The Children of Alsace Part 33

He began to laugh--

"Nothing short of an order from the Emperor would make me! I am a good German, as you say. I do not easily give up what I have won.

And Count Ka.s.sewitz is only my uncle."

"What you do not know is that my father-in-law, for the first time for many, many years, in his exasperation, in the excess of his grief, has spoken. He cried out to Jean: 'Go away! Go away!' I heard the words. I ran quickly. Well, sir, what moved me most was not seeing M. Philippe Oberle senseless, stretched upon the floor; it was my son's expression, and it is my conviction that at that moment he resolved to obey and to leave Alsace."

"Oh," said Farnow, "that would be bad."

He cast a glance at the fair Lucienne, and saw that she was shaking her blond head in sign of denial.

"Yes, bad," continued the mother without understanding in what sense Farnow used the word. "What an old age for me in my divided house--without my daughter, whom you are going to take away; without my son, who will have gone away. You are astonished, perhaps, that I should tell you an anxiety of this sort?"

He made a gesture which might mean anything.

"It is because," the mother continued more quickly, "I have no one to advise me; no help to hope for--under the circ.u.mstances.

Understand clearly. To whom shall I go? To my husband? He would be furious? He would start to work and we should find that by his influence Jean would be incorporated in a German regiment in a week's time--away in the north or the east. My brother? He would rather insist on my son leaving Alsace. You see, monsieur, you are the only one who can do anything."

"What exactly?"

"But much. Jean has promised me that he will join the regiment. You can arrange that he shall be received and welcomed, and not discouraged. You can a.s.sure him protection, society, comrades--you have known him a long time. You can prevent his giving way to melancholy ideas, and stop him if he were again tempted to carry out such a plan."

The lieutenant, much disturbed, frowned, and the expression of his face changed at the last words. Then he said:

"Up to the first of October you have your son's promise--after that I will look after him."

Then speaking to himself, and again occupied with an idea, which he did not express entirely:

"Yes," he said, "very bad--it must not be."

Lucienne heard it.

"So much the worse," said she. "I betray my brother's secret, but he will forgive me when he knows that I betrayed him to calm mamma. You can be easy, mamma, Jean will not leave Alsace."

"Because?"

"He loves."

"Where then?"

"At Alsheim!"

"Whom?"

"Odile Bastian."

Madame Oberle asked absolutely amazed:

"Is it true?"

"As true as we are here. He told me everything."

The mother closed her eyes, and, choking with halting breath:

"G.o.d be praised. A little hope rises in my heart. Let me cry--indeed I must!"

She pointed to the room, which was also open on the other side of the landing and was lighted by a large bay window, through which a tree could be seen.

Farnow bowed, showing Lucienne that he was following her.

And the girl moved on ahead, pa.s.sing through the room where her ancestors had loved Alsace so much.

Madame Oberle turned away; sitting near the window she leaned her head against the panes where as a child she had seen the sleet and the ice form into ferns, and the sun, and the rain, and the vibrating airs of summer-time, and all the land of Alsace.

"Odile Bastian! Odile!" repeated the poor woman. The bright face, the smile, the dresses of the young girl, the corner of Alsheim where she lived--a whole poem of beauty and moral health rose in the mother's mind; and with an effort she held to it jealously, in order to forget the other love-affair on account of which she had come here.

"Why did not Jean confide in me?" she thought. "This is a kind of compensation for the other. It rea.s.sures me. Jean will not leave us, since the strongest of ties binds him to the country. Perhaps we shall succeed in overcoming my husband's obstinacy. I will make him see that the sacrifice we are making, Jean and I, in accepting this German----"

Meanwhile laughter came from the next room, unfurnished except for the two chairs on which Lucienne and Farnow were sitting. Lucienne, with an elbow on the bal.u.s.trade of the open window, the lieutenant a little behind gazing at her, and speaking with an extraordinary fervour; sometimes there was laughter. This laughter hurt Madame Oberle, but she did not turn round. She still saw in the changing blue of the Alsatian fields the consoling image evoked by Lucienne.

Wilhelm von Farnow was speaking during this time, and was using to the best advantage this hour, which he knew would be short, in which he was permitted to learn to know Lucienne. She was listening to him as if dreaming, looking out across the roofs, but really attentive, and accentuating her answers with a smile and a little grimace. The German said:

"You are a glorious conquest. You will be a queen among the officers of my regiment, and already there is a woman of French family, but born in Austria, and she is ugly. There is an Italian, and some Germans, and some Englishwomen. You unite in yourself all their separate gifts--beauty, wit, brilliancy, German culture, and French spontaneity. As soon as we are married I shall present you in the highest German society. How did you develop in Alsheim?"

Her nature was still proud rather than tender, and these flatteries pleased her.

At this hour, profiting by the absence of M. Joseph Oberle at Barr, M. Ulrich had gone up to see his nephew Jean. The days were drawing near when the young man would go to the barracks. It was necessary to tell him about the unsuccessful meeting with Odile Bastian's father. M. Ulrich, after having hesitated a long time, finding it harder to destroy young love than to start for a war, went to see his nephew and told him everything.

They talked for an hour, or rather the uncle talked in monologue, and tried to console Jean, who had let him see his grief, and had wept bitterly.

"Weep, my dear boy," said the uncle. "At this moment your mother is a.s.sisting at the first interview between Lucienne and the other. I confess I do not understand her. Weep, but don't let yourself be cast down. To-morrow you must be brave. Think, in three weeks you will be in the barracks. They must not see you crying. Well, the year will soon pa.s.s, and you will come back to us--and who knows?"

Jean pa.s.sed his hand over his eyes and said resolutely:

"No, uncle."

"Why not?"

At the same place where in the preceding winter the two men had talked so joyously of the future, they were once more seated at the two ends of the sofa.

Outside, daylight was fading away and the air was warm. M. Ulrich found suddenly on Jean's sorrowful face the energetic expression which had so forcibly struck him on the former occasion, and had so delighted him. The Vosges-coloured eyes, with brows close together, were full of changing gleams of light, and yet the eyes were steady.

"No," said Jean; "it is necessary that you should know--you and one other to whom I will tell it. I shall not do my military service here."

"Where will you do it?"

"In France."