Kitabı oku: «Fickle Fortune», sayfa 10

These accusatory voices had justice on their side, and they found but too responsive an echo in Oswald's breast. All the mortifications, all the humiliations he had suffered rose up before him afresh, and stung his soul with keen and cruel stabs. That which he had endured for years, with inward chafing, it is true, but yet mutely, accepting it as a decree of Fate, goaded him to wild rebellion and fury now that he recognised the treachery that had been at work. Gradually every other feeling was stifled by the bitterness and fierce hate raging within him. The Countess would certainly have trembled, could she at this moment have beheld her nephew's countenance. He could not meet her face to face, but he knew the spot where she was vulnerable.

'There is no other way,' he said resolutely. 'To me she will not yield an inch. She will defy me to her last breath. Edmund alone is able to extract her secret from her, therefore he must be told. I will no longer be the victim of a fraud.'

A light, rapid step in the corridor outside interrupted the young man's train of thought. With a quick movement he pushed the miniature out of sight beneath the papers on the writing-table, and cast an angry, impatient glance towards the door; but he started perceptibly as he recognised his visitor.

'Edmund–you here?'

'Well, you need not look scared, as though you had seen a ghost,' said the young Count, closing the door. 'I still number among the living, and have come expressly to prove to you that, in spite of my so-called wound, you have no chance of coming into the property as yet.'

Little did Edmund guess the effect this harmless jest and the fact of his appearance at that precise moment had upon his cousin. It was only by a violent effort that Oswald regained his self-control. His voice was hoarse with emotion as he replied:

'How can you be so imprudent as to come through these long cold corridors! You were ordered not to leave your room to-day.'

'Pooh! what do I care for the doctor's orders?' said Edmund carelessly. 'Do you think I mean to be treated as an invalid, because I have got a scratch on my hand? I have put up with all their nonsense a few hours to please my mother, but I have had enough of it now. My servant has instructions to say that I am asleep, should anyone inquire after me. I came over here to have a chat with you, old fellow. I cannot possibly stay away from you on this, the very last evening you have to spend at Ettersberg.'

These words were spoken with such heartiness that Oswald involuntarily turned away.

'Let us go back to your room, at least,' he said hastily.

'No; we are not so likely to be disturbed here,' persisted Edmund, as he threw himself into an armchair. 'I have so many things to say to you–for instance, how I came by this famous wound, which has set all Ettersberg in an uproar, though it is nothing more than a pin-scratch.'

Oswald's eyes wandered uneasily to the papers, beneath which the portrait lay concealed.

'How you came by it?' he repeated absently. 'I thought your gun was fired accidentally, as you were getting over a hedge.'

'Yes; that is what we told the servants, and my mother and uncle are not to hear any other version of the affair. But I need not make a secret of it to you. I was out this morning with one of the men who joined our shooting-party–with Baron Senden.'

'With Senden?' said Oswald, becoming attentive. 'What was the quarrel between you?'

'He made use of an expression which displeased me. I called him to account at once; one word led to another, and finally we agreed to settle our little difference by meeting this morning. You see no great damage has been done. I shall perhaps have to wear my hand in a sling for a week or so, and Senden has got off as cheaply, with just a graze on the shoulder.'

'So that is why you stayed all night? Why did you not send a message over to me? I would have gone to you.'

'To act as second? That was not necessary. Our host offered me his services–and as the mourning relative you could always arrive time enough.'

'Edmund, do not speak so lightly on grave subjects,' said Oswald impatiently. 'A duel always involves the hazard of a life.'

Edmund laughed.

'Good heavens! I ought to have made my will, I suppose, have summoned you to my side to take a solemn leave of you, and have left a touching message of farewell for Hedwig? Bah! the thing is to keep one's self as cool as possible, and just trust to one's luck for the rest.'

'You do not appear to have taken your adversary's words so coolly. What was the real ground of offence?'

The young Count's face darkened, and he replied with some warmth of tone:

'The subject of our old Dornau lawsuit was broached. They were joking me about my very practical idea of uniting the contending parties in matrimony. I laughed with them and entered quite freely into the spirit of the joke, until Senden remarked very pointedly that as the two properties were to be joined together so peaceably at last, the great efforts formerly made to this end turned out, after all, to have been unnecessary; it was so much trouble wasted.'

