Chapter II: Part 2

There is not a single handsome book in my library that papa himself has not given me; he, who is always inveighing against love of books. Handsome, I mean here, more with regard to exterior than to interior. But happy for me that there are handsome editions of books with irresistible illustrations. Happy for me that you have lived and sketched, Gustave Doré! To you I owe the pearl of my collection; to you is it due that my beloved father has grown almost into a bookworm--as much a bookworm, that is, as I can be called a bluestocking. The noble knight of La Mancha it was that conquered him. At first it was the illustrations which captivated him, and on their account I acquired the book. The unimportant text, though not even English, was, as it were, thrown in with the purchase. What a surprise it was to me! I had thanked him profusely for a picture book, and what a treasure had come into my possession! I could not keep my rapture in it for myself, and day by day as I read, I told the story to my father, and day by day his interest in Dulcinea’s knight grew warmer.

“What has the donkey been doing to-day?” he would ask, and for a while I suffered it to be “the donkey.” Not for long, though. Soon I laughed no longer; rather melted with sympathy, burned with admiration. I grew to love the man ever deceived, but ever believing; the knight so often worsted, but never vanquished; and declared to my father that I desired no better fortune than to meet with such a Don Quixote in real life, and become his wife. Then papa began to think I was getting too excited over it, and it would be well to change the course of my studies. And from that time he took to overlooking my reading, and got to do what he had never done before--to read. And it would have been impossible to see anything more beautiful than the expression of devotion and absorption in his noble Wallenstein-like countenance, in every fold of the fine brow, when thus engaged. Sometimes he heaves a deep sigh, and twists one side of his mustache so furiously that the point is all awry, his eyes get fixed, the eyelids red with the unwonted application. Then I can stand it no longer; I jump up, go to him, and giving him a light kiss on the shoulder, so light that he can pretend he does not perceive it, say:

“Shall we go for a walk, papa? I am quite stiff with sitting.”

“Upon my word, so am I,” he says, and it does me good to see how he straightens himself and draws in a free breath. But he does not immediately carry out my suggestion; the book-marker must first be deliberately placed in the page.

“So far”; he takes the perused pages between the palms of his hands. “Will it be too little for you?”

And I, unthinking, ungrateful as I can be, have so often thoughtlessly made reply, “Oh, much too little; why, it is hardly anything. You must let me read on further, papa.”

Closing the book, he slowly shakes his head, looks at me, considers a little, looks at me again, and then follows: “Do whatever you like!”

And I, before he can defend himself, rush into his arms.

“No, no, only what _thou likest_, not what _I like_, shall be done, now and always.”

“You might just as well have said that in English,” he answers.

“Oh, you dear good father of mine!”

* * * * *

Last year my sister, for the first time since her marriage, passed the winter in Vienna. Report said that her husband on the wedding journey had informed her that she should not set foot in the capital again until he had cured her of her “countess” ways.

He is a tall, cold, haughty man, who barely vouchsafes to utter twenty words in a day, even when most loquacious. It is difficult to know what his tastes are. The sole interests he seems to have are his palace, his equipages, his servants’ liveries, and his wife’s toilets; and that merely to show them off. She makes merry over it, and sometimes says very witty things about it; but I think she would do better if she were to say them to his face instead of behind his back. She has no children, to my sorrow; I should so love to be an aunt. It was decided that I was to come out at one of the balls my sister was to give in the course of the season. I had already been to several soirées the previous winter with papa during Lent; thus had a tolerably extended acquaintance with society folk, and had been mostly struck by the dead level of quality when taken in the quantity. At seventeen one begins to exercise one’s thinking powers, and my reflection had been: If one could disembody the souls of all these fine people and let them go free (the men especially), it would be a sheer impossibility to distinguish one from the other.

Their conversation was simply comical. I could tell off on my fingers the set questions: “Are you coming out next Carnival?” “Are you fond of dancing?” so often had they been put to me; and not a man among them had appeared to me to be one whit different from the crowd of others.

One morning I was informed that papa and mamma desired to see me in the small drawing room--style: Empire, white and gold.

Mamma was sitting upon the sofa, knitting woolen comforters for the Reformatory. With a dainty little white lace cap upon her head, and her white India cashmere morning dress, she looked like a queen or a saint. Papa was sitting beside her in an armchair, very erect and agitated, as could be easily seen from the blinking of his eyes, a trick he had when much moved. My Duphot, in her boundless diffidence, had chosen for her seat the smallest possible tabouret with the most slender of legs, and the effect of her corpulent person upon its ethereal support was killing.

“Will you be pleased to be seated?” my father asked, with forced gayety, and I took a chair as close as possible to my Duphot, so as to be at hand to lend my aid in the event of a catastrophe.

The faces of my parents grew more and more solemn. A sudden feeling of dread came over me, and I began to examine my conscience if perchance----It was clear, thank Heaven, else I should have felt very miserable.

My father looked expectantly at my mother.

“Caroline, will you have the kindness?”

“I thought that you meant to----” returned my mother.

“Oh, no, I beg you----” said he. And with an effort, and dropping her hands upon the comforter, my mother began:

“Paula, you are now grown up; nearly eighteen----”

“And look as if you were twenty,” added my father; to which my Duphot, making assent, becomes scarlet, and totters upon her treacherous seat.

