II

It was early morning four days later, and Harz was loitering homewards.

The shadows of the clouds passing across the vines were vanishing over

the jumbled roofs and green-topped spires of the town. A strong sweet

wind was blowing from the mountains, there was a stir in the branches

of the trees, and flakes of the late blossom were drifting down. Amongst

the soft green pods of a kind of poplar chafers buzzed, and numbers of

their little brown bodies were strewn on the path.

He passed a bench where a girl sat sketching. A puff of wind whirled her

drawing to the ground; Harz ran to pick it up. She took it from him with

a bow; but, as he turned away, she tore the sketch across.

“Ah!” he said; “why did you do that?”

This girl, who stood with a bit of the torn sketch in either hand, was

slight and straight; and her face earnest and serene. She gazed at Harz

with large, clear, greenish eyes; her lips and chin were defiant, her

forehead tranquil.

“I don't like it.”

“Will you let me look at it? I am a painter.”

“It isn't worth looking at, but—if you wish—”

He put the two halves of the sketch together.

“You see!” she said at last; “I told you.”

Harz did not answer, still looking at the sketch. The girl frowned.

Harz asked her suddenly:

“Why do you paint?”

She coloured, and said:

“Show me what is wrong.”

“I cannot show you what is wrong, there is nothing wrong—but why do you

paint?”

“I don't understand.”

Harz shrugged his shoulders.

“You've no business to do that,” said the girl in a hurt voice; “I want

to know.”

“Your heart is not in it,” said Harz.

She looked at him, startled; her eyes had grown thoughtful.

“I suppose that is it. There are so many other things—”

“There should be nothing else,” said Harz.

She broke in: “I don't want always to be thinking of myself. Suppose—”

“Ah! When you begin supposing!”

The girl confronted him; she had torn the sketch again.

“You mean that if it does not matter enough, one had better not do it at

all. I don't know if you are right—I think you are.”

There was the sound of a nervous cough, and Harz saw behind him his

three visitors—Miss Naylor offering him her hand; Greta, flushed, with

a bunch of wild flowers, staring intently in his face; and the terrier,

sniffing at his trousers.

Miss Naylor broke an awkward silence.

“We wondered if you would still be here, Christian. I am sorry to

interrupt you—I was not aware that you knew Mr. Herr—”

“Harz is my name—we were just talking”

“About my sketch. Oh, Greta, you do tickle! Will you come and have

breakfast with us to-day, Herr Harz? It's our turn, you know.”

Harz, glancing at his dusty clothes, excused himself.

But Greta in a pleading voice said: “Oh! do come! Scruff likes you. It

is so dull when there is nobody for breakfast but ourselves.”

Miss Naylor's mouth began to twist. Harz hurriedly broke in:

“Thank you. I will come with pleasure; you don't mind my being dirty?”

“Oh no! we do not mind; then we shall none of us wash, and afterwards I

shall show you my rabbits.”

Miss Naylor, moving from foot to foot, like a bird on its perch,

exclaimed:

“I hope you won't regret it, not a very good meal—the girls are so

impulsive—such informal invitation; we shall be very glad.”

But Greta pulled softly at her sister's sleeve, and Christian, gathering

her things, led the way.

Harz followed in amazement; nothing of this kind had come into his life

before. He kept shyly glancing at the girls; and, noting the speculative

innocence in Greta's eyes, he smiled. They soon came to two great

poplar-trees, which stood, like sentinels, one on either side of an

unweeded gravel walk leading through lilac bushes to a house painted

dull pink, with green-shuttered windows, and a roof of greenish slate.

Over the door in faded crimson letters were written the words, “Villa

Rubein.”

“That is to the stables,” said Greta, pointing down a path, where some

pigeons were sunning themselves on a wall. “Uncle Nic keeps his

horses there: Countess and Cuckoo—his horses begin with C, because

of Chris—they are quite beautiful. He says he could drive them

to Kingdom-Come and they would not turn their hair. Bow, and say

'Good-morning' to our house!”