'You know that the Baron proposed to your future wife and was refused,' said Oswald, with a shrug of the shoulders. 'He naturally feels a certain degree of irritation, which he cannot help showing on every occasion.'

'His remark was levelled at my mother,' said Edmund warmly. 'It is no secret that she opposed the marriage between her cousin and Herr Rüstow, and openly declared herself on the side of the angry father. She has, as you know, a lofty idea of her class-privileges, and she then felt it incumbent on her to uphold the principles she professes. This is why I esteem so highly the sacrifice she is now making for me. Senden's speech implied that she had been actuated by interested motives, and had influenced Uncle Francis in the making of his will, in the hope that Dornau might fall to me. Could I submit to that, I ask it of you?'

'You go too far. I do not believe that Senden had any such arrière-pensée.'

'No matter, I understood him in that sense. Why did he not recall his words when I asked for an explanation? It may be that I was rather too warm, but on that point I can brook no insinuations. You reproach me frequently with my heedlessness and frivolity, Oswald, but even they have a limit. Once past that boundary, I am apt to take matters even more to heart than you.'

'I know,' said Oswald slowly. 'There are two subjects on which you feel seriously and deeply–the point of honour and–your mother.'

'The two are one,' retorted Edmund sharply.

'He who offends her by even the shadow of a suspicion rouses all the spirit in me, and makes me desperate.'

He sprang up as he spoke, and stood before his cousin, drawn up to his full height. The habitual gay, careless expression had vanished from his features, giving place to one of set, stern gravity, and his eyes flashed in his passionate excitement.

Oswald was silent. He was standing by the writing-table, and had already grasped the papers, ready to push them aside and draw forth the picture, but as the young Count's last words fell on his ear he paused involuntarily. Why must such a discussion have arisen at this precise moment?

'It never occurred to me that any such interpretation could be placed on that will,' went on Edmund; 'or I should at once, at the time of my uncle's death, have refused the bequest, and never should have allowed the suit to be instituted. If Hedwig and I had remained strangers, and the court had awarded Dornau to me, I believe the calumny would have thriven and prospered, until they had made me out to be the accomplice of a fraud.'

'It is possible to be the victim of a fraud,' said Oswald in a low tone.

'The victim?' repeated the young Count, stepping quickly up to his cousin. 'What do you mean by that?'

Oswald's hand rested heavily on the papers which overlay his great secret, but there was nothing to indicate the emotion within him. His voice was cold and unmoved, as he replied:

'Nothing. I am not alluding to Dornau. We know perfectly well that my uncle acted in accordance with his own will and judgment–but the instrument was drawn up in favour of a nephew, passing over the daughter and her rights. Calumny, of course, takes advantage of the scope afforded it, and hints at undue influence. In such a case, it would, no doubt, be considered only natural that a mother should lay aside any scruples, and act in the interest of her son.'

'But that would have been fortune-hunting of the most flagrant description,' cried Edmund, blazing up anew. 'I really do not understand you, Oswald. How can you speak so indifferently of such a possible view of the case, of the disgrace it would entail? How should you qualify a scheme formed to oust the rightful heir that another might succeed to his place and property? I should call it a swindle, a dishonourable, an infamous action, and the mere thought that such a suspicion should be coupled with the name of Ettersberg makes my blood boil within me.'

Oswald's hand slid slowly from the table, and he stepped back a little into the shadow, beyond the circle irradiated by the lamp.

'Any such suspicion would do you the keenest injustice, truly,' he said emphatically; 'but the world is generally prompt to think evil. No doubt, it often makes evil discoveries. In our sphere especially there are so many dark family histories which lie hidden for years, and then suddenly one day spring to light. So many, who hold a brilliant position and enjoy great consideration, carry about with them the consciousness of guilt which would utterly crush and annihilate them, were it to be found out.'