My mother continues: “Next year, dear child, you are to go out into the great world.”

“Oh, yes; I am so glad, dear mamma.”

“You are glad because you do not know how poor and worthless are the pleasures which await you there, and how dearly bought.”

“Yes, yes,” put in papa, “and one should ask one’s self _cui bono_, what is the aim of it all?”

Mamma took up the argument. “None other than that of self-examination, and to enable one to arrive at the conclusion, _que le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle_. Everyone plays at the game for a time, my dear Paula, because it is the correct thing to do.”

“Oh, and because it is amusing, mamma, and because one is young and loves gayety and dancing!”

She assented.

“But thinking persons cannot hide from themselves the consciousness of the hollowness of it all, and then they turn to the realities of life, often bitterly to repent of their wasted years. Now my question to you is: Were it not wiser to save yourself these wasted years, and to begin at once with the realities of life?”

“It is but a question,” interposed my father, in a tone of deepest affection, and I read in his words the silent refrain, “Do whatever you like.”

“Yes, certainly, it is but a question,” assented mamma.

And my Duphot echoed, “_Une question_,” while drops of perspiration stood out upon her forehead. Her trouble and agitation overcame me. I thought, “Great Heavens! what can they be meaning to do with me?” And seized with a sudden dread, I cried:

“Am I to go into a convent?”

Mamma smiled; papa laughed; Mme. Duphot blurted out: “_Tout au contraire!_”

I grew still more agitated. Suddenly it flashed across me. “Then I am going to be married!”

Papa patted me kindly on the shoulder. “You must surely have observed that one of the gentlemen introduced to you at your sister’s house has been paying you marked attention?”

“No, papa. I assure you I have not.”

“But he has conversed with you every evening; the last time he remained a full half hour in conversation with you.”

“Who is it?”

“Count Taxen.”

“A tall, dark man?”

“No, a fair young man, of middle height.”

At length I remembered. Of course, a fair young man, of middle height, had often come up to talk to me. About what? Had I been placed on the rack I could not have told, so completely had the subject of our various talks vanished from my memory.

Papa and mamma now imparted to me that he was an exceptionally delightful young man, the darling of his mother, who had never allowed him to be separated from her, and had brought him up with the strictest principles. My parents actually vied with each other in singing the count’s praises, and Mme. Duphot, with tears of emotion, exclaimed enthusiastically:

“_Quel bonheur, mon enfant!_”

The gate bell struck twice.

“They are coming,” said my mother; and my father gave, oh, such a loving look at me! I cannot describe it other, even had it been enveloped in ever so tyrannical a “You shall, you must!” than the old gentle, heart-stirring, tender, “Do whatever you like.” And my oppressed heart beat freely once more, my downcast courage revived; I even felt an irresistible longing to laugh; while Mme. Duphot, who had made a precipitate movement to rise from her tabouret--it had really belonged to Josephine’s _salon_--fell back upon it, and I said:

“Do take care; or you will go to pieces like the French Empire.”

“Child, child!” remonstrated my mother.

“And now, whatever you do, no display of bluestockingism,” added my father hurriedly, as the door was thrown open and the Countess Taxen and her son were announced.

* * * * *

And from that day forth they appeared regularly twice a week at three o’clock, to make their afternoon call; and, moreover, every Saturday I met the count at my sister’s. My parents treated him with marked attention. Mme. Duphot designated him “_un jeune homme accompli_.” Even my brother-in-law, whom I had never seen unbend before, did so to him. The countess never failed to tell me, in her conversations with me, that her son had never caused her an uneasy hour, and that she was to be esteemed the happiest of mothers. I should have gone contrary to the wishes of my dear ones, and of those whose opinion I valued, had I found the least objection to the state of things; and yet, withal, I felt the strongest inclination to do so, though without knowing why.

No formal proposal had been made. I was only told that the count was attracted by me; and that, through his mother, he had begged permission to become more nearly acquainted with me. It must, however, in his estimation, have been of far greater importance that I should know him than that he should know me, for his whole conversation was about himself, his mode of life, his habits, and tastes. He seemed especially to like to dilate upon his love of order, and the punctuality he exacted from his _entourage_. He graphically described to us his old historic castle, the arrangements of the apartments, the decorations of its halls and corridors. We heard less of the country where his estates were situated; of the people living about, not one word.

“And what about the neighborhood?” my sister asked one day. And Bernhard, my brother, home on leave, exclaimed:

“Bruno Schwarzburg must have lived somewhere in your vicinity before his troubles.”

Thus, on April 13, 1882, for the first time I heard the name afterward to be so dear to me. They began talking and laughing about him as a half-mad man, Bernhard constantly putting in, good-naturedly, “After all, he is a fine fellow!”

“Yes, with a bee in his bonnet,” returned the count. “He will never make his fortune, as I have often told him, even at the time he was doing the craziest thing of all and entering an action against himself.”

“How could he do that?” I asked. “How can anyone enter an action against himself?”

