FAILURE.
The clever Pole had, however, been quite mistaken as to the contents of
Lato's letter. Abraham Goldstein's patience with the husband of the
"rich Harfink" was not exhausted,--it was, in fact, inexhaustible; and
if, nevertheless, the letter brought home to Lato the sense of his
pecuniary embarrassments, it was because a young, inexperienced friend,
whom he would gladly have helped had it been possible, had appealed to
him in mortal distress. His young cousin Flammingen was the writer of
the letter, in which he confessed having lost at play, and entreated
Lato to lend him three thousand guilders. To the poor boy this sum
appeared immense; it seemed but a trifle to the husband of the "rich
Harfink," but nevertheless it was a trifle which there would be
great difficulty in procuring. And the lad wanted the money within
twenty-four hours, to discharge gambling-debts,--debts of honour.
Treurenberg had once, when a young man, been in a like situation, and
had been frightfully near vindicating his honour by a bullet through
his brains. He was sorry for the young fellow, and, although his misery
was good for him, he must be relieved. How? Lato turned his pockets
inside out, and the most he could scrape together was twelve hundred
guilders. This sum he enclosed in a short note, in which he told
Flammingen that he hoped to send him the rest in the course of the
afternoon, and despatched the waiting messenger with this consolation.
His cousin's trouble made him cease for a while to ponder upon his own.
Although he could not have brought himself to apply to his wife for
relief in his own affairs, it seemed to him comparatively easy to
appeal to her for another. He did not for an instant doubt that she
would comply with his request. She was not parsimonious, but hard, and
he could endure that for another's sake. He went twice to her room, in
hopes of finding her there, but she was still in the dining-room.
He frowned when her maid told him this, and, lighting a cigar, he went
down into the garden, annoyed at the necessity of postponing his
interview with his wife.
Meanwhile, Olga, out of spirits and unoccupied, had betaken herself to
the library. All day she had felt as if she had lost something; she
could not have told what ailed her. She took up a book to amuse
herself; by chance it was the very novel of Turgenieff's which she had
been about to read, seated in the old boat, when Fainacky had intruded
upon her. She had left the volume in the park, whence it had been
brought back to her by the gardener. She turned over the leaves, at
first listlessly, then a phrase caught her eye,--she began to read. Her
interest increased from chapter to chapter; she devoured the words. Her
breath came quickly, her cheeks burned. She read on to where the hero,
in an access of anger, strikes Zenaide on her white arm with his
riding-whip, and she calmly kisses the crimson welt made by the lash.
There the book fell from the girl's hand; she felt no indignation at
Zenaide's guilty passion, no horror of the cruel rage of the hero; no,
she was conscious only of a kind of fierce envy of Zenaide, who could
thus forgive. On the instant there awoke within her a passionate
longing for a love which could thus triumph over all disgrace, all ill
usage, and bear one exultantly to its heaven!
She had become so absorbed in the book as to be insensible to what was
going on around her. Now she started, and shrank involuntarily. A step
advanced along the corridor; she heard a door open and shut,--the door
of Selina's dressing-room.
"Who is there?" Selina's voice exclaimed.
"I." It was Treurenberg who replied.
Selina's dressing-room was separated by only a partition-wall from the
library.
It was well-nigh noon, and Selina's maid was dressing her mistress's
hair, when Treurenberg entered his wife's dressing-room for the first
time for years without knocking. She had done her best to recover from
the agitation caused her by Fainacky's words, had taken a bath, and had
then rested for half an hour. Guests were expected in the afternoon,
and she must impress them with her beauty, and must outshine the pale
girl whom Lato had the bad taste to admire. When Treurenberg entered
she was sitting before the mirror in a long, white peignoir, while her
maid was brushing her hair, still long and abundant, reddish-golden in
colour. Her arms gleamed full and white from out the wide sleeves of
her peignoir.
"Who is it?" she asked, impatiently, hearing some one enter.
"Only I," he replied, gently.
