times, so that we have been four mortal hours and more coming downward -those seven miles. The keeper said that my lord desired you should hear -at once of the safety of the child, but not of his own presence in the -hut. But I felt that your Excellency should be told of all.' - -'You were right. I thank you. You have been ever faithful to me and -mine.' - -She stretched out her hand to him in dismissal, and sought a refuge in -her oratory. - -She felt that she must be alone. - -She almost forgot the safety of her first-born in the sense that -his father was near her. She fell on her knees before the Christ of -Andermeyer and praised heaven for her child's preservation, and with a -passion of tears besought guidance in her struggle with what now seemed -to her the long and cruel hardness of her heart. - -To hear thus of him whom once she had adored, blinded her to all save -the memories of the past, which thronged upon her. If he had repented -so greatly was it not her obligation to meet his penitence with pardon? -It would be bitter to her to live out her life beside one whose word -she would for ever doubt, whose disloyalty had cut to the roots of the -pride and purity of her race. Nevermore between them could there be -the undoubting faith, the unblemished trust, which are the glorious -noonday of a cloudless love. She might forgive, but never, never, she -thought, would she be able to command forget fulness. - -But for that very reason, maybe, would her duty lie this way. - -The knowledge of those lonely desolate years, passed so near her, -whilst he kept the dignity and the humility of silence, touched all the -generosity of her nature. She knew that he had suffered; she believed -that, though he had betrayed her, he had loved and honoured her in -honesty and truth. One lie had poisoned his life, as a rusted nail -driven through an oak tree in its prime corrodes and kills it. But he -had not been a liar always. She had made his life her own in bygone -years: was she not bound now to redeem it, to raise it, to shelter it -on her heart and in her home? Was not the very shrinking scorn she felt -for his past a reason the more that she should bend her pride to union -with him? She had thought of her life ever as the poet of the flower: - - the ever sacred cup - Of the pure lily hath between my hands, - Felt safe unsoiled, nor lost one grain of gold. - -Had there been egotism in the purity of it, self-love beneath love of -honour? Had she treasured the 'grain of gold' in her hands rather with -the Pharisee's arrogance of purity than with the true humility of the -acolyte? - -She kneeled there before the carven Christ in an anguish of doubt. - -He had given her back her first-born. Should she be less generous to -him? - -Should she for ever arrogate the right of judgment against him, or -should she stretch the palm of pardon even across that great gulf of -wrong dividing them as by a bottomless pit? - -Tears came like dew to her parched heart. It was the first time that -she had ever wept since the night when she had exiled him. Three long -barren years had drifted by; years cold and dark and joyless as the -winter days which bound the earth under bands of iron, and let no -living thing or creeping herb rejoice or procreate. - -When she rose from her knees her mind was made up, a great peace had -descended on her soul. She had forgiven her own dishonour. She had laid -her heart bare before God and plucked her pride up from its bleeding -roots. - -All the early hours of her love recurred to her with an aching -remembrance, which had lost its shame and was sweet in its very pain. -His crime was still dark as the night in her eyes, but her conscience -and her awakening tenderness spoke together and pleaded for her pardon. - -What was love if not one long forgiveness? What raised it higher than -the senses if not its infinite patience and endurance of all wrong? -What was its hope of eternal life if it had not gathered strength in it -enough to rise above human arrogance and human vengeance? - -'Oh, my love, my love!' she cried aloud. 'We will live our lives out -together!' - -Her resolve was taken when she left her oratory and traversed her -apartments to those of the Princess Ottilie, who met her with eager -words of joy, herself tremulous and feeble after the anxious terrors of -the past day. Some look on Wanda's face checked the utterance of her -gladness. - -'Is it not true?' she said in sudden fear. 'Is the child not found?' - -'Yes; his father has found him,' she answered simply. 'Dear mother, -long you have condemned me; judged me unchristian, unmerciful, harsh. I -know not whether you were right, or I. God knows, we cannot. But give -me your blessing ere I go out into the night. I go to him; I will bring -him here.' - -The other gazed at her doubting, incredulous, touched to a great hope. - -'Bring him?' she echoed, 'your child?' - -'My husband.' - -'You will do that?--ah! mercy is ever blessed; the grace of Heaven will -be with you!' - -She sighed as she raised her head. - -'Who can tell? Perhaps my harshness will make heaven harsh to me.' - -When she came forth again from her own rooms she was clothed in a -fur-lined riding-habit. - -'Bid them saddle a horse used to the hills,' she said, 'and let Otto -and two other men be ready to go with me.' - -'It is a fearful night,' Greswold ventured to suggest. 'It will be as -bad a dawn. It snows even here. We met the keeper almost midway up the -Adler Spitze, yet it took us four hours to make the descent.' - -She did not even seem to hear him. - -'May I follow?' he asked her humbly. She gave a sign of assent, and -stood motionless and mute; her thoughts were far away. - -When the horse was brought she went out into the night. The storm of -the upper hills had descended to the lower; the wind was blowing icily -and strong, the snow was falling fast, but on the lower lands it did -not freeze as it fell, and riding was possible, though at a slow pace -from the great darkness. She knew every step of the way through her own -woods and up to the spurs of the Glöckner. She rode on till the ascent -grew too steep for any animal; then she abandoned the horse to one of -her attendants, took her alpenstock and went on her way towards the -Adler Spitze on foot, the men with their lanterns lighting the ground -in front of her. It was wild weather and grew wilder the nearer it grew -to dawn. There was danger, at every step from slippery frozen ground, -from thin ice that might break over bottomless abysses. The snow was -driven in her face, and the wind tore madly at her clothes. But she was -used to the mountains and held on steadily, refusing the rope which -Otto entreated her to take and permit him to fasten to his loins. They -kept to the right paths, for their strong lights enabled them to see -whither they went. Once they crept along a narrow ledge where a man -could barely stand. The ascent was long and weary in the teeth of the -weather; it tried even the stout jägers; but she scarcely felt the -force of the wind, the chill of the black frost. - -No woman but one used as she was to measure her strength with her -native Alps could have lived through that night, which tried hardly -even the hunters born and bred amidst the snow summits. By day the -ascent hither was difficult and dangerous after the summer months, but -after nightfall the sturdiest mountaineer dreamed not of facing it. But -on those heights above her, in the dark yonder, beneath the clouds, -were her husband and her child. That knowledge sufficed to nerve her -limbs to preternatural power, and the men who followed her were loyal -and devoted to her service; they would have lain down to die at her -word. - -When her body seemed to sink with the burden of fatigue and cold, she -looked up into the blackness of the air, and thought that those she -sought were there, and fancied that already she heard their voices. -Then she gathered new strength and crept onward and upward, her hands -and feet clinging to the bare rock, the smooth ice, as a swallow clings -to a house wall. - -She had issued from a battle more bitter with her own soul; and had -conquered. - -At last they neared the refuge built by and named from her, and set -amidst the desolation of the snow-fields. She signed to her men to stay -without, and walking onward alone drew near the heavy door. - -She opened it a little way, paused a moment, drawing her breath with -effort; then looked into the cabin. It was a mere hut of two chambers -made of pitch pine, and lighted by a single window. There was no light -but from the pallid day without, which had barely broken. Before the -fire of burning logs was a nest of hay, and in it lay the child, -sleeping a deep and healthful sleep, his hands folded on his breast, -his face flushed with warmth and recovered life, his long lashes dark -upon his cheeks. - -His father was stretched still as a statue on the truckle-bed of the -keeper who watched beside him. - -The day had now broken, clear, pale, cold; the faint rose of sunrise -was behind the snow peaks of the Glöckner, and an _alpenflühevogel_ -was trilling and tripping on the frozen ground. From a distant unseen -hamlet far below there came a faint sound of morning bells. - -She thrust the door further open and entered. She made a gesture to -the keeper, who started up with a low obeisance, to go without. She -fastened the latch upon him; then, without waking the sleeping child, -went up to her husband's bed. His eyes were closed; he did not notice -the opening and shutting of the door; he was still and white as the -snow without; he looked weary and exhausted. - -At sight of him all the great love she had once borne him sprang up in -all its normal strength; her heart swelled with unspeakable emotion; -she stood and gazed on him with thirsty eyes tired of their long denial. - -Stirred by some vague sense of her presence near him he looked up and -saw her; all his blood rushed into his face. He could not speak. She -stooped towards him and laid her hand gently upon his. - -'I am come to thank you.' - -Her voice trembled. - -He gave a restless sigh. - -'Ah! for the child's sake,' he murmured. 'You do not come for me!----' - -She hesitated a moment, then she gathered all her strength and all her -mercy. - -'I come for you,' she answered in low clear tones. 'I will forget all -else except that I once loved you.' - -His face grew transfigured with a great joy. - -He could not speak; he gazed at her. - -'You were my lover, you are my children's father. You shall return to -us,' she murmured, while her voice seemed to him heard in some dream -of Heaven. 'Your sin was great, yes; but love pardons all sins, nay, -effaces them, washes them out, makes them as though they were not. -I know that now. What have not been my own sins?--my coldness, my -harshness, my cruel, unyielding--pride? Nay, sometimes I have thought -of late my fault was darker than your own; more hateful in God's sight.' - -'Noblest of all women always!' he said faintly. 'If it be true, if it -be true, stoop down and kiss me once again.' - -She stooped, and touched his lips with hers. - -The child slept on in his nest of hay before the burning wood. The -silence of the high hills reigned around them. The light of the risen -day came through the small square window of the hut. Outside the bird -still sang. - -He looked up in her eyes, and his own eyes smiled with celestial joy. - -'I am happy!' he said simply. 'I have lived amongst your hills almost -ever since that night, that I might see your shadow as you passed, hear -the feet of your horses in the woods. The men were faithful; they never -told. Kiss me once more. You believe, say you believe, _now_, that I -did love you though I wronged you so?' - -'I do believe,' she answered him. 'I think God cannot pardon me that I -ever doubted!' - -Then, as she saw that he still lay quite motionless, not turning -towards her, though his eyes sought hers, a sudden terror smote dully -at her heart. - -'Are you hurt? Cannot you move?' she whispered. 'Look at me; speak to -me! It is dawn already; you shall come home at once.' - -He smiled. - -'Nay, love, I shall not move again. My spine is hurt, not broken, I -believe--but hurt beyond help; paralysis has begun. My angel, grieve -not for me, I shall die happy. You love me still! Ah, it is best thus; -were I to live, my sin and shame might still torture you, still part -us, but when I am dead you will forget them. You are so generous, you -are so great, you will forget them. You will only remember that we were -happy once, happy through many a long sweet year, and that I loved -you;--loved you in all truth, though I betrayed you!' - -The hunters bore him gently down in the cool pale noontide along the -peaceful mountain side homeward to Hohenszalras, and there, after -eleven days, he died. - -The white marble in its carven semblance of him lies above his grave -in the Silver Chapel; but in the heart of his wife he lives for ever, -and with him lives a sleepless and an eternal remorse. - -THE END. - - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Ouida - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDA, VOL. 3 (OF 3) *** - -***** This file should be named 52137-0.txt or 52137-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/2/1/3/52137/ - -Produced by Wanda Lee, Laura Natal Rodriguez and Marc -D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images -generouslly made available by the Internet Archive.) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/old/52137-0.zip b/old/old/52137-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 55ae154..0000000 --- a/old/old/52137-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/old/52137-h.zip b/old/old/52137-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 378f248..0000000 --- a/old/old/52137-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm b/old/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 0c232d1..0000000 --- a/old/old/52137-h/52137-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8790 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Wanda, vol. 3, by Ouida. - </title> - <style type="text/css"> - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - - h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { - text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ - clear: both; -} - -p { - margin-top: .51em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .49em; -} - -.p2 {margin-top: 2em;} -.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} -.p6 {margin-top: 6em;} - -hr { - width: 33%; - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - clear: both; -} - -hr.tb {width: 45%;} -hr.chap {width: 65%} -hr.full {width: 95%;} - -hr.r5 {width: 5%; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em;} -hr.r65 {width: 65%; margin-top: 3em; margin-bottom: 3em;} - - -.blockquot { - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -a:link {color: #000099; text-decoration: none; } - -v:link {color: #000099; text-decoration: none; } - -.center {text-align: center;} - -.right {text-align: right;} - - -.caption {font-weight: bold;} - -/* Images */ -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -.figleft { - float: left; - clear: left; - margin-left: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 1em; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -.figright { - float: right; - clear: right; - margin-left: 1em; - margin-bottom: - 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 0; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -/* Footnotes */ -.footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} - -.footnote {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} - -.footnote .label {position: absolute; right: 84%; text-align: right;} - -.fnanchor { - vertical-align: super; - font-size: .8em; - text-decoration: - none; -} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Ouida - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3) - -Author: Ouida - -Release Date: May 23, 2016 [EBook #52137] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDA, VOL. 3 (OF 3) *** - - - - -Produced by Wanda Lee, Laura Natal Rodriguez and Marc -D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images -generouslly made available by the Internet Archive.) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="500" alt="" /> -</div> - -<h1>WANDA</h1> - -<h3>BY</h3> - -<h2>OUIDA</h2> - - -<p class="center"> -<i>'Doch!—alles was dazu mich trieb</i>;<br /> -<i>Gott!—war so gut, ach, war so lieb!'</i><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 20%;">Goethe</span><br /> -</p> - - - -<h4>IN THREE VOLUMES</h4> - -<h4>VOL. III.</h4> - - -<h5>LONDON</h5> - -<h5>CHATTO & WINDUS, PICADILLY</h5> - -<h5>1883</h5> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h3><a name="WANDA" id="WANDA">WANDA.</a></h3> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX.</a></h4> - - -<p>When they came home from their tour amidst the mines of Galicia and -the plains of Hungary, and from their reception amongst the adoring -townsfolk of restored Idrac, the autumn was far advanced, and the long -rains and the wild winds of October had risen, making of every brook a -torrent.</p> - -<p>On their return she found intelligence from Paris that a friend of -her father's, and her own godfather, the Duc de Noira, had died, -bequeathing her his gallery of pictures, and his art collection of -the eighteenth century, which were both famous. The Duc had been a -Legitimist and a hermit. He had been unmarried, and had spent all the -latter years of his life in amassing treasures of art, for which he had -no heir of his own blood to care a jot. The bequest was a very precious -one, and her presence in Paris was requested. Regretful for herself -to leave Hohenszalras, she perceived that to Sabran the tidings were -welcome. Moved by an unselfish impulse she said at once:</p> - -<p>'Go alone; go instead of me; your presence will be the same as mine. -Paris will amuse you more if you are by yourself, and you will be so -happy amongst all those Lancrets and Fragonards, those Reiseiners -and Gauthières. The collection is a marvel, but entirely of the Beau -Siècle. You never saw it? No! I think the Duc never opened his doors -to anyone save to half a dozen old tried friends, and he had a horror -of turning his <i>salons</i> into showrooms. If you think well, we will -leave it all as it is, buying the house if we can. All that eighteenth -century <i>bibeloterie</i> would not suit this place, and I should like to -keep it all as he kept it; that is the only true respect to show to a -legacy.'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated; he was tempted, yet he was half reluctant to yield to -the temptation. He felt that he would willingly be by himself awhile, -yet he loved his wife too passionately to quit her without pain. His -own conscience made her presence at times oppress and trouble him, yet -he had never lost the half-religious adoration with which she had first -inspired him. He suggested a compromise—why should they not winter in -Paris?</p> - -<p>She was about to dissent, for of all seasons in the Tauern she loved -the winter best; but when she looked at him she saw such eager -anticipation on his face that she suppressed her own wishes unuttered.</p> - -<p>'We will go, if you like,' she said, without any hesitation or -reluctance visible. 'I dare say we can find some pretty house. Aunt -Ottilie will be pleased; there is nothing here which cannot do without -us for a time, we have such trusty stewards; only I think it would be -more change for you if you went alone.'</p> - -<p>'No!' he said; 'separation is a sort of death; do not let us tempt fate -by it. Life is so short at its longest; it is ingratitude to lose an -hour that we can spend together.'</p> - -<p>'There was never such a lover since Petrarca,' she said, with a smile. -'Nay, you eclipse him: he was never tried by marriage.'</p> - -<p>But though he jested at it, his great love for her seemed like a -beautiful light about her life. What did his state-secret matter? What -did it matter what cause had led him to avoid political life?—he loved -her so well.</p> - -<p>The following month they were in Paris, having found an hotel in the -Boulevard St. Germain, standing in a great sunny garden; and when they -were fairly installed there, the Princess and the children and the -horses followed them, and their arrival made an event of great interest -and importance in the city which of all others in the world it is -hardest thus to impress.</p> - -<p>The Countess von Szalras, a notability always, was celebrated just -then as the inheritress of the coveted Noira collection, which it had -been fondly hoped would have gone to the hammer: and Sabran, popular -always, and not forgotten here, where most things and people are -forgotten in a week, was courted, flattered, and welcomed by men and -by women; and as he rode down the Allée des Acacias, or entered the -Mirlitons, he felt himself at home. His beautiful wife, his beautiful -children, his incomparable horses, his marvellous good fortune were the -talk of all those who had already left their country-houses for the -winter <i>rentrée</i>, and attained a publicity, beginning with the great -Szalras pearls and ending with the babies' white donkeys, which was the -greatest of all possible offences to her; she abhorred and contemned -publicity with the sensitiveness of a delicate temper and the contempt -of a scornful patrician.</p> - -<p>To Sabran it was not so offensive; there was the Slav in him, which -loved display, and was not ill-pleased by notoriety. All this -admiration around them made him feel that his life after all had been -a great success, that he had drawn prizes in the lottery of fate which -all men envied him; it helped him to forget Egon Vàsàrhely. He had -never so nearly felt affection for Bela as when lines of men and women -stood still to watch the handsome child gallop on his pony down the -avenues of the Bois.</p> - -<p>'Life is after all like baccara or billiards,' he said to himself. -'It is of no use winning unless there be a <i>galerie</i> to look on and -applaud.'</p> - -<p>And then he felt ashamed of the poorness and triviality of the thought, -which was not one he would have expressed to his wife. That very -morning, when she had read a long flattery of herself in a journal of -fashion, she had cast the sheet from her with disgust on every line of -her face.</p> - -<p>'We are safe from <i>that</i>, at least, in the Iselthal,' she had said. -'Cannot you make them understand that we are not public artists to -need <i>réclames</i>, nor yet sovereigns to be compelled to submit to the -microscope? Is this the meaning of civilisation—to make privacy -impossible, to oblige every one to live under a lens?'</p> - -<p>He had affected to agree with her, but in his heart he had not done so. -He liked the fumes of the incense. So did his child.</p> - -<p>'They will put this in the papers!' said Bela, when the snow came and -he had his sledge out for the first time with four little Hungarian -ponies.</p> - -<p>'That is the poison of cities!' said Wanda, as she heard him. 'Who can -have been so foolish as to tell him of the papers?'</p> - -<p>'Your heir, my dear, will never want for reporters of any flattery,' -said his father. 'It is as well he should run the gauntlet of them -early.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened, and said to his brother a little later: 'I like Paris. -Paris prints everything we do, and the people read the print, and then -they want to see us.'</p> - -<p>'What good is that?' said Gela. 'I like home. They all of them <i>know</i> -us; they don't want to <i>see</i> us. That is much better.'</p> - -<p>'No, it isn't,' said Bela. 'One drives all day long at home, and there -is nothing but the trees; here the trees are all people, and the people -talk of us, and the people want to <i>be</i> us.'</p> - -<p>'But they love us at home,' said Gela.</p> - -<p>'That does not matter,' said Bela with hauteur.</p> - -<p>Wanda called the children to her.</p> - -<p>'Bela,' she said gently, 'do you know that once, not so very long ago, -there was a little boy here in Paris very much like you, with golden -hair and velvet coat like yours, and he was called the Dauphin, and -when he went out with his servants, as you do, the people envied him, -and talked of him, and put in print what he did each day? The people -wanted to <i>be</i> him, as you say, but they did not love him—poor little -child!—because they envied him so. And in a very little while—a -very, very little while—because it was envy and not love, they put -the Dauphin in prison, and they cut off his golden hair, and gave -him nothing but bread and water and filthy straw, and locked him up -all alone till he died. That is the use of being envied in Paris—or -anywhere else. Gela is right. It is better when people love us.'</p> - -<p>The next day, as Bela drove in his sledge down the white avenues -through the staring crowds, his little fair face was very grave under -its curls; he thought of the Dauphin.</p> - -<p>When the weather opened, Wanda took him and his brother to Versailles -and Trianon, and told them more of that saddest of all earthly -histories of fallen greatness. Gela sobbed aloud; Bela was silent and -grew pale.</p> - -<p>'I hate Paris,' he said very slowly, as they went back to it in the red -close of the wintry afternoon.</p> - -<p>'Do not hate Paris. Do not hate anything or anyone,' said his mother -softly; 'but love your own home and your own people, and be grateful -for them.'</p> - -<p>Bela lifted his little cap and made the sign of the Cross, as he did -when he saw anything holy. 'I am the Dauphin at home,' he thought; and -he felt the tears in his eyes, though he never would cry as Gela did.</p> - -<p>So she gave them her simples as antidotes to the city's poison, and -occupied herself with her children, with the poor around her, with the -various details of her distant estates, and paid but little heed to -that artificial world which, when she heeded it, offended and irritated -her. To please Sabran she went to a few great houses and to the opera, -and gave many entertainments herself, happy that he was happy in it, -but not otherwise interested in the life around her, or moved by the -homage of it.</p> - -<p>'It is much more my jewels than it is myself that they stare at,' she -assured him, when he told her of the admiration which she elicited -wherever she appeared. 'Believe me, if you put my pearls or my -diamonds on Madame Chose or Baroness Niemand, they would gather and -gaze quite as much.'</p> - -<p>He laughed.</p> - -<p>'Last night I think you wore no ornaments except a few tea-roses, and I -saw them follow you just the same. It is very odd that you never seem -to understand that you are a beautiful woman.'</p> - -<p>'I am glad to be so in your eyes, if I never shall be in my own. As for -that popularity of society, it never commended itself to me. It has too -strong a savour of the mob.'</p> - -<p>'When you are so proud to the world why are you so humble to me?'</p> - -<p>She was silent a moment, then said:</p> - -<p>'I think when one loves any other very much, one becomes for him -altogether unlike what one is to the world. As for being proud, I have -never fairly made out whether my pride is humility or my humility -pride, and none of my confessors have ever been able to tell me. I -assure you I have searched my heart in vain.'</p> - -<p>A shadow passed over his face; he thought that there even would be -pride enough to send him out for ever from her side if she knew——</p> - -<p>One day she suggested to him that he should visit Romaris.</p> - -<p>'Now you are near for so long a time, surely you should go,' she urged. -'It is not well never to see your poor people. The priest is a good -man, indeed; but he cannot altogether make up for your absence.'</p> - -<p>He answered with some irritation that they were not his people. All -the land had been parcelled out, and nothing remained to the name of -Sabran except a strip of the sea-shore and one old half ruined tower: -he could not see that he had any duties or obligations there. She did -not insist, because she never pursued a theme which appeared unwelcome; -but in herself she wondered at the dislike which was in him towards his -Breton hamlet, wondered that he did not wish one of his sons to bear -its title, wondered that he did not desire the children to see once, -at least, the sea-nest of his forefathers. It was more effort to her -than usual to restrain herself from pressing questions upon him. But -she did forbear; and as a consolation to her conscience sent to the -Curé of Romaris a sum of money for the poor, which was so large that it -astounded and bewildered the holy man by the weight of responsibility -it laid on him.</p> - -<p>The indifference shocked her the more because of the profound -conviction, in which she had been reared, of the duties of the noble -to his poorer brethren, and the ties of mutual affection which bound -together her and her people's interests.</p> - -<p>'The weapon of our order against the Socialist is duty,' she had once -said to him.</p> - -<p>He, more sceptical, had told her that no weapon, not even that anointed -one, can turn aside the devilish hate of envy. But she held to her -creed, and strove to rear her children in its tenets. It always seemed -to her that the Cross before which the fiend shrinks cowering in -'Faust' is but a symbol of the power of a noble life to force even -hatred to its knees.</p> - -<p>She did not care for this season in Paris, but she did not let him -perceive any dissatisfaction in her. She made her own interests out of -the arts and charity; she bought the Hôtel Noira, and left everything -as the Duc had left it; she found pleasure in intercourse with her -royal exiled friends, and left her husband his own entire liberty of -action.</p> - -<p>'Are you never jealous?' said her royal friend to her once. 'He is so -much liked—so much made love to—I wonder you are not jealous!'</p> - -<p>'I?' she echoed: and it seemed to her friend as if in that one pronoun -she had said volumes. 'Jealous!'</p> - -<p>She repeated the word as she drove home alone that day, and almost -wondered what it meant. Who could be to him what she was? Who could -dethrone her from that 'great white throne' to which his adoration had -raised her? If his senses ever strayed, his soul would never swerve -from its loyalty.</p> - -<p>When she reached home that afternoon she found a card, on which was -written with a pencil, in German:</p> - -<p>'So sorry not to find you. I am in Paris to see my doctor. Zdenka has -taken my service at Court. I will come to you to-morrow.'</p> - -<p>The card was Madame Brancka's.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXX" id="CHAPTER_XXX">CHAPTER XXX.</a></h4> - - -<p>Sabran, that same afternoon, as he had walked down the Rue de la Paix, -had been signalled and stopped by a pretty woman wrapped to the eyes -in blue fox furs, who was being driven in a low carriage by Hungarian -horses, glorious in silver chains and trappings.</p> - -<p>'My dear Réné,' had cried Madame Olga, 'do you not know me, that -you compel me to flourish my parasol? Yes: I am come to Paris. My -sister-in-law, Zdenka, will do my waiting. I wanted to consult my -physician; I am very unwell, though you look so incredulous. So Wanda -has all the Noira collection? What a fortunate woman she is. The -eighteenth century is the least suited to her taste. She will heartily -despise all those shepherdesses <i>en panier</i> and those smiling deities -on lacquer. How could the Duc leave such frivolities to so serious a -person? What is her doubled rose-leaf amidst all her good luck? She -must have one. I suppose it is you? Well, you will find me at home in -an hour. I am only a stone's throw from your hotel. Have you brought -all the homespun virtues with you from Hohenszalras? I am afraid they -will wither in the air of the boulevards. <i>Au revoir!</i></p> - -<p>And then she had laughed again and kissed her finger-tips to him, and -driven away wrapped up in her shining furs, and he was conscious of a -stinging sense of excitement, annoyance, pleasure, and confusion, as if -he had drunk some irritant and heady wine.</p> - -<p>He had gone on to his clubs with an uneasy sense of something -perilous and distasteful having come into his life, yet also with a -consciousness of a certain zest added to the reductions of this his -favourite city. He did not go to the Hôtel Brancka in the next hour, -and was sensible of having to exercise a certain control over himself -to refrain from doing so.</p> - -<p>'Did you know that Olga was in Paris?' she said, in some surprise, to -him when they met in the evening.</p> - -<p>'I believe she arrived this morning,' he answered, with a certain -effort. 'I met her an hour or two ago. She came unexpectedly; she had -not even told her servants to open her hotel.'</p> - -<p>'Is Stefan with her?'</p> - -<p>'I believe not.'</p> - -<p>'But surely it is her term of waiting in Vienna?'</p> - -<p>He gave a gesture of indifference.</p> - -<p>'I believed it was. I think it was. She will be sure to write to you -this evening, so she said. We cannot escape her, you see; she is our -fate.'</p> - -<p>'We can go back to Hohenszalras.'</p> - -<p>'That would be too absurd. We cannot spend our lives running away from -Madame Brancka. We have a hundred engagements here. Besides, your Noira -affair is not one half settled as yet, and it is only now that Paris is -really agreeable. We will go back in May, after Chantilly.'</p> - -<p>'As you like,' she said, with a smile of ready acquiescence.</p> - -<p>She was only there for his sake. She, would not spoil his contentment -by showing that she made a sacrifice. She was never really happy away -from her mountains, but she did not wish him to suspect that.</p> - -<p>The Hôtel Brancka was a charming little temple of luxury, ordered -after the last mode, and as <i>pimpant</i> as its mistress. It had cost -enormous sums of money, and its walls had been painted by famous -artists with fantastic and voluptuous subjects, which had not been paid -for at the present.</p> - -<p>In finance, indeed, she was much like a king of recent time, who never -had any money to give, but always said to his mistresses, 'Order -whatever you like; the Civil List will always pay my bills.' She had -never any money, but she knew that her brother-in-law, like the king's -ministers, would always pay her bills.</p> - -<p>'One expects to hear the "Decamerone" read here,' said Wanda, with some -disdain, as she glanced around her on her first visit.</p> - -<p>'At Hohenszalras one would never dare to read anything but the -"Imitationis Christi,"' said Madame Olga, with contempt of another sort.</p> - -<p>The little hotel was but a few streets distance off their own grand and -spacious residence, which had undergone scarcely any change since the -days of Louis XV. They saw the Countess Brancka very often, could not -choose but see her when she chose, and that was almost perpetually.</p> - -<p>He had honestly, and even intensely, desired not to be subjected to her -vicinity. But it was difficult to resist its seduction when she lived -within a few yards of him, when she met him at every turn, when the -changing scenes of society were like those of a kaleidoscope, always -composed of the same pieces. The closeness of her relationship to his -wife made an avoidance of her, which would have been easy with a mere -acquaintance, wholly out of possibility. She pleaded her 'poverty' very -prettily, as a plea to borrow their riding-horses, use their boxes -at the Opéra and the Théâtre Français, and be constantly, under one -pretext or another, seeking their advice. Wanda, who knew the enormous -extravagance of both the Branckas, and the inroads which their debts -made on even the magnificent fortunes of Egon Vàsàrhely, had not as -much patience as usual in her before these plaintive pretences.</p> - -<p>'<i>Wanda me boude</i>', said Madame Brancka, with touching reproachfulness, -and sought a refuge and a confidant in the sympathy of Sabran, which -was not given very cordially, yet could not be altogether refused. Not -only were they in the same world, but she made a thousand claims on -their friendship, on their relationship. Stefan Brancka was in Hungary. -She wanted Sabran's advice about her horses, about her tradespeople, -about her disputes with the artists who had decorated her house; she -sent for him without ceremony, and, with insistence, made him ride with -her, drive with her, dance with her, made him take her to see certain -diversions which were not wholly fitted for a woman of her rank, and so -rapidly and imperceptibly gained ascendency over him that before making -any engagement he involuntarily paused to learn whether she had any -claim on his time. It caused his wife the same vague impatience which -she had felt when Olga Brancka had persisted in going out with him on -hunting excursions at home. But she thrust away her observation of it -as unworthy of her.</p> - -<p>'If she tire him,' she thought, 'he will very soon put her aside.'</p> - -<p>But he did not do so.</p> - -<p>Once she said to him, with a little irony, 'You do not dislike Olga so -very much now?' and to her surprise he coloured and answered quickly, -'I am not sure that I do not hate her.'</p> - -<p>'She certainly does not hate you,' said Wanda, a little contemptuously.</p> - -<p>'Who knows?' he said gloomily; 'who could ever be sure of anything with -a woman like that?'</p> - -<p>'Mutability has a charm for some persons,' said his wife, with an -irritation for which she despised herself.</p> - -<p>'Not for me,' said Sabran, quickly. 'My opinion of Madame Olga is -precisely what it has always been.'</p> - -<p>'Are you very sincere to her, then?' said Wanda, and as she spoke, -regretted it. What was Olga Brancka that she should for a moment bring -any shadow of dissension between them?</p> - -<p>'Sincere!' he echoed, with a certain embarrassment. 'Who would she -expect to be so? I told you once before that you pay her in a coin of -which she could not decipher the superscription!'</p> - -<p>Wanda smiled, but she was pained by his tone. 'You are not the first -man, I suppose, who amuses himself with what he despises,' she -answered. 'But I do not think it is a very noble sport, or a very -healthy one. Forgive me, dear, if I seem to preach to you.'</p> - -<p>'Preach on for ever, my beloved divine. You can never weary me,' said -Sabran, and he stooped and kissed her.</p> - -<p>She did not return his caress.</p> - -<p>That day as she drove with the Princess in the Bois, Bela and Gela -facing her, she saw him in the side alley riding with the Countess -Brancka. A physical pain seemed to contract her heart for a moment.</p> - -<p>'Olga is very <i>accaparante</i>,' said the Princess, perceiving them also. -'Not content with borrowing your Arabs, she must have your husband also -as her cavalier.'</p> - -<p>'If she amuse him I am her debtor,' said Wanda, very calmly.</p> - -<p>'Amuse! Can a man who has lived with you be amused by her?'</p> - -<p>'I am not amusing,' said his wife, with a smile which was not mirthful. -'Men are like Bela and Gela; they cannot always be serious.'</p> - -<p>Then she told her coachman to leave the Bois and drive out into the -country. She did not care to meet those riders at every turn in the -avenues.</p> - -<p>'My dear Réné,' said the Princess, when she happened to see him alone. -'Can you find no one in all Paris to divert yourself with except Stefan -Brancka's wife? I thought you disliked her.'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated.</p> - -<p>'She is related to us,' he said a little feebly. 'One sees her of -necessity a hundred times a week.'</p> - -<p>'For our misfortune,' said the Princess, sententiously. 'But she is not -altogether friendless in Paris. Can she find no one but you to ride -with her?'</p> - -<p>'Has Wanda been complaining to you?'</p> - -<p>'My dear Marquis,' replied Madame Ottilie, with dignity. 'Your wife is -not a person to complain; you must understand her singularly little -after all, if you suppose that. But I think, if you would calculate the -hours you have of late passed in Madame Brancka's society, you would -be surprised to see how large a sum they make up of your time. It is -not for me to presume to dictate to you; you are your own master, of -course: only I do not think that Olga Brancka, whom I have known from -her childhood, is worth a single half-hour's annoyance to Wanda.'</p> - -<p>Sabran rose, and his lips parted to speak, but he hesitated what to -say, and the Princess, who was not without tact, left him to receive -herself some sisters of S. Vincent de Paul. His conscience was not -wholly clear. He was conscious of a pungent, irresistible, even whilst -undesired, attraction that this Russian woman possessed for him; it was -something of the same potent yet detestable influence which Cochonette -had exercised over him. Olga Brancka had the secret of amusing men and -of exciting their baser natures; she had a trick of talk which sparkled -like wine, and, without being actually wit, illumined and diverted -her companions. She was a mistress of all the arts of provocation, -and had a cruel power of making all scruples of conscience and all -honesties and gravities of purpose seem absurd. She made no disguise of -her admiration of Sabran, and conveyed the sense of it in a thousand -delicate and subtle modes of flattery. He read her very accurately, and -had neither esteem nor regard for her, and yet she had an attraction -for him. Her boudoir, all wadded softly with golden satin like a -jewel-box, with its perpetual odour of roses and its faint light -coloured like the roses, was a little temple of all the graces, in -which men were neither wise nor calm. She had a power of turning their -very souls inside out like a glove, and after she had done so they were -never worth quite as much again. The fascination which Sabran possessed -for her was that he never gave up his soul to her as the others did; he -was always beyond her reach; she was always conscious that she was shut -out from his inmost thoughts.</p> - -<p>The sort of passion she had conceived for him grew, because it was -fanned by many things—by his constancy to his wife, by his personal -beauty, by her vague enmity to Wanda, by the sense of guilt and of -indecency which would attach in the world's sight to such a passion. -Her palate in pleasure was at once hardened and fastidious; it required -strong food, and her audacity in search of it was not easily daunted. -She knew, too, that he had some secret which his wife did not share; -she was resolved to penetrate it. She had tried all other means; there -only now remained one——to surprise or to beguile it from himself. To -this end, cautious and patient as a cat, she had resumed her intimacy -with them as relations, and with all the delicate arts of which she was -a proficient, strove to make her companionship agreeable and necessary -to him. Before long he became sensible of a certain unwholesome charm -in her society. He went with her to the opera, he took her to pass -hours amidst the Noira collection, he rode with her often; now and then -he dined with her alone, or almost alone, in a small oval room of pure -Japanese, where great silvery birds and white lilies seemed to float on -a golden field, and the dishes were silver lotus leaves, and the lamps -burned in pale green translucent gourds hanging on silver stalks.</p> - -<p>An artificial woman is nothing without her <i>mise en scène</i>; -transplanted amidst natural landscape and out-of-door life she is -apt to become either ridiculous or tiresome. Madame Brancka in Paris -was in her own playhouse; she looked well, and was in her own manner -irresistible. At Hohenszalras she had been as out of keeping with -all her atmosphere as her enamel buttons, her jewelled alpenstock, -her cravat of pointe d'Alençon, and her softly-tinted cheeks had been -out of place in the drenching rain-storms and mountain-winds of the -Archduchy of Austria.</p> - -<p>He knew very well that the attraction she possessed for him was of -no higher sort than that which the theatre had; he seemed to be -always present at a perfect comedy played with exquisite grace amidst -unusually perfect decorations. But there was a certain artificial bias -in his own temperament which made him at home there. His whole life -after all had been an actor's. His wife had said rightly: 'Men cannot -be always serious.' It was just his idler, falser moods which Olga -Brancka suited, and his very fear of her gave a thrill of greater power -to his amusement. When the Princess, his devoted friend, reproved him, -he was unpleasantly aroused from his unwise indulgence in a perilous -pursuit. To pain his wife would be to commit a monstrous crime, a -crime of blackest ingratitude. He knew that; he was ever alive to the -enormity of his debt to her, he was for ever dissatisfied with himself -for being unable to become more worthy of her.</p> - -<p>'She jealous!' he thought. It seemed to him impossible, yet his vanity -could not repress a throb of exultation; it almost seemed to him -that in making her more human it would make her more near his level. -Jealous! It was not a word which was in any keeping with her; jealousy -was a wild, coarse, undisciplined, suspicious passion, far removed from -the calmness and the strength of her nature.</p> - -<p>At that moment she entered the room, coming from a drive in the -forenoon. It was still cold. She had a cloak of black sables reaching -to her feet; it still rested on her shoulders. Her head was uncovered; -she had never looked taller, fairer, more stately; the black furs -seemed like some northern robes of coronation. Beneath them gleamed the -great gold clasps of a belt, and gold lions' heads fastening her olive -velvet gown.</p> - -<p>'Jealous!' he thought, 'this queen amongst women!' His heart sank. -'She would never say anything,' he thought; 'she would leave me.' -Almost he expected her to divine his thoughts. He was relieved when she -spoke to him of some mere trifle of the day. Like many men he could -not be frank, because frankness would have seemed like insult to his -wife. He could not explain to her the mingled aversion and attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him, the curious stinging irritation -which she produced on his nerves and his senses, so that he despised -her, disliked her, and yet could not wholly resist the charm of her -unwholesome magic. How could he say this to his wife? How could he -hope to make her understand, or if she understood, persuade her not to -resent as the bitterest of affronts this power which another woman, -and that woman nearly connected with her, possessed? Besides, even if -he went so far, if he leaned so much on the nobility of her nature as -to venture to do this, he knew very well that she would in reason say -to him, 'Let us go away from where this danger exists.' He did not -desire to go away. He was glad of this old life of pleasure, which let -him forget his secret sorrow. Amidst the excitations of Paris he could -push away the remembrance that another man knew the shame of his life. -The calm and the solitude of Hohenszalras, which had been delightful -to him once, had grown irksome when he had begun to cling to them for -fear lest any other should remember as Vàsàrhely had remembered. Here -in Paris, where he had always been popular, admired, well known, he was -as it were in his own kingdom, and the magnificence with which he could -now live there brought him troops of friends. He hoped that his wife -would not be unwilling to pass a season there in every year, and he -stifled as it rose his consciousness that she would assent to whatever -he wished, however painful or unwelcome to herself.</p> - -<p>'It is really very unwholesome for you to be married to such a saint -as Wanda,' his tormentor said to him one day. 'You do not know what a -little opposition and contradiction would do for you.'</p> - -<p>They were visiting the Hôtel Noira, studying the probable effects of -a new method of lighting the gallery which he contemplated, and she -continued abruptly:</p> - -<p>'Wanda has been buying very largely in Paris, has she not? And she has -bought this hotel of the Noira heirs, I believe? You mean to keep it -altogether as it is; and of course you will come and live in it?'</p> - -<p>'Whenever she pleases,' he answered, intent on a Lancret not well hung.</p> - -<p>'Whenever you please,' said Madame Brancka. 'Why will you pretend -that Wanda has any separate will of her own? It is marvellous to see -so resolute a person as she was as obediently bent as a willow-wand. -But all this French property will constitute quite a fortune apart. I -suppose it will all be settled on your third son, as Gela is to have -Idrac? Will not you give him your title? Count Victor de Sabran will -sound very pretty, and you might rebuild Romaris.'</p> - -<p>He turned from her with impatience.</p> - -<p>'Are we so very old that you want to parcel out our succession amongst -babies? No; I do not intend to give my name to any of Wanda's children. -There is an Imperial permission for them all to bear hers.'</p> - -<p>'You are not very loyal to your forefathers,' said Madame Brancka. -'Wanda might well spare them one of her boys. If not, what is the use -of accumulating all this property in France?'</p> - -<p>'All that she buys is done out of respect for the Duc de Noira,' said -Sabran, curtly. 'If she bear me twenty sons they will all have her -name. It was settled so on the marriage-deeds and ratified by the -Kaiser.'</p> - -<p>'Are prince-consorts always deposed from any throne they have of their -own?' said Madame Olga, in the tone that he hated. 'If I were you I -should rebuild Romaris. I wonder so devoted a wife has not done so -years ago.'</p> - -<p>'There is nothing at Romaris to rebuild.'</p> - -<p>'Decidedly,' thought his companion, 'he hates Romaris, and has no love -of his own race. Did he drown Vassia Kazán in the sea there?'</p> - -<p>Unsparingly she renewed the subject to Wanda herself.</p> - -<p>'You should settle the French properties on little Victor, and give him -the Sabran title,' she urged to her. 'I told Réné the other day that -I thought it very strange he should not care to have one of his sons -named after him.'</p> - -<p>Wanda answered coldly enough: 'In my will, if I die before him, -everything goes to the Marquis de Sabran. He will make what division -he pleases between his children, subject of course to Bela's rights of -primogeniture.'</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka was silent for a moment from surprise.</p> - -<p>'It is odd that he should not care for Romaris,' she said, after a long -pause. 'You have much more trust in him, Wanda, than it is wise to put -in any man that lives.'</p> - -<p>'Whom one trusts with oneself, one may well trust with everything -else,' said her sister-in-law in a tone which closed discussion. But -when she was left alone the thorn remained in her. She thought with -perplexity:</p> - -<p>'No, he does not care for Romaris. He dislikes its very name. He would -never hear of one of the children bearing it. There must be something -he does not say.'</p> - -<p>She remembered sadly what the Duc de Noira had once said to her:</p> - -<p>'In morals as in metals, my dear, you cannot work gold without -supporting it by alloy.'</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka had patience and skill perfect enough to refrain -altogether from those hints and tentatives by which a less clever woman -would have attempted to approach and surprise the key to those hidden -facts which she believed to be the theme of his correspondence with -Vàsàrhely and the cause of his rejection of the Russian appointment. -A less clever woman would have alarmed him, and betrayed herself by -perpetual allusions to the matter. But she never did this: she treated -him with an alternation of subtle compliment and ironical, malice, such -as was most certain to allure and perplex any man, and he never by the -most distant suspicion imagined that she knew anything which he desired -unknown. She was a woman of strong nerve, and her equanimity in his -and his wife's presence was wholly undisturbed by her consciousness -that she had dispatched the anonymous suggestion as a seed of discord -to Hohenszalras. She knew indeed that it was not what people of her -rank and breeding did do, that it was not honest warfare, that it was -what even the very easy morality of her own world would have condemned -with disgust; but she bore the sin of it very lightly. If she had been -driven to excuse it, she would have characterised it as mere mischief. -If her sister-in-law had shown her the letter, she would have glanced -over it with a tranquil face and an air of utter unconcern. If she -could not have done this sort of thing she would have thought herself -a very poor creature. 'I believe you could be as wicked as the Scotch -Lady Macbeth,' Stefan Brancka had said once to her; and she had -answered with much contempt: 'At least I promise you I should not walk -in my sleep if I were so. Your Lady Macbeth was a grotesque barbarian.'</p> - -<p>A great deal of the sin of this world, which is not at all like Lady -Macbeth's, comes from the want of excitement felt by persons, only too -numerous, who have exhausted excitement in its usual shapes. She had -done so; she required what was detestable to arouse her, because she -had lived at such high pressure that any healthy diversion was vapid -and stupid to her. The destruction, if she could achieve it, of her -sister-in-law's happiness, offered her in prospect such an excitement; -and the whim she had taken for passion grew out of waywardness till -it nearly became passion in truth. She never precisely weighed or -considered its possible consequences, but she endeavoured to arouse -a response in him with all the unscrupulous skill of a mistress in -coquetry. When moved by Madame Ottilie's warning he strove honestly to -avoid her, and often excused himself from obedience to her summons, -the opposition only stimulated her endeavours, and made a smarting -mortification and anger against him supply a double motor-power for his -subjection. If she could have believed that she succeeded in making his -wife anxious, she might have been content; but Wanda always received -her with the same serenity and courtesy, which, if it covered disdain, -covered it unimpeachably with admirable grace.</p> - -<p>'If one broke her heart, she would only make one a grand courtesy with -a bland smile,' thought Olga Brancka, irritably and impatiently. 'There -are people who die standing. Wanda would do that.'</p> - -<p>That ill weeds grow apace is a true old saw, never truer than of -vindictive and envious passions. Sheer and causeless jealousy of her -sister-in-law had been alive in her many years, and now, by being fed -and unresisted, so grew that it became almost a restless hatred. It was -far more her enmity to his wife than any other sentiment which inspired -her with a fantastic and unhealthy desire to attract and detach Sabran -from his allegiance. Joined to it now there was a sense of some mystery -in him that baffled her, and which was to such a woman the most pungent -of all stimulants. In all her <i>câlineries</i> and all her railleries she -never lost sight of this one purpose, of surprising from him the -secret which she believed existed. But he was always on his guard with -her; even when most influenced by her atmosphere and her magnetism -he did not once lose his self-control and his habitual coolness. At -moments when she was most nearly triumphing, the remembrance of his -wife came over him like a breath of sweet pure air that passes through -a hot-house, and restored him to self-possession and to loyalty. She -began to fear that all the ability with which she had procured her -exemption from Court duties, and had induced her husband to remain in -Vienna, was all vain, and she grew bolder and more reckless in her use -of stratagems and solicitations to keep Sabran beside her in these -early spring days given over to racing and sporting, and at all the -evening entertainments at which the great world met, and whither she -carried with so much effect her gleaming sapphires and her black pearls.</p> - -<p>'Black pearls argue a perverted taste,' said the Princess Ottilie once -to her, and she unabashed answered:</p> - -<p>'It is perverted tastes that make any noise in the world or possess -any flavour. White pearls are much more beautiful, no doubt, but then -they are everywhere, from the Crown jewel-cases to the peasant's necks; -but my black pearls! you cannot find their match—and how white one's -throat looks with them. I only want a green rose.'