“Ah, how can one!” replied the count; “I don’t understand it, nor would any other man with a grain of common sense in his composition. His father, who left a heap of debts behind him, had had the foresight just before his death to hand over to his son, by deed of gift, the indisputable possession of a small capital. The father dead, the creditors seized upon everything--a set of miserable money-lenders, for the most part, who had been paid over and over again during the old baron’s lifetime. But one widow woman with five children----”

“Excuse me,” interrupted Bernhard, “one daughter, a blind girl.”

The count, who does not like to have his statements questioned, here said impatiently:

“My dear fellow, what does it matter? So this widow came off badly,” he resumed, turning to me. “‘Nothing is left,’ she was told when she presented her claim. ‘What do you mean--there is my money,’ says Bruno. ‘The creditors have no claim upon that,’ explains the lawyer, who was also Schwarzburg’s trustee. His father, I must explain, had taken the precaution to appoint a trustee, as Master Bruno had already shown signs of emulating his progenitor in the matter of squandering. So now he insists upon paying the widow’s claim; the trustee objects, and the upshot of it was a trial, in which Schwarzburg appeared as plaintiff against himself, and which he won by losing the little property he had.”

The laughter was general, and more things were told about the man whom they all seemed to look upon as an original.

But I thought to myself, all his mad pranks--and many were told of all kinds and descriptions--seem always to agree in two points; there is invariably a noble motive at the bottom of them, and he invariably comes off worst in them. So I remarked:

“This baron certainly seems to do any number of foolish things, but luck is very unkind to him.”

“That I cannot see,” returned the count; and I had already learned to know that those words, with him, meant, If I do not see a thing, it does not exist. “If I choose to do idiotic things, I have no right to call myself unlucky because I find myself on the wrong side of the hedge. Moreover, what people are so ready to call want of luck is, more often than not, want of sense. A common-sense man is rarely unlucky.”

Here Bernhard murmured half aloud, “Sickness, death, tempest.”

Again the irritation with which the count greets the most modest expression of opinion became evident--an irritation he seems incapable of checking--as he dryly observed:

“I insure against tempest.”

I felt a sudden exasperation against this child of fortune, who seemed so disposed to take to himself as individual merit the lavish gifts of Providence, and I rejoined:

“Had you had such a father as that of Baron Schwarzburg, who squandered away all the family property, you would have been unable to exercise that wise foresight, for you would have nothing left to you worth insuring.”

His mother crimsoned; my parents exchanged a concerned look, and I felt more than ever alarmed at my own temerity. The greatest of heroes experience a reflex fear, we are told; but there was nothing of the hero in me at that moment, only a rush of feelings of shame, embarrassment, and dread; and these wretched feelings rose like smoke, so to speak, from a still darker background--the knowledge that I had offended the count!

He gave vent to a few disconnected phrases, intended to be severe and cutting, but which were only savage and peevish. It was not the first time that I had made a mental note that the exalted and noble diffidence, so highly vaunted by my parents, was in inseparable connection with the flattery and deference accorded to him. The slightest expression of censure changed it at once into arrogance, and, without an attempt at justifying his opinion, he would angrily reject any comment as absurd, contemptible, and unworthy of notice.

After he had taken his leave, my parents began to reproach me severely.

“You behaved shockingly. You seem to have no idea of the honor conferred upon you by the count’s attentions. Such a man--such a son!”

“Who never caused his mother a single uneasy hour,” I meekly added.

“You are aware of that, and yet do not cherish the highest esteem for him?”

“Of course I esteem what is estimable in him.”

“Then pray show it in your manner and bearing. You acknowledge that you esteem the count, and have every reason so to do, then why conceal the sentiment?” said mamma. “I entreat you, dear child, to let your esteem for him be made more evident.”

She glanced meaningly at papa, and now he began begging me to show my esteem for the count more openly; asking how it was that I, so pleasant and amiable to people in general, should observe such a cold and distant manner to this admirable young man.

Alas, I could give him no answer. It was a question I had too often vainly asked myself. The trivial faults which struck me in the count were as nothing compared to the good qualities he possessed in the eyes of my parents. And so I promised them from henceforth to be much more courteous and attentive to him than I had been before. But even this did not quite satisfy my dear ones.

“See, Paula,” said my father earnestly--and his voice was agitated--“see, dear child, your sister’s marriage with Edward has brought her happiness and placed her in a brilliant position. No man could be a more affectionate husband than he, and so true a _grand seigneur_. Your brother, after having caused us much anxiety by his thoughtlessness, has settled down into the right way; and thus we can look forward to both their futures with easy minds. All we desire now is to be able to feel that your happiness is insured.”

“And that we should do,” began mamma afresh, “if you, dear child, would receive the count’s attentions favorably.”

“Yes,” resumed papa, “that would make us happy and contented.”

He stretched out his hand to me; I seized it and kissed it, and suddenly felt a sharp pain in my eyes, and as through a quivering mist saw his dear face become more and more gentle and tender, and then the dear voice began:

“Besides----”

But the words which usually followed upon this beginning were wanting. I waited yearningly--in vain. They remained unsaid.

That night, on going to bed, I prayed more earnestly than ever; and yet my prayer was that of a foolish child. I prayed for strength to obey my parents gladly and cheerfully; I ought to have framed my prayer quite differently--that I was quickly to be taught in the immediate future.

On the 24th of April, 1882, one of the most perfect days I can remember, we were driving in the open carriage in the Prater, papa and I.

