Problematic Characters Part 46

The door to the anteroom opened, and Mrs. Muller, or Thusnelda, as the baron called her, looked in.

"I cannot--ah! there she is! Where have you been, darling doll? Come, I will put you a little to rights. How you look again!--quite covered with heather, as usual; what are the gentlemen to think?"

With these words the matron led the child out of the room.

"You must know that there is a strong attachment between the two," said the baron. "My old nurse has had many blooming children who have all died young. Other women's hearts often grow hard under such calamities; hers has remained soft, and now she loves the Czika as if she were her first-born. But that is just as if a dove had hatched a falcon. Czika's determination to enjoy unbounded liberty causes the old lady ten times every day infinite trouble and despair. And then, another difficulty.

Thusnelda is very pious, and Czika has--_horribile dictu_--no religion whatever, unless it be some mysterious wors.h.i.+p of the stars, which she performs at night, when she steals away from her couch and dances in the moonlight on the beach, as Thusnelda swears she has seen her do, to her own unspeakable horror and disgust. And, to tell the truth, I believe Thusnelda is right. At least I have noticed more than once that if the gypsies have any object of wors.h.i.+p it is the sun, the moon, and the stars."

"Have you often had opportunity in your travels to come in contact with this interesting race?"

"Oh yes!" said the baron, "even into very close contact, especially once in Hungary--now twelve years ago."

The baron paused, filled his gla.s.s, and drank the wine slowly, fixing his eyes on the tablecloth like a person whose thoughts are completely preoccupied with some recollection.

"Well," said Oswald, "how was that?"

"What?" said the baron, as if awakening from a dream; "oh yes; well, you shall hear what I had to do with gypsies in Hungary."

"I presume that was a romance?"

"Of course," replied the baron; "I was at that time at an age when every man is more or less romantic, unless he be born a mere stick. I was enthusiastic about moonlit magic nights, about wells and forest noises, and, above all, I was enthusiastic about slender maidens, with or without a guitar and a blue ribbon.

"All my views of life were eminently romantic, especially my morality.

The whole of life had no more meaning for me than a puppet-show at a fair, and sovereign irony was the only real feeling which I appreciated. In a word, I was a nice fellow, and if they had hung me on the nearest gallows it would have been my just punishment, and, I trust, a good warning for others.

"I was heartily tired of my student's life at Bonn and at Heidelberg. I had looked in vain into a thousand books to solve the mystery about which so many better men have racked their brains, and I wanted to try it in a new way. I wrote to my guardian, and conveyed to him my intention to travel a few years. My guardian approved the plan, as he approved everything I ever suggested,--so he could get rid of me for a time,--he sent me money and letters of introduction, and I went on my journey. I travelled over Southern Germany, Switzerland, and Northern Italy. But if you were to ask me even for a superficial account of my journey I would be seriously embarra.s.sed. I know as much of those countries as of the landscapes I have seen in my dreams. Last, I went to Hungary. Chance, which was always my only guide, had led me there.

In Vienna I had become acquainted with a Hungarian n.o.bleman, whose father owned large estates at the foot of the Tetra mountains. He had invited me to visit him, and I went. We led quite an idyllic life; the main features of which were wine, women, and dice. He had a couple of beautiful sisters, with whom I fell in love one by one. Then I became enthusiastic about the French _dame de compagnie_ of his mother, who had just come from Paris and put all the young Hungarian ladies to shame by the grace of her manners, her taste in matters of toilette, and her skill in conversation.

"Once I was roaming about in the forest, my mind full of this sweet G.o.ddess, whom I then believed in as I did in genuine pearls and real gold, but whom I afterwards met again in Paris under different circ.u.mstances; I was dreaming, and thus lost myself, or was led by my guide, Chance, to a clearing which a band of gypsies had chosen for their temporary encampment. A few small huts built of clay and wickerwork in very archaic style, a fireplace over which an old dame was roasting a stone-martin, deerskins and rags hanging on the branches to dry--this was the picture which suddenly met my eye. The whole band was away with the exception of the old witch, a few little babies who rolled about in the sand in paradisiac nakedness, and one young girl of about fifteen--"

The baron filled his gla.s.s and drank it at one gulp.

"Of about fifteen--perhaps she was older--it is difficult to determine the age of gypsy girls. She was slender and agile like a deer, and her dark eyes shone with such a magic, supernatural fire, that I was seized by a rapture of delight as I looked deeper and deeper into them, while she was telling me my fortune by reading the lines in my hand. My fate could be read much more clearly in her eyes than in my hand. I was delighted, enraptured, beside myself--the world had disappeared in an instant. You must bear in mind that I was twenty years old, and romantic as few men are, even at that early age; but I felt that to be a gypsy, to feed upon stone-martins, and to sun one's self in the eyes of a gypsy girl was the true and only purpose of life upon earth. I stayed with the gypsies I know not how many days. My friends at the chateau thought I had been torn by wolves. But one evening, when the sun had already disappeared behind the mountain wall which protected our encampment towards the north, and while the band were still away, I was sitting with the Zingarella at the foot of an old oak-tree, and was happy in my young love--when----

"I verily believe there is somebody coming"--the baron said, interrupting himself--"was not that a strange voice?"