</p> - -<p>'Chemicals can supply any deformity,' said the Princess, drily. 'Doing -so is called science, I believe.'</p> - -<p>'Do you call me a deformity?' she asked, with some annoyance.</p> - -<p>'You are an elaborate production of the laboratory,' said the Princess, -calmly. 'I am sure you will admit yourself that nature has had very -little to do with you.'</p> - -<p>'My pearls are black by a freak of nature,' said Madame Olga. 'Perhaps -I am the same.'</p> - -<p>The Princess made a little gesture signifying that politeness forbade -her from assent, but she thought: 'Yes; you were never a white pearl, -but you have steeped yourself in acids and solutions of all degrees of -poison till you are darker than you need have been, and you think your -darkness light, and some men think so too.'</p> - -<p>Sabran had grown to look for that necklace of black pearls with -eagerness in the society to which they both belonged. Few evenings -found him where Madame Brancka was not. She had known his Paris of the -Second Empire; she had known Compiègne and Pierrefonds as he had known -them; she knew all the friendships and the bywords of his old life, -and all the <i>dessous des cartes</i> of that which was now around them. She -amused him. She comprehended all he said, half uttered. She remembered -all he recalled. At Hohenszalras he had not found any charm in this, -but here he did find one. She suited Paris; she knew it profoundly, -she liked all its pastimes, she understood all its sports and all -its slang. She hunted at Chantilly, betted at La Marche, plunged at -baccara, shot and fenced well and gaily, had the theatres and all their -jargon at her fingers' ends; all this made her no mean aspirant to -the post of mistress of his thoughts. All which had seemed tiresome, -artificial, even ridiculous, amidst the grand forests and healthful air -of the Iselthal became in Paris agreeable and even bewitching. Once he -said almost angrily to his wife:</p> - -<p>'You, who ride so superbly, should surely show yourself at the Duc's -hunts. What is the use of long gallops in the Bois before anyone else -is out of bed?'</p> - -<p>'I never rode for show yet,' said Wanda, in surprise. 'And you know I -never would join in any sort of chase.'</p> - -<p>'Surely such humanitarianism is exaggeration,' he said impatiently. -'Olga Brancka rides every day they meet at Chantilly, and she is by no -means of your form in the saddle.'</p> - -<p>'I have never yet imitated Olga,' said his wife, a little coldly; but -she did not object when day after day her finest horses were lent to -Madame Brancka. She never by a word or a hint reminded him that he -was not absolute master of all which belonged to her. Only when her -sister-in-law wanted to take Bela and his pony to Chantilly, she made -her will strongly felt in refusal.</p> - -<p>The child, whose fancy had been fired by what he had heard of the ducal -hunting, of the great hounds and the stately gatherings, like pictures -of the Valois time, was passionately angered at being forbidden to go, -and made his mother's heart ache with his flashing eyes and his flaming -cheeks. 'Cannot she leave even the children alone?' she thought, with -more bitterness than she had ever felt against anyone.</p> - -<p>A few nights later they were both at the Grand Opéra, in the box which -was allotted to the name of the Countess von Szalras. She was herself -not very well; she was pale, she sat a little away from the light. -Her gown was of white velvet; she had no ornament except a cluster of -gardenias and stephanotis, and her habitual necklace of pearls. Olga -Brancka, in a costume of many shaded reds, marvellously embroidered -in gold cords, was as gorgeous as a tropical bird, and sat with her -arms upon the front of the box, playing with a fan of red feathers, or -looking through her glass round the house. He talked most with her, but -he looked most at his wife. There was no woman, in a full and brilliant -house, who could compare with her. A thrill of the pride of possession -passed through him. The malicious eyes of the other, glancing towards -him over her shoulder, read his thoughts. She smiled provokingly.</p> - -<p>'<i>Le mari amoureux!</i>' she murmured. 'Really I did not believe in the -existence of that type. But it is quite admirable that it should exist. -Its example is very much wanted in Paris.'</p> - -<p>He felt himself colour like a youth, but it was with irritation; he was -at a loss for an answer. To have defended his admiration of his wife -at the sword's point would have been easy; to defend it from a woman's -ridicule was more difficult. Wanda did not hear; she was listening -to the song of Dinorah, and was dreamily regretting the solitude of -Hohenszalras, and thinking of what pleasure it would be to return. All -the news that Greswold and her stewards sent her thence was precious to -her; no details seemed to her insignificant or without interest; and -her own letters in return were full of minute attention to the welfare -of everyone and of everything she had left there. She was roused from -her home reverie by the voice of her sister-in-law, raised more highly -and saying impatiently:</p> - -<p>'Why should you object, Réné, when I say that I wish it?'</p> - -<p>'What do you wish?' said Wanda, who always felt a singular annoyance -whenever she heard him thus familiarly addressed. 'Whatever you may -wish, I am sure M. de Sabran can require no second bidding to procure -it for you, if it be within the limits of the possible.'</p> - -<p>'I wish to see a Breton Pardon,' said Olga Brancka, with a gesture of -her fan towards the stage. 'There is one next week in his own country; -I want him to invite me—us—to Romaris.'</p> - -<p>Wanda, who knew that he always shrank from the mention of Romaris, -interposed to save him from persecution.</p> - -<p>'There is nothing at Romaris to invite us to,' she said for him. -'Neither you nor I can live in a cabin or a fishing-boat; especially -can we not in March weather.'</p> - -<p>'You can live in a hut on your Alps,' returned the other, 'and I do -not dislike tent life in the Karpathians. If he sent his major-domo -down, he would soon make the sands and rocks blossom like the rose, and -villages would arise as fast as they did before the great Katherine. -Why not? It would be charming. Has he no feeling for the cradle of his -ancestors? We must put him through a course of Lamartine.'</p> - -<p>'An unfortunate allusion; he lived to lose Milly,' said Sabran, finding -himself forced to say something. 'In midsummer, Mesdames, you might -perhaps rough it, <i>tant bien que mal</i>; but now!—there is nothing to -be seen except fog and surf at sea, and mud and pools inland. Even -a Pardon would not reconcile you; not even the Breton jackets with -scriptural stories embroidered on them, nor the bagpipes.'</p> - -<p>'Positively, you will not take us?'</p> - -<p>'I must disobey even your wishes in the Ides of March.'</p> - -<p>'But whether in March or July—why do you never go yourself?'</p> - -<p>'There is nothing to go there for,' he answered, almost losing his -patience; 'a people to whom I am only a name, a strip of shore on which -I only own a few wind-tormented oak-trees!'</p> - -<p>'Only imagine the duties that Wanda would evolve in your place out of -those people and those oaks!'</p> - -<p>'I have not Wanda's virtues,' he said, half sadly, half jestingly.</p> - -<p>'We have none of us, or the Millennium would have arrived. I cannot -understand your dislike to your melancholy sea-shore. Most of your -countrymen are for ever home-sick away from their <i>landes</i> and their -<i>dolmen.</i> You seem to feel no throb for the <i>mater patria</i>, even when -listening to Dinorah, which sets every other Breton's heart beating.'</p> - -<p>'My heart is Austrian,' said Sabran, with a bow towards his wife.</p> - -<p>'That is very pretty, and what you are also obliged to say,' -interrupted Madame Brancka. 'But why hate Romaris? For my part, I -believe you see ghosts there.'</p> - -<p>His wife said, with a quick reproach in her words: 'The ghosts of men -who knew how to live and to die nobly? He would not be afraid to meet -them.'</p> - -<p>The simplicity of the words and the trustfulness of them sank into his -soul. A pang of terrible consciousness went through him like poisoned -steel. As his wife's eyes sought his the lights swam round with him, -the music was only a confused murmur on his ear; he heard as if from -afar off the voice of Olga Brancka saying: 'My dear Wanda, you are -always so exalted!'</p> - -<p>At that moment some one knocked at the door: he was glad to rise and -open it to admit Count Kaulnitz and two other gentlemen.</p> - -<p>Hardly anything else which his wife could have said would have hurt -him quite so much.</p> - -<p>As he sat there in the brilliant illumination and the hot-house -warmth, with her delicate profile clear as a cameo against the light, -a sensation of physical cold passed through him. He saw himself as he -was, an actor, a traitor, a perjured and dishonoured man. What right -had he there more than any galley-slave at the hulks?—he, Vassia Kazán?</p> - -<p>Well tutored by the ways of the world, he laughed, and spoke, and -criticised the rendering of the opera with his usual readiness of -grace; but Olga Brancka had marked the fleeting expression of his face, -and said to herself: 'Whatever the secret be, the key of it lies in the -sands of Romaris.'</p> - -<p>As she took his arm, when they left the box, she murmured to him: 'I -shall go to Romaris, and you will take me.'</p> - -<p>'I think not,' he said curtly, without his usual suavity. 'I am the -servant of all your sex, it is true, but like all servants I am only -willing to be commanded by my mistress.'</p> - -<p>'O most faithful of lovers, I understand!' she said, with a -contemptuous laugh. 'And she never commands you, she only obeys. You -are very fortunate, even though you do have ghosts at your ruined tower -by the sea.'</p> - -<p>'Yes, I am fortunate, indeed,' he answered gravely, and his eyes -glanced towards his wife, who was standing a stair or two below -conversing with her cousin Kaulnitz.</p> - -<p>'Even though you had to abandon Russia,' murmured Olga Brancka, -dreamily. She could feel that a certain thrill passed through him. -He was startled and alarmed. Was it possible that Egon Vàsàrhely had -betrayed him?</p> - -<p>'Paris is much more agreeable than St. Petersburg,' he answered -carelessly. 'I am no loser. Wanda would have been unhappy, and, what -would have been worse, she would never have said so.'</p> - -<p>'No, she would never have said so. She is like the Sioux, the Stoics, -and the people who died in lace ruffles in '89. I beg your pardon, -those are your people, I forgot; the people whose ghosts forbid you to -entertain us at Romaris.'</p> - -<p>'I would brave an army of ghosts to please Madame Brancka,' said -Sabran, with his usual gallantry.</p> - -<p>'Call me <i>Cousinette</i>, at the least,' she murmured, as they descended -the last stair.</p> - -<p>'<i>Bon soir</i>, madame!' he said, as he closed the door of her carriage.</p> - -<p>'Are you coming with me?' said Wanda, as she went to hers.</p> - -<p>He hesitated. 'I think I will go for an hour to the clubs,' he -answered. He kissed her hand. As he drew the fur rug over her skirts, -she thought his face was very pale as she saw it by the lamplight. She -wished to ask him if he were quite well, but she restrained herself, -knowing how intolerable such importunities are to men. Instead, she -smiled at him, as she said, '<i>Amusez-vous bien</i>,' and left him to -divert himself as he chose.</p> - -<p>'How little women understand men, and how poorly they love them when -they do not leave them alone!' she thought, as her carriage rolled -homeward. She never troubled him, never interrogated him, never even -tried to conjecture what he did when away from her. Sometimes, when -he returned at sunrise, she had already risen, and had said a prayer -with her children, written her letters, or visited her horses, but she -always met him with a smile and without a question.</p> - -<p>It hurt her with an ever-deepening wound to perceive the attraction -which Olga Brancka possessed for him. She did not for a moment believe -that it was love, but she saw that it was an influence which had -audacity enough to compete with her own, a sort, of fascination which, -commencing with dislike, increased to an unhealthy and morbid potency. -She could not bring herself to speak of it to him. She was not one of -those women who reproach and implore. It would have seemed to her as -if both he and she would have lost all dignity in each other's sight -if once they had stooped to what society calls jestingly 'a scene.' He -guessed aright that if she had really believed herself displaced in his -heart she would have left him without a word. She was too conscious of -his entire worship of her to be moved to anything like that jealous -passion which would have seemed to her the last depths of humiliation; -but she was pained, fretted, stirred to a scornful wonder by the power -this frivolous woman possessed of usurping his time and giving colour -to his thoughts.</p> - -<p>It hurt her to think he feared her too much to tell her of any trouble, -any folly, any memory. She reproached herself with having perhaps -alienated his confidence by the gravity of her temper, the seriousness -of her opinions. It would be hard to think that frivolous shallow women -could inspire men with more confidence than a deeper nature could -do, but perhaps it might be so. He had sometimes said to her, half -jestingly: 'You should dwell among the angels; the human world is unfit -for you!' Was it that which alarmed him?</p> - -<p>With that subtle sense of what is in the air around which so often -makes us aware of what is never spoken in our hearing, she was sensible -that the great world in which they lived began to speak of the intimacy -between her husband and the wife of her cousin Stefan. She became -sensible that the world was in general disposed to resent for her, to -pity her, and to censure them, whilst it coupled their names together. -The very suspicion brought her an intolerable shame. When she was -quite alone, thinking of it, her face burned with angry blushes. No -one hinted it to her, no one breathed it to her, no one even expressed -it by a glance in her presence; yet she was as well aware of what they -were saying as though she had been in a hundred salons when they talked -of her.</p> - -<p>She knew the character of Olga Brancka, also, too well not to know that -her own mortification would be the sweetest triumph for one of whose -latent envy she had long been conscious. Ever since she had become the -sole owner of the vast fortunes of the Szalras she had felt for ever -upon her the evil eye of a foiled covetousness. The other had been very -young, and had waited long and patiently, but her hour had now come.</p> - -<p>She said nothing to her husband, and she preserved to her cousin's -wife the same perfect courtesy of manner; but in her own soul she -began to suffer keenly, more from a sense of littleness in him than any -mere personal feeling. To blame him, to entreat him, to seek to detach -him—all these things were impossible to her.</p> - -<p>'If all our years of union do not hold him, what will?' she thought; -and the great natural hauteur of her temper could never have let her -bend to the solicitation of a constancy denied to her.</p> - -<p>One night, when they had no engagements but a ball, to which they could -go at midnight, he did not come in to dinner. Always before, when he -had not returned to dine, he had sent her a message to beg her not to -wait. This evening there was no message. She and the Princess dined -alone.</p> - -<p>'He was never discourteous before,' said the Princess, who disliked -such omissions.</p> - -<p>'It is his own house,' said Wanda. 'He has a right to come or not to -come as he likes, without ceremony.'</p> - -<p>'There can never be too much ceremony,' said the Princess. 'It -preserves amiability, self-respect, and good manners. It is the silver -sheath which saves them from friction. It is the distinguishing mark -between the gentleman and the boor. When politeness is only for the -street or the salon, it is but a poor thing. He has always been so -scrupulous in these matters.'</p> - -<p>As Wanda later crossed the head of the grand staircase, to go and dress -for the ball, she heard her <i>maître d'hôtel</i> in the hall below speak to -the groom of the chambers.</p> - -<p>'Are the Marquis's horses in, do you know?' asked the former; and the -latter answered:</p> - -<p>'Yes, hours ago; they are to go for him at the Union at eleven, but -they left him at the Hôtel Brancka.'</p> - -<p>Then the two officials laughed a little under their breath. Their -words and their laughter came upwards distinctly to her ear. Her first -impulse was a natural and passionate one of bitter burning pain and -wonder. A sensation wholly new to her, of hatred and of impotence -combined, seemed to choke her.</p> - -<p>'Is this what they call jealousy?' she thought, and the mere thought -checked her emotion and changed it to humiliation.</p> - -<p>'I—I—contend with her!' she said in her soul. With a blindness before -her eyes she retraced her steps, and went to the sleeping-rooms of her -children. They were all asleep as they had been for hours. She sat down -beside the bed of the little Ottilie; and gazed on the soft flushed -loveliness of the child, bright as a rose in the dew.</p> - -<p>She kissed the child's cheek without waking her, and sat still there -some time in the faint twilight and the perfect silence, only stirred -by the light breathing of the sleepers; the repose, the innocence, the -silence soothed and tranquillised her.</p> - -<p>'What matter a breath of folly?' she thought. 'He is their father; he -is my love; we have all our lives to spend together.'</p> - -<p>Then she rose and went to her chamber, and had herself clothed in a -court dress of white taffetas and white velvet, embroidered with silver -lilies.</p> - -<p>'Make me look well,' she said to her women. 'Put on all my diamonds.'</p> - -<p>When he entered, near midnight, repentant, self-conscious, almost -confused, she stopped his excuses with a smile.</p> - -<p>'I heard the servants say you dined with my cousin's wife. Why not, if -it please you? But I wonder she allows you to dine without <i>un bout de -toilette.</i> Will you not make haste to dress? We shall be late.'</p> - -<p>The words were perfectly simple and kind, but as she spoke them, so -royal did she look, standing there in the blaze of her jewels, with -her lily-laden train, that he felt abashed, ashamed, angered against -himself, yet more angered against his temptress.</p> - -<p>The old lines of Marlowe came to his mind and his lips:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'O! thou art fairer than the evening air<br /> -Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.' -</p> - -<p>'I am not young enough to merit that quotation,' she said, with a -smile; 'ten years ago perhaps——'</p> - -<p>Her heart contracted as she spoke; she was conscious that she had -wished to look well in his eyes that night. The sense that she was -stooping to measure weapons with such an opponent as Olga Brancka smote -her with a sense of humiliation, which did not leave her throughout the -after hours in which she carried her jewels through the gorgeous crowd -of the ball at the Austrian Embassy.</p> - -<p>'If I lower myself to such a contest as that,' she thought, 'I shall -lose all self-respect and all his reverence. I shall seem scarcely to -him higher than an importunate mistress.'</p> - -<p>Now and again there came to her a passionate anger against himself, a -hardening of her heart to him, since he could thus be guilty of this -inexcusable and insensate folly. But she would not harbour these; she -would not judge him; she would not blame him. Her marriage vows were -not mere dead letters to her. She conceived that obedience and silence -were her clearest duties. Only one thing was outside her duty and -beyond her force—she could not stoop to rivalry with Olga Brancka.</p> - -<p>All at once she took a resolution of which few women would have been -capable. She resolved to leave them.</p> - -<p>Three days after the ball she said very quietly to him:</p> - -<p>'If you do not object, I will go home and take the children. It is time -they were at Hohenszalras. Bela, above all, is not improved by what he -sees and hears here; his studies are broken and his fancy is excited. -In a very little while he would learn quite to despise his country -pleasures, and forget all his own people. I will take them home.'</p> - -<p>He looked at her quickly in surprise.</p> - -<p>'I do not think I can leave Paris immediately,' he said, with -hesitation. 'I have many engagements. Of course you can send the -children.'</p> - -<p>'I said I should go, not you. I long to see my own woods in their -first leaf,' she answered, with a smile. 'It will be better for you to -remain. No one ought to be allowed to suppose that you are bound to my -side. That is neither for your dignity nor mine.'</p> - -<p>'Has anyone suggested——' he began, and paused in embarrassment, for -he remembered the incessant taunts and innuendoes of Olga Brancka.</p> - -<p>'I do not listen to suggestions of that sort,' she replied tranquilly. -'You wish to remain here, and I wish to return home. We are both at -liberty to do what we like. My love, she added, with a grave tenderness -in her voice, 'have I so poor an opinion of you that I dare not leave -you alone? I think I should hardly care for a fealty which was only to -be retained by my constant presence. That is not my ideal.'</p> - -<p>He coloured; he was uncertain what to reply: before her he felt -unworthy and disloyal. A vast sense of her immeasurable nobility swept -over him, and made him conscious of his own unworthiness.</p> - -<p>'Whatever you wish, I wish,' he murmured, and was aware that this could -not be what she would gladly have heard him say. 'I will follow you -soon. Your heart is always in your highlands. I know that you are too -grand a creature to be happy in cities. I have the baser leaven in me -that is not above them. The forests and the mountains do not say to me -all that they do to you.'</p> - -<p>'Men want the movement of the world, no doubt,' she said, without -showing any trace of disappointment. 'I only care for the subjective -life; I am very German, you see. The woods interest me, and the world -does not.'</p> - -<p>No more passed between them on the subject, but she gave orders to her -people to make arrangements for her departure and her children's in two -days' time, and sent out her cards of farewell.</p> - -<p>'Do you think you are wise?' the Princess ventured to say to her.</p> - -<p>She answered:</p> - -<p>'I know what you mean, dear mother; yes, I think so. To struggle for -influence with another, and that other Olga! I should indeed despise -myself if I could stoop so low. If he miss me he can follow me. If he -do not—then he has no need of me.'</p> - -<p>'I confess I do not understand you,' said Madame Ottilie; 'to surrender -so meekly!'</p> - -<p>'I surrender nothing,' she said, almost sternly. 'I know what I have -seen again and again in society. The woman jealous and anxious, losing -ground in his esteem and her own every hour, and rendering alike -herself and him actors in a ludicrous comedy for the mockery of the -world around them—a world which never has any sympathy for such a -struggle. Indeed, why should it have? for if the jealousy of a lover be -poetic, the jealousy of a wife is only ridiculous. I <i>am</i> his wife; I -am not his gaoler. I refuse to admit to others or to him or to myself -that any other could be wholly to him what I am; and I should lose that -place I hold, lose it in his eyes and my own, if I once admitted my -dethronement possible.'</p> - -<p>She spoke with more force and anger than was common with her, and her -auditor admired while she still failed to comprehend her.</p> - -<p>'Is there a more pitiable spectacle,' she continued, 'than that of a -wife contending with others for that charm in her husband's sight which -no philtres and no prayers can renew when once it has fled for ever? -Women are so unwise. Love is like a bird's song—beautiful and eloquent -when heard in forest freedom, harsh and worthless in repetition when -sung from behind prison bars. You cannot secure love by vigilance, -by environment, by captivity. What use is it to keep the person of a -man beside you, if his soul be truant from you? You all say that Olga -Brancka has power over him. If she have, let her use it and exhaust it, -it will not last long; but I will not sink to her level by contesting -it with her. For what can you take me?'</p> - -<p>In her glance the leonine wrath of the Szalras flashed for a moment; -her face was pale, she paced the room with a hasty and uneven step. -The Princess sought a timid refuge in silence There were certain -heights in the nature and impulses of her niece of which she, a dweller -on a lower plain, never caught sight. There were times when the haughty -reserve and the admirable patience of this stronger character made a -union which awed her, and altogether escaped her comprehension.</p> - -<p>In two days' time she left Paris, the Princess and the children -accompanying her.</p> - -<p>He felt his heart misgive him as he let her go. What was Olga Brancka, -what was Paris, what was all the world compared to her? As he kissed -her hands in farewell before her servants at the <i>Gare de l'Est</i>, -the impulse came over him to throw himself into the carriage beside -her, and return with her to the old, fair, still, peaceful life of -Hohenszalras. But he resisted it; he heard in memory the mocking of -Olga Brancka's voice saying to him:</p> - -<p>'<i>Ah, quel mari amoureux!</i>'</p> - -<p>He had his establishment, his engagements, his horses, his friends, his -wagers; he would seem ridiculous to all Paris if he could not endure -a few weeks' separation from his wife. A great banquet at his house -was arranged to take place in a few days' time, at which only great -Legitimist nobles would be present, and at which the toast of '<i>Le -Roi!</i>' would be drunk with solemn honours. What would they say of him -if he failed to receive them because he had followed his wife into -Austria? With a thousand sophisms he reconciled himself to remaining -there without her, and would not face the consciousness within him that -the real motive of his staying on through the coming weeks in Paris -was that Olga Brancka was there. For herself, she parted, with him -tenderly, kindly, without any trace of doubt in him or of purpose in -her departure.</p> - -<p>'You will come when you wish,' were her last words to him. 'You know -well dear, that Hohenszalras without you will seem like a sadly empty -eagle's nest.'</p> - -<p>All his offences against her were heavy on him as he returned to the -great house no longer graced by her presence. He would have given -twenty years of his life to have been able to undo what he had done -when he had taken a name not his own. He was sensible of great talents -in him which might have brought him to renown had he been willing -to face hardship and laborious effort. Even as he had been at his -birth—even as Vassia Kazán—he might have achieved such eminence -as would have made him her equal in honest honour. But he had won -the world and her by a lie, and the act was irrevocable. Chance and -circumstance may be controlled or altered, but the fate which men -make for themselves always abides with them for good or ill: a spirit -either of good or ill which once incarnated by their incantations never -departs from them till death.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI" id="CHAPTER_XXXI">CHAPTER XXXI.</a></h4> - - -<p>'Are you actually left alone?' said Madame Olga gaily to him that -evening, when they met at an embassy. 'I thought Wanda was an Una, who -never let her lion loose?'</p> - -<p>'The remembrance of her would recall him if she did,' he answered -quickly and coldly. 'She does not believe in chains because she does -not need them.'</p> - -<p>'Most knightly of men!' she said, with a little laugh. 'It must be very -fatiguing to have to play the part you so affect, even in absence. Our -metaphors are involved, but your loyalty seems one and indivisible. I -suppose you are left on parole?'</p> - -<p>The departure of his wife had disconcerted and disappointed her; as -he, to realise his position, had required to have the world about him -as spectator of it, so she felt all her triumph over him powerless and -pointless if Wanda von Szalras were not there to suffer by the sight -of it. He had remained; that was much; but she felt that the absence -of his wife had made him colder to herself, that the blank left made a -void between them, that remembrance might be more potent with him than -vicinity; and his consciousness that he was trusted might have more -power than any interference or opposition would have had. She became -sensible that she had less charm for him; that he was less easily -moved by her mockery and attracted by her wit. His earlier animosity -to her still flashed fire now and then, and with this sense of revived -resistance in him her own feeling, which had been born of caprice, took -giant growth as a passion. She grew cruel in it. If she could only know -his secret she thought she would crush him with it, grind him under her -foot, torture him. There was a touch of the tigress under her feverish -and artificial life.</p> - -<p>'<i>Il faut brusquer la chose</i>,' she said savagely to herself, when he -had been alone in Paris about a fortnight, and each day had convinced -her that he grew more wary of her, more unwilling to surrender himself -to the fascination which she exercised upon his baser nature. When -she attempted jests at his wife he stopped her sternly, and she felt -that she lost ground with him. Yet she had still a power upon him; an -unhealthy and fatal power. When he looked at her he thought often of -two lines:—</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'O Venus! shöne Frau meine,<br /> -Ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.' -</p> - -<p>'Wanda writes to you every day?' she asked once.</p> - -<p>'She writes often,' he answered.</p> - -<p>'And what does she say of me?'</p> - -<p>'Nothing!'</p> - -<p>'Nothing? What does she write about? Of the priest's sermons and the -horses' coughs, of how much wood has been cut, and how many shoes the -children wear, of how she sorrows for you, and says Latin prayers for -you twice a day?'</p> - -<p>His face darkened.</p> - -<p>'Madame my cousin,' he said irritably, 'will you understand that men do -not like their religion spoken lightly of? My wife is my religion.'</p> - -<p>Then Madame Olga laughed with silvery, hysterical laughter, and clapped -her hands as if she were applauding a good comedy, and cried shrilly: -'<i>Oh! la bonne blague!</i>'</p> - -<p>But she knew very well that it was not '<i>blague.</i>' She knew very well, -too, that though he was subjugated by a certain sorcery when in her -presence, when absent, his good taste condemned, and his good sense -escaped, her. She was one of those women who have a thousand means of -usurping a man's time, and are not scrupulous if some of those measures -are bold ones. All her admirers tacitly left the field open to one -for whom she made no scruple of her preference; and, under pretext of -her relationship to him, she contrived many ways to bring him beside -her. Every day he said to himself that he would go home on the morrow; -but each day bore its diversions, its claims, its interests, and each -day found him in Paris, sometimes driving her to the Cascade, to St. -Germain, to Versailles, sometimes escorting her to the tribune of a -race-course, or a <i>première</i> at a theatre, sometimes dining with her -in her pretty room, the table strewn with rose-leaves, and the windows -open upon flowering orange trees.</p> - -<p>When he wrote home he wrote eloquent, witty, clever letters; but he did -not speak in them of the woman with whom he spent so much of his time, -and his wife as she read them wished that they had been less clever, -and had said more. She began to fear lest she had done unwisely. She -did not repent, for it seemed to her that she could have done nothing -else with any self-esteem; but she dreaded lest she had over-estimated -the power of her own memory upon him. Yet even so, she thought, it -was better that he should degrade himself and her in her absence than -her presence; and she still felt a certainty—baseless, perhaps—that -he would yet pause in time before he actually gave her a rival in her -cousin's wife.</p> - -<p>'If it were any other,' she thought, 'he might fall; but with Olga, -never! never!'</p> - -<p>And she prayed for him half the night, till her prayer seemed to beat -against the very gates of heaven. But in the day, to her children, to -the Princess, to the household, she seemed always tranquil, cheerful, -and at ease. She applied herself arduously to all those duties which -her great estates had always brought with them, and in occupation -and exertion strove to keep her anxiety at bay, and attain that -self-control which enabled her to write in return to him letters which -had no shade of reproach in them, no hint of distrust.</p> - -<p>It was now June.</p> - -<p>The Paris of the world of fashion was soon about to take wing, to -disperse itself to country-houses, sea-shores, and foreign baths; to -change its place, but to take with it wheresoever it should go all its -agitation, its weariness, its fever, its delirium, and its intrigues. -Olga Brancka saw the close of the season approach with regret yet -expectation. She knew that Sabran must escape her or succumb to her; -and she had a bitter, enraged sense that the power of his wife was -stronger over him than her own. '<i>Il faut brusquer la chose</i>,' she -said again and again to herself. She grew reckless, imprudent, and -was tempted to discard even that external decency which her station -in the world had made her assume. She would have compromised herself -for him with any publicity he might have chosen to exact. But she had -never been able to beguile him into any sort of declaration. When he -most felt the danger of her attraction, when he was nearest forgetting -honour and decency, nearest submitting, the memory of his wife saved -him. He recovered his coolness; he drew back from the abyss. Once or -twice she was tempted to throw the name of Vassia Kazán between them -and watch its effect; but she refrained—she knew so little!</p> - -<p>'You will not take me to Romaris?' she said, for the hundredth time, -one evening, as they rode towards St. Germain's.</p> - -<p>He laughed.</p> - -<p>'<i>Cousinette</i>! if you and I went off to Finisterre you will confess -that we should make a pretty paragraph for the papers, and Count -Stefan would have a very good right to run me through the lungs.'</p> - -<p>'Stefan!' she echoed, with contempt. 'It would be the first time he -ever——Besides, you have had duels; you are not afraid of them; and, -yet again, besides I do not see what harm we should do if we looked at -your <i>chouans</i> and <i>chasse-marées</i> for a few days. No one need even -know it.'</p> - -<p>She spoke quite innocently, but her black eyes watched him with the -'Teufelinne' cunning and passion. He caught the look. He put his hand -in the breast-pocket of his coat, where a letter of his wife's was -lying.</p> - -<p>'It is out of the question,' he said, almost rudely. 'I have no wish to -furnish <i>Figaro</i> with so good a jest. Romaris,' he added, with a smile, -'is of course at your service, like all I possess, if you are so bent -upon seeing its desolation. But you must pardon my receiving you by -deputy, in the person of the curé, who is seventy years old and is the -son of a fisherman.'</p> - -<p>She cut her mare across the ears with a fierce gesture and galloped -away from him. Sabran as he galloped after her thought with a vague -apprehension, 'Why does she dwell on Romaris? Does she suspect that I -abhor the place? Can she have seen anything in my looks or in my words -that has raised any doubts in her?' But he told himself that this was -impossible. As she rode her heart swelled with rage and mortification. -There were many men in the world who would have been happy to go at -her call to Breton wilds, or any other solitude; and he refused her, -bluntly, coldly, because away there in the heart of Austria a woman, -who was the mother of his children, span, and read, and said her -prayers, and led her stupid, blameless, stately life! He escaped her -just because that woman lived! All that hot, cruel caprice which she -called love fastened upon him, and swore that it would not be denied. -She had a sense of a grand white figure which stood for ever betwixt -him and her. She brought herself almost to believe that it was Wanda -von Szalras who wronged her.</p> - -<p>Two nights later she was present at the last night of a gay comic -opera which had made all Paris laugh ever since the first fogs of -winter; a dazzling little opera, with a stage crowded by Louis Treize -costumes, and music that went as trippingly as a shepherdess's feet -in a pastoral. Sabran went to her box after a dinner-party which -he had given to a score of men. She looked well, in a gown of many -shades of yellow, which few women could have braved, but which suited -her night-like eyes and her pearly skin; she had deep yellow roses, -natural ones, in her bosom and hair.</p> - -<p>'I am flattered that you wear my yellow roses,' he murmured.</p> - -<p>'If you had sent me white ones you would have outraged the spirit of -Wanda.'</p> - -<p>He made an impatient movement.</p> - -<p>'When are you going home?' she said, suddenly.</p> - -<p>'Soon!' he answered, with the same impatience.</p> - -<p>'Soon means anything, from an hour to a year. Besides, you have said it -for the last six weeks.'</p> - -<p>'Do you go to Noisettiers?'</p> - -<p>'Of course I go to Noisettiers; you can come there if you please. I am -more hospitable than you.'</p> - -<p>He was silent. Noisettiers was a little place on the Norman -coast, which Stefan Brancka had given to her on his marriage; a -pleasure-house, with Swiss roofs, Cairene windows, Italian balconies -and a Persian court, which was bowered amongst lime-trees and filbert -trees, near Villeville, and had been the scene of much riotous -midsummer gaiety when she had filled it with Parisians and Russians.</p> - -<p>'You are always too good to me,' murmured Sabran, in the meaningless -compliment of usage, as other men entered her box. But she knew by the -coldness of his eyes, by the slightness of his smile, that he would no -more go to Noisettiers than to Romaris.</p> - -<p>'If Wanda had only remained here,' she thought angrily, opening and -shutting her tortoiseshell fan, 'he would have done whatever I had -chosen. Men are mere children; thwart them and they pine.</p> - -<p>'I suppose,' she said aloud to him, 'you will have your own -house-parties at Hohenszalras, as stiff as a minuet, crammed with -grand dukes and grand duchesses, all decorum and dignity, all ennui -and etiquette? By-the-by, are you restored again to the Emperor's good -graces?'</p> - -<p>'It is not likely that I shall be so,' replied Sabran, who always -dreaded the subject. 'If ever I be so fortunate I shall owe it to the -influence Wanda possesses.'</p> - -<p>'Why did you offend him?' she said, bending her inquisitive glance upon -him.</p> - -<p>'All sovereigns are offended when not obeyed. We have discussed this so -often. Need we discuss it again in a theatre?'</p> - -<p>'You are very impenetrable,' she said. 'Your rule of conduct -must follow the lines of M. de. Nothomb's '<i>il ne faut jamais se -brouiller, ni se familiariser, avec qui que ce soit: c'est le secret -de durer.</i>'</p> - -<p>'M. de Nothomb only meant his rule to apply to his own sex,' replied -Sabran. 'With yours, unless a man be either <i>familiarisé</i> or -<i>brouillé</i>, his life must be dull and his experience small.'</p> - -<p>'Which will you be with me?' she said, with significance. 'The choice -is open.'</p> - -<p>He understood that the words contained a menace.</p> - -<p>'I am your cousin and your humble servitor,' he said with gallantry, -giving his place up to a young Spanish noble.</p> - -<p>'Take me home,' she said to him an hour later, before the last scene of -the opera. 'Come to supper. I told them to have ortolans and bisque. -One is always hungry after a theatre, and we must have a last long -talk, since you go to your duties and I to my sea-bathing.'</p> - -<p>He desired to refuse; he dreaded her inquisitiveness and her -solicitation; but she had a magic about her, she subdued him to her -side even while he mentally resisted it. The fleshly charm of the -'Teufelinne' was potent as he wrapped her cloak about her and touched -the yellow roses as he fastened it. Almost in silence he entered her -carriage, and drove beside her to her house. She was silent also, -affecting to yawn and be tired, but by the gleam of the lamp he saw -her great black eyes glowing in the darkness, as he had seen those -of a jaguar in the forests of America glow, as it watched to seize a -sleeping lizard or unweary capybara.</p> - -<p>The few streets were soon traversed by her rapid Russian horses, and -together they entered the little hotel, with its strong perfume of -orange flowers and jessamine from the garden about it. The midsummer -stars were brilliant overhead; he looked up at them, pausing on the -threshold.</p> - -<p>'You are thinking how they shine on Wanda?' she said, with the laugh he -hated. 'Probably they do nothing of the kind. I dare say she is wrapped -in fog and cloud: those are the joys of the heights.'</p> - -<p>The little supper was perfectly prepared, and served with a fine claret -and some tokayer; the lights burned mellowly in the transparent gourds; -the windows were open, the moonlight touched the great gold birds, the -silver lilies on the walls. She had studied how to live and how to -please. She held that love was born as much out of scenic effects as of -the senses. In her own way she was a true artist. She had left him a -few moments to change her attire to a tea-gown, which was one cloud and -cascade of lace from head to foot; the yellow roses still nestled at -her breast.</p> - -<p>Stretched on a divan of oriental stuff, she put out her hand for a -cigar he lighted for her, and said with a little smile:</p> - -<p>'You cannot say I do not know how to live.'</p> - -<p>A brutal response rose to his lips; she did not know how to bridle her -life: but he could not say it. He murmured a compliment, and added: -'What a supreme artist the theatre has lost by your being born with a -Countess's <i>couronne!</i>'</p> - -<p>'Yes,' she said, with her eyes on the rings of smoke that her crimson -lips parted to send upward. 'Sometimes when Stefan does not give me -liberty, or Egon does not pay my accounts, I make them both tremble by -a threat that I will go on the stage. I should certainly draw all Paris -and all Vienna too. But perhaps it is too late; in a few more years I -shall have to marry my daughters. Can you realise that? I am sure I -cannot. Now it will suit Wanda perfectly to do that, and <i>her</i> daughter -is not three years old; she is always so fortunate.'</p> - -<p>He listened impatiently.</p> - -<p>'If we left Wanda's name alone it might be better. Did you bring me to -supper to talk of her?'</p> - -<p>'No; she is your Madonna, I know. One must not be sacrilegious, but one -cannot always worship. You do not touch the tokayer; it came from the -Kaiser; you are always so abstemious—you irritate me.'</p> - -<p>She poured out some of the wine, into a jewel-like goblet of Venice, -and gave it him and made him drink it. She sat up on her divan and -leaned towards him; the breeze from the garden stirred the laces of her -gown and made the golden roses nod.</p> - -<p>Wine openeth the heart of man,' she cried gaily. 'Open yours and tell -me frankly why you refused to go to Russia? We are not in a theatre -now.'</p> - -<p>'Are we not?' he said, with the smile which she feared as her greatest -foe. 'Whether or not, I fear I must refuse to please you; the matter -lies between me and—the Emperor.'</p> - -<p>She remarked the hesitation which made him pause before the last word.</p> - -<p>'Between him and Egon,' she thought; but after all, what was the secret -to her except as a means of influence over him. She believed that she -had here present subtler and surer methods of influence which could -attain their end without coercion.</p> - -<p>She ceased to pursue the theme, and grew gentle and winning; she felt -that he was on the defensive. He had come weakly enough into the very -heart of temptation, but he was on his guard against her sorceries. -Lying back amongst her cushions she amused him with that gay and -discursive chatter of which she had the secret, and which imperceptibly -induced him to relax his vigilance and to feel her charm. There was -that about, her which made all scruples seem ridiculous; there was -a contagion of levity and mockery in her which awakened in him the -cynicism of earlier years, and made him only heed the marvellous force -of seduction of which she was mistress.</p> - -<p>'You ought to be ambitious,' she continued softly. 'I think you might -achieve any eminence if you chose to seek it.'</p> - -<p>'Surely I have enough blessings from fortune not to tempt it by that -last infirmity?'</p> - -<p>'You mean you have married a very rich aristocrat,' she said drily. -'Oh, yes; you have made one of the finest marriages in Europe; but -that is not quite the same thing as "winning off your own hand." It is -a lucky <i>coup</i>, like breaking the bank at <i>roulette</i>, but it cannot -give you the same feeling that a successful soldier or a successful -politician has, nor the same eminence. Indeed, I am not sure that your -wife's possession of every possible good and great thing has not -prevented you gathering laurels for yourself. You have dropped into a -nest lined with rose-leaves; to have fallen on the rocks might have -been better. Do you know,' she added, with a little smile, 'if I had -been your wife I should have given you no rest until you had become the -foremost man of the empire. I should not have cared about horses and -peasants and children; but I should have loved <i>you.</i>'</p> - -<p>He moved uneasily, conscious of the implied satire upon his wife, -conscious also of a vibration of intense passion in the last words. He -remained silent.</p> - -<p>He knew well that had she been his wife, she would have been as false -to him as she was false to Stefan Brancka. But the words sent a thrill -through him half of emotion, half of repugnance. There was little light -on the divan where she reclined, the dewy darkness of the garden was -behind her; he could see the outlines of her form, the glister of rings -on her hands, and jewels at her throat, the shine of her eyes watching -him ardently.</p> - -<p>His heart beat with a certain excitation; he vaguely felt that some -hour of fate had come.</p> - -<p>They were as utterly alone as though they had been in a desert; no one -of her household would have ventured to approach that room without a -summons from her. A little drummer in silver beat twelve strokes upon -his drum, which was a clock. A nightingale was singing in the Cape -jessamine beneath one of the casements. The light was low and soft, -so faint that the moonbeams could be seen where they strayed over the -cranes and lilies on the wall. She said to herself once more: '<i>Il faut -brusquer la chose.</i>' If she let him go now he would escape her for ever.</p> - -<p>Ever and again there came to him the memory of his wife, but he shrank -from it as he would have shrunk from seeing her in a gambling den. It -seemed almost a profanity to remember her here. He longed to rise and -get away, yet he desired to remain. He knew that every moment increased -his danger, and yet he prolonged those moments with irresistible -pleasure. Every gesture, glance, and breath of this woman was -provocative and alluring, yet he thought as he felt her power always -the same thing—'<i>ihr seyd eine Teufelinne.</i>' Willingly he would have -embraced her and then killed her, that she might no more haunt him and -do no more harm on earth.</p> - -<p>As he sat with his face half averted from her she gazed at him with her -burning, covetous eyes; the droop of his eyelids, the curves of his -lips, the fairness of his features all seemed to her more beautiful -than they had ever done; the very disquiet and coldness that were in -them only allured her the more. She leaned nearer still and took his -wrist in her fingers.</p> - -<p>'Come to Noisettiers,' she murmured.</p> - -<p>'No,' he said, sharply and sternly, but he did not withdraw his hand.</p> - -<p>'Why not?' she said, with her whole person swayed towards him as by -an irresistible impulse. 'Why do you affect to be of ice? You are not -indifferent to me. You only obey what you think a law of honour. Why do -you try to do that? There is only one law—love.'</p> - -<p>He strove to draw away from him, but feebly, the clinging of her warm -fingers. The caress of her breath on his cheek, the scent of the roses -in her breast intoxicated him for the instant. She bent nearer and -nearer, and still held him closely in her slender hands, which were as -strong as steel.</p> - -<p>'You love me?' she murmured, so low that it scarce stirred the air, -and yet had all the potency of hell in it. A shudder went over him;. -the baseness of voluptuous impulse and the revulsion of conscious -shamefulness shook his strength as though it were a reed in the wind. -For a moment his arms enclosed her, his heart beat against hers; then -he thrust her away from him and rose to his feet.</p> - -<p>'Love, you? No, a thousand times, no!' he said with unutterable scorn. -'You are a shameless temptress; you can rouse the beast that lies hid -in all men. I despise you, I detest you—I could kiss you and kill you -in a breath; but love!—how dare you speak the word? Mine is hers; I am -hers: if I sinned to her with you I would strangle you when I awoke!'</p> - -<p>All the fierceness and the barbaric strength of the blood of desert -and of steppe broke up in him from underneath the courtesy and calm -of many long years of culture. He was born of men who had slain their -mistresses for a glance, and ravished; their captives in war, and -yielded them to no release but death, and his hereditary instincts -broke the bonds of custom and of habit, and spoke in him now as a wild -animal breaks its bars and leaps up in frank brutality of wrath. He -thrust her backward and backward from him, rose to his feet, wrenched -aside with rude hand the eastern stuffs that hung before the door, and -left her presence and her house before any power of voice or movement -had come back to her.</p> - -<p>As he pushed past the waiting servants in the vestibule, and went -through the courtyard and the gateway, he looked up once again at the -stars shining overhead.</p> - -<p>'Wanda! Wanda!' he said with a deep breath, as men may call in their -extremity on God.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII" id="CHAPTER_XXXII">CHAPTER XXXII.</a></h4> - - -<p>Within half an hour he had given a few orders to his major-domo, -and had taken a special train to overtake the express, already for -on its way that night towards Strasburg. No steam could fly as fast -as his own wishes flew. Never had he felt happier than as the train -rushed across the windy level country of the north-east, bearing him -back to the peace and tenderness and honour which waited for him at -Hohenszalrasburg. He was content with himself, and the future smiled on -him. He slept soundly all that night, undisturbed by the panting and -oscillating of the carriage, and visited by tranquil dreams. He did not -break the journey till he reached S. Johann. The weather in the German -lands was wild and rough. The sound of the winds and rushing rains -brought the remembrance of that year of the floods which had been the -sweetest of his life. Amidst the Austrian Alps the cold was still keen, -and the brisk buoyant air and the strength, that seems always to come -on winds that blow over glaciers and snow-fields were welcome to him, -like a familiar and trusty friend. The servants who met him in answer -to his message, the horses who knew him and whinnied with pleasure, the -summits of the Glöckner, on which a noon-day sun was shining, all were -delightful to him: he thought of the Catullian 'laugh in the dimples of -home.'</p> - -<p>Their ways of life renewed themselves as if they had never been -broken. She divined what had passed, but she never spoke of it. She -was happy in his return, and never disturbed its happiness by inquiry -or allusion. He entered with eagerness into plans and projects which -had of recent years ceased to interest him, and he resumed his old -occupations and pursuits with almost boyish ardour. His restlessness -was appeased, and if a dull apprehension beat at his heart with -warning now and then, it was scarcely heeded in his deep sense of the -intense and forbearing love his wife bore to him. She never asked him -how he had escaped from Olga Brancka. She was satisfied that if he -had been faithless to herself, he would not have returned with such -single-hearted contentment and such lover-like fervour.</p> - -<p>'You are the only woman in the world who can forbear from putting -questions,' said Madame Ottilie to her.</p> - -<p>She answered smiling:</p> - -<p>'I remember Psyche's lamp.'</p> - -<p>'That is very pretty,' said the Princess, 'and I do believe you would -never have cared for the lamp. But, all the same, if the god had been -as honest as he ought to have been, would he have minded the light?'</p> - -<p>'I do not think that enters into the story,' said Wanda. 'He did not -resent the light either; he resented the inquisitiveness.'</p> - -<p>'You are the only woman who has none,' said the Princess, taking up her -netting, and at times she called her niece Pschye, little imagining the -terrible suitability of the name, and the secret that was hidden in -darkness from that noble confidence of the last of the Szalras.</p> - -<p>The remembrance of that night of base temptation left a sense of -uneasiness and of insecurity upon Sabran, but the influence his -temptress had possessed with him was of that kind which fades instantly -in absence. He honestly abhorred the memory of her, and never spoke -her name.</p> - -<p>His wife, to whom the utter degradation of her cousin's wife would -never have seemed possible in a woman nobly born and nurtured, never -imagined the truth or anything similar to it.</p> - -<p>Another woman would have tormented herself and him with innuendo or -direct reference to what had passed in those weeks when she had not -been beside him, and on which he was absolutely silent. But she put all -baseness of curiosity from her; she was content to know that her own -influence in absence had been strong enough to bring him back to his -allegiance. She would not have wished to hear, had he offered to reveal -them, all the various, conflicts of good and evil which had gone on in -his mind, all the subtle changes by which her own power had been for a -moment obscured, only to regain still stronger and purer ascendency. -She was indulgent because she knew human nature well, and expected no -miracles. That he had returned of his own accord, and was content so to -return, was all she desired to know. If to attain that equanimity had -cost her many a struggle, the fact was shut in her own soul and could -concern no other. She esteemed it a poor love which could not bear to -be sometimes shut out in silence.</p> - -<p>'For a man to be manly he must be free,' she thought; 'and how can he -be free if there be someone to whom he must confess every trifle? He -owes allegiance to no one but his own conscience.'</p> - -<p>If in their intercourse she had found his honour less scrupulous, his -code less fine than her own; if she had been ever pained by a certain -levity and looseness of principle betrayed by him at times, she always -strove not to attach too much importance to these. The creeds of a man -of pleasure were necessarily different, she told herself, to those of -a woman reared in austere tenets, and guarded by natural pride and -purity of disposition. Whenever the fear crossed her that he might not -be always faithful to her she put it away from her thoughts. 'What I -have to do,' she thought, 'is to be true to him, not to question or to -doubt him: a man's faithfulness has always such a different reading to -a woman's.'