When she turned round, the doctor was still standing where she had left
him, but his gaze was directed towards the bridge, and he had grown
slightly pale. His profile, with the tightly-compressed lips, reminded
her of the moment in the castle mill when she had asked him about her
grandfather's death; he was struggling with intense emotion of some
kind. Involuntarily her eyes followed the direction of his own, and she
could not have been more startled and shocked by the apparition of the
drowned woman of former times than she was by the sight of her beautiful
sister advancing across the ancient structure with as easy a grace as if
she had gone hence on the previous evening with a gay "au revoir."
Could it be? She glided lightly over the place where she had declared
herself separated forever from the man whom she despised; only a few
hours had passed since she had heaped every epithet of scorn and
contempt upon his home, which she had vowed never again to enter; and
here she was, with her lovely, smiling face, confronting the "dreary
barn," her little feet confidently pressing the grassy paths. No wave
rolled higher, no breeze stirred, to whisper to her of wrong, wilful
treachery, and miserable inconstancy, while the sunshine played about
her graceful form, illumining it as if she were of all earth's children
the most dear.
She had on a dark dress. Rich black lace covered her fair curls, and,
lying upon the snowy neck, fell in long ends over her shoulders and down
her back, like the drooping wings of an angel of night. Behind her
walked the councillor; he looked very animated, and was conducting the
Frau President with an air of such respect that Kitty in all seriousness
began to wonder whether she had only dreamed his contemptuous looks of
the morning and his expressions with regard to the "old cat" and her
"velvet paw."
The doctor slowly advanced to meet the approaching group, while Kitty
stood by the shed as if rooted to the spot, still unconsciously holding
fast the bolt which she had just pushed home. She saw the usual
greetings exchanged. Nothing extraordinary happened; no angry word was
uttered. The councillor warmly congratulated the doctor; the Frau
President graciously smiled, showing the white tips of her teeth;--and
Flora? For one moment her cheeks were dyed with a rosy flush, and her
glance, usually so self-assured, wandered from the doctor's countenance
to the ground at his feet, but she extended her hand with her accustomed
air of good-fellowship, and the tips of her fingers were taken, if not
retained, very much as they had been upon Kitty's arrival, and when
Doctor Bruck turned round, his features were once more composed to
marble.
As she entered the garden, Flora had hastily scanned her young sister
from head to foot, smiling scornfully the while, and then turning to
make some apparently malicious remark to the councillor; but now, upon
her nearer approach, Kitty saw gleaming in her eyes suppressed anger,
amounting to a kind of hostility.
"Well, Kitty? You seem to be perfectly at ease here," she exclaimed;
"you really look quite at home, as if the keys to every drawer and
closet were hanging at your girdle."
The young girl mode no reply as she slowly turned from the door she had
just bolted and gazed at her sister. Was there no shame in this wayward
creature? no shrinking from the sound of her own voice here upon this
spot? But yesterday she had declared, "This house shall never again see
mo within its walls," and now here she stood, about to enter it and to
return to the "sordid surroundings."
"Does Flora's jest annoy you, my dear child?" the councillor asked,
hastily approaching her. He drew her hand through his arm. "Console
yourself with the knowledge of the charming picture you presented among
the hens and chickens. Only wait, and you shall possess the finest
collection of them that can be got together."
The Frau President, who was ascending the steps, paused a moment, as if
her breath had suddenly failed her; her head, trembling nervously, was
turned for an instant with an of contempt towards the tender guardian,
and then she hastened her entrance into the house. "Brainless fop, he
will never cease to be the vulgar bagman!" she muttered, angrily, to
Flora, who put her handkerchief to her lips to hide a laugh.
Kitty, as if unconsciously, let her hand remain within her
brother-in-law's arm. She scarcely heard what he was saying; she did
not observe Doctor Bruck's mute surprise as he stood motionless and
allowed the pair to pass him: she only saw Flora's hand, the one in
which she held the handkerchief to hide her laughter, and which was
covered with a delicate lace mitten that harmonized well with the lace
of her dress and by contrast made her hand more snowy white than ever.
The diamonds had disappeared from the third finger, where the "simple
circlet of gold that weighed upon her like iron" again gleamed dully
through the meshes of the lace. Impossible! It lay beneath the waters
of the rolling stream. Kitty suddenly felt as if all about her were
unreal; her eyes and ears were no longer to be trusted.