The horse-chestnuts were beginning to blossom, the delicate green of spring diffusing its halo all around; that green so tender and so unspeakably joyous, just emerging from its winter covering into the golden sunlight, all unconscious, as yet, of storm or scorching heat.

Our carriage rolled leisurely along by our Rotten Row. Friends and acquaintances galloped or trotted past us; then three horsemen abreast came toward us, the count in the middle. He was riding a handsome chestnut; man and horse alike presenting an air of comfortable self-satisfaction. “The world goes well with us,” they seemed to be thinking--if they thought at all. On the count’s left rode my brother, looking very handsome and spick and span in his uniform of major in the Lancers. To his right rode a gaunt man on a gaunt steed. He sat very erect upon his horse, which seemed as if devoured by inward fire, so wild and beautiful were its fine eyes; for the rest it was a long-legged, bony mare--to say the least of it, positively ugly. Nor did its rider please at first sight. Luckily for him, no one would be content with merely a single glance at the striking countenance. Long and narrow, it reveals a quite unusual amount of energy. The dark eyes, the nose with its dilating nostrils, the sharply pointed beard, the mustache twirling high and leaving the mouth free, reminded me of the portraits of Spanish noblemen of the seventeenth century. But what reminded me of no one, and could be compared to no one but himself, was the animated, sympathetic spirit that sparkled in his eyes. Gravely bowing, he retained his hat in his hand long after the count had resumed his, thus displaying a noble broad forehead, surmounted by thick, waving hair. The brain, I once read, shapes its own place, and his had formed an arch for itself. I know some which are content to reside under a flat level. The stranger looked observantly at me. I felt myself grow red under his gaze, and touched papa’s arm, who was exchanging greetings in the drive. He turned to me, and, following my eyes, recognized the rider.

“Do you know him?” I asked.

“Who?”

“He of La Mancha,” said I, with a sorry jest, to conceal my confusion.

Papa, not noticing it, answered: “Oh, yes. It is that mad fellow, Schwarzburg.”

My presence of mind had returned, and I ventured to ask:

“Tell me more about his foolish doings.”

“I know nothing about him,” said papa.

“Oh, yes, you do. Bernhard is constantly talking of him.”

“To make fun of him.”

“Not always. He really likes and admires him, and says he has a great future before him.”

“Then things must greatly alter.”

“Not so much, after all, dear papa--a little turn of fortune’s wheel; so far he has had nothing but sorrow since his childhood. Remember what Bernhard told us quite lately about him. His parents separated; his mother living abroad, and married again; his father, a spendthrift, caring nothing for the boy--worse off than an orphan; ill used at school, because the payments were so irregular. And he grows up, struggling through it all, and, even as a mere lad, takes a man’s cares upon himself and sets to earning his living.”

“Yes, yes; but then his Don Quixotism with his small inheritance, and his ridiculous love story.”

“Love story? That is odd.”

An unpleasant sensation came over me, and I thought it strange that Bernhard had told me nothing of this love story. After a while, I asked:

“Who was he in love with, this baron?”

Papa had thought no more of our conversation, and could not at first think whom I meant; then answered abruptly:

“He can only adore her memory now. She is dead.”

“When?”

“Some years ago, as the wife of another man, whom she preferred to him--ingratitude to fidelity which would have gained him a name in the Middle Ages, but which in modern times has simply made him ridiculous.”

“I do not understand that. How can the exercise of any virtue render anyone ridiculous? And fidelity is a virtue!”

Papa gave a slight cough, “If you ride a virtue to death, it becomes folly.”

Wisdom--folly. I hated those words, so often in the count’s mouth.

“Ah, well, papa,” said I, “it seems to me that there is no need for any virtue to grow into folly; it is a folly from the very beginning. That is why I have so little regard for wisdom either.”

“That is very evident,” observed my father.

“And why I love the constancy which, seeking no reward, yet remains stanch.”

“Indeed? You do not see how senseless it is in a man to believe he is loved by a woman when he is not? To let himself be fooled by her? To give no ear when he is told she does not care a straw for him? You do not see how senseless is such conduct? Or, perhaps, it rather attracts your admiration because it is such a piece of utter folly!”

“But did she really not love him?”

“She simply fooled him, I tell you. And he, poor fool, must needs be keeping lover’s watch under her windows, quarreling with those who saw through the little game, which cost him more than one duel.”

I was delighted.

“Quite right! I honor him! I can see it now--can hear how after the fight, whether conquered or conqueror, he cries, ‘Dulcinea del Toboso is the most peerless lady in all the world, and I am her true knight!’ Splendid, papa!”

“My dear child! What rubbish you talk! But it all comes from those confounded books, and I will----But enough of it!”

These last words were said in English, and I knew it was high time to give up a subject when my dear good father took to speaking English!

For some weeks past mamma had begun to receive again, every evening after the theater. She desired to give the count opportunities of coming more frequently to our house, without thereby exciting attention. Fruitless endeavor! Although his courtship proceeded so quietly that, thank Heaven, even I was scarcely aware of it, my girl friends began teasing me about him. Most of them, strange to say, called me a lucky girl; and one--I will name her Dora--never failed to add “but as silly, awfully silly, as she is lucky!”