</p> - -<p>Sabran never quite understood the perfect indulgence to him which she -combined with the greatest severity to herself. He thought that the -same measure she gave she would exact. The' serenity and grandeur of -her character made it seem to him impossible that she would ever have -compassion for weakness or for falsehood. He fancied, wrongly, that -a woman less noble herself would be more indulgent than she would be -to error. He did not realise that it is only a great nature which can -wholly understand the full force of the words <i>aimer c'est pardonner.</i> -And then again, he said to himself, she might have pardoned a fault, a -crime even, of high passion, of bold mutiny against moral, law, but how -could she ever pardon a meanness, a treason, a lie?</p> - -<p>So he let the months slide away, and did not say to her whilst he still -might have said it himself, 'I am not what you think me.'</p> - -<p>But he was impressed and profoundly affected by that mute magnanimity, -which never vaunted itself or claimed any praise for itself by any hint -or suggestion. He felt disgust at his own folly in ever having cared to -be a single instant in the presence of the woman of whose libertinage -and inconstancy his yellow roses had been the fitting symbol. When -he had cast her from him, rejected and despised, the glamour she had -thrown over him had fallen like scales from the eyes of one blind. -Her memory made the beauty of his wife's nature and thoughts seem to -him more than ever things for reverence and worship. More than ever -his soul shrank within him when he recollected the treachery and the -deception with which, he had rewarded this noblest of friends.</p> - -<p>Ah! why when she had stretched out her hand to him in that supreme gift -of herself, in, that golden sunset hour after the autumn floods of -Idrac, had he not had courage to kneel at her feet and tell her all? -Perchance she might have still have loved him, might have still stooped -to him!</p> - -<p>He strove his utmost to conceal these anxious self-reproaches from her, -lest she should imagine that his hours of gloom were caused by any -lingering shadows of the fatal folly which had been forced on him, like -a drug by Olga Brancka. The sorceress had failed, and he had flung down -and shivered in atoms the glass out of which she had bidden him drink; -she was to him as utterly forgotten, as though she were in her grave; -but not so easily could he banish the memory of his own treachery to -his wife. The very forbearance of her made him the more conscious of -guilt, when he remembered that one man lived who knew that he was -unworthy even to kiss the hem of her garment. He had been faithful to -her in the present, and so could greet her with clean hands and honest -lips; but in the past he had betrayed her foully; he had done her what -in her sight, if ever she knew it would be the darkest dishonour the -treachery of ä human life could hold.</p> - -<p>The sense of crime, which had slept quiet and mute in his conscience so -many years, was now awake and seldom to be stilled.</p> - -<p>The time passed serenely; the autumn brought its hardy sports, the -winter its vigorous pastimes. With the new year she gave him another -son; she named him after Egon Vàsàrhely, without opposition from Sabran.</p> - -<p>'He is worthier to give them a name than I,' he thought bitterly.</p> - -<p>They did not care to move from the green Iselthal. Of Olga Brancka they -heard but rarely. Now and then she sent a little witty flippant note to -Hohenszalras, dated from Paris or Trouville, or Biarritz, or Vienna, or -Monaco, or St. Petersburg, according to the season and her caprices. -Of these little meaningless notes Wanda did not speak to her husband. -She could not bring herself to talk to him of the woman who had so -nearly wrecked their peace, and it seemed to her that the old saw was -wise: 'Let sleeping dogs lie.' It appeared to her, too, that theirs and -Madame Brancka's paths in life would henceforth very seldom, if ever, -meet.</p> - -<p>Sabran believed that her overtures towards him had sprung from one -of those insane unhealthy passions which sometimes are created by -their very sense of their own immorality; he fancied it had died of -its own fire. He did not credit her with the tenacity and endurance -she really possessed. He had little doubt that long ere now some dandy -of the boulevards, some soldier of the palace, had supplanted him in -that brazier of heated senses which she called by courtesy her heart. -He mistook, as the cleverest men often do mistake, in underrating the -cruelty of women.</p> - -<p>The summer was a soft and sunny one, and they enjoyed it in simple and -healthful pleasures of the open air and of the affections. The children -throve and never ailed a day. Sabran had lost all desire to return -to the excitations and passions of the world; his wife was more than -content in the joys of her home; and if above her a storm brooded, if -in his heart there fretted ceaselessly the chafing sense of a gross -treachery, of an incessant peril, she was as ignorant of what menaced -her as the child to whom she had given birth. With present security -also, the sense of dread often wore away from him.</p> - -<p>The months sped on swiftly and serenely for the mistress of -Hohenszalras, the only shadows cast on them coming from accidents -to her poor people through flood or avalanche, and the occasional -waywardness and turbulence of her eldest born. Bela had not been the -better for his sojourn in a great city, where parasites are never -lacking to the heir of wealth, and where his companions had been -small coquettes and dandies <i>pétris du monde</i> at six years old. The -bright vigorous hardihood of the child had escaped the contagion of -affectation, but he had arrived at an inordinate sense of his own -importance and dignity, despite the memory of the Dauphin which often -came to him. He grew quite beyond the management of his governantes, -and though he never disobeyed his mother, gave little heed to anyone -else's authority. Of Sabran he was alone afraid; but at the same time -he preserved for him that silent intense admiration which a young child -sometimes nourishes for a man by whom he is little noticed, but who is -his ideal of all power, force, and achievement, and of whom he hears -heroic tales.</p> - -<p>He was now seven years old. It was time to think of a tutor for him, -since he was beyond the control of the women entrusted with his -education. When she spoke of it to his father, he answered at once:</p> - -<p>'Take Greswold. He has the best temper in the world to govern a child, -and he is a great scholar.'</p> - -<p>'But he is a physician,' she objected.</p> - -<p>'He has studied the mind no less than the body. He adores the boy, -and will influence him as a stranger could not. Speak to him; he will -be only too happy. As no one is ever ill here,' he added with a smile, -'his present position is a sinecure; he can very well combine another -office with it.'</p> - -<p>'I wanted you to take Bela in your hands,' he said later to the old -doctor, 'because I say to you what I should not care to say to a -stranger. The boy has all my faults in him. As he exactly resembles me -physically so he does morally. There is in him, too, I am afraid, a -tendency to tyranny that I have never had. I am not cruel to anything, -though I am indifferent to most things; he would be cruel if he were -allowed; perhaps it is mere masterfulness which may be conquered by -time. I imagine he has also my fatal facility. I call it fatal because -it renders acquisition and proficiency so easy that it prevents -laboriousness and depth of knowledge. You are much wiser than I am, -and will know how to educate the child much better than I can tell -you how to do. Only remember two things: first, that he is cursed by -certain hereditary passions coming to him from me which must be checked -and calmed, or he will grow up with a character dangerous to himself, -and odious to others in the great position he will one day occupy. -Secondly, that if any child of mine ever bring any kind of sorrow upon -her, I shall be of all men the most wretched. You have always been my -good friend. Be yet more so in preventing my suffering from the pain of -seeing my own moral deformities face me and accuse me in the life of -her eldest son.'</p> - -<p>The old physician listened with emotion and with surprise. Of the moral -defects Sabran spoke of, he had seen none. Since his marriage his -tenderness to his wife, his kindliness to his dependants, his courage -in field sports, and his courtesy as a host had been all that anyone -had seen in him; whilst his abstinence from all interference with and -all appropriation of his wife's vast possessions had aroused a yet -deeper esteem in all who surrounded him. As he heard, over the old -man's mind drifted the memories of all he had observed at the time of -Sabran's accident in the forest and subsequent prostration of nerve and -will. But he thrust these vague suspicions away, for he was blameless -in his loyalty to the house he served, and honoured as his master the -husband of the Countess von Szalras.</p> - -<p>'I will do my uttermost to deserve so precious a trust,' he said, -with deep feeling. 'I think that you exaggerate childish foibles, and -attach too much importance to them. The little Count Bela is imperious -and high-spirited, nothing more; and in this great household, where -everyone salutes him as the heir, it is difficult to keep him wholly -unspoiled by adulation and consciousness of his own future power. But a -great pride has been always the mark of the race of Szalras, although -my lady has so chastened hers that you may well believe the line she -springs from has been always faultless as—if one may say so of any -mortal—one may say she herself is. It is not from you alone that the -child inherits his arrogance, if arrogant he be. As for his facility, -it is like a fairy's wand, a caduceus of the gods; it may be used -for good unspeakable. At least believe this, my dear lord, what any -human teacher can do I will do, thankful to pay my debt so easily. I -have always,' he added less gravely, 'had my own theories as to the -education of young princes, and like all theorists believe everyone -else who has had any doctrine on that subject to be wrong. I shall be -charmed to have so happy an occasion in which to put my theories to the -test. I think nature and learning together, the woods and the study, -should be the preparation for the world.'</p> - -<p>'I have entire confidence in your judgment,' said Sabran. 'Above all, -try and keep the boy from pride. Train him, as Madame de Genlis -trained the d'Orléans boys, for any reverse of fortune. He is born with -that temper which would make any humiliation, any loss of position, -unbearable to him; and who can say——'</p> - -<p>He paused abruptly: what he thought was, who could say that in future -years Egon Vàsàrhely might not tell his son of that secret shame which -hung over Hohenszalras, a cloud unseen, but big with tempest? Greswold -looked at him in a surprise which he could not conceal, and Sabran left -his presence hastily, under excuse of visiting some stallions arrived -that morning from Tunis; he was afraid of the interrogations which -the old man might be led in all innocence to make. Greswold looked -after him with some anxiety; he had become sincerely attached to his -lord, whose life he had saved in Pregratten; but the unevenness of his -spirits, the unhappiness which evidently came over him at times in -the midst of his serene and fortunate life, the strangeness of a few -words which from time to time he let fall, had not escaped the quick -perception of the wise physician, and gave him at intervals a vague, -uncertain feeling of apprehension.</p> - -<p>'Pride!' he thought now. 'If the little Count were not proud he would -be no Szalras; and if his father have not also that superb sin he must -be a greater philosopher than I have ever thought him, and no fit mate -for our lady. What should overtake the child? If war or revolution -ruin him when he grows up that will be no humiliation; he will be none -the less Bela von Szalras, and if he be like my lady he will be quite -content with being that. Nevertheless, one must try and teach him -humility—that is, one must try and make the stork creep and the oak -bend!'</p> - -<p>Sabran, as he examined his Eastern horses and conversed about them with -Ulrich, was haunted by the thoughts which his own words had called -up in him. It was possible, it was always possible, that if she ever -knew, she might divorce him, and the children would become bastards. -The Law would certainly give her her divorce, and the Church also. The -most severe of judges, the most austere of pontiffs, would not hold her -bound to a man who had so grossly deceived her.</p> - -<p>By his own act he had rendered it possible for her, if she knew, to -sever herself entirely from him, and make his sons nameless. Of course -he had always known this. But in the first ardours of his passion, -the first ecstasies of his triumph, he had scarcely thought of it. -He had been certain that Vassia Kazán was dead to the whole world. -Then, as the years had rolled on, the security of his position, the -calmness of his happiness, had lulled all this remembrance in him. But -now tranquillity had departed from him, and there were hours when an -intense dread possessed him.</p> - -<p>True, he did justice to the veracity and honour of his foe. He believed -that Vàsàrhely would never speak whilst he himself was living; but then -again he himself might die at any moment, a gun accident, a false step -on a glacier, a thrust from a boar or a bear, ten thousand hazards -might kill him in full health, and were he dead his antagonist might -be tempted to break his word. Vàsàrhely had always loved her; would it -not be a temptation beyond the power of humanity to resist, when by a -word he could show to her that she had been betrayed and outraged by a -traitor?</p> - -<p>And then the children?</p> - -<p>Though were he himself dead, she would in all likelihood never do aught -that would let the world know his sin, yet she would surely change to -his offspring, most probably would hate them when she saw in their -lives only the evidence of her own dishonour, and knew that in their -veins was the blood of a man born a serf.</p> - -<p>'Born a serf! I!' he thought, incredulous of his own memories, of his -own knowledge, as he left the haras and mounted a young half-broken -English horse, and rode out into the silent, fragrant forest ways. -Almost to himself it seemed a dream that he had ever been a little -peasant on the Volga plains. Almost to himself it seemed an impossible -fable that he had been the natural son of Paul Zabaroff and a poor -maiden who had deemed herself honoured when she had been bidden to bear -drink to the <i>barine</i> in his bedchamber. He had once said that he was -that best of all actors, one who believes in the part he plays; and at -all times, and above all since his marriage, he had been identified -in his own persuasions, and his own instincts and habits, with that -character of a great noble, which, when he paused to remember, he knew -was but assumed. Patrician in all his temper and tone, it seemed to -him, when he did so remember, incredible that he could be actually only -a son of hazard, without name, right, or station in the world. Was he -even the husband of Wanda von Szalras? Law and Church would both deny -it were his fraud once known.</p> - -<p>It was not very often that these gloomy terrors seized him—his temper -was elastic and his mind sanguine; but when they did so they overcame -him utterly; he felt like Orestes pursued by the Furies. What smote him -most deeply and hardly of all was his consciousness of the wrong done -to his wife.</p> - -<p>He rode fast and recklessly in the soft, grey atmosphere of the still -day, making his young horse leap brawling stream and fallen tree-trunk, -and dash headlong through the dusky greenery of the forests.</p> - -<p>When he returned Wanda was seated on the lawn under the great yews -and cedars by the keep. She kissed her hand to him as he rode in the -distance up the avenue.</p> - -<p>A little while later he joined her in her garden retreat, calm and -even gay. With her greeting his terror seemed to have faded away; his -home was here, he possessed her entire devotion—what was there to -fear? Never had the serenity of his life here appeared more precise -to him; never had the respect and honour which surrounded him seemed -more needful as the bulwarks of a contented career. What could the -furnace of ambition, the fatigue of exhausted pleasure give, that could -equal this profound sense of peace, this cultured leisure, and this -untainted atmosphere. The moral loveliness of his wife seemed to him -almost more than mortal in its absolute and unconscious rejection of -all things mean or base. 'The world would find the spring by following -her,' seemed to him to have been written for her—the spring of hope, -of faith, of strength, of purity. Perhaps a better man might have less -intensely perceived and worshipped that spiritual beauty.</p> - -<p>'Shall we have any house-parties this year or not?' she asked him as he -joined her. 'I fear you must feel lonely here after your crowded days -in Paris last year?'</p> - -<p>'No,' he said quickly. 'Let us be without people. We had enough of the -world in Paris, too much of it. How can I be lonely whilst I have you? -And the weather for once is superb, and promises to remain so.'</p> - -<p>'I do not know how it seems to you,' she replied, 'but when I came -from the glare and the asphalte of Paris, these deep shadows, these -cool fresh greens, these cloud-bathed mountains seemed to me to have -the very calm of eternity in them. They seemed to say to me in such -reproach, "Why will you wander? What can you find nobler and gladder -than we are?" I want the children to grow up with that love of country -in them; it is such a refuge, such an abiding, innocent joy. What does -the old English poet say: 'It is to go from the world as it is man's to -the world as it is God's.'</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -'Well, then, I now do plainly see<br /> -This busy world and I shall ne'er agree,' -</p> - -<p>he said, with a smile. 'Cowley was a very wise man; wiser than -Socrates, when all is counted. But, then, Cowley forgot, and you, -perhaps, forget that one must be born with that wiser, holier love in -one; like any other poetic faculty or insight, it is scarcely to be -taught, certainly not to be acquired. I hope your children may inherit -it from you. There is no surer safeguard, no simpler happiness!'</p> - -<p>'But since you are content, may it not be acquired?'</p> - -<p>'Ah, my beloved!' he said with a sigh. 'Do not compare the retreat of -the soldier tired of his wounds, of the gambler wearied by his losses, -with the poet or the saint who is at peace with himself and sees all -his life long what he at least believes to be the smile of God. Loyola -and Francis d'Assisi are not the same thing, are not on the same plane.'</p> - -<p>'What matter what brought them,' she said softly, 'if they reach the -same goal?'</p> - -<p>'You think any sin may be forgiven?' he said irrelevantly, with his -face averted.</p> - -<p>'That is a very wide question. I do not think S. Augustine himself -could answer it in a word or in a moment. Forgiveness, I think, would -surely depend on repentance.'</p> - -<p>'Repentance in secret—would that avail?'</p> - -<p>'Scarcely—would it?—if it did not attain some sacrifice. It would -have to prove its sincerity to be accepted.'</p> - -<p>'You believe in public penance?' said Sabran, with some impatience and -contempt.</p> - -<p>'Not necessarily public,' she said, with a sense of perplexity at the -turn his words had taken. 'But of what use is it for one to say he -repents unless in some measure he makes atonement?'</p> - -<p>'But where atonement is impossible?'</p> - -<p>'That could never be.'</p> - -<p>'Yes. There are crimes whose consequences can never be undone. What -then? Is he who did them shut out from all hope?'</p> - -<p>'I am no casuist,' she said, vaguely troubled. 'But if no atonement -were possible I still think——nay, I am sure—-a sincere and intense -regret which is, after all, what we mean by repentance, must be -accepted, must be enough.'</p> - -<p>'Enough to efface it in the eyes of one who had never sinned?'</p> - -<p>'Where is there such an one? I thought you spoke of heaven.'</p> - -<p>'I spoke of earth. It is all we can be sure to have to do with; it is -our one poor heritage.'</p> - -<p>'I hope it is but an ante-chamber which we pass through, and fill with -beautiful things, or befoul with dust and blood, at our own will.'</p> - -<p>'Hardly at our own will. In your ante-chamber a capricious tyrant -waits us all at birth. Some come in chained; some free.'</p> - -<p>They were seated at her favourite garden-seat, where the great yews -spread before the keep, and far down below the Szalrassee rippled -away in shining silver and emerald hues, bearing the Holy Isle upon -its waters, and parting the mountains as with a field of light. The -impression which had pursued her once or twice before came to her -now. Was there any error in his own life, any cruel, crooked twist -of circumstance concealed from her? An exceeding tenderness and pity -yearned in her towards him as the thought arose. Was he, with all -his talent, power, pride, grace, and strength, conscious of fault or -failure, weighted with any burden? It seemed impossible. Yet to her -fine instinct, her accurate ear, there was in these generalities the -more painful, the more passionate, tone of personal remorse. She might -have spoken, might once more have said to him what she had once said, -and invited him to place a fearless confidence in her affection; but -she remembered Olga Brancka; she shrank from seeking an avowal which -might be so painful to him and her alike.</p> - -<p>At that moment the pretty figure of the Princess Ottilie appeared in -the distance, a lace hood over her head, a broad red sunshade held -above that, and Sabran rose to go forward and offer her his arm.</p> - -<p>'You are always lovers still, and one is afraid of interrupting you,' -she said, as she took one of the gilded wicker chairs. 'I have had a -letter from Olga Brancka; the post is come in. She says she will honour -you in the autumn on her way to waiting at Gödöllö.'</p> - -<p>'It is impossible!' cried Sabran, who grew first red, then pale.</p> - -<p>'Nothing is impossible with Olga,' said the Princess, drily. 'I see -even yet you are not acquainted with her many qualities, which include -among them a will of steel.'</p> - -<p>'She cannot come here,' he said in haste under his breath.</p> - -<p>Wanda looked at him a moment.</p> - -<p>'My aunt shall tell her that it will not suit us. She can go to Gödöllö -by way of Gratz,' she said quietly.</p> - -<p>The Princess shifted her sunshade.</p> - -<p>'What effect do you think that will have? She will cross your -mountains, and she will call up a snowstorm by incantation, so that you -will be compelled to take her in. You who know so much of the world, -Réné, can you inform me how it is that women possess tenacity of will -in precise proportion to the frivolity of their lives? All these -butterflies have a volition of iron.'</p> - -<p>'It is egotism,' he replied with effort, unable to recover his -astonishment and disgust. 'Intensely selfish people are always very -decided as to what they wish. That is in itself a great force; they do -not waste their energies in considering the good of others.'</p> - -<p>'Olga's energies are certainly not wasted in that direction,' said -Madame Ottilie.</p> - -<p>Sabran rose and went in for his letters. It was intolerable to him -to hear the name of this woman, whom he had only escaped by brutal -violence, spoken in the presence of his wife; and even to him, hardened -to the vices of the world though experience had made him, it had never -occurred as possible that she would have the audacity to come thither; -he had too hastily taken it for granted that conscience would have -kept her clear of their path for ever, unless the hazards of society -should have brought them perforce together. The most secretive of men -is always more sincere than an insincere and crafty woman, and he -was overwhelmed for the moment at the infamy and the hardihood of a -character which he had flattered himself he had understood at a glance. -He forgot the truth that 'hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.'</p> - -<p>'There is not a <i>déclassée</i> in Paris who would not have more decency!' -he thought bitterly. He stood in the Rittersaal and affected to be -occupied with his letters; but his eyes only followed their lines, his -mind was absent. He saw no way to prevent her continued intimacy with -them, if she were vile enough to persist in enforcing it. He could not -tell Egon Vàsàrhely or Stefan Brancka; a man cannot betray a woman, -however base she may be. He could not tell his wife of that hateful -hour, which seemed burnt into his brain as aquafortis bites into metal. -He shuddered as he thought of her here, in this house which had known -so many centuries of honour. He cursed the weak and culpable folly -which had first led him into her snares. If he had not dallied with -this Delilah, she would have been vile of purpose and of nature in -vain. He had escaped her indeed at the last; he had indeed remained -faithful in act to his wife; but had it been such fidelity of the soul -and the mind as she deserved? Would not even the semi-betrayal bring -its punishment soon or late? Could he ever endure to see her beside the -woman who so nearly had tempted him? He felt that he would sooner kill -the other, as he had threatened, rather than let her set foot across -the sacred threshold of Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'I knew what she was,' he thought with endless self-accusation. 'Why -did I ever loiter an hour by her side, why did I ever look once at her -hateful eyes?'</p> - -<p>If she had been a stranger he would have braved his wife's scorn of -himself and told her all, but when it was her cousin's wife—one who -even had once been in a still nearer relationship to her—he could -not do it. It seemed to him as if such nearness of shame would be so -horrible to her that he would be included in her righteous hatred of it.</p> - -<p>Moreover, long habit had made him reticent, and silence always seemed -to him safety.</p> - -<p>After some meditation he took his way to the library and there wrote a -brief letter. He said in it, with no preamble, ceremony, or courtesy, -that he begged to decline for himself and his wife the honour of the -Countess Brancka's presence at Hohenszalras. He sealed it with his -arms, and sent a special messenger with it to Matrey. He said nothing -of what he had done to his wife or her aunt.</p> - -<p>He knew that if his antagonist were so disposed she could make feud -between him and her husband for the insult which that curt rejection -of her offered visit bore with it. But that did not weigh on him; he -would have been glad to have a man to deal with in the matter. All -he cared to do was to preserve his home from the pollution of her -presence. Moreover, he knew that it would not be like the <i>finesse</i> and -secrecy of Olga Brancka to do aught so simple or so frank as to seek -the support of her lord.</p> - -<p>Meantime, the Princess was saying to his wife:</p> - -<p>'Will you receive Olga? She will not give up her wishes; she will force -her way to you.'</p> - -<p>'How can I refuse to receive Stefan's wife?'</p> - -<p>'It would be difficult, but you would be justified. She endeavoured to -draw your husband into an intrigue.'</p> - -<p>'Are we sure? Let us be charitable.'</p> - -<p>'My dear Wanda, you are a truer Christian than I am.'</p> - -<p>'Justice existed before Christianity, if you do not think me profane to -say so. I try to be just.'</p> - -<p>'Justice is blind,' said the Princess, drily. 'I never understood very -well how, being so, she can see her own scales.'</p> - -<p>Wanda made no reply. She had not been blind, but she would have never -said to any living being all that she had suffered in those weeks -when he had stayed behind her in Paris. That he had returned to her -blameless she was certain; she had put far behind her for ever the -remembrance of those the only hours of anxiety and pain which he had -given her since their marriage.</p> - -<p>The Princess, communing with herself, wrote a letter to the Countess -Brancka, chill and austere, in which she conveyed in delicate, but -sufficiently clear, language, her sense that the same roof should -not shelter her and Sabran, especially when the roof was that of -Hohenszalras. She sent it because she believed it to be her duty to do -so, but she had little faith in its efficacy. She would have written -also to Stefan Brancka, but she knew him to be a weak, indulgent, -careless man, still young, who had been lenient to his wife's follies -and frailties, and who was only kept from ruin by the strong hand -of his brother. If she told him what was after all mere conjecture, -he might only laugh; if he did not laugh he might kill Sabran in a -duel, were his Magyar blood fired by suspicion. No one could be ever -sure what Count Stefan would or would not do; the only thing sure was -that he would be never wise. To his wife herself he was absolutely -indifferent, but this did not prevent him from having occasional moods -of furious resentment against her. He was too unstable and too perilous -a person to resort to in any difficulty.</p> - -<p>In a few days she received her answer, though Sabran received none. It -was brief and playful and pathetic.</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>'Beloved and reverend Mother,—You never like me, you always -lecture me, but I am glad that you honour me by remembrance, -even if it be to upbraid. I know not of what mysterious -crime you suspect me, nor do I understand your allusions -to M. de Sabran. I have always found him charming, and I -think if he had not married so rich a woman he would have -been eminent in some way; but content slays ambition. Salute -Wanda lovingly and the pretty children. How is your little -Ottilie? My Mila and Marie are grown out of knowledge. We -shall soon have to be thinking of their <i>dots</i>—alas! where -will these come from? Stefan and I have been the prey of -unjust stewards and extortionate tradesfolk till scarce -anything is left except the mine at Schermnitz. Pity me a -little, and pray for me much.</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 55%;">'Your ever devoted</p> -<p style="margin-left: 70%; font-size: 0.8em;">'OLGA.'</p></blockquote> - -<p>Princess Ottilie was a holy woman, and knew that rage was a sin against -herself and heaven, but when she had read this note she tore it in a -hundred pieces, and stamped her small foot upon it, trembling with -passion the while.</p> - -<p>Two months went on; the Countess Olga wrote no more; they deemed -themselves delivered from her threatened presence. She had not replied -to his refusal to permit her to come thither, and Sabran felt relieved -from an intolerable position. Had she persisted, he had decided to -make full confession to his wife rather than permit her to receive -ignorantly the insult of such a visit.</p> - -<p>It was now the end of September, and the weather remained fine and -open. He spent a great deal of his time out of doors, and took his old -interest in the forests, the stud, and the hunting. The letter of Olga -Brancka had brought close to him again the peril from which he had so -hardly escaped in Paris, and the peace and sweetness of his home-life -seemed the more precious to him by contrast. The high intelligence, -the serene temper of his wife, and her profound affection seemed to -him treasures for which he could be never grateful enough to fate and -fortune; their days passed in tranquil and sunny happiness; but ever -and again a word, a look, the merest trifle, sufficed to awake the -sleeping snake of remorse which was, dormant in his breast.</p> - -<p>One day he took Bela with him when he rode—a rare honour for the -child, who rode superbly. His pony kept fair pace with his father's -English hunter, and even the leaping did not scare either it or its -rider.</p> - -<p>'Bravo, Bela!' said Sabran, when they at last drew rein; 'you ride like -a centaur. Is your education advanced enough to know what centaurs -were?'</p> - -<p>'Oh! they were what I should love to be,' replied Bela rapturously. -'They were joined on to the horse!'</p> - -<p>Sabran laughed. 'Well, a good rider is one with his horse, so you may -come very near your ideal. Ulrich has taught you an admirable seat. You -are worthy of your mother in the saddle.'</p> - -<p>Bela coloured with pleasure.</p> - -<p>'In the study you are not so, I fear?' Sabran continued. 'You do not -like learning, do you?'</p> - -<p>'I like some sorts,' said the child with a little timidity; 'I like -history, knowing what the people did in the other ages. Now the Herr -Professor lets us do our lessons out of doors, I do not mind them at -all. As for Gela, he likes nothing but books and pictures,' he added, -with a sense of his one grief against his brother.</p> - -<p>'Happy Gela! whatever his fate in life he will never be alone,' said -his father, as he dismounted to let his hunter take breathing space. -The child leapt lightly from his saddle, took his little silver folding -cup out of his pocket, and drank at a spring, one of the innumerable -springs rushing over the mossy stones and flower-filled grass.</p> - -<p>'One is never alone with horses?' he said shyly, for he never lost his -awe of Sabran.</p> - -<p>'Unless one be ill; then a horse is sorry consolation, and books and -art are faithful companions.'</p> - -<p>'I have never been ill,' said Bela, with a little wonder at himself. 'I -do not know what it is like.'</p> - -<p>'It is to be dependent upon others. A hero or a king grows as helpless -as a lame beggar when he is ill; you will not escape the common lot; -and when you stay in your bed, and your pony in his stall, then you -will be glad of Gela and his books.'</p> - -<p>'Oh! I do love Gela always,' said the child hastily and generously; -'and the Herr Professor says he is ever—ever—so much cleverer than I -am; a million times more clever!'</p> - -<p>'You are clever enough,' said Sabran. 'If you do not let yourself -be vain and overbearing you will do well. Try and remember that if -your pony made a false slip to-day and you fell badly, all your good -health would vanish at a stroke, and all your greatness would serve you -nothing. You would envy any one of the boys going with whole limbs up -into the hills, and, perhaps, all your mother's love and wealth could -do nothing to mend your bones again.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened with a grave face; when women, even his fearless mother, -spoke to him in such a way, he was apt to think with disdain that -they over-rated danger because they were women; and when his tutor so -addressed him, he was also apt to think that it was because the good -professor was a bookworm and cared for weeds, stones, and butterflies. -But when his father said so, he was awed; he had heard Ulrich and -Otto tell a hundred stories of their lord's prowess and courage and -magnificent strength, for the deeds of Sabran in the floods and on -the mountains had become almost legendary in their heroism to all the -mountaineers of the Hohe Tauern, and all the dwellers on the Danube -forest.</p> - -<p>'But ought one not to be brave?' he said with hesitation. 'You are.'</p> - -<p>'We ought to be brave, certainly, or we are not fit to live; but we -must not be vain of being brave, nor rely upon it too much. Courage is -a mere gift of '—he was about to say 'chance,' but seeing the blue -eyes of the child fastened upon him, changed the word and said 'a gift -of God.'</p> - -<p>'What a handsome boy he is,' he thought, as he looked thus at his -little son. 'And how wise it is to leave children wholly to their -mothers when their mothers are wise!'</p> - -<p>'I will remember,' said Bela thoughtfully; 'when I am a man I want to -be just what you are.'</p> - -<p>Sabran turned away at the innocent words. 'Be what your mother's people -were, and I shall be content,' he said gravely.</p> - -<p>'But your people too,' said Bela; 'they were very great and very good. -The Herr Professor reads us things out of that big book on Mexico, and -the Marquis Xavier was a saint,' he says. Gela likes the book better -than I because it is all about birds, and beasts, and flowers; but the -part about the Indians, and the Incas, that pleases me; and then there -are the Breton stories too that are in real history, they are quite -beautiful, and I would die like that.'</p> - -<p>Bela's tongue once loosened seldom paused of its own accord; his eyes -were dark and animated, his face was eager and proud.</p> - -<p>'The Marquis Xavier was a saint, indeed,' said his father abruptly. -'Revere his name. All my children should revere his name and memory. -But lean most to your mother's people; you are Austrian born, and the -chief of your duties and possessions will be in Austria. I think you -would die heroically, my boy, but you will find that it is harder to -live so. The horses are rested, let us ride home; it grows late for -you.'</p> - -<p>Bela, whose mind was quick in intuition, felt that his father did not -care to talk about Mexico or Bretagne.</p> - -<p>'I will ask the Herr Professor if I did wrong to speak to him of the -big book,' he said to himself as he mounted his pony; he was very -anxious to please his father, but he was afraid he had missed the way. -'I suppose it is because they were only saints, and the Szalras were -all soldiers,' he thought on reflection, soldiers being by far the -foremost in his esteem.</p> - -<p>'He says it is harder to live well than to die well,' said Bela over -his bread and milk that night to his brother.</p> - -<p>'I suppose that is because dying is over so soon,' said the meditative -Gela; 'and you know it must take an <i>enormous</i> time to live to be -old—quite old—like Aunt Ottilie.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die very grandly,' said Bela with shining eyes, 'and -have all the world remember me for ever and for ever, as they do great -Rudolph.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die saving somebody,' said Gela, 'just as Uncle Bela -saved the pilgrims; that would please our mother best.'</p> - -<p>'I should like to die in battle,' said the living Bela; 'and that would -please our mother, because so many of us have always died so fighting -the French, or the Prussians, or the Turks. When I am a man I shall die -like Wallenstein.'</p> - -<p>'But Wallenstein was killed in a room,' said Gela, who was very -accurate.</p> - -<p>'You are always so particular!' said Bela impatiently, who had himself -only a vague idea of Wallenstein, as of someone who had gone on -fighting without stopping for thirty years.</p> - -<p>'The Herr Professor says it is just being particular which makes -the difference between the scholar and the sciolist,' said Gela -solemnly, his pretty rosy lips closing carefully over the long word -<i>halbgelehrte.</i></p> - -<p>This night after the ride he and she dined quite alone. As he sat -in the Rittersaal and looked at the long line of knights, the many -blazoned shields, the weapons borne in gallant warfare, a sudden -sensation came to him of the vile thing that he did in being in this -place. It seemed to him that those armoured figures should grow animate -and descend and drive him out. Bela, then sleeping happily, dreaming -of the glories of his ride, had raised with his innocent words a -torturing spirit in his father's breast. What had he brought to this -haughty and chivalrous race?—the servile Slav, the barbaric Persian, -blood, and all the dishonour that their creed would hold the basest -upon earth. Besides, to lie to <i>her</i> children! Even the blue eyes -of the boy had made him embarrassed and humiliated, as if she were -judging him through her first-born's gaze. What would it be when that -child, grown to man's estate, should speak to him of his people, of his -forefathers?</p> - -<p>For the first time it occurred to him that these boys would inevitably, -as they grew older, ask him many questions, wish to know many things. -He could turn aside a child's inquisitive interest, but it would be -more painful, less easy, to refuse to supply a grown youth's legitimate -interrogations. All these children would some time or another make many -inquiries of him that his wife, out of delicate sympathy, never had -intruded upon him. The fallen fortunes of the Sabran race had always -seemed to her one of those blameless misfortunes for which the best -respect is shown by silence. But her sons would naturally, one day or -another, be more interested in learning more of those from whom they -were descended.</p> - -<p>The lie in reply would be easy and secure. There were all the -traditions and recollections of the Sabrans of Romaris to be gathered -from the tongues of the people in Finisterre, and the private papers -of their race which he possessed. He could answer well enough, but it -would be a lie, and a lie seemed to him now a disgrace? Before his -marriage he had looked on falsehood as a necessary part of the world's -furniture, but he had not lived all these years beside a noble nature, -to which even a prevarication was impossible, without growing ashamed -of his former laxities.</p> - -<p>'There is not a dead man amongst all those knights who bore these arms -that should not rise to punish and disown me!' he thought with poignant -hatred of his past.</p> - -<p>When he went to his room the impulse once more came over him to tell -his wife all; to throw himself on her mercy, and let her do the worst -she would; but he had a certain fear of her which acted like a spell on -that moral cowardice, which his Slav temperament and his hidden secret -combined to bind in a dead weight on the physical courage and natural -pride of his character.</p> - -<p>He resolved to do his uttermost as they grew older to rear his sons to -worthiness of that great race whose name they bore; to uproot in them -by all means in his power any falser or darker faults they might have -inherited from him. He promised himself so to watch over his own words -and deeds that as they grew to manhood they should find no palliative -or example of wrong-doing in his life. The closeness of his peril, the -folly of his dalliance with Olga Brancka, had left him distrustful -and diffident of his own powers to resist evil. He said to himself -that he would seek the world no more; his wife was happiest in her own -dominion, amidst her own people; he would court neither pleasure nor -ambition again. Here he had peace; here he loved and was beloved; here -he would abide, and let courts and cities hold those less blessed than -he.</p> - -<p>In the morning he awoke refreshed and tranquil; a beautiful sunrise was -tinging with rose the snows of the opposite Venediger peaks; the flush -of early autumn was upon the lower woods, but no snow had fallen even -on the mountains. The lake was deeply green as a laurel leaf, and its -waters rolled briskly under a strong breeze. It was a brilliant day for -the hills, and the <i>jägermeister</i> and his men were in waiting, for he -had arranged over night to go chamois-hunting on those steep alps and -glaciers which towered above the hindmost forests of Hohenszalras. He -did not very often give rein to his natural love of field sports, for -he knew that his wife liked to feel that the innocent creatures of the -mountains were safe wherever she ruled. But there was real sport to be -had here, with every variety of danger accompanying to excuse it, and -Otto and his men were proud of their lord's prowess and perseverance -on the high hills, and only sorrowed that he so often let his rifles -lie unused in the gun-room. He went out whilst the day was still red -and young, like a rose yet in bud, and climbed easily and willingly the -steep paths and precipitous slopes which led to the glaciers.</p> - -<p>'Count Bela wants sadly to come with us one of these days,' said Otto, -with a broad smile. 'He can use his crampons right manfully; will not -the Countess soon let me teach him to shoot?'</p> - -<p>'I think not willingly, Otto,' said Sabran. 'She thinks children's -hands are best free of bloodshed; and so do I. It can do a child no -good to see the dying agony of an innocent creature. Teach Herr Bela to -climb as much as you like, but leave powder and shot alone.'</p> - -<p>'I am sure the Herr Marquis himself must have been a line shot very -early?'</p> - -<p>'I was at a semi-military college,' said Sabran, thinking of those days -at the Lycée Clovis when he had sought the <i>salle d'armes</i> with such -eagerness, as being the scene of those lessons which would most surely -enable him to meet men as their equal or their master.</p> - -<p>'If only Count Bela might be taught to shoot at a mark?' said the old -huntsman, wistfully.</p> - -<p>'You know very well, Otto, that your lady decides everything for her -children, and that all her decisions I uphold,' said his master. 'Be -sure they are wiser than either yours or mine would be. She can teach -him herself, too; she can hit a running mark as well as you or I. Do -you remember the day when you arrested me in these woods?'</p> - -<p>'Ah, my lord!' said Otto, with a rolling oath; 'never can I pardon -myself, though you have so mercifully pardoned me!'</p> - -<p>'And my good rifle is still lying in the bed of the lake,' said Sabran, -glancing backward at the Szalrassee, now many hundred feet below them, -a mere green ribbon shining through the deeper green of fir and pine -woods.</p> - -<p>'Yes, my lord!' answered the man, cheerily. 'The good English rifle -indeed was lost; but it seems to me that the Herr Marquis did not make -wholly a bad exchange!'</p> - -<p>'No, indeed,' said his master, as he paused and looked down to where -the towers and spires of Hohenszalras glimmered like mere points of -glittering metal in the sunshine far below.</p> - -<p>They were now at the highest altitude at which <i>gemsbocks</i> are found, -and the business of the day commenced as they sighted what looked like -a mere brown speck against the greyness of the opposite glacier. Before -the day was done Sabran had shot to his own gun eight chamois on the -heights, and some score of ptarmigan and black-cock on the lower level. -He saw more than one <i>kuttengeier</i> and <i>lammergeier</i>, but, in deference -to the traditions of the Szalras, did not fire on them. The healthful -fatigue, the rarefied air, the buoyant exhilaration which comes with -the atmosphere of the great heights, made him feel happy, and gave -him back all his confidence in the present and the future. When he -rested on a ledge of rock, listening to Otto's hunter's tales, and -making a frugal meal of some hard biscuit and a draught of Voslauer, he -wondered at himself for having so recently been beguiled by the febrile -excitations of Paris, or having desired the fret and wear of a public -career. What could be better than this life was? To have sought to -leave it was folly and ingratitude. The peace and the calm of the great -mountains which she loved so well seemed to descend into his soul.</p> - -<p>It was twilight when they reached the lower slopes of the hills, -the jägers loaded with game, he and Otto walking in front of them. -From the still far-off islet oh the lake, and from the belfry of the -Schloss, the Ave Maria was chiming; the deep-toned bells of the latter -ringing the Emperor's Hymn.</p> - -<p>Talking gaily with Otto, with that frank kindliness which endeared him -to all these mountaineers, he approached the house slowly, fatigued -with the pleasant tire of a healthy and vigorous man after a long day's -pastime on the hills, and entered by a back entrance, which led through -the stables into the wing of the building where his own private rooms -were situated. He took his bath and dressed himself for the evening, -then went on his way across the vast house to the white salon, where -his wife and her aunt were usually to be found at the time of the -children's hour before dinner. With some words on his lips to claim her -praise for having spared the vultures, he pushed aside the <i>portière</i> -and entered, but the words died on his tongue, half spoken.</p> - -<p>His wife was there, but before the hearth, seated with her profile -turned towards him, also was Olga Brancka. His wife, who was standing, -came towards him.</p> - -<p>'My cousin Olga took us by surprise an hour ago. The telegram must have -missed us which she says she sent yesterday from Salzburg.'</p> - -<p>Her eyes had a cold gaze as she spoke; her sense of the duties of -hospitality and of high breeding had alone compelled her to give any -form of welcome to her guest. Madame Brancka, playing with a feather -screen, looked up with a little quiet self-satisfied smile.</p> - -<p>'Unexpected guests are the most welcome. When there is an old proverb, -pretty if musty, all ready made for you, Réné, why do you not repeat -it? I am truly sorry, though, that my telegram miscarried. I suspect it -comes from Wanda's old-fashioned prejudice against having a wire of her -own here from Lienz. I dare say they never send you half your messages.'</p> - -<p>Sabran had mechanically bowed over the hand she held out to him, but -he scarcely touched it with his own. He was deadly pale. The amazement -that her effrontery produced on him was stupefaction. Versed in the -ways of women and of the world though he was, he was speechless and -helpless before this incredible audacity. She looked at him, she -smiled, she spoke, like the most innocent and unconscious creature. -For a moment an impulse seized him to unmask her then and there, and -hound her out of his wife's presence; the next he knew that it was -impossible to do so. Men cannot betray women in that way, nor was he -even wholly free enough from blame himself to have the right to do so. -But an intense rage, the more intense because perforce mute, seized -him against this intruder by his hearth. Only to see her beside his -wife was an intolerable suffering and shame. When he recovered himself -a little, feeling his wife's gaze upon him, he said with some plain -incredulity in his contemptuous words:</p> - -<p>'The failure of messages is often caused by the senders of them; the -people are extremely careful at Lienz. I do not think the fault lies -<i>there.</i> We can, however, only regret the want of due warning, for the -reason that we can give no fit or flattering reception of an honoured -guest. You come from Paris?'</p> - -<p>For the first time a slight sudden flush rose upon Olga Brancka's -cheek, callous though she was. She felt the irony and the disdain. She -perceived that she had in him an inexorable foe, beyond all allurement -and all entreaty.</p> - -<p>'I passed by Paris,' she answered, easily enough. 'Of course I had to -see my tailors, like everyone else in September. I have been first to -Noissetiers, then to London, then to Homburg, then to Russia. I do not -know where I have not been since we met. And you good people have been -vegetating beneath your forests all that time? I was curious to come -and see you in your felicity. Hohenszalrasburg used to be called the -vulture's nest; it appears to have become a dove's!'</p> - -<p>'I spared a whole family of <i>lammergeier</i> to-day in deference to your -forest law,' he said, turning to his wife, whilst to himself he thought -what a far worse beast of prey was sitting here, smoothing her glossy -feathers in the warmth of his own hearth. She noticed the extreme -pallor of his face, the sound of anger and emotion forcibly restrained; -she imagined something of what he felt, though she could guess neither -its intensity nor its extent. She had done herself violence in meeting -with courtesy and tranquillity the woman who now sat between them, but -she could not measure or imagine the guilt and the audacity of her.</p> - -<p>When, that evening, as twilight came on, she had heard the sound of -wheels beneath the terraces, and in a little while had been informed -by Hubert that the Countess Brancka had arrived, her first movement -had been to refuse to receive her, her next to remember that to one -who had been Gela's wife, and now was Stefan Brancka's, the doors of -Hohenszalras could not be shut without an open quarrel and scandal, -which would regale the world and make feud inevitable between her -husband and the whole race of Vàsàrhely. The Vàsàrhely knew the -worthlessness of Stefan's wife, but for the honour of their name they -would never admit that they did so; they would never fail to defend -her. Moreover, hospitality of a high and antique type had always been -the first of obligations upon all those whom she descended from and -represented. They would not have refused to harbour their worst foe -if he had demanded asylum. They would not have turned away sovereign -or beggar from their gates. Those days were gone, indeed, but their -high and generous temper lived in her. In the brief space in which -Hubert, having made the announcement, waited for her commands, she -had struggled with her own repugnance and conquered it. She had told -herself that to turn Stefan's wife from her doors would be the mere -vulgar melodrama of a common and undignified anger. After all she knew -nothing; therefore she traversed the house to receive her unasked -guest, and gave her welcome without any pretence of cordiality or -friendship, but with a perfect and unhesitating politeness void of all -offence.</p> - -<p>She was thankful that the Princess Ottilie was again in the south of -France with her sister-in-law of Lilienhöhe, so that her indignation, -her interrogation, and her quick regard were spared to them. Now that -her niece was no longer alone, the Princess did not think it her -bounden duty to endure these northern winds, blowing from Poland and -the Baltic over the old duchy of Austria, which she had at all times so -peculiarly detested, though she had been born a thousand miles nearer -the Baltic herself.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka had been profuse in her apologies and expressions of -regret, but she had at once let her carriage, hired at S. Johann, with -its four post-horses changed at Matrey, be taken to the stables, and -had gone herself to her old apartments, where in little time her two -maids had altered her heavy furs and travelling clothes to the costume -of consummate simplicity and elegance in which she now sat, putting -forth her small feet in rose satin shoes to the warmth from the great -Hirschvogel stove, which, with its burnished and enamelled colour, -illumined one side of the white salon.</p> - -<p>Sabran and his wife both remained standing, he leaning his arm on the -scroll work of the great stove, she playing with the delicate ears of -one of the hounds. Madame Brancka alone sat and leaned back in her -low seat, quite content; she was aware that she was unwelcome, and -that her presence was an embarrassment and worse. But the sense of -the wrong and cruel position in which she placed them was sweet and -pungent to her; she was refreshed by the very sense of dilemma and of -danger which surrounded her. She had her vengeance in her hand, and -she would not exhaust it quickly, but tasted its savour with the slow -care and patient appetite of the connoisseur in such things. She had a -Chinese-like skill in patiently drawing out the prolonged pangs of an -ingeniously invented martyrdom.</p> - -<p>'Why do you both stand?' she said, looking up at him between her -half-closed lids. 'Are you standing to imply to me as we do with -monarchs, 'This house is yours whilst you are in it?' I am much -obliged, but I should sell it at once if it were really mine. It is a -splendid, barbaric solitude, like Taróc. We have not been to Taróc this -year. Stefan says Egon lives altogether with his troopers and grows -very morose. You hear from him sometimes, I suppose?'</p> - -<p>To Sabran it seemed as if her half shut black eyes shot forth actual -sparks of fire, as she spoke the name which he could never hear without -an inward spasm of fear.</p> - -<p>'Of course I hear from Egon,' said his wife. 'But he writes very -briefly; he was never much of a penman. He prefers a rifle, a sword, a -riding-whip.'