"What does this mean?" the Frau President asked, with a frown, pointing
to the assemblage in the hall of the furniture from the villa.
"I thought it best to humour Henriette in her desire that these articles
should be removed from her room," said Dr. Bruck.
"She was perfectly right. Begging your pardon, grandmamma, it was a
ridiculous idea to crowd the sick-room with all those things," Flora
remarked, with a shrug. "The poor child is often oppressed for breath;
this well-stuffed furniture must have been stifling."
Her grandmother evidently meditated a severe retort, but the doctor was
present, and the maid was standing at the door of the kitchen; so she
refrained, and went on to the sick-room. As she entered it, she
started. Henriette was leaning out of bed, so wasted and pale, and yet
with such an eager expectancy in her large wide-opened eyes, that the
Frau President feared she was again delirious. The invalid's cool
greeting relieved her, however, and she saw that the look which had
startled her was directed towards Flora, who had entered the room
directly behind her.
The beautiful woman instantly went up to the dean's widow, who had
arisen at the entrance of the visitors, and grasped her hand, as if she
would thus atone for the neglected farewell of the previous evening, and
then she turned to the bed. "Well, dear," she said to the sick girl,
"you are wonderfully better to-day, we hear----"
"And you, Flora?" Henriette interrupted her, with irrepressible
impatience, as she accorded an absent greeting to the councillor, who
stood by her bedside.
Flora suppressed a mocking smile. "I? Oh, tolerably well only!
Yesterday's fright is still telling upon my nerves, but my self-control
and firm will stand me in stead. Yesterday I was indeed in a wretched
state; I was really ill, almost insane, I verily believe, with nervous
agitation; at all events, I have but an indistinct remembrance of what
happened after that terrible walk,--and no wonder! Daniel in the lions'
den was scarcely worse off than I surrounded by those furies----"
"But Kitty defended you nobly," Henriette said. "She stood like a
shield between you and them,--my poor, brave Kitty! Moritz, they tore
the clothes from her back and pulled down her hair----"
"This beautiful hair!" the dean's widow said, tenderly, as she stroked
the shining waves that rippled back from the girl's brow.
"Well, yes; the furies did not deal very gently with her," Flora
admitted, with a frown; "but I must decline taking all the blame for it
upon my shoulders. It was mostly due to her mania for wearing stiff
silk dresses. Those people envy us our wealth and elegance; her silk
dress irritated the women, and they dinned into her ears, and
unfortunately into ours also, how her grandmother went barefoot, how the
castle miller was once only a mill servant, and amassed the money, now
hers, by usury; and various other edifying facts. Kitty's appearance
upon the scene greatly increased our danger; their indignation against
the wealthy heiress was unbounded. Am I not right, Kitty?"
"Yes, Flora," the young girl replied, in a trembling voice, with a
bitter smile. "I must work hard indeed to atone for the wrong done by
my grandfather."
While Flora was speaking, the Frau President seemed to dilate with
satisfaction. This laying bare of a scandalous pedigree was like music
to her ears. She looked fixedly at the councillor. It was impossible
that the new-made nobleman should not shrink at the thought that people
would point at his wife and whisper everywhere the tale of her descent
and of how her fortune was acquired. "Nonsense, Kitty! that sounds too
ridiculously sensitive and silly," she said, shaking her head. "What do
you propose to do?"
Flora laughed. "Open her safe, of course, and scatter her stocks abroad
among the people."
"As Flora did yesterday the contents of her purse in defence of her
charming complexion," Henriette remarked, with an air of easy banter.
Her rising indignation conquered for awhile her burning desire to see
Flora in the dust at the doctor's feet.
"I should never be guilty of such folly," Kitty said, calmly, but
seriously, to Flora, who bit her lip at Henriette's remark. "If a curse
rests upon the money----"
The councillor's laugh interrupted her. "Never vex yourself about that,
child. A curse! I tell you there is a charm about your money; the
dividends from some new investments I have just made for you are
enormous."
The Frau President's eyelids, usually drooping over her eyes in
aristocratic lassitude, opened wide at this expression. The word
"dividend" had power to kindle those eyes with an eager glitter which
the desire for conquest in her time of youth and beauty could scarcely
have called forth.