She is older than I am, and is considered to be very clever and well read. When quite a little girl, an aunt, who was a woman of learning, bequeathed her whole library to her, and she was allowed to have it arranged in her own room; her parents letting her have her own way in everything. Thus at thirteen there was she deep in the study of Humboldt’s “Cosmos,” and Strauss’ “Life of Jesus.” She has explained whole pages of this latter to me, but not very clearly; I never could understand it.

Dora used often to threaten that, if I did not know how to value the count better, she would get him away from me. And I, only too ready, would reply:

“Take him, by all means; you could not please me better.”

For a long time she thought I was only joking.

“Do you know,” she said, “that the Taxens have a prince’s crown in their coat of arms?”

“How could one fail to know it?”

“And have you not thought how well your monogram will look with a crown over it?”

I burst into a fit of laughter.

“Is that the result of studying Humboldt and Strauss at thirteen, to make you such a baby at twenty?”

“Oh, that is quite another thing. I know what is due to the world. The greatest men of learning attach value to position, and would be only too glad to be admitted into princely salons, but as they are so prosy and pedantic----”

Indignant at her silly chatter, I cried:

“You ought to be ashamed to talk such rubbish. Pray what do you know about learned men: you have never even seen one!”

“Nor you, either.”

“No, nor anyone of us, because they do not frequent society, nor have the slightest wish to do so. But you are talking about what you do not understand. You prate about knowledge of the world, and see no further than your own little circle. That is all you think about!”

She was piqued. She is as much accustomed to be admired as the count, and can as little as he endure to be contradicted.

Our passage of arms had been carried on before a room full of my friends, of both sexes, to their great delectation. Dora was not a favorite among her girl friends, and they chuckled audibly at my onslaught.

“You may be as contemptuous as you please,” said Dora angrily, but in so low a voice that only I heard. “You will see the consequences of having made an enemy of me,” with a meaning look toward the door, by which the count was just then entering.

I understood her, and answered in an equally low voice:

“If you only succeed in what you mean, you will make me a friend for life.”

“Very well, I accept your challenge!” she responded, little knowing how I was silently rejoicing in her determination, and wishing it all speed.

The count stood before me; and it seemed as if with his presence the atmosphere about me had become more oppressive, the light darkened. Dora rising, left him the chair opposite to me, and seated herself on the arm of mine. In her white gauze dress, and hair so becomingly arranged, she looked charming, as charming as a Dresden china figure; and the contrast between her bewitching get-up and the conversation she carried on was irresistibly funny.

“I wager,” exclaimed the count, “that the thermometer is up to 28°.”

“If it were 38°,” said she, “I should not feel it. I am never warm. I am the marble guest.”

With an uninterested look the count murmured:

“Yes?”

“But also, I never feel the cold.”

“Ha, ha! You are doing the original. I am not at all original; perfectly prosaic.”

“Oh! I am very prosaic. Would you believe it? I take snuff.”

“Indeed?”

“I always carry my snuffbox about with me.”

“With nothing in it?”

She produced a tiny gold box, no larger than a florin, from her pocket.

“There happens to be nothing in it, just to-day. Look, I have had a death’s head engraved on the lid; and I use death’s-head notepaper. I am always thinking of death. I believe I shall commit suicide one day.”

The count looked aghast.

“I always carry a dagger about with me.”

“Do you really?” said the count.

“So that I may plunge it into my heart the moment that tobacco, my one friend, has no more charms for me.”

He smiled. He began to find her interesting; and as she now went on to tell of a curious old chest which had been discovered in a lumber room of her castle, he became thoroughly engrossed. Seizing an opportunity when they were absorbed in their conversation, I rose and stole away. As I turned, I saw Bernhard standing by me.

“I have been looking for you ever so long,” said he. “One cannot stir a step in this crush.”

And looking round, he called:

“Schwarzburg!”

And I, surprised and so delighted, as though it had been some dear, impatiently looked-for friend, exclaimed:

“Is he here?”

Now, be it said, Bernhard scolded me afterward, quite roundly, for my “Is he here?” But I have never been able to repent it. As I said it, I looked into a pair of eyes radiant with bliss, far too great for me ever to repent the words which called it forth.

Baron Schwarzburg bowed so low before me, that the reverence thus expressed in his salutation almost abashed me. What had I done to arouse reverence?

We had a long talk together, much too long, I was afterward told reproachfully. I cannot say what it was about; I was unconscious of the lapse of time, and of the presence of others. He was talking to me, and all that he said and his manner of saying it was pleasant to me, and worth listening to; seemed better and wiser than anything I had ever heard before, at once dear and true.

When, looking back to that evening, I ask myself the question: Was that when we first made acquaintance? I answer, No. We did not need it; we greeted each other as friends of long standing; our first meeting was as a coming together after separation.

Our conversation was interrupted by papa. He wanted to consult with the baron concerning some matters connected with his estate, and Bernhard had told him that he could not do better than put them into his hands. Both gentlemen engaged in earnest conversation; and at its close I saw them shake hands, and felt quite elated. So the fool of a Schwarzburg could talk sensibly for once--his advice could even be of use!

The soirée was over. Most of the guests had left. Among the last to go were Dora and her people, and the count and his mother. The _comtesse douairière_, as my Duphot called her, was especially amiable to me on saying good-night.