"I hope not," said Oswald.

The door opened; old Hermann looked in and said:--

"Baron Cloten wishes to present his respects, sir; are you at home?"

"Oh no!" replied Oldenburg; "but, to be sure, I cannot very well decline seeing him; he comes to--hm, hm!"

"Do not let me prevent you from being hospitable," said Oswald, rising.

"I pray, stay!" said the baron; "I hope he will not remain long. He comes in a certain affair in which he wants my advice. That is all.

Show him up stairs, Hermann."

A moment afterwards Baron Cloten entered. He wore a riding-coat and top-boots, and seemed to have had a long ride. At least he looked very much heated. Oswald's presence seemed to annoy or to embarra.s.s him; at least he spoke to him with striking formality, after having shaken hands with the baron.

"Very warm to-day," he snarled, seating himself in the chair which the baron had offered him; "Robin is covered with sweat,---told your groom to rub him down with a wisp of straw. Keeps an animal marvellously well. Pleasant wine--what is it?--famous wine--had some the other day at Barnewitz--not half as good. Apropos Barnewitz--no bad effects, baron? Left somewhat early--heat really abominable----"

"Won't you put down your hat, Cloten?"

"Thanks! Am going away directly. Only wanted to see--quite near here--was at Grenwitz--everybody out there--came over here to see how all were."

"But you surely have a few minutes?"

"Not a moment--'pon honor," said Cloten, emptying his gla.s.s and rising; "call in to-morrow, perhaps. Good-by, baron."

Cloten again bowed very formally to Oswald and went to the door, accompanied by the baron.

"I pray, don't trouble yourself," said Cloten.

"I just want to have a look at Robin," replied Oldenburg, and then to Oswald; "excuse me a moment, doctor."

Oswald was alone. The remarkably cool manner of the young n.o.bleman had offended his pride, though he tried to convince himself that he despised him. He walked up and down in the room, much excited. His hatred of the n.o.bility had been fanned into a flame; even Oldenburg's manner seemed to him to have been less cordial while Cloten was there.

His eye fell upon the green silk curtain between the two bookcases, which had struck him before.

"I wonder what this veiled image means? Perhaps a voluptuous Correggio.

At all events, a key to the better knowledge of this strange man.

You'll excuse my curiosity, _monsieur le baron_?"

Oswald pulled the silken cord of the curtain, and the youth at Sas, who lifted the veil before the sacred image of Isis, could not have been more startled than Oswald was when he saw, not a richly tinted Italian painting, but in a niche, a bust of chaste white marble, which, in spite of the antique hair-dress and a slight attempt to idealize, was nothing else than a striking portrait of Melitta. There was her rich waving hair; there her beautiful smooth brow, the straight, delicate nose; there were the soft lips, looking dewy even in marble!

Before Oswald could recover from his amazement to find himself thus face to face with his beloved one, the baron entered.

"Please excuse my indiscretion," said Oswald, who had not been able to draw the curtain back again; "but why do you keep veiled images here which belong in a sanctuary, and not in a common reception-room?"

"You are right," replied the baron, without a trace of confusion; "this green veil is, like most veils, only a provocation; and, by the way, it is very foolish to conceal the copy when the original can be seen at any time by those who will take the trouble of going to Palermo and asking for leave to see the villa Serra di Falco."

"Indeed?" said Oswald, annoyed by the imperturbable calmness with which the baron tried to make him swallow his story. "Ah! in Palermo? I had been tempted to look for the original nearer home."

"You mean in Berlin, at the Museum!" said the baron. "There is a Muse there which looks very much like this bust, but if you examine it more closely you will soon see the difference."

"Yes," replied Oswald; "the nose there is more decided, and the carriage of the head is slightly different, and altogether the resemblance with Frau von Berkow much less striking than in this bust."

"Do you think so?" said the baron, rising and going up to the bust.

"Really, you are right. There is really a slight resemblance between this bust and Frau von Berkow. Well, that does not make me like the work any less, as there are few ladies in the world whom I love more to be reminded of than that amiable and clever lady."

The baron drew the curtain over the bust, as if he wished to end the conversation.

"Come, doctor," he said, "sit down and try to forget that Cloten, this cleverest of all young men, has ever been here."

"I believe it is high time for me to be gone," said Oswald; "the sun is near setting--I should not like to get home too late, to-night especially."