</p> - -<p>'I hear you have called the last child after him? Where are the boys? -They cannot be in bed. Let me see them. It is surely their hour to be -here. Réné, ring, and send for them.'</p> - -<p>His brow contracted.</p> - -<p>'No; it is late,' he said abruptly. 'They would only weary you; they -are barbaric, like the house.'</p> - -<p>He felt an extreme reluctance to bring his children into her presence, -to see her speak to them, touch them; he was longing passionately to -seize her and thrust her out of the doors. As she sat there in the full -light of the many wax candles burning around, sparkling, imperturbable, -like a coquette of a vaudeville, with her rose satin, and her white -taffetas, and her lace ruff, and her pink coral necklace and ear-rings, -and a little pink coral hand upholding her curls in the most studied -disorder, she seemed to him the loath-liest thing that he had ever -seen. He hated her more intensely than he had ever hated anyone in all -his life; even more than he had hated the traitress who had sold him to -the Prussians.</p> - -<p>'Pray let me see the children; I know you never dine till eight,' -she was persisting to his wife, who knew well that she was entirely -indifferent to the children, but who was not unwilling for their -entrance to break the constraint of what was to her an intolerable -trial. She did ring, and ordered their presence. They soon came, -making their obeisances with the pretty grave courtliness which they -were taught from infancy; the boys in white velvet dresses, while their -sister, in a frock of old Venetian point, looked like a Stuart child -painted by Vandyck.</p> - -<p>'<i>Ah, quels amours!</i>' cried Olga Brancka, with admirable effusion, as -they kissed her hand. Sabran turned away abruptly, and muttering a -word as to some orders he had to give the stud-groom, left the chamber -without ceremony, as she, with an ardour wholly unknown to her own -daughters, lifted the little Ottilie on her knee and kissed the child's -rose-leaf cheek.</p> - -<p>'What lovely creatures they are,' she said in German; 'and how they -have grown since they left Paris. They are all the image of Réné; he -must be very proud. They have all his eyes—those deep dark-blue eyes, -like jewels, like the depths of the sea.'</p> - -<p>'You are very poetic,' said Wanda; 'but I should be glad if you would -speak their praises in some tongue they do not understand. The boys may -not be hurt; but Lili, as we call her, is a little vain already, though -she is so young.'</p> - -<p>'Would you deny her the birthright of her sex?' said Madame Brancka, -clasping her coral necklace round the child's throat. 'Surely she will -have lectures enough from her godmother against all feminine foibles. -By the way, where is the Princess?'</p> - -<p>'My aunt is with the Lilienhöhe.'</p> - -<p>'I am grieved not to have the pleasure,' murmured Madame Brancka, -indifferently, letting Ottilie glide from her lap.</p> - -<p>'Give back the necklace, <i>liebling</i>,' said Wanda, as she unclasped it.</p> - -<p>'No, no; I entreat you—let her keep it. It is leagues too large, but -she likes it, and when she grows up she will wear it and think of me.'</p> - -<p>'Pray take it,' said Wanda, lifting it from the child's little breast. -'You are too kind; but they must not be given what they admire. It -teaches them bad habits.'</p> - -<p>'What severe rules!' cried Madame Brancka. 'Are these poor babies -brought up on S. Chrysostom and S. Basil? Is Lili already doomed to the -cloister? You are too austere; you should have been an abbess instead -of having all these golden-curled cupidons about you. Where is the -youngest one, Egon's namesake?'</p> - -<p>'He is in his cot,' said Gela, who was always very direct in his -replies, and who found himself addressed by her.</p> - -<p>Meantime Bela took hold of his mother's hand and whispered to her, -'<i>Mütterchen</i>, she is rude to you. Send her away.'</p> - -<p>'My darling,' answered Wanda, 'when people laugh in our own house we -must let them do it, even if it be at ourselves. And, Bela, to whisper -is <i>very</i> rude.'</p> - -<p>'Egon is so little,' continued Gela, plaintively. 'He cannot read; I do -not think he ever will read!'</p> - -<p>'But you could not when you were as small as he?'</p> - -<p>'Could I not?' said Gela, doubtfully, to whom that time seemed many -centuries back.</p> - -<p>'And Lili, can she read?' said Madame Olga, suppressing a yawn.</p> - -<p>'Oh yes,' said Gela; 'at least, two-letter words she can; and me, I -read to her.'</p> - -<p>'What model children!' cried Madame Brancka, with a little laugh. 'And -the naughty boy who was in a rage because he was not permitted to go to -Chantilly? That was Bela, was it not? Bela, do you remember how cruel -your mother was, and how you cried?'</p> - -<p>Bela looked at her, with his blue eyes growing as stern and cold as his -father's.</p> - -<p>'My mother is always right,' he said gallantly. 'She knows what I ought -to do. I do not think I cried, <i>meine gnädige Frau</i>; I never cry.'</p> - -<p>'Even the naughty boy has become an angel! What a wonderful -disciplinarian you are, Wanda! If your children were not so handsome -they would be insufferable with their goodness. They are very handsome; -they are just like Sabran, and yet they are not at all a Russian type.'</p> - -<p>'Why should they be Russian? We have no Russian blood,' said their -mother, in surprise.</p> - -<p>Madame Brancka laughed a little confusedly, and fluttered her feather -screen.</p> - -<p>'I do not know what I was thinking of. Réné always reminds me of my old -friend Paul Zabaroff; they are very alike.'</p> - -<p>'I have seen the present Prince Zabaroff,' said Wanda, wondering what -the purpose of her guest's words were. 'He was not, as I remember him, -much like M. de Sabran.'</p> - -<p>'Oh, of course he was not equal to your Apollo,' said Madame Brancka, -winding Ottilie's long hair round her fingers.</p> - -<p>'You have had enough of them; they must not worry you,' said their -mother, and she dismissed the children with a word.</p> - -<p>'In what marvellous control you keep them,' said Madame Olga. 'Now, my -children never obeyed me, let me scream at them as I would.'</p> - -<p>'I do not think screaming has much effect on anyone, young or old.'</p> - -<p>'It paralyses a man. But I suppose a child can always out-scream one?'</p> - -<p>'Probably. A child never respects any person who loses their calmness. -As for men, you are better versed in their follies than I.'</p> - -<p>'But do you and Réné absolutely never quarrel?'</p> - -<p>'Quarrel! My dear Olga, how very <i>bürgerlich</i> an idea.'</p> - -<p>'Do you suppose only the bourgeois quarrel?' said Madame Brancka. -'Really you live in your enchanted forest until you forget what the -world is like,' and she began an interminable history of the scenes -between a friend of hers and her husband and her family, a quarrel -which had ended in <i>conseils judiciaires</i> and separation. 'It is a -cruel thing that there is not one law of divorce for all the world,' -she said with a sigh, as she ended the unsavoury relation. 'If Stefan -and I could only set each other free, we should have done it years and -years ago.'</p> - -<p>'I did not know your griefs against Stefan were so great?'</p> - -<p>'Oh, I have no great griefs against him; he is <i>bon enfant</i>: but we -are both ruined, and we both detest each other; we do not know very -well why.'</p> - -<p>'Poor Mila and Marie!'</p> - -<p>'What has it to do with them? They are happy at Sacré Cœur, and -when they come out they will marry. Egon will be sure to portion them; -we cannot. We are not like you, who will be able to give a couple of -millions to Lili without hurting her brothers.'</p> - -<p>'Lili's <i>dot</i> is far enough in the future,' said Lili's mother, who, -very weary of the conversation, saw with relief the doors open, and -heard Hubert announce that dinner could be served. By an opposite door -Sabran entered also, a moment later. The dinner was tedious to both him -and her; they alike found it an almost intolerable penance. Their guest -alone was gay, ironical, at her ease, and never at a loss for a topic. -Sabran looked at her now and then with absolute wonder coming over -him as to whether he had not dreamed of that evening in Paris, alone -beside her, with the smell of the jasmine and orange-buds, and the -moonbeams crossing her white throat, her auburn curls. Was it possible -that a woman lived with such incredible self-control, insolence, -shamelessness? There was not a shadow of consciousness in her regard, -not a moment of uneasiness in her manner. Except the one passing faint -flush which had come on her face at his words of greeting, there was -not a single sign that she was other than the most innocent of women. -The impatience, the disgust, the amazement which were in him were too -strong for his worldly tact and composure altogether to conquer them; -his eyes were downcast, his words were studied or irrelevant, his -discomposure was evident; he felt as reluctant to meet the gaze of his -wife as of his enemy. In vain did he endeavour to sustain equably the -airy nothings of the usual dinner-table conversation. He was sensible -of an effort too great for art to cover it; he felt that there was a -strange sound in his voice, he fancied the very men waiting upon him -must be conscious of his embarrassment. If he could have turned her out -of the house he would have been at peace, for, after all, her offences -were much greater than his own; but to be compelled to sit motionless -whilst she called his wife caressing names, broke her bread, and would -sleep under her roof, was absolute torture to him.</p> - -<p>When they went back again to the white room he sat down at the piano, -glad to find a temporary refuge in music from the embarrassment of her -presence.</p> - -<p>'He cannot have spoken to Wanda?' she thought, uneasy for the first -time, as she glanced at Sabran, who was playing with his usual -<i>maestria</i> a concerto of Schubert's. With the plea that her long post -journey had fatigued her, she asked leave to retire when half an hour -had elapsed, filled with scientific and intricate melody, which had -spared them the effort of further conversation. Her host and hostess -accompanied her to the guest-chambers, with the courtesy which was an -antique custom of the Schloss, as of all Austrian country-houses. Their -leave-taking on the threshold was cold, but studied in politeness; the -door closed on her, and Sabran and his wife returned along the corridor -together.</p> - -<p>His heart beat heavily with apprehension: he dreaded her next word. To -his relief, to his surprise, she said simply to him:</p> - -<p>'It is very early. I will go and write to Rothwand about the mines. -Will you come and tell me again all you said about them? I have half -forgotten. Or if you would rather do nothing to-night, I have other -letters to look over, and I will go to my own room.'</p> - -<p>'I will come there,' he said; and though he was well used to her -strong self-control and forbearance, he felt amazed at the force -of these now, and was moved to a passionate gratitude. 'Any other -woman,' he thought, 'would have torn me asunder to know what there has -been between me and her guest. She does not even speak; and yet God -knows how she loves me! She trusts me, and she will not weary me, nor -importune me, nor seem to suspect me with doubt. Who shall be worthy of -that? How can I rid her house of this insult? The other shall go; she -shall go if I put her out with public shame before my servants. Would -to heaven that to kill such as she is were no more murder than to slay -a vicious beast or a poisonous worm!'</p> - -<p>He followed his wife into the octagon-room, where all her private -papers were. There were details of a mine in Galicia which were -disquieting and troublesome; on the previous day they had agreed -together what to do, but before she had answered her inspector, -fresh details had come in by the post-bag, whilst he had been -chamois-hunting. She sat down and handed him these fresh reports.</p> - -<p>'I do not think there is anything that will alter your decisions,' she -said. 'But read them, and tell me, and I will then write.'</p> - -<p>He drew the documents from her, and began to peruse them, but his hand -shook a little as he held the papers; his eyes were not clear, his mind -was not free. He laid them down and looked at her; she was seated near -him. She was paler than usual and her face was grave, but she seemed -quite absorbed in what she did, as she added figures together, and made -a quick <i>précis</i> of the reports she had received. Her left hand lay on -the table as she wrote; on the great diamond of the <i>bague d'alliance</i>, -the only gift which he had presumed to offer her on their marriage, the -light was sparkling; it looked like a cluster of dewdrops on a lily. He -took that hand on a sudden impulse of infinite reverence, and raised it -to his lips.</p> - -<p>She looked at him, and a mist of tears came into her eyes which were -tears of pleasure, of relief, of restrained emotion comforted; the -gesture gave her all the reassurance that she cared, to have; she was -sure then that Olga Brancka had never made him false to his honour and -hers. She said nothing to him of what was foremost in the minds of -both. She held the value of silence high. She thought that there were -things of which merely to speak seemed a species of dishonour. A single -word ill-said is so often the 'little rift within the lute which makes -the music dumb.'</p> - -<p>She went to rest content; but he was none the less ill at ease, -disturbed, offended, and violently offended, at the presence of his -temptress under the roof of Hohenszalras. It was an outrage to all he -loved and respected; an outrage to which he was determined to put an -end. The only possible way to do so was to see his guest himself alone. -He could not visit her in her apartments; he could not summon her to -his; if he waited for chance, he might wait for days. The insolence -which had brought her here would probably, he reasoned, keep her here -some time, and he was resolved that she should not pass another night -in the same house with his wife and his children.</p> - -<p>Long after Wanda had gone to sleep he sat alone, thinking and -perplexing himself with many a scheme, each of which he dismissed as -impracticable and likely to draw that attention from his household -which he most desired to avoid. He slept ill, scarcely at all, and rose -before daybreak. When he was dressed he sent his man to ask Greswold to -come to him. The old physician, who usually got up before the sun, soon -obeyed his summons, and anxiously inquired what need there was of him.</p> - -<p>'Dear Professor,' said Sabran, with that gracious kindliness which -always won his listener's heart, 'you were my earliest friend here; you -are the tutor of my sons; you are an old man, a wise man, and a prudent -man. I want you to understand something without my explaining it; I do -not desire or intend the Countess Brancka to be the guest of my wife -for another day.'</p> - -<p>Greswold looked up quickly: he knew the character of Stefan Brancka's -wife, he guessed the rest.</p> - -<p>'What can I do?' he said simply. 'Pray command me.'</p> - -<p>'Do this,' said Sabran. 'Make some excuse to see her; say that the -chaplain, or that my wife, has sent you, say anything you choose to get -admitted to her rooms in the visitors' gallery. When you see her alone, -say to her frankly, brutally if you like, that <i>I</i> say she must leave -Hohenszalras. She can make any excuse she pleases, invent any despatch -to recall herself; but she must go. I do not pretend to put any gloss -upon it; I do not wish to do so. I want her to know that I do not -permit her to remain under the same roof with my wife.'</p> - -<p>The old physician's face grew grave and troubled; he foresaw difficulty -and pain for those whom he loved, and to whom he owed his bread.</p> - -<p>'I am to give her no explanation?' he said doubtfully.</p> - -<p>'She will need none,' said Sabran, curtly.</p> - -<p>Greswold was mute. After a pause of some moments he said with -hesitation:</p> - -<p>'By all I have heard of the Countess Brancka, I am much afraid she will -not be moved by such a message, delivered by anyone so insignificant -as myself; but what you desire me to do I will do, only I pray you do -not blame me if I fail. You are, of course, indifferent to her certain -indignation, to her possible violence?'</p> - -<p>'I am indifferent to everything,' said Sabran, with rising impatience, -'except to the outrage which her presence here is to the Countess von -Szalras.'</p> - -<p>'Allow me one question, my Marquis,' said Greswold. 'Is our lady, your -wife, aware that the presence of her cousin's wife is an indignity to -herself?'</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated.</p> - -<p>'Yes and no,' he answered at last. 'She knew something in Paris, but -she does not know or imagine all, nor a tithe part; of what Madame -Brancka is.'</p> - -<p>'I go at once,' said the old man, without more words, 'though of course -the lady will not be awake for some hours. I will ask to see her -maids. I shall learn then when I can with any chance of success get -admittance. You will not write a word by me? Would it not offend her -less?'</p> - -<p>'I desire to offend her,' said Sabran, with a vibration of intense -passion in his voice. 'No; I will not write to her. She is a woman who -has studied Talleyrand; she would hang you if she had a single line -from your pen. If I wrote, God knows what evil she would not twist out -of it. She hates me and she hates my wife. It must be war to the knife.'</p> - -<p>Greswold bowed and went out, asking no more.</p> - -<p>Sabran passed the next three hours in a state of almost uncontrollable -impatience.</p> - -<p>It was the pleasant custom at Hohenszalras for everyone to have their -first meal in their own apartments at any hour that they chose, but he -and Wanda usually breakfasted together by choice in the little Saxe -room, when the weather was cold. The cold without made the fire-glow -dancing on the embroidered roses, and the gay Watteau panels, and -the carpet of lamb-skins, and the coquettish Meissen shepherds and -shepherdesses, seem all the warmer and more cheerful by contrast. Here -he had been received on the first morning of his visit to Hohenszalras; -here they had breakfasted in the early days after their marriage; here -they had a thousand happy memories.</p> - -<p>Into that room he could not go this morning. He sent his valet with -a message to his wife, saying that he would remain in his own room, -being fatigued from the sport of the previous day. When they brought -him his breakfast he could not touch it. He drank a little strong -coffee and a great glass of iced water; he could take nothing else. He -paced up and down his own chambers in almost unendurable suspense. If -he had been wholly innocent he would have been less agitated; but he -could not pardon himself the mad imprudences and follies with which he -had pandered to the vanities and provoked the passions of this hateful -woman. If she refused to go he almost resolved to tell all as it had -passed to his wife, not sparing himself. The three or four hours that -went by after Greswold had left him appeared to him like whole, long, -tedious days.</p> - -<p>The men came as usual to him for his orders as to horses, sport, or -other matters, but he could not attend to them; he hardly even heard -what they said, and dismissed them impatiently. When at last the heavy, -slow tread of the old physician sounded in the corridor, he went -eagerly to his door, and himself admitted Greswold.</p> - -<p>The Professor spread out his hands with a deprecating gesture.</p> - -<p>'I have done my best. But may I never pass such a quarter of an hour -again! She will not go.'</p> - -<p>'She will not?' Sabran's face flushed darkly, his eyes kindled with -deep wrath. 'She defies me, then?'</p> - -<p>'She evidently deems herself strong enough to defy you. She laughed -at me; she spoke to me as though I were one of the scullions or the -sweepers; she menaced me as if we were still in the Middle Ages. In a -word, she is not to be moved by me. She bade me tell you that if you -wish her out of your wife's house you must have the courage to say so -yourself.'</p> - -<p>'Courage!' echoed Sabran. 'It is not courage that will be any match -for her; it is not courage that will rid one of her; she knows the -difficulty in which I am. I cannot betray her to her husband. No man -can ever do that. I cannot risk a quarrel, a scandal, a duel with the -relatives of my wife. I cannot put her out of the house as I might do -if she had no relationship with the Vàsàrhely and the Szalras. She -knows that; she relies upon it.'</p> - -<p>'My lord,' said the physician very gently, 'will you pardon me one -question? Is the offence done to the Countess von Szalras by Madame -Brancka altogether on her side? Are you wholly (pardon me the word) -blameless?'</p> - -<p>'Not altogether,' said Sabran, frankly, with a deep colour on his face. -'I have been culpable of folly, but in the sense you mean I have been -quite guiltless. If I had been guilty in that sense, I would not have -returned to Hohenszalras!'</p> - -<p>'I thank you for so much confidence in me,' said Greswold. 'I only -wanted to know so far, because I would suggest that you should send -for Prince Egon and simply tell him as much as you have told me. Egon -Vàsàrhely is the soul of honour, and he has great authority over the -members of his own family. He will make his sister-in-law leave here -without any scandal.'</p> - -<p>'There are reasons why I cannot take Prince Vàsàrhely into my -confidence in this matter,' said Sabran, with hesitation. 'That is not -to be thought of for a moment. Is there no other way?'</p> - -<p>'See her yourself. She imagines you will not, perhaps she thinks you -dare not, say these things to her yourself.'</p> - -<p>'See her alone? What will my wife suppose?'</p> - -<p>'Would it not be better frankly to say to my lady that you have need -to see her so? Pardon me, my dear lord, but I am quite sure that the -straight way is the best to take with our Countess Wanda. The only -thing which she might very bitterly resent, which she might perhaps -never forgive, would be concealment, insincerity, want of good faith. -If you will allow me to counsel you, I would most strongly advocate -your saying honestly to her that you know that of Madame Brancka which -makes you hold her an unfit guest here, and that you are about to see -that lady alone to induce her to leave the castle without open rupture.'</p> - -<p>Sabran listened, stung sharply in his conscience by every one of the -simple and honest words. When Greswold spoke of his wife as ready to -pardon any offences except those of falseness and concealment his soul -shrank as the flesh shrinks from the touch of caustic.</p> - -<p>'You are right,' he said with effort. 'But, my dear Greswold, though -I am not absolutely guilty, as you were led for a moment to think, I -am not altogether absolutely blameless. I was sensible of the fatal -attraction of an unscrupulous person. I was never faithless to my wife, -either in spirit or act, but you know there are miserable sensual -temptations which counterfeit passion, though they do not possess it; -there are unspeakable follies from which men at no age are safe. I -do not wish to be a coward like the father of mankind, and throw the -blame upon a woman; but it is certain that the old answer is often -still the true one, "The woman tempted me." I am not wholly innocent; -I played with fire and was surprised, like an idiot, when it burnt me. -I would say as much as this to my wife (and it is the whole truth) if -it were only myself who would be hurt or lowered by the telling of it; -but I cannot do her such dishonour as I should seem to do by the mere -relation of it. She esteems me as so much stronger and wiser than I am; -she has so very noble an ideal of me; how can I pull all that down with -my own hands, and say to her, "I am as weak and unstable as any one of -them"?'</p> - -<p>Greswold listened and smiled a little.</p> - -<p>'Perhaps the Countess knows more than you think, dear sir; she is -capable of immense self-control, and her feeling for you is not the -ordinary selfish love of ordinary women. If I were you I should tell -her everything. Speak to her as you speak to me.'</p> - -<p>'I cannot!'</p> - -<p>'That is for you to judge, sir,' said the old physician.</p> - -<p>'I cannot!' repeated Sabran, with a look of infinite distress. 'I -cannot tell my wife that any other woman has had influence over me, -even for five seconds. I think it is S. Augustine who says that it is -possible, in the endeavour to be truthful, to convey an entirely false -impression. An utterly false impression would be conveyed to her if I -made her suppose that any other than herself had ever been loved by me -in any measure since my marriage; and how should one make such a mind -as hers comprehend all the baseness and fever and folly of a man's mere -caprice of the senses? It would be impossible.'</p> - -<p>Greswold was silent.</p> - -<p>'You do not see how difficult even such a confession as that would be,' -Sabran insisted, with irritation. 'Were you in my place you would feel -as I feel.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps,' said Greswold. 'But I believe not. I believe, sir, that you -underrate the knowledge of the world and of humanity which the Countess -von Szalras possesses, and that you also underrate the extent of her -sympathy and the elasticity of her pardon.'</p> - -<p>Sabran sighed restlessly.</p> - -<p>'I do not know what to do. One thing only I know—the wife of Stefan -Brancka shall not remain here.'</p> - -<p>'Then, sir, you must be the one to say so or to write it. She will heed -no one except yourself. Perhaps it is natural. I am nothing more in the -sight of a great lady like that than Hubert or Otto would be. She does -not think I am of fit station to go to her as your ambassador.'</p> - -<p>'You would disown her if she were your daughter!' said Sabran, with -bitter contempt. 'Well, I will see her; I will say a word to the -Countess von Szalras first.'</p> - -<p>'Say all,' suggested Greswold.</p> - -<p>Sabran shook his head and passed quickly through the suite of sleeping -and dressing chambers to the little Saxe salon, where he thought it -possible that Wanda might still be. He found her there alone. She had -opened one of the casements and was speaking with a gardener. The -autumnal scent of wet earth and fallen leaves came into the room; the -air without was cold, but sunbeams were piercing the mist; the darkness -of the cedars and the yews made the airy and brilliant grace of the -eighteenth-century room seem all the brighter. She herself, in a sacque -of brocaded silk, with quantities of old French lace falling down it, -seemed of the time of those gracious ladies that were painted on the -panels. She turned as she heard his step, a red rose in her fingers -which she had just gathered from the boughs about the windows.</p> - -<p>'The last rose of the year, I am afraid, for I never count those of the -hothouses,' she said, as she brought it to him.</p> - -<p>He kissed her hand as he took it from her; he suddenly perceived the -expression of distress and of preoccupation on his face.</p> - -<p>'Is there anything the matter?' she asked; 'did you overstrain yourself -yesterday on the hills?'</p> - -<p>'No, no,' he said quickly; then added, with hesitation: 'Wanda, I have -to see Madame Brancka alone this morning. Will you be angered, or will -you trust me?'</p> - -<p>For a moment her eyebrows drew together, and the haughtier, colder look -that he dreaded came on her face; the look which came there when her -children disobeyed or her stewards offended her, The look which told -how, beneath the womanly sweetness and serenity of her temper, were the -imperious habit and the instincts of authority inherited from centuries -of dominant nobility. In another instant or two she had controlled her -impulse of displeasure. She said gravely, but very gently:</p> - -<p>'Of course I trust you. You know best what you wish, what you are -called on to do. Never think that you need give explanation, or ask -permission to or of me. That is not the man's part in marriage.'</p> - -<p>'But I would not have you suspect—'</p> - -<p>'I never suspect,' she said, more haughtily. 'Suspicion degrades -two people. Listen, my love. In Paris I saw, I heard more than you -thought. The world never leaves one in ignorance or in peace. I neither -suspected you nor spied upon you. I left you free. You returned to me, -and I knew then that I had done wisely. I could never comprehend the -passion and pleasure that some women take in hawks only kept by a hood, -in hounds only held by a leash. What is allegiance worth unless it be -voluntary? For the rest, if the wife of my cousin be a worse woman than -I think, do not tell me so. I do not desire to know it. She was the -idol of my dead brother's youth; she once entered this house as his -bride. Her honour is ours.'</p> - -<p>A flush passed over her husband's face. 'You are the noblest woman that -lives,' he said, in a hushed and reverent voice. He stooped almost -timidly and kissed her; then he bowed very low, as though she were a -queen and he her courtier, and left her.</p> - -<p>'That devil shall leave her house before another night is down!' he -said in his own thoughts, as he took his way across the great building -to Olga Brancka's apartments. He had the red autumn rose, she had -gathered in his hand as he went. Instinctively he slipped it within -his coat as he drew near the doors of the guests' corridor; it was too -sacred for him to have it made the subject of sneer or of a smile.</p> - -<p>Wanda remained in the little Watteau room. A certain sense of fear—a -thing so unfamiliar, so almost unknown to her—came upon her as the -flowered satin of the door-hangings fell behind him, and his steps -passed away down the passages without. The bright pictured panels of -the shepherds in court suits, and the milkmaids in hoops and paniers, -smiling amidst the sunny landscapes of their artificial Arcadia; the -gay and courtly figures of the Meissen china, and the huge bowls filled -with the gorgeous deep-hued flowers of the autumn season; the singing -of a little wren perched on a branch of a yew, the distant trot of -ponies' feet as the children rode along the unseen avenues, the happy -barking of dogs that were going with them, the smell of wet grass -and of leaves freshly dropped, the swish of a gardener's birch-broom -sweeping the turf beneath the cedars—all these remained on her mind -for ever afterwards, with that cruel distinctness which always paints -the scene of our last happy hours in such undying colours on the memory -of the brain. She never, from that day, willingly entered the pretty -chamber, with its air of coquetry and stateliness, and its little gay -court of porcelain people. She had gathered there the last rose of the -year.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXIII">CHAPTER XXXIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>He was so passionately angered against the invader of his domestic -peace, he was so profoundly touched by the nobility and faith of -his wife, that he went to Olga Brancka's presence without fear or -hesitation, possessed only by a man's natural and honest indignation at -an insult passed upon what he most venerated upon earth.</p> - -<p>One of his own servants, who was seated in the corridor, in readiness -for the Countess Brancka's orders, flung wide the door which opened -into the vestibule of the suite of guest-chambers allotted to this most -hated guest, and said to his master:</p> - -<p>'The most noble lady bade me say that she waited for your Excellency.'</p> - -<p>'The brazen wretch!' murmured Sabran, as he crossed the ante-chamber, -and entered the small saloon adjoining it; a room hung with Flemish -tapestries, and looking out on the Szalrassee.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka was seated in one of the long low tapestried chairs; she -did not move or speak as he approached; she only looked up with a smile -in her eyes. He wished she would have risen in fury; it would have -made his errand easier. It was difficult to say to her in cold blood -that which he had to say. But he loathed her so utterly as he saw her -indolent and graceful posture, and the calm smile in her eyes, that he -was indifferent how he should hurt her, what outrage he should offer -to her. He went straight up to where she sat, and without any preface -said, almost brutally:</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka, you affected not to understand my message through -Greswold; you will not misunderstand me now when I repeat that you must -leave the house of my wife before another night.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, with nonchalance, moving the Indian bangles on -her wrist, and gazing calmly into the air. 'I am to leave the house of -your wife—of my cousin, who was once my sister-in-law? And will you -tell me why?'</p> - -<p>Sabran flushed with passion.</p> - -<p>'You have a short memory, I believe, Countess; at least your lovers -have said so in Paris,' he answered recklessly. 'But I think if your -remembrance could carry you back to the last evening I had the honour -to see you in your hotel, you will not force me to the brutality and -coarseness of further explanation.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' she said tranquilly once more, in an unvaried tone, clasping her -hands behind her head and leaning both backward against the cushions -of her chair, whilst her eyes still smiled with an abstracted gaze. -'How scrupulous you are about trifles. Why not about great things, -my friend? What does Holy Writ tell us? One strains at a gnat and -swallows a camel. I have heard a professor of Hebrew say that the Latin -translation is not correct, but——'</p> - -<p>'Madame,' said Sabran sternly, controlling his rage with difficulty, -'pardon me, but I can have no trifling. I give you time and occasion to -make any excuses that you please; but once for all, you will leave here -before nightfall.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, for the third time; 'and if I do not choose to -comply with your desire, how do you intend to enforce it?'</p> - -<p>'That will be my affair.'</p> - -<p>'You will make a scene with my husband? That will be theatrical and -useless. Stefan is one of those men who are always swearing at their -wives in private, but in public never admit that their wives are -otherwise than saints. Those men do not mind being cheated, but they -will never let others say that they are so: <i>amour-propre d'homme.</i>'</p> - -<p>Sabran could have struck her. He reined in his wrath with more -difficulty every moment.</p> - -<p>'I have no doubt your psychology is correct, and has taught you all the -weaknesses of our idiotic sex,' he said bitterly. 'But you must pardon -me if I cannot spare time to listen to your experiences. The Countess -von Szalras is aware that I have come to visit you, and I tell you -frankly that I will not stay more than ten minutes in your rooms.'</p> - -<p>'You have told her?'</p> - -<p>A wicked gleam flashed from under her half-shut eyelids.</p> - -<p>'I would have told her—told her all,' said Sabran, 'but she stopped -me with my words unspoken. What think you she said, madame, of you, -who are the vilest enemy, the only enemy, she has? That if you had -graver faults than she knew she wished not to hear them. You were her -relative, and once had been her brother's wife.'</p> - -<p>His voice had sternness and strong emotion in it. He looked to see her -touched to some shame, some humiliation. But she only laughed a little -languidly, not changing her attitude.</p> - -<p>'Poor Wanda!' she said softly, 'she was always so exaggerated—so -terribly <i>moyen âge</i> and heroic!'</p> - -<p>The veins swelled on his forehead with his endeavour to keep down his -rage. He did not wish to honour this woman by bringing his wife's name -into their contention, and he strove not to forget the sex of his -antagonist.</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka,' he said, with a coldness and calmness which it cost -him hard to preserve, 'this conversation is of no use that I can see. -I came to tell you a hard fact—simply this, that you must leave -Hohenszalras within the next few hours. As the master of this house, I -insist on it.'</p> - -<p>'But how will you accomplish it?'</p> - -<p>'I will compel you to go,' said Sabran, between his teeth, 'if I -disgrace you publicly before all my household. The fault will not be -mine. I have endeavoured to spare you; but if you be so dead to all -feeling and decency as to think it possible that the same roof can -shelter you and my wife, I must undeceive you, however roughly.'</p> - -<p>She heard him patiently and smiled a little. 'Disgrace <i>me?</i>' she -echoed gently. 'Count Brancka will kill you.'</p> - -<p>Sabran signified by a gesture that the possibility was profoundly -indifferent to him. He turned to leave her.</p> - -<p>'Understand me plainly,' he said, as he moved away. 'I leave it at -your option to invent any summons, any excuse, as your reason for -your departure; but if you do not announce your departure for this -afternoon, I shall do what I have said. I have the honour to wish you -good-morning.'</p> - -<p>'Wait a moment,' said Madame Brancka, still very softly. 'Are you -judicious to make an enemy of me?'</p> - -<p>'I much prefer you as an enemy,' said Sabran, curtly; and he added, -with contemptuous irony, 'your friendship is far more perilous than -your animosity; your compliments are like the Borgia's banquets.'</p> - -<p>'Ah!' said Olga Brancka, once again, 'you are ungrateful like all -men, and you are not very wise either. You forget that I am the -sister-in-law of Egon Vàsàrhely.'</p> - -<p>Sabran could never hear that name mentioned without a certain inward -tremor, a self-consciousness which he could not entirely conceal. But -he was infuriated, and he answered with reckless scorn:</p> - -<p>'Prince Vàsàrhely is a man of honour. He would disown you if he knew -that you offer yourself with the shamelessness of a <i>déclassée</i>, and -that you outrage a noble and unsuspecting woman, by forcing yourself -into her home when you have failed in tempting her husband to offer her -the last dishonour.'</p> - -<p>Her face paled under the unveiled and unsparing insults, but she did -not lose her equanimity.</p> - -<p>'We are very like a scene of Sardou's,' she said, with her unchangeable -smile. 'You would have made your fortune on the boards of the Français. -Why did you not go there instead of calling yourself Marquis de Sabran? -It would have been wiser.'</p> - -<p>He felt as if a knife had been plunged through his loins; all the -colour left his face. Had Vàsàrhely told <i>her</i>? No! it was impossible. -They were mere chance words of a woman eager to insult, not knowing -what she said. He affected not to hear, and with a bow to her he moved -once more to leave the chamber. But her voice again arrested him.</p> - -<p>'Tell me one thing before you go,' she said, very gently. 'Does Wanda -know that you are Vassia Kazán?'</p> - -<p>She spoke with perfect moderation and simplicity, not altering her -posture as she lay back in her tapestried chair, but she watched -him with trepidation. She was not altogether sure of facts she -had half-guessed, half-gathered. She had pieced details together -with infinite skill, but she could not be absolutely certain of her -conclusions. She watched him with eager avidity beneath her smiling -calmness. If he showed no consciousness her cast was wrong; she would -miss her vengeance; she would remain in his power. But at a glance she -saw her shaft had pierced straight home. He had strong control and even -strong power of dissimulation in need; but that name thrown at him -stunned him as a stone might have done. His face grew livid, he stood -motionless, he had no falsehood ready, he was taken off his guard: all -he realised was that his ruin was in the grasp of his mortal foe. His -hold on her was lost. His authority, his strength, his dignity, all -fell before those two hateful words, 'Vassia Kazán!'</p> - -<p>'He has told her!' he thought, and the blood surged in his brain -and made him dazed and giddy. He had not told her. By private -investigation, by keen wit, by careful and cruel comparison of various -information, she had arrived at the conclusion that Vassia Kazán and -he who had come from Mexico as the grandson of the Marquis Xavier de -Sabran were one and the same. Certain she could not be, but she was -near enough to certainty to dare to cast her stone at a venture. If it -missed—she was a woman. He could not kill or harm a woman, or call her -to account.</p> - -<p>Even now, if he had preserved his composure and turned on her with a -calm challenge, she would have been powerless.</p> - -<p>But he had lost the habit of falsehood; self-consciousness made him -weak; he believed that Egon Vàsàrhely had betrayed him. His lips were -mute, his tongue seemed to cleave to his mouth. A less keen-sighted -woman would have read confession on his face. She was satisfied.</p> - -<p>'You have not answered my question,' she said quietly. 'Does Wanda know -it? Does such a saintly woman "compound a felony"? I believe a false -name is a sort of felony, is it not?'</p> - -<p>He breathed heavily; his eyes had a terrible look in them; he put his -hand on his heart. For a moment the longing assailed him to spring -upon her and throttle her as a man may a dangerous beast. He could not -speak, a leaden weight seemed to shut his lips.</p> - -<p>He never doubted that she knew his whole history from Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>'It was an ingenious device,' she pursued, in her honeyed, even tones, -'but it was scarcely wise. Things are always found out some time or -another—at least, men's secrets are. A woman can keep hers. My dear -friend, you are really a criminal. It is very strange that Wanda of all -people should have made such a misalliance, and had such an imposture -passed off on her! I belong to her family; I ought to abhor you; and -yet I can imagine your temptation if I cannot forgive it. Still it was -a foolish thing to do, not worthy a man of your wit; and in France, -I believe, the punishment for such an assumption is some years' -imprisonment; and here, you know (perhaps you do not know?), your -marriage would be null and void if she chose.'</p> - -<p>He made a movement towards her, and for the moment, though she was a -woman of great courage, her spirit quailed before the look she met.</p> - -<p>'Hold your peace!' he said savagely. 'Speak truth, if you can. What has -Vàsàrhely told you?'</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely had told her nothing, but she looked him full in the face -with perfect serenity, and answered—'All!'</p> - -<p>He never doubted her, he could not doubt her; what she said was met by -too full confirmation from his memory and his conscience.</p> - -<p>'He gave me his word,' he muttered.</p> - -<p>She smiled. 'His word to <i>you,</i> when he is in love with your wife? The -miracle is that he has not told her. She would divorce you, and after a -decent interval I dare say she would marry him, if only <i>pour balayer -la chose.</i> For a man so devoted to her as you are, you have certainly -contrived to outrage and injure her in the most complete manner. <i>Mon -beau Marquis!</i> to think how fooled we all were all the time by you. How -haughty you were, how fastidious, how patrician!'</p> - -<p>He leaned against the high column of the enamelled stove and covered -his eyes with his hands. He was unnerved, unstrung, half-paralysed. The -blow had fallen on him without preparation or defence being possible to -him. His thoughts were all in confusion; one thing alone he knew—he, -and all he loved, were in the power of a merciless woman, who would no -more spare them than the <i>sloughi</i> astride the antelope will let go its -quivering flesh.</p> - -<p>She looked at him, and a contemptuous wonder came upon her that a man -could be so easily beaten, so easily betrayed into tacit confession. -She ignored the power of conscience, for she did not know it herself.</p> - -<p>She thought, with scorn: 'Why did he not deny, deny boldly, as I should -have done in his place? He would have twisted my weapon out of my -hand at once. I know so little, and I could prove nothing! But he is -unnerved at once, just because it is true! Men are all imbeciles. If he -had only denied and questioned me he must have found that Egon had told -me nothing.'</p> - -<p>And she watched him with derision.</p> - -<p>In truth, she knew so little; she had scarce more to guide her than -coincidence and conjecture. She longed to know everything from himself, -but strong as was her curiosity, her prudence and her cruelty were -stronger still, and she admirably assumed a knowledge that she had not, -guided in all her dagger-strokes by the suffering she caused.</p> - -<p>Yet her passion for him which, unslaked, was as ardent as ever, became -not the less, but the greater, because she had him in her power. She -was one of those women to whom love is only delightful if it possess -the means to torture. Besides, it was not himself whom she hated, -it was his wife. To make him faithless to his wife would be a more -exquisite triumph than to betray him to her.</p> - -<p>'He would be wax—in my hands,' she thought. A vision of the future -passed before her, with her dominion absolute over him, her knowledge -of his shame holding him down with a chain never to be broken. She -would compel him to wound, to deceive, to torment his wife; she would -dictate his every word, his every act; she would make him ridiculous to -the world, so servile should be his obedience to her, so great should -be his terror of her anger. He should be her lover, weak as water in -all semblance, because the puppet of her pleasure. This would be a -vengeance worthy of herself when she should see him kneel at her feet -for permission for every slightest act, and she should scourge him as -with whips, knowing he dare not rise; when she should say softly in his -ear a thousand times a year: 'You are Vassia Kazán!'</p> - -<p>She was silent a few moments, lost in the witchery of the vision she -conjured up; then she looked up at him and said very caressingly, in -her sweetest voice:</p> - -<p>'Why are you so dejected? Your secret may be safe with me. You -know—you know—I was willing ever to be your friend; I am not less -willing now. I told you that you were unwise to make an enemy of me. -Wanda's regard would not outlive such a trial, but perhaps mine may, -if you be discerning enough, grateful enough to trust to it. I know -your crime, for a crime it is, and a foul one: we must not attempt to -palliate it. When we last met you offended, you outraged me. Only a few -moments since you insulted me as though I were the lowest creature on -the Paris asphalte. Yet all this I—I—should be tempted to forgive if -you love me as I believe that you do. I love <i>you</i>, not as that cold, -calm, unerring woman yonder may, but as those only can who know and -care for no heaven but earth. Réné—Vassia—who, knowing your sin, your -shame, your birth, your treachery, would say to you what I say? Not -Wanda!'</p> - -<p>He seemed not to hear, he did not hear. He leaned his forehead upon his -arms; he was sunk in the apathy of an intense woe; only the name of his -wife reached him, and he shivered a little as with cold.</p> - -<p>At his silence, his indifference, her eyes grew alight with flame; but -she controlled herself; she rose and clasped her hands upon his arm.</p> - -<p>'Listen,' she murmured, 'I love you, I love you! I care nothing what -you were born, what sins you have sinned; I love you! Love me, and -she shall never know. I will silence Egon. I will bury your secret as -though it were one that would cost me my life were it known.'</p> - -<p>Only at the touch of her hands did he arouse himself to any -consciousness of what she was saying, of how she tempted him. Then he -shook off her clasp with a rude gesture; he looked down on her with -the bitterest of scorn: not for a single instant did he dream of -purchasing her silence so.</p> - -<p>'You are even viler than I thought,' he said in his throat, with a -dreary laugh of mockery. 'How long would you spare me if I sinned -against her with you? Go, do your worst, say your worst! But if you -stay beneath my wife's roof to-night, I will drive you out of the -house before all her people, if it be my last act of authority in -Hohenszalras!'</p> - -<p>'I love you!' she murmured, and almost knelt to him; but he thrust her -away from him, and stood erect, his arms folded on his chest.</p> - -<p>'How dare you speak of love to me? You force me to employ the language -of the gutter. If Egon Vàsàrhely have put me in your power, use it, -like the incarnate fiend you are. I ask no mercy of you, but if you -dare to speak of love to me I will strangle you where you stand. Since -you call me the wolf of the steppes you shall feel my grip.'</p> - -<p>She fell a few steps backward and stretched her hand behind her, and -rung a little silver bell. Absorbed in his own bitterness of thought he -did not hear the sound or see the movement. She had already, between -Greswold's visit to her and his master's, written a little letter:</p> - -<blockquote> -<p> -'Loved Wanda,—Will you be so good as to -come to me for a moment at once?—Yours,<br /> -<span style="margin-left: 70%; font-size: 0.8em;">'OLGA.'</span><br /> -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p>She had said to one of her women, who was in the next apartment: 'When -I ring you will take that note at once to my cousin, the Countess, -yourself, without coming to me.' She had had no fear of leaving the -woman in the adjoining room, who was a Russian, wholly ignorant of the -French tongue, which she herself always used.</p> - -<p>She recoiled from him, frightened for the moment, but only for that; -she had nerves of steel, and many men had cursed her and menaced her -for the ruin of their lives, and she had lived on none the worse. -'<i>On crie—et puis c'est fini</i>,' she was wont to say, with her airy -cynicism. Something in his look, in his voice, told her that here it -would not finish thus.</p> - -<p>'He will shoot himself if he do not strangle me; and he will escape -so,' she thought, and a faint sort of fear touched her. She was alone -before him; she had said enough to drive him out of all calmness and -all reason. She had left him nothing to hope for; she had made him -believe that she knew all his fatal past. If he had struck her down -into the dumbness of death he would have been scarcely guilty.</p> - -<p>But it was only for a moment that such a dread as this passed over her.</p> - -<p>'Pshaw! we are people of the world,' she thought. 'Society is with us -even in our solitude. Those violent crimes are not ours: we strike -otherwise than with our hands.'</p> - -<p>And, reassured, she sank down into her chair again, a delicate figure -in a cloud of muslin of the Deccan and old lace of Flanders, and -clasped her fingers gracefully behind her head, and waited.</p> - -<p>He did not move; his eyes were fastened on her, glittering and cold as -ice, and full of unspeakable hatred. He was deadly pale. She thought -she had never seen his face more beautiful than in that intense mute -wrath which was like the iron frost of his own land.</p> - -<p>'When he goes he will go and kill himself,' she mused, and she listened -with passionate eagerness for the passing of steps down the corridor.</p> - -<p>But he did not stir; he was absorbed in wondering how he could deal -with this woman so that his wife should be spared. Was there any way -save that vile way to which she had tempted him? He could see none. -From a passion rejected and despised there can be no chance of mercy. -He had ceased altogether to think of himself.</p> - -<p>To take his own life did not pass over his thoughts then. It would have -spared Wanda nothing. His shame, told when he were dead, would hurt -her almost more than when he were living. He had too much courage to -evade so the consequences of his own acts. In the confusion of his mind -only this one thing was present to it—the memory of his wife. All that -he had dreaded of disgrace, of divorce, of banishment, of ruin, were -nothing to him; what he thought of was the loss of her herself, her -adoration, her honour, her sweet obedience, her perfect faith. Would -ever he touch even her hand again if once she knew?</p> - -<p>His remorse and his grief for his wife overwhelmed and destroyed every -personal remembrance. If to spare her he could have undergone any -extremity of torture he would have welcomed it with rapture. But it is -not thus that a false step can be retrieved; not thus that a false word -can be effaced. It, and the fate it brings, must be faced to the bitter -end.</p> - -<p>He had no illusions; he was certain that the woman who would have -tempted him to be false to her would spare her nothing. He would not -even stoop to solicit a respite for her from Olga Brancka. He knew the -only price at which it could be obtained.</p> - -<p>He stood there, leaning his shoulders on the high cornice of the -stove, his arms crossed upon his chest, repressing every expression or -gesture that could have delighted his enemy by revelation of what he -suffered. In himself he felt paralysed; he felt as though neither his -brain nor his limbs would ever serve him again. He had the sensation -of having fallen from a great height; the same numbness and exhaustion -which he had felt when he had dropped down the frozen side of the -Umbal glacier. Both he and she were silent; he from the stupefaction -of horror, she from the eagerness with which she was listening for the -coming of Wanda von Szalras.</p> - -<p>After a short interval of her thirsty and cruel anxiety, the page, who -was in waiting outside, entered with a note for his master.</p> - -<p>Sabran strove to recover his composure as he stretched his hand out and -took the letter off the salver. It contained only two lines from his -wife:</p> - -<p>'Olga asks me to come to her. Do you wish me to do so?'</p> - -<p>A convulsion passed over his face.</p> - -<p>'Oh! most faithful of all friends!' he thought with a pang, touched to -the quick by those simple words of a woman whose fidelity was to be -repaid by shame.</p> - -<p>'Where is the Countess?' he asked of the young servant, who answered -that she was in the library.</p> - -<p>'Say that I will be with her there in a few moments.'</p> - -<p>The page withdrew.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka was mute; there was a great anger in her veiled eyes. Her -last stroke had missed, through the loyalty of the woman whom she hated.</p> - -<p>He took a step towards her.</p> - -<p>'You dared to send for her then?'</p> - -<p>She laughed aloud, and with insolence.</p> - -<p>'Dare? Is that a word to be used by a Russian <i>moujik</i>, as you are, to -me, the daughter of Fedor Demetrivitch Serriatine? Certainly, I sent -for your wife, my cousin. Who should know what I know, if not she? Egon -might make you what promises he would; he is a man and a fool. I make -none. If you prevent my seeing Wanda, I shall write to her; if you -stop her letters, I shall telegraph to her; if you stop the telegrams, -I will put your story in the Paris journals, where the Marquis de -Sabran is as well known as the Arc de l'Étoile. You were born a serf, -you shall feel the knout. It would have been well for you if you had -smarted under it in your youth.'</p> - -<p>So absorbed was he in the memory of his wife, and in the thought of -the misery about to fall upon her innocent life, that the insults to -himself struck on him harmless, as hail on iron.</p> - -<p>'Spare your threats,' he said coldly. 'No one shall tell her but -myself. You know her present condition; it will most likely kill her.'</p> - -<p>'Oh, no,' said the Countess Brancka, with a little smile. 'Her nerves -are of iron. She will divorce you, that is all.'</p> - -<p>'She will be in her right,' he said, with the same coldness. Then, -without another word, he turned and left her chamber.</p> - -<p>'For a bastard, he crows well!' she said, loud enough to be heard by -him, in the old twelfth-century French of the words she quoted.</p> - -<p>Sabran went onward with a quick step; if he had paused, if he had -looked back, he felt that he would have murdered her.</p> - -<p>'Talk of the cruelty of men! What beast that lives,' he thought, 'has -the slow unsparing brutality of a jealous woman?'