"Enormous?" she repeated. "Mine are by no means so large. I will sell
out, and invest in this new stock."
"That can easily be arranged, dearest grandmamma; I will take the
necessary steps immediately. Yes, yes, the saying is quite true, 'Where
doves alight there doves will flock,' and never truer than in the
present wondrous age. The capitalist is a rock upon which the waves
toss up treasure of their own accord----"
"That is not the opinion of the prudent men of the day, Moritz," said
Doctor Bruck. When Henriette made her eager retort he had advanced to
the bedside and had taken her hand soothingly in both his own, and he
was still standing thus. He was in full dress beneath his light
overcoat, and looked a most distinguished figure, but in the face which
he now turned full upon those present there was perceptible a certain
strange look of suffering which Kitty had noticed to-day for the first
time. "There has been a good deal of mistrust lately about these sudden
gains, and people begin to call them by a very ugly name----"
"Swindling, I suppose you mean," the councillor gaily interrupted him.
"My dearest doctor, I have the highest respect for your scientific
attainments, but you must permit me to excel you in a knowledge of
business affairs. You are a most distinguished surgeon, and have just
achieved fame----"
Henriette here sat upright, and asked, eagerly, panting as if almost
overcome by her feeling of triumph, "Do you know that, Flora?"
"Of course I know it, you silly child, although the Herr Doctor has
hitherto not thought it worth while to give me any personal information
of his fortunate cure at L----," Flora lightly made answer, while her
eyes boldly and as if in challenge encountered Henriette's gaze. "I
also know that the sun of princely favour has suddenly shone full upon
him in a most unexampled fashion. Of course this is still a court
secret, to be kept even from his betrothed." Her lips parted in an
enchanting smile, and the rosy flush that tinted her cheek at her last
words became her charmingly.
Henriette fell back disappointed among her pillows,--even she had been
mistaken in this chameleon nature.
The Frau President, standing beside the doctor, tapped him almost
affectionately upon the shoulder. Never before had she treated him with
such condescending familiarity. "May we not know something further?
Are the preliminaries not yet arranged?" she asked, in a gentle,
flattering tone.
"He has just returned from an interview with the prince," his aunt said,
never turning her gaze from her darling, her eyes beaming with proud
affection.
"Ah, then the report that Herr von Baer has been pensioned off is true?"
the old lady asked, with well-feigned indifference, masking her
eagerness.
"I do not know; that is no affair of mine," the doctor quietly replied.
"The prince desires that as long as I remain here I shall take charge of
his chronic inflammation of the foot----"
"As long as you remain here, Bruck?" Flora interrupted him, quickly.
"Are you going away?"
"I shall establish myself in L---- in the beginning of October," he
coldly answered, without looking at her. His eyes were fixed upon the
budding apple-tree outside of the window.
"What! you have declined a position and a title at our court?" the Frau
President exclaimed, clasping her hands in amazement.
"I am not permitted to decline the title." An ironical smile flitted
across his features. "Evidently his Serene Highness thinks it contrary
to all the laws of etiquette to be attended by an untitled physician.
He insists upon making me Hofrath."
As he spoke, his aunt, struggling against her evident emotion, held out
her hand to him, and he--usually reserve itself--put his arm around her
slender form and clasped her close to his breast. The suffering, the
calumniation, which they two had steadfastly endured together isolated
them, in the moment of recompense, from the rest of the circle.
Flora turned away and walked to the window, biting her lip until it
nearly bled; one could see how she longed to thrust away the faithful
friend from the place which the false love had forfeited.
"But he is going away, aunt," Henriette said, in a low, hoarse tone.
"Yes, to where fortune and fame await him," the old lady answered,
lifting her tearful face from his shoulder. "I can gladly stay behind
in the home which his filial love has provided for me, if I know him
appreciated, honoured, and esteemed where he is. And, besides, my
mission is almost at an end,--another is to take my place." The
tenderness of her tone gave way to profound seriousness, as her eyes,
usually so gentle in their expression, looked almost sternly towards the
beautiful woman at the window. "She, with her rich endowments of
intellect, will appreciate more fully than I can the sanctity and, at
the same time, the frequent trials of his profession, and will surely
create for him a home whither he may flee from the cares that beset his
public career, and where affection and serenity will abide _uniformly_."