'Well, I could not do it,' said the young Count, turning his frank, handsome face full upon his cousin. 'I must bear an unsullied brow before the world, must feel myself to be without reproach, that I may breathe freely, and boldly meet the slander I despise–there would be no living for me else. Dark family histories! They are, no doubt, more plentiful than we wot of, but I would suffer no such lurking shadow in our annals, not though I myself must set to work to drag it to light.'

'And suppose silence were imposed on you–for the sake of the family honour?'

'It would probably kill me; for to live with the knowledge that there was a stain on our escutcheon would be, I think, to me a thing impossible!'

Oswald passed his hand across his brow, which was covered with a cold sweat. In keen and terrible suspense he followed his cousin's every movement. Perhaps no interference of his would be necessary; perhaps accident might relieve him of the onerous task which he felt must be fulfilled in one way or another. Edmund had gone up to the writing-table, and as he spoke on, he took up some of the papers unthinkingly, and threw them aside without looking at them. One minute more and he would probably discover the little case, the shape of which must necessarily attract his attention–and then–then would come the catastrophe.

'At all events, it will be seen what view I take of such innuendoes, and the lesson Senden has had will serve for others. Nothing is sacred to calumny, no object, however pure and lofty, not even one which to most minds is the ideal of all that is good.'

'Ideals may fade, idols crumble to the dust,' remarked Oswald. 'You have had no experience of that at present.'

'I was speaking of my mother,' said the young Count, with deep feeling.

Oswald made no reply, but it was well that he was standing in the shade; at least the other saw not the torture this interview inflicted on him. It happened so rarely that Edmund appeared in serious mood, and to-day of all days he was grave and earnest of speech, showing the deeper side of his nature. And all the time his right hand was busy, mechanically turning over the papers on the table, approaching nearer and nearer the fatal spot. Oswald's arm twitched, ready to drag the unsuspecting man back from the abyss which yawned before him–but he checked the impulse, and remained motionless in his place.

'You can understand now why I desire to keep this meeting from my mother's knowledge, notwithstanding its harmless issue.' Edmund continued. 'She would inquire, as you do into its origin, and the truth might wound her. Whilst I am to the fore not the very shadow of offence shall come near her. I would give my life rather than hear her aspersed by a calumnious word–give my life, aye, readily, willingly.'

Separately, one by one, he had taken up the papers and thrown them aside. Now he had come to the last sheet, that beneath which the picture lay, but suddenly Oswald's hand was upon his, grasping it with a grasp of iron, and impeding any further movement.

'What is it?' asked Edmund in astonishment. 'What is the matter with you?'

For all answer, Oswald threw his arm about him and drew him away.

'Come, Edmund, let us go to the sofa yonder.'

'What, you draw me violently from the table simply for that? One would have thought a mine was about to explode. Have you any combustibles, any train laid over there?'

'Possibly,' said Oswald, with a strange smile. 'Let those papers be. Come.'

'Oh, you need fear no indiscretion on my part,' declared the Count, with a sudden outbreak of tetchiness. 'There was no need to place your hand on your papers in that prohibitory manner. I did not look at them, and if I touched them, I did it mechanically. You appear to have secrets, and I, no doubt, am disturbing you when you would wish to be sorting your letters and putting them in order. It will be better for me to go.' He moved away, as though to leave the room; but Oswald held him by the arm, though he tried angrily to free it.

'No, Edmund, you must not leave me so–not to-day, old fellow.'

'Indeed, it is the last evening you have to spend here,' said Edmund, half wrathful, half appeased. 'You are doing all you can to show me how little that affects you.'

'You do me injustice. The separation is more painful to me than you can imagine.'

Oswald's voice shook so audibly that Edmund looked at him in surprise, and all his anger vanished.

'Why, what ails you, Oswald? You are as pale as death, and have seemed so strange all the evening. But I can guess: you have been searching among these letters and papers, which, no doubt, belonged to your parents, and they have awakened many sad memories.'

'Yes, much that is very sad,' said Oswald, drawing a deep breath; 'but it is over now. You are right, they were old memories which put me out of tune. I will drive the troubling thoughts from me, and altogether make an end of them now.'

'Then I really will go,' declared Edmund. 'I forgot that you might still have much to arrange and set in order. We shall meet to-morrow morning. Good-night, Oswald.'