</p> - -<p>He went on, without pausing once, across the great house. So much he -could spare his wife, he could save her from her enemy's triumph in -her suffering; he could do as men did in the Indian Mutiny, plunge the -knife himself into the heart that loved him, and spare her further -outrage.</p> - -<p>When he reached the door of the library, he stopped and drew a deep -breath. He would have gone to his death with calmness and a smile; but -here he had no courage. A sickening spasm of pain seemed to suffocate -him. He knew that he met only his just punishment. If he could only -have suffered alone he would not have rebelled against his doom. But to -smite her!——</p> - -<p>With greater courage than is needed in the battle-field he turned -the handle of the door and entered. She was seated at one of the -writing-tables with a mass of correspondence before her, to which she -had been vainly striving to give her attention. Her thoughts had been -with him and Olga Brancka. She looked up with the light on her face -which always came there when she saw him after any absence, long or -short. But that light was clouded as she perceived the change in his -look in his carriage, in his very features, which were aged, and drawn, -and bloodless. She rose with an exclamation of alarm, as he came to her -across the length of the noble room, where he had first seen her seated -by her own hearth, and heard her welcome him a stranger and unknown -beneath her roof.</p> - -<p>'Wanda! Wanda!' he said, and his voice seemed strangled, his lips -seemed dumb.</p> - -<p>'My God, what is it?' she cried faintly. 'Are the children——'</p> - -<p>'No, no,'he muttered. 'The children are well. It is worse than death. -Wanda, I have come to tell you the sin of my life, the shame of it. Oh! -how will you ever believe that I loved you since I wronged you so?'</p> - -<p>A great sob broke down his words.</p> - -<p>She put her hand to her heart.</p> - -<p>'Tell me,' she said, in a low whisper, 'tell me everything. Why not -have trusted me? Tell me—I am strong.'</p> - -<p>Then he told her the whole history of his past, and spared nothing.</p> - -<p>She listened in unbroken silence, standing all the while, leaning one -hand upon the ebony table by her.</p> - -<p>When he had ceased to speak he buried his face in her skirts where -he knelt at her feet; he did not dare to look at her. She was still -silent; her breath came and went with shuddering effort. She drew her -velvet gown from him with a gesture of unspeakable horror.</p> - -<p>'You!—you!' she said, and could find no other word.</p> - -<p>Then all grew dark around her; she threw her arms out in the void, and -fell from her full height as a stone drops from a rock into the gulf -below; struck dumb and senseless for the first time in all the years -that she had lived.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXXIV">CHAPTER XXXIV.</a></h4> - - -<p>Twelve hours later she gave premature birth to a male child, dead. Once -in those hours when her physical agony lulled for a moment and her -consciousness returned, she said to her physician:</p> - -<p>'Tell him to send for Egon. Egon betrays no one.'</p> - -<p>They were the first words she had spoken. Greswold understood nothing; -but he saw that some great calamity had fallen on those he loved -and honoured, and that her lord never came nigh her chamber, but -only pacing to and fro the corridors and passages of the house, with -restless, ceaseless steps, paused ever and again to whisper—'Does she -live?'</p> - -<p>'Come to her,' said the old man once; but Sabran shuddered and turned -aside.</p> - -<p>'I dare not,' he answered, 'I dare not. If she die, it is I who shall -have killed her.'</p> - -<p>Greswold did not venture to ask what had happened; he knew it must -be some disaster of which the Countess Brancka was the origin or the -messenger.</p> - -<p>'My lady has spoken a few words,' he said later to his master. 'She -bade me tell you to send for Prince Vàsàrhely. She said he would betray -no one. I could ask nothing, for her agony returned.'</p> - -<p>Sabran was silent; the thought came to him for the first time that it -might be possible Olga Brancka had used the name of her brother-in-law -falsely.</p> - -<p>'Send for him yourself,' he said wearily; 'What she wishes must be -done. Nothing matters to me.'</p> - -<p>'I think the Prince is in Vienna,' said Greswold; and he sent an -urgent message thither, entreating Vàsàrhely's immediate presence at -Hohenszalras, in the name of his cousin.</p> - -<p>Olga Brancka remained in her own apartments, uncertain what to do.</p> - -<p>'If Wanda die,' she thought, 'it will all have been of no use; he -will be neither divorced nor disgraced. Perhaps one might plead the -marriage invalid, and disinherit the children; but one would want so -much proof, and I have none. If he had not been so stunned and taken -off his guard, he might easily have defied me. Egon may know more, but -if Wanda dies he will not move. He would care for nothing on earth. He -will forget the children were Sabran's. He will only remember they were -hers!'</p> - -<p>No one who loved her could have been more anxious for Wanda von Szalras -to live than was this cruellest of her enemies, who passed the time -in a perpetual agitation, and, as her women brought her tidings from -hour to hour, testified so much genuine alternation of hope and terror, -that they were amazed to see so much feeling in one so indifferent -usually to all woes not her own. She was miserably dull; she had no one -to speak to; she had no lover, friend, rival, or foe to give her the -stimulant to life that was indispensable to her. Even she did not dare -to approach the man whose happiness she had ruined, any more than she -would have dared to touch a lion wounded to the death. Yet she could -not tear herself away from the scene of her vengeance.</p> - -<p>The whole house was hushed like a grave; the servants were full of -grief at the danger of a mistress they adored; even the young children, -understanding that their mother was in peril, did not play or laugh; -but sat unhappy and silent over their books, or wandered aimlessly -along the leafless gardens. They knew that there was something -terrible, though they knew not what.</p> - -<p>'What is death?' said Lili to her brothers.</p> - -<p>'It is to go and live with God, they <i>say</i>,' answered Bela, doubtfully.</p> - -<p>'But how can God be happy Himself,' said Gela, 'when He causes so much -sorrow?'</p> - -<p>'Our mother will never go away from us,' said the little Lili, who -listened. 'They may call her from heaven ever—ever so much; she will -not leave <i>us</i>.'</p> - -<p>Bela sighed; he had a heavy, hopeless impression of death as a thing -that was stronger than himself.</p> - -<p>'Pride can do naught against death, my little lord,' one of the -foresters had once said to him. 'You will find your master there one -day.'</p> - -<p>A day and a night passed; puerperal convulsions succeeded to the birth -of the dead boy, and Wanda was unconscious alike of her bodily and her -mental torture. The physicians, whom Greswold had summoned instantly, -were around her bed, grave and anxious. The only chance for her lay in -the magnificent health and strength with which nature had dowered her. -Her constitution might, they said, enable her to resist what weaker -women would have gone down under like boats in an ocean storm.</p> - -<p>It was towards dawn on the second day when Egon Vàsàrhely arrived.</p> - -<p>'She lives?' he said, as he entered.</p> - -<p>'That is all,' said Greswold, with tears in his voice.</p> - -<p>'Can I see her?'</p> - -<p>'It would be useless. She would not know your Excellency.'</p> - -<p>Sabran came forward from the further end of the Rittersaal, where the -lights were burning with a yellow glare as the grey light of the dawn -was stealing through the unshuttered windows.</p> - -<p>'Allow me the honour of a word with you, Prince;' he said. 'I -understand; you have come at her summons—not at mine.'</p> - -<p>Greswold withdrew and left them alone. Vàsàrhely was still wrapped in -the furs in which he had travelled. He stood erect and listened; his -face was very stern.</p> - -<p>'Did you give up my secret to your brother's wife?' said Sabran, -abruptly.</p> - -<p>'Can you ask that?' said Vàsàrhely. 'You had my word.'</p> - -<p>'Madame Brancka knows all that you know. She said that you had -betrayed me to her. She would have told Wanda. I chose sooner to tell -her myself. The shock has killed the child. It may kill her. Your -sister-in-law is here. If she used your name falsely it is for you to -avenge it.'</p> - -<p>'Tell me what passed between you,' said Prince Egon. His face was dark -as night.</p> - -<p>Sabran hesitated a moment. Even now he could not bring himself to -disclose the passion which his enemy had conceived for him. It was one -of those women's secrets which no gentleman can surrender to another.</p> - -<p>'You are aware,' he replied, 'that Madame Brancka has been always -envious of your cousin; always willing to hurt her. When she got -possession of the story of my past she used it without mercy. She -would have told my wife with brutality; I told her myself, hoping to -spare her something by my own confession. Madame Brancka affirmed to -me, twice or thrice over, that you had given her all the information -against me.'</p> - -<p>'How could you believe her? You had had my promise.'</p> - -<p>'How could I doubt her?'</p> - -<p>'It is natural you should know nothing of honour!' thought Vàsàrhely, -but he did not utter what he thought. He saw that, dark as had been the -crimes of Sabran against those of his race, the chastisement of them -was as great.</p> - -<p>He said simply:</p> - -<p>'You might sooner have doubted anything than have believed that I -should entrust the Countess Brancka with such a secret, and have given -her such a power to injure my cousin. How can she have learned your -history? Have you betrayed yourself?'</p> - -<p>'Never! Since she had it not from you, I cannot conceive how or where -she learned it. Not a soul lives that knows me as——'</p> - -<p>He paused; he could not bring himself to say the name he bore from -birth.</p> - -<p>'My brother is unfortunate,! said Vàsàrhely, curtly. 'He has wedded a -vile woman. Leave her to me.'</p> - -<p>He saluted Sabran with cold but careful ceremony, and went, to his -own apartments. Sabran passed to the corridor which led to his wife's -rooms, and there resumed his miserable restless walk to and fro before -her door. He dared not enter. In her conscious hours she had not asked -for him. He had ever present before his eyes that movement of horror, -of repulsion, with which she had drawn the hem of her gown from his -grasp.</p> - -<p>Now and again, when her attendants came in and out, he saw through -the opening of the door the bed on which she lay and the outline of -her form in the pale light of the lamp. He could not rest. He could -not even sit down or break a mouthful of bread. If she died, his sin -against her would have slain her as surely as though his hand had taken -her life. It was about six of the clock in the chilly dawn of the -autumnal day.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXV" id="CHAPTER_XXXV">CHAPTER XXXV.</a></h4> - - -<p>Egon Vàsàrhely passed the next three hours in mental conflict with -his own passions. It would have been precious to him—would have been -a blessed and sacred duty—to avenge the woman he adored. But he had -a harder task. For her sake he had to befriend the traitor who had -wronged her, and shelter him from the just opprobrium of the world. -Crueller combat with temptation none ever waged than he fought now -against his own truest instincts, his own dearest affections. She lay -there, perchance dying, of this treachery which had struck her down in -her happiest hours; and it seemed to him as if, through the silence of -the darkened and melancholy house, he heard her voice saying to him: -'For my sake, spare him—spare my children!'</p> - -<p>'I give you more than my life, my beloved!' he murmured, as he sat -alone, whilst the grey day widened over forest and mountain, and for -her sake prepared to shield the man who had deceived her from disgrace -and death.</p> - -<p>'The hound!' he thought. 'He should be branded as a perjurer and thief -throughout the world! Yet for her—for her—one must protect him.'</p> - -<p>An hour or two later he sent his name to the Countess Brancka, with -a request to be received by her. She was but then awaking, and heard -with astonishment and alarm of his arrival, so unlooked for and so -dreaded. It had never occurred to her as possible that he would come to -Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'Wanda must have sent for him!' she thought. 'Oh heavens! why could she -not die with the child!'</p> - -<p>It was impossible for her to avoid him; shut up here she could neither -deceive nor escape him. She could not go away without her departure -being known to the whole household. She was afraid of him, terribly -afraid; the Vàsàrhely had a hand of iron when they were offended or -injured. But she put a fair face on a bitter obligation, and, when she -was dressed, went with a pretty smile into the salon to receive him.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely gave her no greeting as he entered. A great fear took -possession of her as she saw the expression of his eyes. He was the -only living being of whom she was in awe. He approached her without any -observances of courtesy. He said, simply and sternly:</p> - -<p>'I hear that you have used my name falsely, to the husband of Wanda; -that you have dared to give me as your authority for accusations -against him. What is your excuse?'</p> - -<p>She was for the moment so bewildered and disturbed by his presence and -his charge that she lost all her ability and power of interminable -falsehood. She was silent, and he saw her bosom heave and her hands -tremble a little.</p> - -<p>'What is your excuse?' he said again. 'Why did you come into this house -to injure Wanda von Szalras? How did you dare to use my name to do her -that injury?'</p> - -<p>She tried to laugh a little, but she was nervous and thrown off her -guard.</p> - -<p>'I wished to do her a service! Since she has married an adventurer—an -impostor—she ought to know it and be free.'</p> - -<p>'What is your authority for calling the Marquis de Sabran an -adventurer? To him you employed my name as your authority. What truth -was beneath that lie?'</p> - -<p>She was silent. For the only time in her life she knew not what to -say. She had no facts in her hands. Her ground was too uncertain to -sustain her in a steady attitude.</p> - -<p>'You know that he is Vassia Kazán!' she said, with another little laugh.</p> - -<p>The face of Vàsàrhely revealed nothing.</p> - -<p>'Who is Vassia Kazán?' he repeated.</p> - -<p>'He is—the man who robbed you of Wanda.'</p> - -<p>'He could not rob me of what I never possessed. What grounds have you -for calling him by this name?'</p> - -<p>'I have reason to believe it.'</p> - -<p>'Reason to believe it! You told him that you heard this story from -myself.'</p> - -<p>'He never denied it.'</p> - -<p>'I am not concerned to discuss what he did or did not do. I come here -to know on what grounds you employed my name?'</p> - -<p>'Egon, I will tell you the truth!'</p> - -<p>'Can you?'</p> - -<p>'Yes; I can and I will. When I was at Taróc, three summers ago, I saw -a fragment of a letter in Sabran's writing. I saw the name of Vassia -Kazán. I put this and that together. I heard something from Russia; I -sent some people to Mexico. I had always had my suspicions. I do not -say I have any positive legal proof, but I am morally convinced that he -is no Marquis de Sabran, and that he was born a serf near the city of -Kazán. I have charged him with it, and he has as good as confessed it. -He was struck dumb with consciousness.'</p> - -<p>She watched the face of Vàsàrhely, but it might have been cast in -bronze for anything that it told her.</p> - -<p>'You saw a fragment of a letter, of which you knew nothing,' he said -coldly; 'you formed some vague suspicions; you descended to the use -of spies, and, because you have invented a theory of your own on your -so-called discoveries, you deem you have a title to ruin the happiness -of your cousin's home. And you father your work upon me! Often have I -pitied my brother, but never so deeply as now.'</p> - -<p>'If my so-called discoveries were false,' she interrupted, with -hardihood, 'why did he not say so? He was convicted by his own -admissions. If my charge had been baseless, would he have said that he -would tell his wife himself rather than let her learn it from me?'</p> - -<p>'I neither know nor care what he said,' answered Vàsàrhely. 'I have -only your version for it. You must pardon me if I do not attach -implicit credence to your word. What I do know is that you ventured to -use my name to give force and credibility to your accusations. Had you -really known for certainty such a history, you would, had you had any -decency or feeling, have consulted your husband and myself on the best -means of shielding our cousin's honour. But you have always envied and -hated her. What is her husband to you—what is it to you whether he be -a noble or a clown? You snatch at the first brand you think you see, -in the hope to scorch her honour with it. But when you used my name -falsely you did a dangerous thing for yourself. I shall waste no more -words upon you, but you will sign what I write now, or you will repent -it.'</p> - -<p>She affected to laugh.</p> - -<p>'My dear Egon, <i>quel ton de maître!</i> What authority have you over me? -Even if you invest yourself in your brother's, that counts for very -little, I assure you.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps so; but if my brother be too careless of his honour and too -credulous of your deceptions, he is yet man enough to resent such -infamy as you have been guilty of now. You will sign this.'</p> - -<p>He passed to her a few lines which he had already written and brought -with him. They ran thus:</p> - -<p>'I, Olga, Countess Brancka, do acknowledge that I most untruthfully -used the name of my husband's brother, the Prince Vàsàrhely, in an -endeavour to injure the gentleman known as the Marquis de Sabran; and I -hereby do ask the pardon of them both, and confess that in such pardon -I receive great leniency and forbearance.'</p> - -<p>'Sign it,' said Prince Egon.</p> - -<p>'Pshaw!' said Madame Brancka, and pushed it away with a loud laugh, -deigning no further answer.</p> - -<p>'Will you sign it or not?' asked Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>She replied by tearing it in shreds.</p> - -<p>'It is easily rewritten,' he said, unmoved. He went to a writing-table -that stood in the room, looked for paper and found it, and wrote out -the same formula.</p> - -<p>'Do not be foolish, Olga,' he said curtly, as he returned. 'You are a -clever woman, and always consult your own interests. I dare say you -have done a thousand things as base as your attempt to ruin my cousin's -happiness, but I do not suppose you have often done anything so unwise. -You will sign this at once, or you will regret it very greatly.'</p> - -<p>'Why should I sign it?' she said insolently. 'The man is what I say; he -could not deny it. If I only guessed at the truth, I guessed aright. I -wonder that you do not see <i>your</i> interests lie in exposing him. When -the world knows he is an impostor Wanda will divorce him and put the -children under other names in religious houses. Then you will be able -to marry her. I told him she would marry you <i>pour balayer la honte.</i>'</p> - -<p>For the moment she was alarmed at the fires that leapt from Vàsàrhely's -sombre eyes. It cost him much—as much as it had cost Sabran—not to -strike her where she stood. He paused a second to control himself, then -answered her coldly and calmly—</p> - -<p>'My cousin will never seek a divorce, nor shall I wed with a divorced -woman. Your hate misleads you; there is no blinder thing than hate. You -will sign this paper, or I shall telegraph for my brother.'</p> - -<p>'For Stefan!'</p> - -<p>All her boundless indifference to her husband, and her contempt for -him, were spoken in the accent she gave his name.</p> - -<p>'For Stefan. You are pleased to despise him because you can lead him -into mad follies, and can make him believe you are an innocent woman. -But Stefan is not altogether the ignoble dupe you think him. He is -a dupe, wiser men than he have been so; but he would not bear your -infidelity to him if he really knew it, nor would he bear other things -if he knew of them. Two years ago you took two hundred thousand -florins' worth of diamonds, in my name, from my jeweller Landsee in -the Graben. How should a tradesman suspect that a Countess Brancka was -dishonest? At the end of the year he brought his bill for that and -other things to me, whilst I was in Vienna. He had never, of course, -doubted that you went on my authority. Equally, of course, I did not -betray you, but paid the amount. When you do such things you should -not give written orders. They remain against you. Now, if Stefan knew -this, or if he knew that you had taken money from the richest of your -lovers, the young Duc de Blois, as I knew it so long as seven years -ago, you would no longer find him the malleable easily-cozened fool -you deem him. You would learn that he has Vàsàrhely blood in him. I -have only named two out of the many questionable facts I know against -you. They have been safe with me. I would never urge Stefan to a public -scandal. But, unless you sign this, and apologise for using my name to -the husband of my cousin, as you used it to Landsee of the Graben, I -shall tell my brother. He will not divorce you. That is not our way; -we do not go to lawyers to redress our wrongs. But he will compel you -to retire for your life into a religious house—as you would compel -the harmless children of Wanda; or he would imprison you himself in -one of our lonely places in the mountains, where you would cry in vain -for your lovers, and your friends, and your <i>menus plaisirs</i>, and none -would hear you. Do not mistake me. You have often called us barbaric; -you will find we can be so. As I say, we do not carry our wrongs to -lawyers. We can avenge ourselves.'</p> - -<p>She had lost all colour as he spoke. A nervous spasm of laughter -contracted her mouth, and remained on it like the ghastly <i>rictus</i> of -death. She knew him well enough to know that he meant every syllable -he said. The Vàsàrhely had had stern tragedies in their annals, and to -women impure and unfaithful had been merciless as Othello.</p> - -<p>She felt that she was vanquished; that she would have to obey him or -suffer worse things. But though she was aware of her own impotence, she -could not resist a retort that should sting him.</p> - -<p>'You are very chivalrous! I always knew you had an insane adoration -of your cousin, but I never should have thought you would have put -on sabre and spurs in her husband's defence. Will he reward you by -effacing himself? Will he end as he has begun, like the hero of a -melodrama at the Gymnase, and shoot himself at Wanda's feet? You would -marry a widow, though you would not marry a divorced woman!'</p> - -<p>'Some time ago, when we spoke of him,' he replied, still with stern -self-control, 'I told you that were his honour called in question I -would defend it as I would my brother's—not for his sake, for hers. -I would, for her sake, defend it so were he the guiltiest soul on -earth. He belongs to her. He is sacred to me. You mistake if you deem -her such a woman as yourself. She has loved him. She will love no -other whilst she lives. She has given herself to him. She will give -herself to no other, though she outlive him from this hour. You make -your calculations unwisely, for when you make them you suppose that -every man and every woman have your own dishonesty, your own passions, -your own baseness. You are short of sight, because you only see in the -circle of your own conceptions.'</p> - -<p>She understood that he knew the secret of the man he protected, but -that he would never admit that he did so; would never reveal it or let -any other reveal it. She understood that he had himself forborne from -its exposure, and would never, whilst he lived, allow any other to hold -it up to the derision of the world. She understood that, if need were, -Vàsàrhely would defend, as he said, the honour of his cousin's husband -at the point of the sword against all foes or mockers.</p> - -<p>'For her sake!' she cried, 'always for her sake! What can you both see -so marvellous in her? She has been a greater fool than any woman that -has ever lived, though she can read Greek and write in Latin! What -has she done with all her wisdom and her holiness? You know as well -as though it were written there upon the wall that he is what I say. -Why do you put your lance in rest for him? Why are you ready to shed -blood on his behalf? He is an impostor who has taken in first the world -and then the mistress of Hohenszalras. If you were the hero you have -always seemed to me you would tear his heart out of his breast, shoot -him like a wolf in these very woods! If her honour is yours, avenge her -dishonour!'</p> - -<p>She spoke with force and fire, and longing to behold the spirit of evil -roused in her hearer's soul and stung to action.</p> - -<p>But she might as well have tried to move the mountains from their base -as rouse either pain or rage in her brother-in-law. Vàsàrhely kept his -attitude of stern, cold, contemptuous disgust. Not a muscle of his face -changed. He said merely:</p> - -<p>'You have been told what I shall do if you do not sign this paper. The -choice is yours. If you desire to hear any more episodes of your past I -can tell you many.'</p> - -<p>Then she changed her attitude and her eloquence. She dissolved in -tears; she wept; she implored; she tried to kneel to him. But he was -inflexible.</p> - -<p>'You are a good actress,' he said simply. 'But you forget; it is Stefan -whom you can deceive, not me.'</p> - -<p>When she had vainly used all her resources of alternate entreaty -and invective, of cajolery and insolence, she sank into her chair, -exhausted, hysterical, nerveless.</p> - -<p>'I am ill; call my woman,' she said faintly.</p> - -<p>He replied:</p> - -<p>'You are no more ill than I am.'</p> - -<p>'You are brutal, Egon,' she said, raising herself, with flashing eyes -and hissing tongue.</p> - -<p>'What have you been to her?' said Vàsàrhely.</p> - -<p>He waited with cold, inflexible patience. When another half-hour had -gone by she signed the paper, and flung it with fury to him.</p> - -<p>'You know very well it is true!' she cried, as she leaned across the -table like a slender snake that darted. 'Would she lie dying of it if -it were only a lie?'</p> - -<p>'That I know not,' said Vàsàrhely, coldly. 'What I know is that your -carriage will be ready in an hour, and that you will go hence. If ever -you be tempted to speak of what has occurred here, you will remember -that my silence to Stefan and your own people is only conditional on -yours on another matter.'</p> - -<p>Then he left her.</p> - -<p>She was cowed, intimidated, vanquished. When the hour was over she went -through the two lines of bowing servants, and left Hohenszalras ere the -noon was past.</p> - -<p>'It is the first time in my life I ever failed,' she thought, as the -pinnacles and towers of the burg were lost to her sight. 'What do these -men see in that woman?'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXXVI">CHAPTER XXXVI.</a></h4> - - -<p>Vàsàrhely, when he left her, went straight to Sabran, who, seated on an -oaken bench in the corridor of his wife's apartments, knew not how the -hours passed, and seemed aged ten years in a day. Vàsàrhely motioned -him to pass into one of the empty chambers. There he gave him the lines -which Olga Brancka had signed.</p> - -<p>'You are safe from her,' he said. 'She cannot tell your story to the -world. She will not dare even to whisper it as a conjecture.'</p> - -<p>Sabran did not speak. This great debt owed to his greatest foe hurt him -even whilst it delivered him.</p> - -<p>'For the first time I have concealed the truth,' pursued Vàsàrhely. 'I -affected to disbelieve her story. There was no other way to save it -from publicity. That alone would not have sufficed, but I had means to -coerce her.'</p> - -<p>'You have been very generous.'</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely shrank from his praise as though from some insolence. He did -not look at Sabran; he spoke briefly between his closed teeth. All -his soul was full of longing to strike this man; to meet him in open -combat and to kill him; forcing him and his foul secret together down -underneath the sole sure cover of the grave. But the sense that so -near, within a few feet of them, she lay in peril of her life, made -even vengeance seem for the moment profane and blasphemous.</p> - -<p>'There will be always time,' he thought.</p> - -<p>That hushed and darkened chamber hard by awed his hatred into silence. -What would she wish? What would she command? Could he but know that, -how clear would be his path!</p> - -<p>He hesitated a moment, then turned away.</p> - -<p>'I shall wait here until the danger is past, or she is called to God,' -he said hoarsely.</p> - -<p>Then he walked away down the corridor slowly, like a man wounded with a -wound that bleeds within.</p> - -<p>Sabran stood awhile where he had left him, his eyes bent on the ground, -his heart sick with shame.</p> - -<p>'<i>He</i> was worthy of her!' he thought with the most bitter pang of his -life.</p> - -<p>Three more days and nights passed; they were to him like a hideous -nightmare; at times he thought with horror that he would lose his -reason. The dreadful stillness, the dreadful silence, the knowledge -that death was so near that bed which he dared not approach, the -impossibility of learning what memories of him, what hatred of him, -might not be haunting the stupor in which she lay, together made up a -torture to which her bitterest reproach, her deadliest punishment would -have seemed merciful.</p> - -<p>All through that exhaustion, in which they believed her mind was -without consciousness, the memory of all that he had told her was -alive in it, in that poignant remembrance which the confusion of a -dulled brain only makes but the more terrible, turning and changing -what it suffers from into a thousand shapes. In her worst agony this -consciousness never left her; she kept silence because in her uttermost -weakness she was strong enough not to give her woe to the ears of the -others, but in her heart there seemed a great knife plunged, a knife -rusted with blood that was dishonoured.</p> - -<p>When she knew that the child she bore was dead, she felt no sorrow, -she thought only—'Begotten of a serf, of a coward!'</p> - -<p>The intolerable outrage, the intolerable deception, were like flames of -fire that seemed to eat up her life; her love for him, for the hour at -least, had been stunned and ceased to speak. To the woman who came of -the races of Szalras and Vàsàrhely, the dishonour covered every other -memory.</p> - -<p>'All his life only one long lie!' she thought.</p> - -<p>Her race had been stainless through a thousand years of chivalry and -heroism, and she—its sole descendant—had sullied it with the blood of -a base-born impostor!</p> - -<p>Whilst she lay sunk in what they deemed a perfect apathy, the disgrace -done to her, to her name, to her ancestry, was ever present to her -mind: a spectre which no one saw save herself. Every other emotion was -for the time quenched in that. She felt as though the whole world had -struck her on the cheek and she was powerless to resent or to revenge -the blow. In hours of delirium she thought she saw all the men and -women of her race who had reigned there before her standing about her -bed, and saying: 'You held our honour, and what did you do with it? You -let it sink to the earth in the arms of a nameless coward.'</p> - -<p>One night she said suddenly: 'My cousin—is he here?'</p> - -<p>When they told her that he had remained at Hohenszalras she seemed -reassured. At sunrise she asked the same question. When they answered -with the same affirmative, she said: 'Bid him come to me.'</p> - -<p>They fetched him instantly. As he passed Sabran in the corridor he -paused.</p> - -<p>'Your wife has sent for me,' he said; 'have I your permission to see -her?'</p> - -<p>Sabran bent his head, but his heart beat thickly with the only jealousy -he had ever felt. She asked for Egon Vàsàrhely in her stupor of misery, -and he, her husband, had lost the right to enter her chamber, dared not -approach her presence!</p> - -<p>'Wanda, I am here!' said Vàsàrhely, softly, as he bent over her. She -looked at him with eyes full of unspeakable agony.</p> - -<p>'Is it true?' she murmured.</p> - -<p>'Yes!' he said bitterly between his teeth.</p> - -<p>'And you knew it?'</p> - -<p>'Too late! But Wanda—my beloved Wanda—trust to me. The world shall -never hear it.'</p> - -<p>Her eyes had closed, a shiver ran through all her frame. 'Olga?' she -muttered.</p> - -<p>'She is in my power. I will deal with her,' he answered. 'She will be -silent as the grave.'</p> - -<p>She gave a long shuddering sigh, and her head sank back upon her -pillows.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely fell on his knees beside her bed, and buried his face on her -hands.</p> - -<p>'My violated saint!' he murmured. 'Fear not; I will avenge you.'</p> - -<p>Low though the words were, they reached and moved her in her dim blind -weakness. She stretched out her hand, and touched his bowed head.</p> - -<p>'No, no—not <i>that.</i> He is my children's father. He must be sacred; -give me your word, Egon, there shall be no bloodshed between him and -you.'</p> - -<p>'I am your next friend,' he said, with intense appeal in his voice. -'You are insulted and dishonoured—your race is affronted and -stained—who should avenge that if not I, your kinsman? There is no -male of your house. It falls to me.'</p> - -<p>All the manhood and knighthood in him were athirst for the life of the -impostor who had dishonoured what he adored.</p> - -<p>'Promise me,' she said again.</p> - -<p>'Your brothers are dead,' he muttered. 'I may well stand in their -place. Their swords would have found him out ere he were an hour -older.'</p> - -<p>She raised herself with a supreme effort, and through the pallor and -misery of her face there came a momentary flash of anger, a momentary -flash of the old spirit of command.</p> - -<p>'My brothers are dead, and I forbid any other to meddle with my life. -If anyone slew him it would be I—I—in my own right.'</p> - -<p>Her voice had been for the instant stern and sustained, but physical -faintness overcame her; her lips grew grey, and the darkness of great -weakness came before her sight.</p> - -<p>'I forbid you! I forbid you!' she said, as her breath failed her.</p> - -<p>Vàsàrhely remained kneeling beside her bed. His shoulders trembled with -restrained emotion. Even now she shut him out of her life. She denied -him the right to be her champion and avenger.</p> - -<p>She moved her hand towards him as a blind woman would have done.</p> - -<p>'Give me your word.'</p> - -<p>'You are my law,' he answered. 'I will do nothing that you forbid.'</p> - -<p>She inclined her head with a feeble gesture of recognition of the -words. He rose slowly, kissed the white fingers that lay near him, and, -without speaking, left her presence.</p> - -<p>'Bloodshed, bloodshed!' she thought, in the vague feverish confusion -of half-conscious thought. 'Though rivers of blood rolled between him -and me what could they wash away of the shame that is with me for ever? -What could death do? Death could blot out nothing.'</p> - -<p>A sense of awful impotence lay upon her like a weight of iron. Do what -she would she could never change the past! Her sons must grow to youth -and manhood tainted and dishonoured in her sight. There were times when -all the martial and arrogant spirit in her was like flame in her veins, -and she thought: 'Could I but rise and kill him—I, myself!'</p> - -<p>It seemed to her that it would be but justice.</p> - -<p>When Vàsàrhely, coming out from her chamber, passed the impostor who -had done her this dishonour, it cost him the greatest self-sacrifice -of his life not to order him out yonder in the chilly twilight of the -leafless woods, to stand before him in that ordeal of combat which, in -the code of honour of the Magyar Prince, was the sole tribunal to which -a man of honour could appeal. But she had forbade him to avenge her. -He felt that he had no share in her life sufficient to give him title -to disobey her. His own love for her told him that this offender was -still dear enough to her for his life to be sacred in her sight.</p> - -<p>'If I had not loved her,' he thought, 'I could have avenged her without -suspicion; but what would it seem to her and to the world?—only that I -slew him out of jealous rancour! In her soul she loves him still. Her -hate will fade, her love will survive, traitor and hound though he be.'</p> - -<p>He motioned Sabran towards one of the empty chambers in the gallery. -When he had closed the door of it he spoke with a low, hoarse voice:</p> - -<p>'Sir, I have the right as her kinsman, I have the right her brothers -would have had, to publicly insult you, to publicly chastise you. But -she has commanded me to abstain; she will have no feud between us. I -obey her; so must you. I have but one thing to say to you. Once you -spoke of suicide. I forbid you to follow up your crimes by causing the -unending misery that death by your own hand would bring to her. You -have been coward enough. Have courage at least not to leave a woman -alone under the disgrace you have brought upon her.'</p> - -<p>'Alone!' echoed Sabran. 'She will never admit me to her presence again. -She will demand her divorce as soon as ever she has strength to -remember and to speak.'</p> - -<p>'Do you know her so ill after nine years of marriage? Whatever she -do it will be for you to accept it, and not evade your chastisement -by the poltroon's refuge of oblivion in the grave. You have said you -think yourself my debtor; all the quittance I desire is this. You will -obey me when I forbid you to entail on your wife the lifelong remorse -that your suicide—however you disguised it—would bring upon her. In -obeying her, by holding back my hand from avenging her, I make the -greatest sacrifice that she could have demanded. Make yours likewise. -It would be easy for you to escape chastisement in death. You must -forego that ease, and live. I leave you to your conscience and to her.'</p> - -<p>He opened the door and passed down the corridor, his steps echoing on -the oaken floor.</p> - -<p>In half an hour he had left the house, and gone on his lonely way to -Taróc.</p> - -<p>Sabran stood mute.</p> - -<p>He had lost the power to resent; he knew that if this man chose to -strike him across the eyes with his whip he would be within his right. -The insults cut him to the bone as though the lash were on him; but he -held his peace and bore them, not in submission, but in silence. His -profound humiliation, his absolute despair, had broken the nerve in -him. He felt that he had no title to look a gentleman in the face, no -power to defend himself, whatever outrages were heaped on him.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXXVII">CHAPTER XXXVII.</a></h4> - - -<p>In time the convulsions ceased, the stupor lightened; they began to -hope.</p> - -<p>The danger had been great, but it was well-nigh past; the vigour and -perfection of her strength had enabled her to keep her hold on life. -After those few words to her kinsman she spoke seldom, she appeared -sunk in silent thought; when the door opened she shrank with a sort of -apprehension. Greswold watching her said to himself: 'She is afraid -lest her husband should enter.'</p> - -<p>She never spoke of him or of the children.</p> - -<p>Sabran did not dare to ask to see her. When Greswold would fain have -urged him, he refused with vehemence.</p> - -<p>'I dare not—it would be to insult her more. Only if she summon -me—but that she will never do.'</p> - -<p>'He has been faithless to her,' thought the old man.</p> - -<p>All those weeks of her slow and painful restoration to life she was -mute, her lips only moving in reply to the questions of her physicians. -It seemed to her strange that when her spiritual and mental life -had been poisoned to their source, her bodily life should be able -mechanically to gather force, and resume its functions. Had matter so -far more resistance than the soul?</p> - -<p>Her women were frightened at the look upon her face; it had the -rigidity, the changelessness of marble, and all the blood seemed gone -out of it for ever.</p> - -<p>In after days her heart would speak; remembered happiness, lost -beliefs, ruined love, would in their turn have place in her misery; but -now all she was sensible of was the unbearable insult, the ineffaceable -outrage. She was like a queen who beholds the virgin soil of her -kingdom invaded and wasted by a traitor.</p> - -<p>Any other thing she would have pardoned—infidelity, indifference, -cruelty, any sins of manhood's caprice or passion—but who should -pardon this? The sin was not alone against herself; it was against -every law of decency and truth that ever she had been taught to hold -sacred; it was against all those great dead, who lay with the cross -on their breasts and their swords by their side, from whom she had -received and treasured the traditions of honour, the purity of a race.</p> - -<p>It was those dead knights whom he had smote upon the mouth and mocked, -crying to them:. 'Lo! your place is mine; my sons will reign in your -stead. I have tainted your race for ever; for ever my blood flows with -yours.'</p> - -<p>The greatness of a great race is a thing far higher than mere pride. -Its instincts are noble and supreme, its obligations are no less than -its privileges; it is a great light which streams backward through -the darkness of the ages, and if by that light you guide not your -footsteps, then are you thrice accursed holding as you do that lamp of -honour in your hands.</p> - -<p>So had she always thought; and now he had dashed the lamp in the dust.</p> - -<p>Her convalescence came in due course; but the silence, almost absolute -silence, which she preserved on the full recovery of her consciousness -alarmed her physicians, who had no clue to the cause. Greswold alone, -who divined that there was some wrong or disaster which severed her -from her husband, guessed that this immutable speechlessness was but -the cover and guard of some great sorrow. No tears ever dimmed her -eyes or relieved her bursting heart; she lay still, absorbed in mute -and terrible retrospection. As her great weakness left her, there came -upon her features the colder darker look of her race, the look which he -who had betrayed her had always feared. She never spoke of him, nor of -the children. Her women would have ventured to bring the children to -her, unbidden, but Greswold forbade them; he knew that for the devoted -tenderness she bore them to be thus utterly still and changed, some -shock must have befallen her so great that the instincts of maternity -were momentarily quenched in her, as water springs are dried up by -earthquake.</p> - -<p>'She never speaks of me, nor of them?' asked Sabran with agony every -day of Greswold, and the old man answered him:</p> - -<p>'She never speaks at all. She replies to our questions as to her -health, she asks briefly for what she needs; no more.'</p> - -<p>'The children are innocent!' he said wearily, and his heart had never -gone forth to them so much as it did now, when they were shut out like -himself from the arms of their mother.</p> - -<p>Yet he understood how she shrank from them—might well almost abhor -them—seeing in them, as Vàsàrhely saw, the living proofs of her -surrender to a coward and a traitor.</p> - -<p>'What can he have done?' mused Greswold. 'Infidelity, perhaps, she -would not forgive; but it would not make her thus blind and deaf to the -children.'</p> - -<p>He passed his days in utter wretchedness; he wandered in the wintry -woods for hours, or sat in weary waiting outside her door. He cared -nothing what his household thought or guessed. He had forgotten every -living creature save herself. When he saw his young sons in the -distance he avoided them; he dreaded their guileless questions, the -stab of their unconscious words. Again and again he was tempted to blow -out his brains, or fling himself from the ice walls that towered above -him; but the sense that it would seem to her the last cowardice—the -last shame—restrained him.</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to him that the tie between them was so strong, the -memories of their past passion so sweet, that even his crime could not -part them. Then he remembered of what race she came, of what honour she -was the representative and guardian, and his heart sank within him, and -he knew that his offence was one beyond all pardon.</p> - -<p>The whole household dimly felt that some great grief had fallen on -their master. His attitude, his absence from his wife's room, the -arrival of Prince Vàsàrhely, the abrupt departure of the Countess -Brancka, all told them that some calamity had come, though they were -loyally silent one to the other, their service having been always one -of devotion and veneration for their mistress, since they were all -Tauern-born people, bred up by their fathers in loyalty to Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>'The first who speaks of aught he suspects goes for ever,' old Hubert -had said to his numerous <i>dienerschaft</i> in the hearing of them all, -when one of the pages—he who had borne the note to his master in Olga -Brancka's rooms—ventured to hint that he thought some evil was abroad, -and would part their lord and lady. But all the faithful silence of -their attendants could not wholly conceal from the elder children -that something wrong, some greater sorrow even than their mother's -illness, was hanging over the old house. They were dull and vaguely -alarmed. They had not even the kindly presence of the Princess, who, -if she sometimes wearied them with admonitions, treated them with -tenderness, and atoned for her homilies by unending gifts. They were -very unhappy, though they said little, and wandered like little ghosts -among the wintry woods and in their spacious play-rooms. They were -tended, amused, provided for in all the same ways as usual. There were -all their pastimes and playthings; all their comforts and habits were -unaltered; but from the background of their sports and studies the -stately figure of their mother was missing, with her serene smile and -her happy power of checking all dispute or turbulence with a mere word -or a mere glance.</p> - -<p>The winter had come at a stroke, as it does without warning oftentimes -in the old Archduchy; the snow falling fast and thick, the waters -freezing in a night, the hills and valleys growing white and silent -between a sunset and a sunset.</p> - -<p>Their sledges carried them like lightning over the frozen roads, and -their little skates bore them swift as circling swallows over the ice. -It was the season Bela loved so well; but he had no joy in anything. -There was no twilight hour in the white-room at their mothers feet, -whilst she told them legends and stories: there was no moment in the -mornings when she came into their study and found their little puzzled -brains weary over a Latin declension or a crabbed page of history, and -made all clear to them by a few lucid graphic sentences; there was no -possible hope that, when the day was broad and bright over the wintry -land, she would call to them to bring the dogs and go with her and her -black horses through the glittering forests, where every bough was -heavy with the diamonds of the frost. To the little boys it seemed as -if the whole world had grown suddenly silent, and they were left all -alone in it.</p> - -<p>Their troops of attendants were no more consolation to them than his -crowd of courtiers is to a bereaved sovereign.</p> - -<p>Then, again, when Egon Vàsàrhely had by chance met them he had looked -at them strangely, and had always turned away without a greeting. 'And -when I was quite little he was so kind,' thought Bela, whose pride -seemed falling from him like a useless ragged garment.</p> - -<p>'It's all since Madame Olga came,' he said once to his brother. 'She is -a bad, bad woman. She was rude to our mother.'</p> - -<p>'I thought ladies were always good?' said Gela.</p> - -<p>'They are much wickeder than men,' said Bela, with premature wisdom. -'At least, when they <i>are</i> wicked. I heard a gentleman say so in Paris.'</p> - -<p>'What could she do when she was here, do you think?' asked Gela, with a -tremor.</p> - -<p>'I do not know,' said Bela, gravely and sadly. 'But I am sure that she -hated our mother.'</p> - -<p>He was sure that all the evil had come from her; he had heard of evil -spirits, the people believed in them, and had charms against them. She -was one of them. Had she not tempted him to disobedience and revolt, -with her pictures of the grand gaiety, the magnificent gatherings, the -heart-rousing 'Halali!' of the Chantilly hunt?</p> - -<p>Bela did not forget.</p> - -<p>He would have cut off his little right hand, now, never to have vexed -his mother.</p> - -<p>He was yet more sorrowful still for his father. Though they were not -allowed to approach their mother's apartments, he had disobeyed the -injunction more than once, and had seen Sabran walking to and fro that -long gallery, or seated with bent head and folded arms on one of the -oaken benches. With all his boldness Bela had not dared to approach -that melancholy figure; but it had haunted his dreams, and troubled -him sorely as he rode and drove, and played and did his lessons. The -snow had come on the second week of his mother's illness, and when he -visited his riding-pony in its loose box on these frosted days on which -he could not use it, he buried his face in its abundant mane, and wept -bitterly, though he boasted that he never cried.</p> - -<p>Eight weeks passed by after the departure of Olga Brancka before his -mother could leave her bed; and all that while, save for a brief -question now and again as to their health, put to her physician, she -had never mentioned the children once. 'She does not want us any more,' -said Bela, with the great tears dimming his bold eyes.</p> - -<p>In the ninth week she was lifted on to a great chair, placed beside -one of the windows, and she turned her weary gaze on to the snow world -without. What use was life? Why had it returned to her? All emotion of -maternity, all memory of love, were for the time killed in her. She was -only conscious of an intolerable indignity, for which neither God nor -man could give her consolation.</p> - -<p>She would have gone barefoot all the world over sooner than be again -in his presence, had not the imperious courage which was the strongest -instinct of her nature refused to confess itself unable to meet the man -who had wronged her. In the long dark night which these past two months -had seemed to her, she had brought herself to face the inevitable end. -She had nerved herself to be her own judge and his. Weaker women would -have made the world their judge; she did not. She did not even seek the -counsel of that Church of which she was a reverent daughter. Her priest -had no access to her.</p> - -<p>'God must see my torture, but no other shall,' she said in her heart, -nor should the world ever have her fate to make an hour's jesting -wonder of, as is its way with all calamity. It would be her lifelong -companion; a rusted iron for ever piercing deeper, and deeper into her -flesh; but she would dwell alone with it—unpitied. The men of her race -had always been their own lawgivers, their own avengers; she would be -hers.</p> - -<p>Once she bade them bring her pens and ink, and she began to use them. -Then she laid them down, and tore in two an unfinished letter. 'Only -cowards write to save themselves from pain,' she thought, and on the -tenth day after she had risen from her bed she said to Greswold:</p> - -<p>'Tell the women to leave me alone, and ask—my husband—to come here.'</p> - -<p>She said the last words as if they choked her in their utterance. Her -husband he was; nothing could change the past.</p> - -<p>The old man hesitated, and ventured to suggest that any exertion was -dangerous; would it be wise, he asked, to speak of what might agitate -her? And thereon he paused and stammered, knowing that it was not his -place to have observed that there was any estrangement between them.</p> - -<p>She looked at him with suspicion.</p> - -<p>'Have I spoken in my sleep or in my unconsciousness?' she thought.</p> - -<p>Aloud she said only:</p> - -<p>'Be so good as to go to him at once.'</p> - -<p>He bowed and went, and to himself mused:</p> - -<p>'Since she loves him, her heart will melt when she meets his eyes. -His sin after all cannot be beyond those which women have forgiven a -million times over since first creation began.'</p> - -<p>Yet in himself he was not sure of that. The Szalras had had many great -and many generous qualities, but forgiveness of offence had never been -among them.</p> - -<p>She remained still, her hands folded on her knees, her face set as -though it were cast in bronze. The great bedchamber, with its hangings -of pale blue plush and its silver-mounted furniture, was dim and -shadowy in the greyness of a midwinter afternoon. Doors opened, here -to the bath and dressing chambers, there to the oratory, yonder to the -apartments of Sabran. She looked across to the last, and a shudder -passed over her; a sense of sickness and revulsion came on her.</p> - -<p>She sat still and waited; she was too weak to go further than this -room. She was wrapped in a long loose gown of white satin, lined and -trimmed with sable. There were black bearskins beneath her feet; the -atmosphere was warmed by hot air, and fragrant with, some bowls full of -forced roses, which her women had placed, there at noon. The grey light -of the fading afternoon touched the silver scroll-work of the bed, and -the silver frame of one large mirror, and fell on her folded hands and -on the glister of their rings. Her head leaned backward against the -high carved ebony of her chair. Her face was stern and bitterly cold, -as that of Maria Theresa when she signed the loss of Silesia.</p> - -<p>He approached from his own apartments, and came timidly and with a slow -step forward. He did not dare to salute her, or go near to her; he -stood like a banished man, disgraced, a few yards from her seat.</p> - -<p>Two months had gone by since he had seen her. When he entered he read -on her features that he must leave all hope behind.</p> - -<p>Her whole frame shrank within her as she saw him there, but she gave -no sign of what she felt. Without looking at him she spoke, in a voice -quite firm though it was faint from feebleness.</p> - -<p>'I have but little to say to you, but that little is best said, not -written.'</p> - -<p>He did not reply; his eyes were watching her with a terrible appeal, a -very agony of longing. They had not rested on her for two months. She -had been near the gates of the grave, within the shadow of death. He -would have given his life for a word of pity, a touch, a regard—and he -dared not approach her!</p> - -<p>She did not look at him. After that first glance, in which there had -been so much of horror, of revulsion, she did not once look towards -him. Her face had the immutability of a mask of stone; so many wretched -days and haunted nights had she spent nerving herself for this -inevitable moment that no emotion was visible in her; into her agony -she had poured her pride, and it sustained her, as the plaster poured -into the dry bones at Pompeii makes the skeleton stand erect, the ashes -speak.</p> - -<p>'After that which you have told me,' she said, after a moment's silence -in which he fancied she must hear the throbbing of his heart, 'you must -know that my life cannot be lived out beside yours. The law gives you -many, rights, no doubt, but I believe you will not be so base as to -enforce them.'</p> - -<p>'I have no rights!' he muttered. 'I am a criminal before the law. The -law will free you from me, if you choose.'</p> - -<p>'I do not choose,' she said coldly; 'you understand me ill. I do not -carry my wrongs or my woes to others. What you have told me is known -only to Prince Vàsàrhely and to the Countess Brancka. He will be -silent; he has the power to make her so. The world need know nothing. -Can you think that I shall be its informant?'