The Northern Light Part 43

Frau von Eschenhagen's brow darkened at this remark; she did not see fit to answer it though, but showed that she wanted to avoid further discussion by asking, in a changed tone:

"Has Toni come back yet? I heard from Adelheid that she had been visiting in the city, but was expected any day."

Herr von Schonau, who in the meantime had ensconced himself in a comfortable chair, answered:

"Yes, she came home yesterday--and with an escort, too. She brought a young man with her who was to be her future husband, she declared, and as he declared so too, with great positiveness, there was nothing left me but to say, yes and Amen."

"What's that? Toni engaged again?" exclaimed Frau Regine in surprise.

"Yes, this time she did it all herself. I knew nothing of it. But you see, she took it into her head that she must be loved to distraction; nothing less romantic would do for her. Well, Herr von Walldorf seems to answer all her requirements. He related to me with the greatest satisfaction how he fell on his knees and a.s.sured her he could not live without her, and how she gave him a similar touching a.s.surance, with more to the same effect. Yes, Regine, the day has gone by when we can keep the children in leading strings. When they get ready, they want to choose their own partners for life and I must say they're not far wrong."

The last sentence was uttered with seeming carelessness, but Regine understand it fully. Thoughtfully she repeated:

"Walldorf? The name is strange to me. When did Toni meet him?"

"He is a friend of my son and came home with him on his last visit. As a result of that visit, I met the mother, and she invited Toni to spend a few weeks with her, and that's where all the courting was done. But I have no reason to feel dissatisfied. Walldorf's a handsome fellow, and lively, and head over heels in love; he seems a little light and frothy now, but that will disappear when he gets a sensible wife like Toni.

These model sons are not always to my taste; they get too skittish when they break loose. We have an example of that in Will. Walldorf will resign in the Autumn. I won't have my Toni marrying a lieutenant; I will buy them an estate and they will be married at Christmas."

"I am greatly rejoiced on Toni's account," said Frau von Eschenhagen, heartily. "You take a great load from my heart by this news."

"And now," said the head forester, nodding to her, "you should follow my example and take a load from the heart of another betrothed couple. Be reasonable, Regine, and give in. Little Marietta is a dear, good girl, if she has sung in a theatre. Every one speaks highly of her. You need never be ashamed of your daughter-in-law."

Regine rose suddenly and pushed her chair back with a violent movement.

"I beg you, Moritz, once for all, to spare me such requests. I will stand by my word. Willibald knows the conditions under which I shall return to Burgsdorf. If he does not fulfill them, we are better apart."

"It will be a long time before he will do that," said her brother-in-law, dryly. "When a man is asked to abandon the woman he loves for a mother's whim, he's not apt to do it if he's made of the right stuff."

"You express yourself very freely," said Frau Regine, angrily. "But what does a man know of a mother's love or of the grat.i.tude of children? You are all an ungrateful, heedless, selfish--"

"Hold! I have something to say for my own s.e.x," von Schonau began excitedly. Suddenly, however, he leaned forward and said in a changed tone:

"We haven't seen each other for seven months, Regine, so don't let's quarrel the very first day we meet. We can do that any time, you know.

We won't discuss that obstinate heir of Burgsdorf, but speak of ourselves. How do you like life in the city? To me you hardly seem contented."

"I am very well contented," declared Regine with great decision. "All I miss is the work; I am not accustomed to an idle life."

"Of course you miss it. You always have been at the head of a great establishment, and that's where you should be now, so I--"

"Don't begin again, I beg you."

"No, I don't mean Burgsdorf this time," said von Schonau, looking down at his riding boots. "I only meant--you're all alone in the city, and I'm all alone at Furstenstein, and when Toni marries, it will be very weary. Would it not be better--oh, I've said it all to you before--perhaps you won't, perhaps you have a better offer in view, but--wouldn't it be better to have a triple instead of a double marriage?"

Frau von Eschenhagen looked darkly on the ground and shook her head.

"No, Moritz, I never was less in the humor for marrying than now."

"Another refusal !" cried the head forester impatiently. "This makes the second time. First you would not have me because you had your son and your beloved Burgsdorf to look after, now you won't have me because you are not in the humor. Humors have nothing to do with marrying, only common sense; but when a woman hasn't any sense, and is too stubborn to--"

"You're in a very flattering mood, I must say," interrupted Regine, thoroughly aroused now. "It would be a very peaceful marriage, with you wagging your sharp tongue all the time."

"It wouldn't be peaceful. I never expected that," Schonau declared, "but neither would it be monotonous. I believe we could endure one another.

Now, once for all, Regine, will you have me or will you not?"

"No, I don't care to enter into a marriage of endurance."