He held out his hand to his cousin, but the latter, assuredly for the first time in his life, took him in his arms, and held him for a moment in a tight embrace.

'Goodnight, Edmund. I have often seemed harsh and cold in return for your warm and hearty friendship, yet you have been very dear to me–how dear I hardly knew myself until this hour.'

'The hour of parting,' said Edmund, half reproachfully, as he cordially returned the embrace. 'But for that, the confession would never have passed your lips. No matter, I have always felt, known how you cared for me in your heart of hearts.'

'Not fully, perhaps. I did not know it myself until to-day. But go now. With that wound of yours, you really should not stay up longer. Go and rest.'

Passing his arm round his cousin's shoulder, he walked with him to the door and down the corridor. There they parted; but as the young Count retraced his steps to his own room, Oswald stood again before his writing-table, holding the portrait in his hand. Once more he contemplated it, then closing the case with a firm pressure, he said under his breath:

'It would be his death. I will not reign as master of Ettersberg at that price.'

CHAPTER X

Next morning the three gentlemen breakfasted alone, though Oswald's departure had been fixed for the forenoon. Count Edmund paid no attention whatever to the medical advice which would have confined him to his room. He appeared with a bandaged hand, but in good health and spirits, and laughed at the remonstrances of Baron Heideck, who recommended more prudence and greater care. The Countess remained invisible. She was suffering, it appeared, from a violent nervous attack, resulting probably from the fright she had sustained on hearing the first exaggerated account of her son's condition.

Edmund, who had paid a visit to his mother's room, had found her in a state of intense nervous excitement, and to his inquiry as to whether Oswald might take leave of her in person, she had replied decidedly that she was far too unwell to admit anyone but her son. The young Count was somewhat embarrassed when conveying this message to his cousin. He felt that the refusal to say good-bye involved a slight, and thought his mother might have exerted herself so far as to receive her nephew, if only for a few minutes, before his departure.

Oswald, however, accepted the fiat with great calm, and without the smallest show of surprise. He guessed, no doubt, what share the disappearance of the miniature and its probable fate had in this 'nervous attack.' The Countess would certainly have heard from Everard that her nephew had entered the room soon after she had left it, and had remained there alone.

The conversation at breakfast was rather monosyllabic. Baron Heideck, though he had ultimately acquiesced in Oswald's plans, was not disposed to show any special heartiness towards the young relative who had so resolutely set his will at defiance.

Edmund was disturbed, and unlike himself, being oppressed by the thought of the coming separation, the full meaning of which he only realized now that it was imminent. Oswald alone maintained his accustomed calm and grave demeanour. They were on the point of leaving the table, when the young Count was summoned away to see the doctor, who had just arrived. Baron Heideck would have followed–he wished to impress upon the medical man that greater strictness and vigilance would be necessary with so heedless a patient; but a low word from Oswald made him turn and pause. When they were alone together, the latter drew from his breast-pocket a small and carefully-sealed packet.

'I had hoped to see my aunt again before leaving,' he began. 'As this will not now be possible, I must beg of you to take charge of a last–a last commission for me. It is my express request that this packet be delivered into the Countess's own hands, and that it be given to her when she is alone.'

'What is this mysterious commission?' asked Heideck, in surprise. 'And why do you choose me instead of Edmund?'

'Because it would hardly accord with my aunt's wishes that Edmund should hear of the delivery or of the contents of this packet. I must repeat my request that it be given her when no third person is present.'

The icy tone in which these words were spoken, and the haughty, menacing glance which accompanied them, were the only revenge the young man permitted to himself. Heideck naturally did not understand his meaning, but he perceived that the matter referred to was of no ordinary nature, and he accepted the little parcel without more ado.

'I will undertake the commission,' he said.

'I thank you,' replied Oswald, stepping back, and showing by his manner that the interview was at an end. There was indeed no time for further conversation, as just then Edmund returned, accompanied by the doctor, whom he insisted on taking round to see his mother. Her condition made him anxious, he said.