</p> - -<p>'If you divorce me——' he murmured.</p> - -<p>A quiver of bitter anger passed over her features, but she retained her -self-control.</p> - -<p>'Divorce? What could divorce do for me? Could it destroy the past? -Neither Church nor Law can undo what you have done. Divorce would make -me feel that in the past I had been your mistress, not your wife, that -is all.'</p> - -<p>She breathed heavily, and again pressed her hand on her breast.</p> - -<p>'Divorce!' she repeated. 'Neither priest nor judge can efface a past as -you clean a slate with a sponge! No power, human or divine, can free -<i>me</i>, purify <i>me</i>, wash your dishonoured blood from your children's -veins.'</p> - -<p>She almost lost her self-control; her lips trembled, her eyes were full -of flame, her brow was black with passion. With a violent effort she -restrained herself; invective or reproach seemed to her low and coarse -and vile.</p> - -<p>He was silent; his greatest fear, the torture of which had harassed him -sleeping and waking ever since he had placed his secret in her hands, -was banished at her words. She would seek no divorce—the children -would not be disgraced—the world of men would not learn his shame; -and yet as he heard a deeper despair than any he had ever known came -over him. She was but as those sovereigns of old who scorned the poor -tribunals of man's justice because they held in their own might the -power of so much heavier chastisement.</p> - -<p>'I shall not seek for a legal separation,' she resumed; 'that is to -say, I shall not, unless you force me to do so to protect myself from -you. If you fail to abide by the conditions I shall prescribe, then you -will compel me to resort to any means that may shelter me from your -demands. But I do not think you will endeavour to force on me conjugal -rights which you obtained over me by a fraud.'</p> - -<p>All that she desired was to end quickly the torture of this interview, -from which her courage had not permitted her to shrink. She had to -defend herself because she would not be defended by others, and she -only sought to strike swiftly and unerringly so as to spare herself -and him all needless or lingering throes. Her speech was brief, for -it seemed to her that no human language held expression deep and vast -enough to measure the wrong done to her, could she seek to give it -utterance.</p> - -<p>She would not have made a sound had any murderer stabbed her body; she -would not now show the death-wound of her soul and honour to this man -who had stabbed both to the quick. Other women would have made their -moan aloud, and cursed him. The daughter of the Szalras choked down her -heart in silence, and spoke as a judge speaks to one condemned by man -and God.</p> - -<p>'I wish no words between us,' she said, with renewed calmness. 'You -know your sin; all your life has been a lie. I will keep me and mine -back from vengeance; but do not mistake—God may pardon you, I never! -What I desired to say to you is that henceforth you shall wholly -abandon the name you stole; you shall assign the land of Romaris to the -people; you shall be known only as you have been known here of late, -as the Count von Idrac. The title was mine to give, I gave it you; no -wrong is done save to my fathers, who were brave men.'</p> - -<p>He remained silent; all excuse he might have offered seemed as if from -him to her it would be but added outrage. He was her betrayer, and she -had the power to avenge betrayal; naught that she could say or do could -seem unjust or undeserved beside the enormity of her irreparable wrongs.</p> - -<p>'The children?' he muttered faintly, in an unuttered supplication.</p> - -<p>'They are mine,' she said, always with the same unchanging calm that -was cold as the frozen earth without. 'You will not, I believe, seek to -enforce your title to dispute them with me?'</p> - -<p>He gave a gesture of denial.</p> - -<p>He, the wrong-doer, could not realise the gulf which his betrayal had -opened betwixt himself and her. On him all the ties of their past -passion were sweet, precious, unchanged in their dominion. He could not -realise that to her all these memories were abhorred, poisoned, stamped -with ineffable shame; he could not believe that she who had loved the -dust that his feet had brushed could now regard him as one leprous and -accursed. He was slow to understand that his sin had driven him out of -her life for evermore.</p> - -<p>Commonly it is the woman on whom the remembrance of love has an -enthralling power when love itself is traitor; commonly it is the man -on whom the past has little influence, and to whom its appeal is vainly -made; but here the position was reversed. He would have pleaded by it: -she refused to acknowledge it, and remained as adamant before it. His -nerve was too broken, his conscience was too heavily weighted for him -to attempt to rebel against her decisions or sway her judgment. If she -had bidden him go out and slay himself he would gladly have obeyed.</p> - -<p>'Once you said,' he murmured timidly, 'that repentance washes out all -crimes. Will you count my remorse as nothing?'</p> - -<p>'You would have known no remorse had your secret never been discovered!'</p> - -<p>He shrank as from a blow.</p> - -<p>'That is not true,' he said wearily. 'But how can I hope you will -believe me?'</p> - -<p>She answered nothing.</p> - -<p>'Once you told me that there was no sin you would not pardon me!' he -muttered.</p> - -<p>She replied:</p> - -<p>'We pardon sin; we do not pardon baseness.'</p> - -<p>She paused and put her hand to her heart; then she spoke again in that -cold, forced, measured voice, which seemed on his ear as hard and -pitiless as the strokes of an iron hammer, beating life out beneath it.</p> - -<p>'You will leave Hohenszalras; you will go where you will; you have the -revenues of Idrac. Any other financial arrangements that you may wish -to make I will direct my lawyers to carry out. If the revenues of Idrac -be insufficient to maintain you——'</p> - -<p>'Do not insult me—so,' he murmured, with a suffocated sound in his -voice, as though some hand were clutching at his throat.</p> - -<p>'Insult <i>you</i>!' she echoed, with a terrible scorn.</p> - -<p>She resumed, with the same inflexible calmness:</p> - -<p>'You must live as becomes the rank due to my husband. The world need -suspect nothing. There is no obligation to make it your confidante. If -anyone were wronged by the usurpation of the name you took it would -be otherwise, but as it is you will lose nothing in the eyes of men; -society will not flatter you the less. The world will only believe that -we are tired of one another, like so many. The blame will be placed on -me. You are a brilliant comedian, and can please and humour it. I am -known to be a cold, grave, eccentric woman, a recluse, of whom it will -deem it natural that you are weary. Since you allow that I have the -right to separate from you—to deal with you as with a criminal—you -will not seek to recall your existence to me. You will meet my -abstinence by the only amends you can make to me. Let me forget—as -far as I am able—let me forget that ever you have lived!'</p> - -<p>He staggered slightly, as if under some sword-stroke from an unseen -hand. A great faintness came upon him. He had been prepared for rage, -for reproach, for bitter tears, for passionate vengeance; but this -chill, passionless, disdainful severance from him for all eternity he -had never dreamed of: it crept like the cold of frost into his very -marrow; he was speechless and mute with shame. If she had dragged him -through all the tribunals of the world she would have hurt him and -humiliated him far less. Better all the hooting gibes of the whole -earth than this one voice, so cold, so inflexible, so full of utter -scorn!</p> - -<p>Despite her bodily weakness she rose to her full height, and for the -first time looked at him.</p> - -<p>'You have heard me,' she said; 'now go!'</p> - -<p>But instead, blindly, not knowing what he did, he fell at her feet.</p> - -<p>'But you loved me,' he cried, 'you loved me so well!'</p> - -<p>The tears were coursing down his cheeks.</p> - -<p>She drew the sables of her robe from his touch.</p> - -<p>'Do not recall <i>that</i>,' she said, with a bitter smile. 'Women of my -race have killed men before now for less outrage than yours has been -to me.'</p> - -<p>'Kill me!' he cried to her. 'I will kiss your hand.'</p> - -<p>She was mute.</p> - -<p>He clung to her gown with an almost convulsive supplication.</p> - -<p>'Believe, at least, that I loved <i>you</i>!' he cried, beside himself in -his misery and impotence. 'Believe that, at the least!—--'</p> - -<p>She turned from him.</p> - -<p>'Sir, I have been your dupe for ten long years; I can be so no more!'</p> - -<p>Under that intolerable insult he rose slowly, and his eyes grew blind, -and his limbs trembled, but he walked from her, and sought not again -either her pity or her pardon.</p> - -<p>On the threshold he looked back once. She stood erect, one hand resting -upon the carved work of her high oak chair; cold, stalely, motionless, -the furred velvets falling to her feet like a queen's robes.</p> - -<p>He looked, then passed the threshold and closed the door behind him. He -walked down the corridors blindly, not knowing whither he went.</p> - -<p>They were dusky, for the twilight of the winter's day had come. He did -not see a little figure which was coming towards him until the child -had stopped him with a timid outstretched hand.</p> - -<p>'Shall we never see her again?' said Bela, in a hushed voice. 'It is so -long!—so long! Oh, please do tell me!'</p> - -<p>Sabran paused, and looked down on the boy with blood-shot burning eyes. -For a moment or so he did not answer; then, with a sudden movement, he -drew his son to him, lifted him in his arms and kissed him passionately.</p> - -<p>'You will see her, not I—not I!' he said with a sob like a woman's. -'Bela, listen! Be obedient to her, adore her, have no will but hers; be -loyal, be truthful, be noble in all your words and all your thoughts, -and then in time perhaps—perhaps—she will pardon you for being also -mine!'</p> - -<p>The child, terrified, clung to him with all his force, dimly conscious -of some great agony near him, but far beyond his comprehension or -consolation.</p> - -<p>'I love you, I will always love you!' he said, with his hands clasped -around his father's throat.</p> - -<p>'Love your mother!' said Sabran, as he kissed the boy's soft cheeks, -made wet by his own tears; then he released the little frightened -form, and went himself away into the darkness.</p> - -<p>In a little time, with no word to any living soul there, he had -harnessed some horses with his own hands, and in the fast falling gloom -of the night had driven from Hohenszalras.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXVIII">CHAPTER XXXVIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>Bela heard the galloping hoofs of the horses, and ran with his fleet -feet, quick as a fawn's, down the grand staircase and out on to the -terrace, where the winds of the north were driving with icy cold and -furious force over a world of snow. With his golden hair streaming in -the blast, he strained his eyes into the gloom of the avenues below, -but the animals had vanished from sight. He turned sadly and went into -the Rittersaal.</p> - -<p>'Is that my father who has gone?' he said in a low voice to Hubert, who -was there. The old servant, with the tears in his eyes, told him that -it was. A groom had come to him to say that their lord had made ready -a sledge and driven away without a word to any one of them, while the -night was falling apace.</p> - -<p>Bela heard and said nothing; he had his mother's power of silence in -sorrow. He climbed the staircase silently, and went and listened in the -corridor where his father had waited and watched so long. His heart was -heavy, and ached with an indefinable dread. He did not seek Gela. It -seemed to him that this sorrow was his alone. He alone had heard his -father's farewell words; he alone had seen his father weep.</p> - -<p>All the selfishness and vanity of his little soul were broken up and -vanished, and the first grief he had ever known filled up their empty -place. He had adored his father with an unreasoning blind devotion, -like a dog's; and this intense affection had been increased rather than -repressed by the indifference with which he had been treated.</p> - -<p>His father was gone; he felt sure that it was for ever: if he could not -see his mother he thought he could not live. To the mind of a child -such gigantic and unutterable terrors rise up under the visitation of a -vague alarm. Abroad in the woods, or under any bodily pain or fear, he -was as brave as a lion whelp, but he had enough of the German mystic in -his blood to be imaginative and visionary when trouble touched him. The -sight of his father's grief had shaken his nerves, and filled him with -the first passionate pity he had ever known. A man so great, so strong, -so wonderful in prowess, so far aloof from himself as Sabran had always -seemed to his little son, to be so overwhelmed in such helpless sorrow, -appeared to Bela so terrible a thing that an intense fear took for the -first time possession of his little valiant soul. His father could slay -all the great beasts of the forests; could break in the horse fresh -from the freedom of the plains; could breast the stormy waters like -a petrel; could scale the highest heights of the mountains. And yet -someone—something—had had power to break down all his strength, and -make him flee in wretchedness.</p> - -<p>It could not be his mother who had done this thing? No, no! never, -never! It had been done because she was lying ill, helpless, perhaps -was dead.</p> - -<p>As that last dread came over him he lost all control over himself. -He knew what death was. A little girl he had been fond of in Paris -had died whilst he was her playmate, and he had seen her lying, so -waxen, so cold, so unresponsive, when he had laid his lilies on her -little breast. A great despair came over him, and made him reckless -what he did. In the desperation of terror blent with love, he started -up and ran to the door of his mother's apartments. It yielded to his -pressure; he ran across the ante chamber and the dressing-rooms, and -pulled aside the tapestry.</p> - -<p>Then he saw her; seated at the further side of the great bedchamber. -There was a feeble grey light from the western sky, to which the -casements of the chamber turned. It was very pale and dim, but by it he -saw her lying back, rigid and colourless, the white satin, the dusky -fur, the deep shadows gathered around her. There was that in her look -and in her attitude which made the child's heart grow cold, as his -father's had done.</p> - -<p>She was alone; for she had bade her women not come unless she summoned -them. Bela stood and gazed, his pulses beating loud and hard; then with -a cry he ran forward and sprang to her, and threw his arms about her.</p> - -<p>'Oh, mother, mother, you are not dead!' he cried. 'Oh, speak to me; do -speak to me! He is gone away for ever and ever, and if we cannot see -you we shall all die. Oh, do not look at me so! Pray, pray, do not. -Shall I fetch Lili?—-'</p> - -<p>In his vague terror he thought to disarm her by his little sister's -name. She had thrust him away from her, and was looking with cold and -cruel eyes on his face, that was so like the face of his father. She -was thinking:</p> - -<p>'You are the son of a serf, of a traitor, of a liar, of a bastard, -and yet you are <i>mine</i>! I bore you, and yet you are his. You are -shame incarnate. You are the living sign of my dishonour. You bear my -name—my untainted name—and yet you were begotten by him.'</p> - -<p>Bela dropped down at her feet as his father had done.</p> - -<p>'Oh, do not look at me so,' he sobbed. 'Oh, mother, what have I done? -I have tried to be good all this while. He is gone away, and he is so -unhappy, and he bade me never vex or disobey you, and I never will.'</p> - -<p>His voice was broken in his sobs, and he leaned his head upon her -knees, and clasped them with both his arms. She looked down on him, and -drew a deep shuddering breath. The holiest joy of a woman's life was, -for her, poisoned at the springs.</p> - -<p>Then, at the child's clinging embrace, at his piteous and innocent -grief, the motherhood in her welled up under the frost of her heart, -and all its long-suffering and infinite tenderness revived, and -overcame the horror that wrestled with it. She raised him up and -strained him to her breast.</p> - -<p>'You are mine, you are mine!' she murmured over him. 'I must forget all -else.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXXIX">CHAPTER XXXIX.</a></h4> - - -<p>He spring dawned once more on Hohenszalras, and the summer followed it. -The waters leapt, the woods rejoiced, the gardens blossomed, and the -children played; but the house was silent as a house in which the dead -are tying. There was indeed a corpse there—the corpse of buried joy, -of murdered love, of ruined honour.</p> - -<p>The household resumed its calm order, the routine of the days was -unbroken, the quiet yet stately life had been taken up in its course -as though it had never been altered; and wherever young children are -there will always be some shout of mirth, some sound of happy laughter -somewhere; the children laugh as the birds sing, though those amidst -them bury their dead.</p> - -<p>But the house was as a house of mourning, and the sense of death was -there as utterly as though he who was gone had been laid in his grave -amidst the silver figures and the marble tombs in the Chapel of the -Knights. No one ever heard a sigh from her lips, or ever saw the tears -beneath her eyelids; but the sense of her bereavement, as one terrible, -inconsolable, eternal, weighed like a pall on all those who were about -her; the lowliest peasant on her estates understood that the sanctity -of some untold woe had built up a wall of granite between her and all -the living world.</p> - -<p>She had always been grateful to fate for her old home set amidst the -silence of the mountains, but she had never been so thankful for it -as now. It shielded her from all the observation and interrogation of -the world; no one came thither unbidden, unless she chose, no visitant -would ever break that absolute solitude which was the sole approach -to peace that she would ever know. Even her relatives could not pass -the icy barrier of her cold denial. They wearied her for a while with -written importunities and suggestions, hinted wonder, delicately -expressed questions. But they made no way into her confidence; they -soon left her to herself and to her children. They said angrily to -themselves that she had been always whimsical and a solitary; they -had been certain that soon or late that ill-advised union would be -dissolved in some way, private or public. They were all people haughty, -sensitive, abhorrent of scandal; they were content that the separation -should be by mutual consent and noiseless.</p> - -<p>She had had letters from Egon Vàsàrhely full of delicate tenderness; in -the last he had asked with humility if he might visit Hohenszalras. She -had written in return to him:</p> - -<p>'You have my gratitude and my affection, but until we are quite old we -will not meet. Leave me alone; you can do naught for me.'</p> - -<p>He obeyed; he understood the loyalty to one disloyal which made her -refuse to meet him, of whose loyalty she was so sure.</p> - -<p>He sent a magnificent present to the child who was his namesake, and -wrote to her no more save upon formal anniversaries.</p> - -<p>The screen of her dark forests protected her from all the cruel comment -and examination of the men and women of her world. She knew them well -enough to know that when she ceased to appear amidst them, when she -ceased to contribute to their entertainment, when she ceased to bid -them to her houses, she would soon cease also to be remembered by them; -even their wonder would live but for a day. If they blamed her in their -ignorance, their blame would be as indifferent as their praise had -been.</p> - -<p>She had been told by her lawyers that her husband had refused to touch -a coin of the revenues of Idrac, and had once visited them to sign a -power of procuration, whereby they could receive those revenues and set -them aside in accumulation for his son Gela. That was all she heard. -Whither he had gone she was ignorant. She did not make any effort to -learn. On the night following his departure a peasant had been sent -with the sleigh and horses home to Hohenszalras. The solicitors of -Salzburg had seen him a week or two later at their ancient offices -under the Calvarienburg: that was all. She had bade him let it be -forgotten that he had ever lived beside her. He had obeyed her.</p> - -<p>The days, and weeks, and months went on, and his place knew him no -more. The jägers, seated round their fires in their forest-huts, spoke -longingly and wonderingly of his absence. The hunters, when they -brought down a steinbock with unusual effort or skill, said that it had -been a shot that would have been worthy of his praise. His old friend -wept for him with the slow sad tears of age, and the child Bela prayed -for his return every night that he knelt down before his crucifix. But -his name never passed his wife's lips, and was never written by her -hand. She had given her all with the superb generosity of a sovereign; -she had in her wrongs the intense abiding unutterable disgust of a -sovereign betrayed and outraged. When she let grief have its way, it -was when no eyes beheld her, when the night was down and solitude -sheltered her.</p> - -<p>She had never spoken of what had befallen her to any human ear; not -even to her priest's. The horror of it was buried in her own breast; -its sepulchre all the waste and ashes of her perished joys.</p> - -<p>When the Princess Ottilie, weeping, entreated to be told the worst, she -answered briefly:</p> - -<p>'He betrayed me. How, matters nothing.'</p> - -<p>More than that she never said. The Princess supposed that she spoke -of the disloyalty of the passions, and dared not urge her to more -confidence. 'I warned him that she would never forgive if he were -faithless,' she thought, and wept for hours at her orisons, her gentle -soul resenting the inflexibility of this mute immutable bitterness of -offended love.</p> - -<p>Too proud and too delicate to intrude undesired into any confidence, -and too tenderhearted to utter censure aloud to one she loved, the -Princess showed in a thousand ways without speech that she considered -there were cruelty and egotism in her unexplained separation from -her husband. Believing as she did that his offence was that conjugal -infidelity which, however blameable, is one of those injuries which -all women who love forgive, and which those who do not love endure in -silence from patience and dignity, herself offended at her exclusion -from all knowledge of the facts, she said but little; but her whole -attitude was one of restrained reproach.</p> - -<p>'With time she will change,' she said to herself. But time passed on, -and she could see no change, nor any hope of it.</p> - -<p>The grave severe beauty of their mother had a vague terror for her -children. She never now smiled at their mirth, laughed at their sports, -or joined in their pastimes. She was almost always silent. Bela longed -to throw his arms about her knees, and cry out to her: 'Mother, -mother, where is <i>he?</i>' But he did not venture to do so. Without his -reasoning upon it, the child instinctively felt that her frozen calm -covered depths of suffering which he did not dare disturb. He had been -so completely terrified once, that the remembrance of that hour lay -like ice upon his bright courage. Even the younger ones felt something -of the same fear. Their mother remembered them, cared for them, was -heedful that their needs of body and of brain were perfectly supplied. -But they felt, as young children feel what they cannot explain, that -they were outside her life, insufficient for her, even fraught with -intense pain to her. Often when she stooped to kiss them a shudder -passed over her; often when they came into her presence she looked away -from them, as though the sight of them stung and blinded her. They -never heard an angry word from her lips, but even repeated anger would -have kept them at less distance from her than did that mute majesty of -a grief they could not comprehend.</p> - -<p>She was more severe to all her dependants; she never became unjust, -but she was often stern; the children at the schools saw her smile no -more. Santa Claus still filled their stockings on Christmas Eve; but of -the stately figure which moved amidst them, robed in black, they grew -afraid. She seldom went to them or to her peasantry. Bela and Gela were -sent with her winter gifts. In the summer the sennerins never now saw -her enter their high huts and drink a cup of milk, talking with them of -their herds and flocks.</p> - -<p>She was tranquil as of old. She fulfilled the duties of her properties, -and attended to all the demands made upon her by her people; her -liberalities were unchanged, her justice was unwarped, her mind was -clear and keen. But she never smiled, even on her young daughter; and -the little Lili said once to her brothers:</p> - -<p>'Do you know, I think our mother is changing to marble. She will soon -be of stone, like the statues in the chapel. When I touch her I feel -cold.'</p> - -<p>Bela was angered.</p> - -<p>'You are ungrateful, you little child,' he said to his sister. 'Who -loves us, who cares for us, who thinks of us, as our mother does? If -her lips are cold, perhaps her heart is broken. We are only children; -we can do so little.'</p> - -<p>He had treasured the words of his father in his soul. He had never -told them, except to Gela, but they were always present to him. He -alone had seen and heard enough to understand that some dire disaster -had shattered in pieces the beautiful life which his parents had led -together. He had received an indelible impression from the two scenes -of that evening. Without comprehending, he had felt that something -had befallen them, which struck at their honour no less than at -their peace. He had a clear conception of what honour was; it was -the first tuition that Wanda von Szalras gave her children. Vague as -his understanding of their grief had been, it had been sufficient -to strike at that pride winch was inborn in him. He was like the -Dauphin of whom he had thought in Paris. He had seen his father driven -from his throne; he had seen his mother in the sackcloth and ashes -of affliction. He was humiliated, bewildered, softened; he, who had -believed himself omnipotent because all the people of the Iselthal ran -to do his bidding, felt how helpless he was in truth. He was shut out -from his mother's confidence; he had been powerless to console her or -to retain his father; there was something even in himself from which -his mother shrank. What had his father said? 'She will in time pardon -you for being mine.' What had been the meaning of those strange words? -And where had his father gone?</p> - -<p>When the summer came and Bela rode through the glad green woods, his -heart was heavy. Would his father never ride there any more? Bela -had often watched, himself unseen, the fiery horse that bore the -man he loved come plunging and leaping through bough and brake till -it passed him as though the wind bore it. He had always thought as -he had watched, 'When I grow up I will be just what he is'; and now -that splendid and gracious figure which had been always present on -the horizon of his child's mind, magnified and glorified like the -illuminated figures in the painted chronicles, was no more there—had -faded utterly away in the dusk and the snow of that wintry twilight.</p> - -<p>A thousand times was the question to his mother on his lips: 'Will he -never come back? Shall we never see him again?' But he dared not speak -it when he saw that look of a revulsion they could not comprehend -always upon her face.</p> - -<p>'He bade me never vex her,' Bela thought, and obeyed.</p> - -<p>'I wonder if ever he think of us,' he said once to Gela, as their -ponies walked down one of the grassy rides of the home woods.</p> - -<p>'Perhaps he is dead,' said Gela, in a hushed, wistful voice.</p> - -<p>'How dare you say that, Gela?' said his brother, angry from an -intolerable pain. 'If he were—were—<i>that</i>, we should be told it. -There would be masses in the chapel. We should have black clothes. Oh -no! he is not dead. I should know it, I am sure I should know it. He -would send down some angel to tell me.'</p> - -<p>'Why do you care so much for him?' said Gela, very low. 'It must be he -who has made our mother so changed, so unhappy; and it is she whom we -should love most. You say even he told you so.'</p> - -<p>Bela's lips unclosed to loose an angry answer. He was thinking; 'It is -she who sent him away, she who made him weep.' But his loyalty checked -it; he would not utter what he thought, even to his brother.</p> - -<p>'I think he would not wish us to talk of it,' he said gravely and -sadly. 'We will pray for him; that is all we can do.'</p> - -<p>'And for her,' said Gela, under his breath.</p> - -<p>They were both mute, and let the bridles lie on their ponies' necks as -they rode home quietly and sorrowfully in the still summer afternoon to -the great house, which, with all its thousand casements gleaming in the -sun, seemed to them so silent, so empty, so deserted now. Bela looked -up at the banner, with its deep red and its blazoned gold streaming on -a westerly wind. 'The flag would be half-mast high if it were <i>that</i>,' -he thought, his heart wrung by the dread which Gela had suggested to -him. He had seen the banner lowered when Prince Lilienhöhe had died.</p> - -<p>On the lawn under the terrace the other children were playing with -little painted balloons; the boys did not go to them, but riding round -to the stables entered the house by the side entrance. Gela went to his -violin, which he loved better than any toy, and studied seriously. -Bela wandered wearily over the building, tormented by the doubt which -his brother had put in his thoughts. They were always enjoined to keep -to their own wing of the house; but he often broke the rule, as he did -most others. He walked listlessly along the innumerable galleries, and -up and down the grand staircases, his St. Hubert hound following his -steps. His face was very pale, his little hands were folded behind -his back, his head was bent. He knew that the Latin and Greek for the -morrow were all unprepared, but he could not think of them. He was -thinking only: 'If it should be, if it should be?'</p> - -<p>He came at last to the door of the library. It was there that his -mother now spent most of her time. She took long rides alone, always -alone; and often chose for them the wildest weather. When she was -indoors, she passed her time in unremitting application to all the -business of her estates. He opened the great oak door very softly, and -saw her seated at the table; Donau and Neva, who now were old, were -lying near her feet. She was studying some papers. The sunset glow came -through the painted casements and warmed all the light about her, but -by its contrast, her attitude, her expression, her features, looked -only the graver, the colder, the more colourless. Her gown was black, -her pearls were about her throat, her profile was severe, her cheek, -turned to the light, was pale and thin. She did not see the little -gallant figure of her son in his white summer riding-clothes, and with -his golden hair cut across his brows, looking like a boy's portrait by -Reynolds.</p> - -<p>He stood a moment irresolute; then he went across the long room and -stood before her, and bowed as he knew he ought to do. She started and -turned her head and saw the pallor of the child's face. She put out her -hand to him; it was very thin, and the rings were large upon it. He -saw a contraction on her features as of pain; it was but of a moment, -because he looked so like his father.—</p> - -<p>'What is it, Bela?' she said to him. 'You ought not to come here.'</p> - -<p>His lower lip quivered. He hesitated; then, gathering all his courage, -said timidly:</p> - -<p>'May I ask you just one thing?'</p> - -<p>'Surely, my child—are you afraid of me?'</p> - -<p>It struck her, with a sudden sense of contrition, that she had made the -children afraid of her. She had never thought of it before.</p> - -<p>Bela hesitated once more, then said boldly: Gela said to day <i>he</i> might -be dead. Oh, if he ever die, will you please tell me? I shall think of -it day and night.'</p> - -<p>Her face changed terribly; the darker passions of her nature were -spoken on it.</p> - -<p>'I have forbidden you to speak of your father, if it be him you mean,' -she said sternly and very coldly.</p> - -<p>But Bela, though frightened, clung to his one thought.</p> - -<p>'But he may die!' he said piteously. 'Will you tell me? Please, will -you tell me? He might be dead now—we never hear.'</p> - -<p>She leaned her arm upon the table, and covered her eyes with her hand. -She was silent. She strove with herself so as not to treat the child -with harshness. Though he hurt her so cruelly, he was right. She -honoured him for his courage.</p> - -<p>'If you will only tell me that,' said the boy, with tears in his -throat, 'I will never ask anything else—never—never!'</p> - -<p>'Why do you cling so to his memory?' she said, with a sudden impatience -of jealousy. 'He never took heed of you.'</p> - -<p>'I was so little,' said Bela, with a sigh. 'But I loved him—oh! I have -always loved him—and I was the last to see him that night.'</p> - -<p>'I know!' she said harshly, ashamed meanwhile of her own harshness, for -how could the child suspect the torture his words were to her? What -had his father given her beautiful boy?—disgraced descent, sullied -blood, the heritage of falsehood and of dishonour. Yet the boy loved -his memory better than he loved her presence. And the time had been, -not so long passed, when she would have recognised the preference with -fond and generous delight.</p> - -<p>Bela stood beside her, his eyes watching her with timid interrogation, -with longing appeal. The look upon his face went to her heart. She knew -not what to say to him. She had hoped he would be always silent, and -forget, as children usually forget.</p> - -<p>'You are right to feel so,' she said to him at last, with a violent -effort. 'Cherish his memory, and pray for him always; but do not speak -of him to me. When you are grown to manhood, if I be living then, you -shall hear what has parted your father and me; you shall judge us -yourself. But there are many years to that; many weary years for me. -I shall endeavour that they shall be happy ones for you; but you must -never ask me, never speak, of him. I gave you that command that night; -but you are very young, you have forgotten.'</p> - -<p>Bela listened with a sinking heart. He gathered from her words that -his father's absence was, as he had feared, for ever.</p> - -<p>'I had not forgotten,' he said in a whisper, for the moment was -terrible to him. 'But if—if what Gela said should ever be, will you -tell me that? I will not disobey again, but pray—pray—tell me <i>that.</i>'</p> - -<p>His mother's face seemed to him to grow colder and colder, paler and -paler, till she scarcely looked a living woman.</p> - -<p>'I will tell you—if I know,' she said, with a pause between each slow -spoken word. Then the only smile that had come upon her lips for many -months came there; a smile sadder than tears, more bitter than all -scorn.</p> - -<p>'He will outlive me, fear not,' she said, as she put out her hand to -the child. 'Now leave me, my dear; I am occupied.'</p> - -<p>Bela touched her hand with his lips, which, despite his will, quivered -as he did so. He felt that he had failed, that he had disobeyed and -hurt her, that he had been unable to show one tenth of all the feelings -which choked him with their force and longing. He hung his head as -he went sorrowfully away. 'She may not know! She may not know!' he -thought, with terror.</p> - -<p>He looked back at her timidly as he closed the door. She had resumed -her writing; the red sunset light fell on her black gown, on her -stately head, on her profile, cut clear as on a cameo.</p> - -<p>He dared not return.</p> - -<p>The mother whom he had known in other years, on whose knee he had -rested his head as she told him tales in the twilight hour, whose hand -had caressed his curls, whose smile had rewarded his stammering Latin -or his hardly achieved line of handwriting, who had stooped over him -in his drowsy dreams, and made him think of angels, the mother who had -said to Egon Vàsàrhely: 'This is my Bela: love him a little for my -sake,' seemed as far from him as though she were lying in her tomb.</p> - -<p>She, when the tapestry had fallen behind the slender figure of her -little son, continued to write on. It was hard, dry matter that she -wrote of; the condition of her miners amongst the silver ore of the -north-east. She forced her mind to it, she compelled her will and -her hand; that was all. These things depended on her; she would not -neglect them, she strove to find in them that distraction which lighter -natures seek in pleasure. But in vain she now endeavoured to compel her -attention to the details she was following and correcting; soon they -became to her so confused that they were unintelligible; for once her -intelligence refused to obey her will. The child's words haunted her. -She laid down her pen, pushed aside the reports and the letter in which -she was replying to them, and rising paced to and fro the long polished -floor of the library.</p> - -<p>It was here that he had first bowed before her on that night when -Hohenszalras had sheltered him from the storm.</p> - -<p>'We had a mass of thanksgiving!' she thought.</p> - -<p>The child's words haunted her. Not to know even <i>that</i> when they had -passed nine years together in the closest of all human ties! For the -first time the misgiving came to her, had she been too harsh? No; it -would have been impossible to have done less; many would have done far -more in chastisement of the fraud upon their honour and good faith. -Yet as she recalled their many hours of joy it seemed as if she had -remembered these too little. Then again she scouted her own weakness. -What had been all his life beside her save one elaborate lie?</p> - -<p>The broad shafts of the blazing sunset slanted across the inlaid woods -of the floor which she paced; the windows were open, the birds sang in -the rose boughs and ivy without. The summers would come thus, one after -another, with their intolerable light, and the intolerable laughter of -the unconscious children; and she would carry her burden through them, -though the day was for ever dark for her.</p> - -<p>Time had been when she had thought that she should die if he were lost -to her; but she lived on and marvelled at herself. Her very soul seemed -to have gone from her with the destruction of her love. Her body seemed -to her but a mere shell, an inanimate pulseless thing. The only thing -that seemed alive in her was shame.</p> - -<p>She paced now up and down the long room while the sunset died and the -grey evening dulled the painted panes of the casements. The boy's -question had pierced through her frozen serenity. It was true that she -had no knowledge where his father was; he might be dead, he might be -killed by his own hand—she knew nothing. She had bidden him let her -forget that he had ever lived beside her, and he had obeyed her. He -might be in the world of men, careless and content, consoled by others, -or he might be in his grave.</p> - -<p>All she knew was that he never touched the revenues of Idrac.</p> - -<p>She paused on the same spot where he had stood before her first, with -his fair beauty, his courtier's smile, his easy grace, the very prince -of gentlemen; and her hands clenched the folds of her gown as she -thought—'the first of actors! Nothing more.'</p> - -<p>And she, Wanda von Szalras, had been the dupe of that inimitable -mimicry and mockery!</p> - -<p>The thought was like a rusted iron, eating deeper and deeper into her -heart each day. When her consciousness, her memory, would have said -otherwise, would have told her that in much he was loyal and sincere, -though in one great thing he had been false, she would not trust -herself to hearken to the suggestion. 'Let me see clearly, though I die -of what I see!' she said in her soul. She would be blind no more. She -hated herself that she had been ever blind.</p> - -<p>She had been always his dupe, from the first sonorous phrases she had -heard him utter in the French Chamber to the last sentence with which -he had left her when he went from her to the presence of Olga Brancka. -So she believed. Here she did him wrong; but how was she to tell that? -To her it seemed but one long-sustained comedy, one brilliant and -hateful imposture.</p> - -<p>Sometimes his cry to her rang in her ears: 'Believe at least that I -did love you!' and some subtle true instinct in her whispered to her -that he had there been sincere, that in passion and devotion at least -he had never been false. But she thrust the thought away; it seemed but -another form of self-deception.</p> - -<p>The dull slow evening passed as usual; it was late in summer and the -night came early. She dined in company with Madame Ottilie and sat with -her as usual afterwards. The room seemed full of his voice, of his -laughter, of the music of which he had had such mastery.</p> - -<p>She never opened her lips to say to the Princess Ottilie: 'But for you -he would have passed from my life a mere stranger, seen but once.' -But the tender conscience of the Princess made her feel the bitterest -reproach every time that the eyes of her niece met her own, every time -that she passed the blank space in the picture gallery where once had -hung the portrait of Sabran, painted in court dress by Mackart. The -portrait was locked away in a dark closet that opened out from the -oratory of his wife. With its emblazoned arms and marquis's coronet on -the frame, it had seemed such a perpetual record of his sin that she -had had it taken from the wall and shut in darkness, feeling that it -could not hang in its falsehood amidst the portraits of her people. But -often she opened the door of her oratory and let the light stream upon -the portrait where it leaned against the closet wall. It seemed then as -if he stood living before her, looking as he had looked so often at the -banquets and balls of the Hofburg, when she had felt so much pride in -his personal beauty, his grace of bearing, his supreme distinction.</p> - -<p>'Who could have dreamed that it was but a perfect comedy,' she thought, -'as much a comedy as Got's or Bressant's!'</p> - -<p>Then her conscience smote her with a sense that she did him injustice -when she thought so. In all things save his one crime he had been -as true a gentleman as any of the great nobles of the empire. His -intelligence, his bearing, his habits, his person, were all those of a -patrician of the highest culture. The fraud of his name apart, there -had been nothing in him that the most fastidious aristocrats would -have disowned. He had inherited the qualities of a race of princes, -though he had been descended unlawfully from them. His title had been -a borrowed thing, unlawfully worn; but his supreme distinction of -manner, his tact, his bodily grace, that large and temperate view of -men and things which marks a gentleman, these had all been inborn and -natural to him. He had been no mere actor when he had moved through -a throne-room by her side. Her calmer reason told her this, but her -instincts of candour and of pride made her deny that where there was -one fraud there could be any truth.</p> - -<p>She span on now at her ivory wheel because it was mere mechanical work, -which left thought free. The Princess, in lieu of slumbering, looked at -her ever and again. Suddenly she gathered her courage and spoke.</p> - -<p>'Wanda, you are a Christian woman,' she said slowly and softly. 'Is it -Christian never to forgive?'</p> - -<p>Her face did not change as she turned the spinning-wheel.</p> - -<p>'What is forgiveness?' she said coldly. 'Is it abstinence from -vengeance? I have abstained.'</p> - -<p>'It is far more than that!'</p> - -<p>'Then I do not reach it.'</p> - -<p>'No; you do not. That is why I presumed to ask you, is it in consonance -with your tenets, with your duties?'</p> - -<p>'I think so.'</p> - -<p>'Then change your creed,' said the Princess.</p> - -<p>A sombre wrath shone in her eyes as she looked up one moment.</p> - -<p>'I have the blood in me of men who were not always Christians, but who, -even when Pagan, knew what honour was. There are some things which are -so vile that one must be vile oneself before one can forgive them.'</p> - -<p>The Princess sighed.</p> - -<p>'I am in ignorance of the nature of your wrongs; but this I know—they -erred who gave you absolution at Eastertide, whilst you still bore -bitterness in your soul.'</p> - -<p>'Would I lay bare my soul and his shame now to any priest?' thought -Wanda; but she repressed the answer. She said simply: 'Dear mother, -believe me, I have been more merciful than many would have been.'</p> - -<p>'You mean that you have not sought for a divorce? Nay, that is not -mercy; that is decency, dignity, self-respect. When they of a great -race go to the public with their wrongs they drag their escutcheon in -the mud for the pleasure of the crowd. That you have not done; that is -not mercy. You do but follow your instincts; you are a gentlewoman.'</p> - -<p>A momentary impulse came over her, as she heard, to tell her companion -his sin and her own shame; the woman's weakness, desiring sympathy -and comprehension, assailed her for an instant. But she resisted and -repressed it. The Princess Ottilie was aged and feeble. She had had no -slight share in bringing about this union, which was now so cruelly -broken; she had been ever proud of her penetration and devoted to his -defence. To learn the truth would be a shock so terrible to her that -it must needs be veiled from her for ever. Besides, his wife felt as -though the relation would blister her lips were she to make it even to -her oldest friend.</p> - -<p>Had she known all, the elder woman would have been even more bitter -in her hatred, even more inflexible in her sense of outrage than she -herself; but she could not purchase sympathy at such a price. She chose -rather to be herself condemned.</p> - -<p>Offended, the Princess rose slowly to go to her own apartments. The -tears welled painfully in her eyes.</p> - -<p>'You were so happy, he was so devoted,' she murmured. 'Can all that -have crumbled like a house of sand?'</p> - -<p>Wanda von Szalras said bitterly:</p> - -<p>'What did I say once, the day of my betrothal? That I leaned on a reed. -The reed has withered, that is all. You see, I can stand without it.'</p> - -<p>She conducted her aunt to her bedchamber with the usual courteous -observances; then returned and sat long alone in the silent chamber.</p> - -<p>'Forgive! what is the obligation of forgiveness?' she thought. 'It is -the obligation to pardon offences, infidelity, unkindness, cruelty, but -not dishonour. To forgive dishonour is to be dishonoured. So would my -fathers have said.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XL" id="CHAPTER_XL">CHAPTER XL.</a></h4> - - -<p>Bela that dawn was awakened by his mother standing beside his bed. She -stooped and touched his curls with her lips.</p> - -<p>'I was harsh to you yesterday, my child,' she said to him. 'I come to -tell you now that you were quite right to have the thought you had. You -are his son; you must not forget him.'</p> - -<p>Bela lifted up his beautiful flushed face and his eye brilliant from -sleep.</p> - -<p>'I am glad I may remember,' he said simply; then he added, with his -cheeks burning: 'When I am a man I will go and find him and bring him -back.'</p> - -<p>His mother turned away her face.</p> - -<p>When his manhood should come and he should hear the story of his -father's sin, what would he say? Would not all his soul cry out aloud -and curse the impostor who had begotten him?</p> - -<p>The eyes of Bela followed the dark form of his mother as she passed -from his room.</p> - -<p>'She is very unhappy,' he thought wistfully. 'If I could find him -<i>now</i>, would it make her happy again, I wonder?'</p> - -<p>And the chivalry that was in his blood stirred in his childish veins.</p> - -<p>'But you said that she sent him away?' whispered Gela, when Bela got -upon his brother's bed and confided his thoughts to him.</p> - -<p>'I did think so; but I might mistake,' said Bela. 'Perhaps he went -because he was obliged, and that it is which grieves her.'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps,' said Gela, meditatively.</p> - -<p>'If I only knew where to go to find him I would go all over the world,' -said Bela, with passion. 'I would ride Folko to the earth's very, very, -end to reach him.'</p> - -<p>'You could not get over the seas so,' said Gela; 'and he may be over -the seas.'</p> - -<p>'And we have never even seen the sea!' said Bela, to whom the suggested -distance seemed more terrible than he had ever imagined. 'What can we -do, Gela, do you think? you are clever about everything.'</p> - -<p>Gela was silent a moment.</p> - -<p>'Let us pray for him with all our might,' he said solemnly; and the two -little boys knelt down by the bedside in their little nightshirts and -prayed together for their father.</p> - -<p>When Bela rose his face was very troubled, but very resolute. He drew -out of its sheath a small sword with a handle of gold, which Egon -Vàsàrhely had sent him years before. 'One must pray first,' he thought, -'but afterwards one must help oneself. God does not care for cowards.'</p> - -<p>In the day he went out all alone and found Otto; the children were -allowed to go over the home woods at their pleasure. The <i>jägermeister</i> -was very dear to Bela, for he told such wondrous tales of sport and -danger, and spoke with such reverent affection of his lost lord.</p> - -<p>'Where <i>can</i> he be, Otto?' said the child now, in a low hushed voice, -as they sat under the green oak boughs.</p> - -<p>'Ah, my little Count, if only I knew!' said Otto. 'I would walk a -thousand miles to him, and take him the first blackcock that shall fall -to my gun this autumn.'</p> - -<p>'You really say the truth? You do not know?' said Bela, with stern -questioning eyes.</p> - -<p>'Would I tell a lie, my little lord?' said the old hunter, -reproachfully. 'Since your father drove away that cruel night none of -us have set eyes on him, or ever heard a word. If Her Excellency do not -know, how should we?'</p> - -<p>'I mean to find him,' said the child, solemnly.</p> - -<p>The old man sighed.</p> - -<p>'How should you do that? Our hills are between us and all the rest of -the world. Perhaps he is gone because he was tired of being here.'</p> - -<p>'No,' said Bela, who remembered his father's farewell to him, of which -he could never bring himself to speak to any living creature.</p> - -<p>Otto was silent too: he could not tell the child what all the household -believed—that his father had found too great a charm in the presence -of the Countess Brancka.</p> - -<p>The weeks and months stole on their course, which in the forest-heart -of the old Archduchy seems so leisurely beside the feverish haste of -the mad world. The ways of life went on unchanged; the children throve, -and studied, and played, and grew apace; the health of the Princess -became more delicate, and her strength more feeble; the seasons -succeeded each other with monotony; no sound from the cities of men -that lay beyond the ramparts of the glaciers broke the silence and the -calm of Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>Wanda herself would not have known that one year was different to -another had she not been forced to count time by the inches which it -added to the stature of her offspring, and the recurrence of the days -of their patron saints. They grew as fast as reeds in peaceful waters, -and forced her to recognise that the years were dropping into the past. -Time for her was shod with lead, and crept tamely, like a cripple upon -broken ground. For the children's sake she lived; but for them she -knew not why she rose to these long, colourless, lonely hours. But -her corporeal life ailed nothing, whilst her spiritual life was sick -unto death. Almost she could have wished for the lassitude of weakness -to dull her pain; her bodily strength seemed to intensify what she -suffered.</p> - -<p>In the frosted brilliant winter time she still drove her fiery horses -over the snow that was like marble, plunging into the recesses of the -woods, seeing above her the ramparts, and bastions, and pinnacles of -the great ice-range of the Glöckner glaciers. The intense cold, the -rushing air, the whiteness as of a virgin earth, the sense of profound -solitude, did her good, cooled the sense of shame that seemed burnt -into her life, soothed the anguish of a love fooled, betrayed, and -widowed. She felt with horror that the longer she kneeled beside -the altar, the longer she prayed before the great Christ in her -chapel, the more passionately she rebelled against the fate that had -overtaken her. But, alone in the rarefied air, with the vastness of -the mountains about her, with the cold wind pouring like spring water -down a thirsty throat in its merciful coldness, with the white peaks -meeting the starry skies, and the waters hushed in their shroud of ice, -she gathered some kind of peace, some power of endurance: consolation -neither earth nor heaven could give to her.</p> - -<p>Of him she never heard. She could only have heard through her lawyers, -and they knew nothing. Neither in Paris nor in Vienna was he seen. By -a letter she received from the priest of Romaris she had learned that -he was not there. She had sent one of her men of business thither with -money and plans, to build on the site of the old house of the Sabrans a -Maison de Dieu for the aged and sick fishermen of the coast and their -widows.' It will be a <i>chapelle expiatoire</i>,' she had thought bitterly, -and she had endowed it richly, so that it should be independent of -all those who should come after her. In all the occupations entailed -by this and similar projects she was as attentive as of yore to all -demands made on her.</p> - -<p>When she perused a lawyer's long preamble, or corrected an architect's -estimates and drawings, she was the same woman as she had been ere her -betrayer had crossed the threshold of her home. Her character had been -built on lines too strong, on a base too firm, for the earthquake of -calamity, the whirlwind of passion, to undo it. But in her heart there -was utter shipwreck. She had given herself and all that was hers with -magnificent generosity; and she had received in return betrayal and a -dishonour under which day and night all the patrician in her writhed -and suffered.</p> - -<p>When in the autumn of that year Cardinal Vàsàrhely, travelling in great -state from Buda Pesth, arrived at Hohenszalras—a guest whom none -could deny, a judge whom none could evade—he did not spare her open -interrogation, searching censure, stern rebuke.</p> - -<p>The Lilienhöhe she had excused herself from receiving; the Kaulnitz she -had also refused; others as nearly related to her had encountered the -same resistance to their overtures; but Cardinal Vàsàrhely came to take -up his residence at the Holy Isle, with the weight of authority and the -sanctity of the Church.</p> - -<p>He visited his niece for the sole purpose of remonstrance. When he -found himself met by a respectful but firm refusal to acquaint him -with the reasons for her conduct, he did not, either, spare her the -stately wrath of the incensed ecclesiastic. He was a man of noble -presence, and of austere if arrogant life. He spoke with all the weight -of his sixty years and of his eminence in the service of the Church. -His eyes were bent on her in stern scrutiny as he stood drawn up to all -his great height beside her in the library.