Harz bowed.

“Father said all strangers should, and I think it brings good luck.”

From the doorstep she looked round at Harz, then ran into the house.

A broad, thick-set man, with stiff, brushed-up hair, a short, brown,

bushy beard parted at the chin, a fresh complexion, and blue glasses

across a thick nose, came out, and called in a bluff voice:

“Ha! my good dears, kiss me quick—prrt! How goes it then this morning? A

good walk, hein?” The sound of many loud rapid kisses followed.

“Ha, Fraulein, good!” He became aware of Harz's figure standing in the

doorway: “Und der Herr?”

Miss Naylor hurriedly explained.

“Good! An artist! Kommen Sie herein, I am delight. You will breakfast? I

too—yes, yes, my dears—I too breakfast with you this morning. I have the

hunter's appetite.”

Harz, looking at him keenly, perceived him to be of middle height and

age, stout, dressed in a loose holland jacket, a very white, starched

shirt, and blue silk sash; that he looked particularly clean, had an air

of belonging to Society, and exhaled a really fine aroma of excellent

cigars and the best hairdresser's essences.

The room they entered was long and rather bare; there was a huge map on

the wall, and below it a pair of globes on crooked supports, resembling

two inflated frogs erect on their hind legs. In one corner was a cottage

piano, close to a writing-table heaped with books and papers; this nook,

sacred to Christian, was foreign to the rest of the room, which was

arranged with supernatural neatness. A table was laid for breakfast, and

the sun-warmed air came in through French windows.

The meal went merrily; Herr Paul von Morawitz was never in such spirits

as at table. Words streamed from him. Conversing with Harz, he talked

of Art as who should say: “One does not claim to be a connoisseur—pas si

bete—still, one has a little knowledge, que diable!” He recommended

him a man in the town who sold cigars that were “not so very bad.” He

consumed porridge, ate an omelette; and bending across to Greta gave her

a sounding kiss, muttering: “Kiss me quick!”—an expression he had picked

up in a London music-hall, long ago, and considered chic. He asked his

daughters' plans, and held out porridge to the terrier, who refused it

with a sniff.

“Well,” he said suddenly, looking at Miss Naylor, “here is a gentleman

who has not even heard our names!”

The little lady began her introductions in a breathless voice.

“Good!” Herr Paul said, puffing out his lips: “Now we know each other!”

and, brushing up the ends of his moustaches, he carried off Harz into

another room, decorated with pipe-racks, prints of dancing-girls,

spittoons, easy-chairs well-seasoned by cigar smoke, French novels, and

newspapers.

The household at Villa Rubein was indeed of a mixed and curious nature.

Cut on both floors by corridors, the Villa was divided into four

divisions; each of which had its separate inhabitants, an arrangement

which had come about in the following way:

When old Nicholas Treffry died, his estate, on the boundary of

Cornwall, had been sold and divided up among his three surviving

children—Nicholas, who was much the eldest, a partner in the well-known

firm of Forsyte and Treffry, teamen, of the Strand; Constance, married

to a man called Decie; and Margaret, at her father's death engaged to

the curate of the parish, John Devorell, who shortly afterwards became

its rector. By his marriage with Margaret Treffry the rector had one

child called Christian. Soon after this he came into some property, and

died, leaving it unfettered to his widow. Three years went by, and when

the child was six years old, Mrs. Devorell, still young and pretty, came

to live in London with her brother Nicholas. It was there that she met

Paul von Morawitz—the last of an old Czech family, who had lived for

many hundred years on their estates near Budweiss. Paul had been left an

orphan at the age of ten, and without a solitary ancestral acre. Instead

of acres, he inherited the faith that nothing was too good for a von

Morawitz. In later years his savoir faire enabled him to laugh at faith,

but it stayed quietly with him all the same. The absence of acres was of

no great consequence, for through his mother, the daughter of a banker

in Vienna, he came into a well-nursed fortune. It befitted a von

Morawitz that he should go into the Cavalry, but, unshaped for

soldiering, he soon left the Service; some said he had a difference with

his Colonel over the quality of food provided during some manoeuvres;

others that he had retired because his chargers did not fit his legs,

which were, indeed, rather round.