“You are so sweet, dear child, I quite admired you. How charming you were this evening toward that poor baron, the _attaché_ fellow! But do not forget that there may be a danger of your good nature being misunderstood. That class of person does not always know how to accept our notice, and is often made uncomfortable by our desire to make them feel _à leur aise_ in our society.”

I hardly knew what to make of this comment; whether to take it as one of praise or blame.

* * * * *

I will not attempt to describe my simple love story at length. That my parents would consent to my marriage with Baron Schwarzburg, the “_attaché_ fellow,” I did not for a moment believe. The consciousness of my love for him and of its hopelessness revealed themselves simultaneously to me; and it would have been a grave wrong in me had I given myself up to the former. But I had not given myself up to it; it had taken hold of me before I was aware, and from the first moment I was as completely under its sway as I am to this day. It was the same with him. His affection for me came as suddenly as did my great love for him. It was only his perfect absence of vanity which for a long time made him think it impossible that he could inspire me with any warmer feelings than those of friendship. But even that seemed to make him supremely happy; and as for me--a new life had unfolded to me since he had taken me into his confidence, and since I had learned to know the workings of his noble, unselfish heart. He had met almost on every side with injustice, and yet he always held that Right must conquer. He had endured countless bitternesses, yet had come through them without one taint of bitterness. Truly with such a fund of love and strength in his own heart, how should he believe in anything but goodness?

The wonderful thing to me is that his own estimate of himself should be so different from what he really is. He affirms the motive of the greater part of his actions, and the source of all his strength, to have been self-will. The other day when he was repeating this to me, I asked:

“And was it mere act of self-will that led you, as a young barrister, to enter that action against yourself?”

He replied, with a frown, “Is that old story not yet forgotten?”

“Not yet.”

“Then allow me to give you the true reading of it. It was undertaken in no ridiculous spirit of self-sacrifice, but in order to defend my integrity against my money; a thing of priceless worth against that which has a marketable value. My client was the widow of an estimable man and faithful old servant; the money in question his savings honestly earned. How many years back the sum had been in all confidence intrusted to his master’s keeping, the wife did not know. She only knew that his master had repeatedly assured him that the money had been invested in a thoroughly sound mortgage. What the mortgage was her husband had no idea, and as the widow of the baron’s most faithful and devoted servant it would never have occurred to her to ask if her money was safely invested, or in what. All very well, the lawyer said, but why was the woman so stupid? Could she not see what was going on, and how the baron was making ducks and drakes of his property? She had seen it all, but trusted to her lord’s word more than to the evidence of her senses. And for that implicit trust, was she to be made the victim, and was her master’s son to consent to such plunder? Could he? What is your opinion, countess; how would you have acted in his place?”

My answer was, “As you did.”

“And would that have been anything extraordinary?”

“No; only what was right.”

“Thank God!” he exclaimed, while a great peaceful joy illumined his countenance; “only what was right. Yes, that is it.”

He looked radiant.

“Why thank God?” I asked.

“Because I have been permitted to justify myself to you.”

“You justify yourself--to me!” I said in some confusion.

“And because you made it so easy to me, and because you have such a clear insight into things, and such an upright mind. Above all, that you concede that we only do what is right, even must we defend that right doing to our own loss.”

“But is not that natural?”

“No, egotism is natural. And the world just now prizes it highly. Take up any newspaper, and you will read any number of articles in favor of it and its ally, ‘healthy realism.’ In this age of humanitarianism--strange anomaly--we find idealism arraigned, and every kind of unusual display of self-denial, that groundwork and absolute necessity of humanitarianism, stigmatized as sickly and sentimental.”

Here the count, my sister, and Dora came up to us.

“Aha, here is the baron laying down the law!” exclaimed the count.

And Schwarzburg, looking dismayed, turned apologetically to me, saying:

“Is it true--was I really laying down the law?”

“It is rather a habit of yours,” interposed the count, assuming the cold haughty manner of people in society, to those not so highly privileged, and that to me is so narrow and petty.

“You were certainly not laying down the law,” I cried; “on the contrary, you were telling me something of great interest.”

“A secret?” giggled Dora.

“Certainly not.”

“Then pray impart your interesting story to us, especially if it is not too long. But I fear it is long--as long-winded as it is interesting. I have been watching you at a distance. You are always so vastly entertaining, you two.”

My cheek crimsoned, and Baron Schwarzburg leveled a look at Dora which spoiled all inclination to pursue her ill-bred jesting further. But it had done its work, and bore ill consequences for me. Count Taxen did not stir from my side the remainder of the evening; and we carried on a melancholy duologue anent ancient castellated halls and old armor! “A mold and mildew type of conversation,” as Elizabeth calls it, when her husband, who is uncommonly like the count in essentials, begins one of his interminable talks with her on that theme. I saw her look across at me several times with unconcealed commiseration.

The next day she came to talk over matters with me. It was early in the afternoon, and I had just gone up to my room after luncheon, when she came in.

She began taking off her bonnet and arranging a refractory lock displaced by the wind, apparently very intent on so doing; but I could see very plainly that her thoughts were no wise occupied by the lovely, intellectual looking face reflected in the looking-glass. Suddenly she began:

“Tell me, child, what are you meaning by this Schwarzburg worship of yours?”