The bulletins, however, proved favourable with regard to both patients. The Count's wound turned out to be most insignificant, and the Countess was merely suffering from a slight nervous attack, a natural consequence of yesterday's fright. Rest and a few simple remedies would restore them both, and Edmund even forced from the doctor the admission that he might safely leave his room and accompany his cousin to the carriage now waiting for him below.

Baron Heideck took a brief, cold leave of his nephew, but Edmund showed himself greatly affected by the parting. He beset Oswald with entreaties to come back to Ettersberg at all events for the wedding, and promised in his turn shortly to pay a visit to the capital. Oswald accepted it all with rather a sad smile; he knew that neither project would hold good. The Countess would certainly find means to prevent her son's intended journey. One last hearty embrace–then the carriage rolled away, and Edmund, as he reentered the castle alone, felt a desolate sense of the void left by his friend's departure.

More than a couple of hours passed by before Baron Heideck betook himself to his sister's room to execute the commission which had been confided to him. He had been in no special haste; knowing the terms on which Oswald and his aunt stood, he thought it probable that this last message was of no agreeable import, and that it might increase, rather than lessen, the Countess's indisposition. Possessed by this idea, the Baron had at first proposed to postpone the business to the following day; but Oswald's look and tone, as he gave over the packet, had been so peculiar and impressive, that he resolved to have the matter cleared up without further delay. At his request, the Countess dismissed her maid, with orders to admit no one, and the brother and sister remained long closeted together.

The Countess sat on her sofa, looking very pale and worn. It was easy to see what she had suffered since the preceding evening, all that she was suffering now as she sat passive, allowing the stream of her brother's reproaches to flow on without response. He stood before her with the open packet in his hand, speaking in a rather subdued voice, certainly, but with every evidence of great excitement.

'So you really could not make up your mind to part with that unhappy picture! I thought it had been destroyed long ago. How could you be so mad as to keep it in your possession?'

'Do not scold me, Armand.' The Countess's voice was stifled as though by tears. 'It is the only souvenir I have kept–the only one. It came to me with a last message from him, after … after his death.'

'And for the sake of this sentimental folly you conjure up a frightful danger, a danger which threatens ruin both to yourself and your son. Do not these features speak clearly enough? Formerly, when Edmund was a child, the likeness was not so striking, so extraordinary; but now that he is nearly of the same age as … as the other, it is positively damning. Your imprudence has cost you a lesson, however, and a hard one. You know into whose hands the picture fell?'

'I have known since yesterday evening. My God, what will come to us now?'

'Nothing,' said Heideck coldly. 'The fact of his surrendering it is ample proof of that. Oswald is too good a lawyer not to know that a mere likeness is no evidence, and that a charge cannot be founded on such testimony. Still, it was a generous act to give it back. Another man would have held possession of it, if only to harass and torment you. That picture must be destroyed.'

'I will destroy it,' said the Countess.

'No, I will do that myself,' retorted her brother, replacing the little case carefully in his pocket. 'I rescued you once from a very real danger, Constance; now I must stand between you and the remembrance of it, which may be almost as fatal. That ghost has been buried for years. Do not let it rise up again, or the whole fortune and happiness of Ettersberg may be wrecked. This unfortunate souvenir must disappear to-day. Edmund must have no more suspicion of the secret than his father had before him.'

Involuntarily he raised his voice as he pronounced these last words, but he ceased speaking suddenly, for at that very moment the door which led into the adjoining room was thrown open, and Edmund appeared on the threshold.

'What am I not to suspect?' he asked with quick vehemence.

The young Count had naturally not supposed that his mother's prohibition of admittance extended to himself. He had crossed the anteroom softly, fearing to disturb her. The closed doors and the subdued tone in which the conversation had been carried on made it well-nigh impossible that he should have overheard more than his uncle's last words. The expression of his face bore proof of this. It betokened astonishment, but no fear.

Nevertheless, the Countess bounded from her seat with a terrible start, and it required a mute but significant gesture of warning from her brother, a pressure of his hand upon her shoulder, to give her back her self-control.

'What is it I am not to suspect?' repeated Edmund, as he came quickly towards them. He addressed his question to the Baron.

'Is it possible that you can have been listening? asked the latter, his breath almost failing him as he thought of such a possibility.