"So be it!" cried the head forester, furious now as he jumped up and seized his hat. "If it gives you such pleasure to be eternally saying no, why say it. Willibald will marry and he is right, and now I'll do everything to hurry on his marriage just to annoy you." So saying he left the room in a violent temper, slamming the door behind him as he went, while Frau Regine remained behind equally irritated. These two were apparently fated to quarrel whenever they met; it seemed a necessity of their natures, but no quarrel was so bitter that peace could not be established at their next meeting.

In the meantime Prince Adelsberg had found Frau von Wallmoden in the park. He begged her to continue her walk, and now the two were sauntering under the cool dark shadows of the great lindens, whose spreading branches protected them from the sun's rays, which beat down so fiercely on the neighboring meadows.

Egon had not seen the young wife since her husband's death. He had made a formal visit of condolence at that time, but Eugen Stahlberg had received him in his sister's stead, and immediately after the brother and sister had left for the North. Adelheid still wore deep mourning, but Prince Egon thought the sombre attire and black veil under which her fair hair gleamed like a halo, only enhanced her beauty.

His glance frequently sought the fair young face, and each time he asked himself what change had come over it; he felt there was a change, but could not define wherein it lay. Egon had only seen her when her cold, proud reserve held every one in check. Now all coldness had disappeared, he saw and felt it, and yet there seemed a mystery about her which he could not unravel.

She could not be grieving for a husband old enough to be her father, who, even had he been nearer her own age, was of a cold, guarded nature, and could not inspire the love of a fresh young girl. And yet there was something in the face which told of sorrow, of a deep and voiceless woe.

"If this icy exterior could be broken through one would find warmth and life beneath," Prince Egon had declared more than once, half jestingly.

Now this transformation had been partially effected, slowly, almost imperceptibly. But this soft, half-pained expression, which had taken the place of the haughty, cold one, this sorrowful glance, gave the young widow the one charm which had been lacking--gentleness.

The conversation had been about trifling every-day matters, inquiries and answers concerning the court and the harmless gossip of the day.

Egon repeated the story he had already related to the head forester about the heat of Ostend, and his desire for solitude in his little woodland home. His listener's fleeting smile showed him that she was as incredulous as Herr von Schonau had been; perhaps she too had read the newspaper statements concerning the royal niece at Ostend. He was angry, and was puzzling his brain to know how he could broach the subject, and correct the error into which the papers had led her, when Adelheid asked suddenly:

"Will your highness be alone all summer at Rodeck? Last year you had a guest with you."

A shadow darkened the prince's face, and he forgot the correction which he was about to make concerning his reported betrothal.

"You mean Hartmut Rojanow ?" he said very seriously. "He will scarcely join me; he is in Sicily at present, or was, at least, a couple of months ago. Since then I have not heard from him, and don't even know where to write."

Frau von Wallmoden stooped to pluck a flower which grew in her way, as she said quietly:

"I believed you were in constant correspondence with one another."

"I hoped to be when we parted, but the fault is not on my side. Hartmut has become an unsolvable riddle to me lately. You witnessed the glittering success of his 'Arivana' on that first night; which success has been repeated in many cities since then; the drama has fairly taken the people by storm, and the poet who has done it all flees from the world, even from me, and buries himself, G.o.d knows where. I cannot understand it. Upon my soul, I cannot understand it."

Adelheid plucked the petals of her flower as they walked on slowly, then said in a low tone, as she looked with intense interest into the prince's face:

"And when did Herr Rojanow leave Germany?"

"In the beginning of December. Shortly before that he had gone to Rodeck to spend a few days; that was immediately after 'Arivana' was brought out. I thought it was a whim of the moment and said little, but suddenly he came back to me in the city in a state of excitement which fairly frightened me, and announced that he was going to leave Germany and travel. He wouldn't listen to reason, wouldn't answer a question, and was off like a thunder-bolt. He had been gone weeks before I heard from him again; since then I have had some letters, few and far between. He was in Greece for several months, then he went to Sicily, and now for two months I have been waiting anxiously for news."

Egon spoke in an anxious tone. No need to ask how painfully this separation from his dearest friend affected him.

He little knew that the woman by his side could have solved the riddle for him. She knew what drove poor, unsatisfied Hartmut from land to land, knew the blemish that soiled the poet's name. This was the first news she had heard of him since that fatal night at Rodeck, when all had been revealed to her.

"I presume poets are formed of different clay from common mortals," she said slowly, as she scattered the leaves before her. "That's the only reason one can ascribe for their vagaries."

The young prince shook his head sadly.

"No, it is not that; his peculiarities spring from some other source. I have felt confident for a long time that there is something dark and mysterious in Hartmut's life, but I never could ascertain what it was.