He had an admirable appetite for pleasure; a man-about-town's life

suited him. He went his genial, unreflecting, costly way in Vienna,

Paris, London. He loved exclusively those towns, and boasted that he

was as much at home in one as in another. He combined exuberant vitality

with fastidiousness of palate, and devoted both to the acquisition of a

special taste in women, weeds, and wines; above all he was blessed with

a remarkable digestion. He was thirty when he met Mrs. Devorell; and she

married him because he was so very different from anybody she had ever

seen. People more dissimilar were never mated. To Paul—accustomed to

stage doors—freshness, serene tranquillity, and obvious purity were the

baits; he had run through more than half his fortune, too, and the fact

that she had money was possibly not overlooked. Be that as it may, he

was fond of her; his heart was soft, he developed a domestic side.

Greta was born to them after a year of marriage. The instinct of the

“freeman” was, however, not dead in Paul; he became a gambler. He lost

the remainder of his fortune without being greatly disturbed. When

he began to lose his wife's fortune too things naturally became more

difficult. Not too much remained when Nicholas Treffry stepped in,

and caused his sister to settle what was left on her daughters, after

providing a life-interest for herself and Paul. Losing his supplies, the

good man had given up his cards. But the instinct of the “freeman”

was still living in his breast; he took to drink. He was never grossly

drunk, and rarely very sober. His wife sorrowed over this new passion;

her health, already much enfeebled, soon broke down. The doctors sent

her to the Tyrol. She seemed to benefit by this, and settled down at

Botzen. The following year, when Greta was just ten, she died. It was a

shock to Paul. He gave up excessive drinking; became a constant smoker,

and lent full rein to his natural domesticity. He was fond of both the

girls, but did not at all understand them; Greta, his own daughter, was

his favourite. Villa Rubein remained their home; it was cheap and roomy.

Money, since Paul became housekeeper to himself, was scarce.

About this time Mrs. Decie, his wife's sister, whose husband had died

in the East, returned to England; Paul invited her to come and live with

them. She had her own rooms, her own servant; the arrangement suited

Paul—it was economically sound, and there was some one always there to

take care of the girls. In truth he began to feel the instinct of the

“freeman” rising again within him; it was pleasant to run over to Vienna

now and then; to play piquet at a Club in Gries, of which he was the

shining light; in a word, to go “on the tiles” a little. One could not

always mourn—even if a woman were an angel; moreover, his digestion was

as good as ever.

The fourth quarter of this Villa was occupied by Nicholas Treffry, whose

annual sojourn out of England perpetually surprised himself. Between him

and his young niece, Christian, there existed, however, a rare sympathy;

one of those affections between the young and old, which, mysteriously

born like everything in life, seems the only end and aim to both, till

another feeling comes into the younger heart.

Since a long and dangerous illness, he had been ordered to avoid the

English winter, and at the commencement of each spring he would appear

at Botzen, driving his own horses by easy stages from the Italian

Riviera, where he spent the coldest months. He always stayed till June

before going back to his London Club, and during all that time he let no

day pass without growling at foreigners, their habits, food, drink, and

raiment, with a kind of big dog's growling that did nobody any harm. The

illness had broken him very much; he was seventy, but looked more. He

had a servant, a Luganese, named Dominique, devoted to him. Nicholas

Treffry had found him overworked in an hotel, and had engaged him with

the caution: “Look—here, Dominique! I swear!” To which Dominique, dark

of feature, saturnine and ironical, had only replied: “Tres biens,

M'sieur!”