</p> - -<p>'If your griefs against your husband,' he urged, 'are of sufficient -gravity to justify you in desiring eternal separation from him, you -should not lean merely upon your own strength. You should seek the -support of your spiritual counsellors. Although the Holy Church has -never sanctioned the concubinage which the laws of men have called by -the name of divorce; yet, as you are aware, my daughter, in extreme -cases the Holy Father has himself deigned to unloose an unworthy bond, -to annul an unsuitable marriage. In your case, if the offences of your -lord have been so grave, I make no doubt that by my intercession with -His Sanctity it would be possible to dissolve an union which has become -unholy.'</p> - -<p>She met his gaze calmly and coldly.</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence is very good to interest yourself in my sorrows,' she -replied; 'but for the intercession with our Holy Father which you -offer, I will not trouble you. Whatever the offences of my husband be -against me, they can concern me alone. I have summoned no one to hear -them. I seek no one's judgment. As regards the power of the Supreme -Pontiff to bind and loose, I would bow to it in all matters spiritual, -but I cannot admit that even he can release me from an earthly tie -which I voluntarily assumed.'</p> - -<p>A rebuking wrath flashed from the eagle eyes of the great Churchman.</p> - -<p>'I did not think that Wanda von Szalras would heretically deny the Pope -his power over all souls!' he said sternly. 'Are you not aware that -when the Holy Father deigns in his mercifulness to decree a marriage as -null and void, it becomes so from that instant? It is as though it had -never been; the union is effaced, the woman is decreed pure.'</p> - -<p>'And the children,' she said bitterly; 'can the Holy Father efface -<i>them?</i>'</p> - -<p>The Cardinal was affronted and appalled.</p> - -<p>'You would call in question the infallible omnipotence of the Head of -the Church!' he said with horror.</p> - -<p>'The days of miracles are past,' she said coldly. 'I shall not entreat -for them to be wrought for me. I trust your Eminence will pardon me if -I say that no human, nay, no heavenly, permission could legitimate -adultery in my sight or in my person.'</p> - -<p>'You merit excommunication, my daughter,' said the haughty prelate, -his brow black with wrath. He saw no reason why this marriage, which -had offended all her house, should not be annulled by the all-powerful -verdict of the Vatican. Such cases were rare, but it would be possible -to include hers amongst them. The children could be consigned to -religious houses, brought up to religious lives, unknown to and -unknowing of the world.</p> - -<p>'If the man whom you chose to wed,' he continued sternly, 'has offended -or outraged you so greatly, let your relatives judge him and deal with -him. You were warned against the gift of your hand to a stranger with -an uncertain past behind him; he had not the eminence, the repute, the -character that should have been demanded in your husband. But you were -inflexible in your resolve then, as you are now in your silence.'</p> - -<p>'I know of no one living to whom I owe any account,' she said with -haughty decision; 'no one to whom I was bound to lay bare my mind and -heart then, or to whom I am so bound now.'</p> - -<p>'You are so bound every time you kneel in the confessional.'</p> - -<p>'To reveal my own sins, perchance, not his.'</p> - -<p>'Your soul should be as an open book before your priest.'</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence will pardon me. I bow willingly and reverently to the -Church in all matters spiritual, but in the rule of my own conduct I -admit no guide but my conscience. My sorrows are all my own. No priest -or layman shall intrude upon them.'</p> - -<p>She spoke with peremptory and unyielding decision; the old spirit of -her race was aroused in her, which in times bygone had bearded popes -and monarchs, and braved the thunders of excommunication. They had been -pious sons of Rome, but yet ofttimes rebellious ones; when their honour -called one way and the priests pointed the other, they had lifted their -swords in the sunlight and gone whither honour bade.</p> - -<p>The Churchman knew that power of secular revolt which had been always -latent in the Szalras blood; he knew now that, armed with the weapons -of the Church though he was, he might as well seek to bow the mountains -down as bend her will. He took for granted that her wrongs were great -enough to entitle her to freedom; he had thought that she might wed -again with his nephew, who had loved her so long; their mighty fortunes -would have fitly met; this hateful union with a foreigner, a sceptic, -a debauchee, would have become a thing of the past, washed away into -absolute non-existence;—so he had dreamed, and he found himself -confronted with a woman's illogical inconsistency and obstinacy.</p> - -<p>He was deeply incensed. He assailed her for many days with all the -subtle arguments of the ecclesiastical armoury, but he made no -impression. She utterly refused to tell why she had exiled her husband -from her house, and she as utterly refused to take any measures to -attain her own freedom. When he left her he said a word of rebuke -that long lingered in her memory. 'You are rebellious and almost -heretical, my daughter. You entrench yourself in your silence and your -pride, which you appear to forget are heinous sins when opposed to -your spiritual superiors. But this only I will remind you of: if you -deny the Church the power to annul the union of which its sacrament -sanctified the consummation, be at least consistent: do not absolve -yourself from its duties.'</p> - -<p>With that keen home thrust in parting he left her, giving his blessing -to the kneeling household; and six white mules, always kept there in -readiness for his visits, bore him away through the embrowning woods.</p> - -<p>When he reached his palace in Buda he summoned Egon Vàsàrhely and -related what had passed.</p> - -<p>His nephew heard in silence.</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence erred in your judgment of Wanda,' he said at length. -'She would never make her wrongs, whatever they be, public, nor seek -for dissolution of her marriage. She may repent it, but she will repent -it in solitude.'</p> - -<p>'If the marriage be so sacred in her eyes,' said the angry prelate, -'let her continue to live with her husband. She has been a law to -herself; she has parted from him; where is the wifely submission there? -Where the sanctity of the immutable bond?'</p> - -<p>'Perhaps some day she will bid him return,' said Vàsàrhely, whose -features were very grave and pale.</p> - -<p>'She could forget this fatal folly like a bad dream,' continued the -Cardinal, unheeding. 'She could begin a new life; she could wed with -you.'</p> - -<p>'Your Eminence mistakes,' said Vàsàrhely, abruptly. 'Though that man -were dead ten times over, Wanda would never wed with me—nor I with -her.'</p> - -<p>'You are both wiser than the wisdom and holier than the holiness of the -Church,' said the incensed ecclesiastic, with boundless scorn. He was -accustomed to bend human volition like a willow wand in his hand.</p> - -<p>When she herself had left the terrace where she had parted from the -prelate, having accompanied him there in that stately etiquette which, -though she had been dying, habit would have compelled her to observe in -every detail, she had turned with a sense of intolerable pain from the -sunshine of the September day.</p> - -<p>It was a pretty scene that stretched before her, the children standing -bareheaded, the household hushed and kneeling still where the mighty -dignitary of the Mother Church had given them his benediction; the gold -embroideries and rich colours of the liveries glowing in the light; -the white mules and the scarlet-clothed attendants of the Cardinal -passing down the avenue of oaks, with the immediate background of the -darksome yews, and, further, the flushed foliage of the forests and the -shine of the snow peaks; but to her it was fraught with unendurable -associations. The central figure was missing from it which for so many -years had graced all pageants and conducted all ceremonies there. It -was the sole time since the exile of her husband that there had been -any arrival or departure at Hohenszalras.</p> - -<p>She had been compelled to receive the Cardinal with all due state and -observance, and the oppressiveness of his three days' sojourn had worn -and wearied her.</p> - -<p>'I would sooner receive five emperors than one Churchman,' she said to -the Princess. 'We are far from the days of the Apostles!'</p> - -<p>'Christ must be honoured in His Vicars,' said the Princess, coldly, and -with disapprobation chill on all her features.</p> - -<p>Wanda turned away as the white mules disappeared in a bend of the -avenue, and went into the house alone, whilst the children and the -household still lingered in the sunshine. She traversed the whole -length of the building to reach her octagon-room, where she was certain -to be alone. The interrogation and censure of her uncle had left on her -a harassed sense of being somewhere at fault: not to him, nor to the -Church he represented and invoked, but to her own Conscience.</p> - -<p>As she passed through one of the galleries she saw her youngest child -Egon, now nearly two years old, playing with his nurse, an old, grave -North German woman. They were the only living beings of the house who -had not been upon the terraces to receive the Cardinal's last blessing; -the one too young, the other too old to care. The child, with his fair -face and his light curls, was like the child Christ of Carlo Dolce, -yet there was the same resemblance in him to his father which pierced -her soul whenever she looked in the faces of her other offspring.</p> - -<p>She paused and stooped towards him now, where he played with a toy lamb -in the breadth of sunlight that fell warm and broad through the open -lattices of an oriel window, in the embrasure of which his attendant -was sitting. The baby looked up under his long dark lashes, and made a -little timid movement towards his nurse.</p> - -<p>'Is he afraid of me?' said Wanda, with the same vague sense of remorse -which she had felt before his eldest brother.</p> - -<p>'Oh no! he is not afraid, my lady,' said the old woman with him, -hurriedly. 'But he sees you so rarely now, and when they are so young -they are frightened at grave faces.'</p> - -<p>The nurse stopped herself, fearing she had said too much; but her -mistress listened without anger and with a sharp pang of self-reproach.</p> - -<p>'Come for him to my room when I ring,' she said; and she stooped again -and lifted the little boy in her arms.</p> - -<p>'Are you all afraid of me, my poor children,' she murmured to him. -'Surely I have never been cruel to you?'</p> - -<p>He did not understand; he was still frightened, but he put his arm -about her throat and hid his pretty face on her shoulder with a gesture -that was half terror, half confidence. She took him to her own room -and soothed and caressed and amused him, till he regained his natural -fearlessness and sat happy on her knee, playing with some Indian ivory -toys; then he grew tired, and leaned his head against her breast, and -fell asleep as prettily as a Star of Bethlehem shuts its white leaves -up at sunset.</p> - -<p>She watched him with an aching heart.</p> - -<p>She could look on none of her children without a throb of intolerable -shame. They were the symbols as they were the offspring of all her -hours of love. Another woman might have forgotten all except that they -were hers.</p> - -<p>She could not.</p> - -<p>From that day she had the younger children brought to her more often, -drove them out at times, and soon regained their affection, although -to them all a majesty and melancholy, as inseparable from her now as -shadows from the night, made her presence inspire them with a certain -awe; even Lili, the most willful of them all, in her pretty, gay, -childish vanity and naughtiness, never ventured to disobey or to weary -her.</p> - -<p>'When I am with her it is as if I were at Mass,' Lili said to her -brothers. 'You know what one feels when the Host comes and the bell -rings, and it is all so still, and only the Latin words——'</p> - -<p>'It is the presence of God that we feel at Mass,' said Gela, in a -hushed voice. 'And I think our mother has God with her very much. Only -He makes her sad.'</p> - -<p>'But she never does cry,' said her little daughter.</p> - -<p>'No,' said Gela, 'I think she is too sad for that. You know when it is -very, very cold the skies cannot rain. I think that it is just so cold -with her.'</p> - -<p>And Gela's own eyes filled, for he, the most thoughtful and the most -quick in perception of them all, adored his mother. When he could he -would sit in her presence for hours, mute and motionless, with a book -on his knees, glancing at her with his meditative eyes now and then in -rapt veneration.</p> - -<p>'When Bela grows up he will wander, I dare say, and perhaps be a great -soldier,' Gela thought at such times. 'But for me, I shall stay always -with our mother, and read every thing that is written, and do all I can -for the people, and care for nothing but for her and them.'</p> - -<p>She had not let loose in the presence of Cardinal Vàsàrhely the -burning wrath which had consumed her. And yet the valedictory words of -the prelate recurred to her with haunting persistency. He had said to -her: 'If you refuse to be released from your marriage, do not absolve -yourself from its duties.' Was it possible, she asked herself, that -she still owed allegiance to one who, whilst he had embraced her, had -dishonoured her?</p> - -<p>'As well,' she thought bitterly, 'as well say that the man and woman -chained and drowned together in the Noyades of Nantes were united in a -holy union!'</p> - -<blockquote> -<p> -'<i>Ego conjungo vos in matrimonium, in nomine Patris et Filii -et Spiritus Sancti.</i>' -</p> -</blockquote> - -<p>As she remembered those words of the Marriage Sacrament, uttered as she -had stood beside him in the midst of the incense, the colour, the pomp, -the gorgeous grandeur of the Court Chapel in Vienna, she felt that -they had bound on her eternal silence, perpetual constancy, even in a -sense continual submission; they forbade her to disgrace him before the -world; they made his shame hers, they required her to defend him so far -as in her lay from the punishment with which the laws would have met -his wrong-doing: but she could not bring herself to acknowledge that it -demanded more. Truth could not be forced to dwell beside falsehood. -Honour could not take the kiss of peace from dishonour.</p> - -<p>The natural veneration she bore to the speaker added to the weight of -the reproach implied in the Cardinal's words. Even beyond her pride -was her intense sense of the obligations of duty. She asked herself a -thousand times a week if she had indeed failed in these. Honour was -a yet higher thing than duty. Offended honour had its title to any -choice. Her race had never gone to others with their wrongs; they had -known how to avenge themselves by their own hand, in their own way. -If she had chosen to stab him in the throat which had lied to her she -would not, she thought, have gone outside her right. Yet she had been -merciful to him; she had neither exposed nor chastised him; she had -simply cut his life adrift from hers, which he had outraged.</p> - -<p>No man's repute is hurt by separation from his wife; he was in no worse -circumstance than he had been ere he had met her; she did not withdraw -her gifts. She had given a noble name to one nameless; she had granted -a feudal title to a bastard; she had enriched a man who previously -had owned nothing, save half a million of francs won at play and a -strip of sea-shore that was stolen. She withdrew none of her gifts; -she left the impostor to the full enjoyment of the world; she did -not even move a step to secure the world's sympathy with herself. All -she had done as her just vengeance was to withdraw herself from the -pollution of his touch, and to exile him from the home of her fathers. -Who could have done less? His children would in the future possess all -she had, though through him they destroyed the purity of her race for -ever: centuries would not wash out in her sight the stain that was in -their blood: but she did not disinherit them. She could not see that -she had failed anywhere in her duty; she had been more generous in her -judgment than many could have been. Wherever women spoke of her and of -her separation from her husband, there would they surely, with many a -bitter word, repay her all the affronts which she had put upon them by -her indifference and by what they had esteemed her arrogance. She knew -that in such a position as she had perforce created, unexplained, the -man is easily and constantly absolved of blame, the woman is always and -certainly condemned. Therefore she had never doubted that the future -would lie lightly on his shoulders, passed in sensual idleness, in -oblivion more or less easily attained. Could it be possible that though -she had been so cruelly betrayed her own obligations remained the same? -Had her marriage vows compelled her to endure even such offence as -this without alteration in her own obedience? Was she inconsistent in -sending her betrayer from her, whilst she still considered her bond to -him binding? Since she refused to take advantage of the release that -the Law and the Church would give her, was it unjustifiable to free -herself from his hourly presence, his daily contact? No! she could not -believe that it was so.</p> - -<p>On her name-day, in the following spring, addressing his felicitations -to her, Egon Vàsàrhely added words which had cost him much to write.</p> - -<p>'You know how dear, more dear than any earthly thing, you have been -ever to me,' he wrote, 'therefore you will pardon me what I am about to -say. If I had followed my own selfish desires I should have entreated -you to disgrace him publicly, begged you to shake off publicly all -bonds to a traitor; and I should have shot him dead, with or without -the formula of a quarrel; he himself knew that well. But for your own -sake I would say to you now, pardon him if you can. Though you are the -possessor of a position and of a character rare amongst women, yet even -you must suffer as a separated wife. The children as they grow older -will suffer from it likewise. You could divorce your husband; the Law -and the Church would set you free from an union contracted in ignorance -with a man guilty of a fraud. You would be free, and he would endure -his fit chastisement. But I understand why you refuse to do that. I -comprehend your feeling. Publicity would to you intensify disgrace. -Divorce could do nothing to heal your cruel wounds. Therefore I urge -on you forgiveness. It has cost me many months' bitter struggle to be -able to write this to you. His offence is vile. His past is hateful. -He himself merits nothing. But for your commands I would have set my -heel on his throat as on a snake's. But there may have been excuses -even for him; and since you acknowledge him as your husband you will, -in the end, be more at peace if you do not continue to insist on a -separation which will be food for the world's calumny. Besides, though -you know it not, you have not exiled him from your heart, though you -have sent him from your house. If you had not still loved him you would -have said to me—Slay him. I believe that he loved you, though he had -such foul guilt against you, and he must have some true qualities of -character and mind since he satisfied yours for many long years. Of -where he may be now I know not. Since I saw you I have not quitted my -own country. But I would say to you—wherever he be, send for him. You -will understand without words what it costs me to say to you—Since you -will not accept the freedom of the Law, summon him to you and cleanse -his soul in yours. I speak for you, not him. If I saw him lying dead -like a dog in a ditch, for myself, I should thank God. Sometimes I look -with stupor at my sword. Can it lie idle there and you be unavenged?'</p> - -<p>The letter touched her profoundly. She realised the grandeur of -generosity, the force of compelling duty, which had enabled Vàsàrhely -to write it, proudest of gentlemen as he was, most devoted of lovers as -he had been.</p> - -<p>She replied to him:</p> - -<p>'I have thought myself strong, but of late years I have found that -there are things beyond my strength; what you counsel is one of them. -Religion enjoins, indeed, forgiveness without limit; but there are -wrongs for which religion makes no provision, and of which it has no -comprehension. Nevertheless, I thank you for him and for myself.'</p> - -<p>Any crime, any folly, any violence or faithlessness, which yet should -have left his honour pure, she thought it would have been possible to -condone; the life of a woman who loves must ever be one long pardon. -But such shame as this of his ate into her very soul, as rust into -the pure metal. It was such shame that when her heart went out to what -she had once loved in the yearning of affection, she felt herself -disgraced, feeling that the dominion of the senses, the weakness of -remembered and desired joys made her oblivious of indignity, feeble as -an enamoured fool.</p> - -<p>Her friends, her priests, even her own conscience might say to her -'Forgive,' but she could not bend her will to do it. Forgiveness would -mean reconciliation, union, life spent together as in their days of -love. She could not bring herself to endure that perpetual contact, -that incessant communion. To her sight he was stained with a moral -leprosy. She could not consent to admit that one in spiritual health, -and clean of guilt, must dwell with one spiritually diseased.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLI" id="CHAPTER_XLI">CHAPTER XLI.</a></h4> - - -<p>Another year passed by, and of him she still heard nothing. As, once -before, his silence had told her of his passion more eloquently than -speech could have done, so now the same silence tended to soften her -wrath, to soothe her horror. She had expected him to take one of two -courses: either to assail her with written entreaties for pardon, and -ceaseless efforts to palliate his crime in her sight, or to go out into -the world of men to seek oblivion in pleasure, and perhaps absolution -in ambition.</p> - -<p>He had done neither.</p> - -<p>Once she, having occasion to go to the room which had been set aside -for the boys' studies, saw the old professor absorbed in the perusal -of a letter. Confused and startled he slipped it hurriedly beneath a -Latin exercise of Bela's, which lay with other papers on the table. The -children were out riding.</p> - -<p>His mistress looked at him, and her face grew a shade paler still.</p> - -<p>'You correspond with my husband?' she said abruptly, pausing, as she -always paused, before she said the latter words.</p> - -<p>Greswold flushed consciously, stammered a few unintelligible words, and -was silent.</p> - -<p>'You hear from him?' she continued with correct inference. 'You know -where he is?'</p> - -<p>'I have promised that I will not say. I pray your Excellency to pardon -me,' murmured the old man, the colour mounting upward to his grey locks.</p> - -<p>She was silent a moment; she knew not what emotion moved her, whether -wrath, or wonder, or offence; or whether even relief from long suspense.</p> - -<p>'Do not be angered, my lady,' pleaded Greswold, timidly. 'It is the -only way in which he can hear of you and of his children. Could your -Excellency believe that all these months, these years, he lived on -without any tidings?'</p> - -<p>'I think you have exceeded your duty,' she said coldly. 'I think that -you should have asked my permission.'</p> - -<p>The old man stood penitent, like a chidden child. He was afraid of her -interrogations; but she made none.</p> - -<p>'You will give me your word,' she pursued, 'never to speak of this -correspondence to Herr Bela or to any of the children.'</p> - -<p>Greswold bowed his assent. 'My lord has forbidden me also,' he said -eagerly.</p> - -<p>Her brows contracted.</p> - -<p>'You have committed an imprudence,' she said, in a tone which chilled -the old man to the marrow. 'Be heedful that no one knows of it.'</p> - -<p>She said no more; took the volume she had needed, and quitted the room.</p> - -<p>'Who shall tell the heart of a woman?' thought Greswold, left to -himself. 'She knows not whether the man she once adored be living or -dead, and she does not put to me one single question, does not even -seek to learn where he dwells or what he does! What could his sin be to -sweep all love away as fire makes a desert of a smiling meadow? And be -it what it would, of what use is human love if it have not enough of -the divine love in it to rejoice over the sinner who repents?'</p> - -<p>He knew not that the sin she might, she would, have forgiven, but that -the shame ate into the fair marble of her honour like a corroding acid.</p> - -<p>From that time he expected daily some fresh question, some allusion at -least to the confession which she had surprised from him. But she never -spoke to him again of it. If she placed a violent control upon herself, -because she did not think it fitting to speak of her husband to one -in her employ, or if her husband were absolutely dead to her memory -and her affections, he could not tell. He only knew that by no word or -sign did she appear to recall the brief conversation which had passed -between them.</p> - -<p>Although what he had done was innocent enough, the old physician, in -his scrupulous sense of duty, began to have a sense of guilt. Had he -any right to retain any hidden knowledge from the mistress whose roof -sheltered him, and whose bread he ate?</p> - -<p>But his loyalty to his pledged word, and to him whom the world of men -still called Sabran, obliged him to be mute.</p> - -<p>'After all,' he thought, 'if she knew it might be better, but my first -duty is to keep my word.'</p> - -<p>She never tempted him to break it. She was not callous and hardened -as he supposed. She felt a growing desire to learn where and how her -husband had taken up the broken threads of his severed life. She had -believed either that he would return to the unfettered existence that -could be dreamed away under the cedar groves of Mexico, with the senses -satisfied and the moral law set at naught, or that he would go amongst -the men and women of the great world, popular, pitied, and easily -consoled. She had seen that world exercise a potent fascination over -him, and if it were called to pronounce against her or against him, she -was well aware that he would bear away all its suffrages. He had always -humoured and flattered it; she never.</p> - -<p>He had passed from the sight of those who knew him as utterly as -though he had descended to his grave. No sound or hint told her of his -destiny. She still thought at times that he must have sought those -flowery recesses of the West which had given his youth their shelter. -It might well be that in his total ruin his instincts had urged him to -return to the free barbaric life of his early manhood, where none would -reproach him, none deride him, none know his secret or his sin. His -correspondence with Greswold suggested a doubt to her. Perhaps remorse -was with him and the weight of remembrance.</p> - -<p>When, too harshly, she had assumed that all his love and life had been -a lie, because one lie had been beneath it, she had told herself that -he would find solace in those vices and pastimes which, in his earlier -years, had been fatal to his ambition and to his perseverance. But -since he cared to hear of his children's welfare, it might well be that -their life together was nearer to his heart than she had credited. She -believed that, if he had been sunk in the kind of self-indulgence she -had imagined, he would have shunned all tidings, all memories, of his -lost home.</p> - -<p>Then again, with the inconsistency of all great suffering, an intense -indignation possessed her that he did dare to remember, did dare to -recall, that her offspring were also his. Even alone the hot flush of -an ever-increasing shame came to her face when she thought that she -had been for nine long years his, in the most absolute possession that -woman can grant to man. Exile, severance, silence, cold and dark as the -winters of the land of his birth, could not alter that. Whenever he -chose to think of her she must be his in remembrance still.</p> - -<p>Once the Princess ventured to say again to her a word which came from -her heart. They were standing on the terrace watching the blush of -evening glow on the virginal snows of the mountains.</p> - -<p>'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath,' she murmured. 'Wanda, mine, -do never you think of those words—you who let so many suns rise and -set, and find your wrath unchanged?'</p> - -<p>'If it were <i>only</i> that!' she answered bitterly. 'It is so much -else—so much else! Crimes deep as yonder water, high as yonder hills, -I could have forgiven, but—a baseness—never! Nay, there are pardons -that would only be as base as what they pardoned.'</p> - -<p>So it seemed to her.</p> - -<p>When again and again her heart was thrilled with its old tenderness, -her mind was haunted by a million memories of dead delights, she strove -against herself, and trod down her temptation with the merciless -self-punishment of an ascetic. It humbled and stained her in her own -sight to feel that love could live within her without honour.</p> - -<p>'Forgive me,' said the Princess, 'but it always seems to me that -you—noble and generous and pure of mind as you are—yet have met ill -the supreme trial, the supreme test of your life. You believed that you -loved the man you wedded, but you loved your own pride more. If love be -not endless forbearance, endless compassion, endless pity and sympathy, -what is it but the mere fever and instincts of carnal passions? What -raises it above the self-indulgence of the senses if not its sacrifice -of will and its long-suffering? You have said so yourself in other -days than these.'</p> - -<p>'And what,' she thought passionately as she heard, 'what would it be -but the basest indulgence of the senses to let oneself love and be -beloved by what one scorned?—to stoop and kiss the lips that lied for -mere sake of their sweetness?—to gather in one's arms the coward, the -traitor, and persuade oneself that one forgave because one grew blind -with amorous remembrance?'</p> - -<p>'Is it well,' pursued her companion with soft solemnity, 'to let anyone -who is so near to you live his own life when that life may be one of -sin? You send him from you, and how can you tell into what extremes of -evil or of folly despair may not drive him? A man cast forth from his -home is like a ship cut loose from its anchor and rudderless. Whatever -may have been his weakness, his offences, they cannot absolve you from -your duty to watch over your husband's soul, to be his first and most -faithful friend, to stand between him and his temptations and perils. -That is the nobler side of marriage. When the light of love is faded, -and its joys are over, its duties and its mercies remain. Because -one of the twain has failed in these the other is not acquitted of -obligation. Pardon me if I seem to censure. Look in your own heart and -judge if I err.'</p> - -<p>'You do not know! You do not know! If I forgave him I should never -forgive myself!'</p> - -<p>She turned her head from the roseate and happy light that spoke to her -of other days, and went with a swift uneven step into the house, now -darkened by the passing of the day.</p> - -<p>She flung his memory from her as so much unholiness. Had passion not -yet lived in her, the coldness of unforgiving sorrow might not have -seemed to her so sovereign a duty.</p> - -<p>Some weeks after she had seen the letter in Greswold's hands a small -hamlet was burnt down during a high north wind. It belonged to her. -Hearing of the calamity she went thither at once. It was some two and -a half German miles from the castle. She drove, herself, four young -Hungarian horses, whose fretting graces and tempestuous gallop gave -her the only pleasure which she was now capable of enjoying. They were -harnessed to a carriage light and strong, built on purpose to scour -rapidly rough forest roads and steep hill-sides. When she had visited -the melancholy scene, given what consolation she could, and distributed -money to the homeless peasants, promising to rebuild the houses with -her own timber and shingles—for the conflagration had been the fault -of no one, but of the wild wind which had scattered the burning embers -of a hearth-fire on a neighbouring wood-stack—her horses were rested, -and she began her homeward drive as the pale afternoon grew grey and -the twilight fell on the little grassy vale, now charred and smoking -with the smouldering ruins of the châlets.</p> - -<p>'Our Countess never leaves us alone in any trouble,' said the women -gathered about the stone statue of S. Florian, their most trusted -patron, who, despite their prayers, had refused to save them from the -flames. The hamlet was not far from the Maurer glaciers, and was shut -in by a complete wall of mountains; it was green, fresh, beautifully -cool in summer. Now, in the late spring, it was still dreary, and -patches of snow still lay on its sward; it was set high on the mountain -side, and dense forests sloped down from it, seldom traversed, and dark -early in the afternoon. Her groom lit the lamps of her carriage as she -entered the deep woods, through which the road was little more than a -timber-track. The long gallops and the steep inclines coming thither -had calmed and pacified her young horses. They gave her no trouble to -control them, as they trotted rapidly along the shadowy forest ways. -In other parts of the country the sun had not then set, but here the -gloom was grey, like that of a cloudy dawn. Yet it was not so dark but -that she perceived ahead of her, as her horses turned a curve in the -moss-grown path, a figure, whose height and outline made her heart -stand still. As the animals went past him in their swinging trot the -blaze of the lamps fell full upon him. He turned and retreated quickly -into the undergrowth beneath the drooping boughs of the Siberian pines, -but she saw him, he saw her. Mechanically he uncovered his head and -bowed low; she drove onward with a sense of suffocation at her throat -and a chill like ice in her veins. She had recognised him in that -moment of time. He was changed, aged, and there were threads of grey in -his hair. He wore a forester's dress and had a gun on his shoulder.</p> - -<p>Where they had met, in these woods that lay under the snow saddle of -the Reggen Thörl, it was still twenty English miles away from the burg. -It was late when she reached home, but her people were used to those -long night drives, and even the Princess had become resigned to them. -On the plea of fatigue she went to her own rooms and there remained. A -faintness and sense of confusion stayed with her. She had not thought -that merely meeting him thus would affect her. She had underrated, the -power of the past.</p> - -<p>When she had deemed him far away in other countries he was there in her -own lands, not twenty miles from her. The knowledge of his vicinity -moved her with a mingled sense of unendurable pain, partial anger, -reviving love. It seemed horrible to have passed him by as any stranger -would have passed, without a sign or word. Yet he was dead to her, -whether oceans were between them or only a few leagues of hill and -grass and forest.</p> - -<p>She did not sleep, she did not even lie down that night. He seemed -always before her; in the stillness of her chamber she heard his voice, -and she started up thinking he touched her.</p> - -<p>He had looked aged, ill, weary, unhappy; the sight of him bore -conviction to her that he, like herself, found no compensation, no -consolation. Perchance her monitress had been right; she had been -cruel. Perchance, whatever sin his present or his future life might -hold would lie, directly indeed at his own door, but indirectly at -hers. She had always held that high and spiritual view of marriage -which, rising above mere sensual indulgence, regarded the bond of souls -as sacred, and made the life on earth mere passage and preparation -for eternity. She had loved to believe that she ennobled, purified, -exalted his life by union with hers. Was she now false to her own creed -when she left him alone, unfriended, unpardoned, to drift to any solace -in vice, or any distraction in evil, which might be his fate? The -sensitiveness and apprehension of her conscience before the possibility -of a neglected duty made of her meditations a very martyrdom. All her -life long she had been resolute and serene in action, deciding quickly, -and carrying resolve into action without hesitation; but here, in the -supreme crisis of her fate, she was irresolute and wrung by continual -doubt. Had it only been any other crime than this!—this which cankered -all the honour of her race, and was rank with the abhorred putridity of -fraud!</p> - -<p>The spring passed into summer, and the children played amidst masses of -roses and sweet ranks of lilies, stretching down the green grass alleys -of the gardens. More than once she went to the same hamlet, where now -châlets were arising, made of pine and elm, cut in the past winter in -her own woods. But of him she saw no more. She could not bend her will -to ask of him of any of her household, not even of Greswold. Whether he -lingered amidst her mountains, or whether he had but come thither in a -momentary impulse, she knew not.</p> - -<p>The infinite yearning of affection, which is wholly outside the -instincts of the passions, awoke in her once more. She began to doubt -her own reading of obligation and of duty. Had her counsellors been -right—had she met the supreme test of her character and had failed -before it?</p> - -<p>Was it true that a great love must be as exhaustless as the ocean in -its mercy and as profound in its comprehension?</p> - -<p>Had his sin to her released her from her duties towards him? Because -he had been disloyal was she absolved from loyalty to him? Ought she -sooner to have said to him,—'Nay, no crime, no untruth, no failure in -yourself shall divide you from me; the darker be your soul the greater -need hath it to lean on mine?'</p> - -<p>In the violent scorn of her revolted pride, of her indignant honour, -had she forgotten a lowlier yet harder duty left undone?</p> - -<p>In her contempt and dread of yielding to mere amorous weakness had she -stifled and denied the cry of pity, the cry of conscience?</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>To suffer woes which hope thinks infinite, To forgive wrongs -darker than death or night, To defy power which seems -omnipotent, To love, and live to hope till hope creates From -its own wreck the thing it contemplates, Neither to change, -nor falter, nor repent.</p></blockquote> - -<p>This, perchance, had been the higher diviner way which she had -missed—this the obligation from the passion of the past which she had -left unfulfilled, unaccepted.</p> - -<p>Resolutely she had gone on upon her joyless path, not doubting that -her course was right. It had seemed to her that there was no other way -possible; that, stretching her hand to him across the gulf of shame -that severed them, she would do nothing to raise him, but only fall -herself, degraded to his likeness.</p> - -<p>So it had always seemed to her.</p> - -<p>Now alone the misgiving arose in her whether she had mistaken arrogance -for duty; whether, cleaving so closely to the traditions of honour, she -had forgotten the obligations of mercy. Had it been any other thing, -any other sin, she thought, rather than this, which struck at the very -root of all the trusts, of all the faiths, which she had most venerated -as the legacy of her fathers!——</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to her as though, were that time of torture to be -lived through again, she would not send him from her; she would say to -him:</p> - -<p>'What we love once we love for ever. Shall there be joy in heaven over -those who repent, yet no forgiveness for them upon earth?'</p> - -<p>Sometimes it seemed to lier as though even now, after these years, she -still ought to summon him and say this. But time passed on and passed -away, and it remained unsaid.</p> - -<p>She rode often through the same woods, now in full leaf, with sunny -waters tumbling and sparkling through their flower-filled moss, but he -crossed her path no more. He might have come thither, she thought, in -some brief hope of possible reconciliation to her, and then his courage -might have failed him, and he might have returned to whatsoever distant -climate held him, whatsoever manner of life consoled him. That he might -dwell amidst the hills, unseen of men, for her sake, never once seemed -to her possible. Egon Vàsàrhely might have done that; but not he—he -loved the world.</p> - -<p>The summer weighed wearily upon her. The light, the fragrance, the -gaiety of nature hurt her. In winter all the earth seemed of accord -with herself; it was silent, stern, solitary. The keen winds, the -glittering snow, the air that was like a bath of ice, the sense of -absolute isolation and seclusion which the winter brought with it were -precious to her. Not even the pretty figures of the children running -through the bowers of blossom and of foliage could make the summer -otherwise than oppressive and mournful to her.</p> - -<p>Sometimes she thought of how it had been on other summer nights, when -he had wandered with her through the white lines of the lilies by the -starlight, or sent the melodies of Schumann and of Beethoven out upon -the dewy, balmy air. Then she could bear no more to look upon the -moonlit gardens.</p> - -<p>The love she had borne him stirred at those times beneath the -gravestones of scorn and wrath and almost hatred which she had heaped -upon it, to keep it buried far down for evermore. All the echoes of -passion came to her at those moments; she despised herself because -she felt that she would give her soul to feel his lips on hers again. -She was ashamed that the mere sight of him could thus have moved her. -Again and again she recalled noble acts, beautiful thoughts, which -had been his; again and again she recalled the early hours of their -love with burning cheeks and longing heart. She could have scourged -herself to banish those memories, those desires. They were terrible -and irresistible to her as the visions that assailed the saints of the -Thebaïd. Her whole soul softened to him, yearned for him, forgave him. -Then she would shrink in disdain from her own weakness, and pace her -chamber like a wounded lioness.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLII" id="CHAPTER_XLII">CHAPTER XLII.</a></h4> - - -<p>The first flush of autumn came upon the woods. Soon it would be three -years since Olga Brancka had driven thither, and her work had held good -and never been undone. Bela and Gela had grown tall and slender as the -young fir trees; and Bela often said to his brother: 'I was ten years -old on Easter Day. That is quite old. If ever I am to find him I am old -enough now.'</p> - -<p>He had not forgotten. He never forgot. Every day he wearied his little -brain with thinking what he could do. Every night he asked Heaven to -help him. He had read a Bohemian ballad which had fascinated him; the -story of how, in the days of chivalry, Wratislaw, the son of Berka, -when but twelve years old, had made, all by himself and on foot, -a pilgrimage from Prague to Tartary, to release his brother from -captivity. Bela knew very well that the world had changed since then, -and that if some things were easier some were harder now than then. But -if Wratislaw had done so much at twelve, why should he, who was ten, -not do something?</p> - -<p>He thought himself quite old. He had a big pony, and Folko was ridden -by his little brothers. He had been taught to shoot at a target and -a running mark; he had become skilful at climbing with crampons and -managing a boat. When he rode he had long boots that pulled up to his -knees. He could drive three ponies, harnessed in the Russian way, with -skill and surety. Perhaps, he thought, the Bohemian boy had not been -able to do half as much as this. The ballad spoke of him as a little -weakling, and yet he had found his way from Prague, in her dusky -plains, to burning Tartary.</p> - -<p>Almost he was ready to set forth on a Quixotic search without any clue -to where his father dwelt, but his educated sense checked him with -the remembrance that, wide as the world was, it would be of no avail -to begin a harebrained pilgrimage with no fixed goal. Even Wratislaw, -who was his ideal, had been certain that his brother languished in -the Tartar tents before he had set his fair face to the southeast. So -he remained patient in his impatience, and strove with all his might -to perfect himself in all bodily exercises and manly habits, that he -might be the better fitted to go on his errand whenever he should have -any thread of guidance. No one guessed the resolves and the hopes -which fermented like new wine in his pretty golden-haired head. His -attendants thought each year that he grew gentler and more serious, and -his tutors found him at once more docile and more absent-minded. But no -one imagined that he was bent on any unusual enterprise.</p> - -<p>His father had not been recognised by the groom who had accompanied his -mistress in the drive through the woods of the Reggen Thörl; and no -rumour of the near presence of Sabran had reached any of the household. -Greswold alone knew that amidst the solitudes of the avalanche and -the glacier, in the chill of the air where the eagle and the vulture -alone made their home, in a life of absolute isolation, asceticism, and -physical denial of every kind, the man who had sinned against her spent -his exile, in such self-chosen expiation as was possible to one who had -neither the faith nor the humility needful to make him seek refuge -and atonement in any religious service. He dwelt in the loneliness -of the ice-slopes, leading the life of a common hunter, shunning all -men, accepting each monotonous and joyless day as portion of his just -punishment; in the perils of winter on the mountains doing what he -could to save human or animal life; knowing no solace save such as -existed for him in the sense of being near all that he had lost, and -the power of watching the distant movements of his wife and children at -such rare hours as he ventured to approach the hills of Hohenszalras -and turn his telescope on the gardens of his lost home. A hunter or -two, a guide or two of the Umbal and the Trojerthal had his confidence, -but the loyalty which is the common virtue of all mountaineers made -them preserve it faithfully. For the rest, in these unfrequented -places, avoidance of all those who might have recognised him was easy; -he was clothed like the men of the hills, and lived like them in a -châlet, high perched on a ledge of rock at a great altitude in the wild -and almost inaccessible region of the Hintere Umbalthörl. Of the future -he never dared to think; he took each day as it came; the best he hoped -for was a mountaineer's death some hour or another, amidst the clear -serene blue ice, the everlasting snows.</p> - -<p>When he had gone out from the chamber of his wife, banished and -accursed, all his spirit had died in him, and nothing had seemed clear -in his memory except that love which had been so insufficient to wash -out his sin. The world would no doubt have welcomed him; he was not -too old for its distractions and its ambitions to be still possible -for him; but he had no courage left to take them up, no energy to make -another future for himself. His whole life was consumed in a vain -regret, as vain a desire, as vain a penitence. Had he had the faith of -those men who dwelt under the willows of the Holy Isle he would have -joined them. But he had no belief; he had only a futile, heart-broken, -hopeless repentance, which availed him nothing and could atone for -nothing.</p> - -<p>Perhaps, he thought, if she had known that, it might have changed her. -But he did not dare to approach her by any written appeal. It seemed -to him as if any words from him would only appear but added falsehood, -added insult. He never, even in his own thoughts, reproached her for -her separation from him. He recognised that no other path was open to -her. The pure daylight of her nature could find no mate in the dusk -and shadow of his own; the loyalty of truth could not unite with the -servitude and cowardice of falsehood. He knew it, and never rebelled -against his chastisement.</p> - -<p>Whilst still it was dawn one morning, his young son, just awaking, -heard a pebble thrown at his window. He sprang out of bed and ran and -looked out. Old Otto stood below.</p> - -<p>'My little lord,' he said softly; 'if you can come to me in the woods, -when you are dressed, I have something to tell you.'</p> - -<p>'Of him?' cried Bela.</p> - -<p>The huntsman made a sign of assent.</p> - -<p>The child, excited to intense emotion, hardly knew how his servant -dressed him, or how he swallowed his breakfast. After their morning -meal he could always run in the woods, as he chose, before beginning -his studies, and he sped as fast as his feet could bear him to the -trysting-place.</p> - -<p>'My lord, your father has been seen on the other side of Glöckner by my -underling, Fritz,' said Otto, gravely; 'and I have heard, too, that the -villagers have seen him in Pregratten. I made bold to tell you, Count -Bela, for I had given you my word.'</p> - -<p>Bela's whole form shook with excitement.</p> - -<p>'I knew if he had died I should have known it!' he said, with a hushed -ecstasy. 'Tell me more, tell me more, quick!'</p> - -<p>'There is no more to tell, my little lord,' said Otto. 'Fritz will -swear that he saw your father, though there was a stretch of glaciers -and many fathoms of ice between them. He says there was no mistaking -the way he sighted his rifle and fired. And I have heard by gossip, -too, from the folks of the Hintere Umbalthörl that there can be no -manner of doubt of the fact that His Excellency has dwelt there, for a -time at least.'</p> - -<p>Bela gave a deep breath.</p> - -<p>'Then he lives, and I can find him!'</p> - -<p>'Yes, he lives; the Lord be praised! 'said Otto.</p> - -<p>When he went to the house the boy told no one his precious secret. He -studied ill, and was punished, but he did not heed it. His heart was -full of joy; his brain teemed with projects.</p> - -<p>'I will go and bring him back!' he kept saying to himself; and no force -could hold his thoughts to his Homer or his Euclid.</p> - -<p>He would tell no one, he resolved, not even Gela; and he would go -alone, all alone, as the Bohemian boy had gone.</p> - -<p>'What ails Bela to-day? He is not like himself,' said his mother to -Greswold, who assured her he was well, but added that he was often -careless.</p> - -<p>The child shut his secret up in his own breast, and though he longed -to tell Gela he did not. He had been tempted to confide in Otto, but -resisted even that desire, knowing that Otto was stern where duty -pointed, and had been always forbidden to let the little nobles wander -alone to the mountains. He had his father's power of reticence, his -mother's strength of self-control.</p> - -<p>He knew what hill work was like. The elder boys often went climbing, -with their guides, on fine days from May to September, and had a -little tent which was set up for them at a fair altitude, whence -Greswold taught them to take observations and measurements. But the -mountaineering for the season was now over; it was now S. Michael's -Day, and avalanches fell and snow-storms had begun on the higher -slopes. He knew that if anyone saw him he would be stopped and taken -back. For that reason he said nothing to Gela, who could never be -persuaded to a disobedience; and he rose in the dark, before the hour -at which his attendant came to dress him, got his clothes on as best he -could, slipped the sword Vàsàrhely had given him in his belt, and took -his crampons and alpenstock in his hand.</p> - -<p>He had kneeled and said his prayers, fervently though quickly.</p> - -<p>'A soldier cannot pray <i>very</i> long if he hear the trumpets sounding,' -he had thought, as he rose. He felt neither irresolution nor fear; he -was strong with ardour and an exalted sense of right-doing.</p> - -<p>He had the little knapsack which, in the long forest walks with his -tutor, he was used to carry packed with simple food for a morning meal -when they halted under the pines. He had put some bread and cakes into -this overnight, and he had filled his little silver flask with milk, -as he had seen the flasks of the gentlemen filled with wine in those -grand days when the Kaiser and the Court had hunted with his father. -Thus equipped he managed to escape from the house by a side door, left -open by some of the under-servants, who had just risen. He knew the -quick way to reach the Glöckner slopes, for he had been taken there by -Otto to learn mountaineering, and for his age he climbed well. His eye -was sure, his step firm, and he knew not fear. He never thought of the -misery his absence might cause; he was absorbed in his self-imposed -mission.</p> - -<p>'I will bring him back,' he thought, 'and then she will smile again.'</p> - -<p>He had been trained in the lore of the high hills too well not to know -that it would take him several days to reach the Hintere Umbalthörl; -but he said to himself that this must be as it would. He would climb -on and on, sleep in any hut he could, and find what food he might. The -Bohemian boy had crossed many mountains and seas and deserts before he -had ransomed his brother.</p> - -<p>It was a fine morning, with light pleasant winds. There was a clear -blue in the sky, though north-east there was a brown haze, such as -hunters fear, upon the hills.</p> - -<p>'It will rain or snow to-morrow,' thought Bela, who had been made wise -in the signs of the weather. But even that prevision did not deter him; -he had his liberty and he meant to use it. He had been well trained to -all bodily exercises, and he could walk long and fast without fatigue. -His slender fair limbs were as strong as steel, and his health was -perfect. He knew all the tracks of the home-lying woods, and he wanted -no one to guide him. He got, with promptitude and address, out of sight -of the terraces and towers of Hohenszalras, and soon entered what was -called the Schwarzenwald, a dense pine-wood ascending abruptly the -mountain side from the gardens; the only place where the wildness of -the hills came in unbroken contact and close proximity to the lawns and -flowers of the south side of the schloss, the lower spurs of the Gross -Glöckner descending there so steep and stern that they enclosed the -parterres with a gigantic rampart of granite.</p> - -<p>The contrast of the rose gardens with these huge overhanging heights -had always so pleased the tastes of the Szalras châtelaines, that they -had never allowed any attempts to be made to change or modify the -savage grandeur and sombre wilds of the black wood.</p> - -<p>He was already a trained pedestrian, and he covered five miles without -pausing to breathe himself. Then he thought he had come far enough -to make it safe to pause and eat. He drank his milk and opened his -knapsack. There was turf still about him, and a few trees, but he had -come into the rocky region. Huge walls of red and grey marbles leaned -over him; white limestone crags faced him. Precipices, black with pines -and firs, shelved downward. He was still on his mother's land, but in a -part unknown to him.</p> - -<p>Once rested, he climbed up manfully, straining his little velvet -breeches and soaking his silver-buckled shoes in the wet moss as he -went; for in the Schwarzenwald regular paths soon ceased. There was -the barest track visible, made by sheep, and pushing its upward way -under branches, over boulders, and through wimpling burns. It was the -loneliest part of all the woods and hills; descending as it did to -the rose gardens of the burg, the hunters and shepherds seldom passed -through it. Steep and solitary, crowned with bare rocks, and leading -only to the glacier slopes, few steps ever went over its short grass -save those of woodland animals and of shepherds' flocks. At this time -of the year even the latter were not near. They had been already -brought down to their stables from the green stretches of pasture -between the rocks. Bela met no one; not even one of his own peasantry.