AN ACCIDENT.
The rain rattled against the glass enclosure of the balcony, flash
after flash of lightning illumined the darkness, and the crashing
thunder shook the walls of the old manor-house of Linau to their
foundations.
Hugo von Wangen was pacing the spacious room restlessly to and fro. The
storm had been raging for more than two hours. The rain was falling in
torrents, and through it could be heard the rushing noise of the brook
at the end of the garden,--it was plainly overflowing its banks.
"The storm is increasing," said Wangen, and his words instantly
received confirmation from an intensely vivid flash of lightning,
followed by a reverberating clap of thunder. The panes in the windows
shook almost to breaking, and the howling of the blast all but drowned
the sound of his voice.
"You make me very nervous," Bertha said, "by pacing backwards and
forwards in that manner, like some wild animal in a cage. Come and sit
down with us, your restlessness can do no good."
Wangen did not heed her; he quickened his steps, his anxiety evidently
increasing every minute. "I hope there has been no accident," he said.
"The Dombrowker bridge is unsafe at the best of times, and very
dangerous in a storm like this."
"Don't worry yourself, Hugo," Clara rejoined, leaving the table where
she had been seated at her embroidery and affectionately putting her
arm through her brother's as he pursued his restless walk. "Herr Kaempf
is with the men, and he is so prudent he will see that nothing happens.
Perhaps he has not started from the station, but is waiting there for
the storm to abate."
"Clara is right," Bertha said, kindly. Since Elise and her charge had
made their appearance again at supper the mistress of the house had
been once more all sweetness and amiability, and had seemed desirous of
effacing any unfavorable impression produced by her previous ill
humour. "Herr Kaempf is certainly waiting at the station. He must have
seen the storm coming up all the afternoon."
"That is just why he will surely have driven over,--it came up so very
slowly, and then burst forth with such sudden fury. Something must
surely have hap----"
He interrupted himself to listen. The noise of the rain beating against
the glass panes was fainter for the moment, and Wangen distinctly heard
the rolling of wheels in the court-yard.
It ceased, and the next moment the door of the garden-room was
hurriedly opened, and Inspector Kaempf appeared on the balcony. The
water was dripping from his wet and muddy overcoat, and his hair hung
in damp, straight strings over his sunburned forehead.
"Thank God you are back again!" Wangen exclaimed, hastening to meet
him, but pausing as he looked into the troubled face of the man, who
turned in some hesitation from him to the ladies.
"We are back again," the inspector said, after an instant's pause. "The
first carriage is here, the other is directly behind us, nothing has
happened to us, but--I should be sorry to startle madame and the
ladies, but--there has been an accident. A stranger left the station a
short time before us in a one-horse light wagon, and wagon and horse
fell over the cliffs in the Dombrowker Pass. The driver is dead, and
the stranger is senseless. He fell but a short distance, but there is a
wound upon his forehead,--he must have struck his head against a stone.
We put him into our foremost wagon and brought him here; there was
nothing to be done for the unfortunate driver. The storm was furious,
and we have been obliged to drive very slowly. The stranger may revive,
but I fear----the men are now bringing him into the hall."
As he spoke, the sound of many footsteps and a murmur of low voices
were heard in the hall, whither Wangen instantly went, followed by the
inspector, Elise, Clara, and last by Bertha.
The spacious hall was filled with men-servants and maids, who had
hurried hither from all parts of the house and stables upon hearing of
the accident. The unconscious stranger had been carefully brought in
from the wagon and laid upon various wraps on the floor of the hall,
where men and maids were crowding about him, whispering their pity and
dismay, and wondering who the unfortunate man could be lying there as
pale and lifeless as the poor driver, whose body had just arrived in
the second wagon.
No one knew him, not even Herr Berndal, the second inspector, who had
lived at Linau for years, and who knew every one in all the country
round. One of the men affirmed that he had seen the gentleman
get out of a first-class carriage when the train arrived at the
railway-station. He must be a rich man, he thought, for he had a very
grand air, and the station-master had bowed low to him and had sent one
of the porters to get him a conveyance immediately.
There was nothing of the grand air to be seen now in the senseless
figure lying there, his clothes muddy and disordered, his face ghastly
pale and stained with the blood that trickled from a wound in the
forehead, now half concealed by the thick dark hair. The features were
scarcely distinguishable in the fitful light of the candles in the
hall and of a stable lantern held by one of the men, but the maid
at the man's elbow whispered that the poor gentleman would be very
fine-looking if he were not so horribly pale, and he could not be over
thirty at most.