'No, uncle,' said the young Count angrily. 'I am not in the habit of playing the spy or the listener. I merely caught your last words as I was opening the door. It is natural surely that I should like to know their meaning, and to learn what it is that has hitherto been kept secret from me as from my father.'

'You heard me beg my sister not to mention the subject to you,' replied Heideck, who had now recovered his composure. 'I was alluding to a reminiscence of our youth which we shall do well to keep to ourselves. You know that our early days were passed amid graver, sadder circumstances than yours. We had battles to fight and sacrifices to make whereof you can have no conception.'

The explanation was plausible and appeared to find belief, but Edmund's tone, though tender, was fraught with deep reproach, as he said, turning to the Countess:

'I could not have believed, mother, that you had a secret from me.'

'Do not torment your mother now,' interrupted Heideck. 'You see how very unwell she is?'

'You should have spared her then, and not have called up painful reminiscences to-day,' replied Edmund, rather warmly. 'I came to tell you, mother, that Hedwig and her father are here. May I bring her to you? As you felt able to see my uncle, you will, I am sure, not refuse to receive us.'

'Certainly,' assented the Countess. 'Indeed, I feel much better now. Bring Hedwig to me at once.'

'I will fetch her,' said Edmund, and went; but before leaving the room he turned once again, and cast a strange scrutinising glance at his mother and uncle. There was no suspicion in his look, but, as it were, a vague presentiment of coming trouble.

The young Count had sent a message over to Brunneck on the preceding evening, with the news that he had been slightly wounded in the hand when out shooting, and therefore would not be able to pay his usual visit, adding that there was not the smallest cause for uneasiness. This piece of intelligence had brought the Councillor and his daughter over to Ettersberg without loss of time. The sight of Edmund, who received them with all his wonted gaiety, soon set any remaining fears on his account at rest. Almost simultaneously with them came the neighbouring squire on whose estate the accident had occurred. He had driven over with his son to inquire after the patient.

Under these circumstances Baron Heideck's first meeting with the new relations was more easy and unconstrained than it would otherwise have been. The young lady's beauty was not without its influence on the rigid aristocrat, who, in spite of his prejudices, could not altogether withhold approval of his nephew's choice. Towards the Councillor, Heideck did indeed preserve a cool and reserved, though a polite demeanour. The presence of strangers made the conversation more animated and general. Edmund alone appeared unusually silent and abstracted. He refused, however, to admit that this had anything to do with his wound, attributing the depression he could not disguise to his recent parting with Oswald. He would not confess even to himself that any other vague trouble was weighing on him.

The two neighbours did not remain very long, and an hour or so after their departure, Rüstow and his daughter set out on their return-journey to Brunneck. Edmund lifted his betrothed into the carriage, and took a tender leave of her. Then he went away back to his own room, but he could feel settled nowhere; a strange restlessness was upon him which drove him from place to place. At length he threw himself upon the sofa, and tried to read, but he could not force his mind to follow the words or understand their sense. A most unwonted cloud lay on the young Count's brow, usually so clear and serene; he had a sombre, harassed look as he sat brooding over the words he had heard spoken in his mother's room. With painful persistency they recurred to his mind, strive as he might to turn his thoughts into another current. What was he not to know? What was it they were hiding so carefully from him?

Edmund was so little accustomed to bear the pressure of any care, to carry about with him any troublesome problem or doubt, that this condition soon became intolerable to him. He threw his book aside, sprang to his feet, and walked straight up to his uncle's room.

Baron Heideck was lodged in the visitors' suite, situated in the upper story. Hither he had retired as soon as the guests drove off. He was standing before the fireplace, busily fanning the flames which had recently been kindled on the hearth, when his nephew entered. As the door opened, he looked round in surprise, and the surprise hardly appeared to be a pleasant one.

'Am I disturbing you?' asked Edmund, who noticed this.

'Oh, certainly not,' said Heideck. 'But it seems to me imprudent of you in your present condition to be wandering about the house instead of remaining quietly in your own room.'

'I have the doctor's permission to leave it, you know, and I wanted to speak to you for a few minutes. You have had a fire lighted, I see. Do you not find it too warm this mild weather?'