Her unexpected question took me by surprise, and I answered in a low voice:

“What can I mean?”

“That is what I want to know. I want to know what you are thinking, what dreams you are allowing yourself to indulge in! Do you know that for some time past you are quite altered?”

I felt myself growing more and more downhearted.

“How altered, Elizabeth?”

“Oh,” she said, “do not let us waste time in fencing. The manner in which you distinguish Schwarzburg is the subject of general remark. You make your almost veneration of him so ostentatiously apparent.”

“I do not make it ostentatiously apparent; I only do not conceal it.”

“And what is it to lead to?”

“It will lead to nothing,” I answered dejectedly. “In a few weeks he goes to Bosnia; and I to Trostburg.”

Shrugging her shoulders, she made a few steps forward, then sat down on the chair before my writing table. The volume with “My Memoirs” written large upon it attracted her attention; her face relaxed its grave expression, and she began to laugh.

“So the child has taken to writing her ‘Memoirs’; here are all the secrets--one need only to look in and find them all laid bare. Do not look so frightened. I am curious, but not indiscreet.”

While her words were sarcastic, her great blue eyes were so sincere, were looking at me with such a depth of love and sympathy, that, taking courage, I went up to her and said:

“You asked me what I want. I will confess to you what I do not want; I will not marry Count Taxen.”

“Bravo, that is good,” she answered phlegmatically. “And what about the count, who purposes either to-day or to-morrow to make formal proposal for your hand?”

In deadly fear, I cried:

“How do you know this?”

“From himself.”

“And does he not see how utterly indifferent he is to me?”

“No. That would be the last thing he would be likely to see.”

“And how much more, how unspeakably more, I prefer another to him?”

“That still less. A Count Taxen simply considers it an impossibility that a Baron Schwarzburg should be preferred before him.”

“And Dora, who is a thousand times better suited to him, and who promised me that she would make capture of him--Dora, on whom I have set my hopes--why is she not as good as her word?”

“Because she cannot, sweet Simplicity. Because she has done all in her power, but in vain. She is not to the count’s taste. He scents the egoist in her, and is too utterly the egoist himself not to avoid his duplicate.”

“Oh, what can I do, Elizabeth! what can I do? If I have to marry the count I shall die of despair.”

She threw her arms round me, and drew me down to her, and I laid my cheek upon her wavy hair.

“Do you really think so?” she asked. “I believe you might manage to be not so desperately unhappy with him. Only you need to be a little wise, my pet; do not go against him in little things, and you would soon find that you had your own way in more important ones. You would have to be very careful not to hurt his vanity, and where possible to sing his praises to him.”

“What, flatter him!” I cried, “praise what I do not approve! Flattery! oh, the shame and disgrace of it!”

“Do not give it such high-sounding names,” said she. “To be a bad wife is the only shame and disgrace to a woman. In comparison with that, any self-imposed humiliation weighs but lightly in the scale. And after all, it is but a case of weighing one evil against another, a compromise with the enemy, otherwise called the ills of life. Perfect happiness, cloudless, whose lot is it? Who even may indulge an unbroken dream of it?”

“Oh, were it only a matter of a dream, I should soon be in possession of it.”

“Indeed! Then trust me, and put your dream into words.”

“Dare I? May I?”

“You must.”

“Do not forget that it is only a dream.”

“Well--begin.”

“I should dream that I was his--you know whom I mean--and had no more ardent wish than to make life, hitherto so hard to him, sweet and beautiful. At his side I would grow wise, and clever, and better day by day. Every breath I drew would be a song of praise to him. Did, however, so strange a thing happen that he could ever do anything my conscience did not approve, I would tell it him, frankly, freely. I would shrink from no pain; for he would be there to bear it with me, and its burden would be lightened. What pain could come to me, so long as I was his, and his love mine?”

“Yes,” said Elizabeth, in a low, stifled voice; “yes.”

“That is what my dream is like--the purest bliss. But the reality is horror--horror, Elizabeth! You have utterly crushed me. That miserable compromise; that mean-spirited subjection in order to preserve the outward appearance of unity while hiding the inward disunion--I could not do it. And you----”

A horrible thought had flashed across me; I bent down and looked into her face; it was bathed in tears. “Can you do it, my darling?” I said, sinking on my knees, and embracing her.

She pressed me convulsively, and agonizing sobs shook her breast, as she answered:

“I have learned to do it!”

For a time we preserved deep silence. When at length I raised my eyes to her dear face, it wore its accustomed look of composure.

She rose.

“Come with me to our parents, child,” she said. “I cannot help you to the realization of your dream; but you shall not be sacrificed.”

* * * * *

Mamma was sitting in the corner of the sofa, knitting. Mme. Duphot was reading aloud to her, Ozanani’s “Poëtas Francis Caius.”

“May we come in, mamma? We want to speak to you.”

Without looking up, mamma answered:

“Please let us just finish the chapter. Sit down, girls.”

We sat down, and Mme. Duphot finished the beautiful legend of the Holy Francis and Wolf von Gubio. Then placing her book, over which she had several times hurriedly glanced at me, on the table, she rose.