Why does the tone of his soft, melodious voice so affect her to-day?
Why, in spite of herself, does Lato seem more attractive to her than he
has done for years? She is irritated by the contradictory nature of her
feelings.
"What do you want?" she asks, brusquely.
"To speak with you," he replies, in French. "Send away your maid."
Instead of complying, Selina orders the girl, "Brush harder: you make
me nervous with such half-work."
Treurenberg frowns impatiently, and then quietly sends the maid from
the room himself. Selina makes no attempt to detain her,--under the
circumstances it would be scarcely possible for her to do so,--but
hardly has the door closed behind Josephine, when she turns upon Lato
with flashing eyes.
"Why do you send away my servants against my express wish?"
"I told you just now that I want to speak with you," he replies, with
more firmness than he has ever hitherto displayed towards her,--the
firmness of very weak men in mortal peril or moral desperation. "What I
have to say requires no witnesses and can bear no delay."
"Go on, then." She folds her arms. "What do you want?"
He has seated himself astride of a chair near her, and, with his arms
resting on the low back and his chin in his hands, he gazes at her
earnestly. Why do his attitude and his way of looking at her remind her
so forcibly of the early time of their married life? Then he often used
to sit thus and look on while she arranged her magnificent hair
herself, for then--ah, then----! But she thrusts aside all such
reflections. Why waste tenderness upon a man who is not ashamed to--who
has so little taste as to----
"What do you want?" she asks, more crossly than before.
"First of all, your sympathy," he replies, gravely.
"Oh, indeed! is this what you had to tell me that could bear no delay?"
He moves his chair a little nearer to her. "Lina," he murmurs, "we have
become very much estranged of late."
"Whose fault is it?" she asks, dryly.
"Partly mine," he sadly confesses.
"Only partly?" she replies, sharply. "That is a matter of opinion. The
other way of stating it is that you neglected me and I put up with it."
"I left you to yourself, because--because I thought I wearied you," he
stammers, conscious that he is not telling quite the truth, knowing
that he had hailed the first symptoms of her indifference as a relief.
"It certainly is true that I have not grieved myself to death over your
neglect. It was not my way to sue humbly for your favour. But let that
go; let us speak of real things, of the matter which will not bear
delay." She smiles contemptuously.
"True," he replies; "I had forgotten it in my own personal affairs. I
wanted to ask a favour of you."
"Ah!" she interposes; and he goes on: "It happens that I have no ready
money just now; what I have, at least, does not suffice. Will you
advance me some?"
She drums exultantly upon her dressing-table, loaded with its apparatus
of glass and silver. "I would have wagered that we should come to this.
H'm! how much do you want?"
"Eighteen hundred guilders."
"And do you consider that a trifle?" she exclaims, provokingly. "If I
remember rightly, it amounts to the entire year's pay of a captain in
the army. And you want the money to--discharge a gambling-debt, do you
not?"
"Not my own," he says, hoarsely. "God knows, I would rather put a
bullet through my brains than ask you for money!"
"That's very easily said," she rejoins, coldly. "I am glad, however, to
have you assure me that you do not want the money for yourself. To pay
your debts, for the honour of the name which I bear, I should have made
any sacrifice, but I have no idea of supporting the extravagancies of
the garrison at X----." And Selina begins to trim her nails with a
glittering little pair of scissors.
"But, Selina, you have no idea of the facts of the case!" Treurenberg
exclaims. He has risen, and he takes the scissors from her and tosses
them aside impatiently. "Women can hardly understand the importance of
a gambling-debt. A life hangs upon its payment,--the life of a
promising young fellow, who, if no help is vouchsafed him, must choose
between disgrace and death. Suppose I should tell you tomorrow that he
had shot himself,--what then?"
"He will not shoot himself," she says, calmly. "Moreover, it was a
principle with my father never to comply with the request of any one
who threatened suicide; and I agree with him."