The emphasis she placed upon the last word told Kitty that the widow had
observed, and ascribed to caprice, Flora's behaviour on the preceding
day.
"That is all very charming and delightful, my dear Frau Dean, and I have
no doubt that Flora will make an admirable professor's wife," the Frau
President remarked, evidently piqued by the tone which the simple widow
of a dean had adopted towards her grandchild; "but nowadays there can be
no home without comfortable apartments, and I am having an immense
amount of trouble in arranging them. I have just had a most fatiguing
discussion with the cabinet-maker; he insists--Heaven knows why!--that
it will be impossible to have Flora's buhl furniture, ordered months
ago, finished by Whitsuntide. And Flora, too, has had trouble with her
trousseau,--the workwomen have been so dilatory that it cannot be ready
before the beginning of July. What is to be done?"
"We will wait," Doctor Bruck said, briefly, and took up his hat and cane
to put them in the hall.
The Frau President started, and a perplexed expression crossed her
countenance; but she instantly recovered herself, and, laying her hand
on his arm, said, "How kind and good you are, my dear doctor, to help us
thus out of our dilemma! I was afraid of encountering your opposition.
Whitsuntide has been quite a nightmare to me, you so insisted upon that
time."
"Yes; but my removal to L---- makes some change necessary," he said,
quietly, and left the room.
"And what does Flora think?" the dean's widow asked, in an uncertain
tone; she was apparently rather shocked at the doctor's cool behaviour,
and the sudden, embarrassed silence on the part of the others.
Flora turned towards her a beaming countenance. "I am very glad of the
postponement, since my future position is to be so different from what I
had expected. There is need of much preparation and reflection. Good
heavens, think of the change! A very different mode of life is looked
for by the world from the wife of a famous professor from that expected
of the wife of a simple doctor, Hofrath and physician to the royal
household though he be." There was undeniable arrogance in her whole
bearing; every word she said showed the exultation she could not
suppress: she had reached the pinnacle of her most ardent aspirations.
The councillor rubbed his hands in a state of great satisfaction; he
would have liked to laugh in her face. But the Frau President had some
trouble to conceal her rising indignation; her grandchild evidently
contemplated achieving at her husband's side a higher social position
than she herself, the wife of an exalted government official, had ever
attained.
"What are you talking of, Flora?" she said, with a disapproving shake of
her head.
"Of my brilliant future, grandmamma," she replied, with a supercilious
little smile, as she turned away with the air of one who would not by
any word or look be reminded of a disagreeable past.
"And now I resign myself entirely to you, dear aunt," she said to the
dean's widow, who was closely observing her every look and word. "Do
with me what you will. I will obey you in everything; only show me how
I can make Leo happy; I will sew, cook----" And, as she spoke, she drew
off her lace mittens as if impatient to begin; but, as she did so, she
made a grasp at the empty air, with a sudden exclamation of dismay,--the
"simple golden circlet" had slipped from her finger. No one had heard
it fall on the floor; every one looked for it, but in vain: it seemed to
have vanished into air.
"It must be among your pillows, Henriette," Flora declared. She had
grown quite pale. "Let me raise you up for a moment and see----"
"That I cannot allow," the dean's widow firmly interposed. "Henriette
must not be disturbed, nor her position unnecessarily altered----"
"Unnecessarily," Flora repeated, reproachfully, pouting like a child.
"Why, aunt, it is my betrothal-ring."
Kitty fairly trembled at these words. Was Flora really such a child of
good fortune that some miracle had restored to her the ring she had
flung away? or was this all a brazen falsehood? In vain did she look
for an answer to this in the anxious eyes of the beautiful sphinx.
"It is an unlucky accident," the dean's widow said, "but the ring cannot
be lost; we shall find it when Henriette's bed is made, and my servant
shall take it over to the villa to you."
"She shall be rewarded with a handful of gold if she brings it to me
this evening," declared Flora, who was evidently much disturbed.
The Frau President and the councillor seated themselves by the bedside
of the sick girl, who had taken no further part in the conversation.
Only once had she raised her head, with her lips opened as if to speak.
When her grandmamma had said she could not understand the delay upon the
part of the cabinet-maker, she had been upon the point of saying,
"Because your orders have been all but countermanded." But she
remembered before it was too late that the past must never again be
alluded to.