I caught her hand.

“Stay!” I whispered to her; and Elizabeth hurriedly joined in.

“Stay, dear Duphot, we count upon your help. We want papa here, too, as well. May I send to ask him to come, mamma?”

“Yes, ask him to come.”

Dear mamma! so unsuspectingly and peacefully going on with her work, meditating over the sweet teaching of St. Francis. I felt so sorry for her. How gladly would I have spared her the pain I was about to cause her, but--how could I?

The door opened. Papa came in, but not alone; my brother was with him. The eyes of both were directed upon me as they came in.

“Oh, yes; there she is,” said papa, in a severe, menacing voice.

I wanted to rise, but my knees shook too violently, and I could only stretch out my hand to seize his as he passed me. He drew it hastily back, and going across to the sofa, sat down by mamma. My brother subsided on to a chair near them; and Mme. Duphot, who had been sitting by mamma, diffident as ever, pushed her tabouret a little further back. My sister and I sat at a little distance from them, like a criminal and his counsel before their judges.

“Dear papa, dear mamma,” began Elizabeth, “in Paula’s name I would pray you ask the count to cease paying his addresses to her. Paula cannot like him, and is determined that she will not marry him.”

I was dismayed and terrified at the abrupt manner in which she said this.

Mme. Duphot sighed.

Bernhard muttered “Oho!”

My father and mother were silent.

“It is Paula’s earnest hope,” resumes Elizabeth, “that you, dear father and mother, will give your sanction to her decision.”

“Oh, do!” I broke in; “be merciful. I will be forever grateful to you. I cannot marry Count Taxen. I do not feel the smallest particle of affection for him; rather the reverse.”

“Does that mean that you have a dislike to him?” exclaimed papa angrily. “Who has been putting such folly into your head? I suppose your elder sister?”

“For all I hold dearest in the world, do not think that! It is I who have implored her to intercede for me with you.”

“In the first place,” said mamma, “you need no one to intercede between you and your parents, but should have come in all confidence to them yourself. In the second place, your sister, instead of being so ready to take this office upon herself, should have pointed out to you how foolish it is to have allowed any such fancy not only to exist, but to be blurted out before us, and for which there is not the slightest reason.”

“She declares it--that is her reason!” returned Elizabeth.

Her voice, before somewhat veiled, was now as hard and sharp as when first she came to me. I drew nearer to her, and put my arm round her--her whole frame quivered.

“Folly--folly,” repeated papa. “We cannot listen to such trash.”

“The count is an upright, honorable man; well bred, good looking, and of unexceptionable manners; a man with whom you could not fail to be happy, Paula,” pronounced mamma, in severe and uncompromising tones. “You may not love him now, but you will certainly learn to do so when it has become your duty.”

A shudder ran through me, and I stammered out:

“No, mamma, no! I shall never learn to love him, because I----”

The confession I was about to make died away upon my lips. I turned a look of entreaty upon my sister. Her lovely face was aflame; with arms crossed upon her breast, she was looking unflinchingly, an expression of reproach and indignation in her eyes, at mamma.

“Do you remember,” she said, “some seventeen years ago addressing that same promise to me, and with about as much justification? My suitor, too, was upright, well bred, and good looking. Now, mother dear, as you have not seen or guessed how matters stand with me, hear once for all; your promise has _not_ brought its fulfillment.”

“Elizabeth!” cried my father and mother together.

Bernhard, who at first had listened with somewhat skeptical smile, suddenly sunk his head. Mme. Duphot had risen, and slipped out of the room like a shadow. With a calm that chilled me to the heart, Elizabeth continued:

“That love, which as a matter of course was to come with marriage, enveloping me in blessed blindness, in happy deception, came not. My heart remained cold, my eyes clear, and with those clear eyes of mine I saw my upright, well-bred husband through and through----” She gave a short hard laugh. “It was no edifying spectacle.”

I had been so shocked at Elizabeth’s words, above all by the decided manner in which she had said them, that I had not ventured to look at my parents. I cast a furtive glance at the chair previously occupied by Bernhard. It was empty; my brother had risen, and was standing by the window near to which Elizabeth was sitting, looking earnestly at her, but, to my relief, not angrily.

“What does this mean?” asked papa. “What accusation do you bring against your husband? He has never acted other than as a gentleman; never been guilty of a single reprehensible action.”

“Never! He has never wronged another in the matter of honor or property,” returned Elizabeth; “nor has he ever, of his own free will, stirred a finger to help another, let alone made any sacrifice for anyone; has never forgotten self for the sake of any living creature. He has no notion of generosity, or of the beautiful, save”--and a roguish look flashed across her face--“when he comes across it in the shape of some old oak chest or rusty spur, lost four centuries ago by some brave knight intent on plundering a traveling merchant.”

“My dear Elizabeth!” said Bernhard reproachfully, as, standing now behind her, he laid his hand on the back of her chair.

“I know I ought not to talk like this,” she answered. “It has never happened before, and would not to-day, were it not for the sake of saving this child from the fate which has befallen me.”

Dear mamma was in a state of greatest agitation and perplexity.

“You exaggerate cruelly, Elizabeth,” said she reproachfully. “You accuse your parents, and speak unbefittingly of your husband.”