"You are right in general; but this is an exception. This poor boy is
not yet nineteen,--a child, unaccustomed to be left to himself, who has
lost his head. What if you are right, and he cannot find the courage to
put an end to himself,--the hand of a lad of eighteen who has condemned
himself to death may well falter,--what then? Disgrace, for him, for
his family; dismissal from the army; a degraded life. Have pity,
Selina, for heaven's sake!"
He pleads desperately, but he might as well appeal to a wooden doll,
for all the impression his words make upon her, and at last he pauses,
breathless with agitation. Selina, tossing her head and with a scornful
air, says, "I have little sympathy for young good-for-naughts; it lies
in the nature of things that they should bear the consequences of their
actions; it is no affair of mine. I might, indeed, ask how it happens
that you take such an interest in this case, did I not know that you
have good reason to do so,--you are a gambler yourself."
Treurenberg starts and gazes at her in dismay. "A gambler! What
can make you think so? I often play to distract my mind, but a
gambler!--'tis a harsh word. I am not aware that you have ever had to
suffer from my love for cards."
"No; your friendship with Abraham Goldstein stands you in stead. You
have spared me, if it can be called sparing a woman to cause her
innocently to incur the reputation for intense miserliness!"
There is some truth in her words, some justice in her indignation. Lato
casts down his eyes. Suddenly an idea occurs to him. "Fainacky has told
you, then, of my relations with Abraham Goldstein?"
"Yes."
"Ah!" he exclaims; "I now understand the change in you. For heaven's
sake, do not allow yourself to be influenced by that shallow, malicious
coxcomb!"
"I do not allow myself to be influenced by him," the Countess replies;
"but his information produced an impression upon me, for it was, since
you do not deny it, correct. You are a gambler; you borrow money at a
high rate of percentage from a usurer, because you are too arrogant or
too obstinate to tell me of your debts. Is this not so?"
Treurenberg has gone towards the door, when he suddenly pauses and
collects himself. He will make one more attempt to be reconciled with
his wife, and it shall be the last. He turns towards her again.
"Yes," he admits, "I have treated you inconsiderately, and your
wounding of my pride, perhaps unintentionally, does not excuse me. I
have been wrong,--I have neglected you. I play,--yes, Selina, I
play,--I seek the society of strangers, but only because I am far, far
more of a stranger at home. Selina," he goes on, carried away by his
emotion, and in a voice which expresses his utter misery, "I cannot
reconcile myself to life amid your surroundings; call it want of
character, weakness, sensitiveness, as you please, but I cannot. Come
away with me; let us retire to any secluded corner of the earth, and I
will make it a paradise for you by my gratitude and devotion; I will
serve you on my knees; my life shall be yours, only come away with me!"
Poor Lato! he has wrought his own ruin. Why does he not understand that
every word he speaks wounds the most sensitive part of her,--her
vanity?
"You would withdraw me from my surroundings? And, pray, what society do
you offer me in exchange?" she asks, bitterly. "My acquaintances are
not good enough for you; I am not good enough for the atmosphere in
which you used to live."
He sees his error, perceives that he has offended her, and it pains
him.
"Selina," he says, softly, "there shall be no lack of good friends for
you at my side; and then, after all, what need have we of other people?
Can we not find our happiness in each other? What if God should bless
us with an angel like the one He has taken from us?"
He kneels beside her and kisses her hand, but she withdraws it hastily.
"Do not touch me!" she exclaims; "I am not Olga!"
He starts to his feet as if stung by a serpent. "What do you mean?"
"What I say."
"I do not understand you!"
"Hypocrite!" she gasps, her jealousy gaining absolute mastery of her;
"I am not blind; do you suppose I do not know upon whom you lavish kind
words and caresses every day, which fall to my share only when you want
some favour of me?"
It seems to him that he hears the rustle of feminine garments in the
next room. "For God's sake, Selina, not so loud," he whispers.
"Ah! your first emotion is dread of injuring her; all else is
indifferent to you. It does not even occur to you to repel my
accusation."