The whispering suddenly ceased when Herr von Wangen appeared, and the
servants respectfully made way for the new arrivals.
Wangen looked down compassionately upon the unconscious man; Bertha,
after one timid glance at the motionless form, hid her face in her
hands and turned away in horror; while Elise stooped, and, gently
brushing aside the hair from the wound, listened eagerly, in hopes of
catching some faint sound of breathing from the parted lips.
"There is hope," she said, gently: "he is still living." Then, as the
light of the lantern held by the man beside her fell full upon the
stranger's face, she started, grew very pale, and with difficulty
suppressed a cry of horror. "Good God!" she whispered, "it is he! Oh,
horrible!"
Her start, her change of colour, and her whispered words attracted
Bertha's attention again, and Wangen, no less amazed, bent over the
prostrate figure and eagerly examined the lifeless features. "You know
him?" he asked, hurriedly. "Yes, yes; I too have seen that face before,
but where? Now I remember--at Castle Osternau. Surely it is the
Candidate who disappeared so suddenly, the tutor with the odd
name,--yes, I remember it now,--Pigglewitch."
The name, even at this moment, called forth a smile from some of the
servants, but Wangen exclaimed, eagerly, "There! his lips moved, he
will recover! Help me, Hans, instantly to take him up gently and carry
him to the blue room, it is ready for guests. Be careful! he is coming
to himself."
And, all alert in the hope of the stranger's recovery, Wangen himself
supported the head and shoulders of the wounded man, and, with the help
of the groom, carried him slowly up the steep staircase to the
designated guest-chamber and laid him upon the huge old-fashioned bed.
Elise walked beside the bearers, lending what aid she could, and never
heeding that the blood, which was beginning to flow freely from the
wound in the unfortunate man's forehead, was staining her hands and her
dress.
"We must have medical aid immediately," Wangen said, when his burden
had been safely deposited in the blue room; "every minute is precious."
He was interrupted by a vivid flash of lightning and a terrific clap of
thunder, the echo of which was drowned in the dashing of the rain
against the rattling window-panes.
"No servant will venture to drive to Ostrowko in such a night as this,"
Inspector Berndal declared; "we shall have to wait until the storm
abates. It would be impossible to brave its fury."
Elise had occupied herself in arranging the pillows about the wounded
man's head, after sending a maid for water to wash the wound, but as
the words of the inspector fell upon her ear she turned to him, and
said, quietly, "I know the road to Ostrowko perfectly well. I will
drive over there and bring the doctor if you will have a vehicle made
ready for me."
"What! you drive to Ostrowko in this storm, Fraeulein Lieschen?
Impossible!"
"You forget that I am a country girl, and accustomed from my earliest
childhood to drive alone over the roughest possible roads. My sight is
keen, my hand is sure. I know the road, and am not afraid either of the
darkness or of the storm. Delay may imperil a human life; you have just
said that every minute is precious, Herr von Wangen. You must not
prevent my going to Ostrowko."
The inspector looked admiringly at the girl, who announced her daring
resolve as quietly as if it were the easiest and most natural of
undertakings.
"I really believe you would do as you say, Fraeulein von Osternau," he
said, "but it is out of the question. I never could look any one in the
face again if I allowed you to go. I will go for the doctor, and bring
him back with me as soon as may be."
"You have just got home," Elise remonstrated.
"All the more reason why I should be the one to go out again,--I could
not possibly be wetter than I am. I shall bring the doctor back with
me."
He was so evidently resolved to go that Elise did not gainsay him, but
quietly declared her intention to stay beside the wounded man until the
doctor arrived. Wangen suggested that, since the poor fellow was
unconscious, the housekeeper or one of the maids might just as well
relieve her of this duty; but Elise was firm, and Bertha supported her
in her decision, although in a mocking way that was very irritating.
"Let her do as she wishes," she said to her husband, quite loud enough
to be heard by the self-constituted nurse. "It will be a comfort to
her. Do you remember her enthusiasm for her music-teacher when she was
but seventeen? She preserved his image faithfully in her heart and
recognized him immediately. We ought not to interfere with her."
Elise blushed painfully, but she suppressed the bitter retort that rose
to her lips. Clara threw her arms round her and whispered to her,
"Don't let her distress you, darling Elise. She grows worse and worse;
you must not mind her."
Wangen, too, was grieved by Bertha's tone and manner, reminding him as
it did of his late interview with her, and his voice was not so cordial
as usual as he rejoined, "This is no time for jesting, Bertha. Come,
let us leave Fraeulein Lieschen to her work of mercy. The poor man could
not be in better hands."