</p> - -<p>He climbed and climbed uninterrupted, at first enjoying his solitude -rapturously, his triumph boisterously, and then going on more solemnly, -being a little awed by the sense of utter silence round him, in which -no sound was heard except of rippling water, of blowing boughs, and -afar off some faint tinkle of a church bell from a distant hamlet.</p> - -<p>His spirits were exalted and full of enthusiasm. Joined to his boldness -and ardour he had the German love of the mystical and marvellous. All -the vast white range of the Glöckner to him was as a fairyland opening -on enchanted empires all his own. All the forenoon he was happy.</p> - -<p>His brain, was busy with many pictures as he went. He saw his search -successful and his father found; he saw his happy return, and the -crowd of the glad household which would flock to meet his steps; he -thought how he would kneel down at her feet, and never rise until his -prayer should be heard, and his mother smile again; he thought how he -would cry out to her, 'Oh, mother, mother! I have brought him home!' -and how she would look, and the light and the warmth come back into -her face. It was so little to do—only to climb amidst these kindly -familiar mountains that had been always above him and around him since -first his eyes had opened. Wratislaw had gone over lands, and seas, and -deserts, and braved the jaws of lions, and the steel of foemen, and the -dragon's breath of the hot sand wind; he himself had so little to do; -only to climb some rough uneven ground, some green steep pastures, some -smooth fields of ice. He felt sad to think it was such a little thing.</p> - -<p>Far down below he could hear the great bells of the burg chiming and -clanging, and he knew that they were giving the alarm for him; he saw -men small as mice grouping together here, and running apart there; he -knew they were coming out to search for him. He resolved to be very -wary. He had got so long a start that he was high on the hills ere he -heard the alarm-bells ring. He knew that he must avoid being seen -by anyone he met, or, known as he was to the whole country-side, his -liberty would soon be at an end. But the huts of the cattle-keepers -were empty, and the chances of meeting a mountaineer were few. Hundreds -of men might come upward in search of him, and yet miss him amidst -those endless walls of stone, those innumerable peaks and paths and -precipices, each one the fellow of the other.</p> - -<p>He climbed the grassy slopes, the steep stone ways, as he had learned -to do with Otto, and though he was still for from the sides of Glöckner -he was yet soon on very high ground. A great mountain, green at the -base, snow-covered half the way down, frowned above him; it was but one -of the spurs of the Glöcknerwand, but he believed it to be the king of -the Austrian Alps itself. He met no one; the mountains were solitary; -the first breath of autumn had scared the cattle-keepers downward -with their flocks and herds. Sometimes, very far off, he saw a lonely -figure, a pedlar, or a hunter, or a shepherd, or some <i>alm</i> still -tenanted by its flock, but they were mere specks on the immensity of -the glacier slopes and the domes of snow. The solitude enchanted him at -first; he had never been alone before. He drank from a stream, ate more -bread, and held on firmly and fearlessly. The thought that his father -was there beyond him, amidst those dazzling peaks, those lowering -clouds, seemed to shoe his little feet with fire. He felt weaker, for -his bread had nourished him but little, and he had not found a hut of -any kind as he had expected to do. But he toiled on, the slope of the -same mountain always facing him, always seeming to recede and to grow -higher and higher the further and further he went.</p> - -<p>The wall of granite which he was on, nine miles or more above and -beyond his home, was known as the Adler Spitze. He had been near -it in other days, but he did not recognise it now; all these stern -slopes and steeps, all these domes and roof-like ridges of snow and -ice, so resemble each other that a longer apprenticeship to the hills -than his had been is needed to distinguish them one from another. The -Adler Spitze was a dangerous and seldom traversed peak; its sides were -bristling with jagged rocks, and its chasms were many and deep. More -than one death had been caused by it in late years, and near its summit -his mother, had caused to be erected a refuge, one of the highest of -the district, where a keeper was forever on the watch for belated -travellers. These were, however, very few, for the mountain had gained -a bad name amongst the hunters and pedlars and muleteers who alone -traversed these hills, and was left almost entirely to the birds of -prey, which were numerous there and had given it its name.</p> - -<p>When the pine-woods ceased, and there was only around him mere naked -rock, with a little moss growing on it here and there, Bela knew -that he had come very high indeed. And he had his wish: he was quite -alone. There was nothing to be seen here except the dusky forest, -shelving downward, and vast slopes of naked grey stone, with large -loose rocks scattered over them, as if giants had been playing there at -pitch-and-toss. There was too much mist in the north and west, which -faced him, for the opposite mountains to be seen, for it was still -early in the day. He did not now feel the joy and excitement he had -expected. He had climbed to the glacier region indeed, but the scene -around was dreary, and the vast expanse of vapour surrounding him -looked chill and melancholy.</p> - -<p>In the excitement and exultation of his thoughts he had forgotten -many things which he knew very well, trained to the hills as he was; -he had forgotten that it might rain or snow before he reached any -halting-place, that fogs came on at that season with fatal suddenness, -that if the sun were obscured the cold would soon become great, that -if a mist came down he would be unable to find any road, and that men -had been often killed on those heights who had known every inch of the -hills.</p> - -<p>Something of his buoyancy and certainty of success began to pale and -grow dull as the isolation lost its sense of novelty, and that intense -silence of the glacier world, which is at all times so solemn, began to -strike awe into his intrepid soul. He had often been as high, but there -had been always on his ear his brother's voice, and his guide's laugh, -and the merry sounds of the men chattering together as they climbed. -Now there was no sound anywhere, save now and then a splitting cracking -noise, which he knew was ice giving way under the noon-day heat of -the sun. 'It must be just as still as this in the grave,' he thought, -with a chill in his warm eager leaping young blood. A little tuft of -edelweiss growing in a crevice, and an <i>alpenlerche</i> winging its way -through the blue air, seemed to him like friends.</p> - -<p>He wished now that Gela were with him.</p> - -<p>'But it would have been of no use to ask him,' he thought sadly. 'He -never will disobey, even to make good come of it.'</p> - -<p>A white mist had settled over all the lower world, one of the autumn -fogs which come from the lower clouds enwrapped all the lakes and -pastures and forests of Hohenszalras. Nothing could better baffle and -distract his pursuers; perplexed and blinded, they would be wholly at -a loss to trace his steps. It did not occur to him that the fog on -the lower lands might mean also storm and snow, and the darkness and -dampness of ice-cold vapours, in the upper air where he was.</p> - -<p>It had become rough, hard, toilsome work; he was bruised, and almost -lame, and very tired. But the spirit in him was not crushed; he kept -always thinking: 'If it did not hurt, it would be nothing to do it.'</p> - -<p>He had now got above all grass; the ground was loose shingle where it -was not bare granite, limestone, or marble, on all of which it was -difficult to keep a hold. There was snow not very far above him. The -air here was intensely cold. He had not thought to bring any furs -with him. His limbs were sorely cramped, his feet began to feel numb, -his fingers were so chilled he could hardly grip his alpenstock; the -hard slopes gave scarcely any footing to his climbing-irons; there -were clouds about him enveloping him, freezing him in their icy mist. -He began to think piteously of his brother, of his home, and of the -warm-cushioned nooks by the study fire, but he would not give in; he -toiled on, cutting and hurting his hands and knees as he groped on his -upward way. He reminded himself of Wratislaw, of Cassabianca, and all -the boy-heroes he had ever read of; he would not yield in endurance to -any one of them.</p> - -<p>But, looking up, he knew by the colour of the sky that it was about to -snow; the heavens were of a leaden uniform grey, and seemed to meet -and touch the mountain. Then Bela knew that in all likelihood he would -never see Gela or his home again.</p> - -<p>He choked down the sob that rose in his throat, and tried to think -what he could do to save himself. The ascent was now so steep that he -could make no upward way, and could barely keep himself from sliding -downwards. He caught at a projecting boulder and pulled himself with -great effort up on to it; there he could sit in a cramped position and -take breath. When he looked down he saw no forests, no land, no rocks, -nothing but a sea of fog, which had gathered thick and grey beneath -him. In autumn and spring the mountain weather changes in ten minutes -from fair to foul.</p> - -<p>The odd stupor that comes from long exposure at a great altitude in -cold and vapour was stealing over him. Strange noises sounded in his -ears, and his feet and hands tingled. He began to fear that he should -get no further on his way, and he had not listened so often to the -tales told by huntsmen without knowing clearly enough the dangers -which await those who are out on the mountain side in bad weather when -daylight goes.</p> - -<p>As he sat there, gazing dizzily into the ocean of vapour below him, -and upward to the huge walls of granite and of snow, he saw coming -and descending towards him from out the clouds a huge dark bird; the -immense wings seemed wide as heaven itself as it circled and swept the -air.</p> - -<p>Bela's heart stood still: it was a male eagle, a golden eagle, and he -knew it.</p> - -<p>The child's aching eyes watched the monarch of the upper air with a -horrible fascination. It looked black as night against the steely sky, -the snow-covered peaks.</p> - -<p>He sat erect, and cried aloud to it in half delirious indignant -reproof. 'Oh, you great bird! you are treacherous, you are thankless! -<i>We</i> have spared you and yours always, and now you will kill me! Oh, -do you not hear? The Szalras have always spared you! Do you not hear?' -But the shouts of his young voice died away against the granite walls -around him, and the king-bird paused not, but came nearer, and nearer, -and nearer.</p> - -<p>It circled round and round, and each circle narrowed, till it was -poised immediately above his head, motionless, balancing itself upon -its outstretched pinions. He could see its eyes bent on him, see the -giant claws drawn up against its belly, see the hooked yellow beak. -The eagle was lord of the air, and he had intruded on its royalty: in -another moment he felt that it would descend on him and bear him off in -its talons or batter him to death with the blows of its wings. He drew -his little sword and waited for it; his eyes did not shrink, his body -did not cower; he looked upward with his toy-blade drawn in as true a -courage as that of Leonidas.</p> - -<p>'If only I could take him home once—once—I would not mind dying here -afterwards,' he thought, in his dreamy exultation; '<i>Gott und mein -Schwert!</i>' he muttered, and waited still, calmly. Yet to die with his -errand undone—that seemed cruel.</p> - -<p>The huge dark mass balanced itself one moment, more, then measuring its -prey rushed through the air towards him. But, ere it had seized him, -a shot flashed through the shadows, and rang through the silence; the -bird dropped dead in a ring of blood on the naked stone of the mountain -side.</p> - -<p>Bela sprang up, and tottering on the slippery shelving rock threw his -arms outward with a loud cry.</p> - -<p>'I came to find you!' he shouted, in his rapturous joy; then cold and -fatigue and past terror conquered him. He swooned at his father's feet.</p> - -<p>Sabran had not known that it was his son whom he saved. He had seen -a child menaced by a bird of prey, and so had fired. When the boy -staggered to him with that cry of welcome, he was for the moment -stunned with amazement and gratitude and inexpressible emotion; the -next he raised the little brave body in his arms.</p> - -<p>'Oh! tell me where your mother kissed you last, that I may set my lips -there!' he murmured to the child: but Bela heard not.</p> - -<p>He was cold, inanimate, and senseless. He had gained his goal, but he -had no sight or sense to know it. His father looked around him with -terror for his sake. The snow had begun to fall, the darkness was -deepening, the mists were creeping upward; he, who for three years had -dwelt a mountaineer amidst these mountains, knew the danger of being -belated amidst them in autumn, when, at a stroke, autumn became winter; -sometimes in a single night. He himself had his dwelling far from there -upon the Isel water, under the Umbal glacier. If he had to carry the -boy it would be useless to dream of reaching the rude place which he -had made his home: the weight of a tall child of ten years old is no -light burden, and he knew that even if Bela regained his consciousness -he would be incapable of exertion in the cold, which would intensify -with every hour. But he wasted no moments in hesitation. He knew what -the white fall of those softly-descending feathers from above, what -the darkness and wetness of the dense fog down below, meant, out on -the spurs of Glöckner after sunset. Lives were lost here every year; -herds that had stayed on the Alps too late were surprised and destroyed -by early snow-storms; pedlars and carriers were belated, and sent to -a last sleep by that sudden plunge of autumn into frost. He knew his -way inch by inch, and he knew that there was, some mile or so beyond -him, the Wandahutte, erected in a dangerous pass by his wife, as a -thanksgiving in the first months of their marriage. There he would find -a rude bed, food, wine, and shelter for the night. He set himself to -reach it.</p> - -<p>It was hard to climb with the child, held by one arm, and thrown across -one shoulder, as shepherds throw a disabled lamb. His other hand -gripped his alpenstock; he had left his rifle under a ledge of rock, as -a useless load. He had stripped off the hunter's jacket that he wore, -and wrapped it round Bela, whose body and limbs felt frozen. Down -below in the valleys fruit trees had still their plums and pears, and -asters and dahlias still flowered, but at this elevation the cold was -piercing and the snow froze as it fell.</p> - -<p>A high wind also had risen, as the day declined, and blew the white -powder of the snow in whirling clouds: the terrible <i>tourmente</i> of -the Alps which every traveller dreads. In the confusion of it he knew -that he might walk round and round on the same road all night, making -no progress. Soon it grew dark, though not quite four o'clock. He had -no light with him, for he had not intended to be out at night; he had -but come thither, as he often came, to see the distant gleam of the -Szalrassee, the far-off outline of the Hohenszalrasburg. He had been -reascending and returning when he had seen a child menaced by an eagle, -and had fired. Had he been by himself he would have found the hut -speedily, but weighted with the burden of Bela's inert body he made -little way, and staggered often on the slippery frozen steep. He had no -hands free to wield his hatchet and cut his way by steps over the ice -which had formed in all the fissures of the rocks.</p> - -<p>The mountains had been his only friends in his exile. He had returned -to them, he had dwelt amongst them, he had borne his sorrows through -their help, and strengthened himself with their strength. But they -menaced him sorely now. For himself he cared not, but his heart ached -for the child, whose courage and affection had brought him thither to -meet his death.</p> - -<p>'My poor Bela!' he murmured, as the boy's fair head hung over his -shoulder, 'why did you come to me? I give you nothing but evil. Safety, -comfort, happiness, honour, all come from <i>her.</i>'</p> - -<p>The whole heavens seemed to open, so dense a storm of snow now poured -upon him. There were strange deep noises ever and again, as from the -very bowels of the hills; a thousand times had he rejoiced to match -his strength against the mountains and to conquer, but now they were -his masters. All around him were the bastions and walls and domes of -the great ice peaks; the huge glaciers hung above like frozen seas -suspended; he could not behold them but he felt their presence and -their awe.</p> - -<p>'The snow is in my blood and my blood is yours, and now it claims us,' -he muttered to the senseless ear of the child. He and the child had -loved the snow, met it with welcome, sported with it in triumph; and -now it killed them. They would lie down in it, and be one with it for -ever.</p> - -<p>But although these fancies drifted in his brain, he strove with all his -might to keep in movement, to ascend ever in the easterly direction of -the refuge which he sought to gain. So far as he could, weighted with -his burden and blinded by the darkness, he continued to climb, gripping -the hard slopes with his feet and his alpenstock. He had given his coat -to the child; the cold made every vein in his own body numb; his limbs -pricked and seemed to swell; he had only his woollen shirt, above his -linen one, and his velvet breeches between him and the frozen air, that -could slay a hundred sheep massed together in their warmth and wool. -He knew that the hut was but a mile, or little more, from the place -where he had shot the eagle; but half a mile in the snowstorm and the -darkness was longer than forty miles in sunshine and fair weather. He -could not be even sure that he went aright; he could see nothing; the -sky was covered with the low dense clouds; he could only guess. All -the slender signs and landmarks, that would even in mere twilight have -served to guide his steps, were now hidden. A thick woolly impenetrable -gloom enshrouded him; he felt as though he were muffled and suffocated -by it, and the fatal drowsiness—the fatal desire to lie down and be -at rest—with which frost kills, stole on him.</p> - -<p>With all the manhood in him he resisted it for the child's sake.</p> - -<p>He had been climbing and wandering three short hours only, and he -had believed that it was midnight at the least. Bela still hung like -a lifeless thing over his shoulder, but he felt that his limbs were -warmer, and his heart beat feebly, but with regularity.</p> - -<p>'God grant me power to save him, for his mother's sake,' thought -Sabran; 'then there may come what will.'</p> - -<p>He struggled anew against the mortal sleepiness, the increasing -numbness, that grew upon himself. Suddenly, as he turned, without -knowing it, the corner of a wall of rock he saw a starry light. He knew -that it was the lamp of the refuge which, by his wife's command, was -lit at twilight every evening the whole year round. It was now but a -few roods off; he could see even the outline of the cabin itself, black -against its background of snow. But he had taken the wrong path to it. -Between him and it there yawned a wide crevasse in the glacier on which -he now stood.</p> - -<p>He shouted loud, but the wind was louder than his voice. The keeper in -the refuge could not hear. He paused doubtfully. To retrace his steps -and seek the right path would be certain destruction; it would take him -many miles about, and there was no chance even in the darkness that he -would ever find it; his strength, too, was failing him, and the child -was still unconscious. There was but one way of escape, to leap the -fissure. It was wider than any man could be sure to clear, and if he -fell within it he would fall into jagged ice a thousand fathoms down. -By daylight he had often looked down into its awful depths, blue in -their darkness, set with jagged teeth of ice like a trap's jaws.</p> - -<p>The leap might be death or life.</p> - -<p>He hesitated a few instants, then drew quite close to the edge, and -cast aside his pole, for the chasm was too wide for that to help him, -and he needed both hands free to hold the boy more firmly. The lamp -from the hut shed light enough to guide him; the snow fell fast, the -wind was violent. He paused another moment on the brink, drew the child -closer to him and clasped him with both arms; then, gathering all his -force into his limbs, he leaped.</p> - -<p>He cleared the fissure, but staggered on the slippery ice beyond. He -fell heavily, but still held his son so that Bela fell uppermost and -dropped upon him.</p> - -<p>Crushed by his weight, Sabran sank at full length on the white crystal -ground; alone he would have leaped as surely as the chamois.</p> - -<p>The shock awoke Bela from his trance; he opened his blue eyes giddily.</p> - -<p>'It is you!' he murmured feebly, as he felt himself lying on his -father's breast.</p> - -<p>'It is I!' said Sabran. 'My child, if you can move, try and creep to -that hut and call. I cannot.'</p> - -<p>The child, without a sound, trembling sorely, and with a sense of -confusion making his head dizzy, obeyed, drew himself slowly up, and -dragged his tired, aching, cramped limbs over the snow.</p> - -<p>'You are brave,' murmured his father, whose eyes followed him. 'You are -your mother's son.'</p> - -<p>Bela reached the door of the hut and beat on it with his little frozen -hands, and then fell down against it.</p> - -<p>'It is I—Count Bela!' he managed to cry aloud. 'Come to my father; -quick!'</p> - -<p>The door was flung aside, and the keepers of the hut rushed out at the -first cry. They had been asleep. They were old jägers, past the work -of the forests, but still strong. Having lighted the beacon without, -they had drunk a little wine, and chattered, and then dosed. Terrified -at their own negligence and at the sight of their lady's son, they -staggered out into the night, and together they bore the body of Sabran -into the refuge. He was unable to rise.</p> - -<p>'You cannot move!' sobbed the child, raining kisses on his hands.</p> - -<p>'I am stiff from the cold; nothing more,' said his father, faintly.</p> - -<p>Then he looked at the men.</p> - -<p>'One of you, if it be possible, go to the Burg. Tell the Countess von -Szalras that her son is safe. You need not speak of me. Bring the -physician here when it is morning; but say nothing of me to-night. Give -me a little of your wine——'</p> - -<p>His lips were blue, he felt faint; in his own heart he said to himself, -'I am hurt unto death.'</p> - -<p>Bela had thrown his arms about him, and, trembling like a leaf, clung -there and sobbed aloud deliriously.</p> - -<p>'You are hurt, you are hurt, and all for me!' he sobbed, as he saw his -father placed on the truckle bed set aside for any belated wanderer on -the hills.</p> - -<p>Sabran smiled on him.</p> - -<p>'My child, do not grieve so; it is nothing; a mere momentary wrench; -do not even think of it. No, no! I am not in pain.'</p> - -<p>The wine revived him, and restored his strength, and he sought to -conceal his injury for the boy's sake.</p> - -<p>'Warm some of this wine and give it to my son,' he said to the keeper -of the hut; 'then undress him, wrap him warmly, and make him sleep -before the fire.'</p> - -<p>'You are hurt, you are ill!' moaned Bela. 'I came to find you to take -you back. Our mother has never been the same;—she has never smiled——'</p> - -<p>'Hush!' said Sabran, almost sternly. 'Do not speak of your mother -before these men, her servants. You came to seek me, my poor little -boy? That was good of you, and it was good to remember me. It is three -years——'</p> - -<p>Bela clung to him and put his lips to his father's ear, that the men -might not hear.</p> - -<p>'The others have always prayed for you,' he murmured, 'because we were -all told. But me, I have loved you always. I have never thought of -anything else. And I have tried to be good, oh! I <i>have</i> tried!'</p> - -<p>A great suffering came on his father's face as he heard the innocent -words, and a great tenderness.</p> - -<p>'When I am dead, as I shall be so soon, will he remember, too?' he -thought.</p> - -<p>Aloud he said:</p> - -<p>'My child, it is very sweet to me to hear your voice again. But if you -love me now, obey me. You will have fever and ague if you do not drink -some warm wine, let yourself be undressed, and lie down before the -fire. Do not be afraid. You will see me when you awake. I shall not -stir.'</p> - -<p>He thought as he spoke:</p> - -<p>'No, I shall never stir again; they will bear me away to my grave, that -is all. I am like a felled tree. All is over. Well, perchance, so best: -when I am dead she may forgive—she may love the children.'</p> - -<p>When at last Bela, sobbing piteously, had reluctantly obeyed, and -when, despite all his struggles, nature, frozen, weary, and worn out, -compelled him to close his eager eyes in heavy dreamless slumber, -Sabran with a glance called the keeper to him.</p> - -<p>'Now the child sleeps,' he said, 'get my clothes off me, if you can. -Touch me gently. I think my back is broken.'</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<h4><a name="CHAPTER_XLIII" id="CHAPTER_XLIII">CHAPTER XLIII.</a></h4> - - -<p>It was twelve o'clock in the night. Wanda von Szalras paced the -Rittersaal with feverish steps and limbs which, whilst they quivered -with fear, knew no fatigue. It had been nine in the morning when -Greswold and the servants, having searched in vain, came at last to her -with the tidings that her first-born son was lost; his bed empty, his -clothes gone, his little sword away from its place. All the day she had -sought herself, and organised the search of others with all the energy -and courage of her race. She had not given way to the despair which had -seized her, but in her own soul she had said: 'Does fate chastise me -thus for my own cruelty? I have shrunk from their sweet faces because -they were like his. For two long months I exiled them, I thrust them -from my presence and my heart. I have been ashamed of them. Does God -punish me through them? Shall I lose my children, too? Can I forgive -myself? Have I not even wished them unborn? Oh, my Bela, my darling, my -first-born! Yes, you are his, but more than all, you are mine!'</p> - -<p>When night closed in, and all the many separate search-parties -returned, bringing no news of him, she thought that she would lose her -reason. All had been done that could be done; the men on the estates -were scattered far and wide. It was known that there were snow-storms -on the heights; the white fury had even at eventide descended to the -lower ground, and the terraces and gardens shone white as the lights of -the heavens fell upon them. Every now and then there came the report -of a gun on the hills; the men were firing in hope that the child, if -lost, might hear the shots. The evening passed on and midnight came, -and no one knew where Bela was in those vast forests, those immense -hills, all hidden in the impenetrable darkness. She saw him at every -moment lying white and cold in some hollow in the snow; she saw the -cruel winds blow his curls, his fair limbs stiffen. Every year the -winter and the mountains took their toll of lives.</p> - -<p>She had known nothing of the purport of the child's disappearance; -she had been left to every vague conjecture with which her mind could -torture her. The whole household and all the woodsmen and huntsmen had -scoured the hills far and wide, and the whole day and night had gone by -with no tidings, no result. Sleep had visited no eyes at Hohenszalras; -from its terraces the snow-storm and hurricanes beating around the head -of Glöckner were discernible by the agitation of the clouds that hid -one-half the heights.</p> - -<p>Gela had stayed up beside her, his little pale face pressed to the -window frame, his terrified eyes staring into the gloom which near at -hand grew red with the beacon fires.</p> - -<p>As midnight tolled from the clock tower he came to her, and touched her -hand.</p> - -<p>'Mother,' he whispered, 'I dared not say it before, but I must say it -now. I think—I think—Bela is gone to try and bring <i>him</i> home.'</p> - -<p>'Him!' she echoed, while a thrill ran like fire and ice together -through her, from head to foot. 'You mean—your father?'</p> - -<p>'Yes.'</p> - -<p>She was silent. Her breast heaved.</p> - -<p>'What makes you say that?' she asked, at last.</p> - -<p>'Bela thought of nothing else all this year and last year, too,' said -Gela, in a hushed voice. 'He was always talking of it. When he was -smaller he thought of riding all over the world. Yesterday he was so -strange, and when we went to bed he kissed me ever so many times; and -he prayed a long, long while. And for nothing less would he have taken -the sword, I think. And—and I heard the men saying to-day that our -father was somewhere near; and I think that Bela might have heard that, -and so have gone to bring him home.'</p> - -<p>'To bring him home!'</p> - -<p>The words, uttered in his son's soft, grave, flute-like voice, pierced -her heart. She could not speak.</p> - -<p>'Will he rob me even of my first-born?' she thought, bitterly.</p> - -<p>At that moment Greswold entered. Gela, looking in his face, gave a -shout of joy.</p> - -<p>'You have found my Bela!' he cried, flinging his arms about the old man.</p> - -<p>'Yes, your brother is safe, quite safe! My Lady hears?'</p> - -<p>She heard, and the first tears that she had ever shed for years rushed -to her eyes. She drew Gela, with a passionate gesture, to her side, -and falling on her knees beside the Imperial throne in the Kittersaal, -praised God.</p> - -<p>Then, when she rose, she cried in very ecstasy:</p> - -<p>'Fetch him; bring him at once!—oh, my child! Who found him? Who has -him now? If a peasant saved his life, he and his shall have the finest -of all my land in Iselthal in grant for ever and for ever!—--'</p> - -<p>Greswold looked at her timidly; then said:</p> - -<p>'May I speak to your Excellency alone?'</p> - -<p>She touched Gela's hair tenderly.</p> - -<p>'Go, my darling, and bear the good news to our reverend mother. You -know how she has suffered.'</p> - -<p>The boy obeyed and left the hall. She turned to Greswold.</p> - -<p>'Tell me all, now.'</p> - -<p>The old man hesitated, then took his courage up and answered.</p> - -<p>'My Lady—his father found your son.'</p> - -<p>She put her hand out and clenched the arm of the throne as if to save -herself from falling.</p> - -<p>'His father!' she echoed. 'How came he there? Answer me, with the -truth, the whole truth.'</p> - -<p>'My Countess,' said Greswold, while his voice shook, 'your husband has -dwelt amidst the Glöckner slopes almost for the last three years. When -he left here he remained absent awhile, but not long. He has lived in -utter solitude. Few knew it. The few who did kept his secret. I was one -of these. He had corresponded with me ever since he left your house. -You may remember being angered?'</p> - -<p>She made a gesture of assent.</p> - -<p>'Go on,' she murmured. 'He found my child, you say?'</p> - -<p>'He found Count Bela; yes. It seems he had come as near here as some -nine miles eastward; near the hut which your Excellency built, not -very long after your marriage, on the crest of the Adler Spitze, in -consequence of the fatal accident to the Bavarian pedlars. He knew -nothing of Count Bela's loss, but there he saw a young boy threatened -by an eagle, and shot the bird. The fog was even then coming on upon -the heights. He found his son insensible from fatigue, and cold, and -terror, and bore him in his arms until he reached the refuge. He had -been near it all the time, but as the mist deepened and the snow fell -he lost his way, and must have gone round and round on the same path -for hours. We were, in sheer despair, mounting towards the Adler -Spitze, though we did not believe the child could have possibly got so -far, when we met one of the keepers descending with the news. The storm -is at its height; we could only grope our way, and we missed it many -times, so that we have been four mortal hours and more coming downward -those seven miles. The keeper said that my lord desired you should hear -at once of the safety of the child, but not of his own presence in the -hut. But I felt that your Excellency should be told of all.'</p> - -<p>'You were right. I thank you. You have been ever faithful to me and -mine.'</p> - -<p>She stretched out her hand to him in dismissal, and sought a refuge in -her oratory.</p> - -<p>She felt that she must be alone.</p> - -<p>She almost forgot the safety of her first-born in the sense that -his father was near her. She fell on her knees before the Christ of -Andermeyer and praised heaven for her child's preservation, and with a -passion of tears besought guidance in her struggle with what now seemed -to her the long and cruel hardness of her heart.</p> - -<p>To hear thus of him whom once she had adored, blinded her to all save -the memories of the past, which thronged upon her. If he had repented -so greatly was it not her obligation to meet his penitence with pardon? -It would be bitter to her to live out her life beside one whose word -she would for ever doubt, whose disloyalty had cut to the roots of the -pride and purity of her race. Nevermore between them could there be -the undoubting faith, the unblemished trust, which are the glorious -noonday of a cloudless love. She might forgive, but never, never, she -thought, would she be able to command forget fulness.</p> - -<p>But for that very reason, maybe, would her duty lie this way.</p> - -<p>The knowledge of those lonely desolate years, passed so near her, -whilst he kept the dignity and the humility of silence, touched all the -generosity of her nature. She knew that he had suffered; she believed -that, though he had betrayed her, he had loved and honoured her in -honesty and truth. One lie had poisoned his life, as a rusted nail -driven through an oak tree in its prime corrodes and kills it. But he -had not been a liar always. She had made his life her own in bygone -years: was she not bound now to redeem it, to raise it, to shelter it -on her heart and in her home? Was not the very shrinking scorn she felt -for his past a reason the more that she should bend her pride to union -with him? She had thought of her life ever as the poet of the flower:</p> - -<p style="margin-left: 20%;"> -<span style="margin-left: 25%;">the ever sacred cup</span><br /> -Of the pure lily hath between my hands<br /> -Felt safe unsoiled, nor lost one grain of gold. -</p> - -<p>Had there been egotism in the purity of it, self-love beneath love of -honour? Had she treasured the 'grain of gold' in her hands rather with -the Pharisee's arrogance of purity than with the true humility of the -acolyte?</p> - -<p>She kneeled there before the carven Christ in an anguish of doubt.</p> - -<p>He had given her back her first-born. Should she be less generous to -him?</p> - -<p>Should she for ever arrogate the right of judgment against him, or -should she stretch the palm of pardon even across that great gulf of -wrong dividing them as by a bottomless pit?</p> - -<p>Tears came like dew to her parched heart. It was the first time that -she had ever wept since the night when she had exiled him. Three long -barren years had drifted by; years cold and dark and joyless as the -winter days which bound the earth under bands of iron, and let no -living thing or creeping herb rejoice or procreate.</p> - -<p>When she rose from her knees her mind was made up, a great peace had -descended on her soul. She had forgiven her own dishonour. She had laid -her heart bare before God and plucked her pride up from its bleeding -roots.</p> - -<p>All the early hours of her love recurred to her with an aching -remembrance, which had lost its shame and was sweet in its very pain. -His crime was still dark as the night in her eyes, but her conscience -and her awakening tenderness spoke together and pleaded for her pardon.</p> - -<p>What was love if not one long forgiveness? What raised it higher than -the senses if not its infinite patience and endurance of all wrong? -What was its hope of eternal life if it had not gathered strength in it -enough to rise above human arrogance and human vengeance?</p> - -<p>'Oh, my love, my love!' she cried aloud. 'We will live our lives out -together!'</p> - -<p>Her resolve was taken when she left her oratory and traversed her -apartments to those of the Princess Ottilie, who met her with eager -words of joy, herself tremulous and feeble after the anxious terrors of -the past day. Some look on Wanda's face checked the utterance of her -gladness.</p> - -<p>'Is it not true?' she said in sudden fear. 'Is the child not found?'</p> - -<p>'Yes; his father has found him,' she answered simply. 'Dear mother, -long you have condemned me; judged me unchristian, unmerciful, harsh. I -know not whether you were right, or I. God knows, we cannot. But give -me your blessing ere I go out into the night. I go to him; I will bring -him here.'</p> - -<p>The other gazed at her doubting, incredulous, touched to a great hope.</p> - -<p>'Bring him?' she echoed, 'your child?'</p> - -<p>'My husband.'</p> - -<p>'You will do that?—ah! mercy is ever blessed; the grace of Heaven will -be with you!'</p> - -<p>She sighed as she raised her head.</p> - -<p>'Who can tell? Perhaps my harshness will make heaven harsh to me.'</p> - -<p>When she came forth again from her own rooms she was clothed in a -fur-lined riding-habit.</p> - -<p>'Bid them saddle a horse used to the hills,' she said, 'and let Otto -and two other men be ready to go with me.'</p> - -<p>'It is a fearful night,' Greswold ventured to suggest. 'It will be as -bad a dawn. It snows even here. We met the keeper almost midway up the -Adler Spitze, yet it took us four hours to make the descent.'</p> - -<p>She did not even seem to hear him.</p> - -<p>'May I follow?' he asked her humbly. She gave a sign of assent, and -stood motionless and mute; her thoughts were far away.</p> - -<p>When the horse was brought she went out into the night. The storm of -the upper hills had descended to the lower; the wind was blowing icily -and strong, the snow was falling fast, but on the lower lands it did -not freeze as it fell, and riding was possible, though at a slow pace -from the great darkness. She knew every step of the way through her own -woods and up to the spurs of the Glöckner. She rode on till the ascent -grew too steep for any animal; then she abandoned the horse to one of -her attendants, took her alpenstock and went on her way towards the -Adler Spitze on foot, the men with their lanterns lighting the ground -in front of her. It was wild weather and grew wilder the nearer it grew -to dawn. There was danger, at every step from slippery frozen ground, -from thin ice that might break over bottomless abysses. The snow was -driven in her face, and the wind tore madly at her clothes. But she was -used to the mountains and held on steadily, refusing the rope which -Otto entreated her to take and permit him to fasten to his loins. They -kept to the right paths, for their strong lights enabled them to see -whither they went. Once they crept along a narrow ledge where a man -could barely stand. The ascent was long and weary in the teeth of the -weather; it tried even the stout jägers; but she scarcely felt the -force of the wind, the chill of the black frost.</p> - -<p>No woman but one used as she was to measure her strength with her -native Alps could have lived through that night, which tried hardly -even the hunters born and bred amidst the snow summits. By day the -ascent hither was difficult and dangerous after the summer months, but -after nightfall the sturdiest mountaineer dreamed not of facing it. But -on those heights above her, in the dark yonder, beneath the clouds, -were her husband and her child. That knowledge sufficed to nerve her -limbs to preternatural power, and the men who followed her were loyal -and devoted to her service; they would have lain down to die at her -word.</p> - -<p>When her body seemed to sink with the burden of fatigue and cold, she -looked up into the blackness of the air, and thought that those she -sought were there, and fancied that already she heard their voices. -Then she gathered new strength and crept onward and upward, her hands -and feet clinging to the bare rock, the smooth ice, as a swallow clings -to a house wall.</p> - -<p>She had issued from a battle more bitter with her own soul; and had -conquered.</p> - -<p>At last they neared the refuge built by and named from her, and set -amidst the desolation of the snow-fields. She signed to her men to stay -without, and walking onward alone drew near the heavy door.</p> - -<p>She opened it a little way, paused a moment, drawing her breath with -effort; then looked into the cabin. It was a mere hut of two chambers -made of pitch pine, and lighted by a single window. There was no light -but from the pallid day without, which had barely broken. Before the -fire of burning logs was a nest of hay, and in it lay the child, -sleeping a deep and healthful sleep, his hands folded on his breast, -his face flushed with warmth and recovered life, his long lashes dark -upon his cheeks.</p> - -<p>His father was stretched still as a statue on the truckle-bed of the -keeper who watched beside him.</p> - -<p>The day had now broken, clear, pale, cold; the faint rose of sunrise -was behind the snow peaks of the Glöckner, and an <i>alpenflühevogel</i> -was trilling and tripping on the frozen ground. From a distant unseen -hamlet far below there came a faint sound of morning bells.</p> - -<p>She thrust the door further open and entered. She made a gesture to -the keeper, who started up with a low obeisance, to go without. She -fastened the latch upon him; then, without waking the sleeping child, -went up to her husband's bed. His eyes were closed; he did not notice -the opening and shutting of the door; he was still and white as the -snow without; he looked weary and exhausted.</p> - -<p>At sight of him all the great love she had once borne him sprang up in -all its normal strength; her heart swelled with unspeakable emotion; -she stood and gazed on him with thirsty eyes tired of their long denial.</p> - -<p>Stirred by some vague sense of her presence near him he looked up and -saw her; all his blood rushed into his face. He could not speak. She -stooped towards him and laid her hand gently upon his.</p> - -<p>'I am come to thank you.'</p> - -<p>Her voice trembled.</p> - -<p>He gave a restless sigh.</p> - -<p>'Ah! for the child's sake,' he murmured. 'You do not come for me!—--'</p> - -<p>She hesitated a moment, then she gathered all her strength and all her -mercy.</p> - -<p>'I come for you,' she answered in low clear tones. 'I will forget all -else except that I once loved you.'</p> - -<p>His face grew transfigured with a great joy.</p> - -<p>He could not speak; he gazed at her.</p> - -<p>'You were my lover, you are my children's father. You shall return to -us,' she murmured, while her voice seemed to him heard in some dream -of Heaven. 'Your sin was great, yes; but love pardons all sins, nay, -effaces them, washes them out, makes them as though they were not. -I know that now. What have not been my own sins?—my coldness, my -harshness, my cruel, unyielding—pride? Nay, sometimes I have thought -of late my fault was darker than your own; more hateful in God's sight.'</p> - -<p>'Noblest of all women always!' he said faintly. 'If it be true, if it -be true, stoop down and kiss me once again.'</p> - -<p>She stooped, and touched his lips with hers.</p> - -<p>The child slept on in his nest of hay before the burning wood. The -silence of the high hills reigned around them. The light of the risen -day came through the small square window of the hut. Outside the bird -still sang.</p> - -<p>He looked up in her eyes, and his own eyes smiled with celestial joy.</p> - -<p>'I am happy!' he said simply. 'I have lived amongst your hills almost -ever since that night, that I might see your shadow as you passed, hear -the feet of your horses in the woods. The men were faithful; they never -told. Kiss me once more. You believe, say you believe, <i>now</i>, that I -did love you though I wronged you so?'</p> - -<p>'I do believe,' she answered him. 'I think God cannot pardon me that I -ever doubted!'</p> - -<p>Then, as she saw that he still lay quite motionless, not turning -towards her, though his eyes sought hers, a sudden terror smote dully -at her heart.</p> - -<p>'Are you hurt? Cannot you move?' she whispered. 'Look at me; speak to -me! It is dawn already; you shall come home at once.'</p> - -<p>He smiled.</p> - -<p>'Nay, love, I shall not move again. My spine is hurt, not broken, I -believe—but hurt beyond help; paralysis has begun. My angel, grieve -not for me, I shall die happy. You love me still! Ah, it is best thus; -were I to live, my sin and shame might still torture you, still part -us, but when I am dead you will forget them. You are so generous, you -are so great, you will forget them. You will only remember that we were -happy once, happy through many a long sweet year, and that I loved -you;—loved you in all truth, though I betrayed you!'</p> - -<p>The hunters bore him gently down in the cool pale noontide along the -peaceful mountain side homeward to Hohenszalras, and there, after -eleven days, he died.</p> - -<p>The white marble in its carven semblance of him lies above his grave -in the Silver Chapel; but in the heart of his wife he lives for ever, -and with him lives a sleepless and an eternal remorse.</p> - -<h4>THE END.</h4> -<hr class="full" /> -<p style="margin-left: 20%; font-size: 0.8em;"> -CONTENTS<br /><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX">CHAPTER XXX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI">CHAPTER XXXI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII">CHAPTER XXXII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII">CHAPTER XXXIII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV">CHAPTER XXXIV.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV">CHAPTER XXXV.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI">CHAPTER XXXVI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII">CHAPTER XXXVII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII">CHAPTER XXXVIII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX">CHAPTER XXXIX.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XL">CHAPTER XL.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLI">CHAPTER XLI.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLII">CHAPTER XLII.</a><br /> -<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII">CHAPTER XLIII.</a><br /> -</p> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Wanda, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Ouida - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDA, VOL. 3 (OF 3) *** - -***** This file should be named 52137-h.htm or 52137-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/2/1/3/52137/ - -Produced by Wanda Lee, Laura Natal Rodriguez and Marc -D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images -generouslly made available by the Internet Archive.) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive -specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this -eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook -for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, -performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given -away--you may do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks -not protected by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the -trademark license, especially commercial redistribution. - -START: FULL LICENSE - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full -Project Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at -www.gutenberg.org/license. - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or -destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your -possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a -Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound -by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the -person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph -1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this -agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the -Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection -of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual -works in the collection are in the public domain in the United -States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the -United States and you are located in the United States, we do not -claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, -displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as -all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope -that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting -free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm -works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the -Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily -comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the -same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when -you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are -in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, -check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this -agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, -distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any -other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no -representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any -country outside the United States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other -immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear -prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work -on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, -performed, viewed, copied or distributed: - - This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and - most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no - restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it - under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this - eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the - United States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you - are located before using this ebook. - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is -derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not -contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the -copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in -the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are -redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply -either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or -obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any -additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms -will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works -posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the -beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including -any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access -to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format -other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official -version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site -(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense -to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means -of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain -Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the -full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -provided that - -* You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed - to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has - agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid - within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are - legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty - payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project - Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in - Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg - Literary Archive Foundation." - -* You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all - copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue - all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm - works. - -* You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of - any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of - receipt of the work. - -* You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than -are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing -from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and The -Project Gutenberg Trademark LLC, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm -trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project -Gutenberg-tm collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may -contain "Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate -or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other -intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or -other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or -cannot be read by your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium -with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you -with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in -lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person -or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second -opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If -the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing -without further opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO -OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT -LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of -damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement -violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the -agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or -limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or -unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the -remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in -accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the -production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, -including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of -the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this -or any Project Gutenberg-tm work, (b) alteration, modification, or -additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any -Defect you cause. - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of -computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It -exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations -from people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future -generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see -Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at -www.gutenberg.org - - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by -U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is in Fairbanks, Alaska, with the -mailing address: PO Box 750175, Fairbanks, AK 99775, but its -volunteers and employees are scattered throughout numerous -locations. Its business office is located at 809 North 1500 West, Salt -Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email contact links and up to -date contact information can be found at the Foundation's web site and -official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact - -For additional contact information: - - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND -DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular -state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To -donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project -Gutenberg-tm concept of a library of electronic works that could be -freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and -distributed Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of -volunteer support. - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in -the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - - -</pre> - -</body> -</html> diff --git a/old/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index abf4ef5..0000000 --- a/old/old/52137-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null |