"Accusation?" he murmurs, hopelessly. "I do not yet understand of what
you accuse me."
"Of your relations with that creature before my very eyes!"
Transported with indignation at these words, he lifts his hand,
possessed by a mad impulse to strike her, but he controls himself so
far as only to grasp her by the arm.
"Creature!" he exclaims, furiously. "Creature! Are you mad? Olga!--why,
Olga is pure as an angel, more spotless than a snowflake before it has
touched the earth."
"I have no faith in such purity. If she has not actually fallen, her
passion is plainly shown in her eyes. But there shall be no open
scandal,--she must go. I will not have her in the house,--she must go!"
"She must go!" Treurenberg repeats, in horror. "You would turn her out
of doors,--a young, inexperienced, beautiful girl? Selina, I will go,
and the sooner the better for all I care, but she must stay."
"How you love her!" sneers the Countess.
For a moment there is silence in the room. Lato gazes at his wife as if
she were something strange which he had never seen before,--gazes at
her in amazement mingled with horror. His patience is at an end; he
forgets everything in the wild desire to break asunder the fetters
which have bound him for so long, to be rid of the self-control which
has so tortured him.
"Yes," he says, raising his voice, "I love her,--love her intensely,
unutterably; but this is the first time that I have admitted it even to
myself, and you have brought me to do so. I have struggled against this
passion night and day, have denied its existence, have done all that I
could to stifle it, and I have tried to the utmost to be reconciled
with you, to begin with you a new life in which I could hope to forget
her. How you have seconded me you know. Of one thing, however, I can
assure you,--the last word has been uttered between you and myself; it
would not avail you now though you should sue for a reconciliation on
your knees. A woman without tenderness or compassion I abhor. I have a
horror of you!" He turns sway, and the door closes behind him.
"Where is the Count?" Frau von Harfink asks a servant, at lunch, where
Treurenberg's place is vacant.
"The Herr Count had his horse saddled some time ago," the man replies,
"and left word that he should not be here at lunch, since he had urgent
business in X----."
"Indeed!" the hostess says, indifferently, without expending another
thought upon her son-in-law. She never suspects that within the last
few hours, beneath her roof, the ruin has been completed of a human
existence long since undermined.
Lunch goes on,--a hurried meal, at which it is evident that the
household is in a state of preparation for coming festivities; a meal
at which cold dishes are served, because the entire culinary force is
absorbed in elaborating the grand dinner for the evening; a lunch at
which no one talks, because each is too much occupied with his or her
own thoughts to desire to inquire into those of the others.
Frau von Harfink mentally recapitulates the evening's _menu_, wondering
if nothing can be added to it to reflect splendour upon the Harfink
establishment.
Paula's reveries are of her coming bliss; her usually robust appetite
is scarcely up to the mark. In short, the only one who seems to eat
with the customary relish is the Pole, who, very temperate in drinking
and smoking, is always ready for a banquet. He is also the only one who
notices the want of appetite in the rest. He does not waste his
interest, however, upon the Baroness or Paula, but devotes his
attention exclusively to Selina and Olga.
The Countess is evidently in a very agitated state of mind, and,
strange to relate of so self-satisfied a person, she is clearly
discontented with herself and her surroundings. When her mother asks
her whether two soups had better be served at dinner, or, since it is
but a small family affair, only one, she replies that it is a matter of
supreme indifference to her, and will certainly be the same to the
guests, adding,--
"The people who are coming will probably have some appetite; mine was
spoiled some days ago by the mere _menu_, which I have been obliged to
swallow every day for the last fortnight." These are the only words
spoken by her during the entire meal.
The Pole finds her mood tolerably comprehensible. She has had a scene
with Treurenberg, and has gone too far,--that is what is annoying her
at present. But Olga's mood puzzles him completely. The depression
she has manifested of late has entirely vanished, she holds her head
erect, her movements are easy, and there is a gleam in her eyes of
transfiguring happiness, something like holy exultation.