After Delmar had ordered the carriage for Bertram, he walked slowly
along the village street towards Dr. Putzer's. The nearer he came to
the house the more he lingered; never had he experienced such a dread
as possessed him at thought of the coming interview which would decide
his fate.
But he was ashamed of what seemed to him cowardice, and as he paused
for an instant at the small grated gate opening into the doctor's
garden he braced himself to meet his fate, reflecting that no delay
would postpone the inevitable, and then walked quickly through the
garden to the house-door.
Dr. Atzinger received him. "You have been long in coming, Herr Delmar,"
he said. "Our patient has been impatiently awaiting you. If I had
yielded to his wishes you would have seen him some days ago; but even
now, I confess frankly, I should have liked to postpone this interview.
I think him far too weak for any agitation of mind, and I have yielded
to him in this instance only because I feared more from the effect of
his restless impatience than from the conversation with you, which he
evidently considers as of the first importance. Unfortunately I cannot
be present at this interview. He has asked to see you alone, and I must
therefore entreat you to use extreme caution, remembering that any
over-excitement on his part is certain death. Pray do all you can to
soothe him."
Paul willingly promised all that was asked of him. He felt no
irritation towards Putzer, who had been but the tool of Herr von
Heydeck.
Atzinger conducted him to the door of the doctor's bedroom, saying as
he opened it, "Here is the man you so wish to see; now remember, my
dear friend, to send him away as you promised, as soon as you feel
exhausted."
"Yes, yes; tell him to come in," was the reply, in feeble tones.
Delmar entered, and Dr. Atzinger left him alone with the patient.
The room was large and sunny, and supplied with every comfort that
could be procured in a retired Tyrolean village. The sick man's bed was
so placed that as he lay with his face turned to the window he had a
full view of the steep rock crowned by Castle Reifenstein.
Upon Paul's entrance the invalid raised himself into a half-sitting
posture and turned his face full towards his visitor. "I have been
longing for you for many days, Herr Delmar," he said, in a faint,
scarce audible voice. "You are come at last, and I thank you. I was
afraid I should never see you again."
Was this Dr. Putzer? Delmar never could have believed it from the
evidence of his senses. There was absolutely no resemblance between
the wine-flushed bloated countenance which Paul remembered and this
ashy-pale flabby face, save for the light disordered hair that fell
on either side of it. And just as little did the invalid's weak gentle
voice resemble Dr. Putzer's hoarse brutal tones.
Delmar was so shocked and startled by the alteration he observed in the
man that he could at first find no words in which to reply to his
salutation.
The doctor continued: "Sit here, Herr Delmar, close by my bed; I have
much to say, and not much strength wherewith to say it. I must pray you
to lend me your patient attention."
Paul obeyed; he drew a chair to the bedside and sat down, filled with
pity for the sick man, whose every word evidently cost him a painful
effort. His compassion got the better of his desire to hear what the
man had to say. "Talking is too much for you, Herr Doctor," he said
kindly. "You must not exert yourself I beg you reserve what you have to
tell me for another day, when you are stronger and better, and let us
discuss only commonplace topics at present. I will pay you a daily
visit, and your friend Dr. Atzinger tells me that you will be much
stronger and more equal to the task you have imposed upon yourself in a
few days."
A grim smile, which reminded Paul of the Dr. Putzer of his remembrance,
flitted across the pale face. "My dear friend Dr. Atzinger is an
ignoramus!" the sick man replied. "I shall never be stronger; I
shall shortly be found dead in my bed,--perhaps to-day, perhaps
to-morrow,--any time within the next fortnight. I know this with
absolute certainty, and therefore I was so impatient to see you, for I
must and will speak with you. I will not die without being revenged
upon the worthless woman whose fault it is that I lie here a dying man,
and who has had no thought except for her own safety. She expected me
to die without ever being able to utter another word, and she robbed me
of every cent I possess that she might escape danger; but she was
mistaken,--I still live, and will use my last breath in revenging
myself upon her."
The doctor's voice grew stronger and his eyes flashed as he said these
words. But the momentary excitement over, he sank back exhausted among
his pillows. Paul feared he was dying, and rose hastily to call Dr.
Atzinger, but Putzer divined his intention. "Stay," he gasped; "it will
pass off,--in a moment I shall be strong enough."
Again Paul obeyed, and after resting for a few minutes, the doctor
continued: "Indignation at that wretched woman exhausted me; it shall
not occur again. I will husband my strength for what I have to do.
There may be no to-morrow for me, and you shall not leave me until I
have armed you for my revenge upon that fiend. I might tell you much,
but I think you already know most of what I have to say. You would not
have come to Tausens if you had not known that Herr von Heydeck has
defrauded you of your inheritance, and if you did not wish to recover
it from him. You know this, but you do not know what it is most
important that you should, and you perhaps imagine that with the help
of certain proof of which I am ignorant you can force Herr von Heydeck
to acknowledge you as his son and to leave you his property and his
name. Is not this so?"
Paul made no reply except by a faint motion of the head, which the
doctor took for assent, and continued: "I thought so. You will scarcely
undertake a wearisome lawsuit for the sake of the property. I have
heard that you are very rich, that you are the possessor of millions.
Is this true?"
"Yes, it is true!" Paul replied, firmly.
His answer satisfied the doctor. "Then I am right. Herr von Heydeck's
wealth does not allure you; you did not come to Tausens to demand your
rightful inheritance? Answer me, am I right?"
"Yes!" Paul said, distinctly.
"Then it is the name and title of von Heydeck that you covet. I thought
so. Well, Herr Delmar. I shall have to depress your hopes slightly. I
think I remember, before my illness, when I was not exactly myself,
having told you that you could lay no claim to the name of Heydeck.
What I then said is true; you are the son of Count Menotti, not of Herr
von Heydeck!"
"But Herr von Heydeck acknowledged me as his son, and such I therefore
am in the eye of the law," Paul rejoined, hoping to incite the doctor
to further revelations by this insistance. His hope was fulfilled.
"You think so, but you are mistaken," the doctor continued. "You think
you know all about it because you probably possess proof that Herr von
Heydeck delivered you over to Herr Delmar as a child, and that you are
the boy whom Herr von Heydeck gave out for dead in order that he might
appropriate to himself the child's maternal inheritance. All this you
know, but you do not know that there was no child by Herr von Heydeck's
marriage with his first wife; that you were the illegitimate child of
your mother and Count Menotti; that you were born before Herr von
Heydeck was married to your mother, and that therefore you can lay no
claim whatever to the name of Heydeck."
The words were spoken. Paul saw the yawning abyss which was to have
swallowed up his hopes suddenly disappear, and a sunny future expand
before him. The burden which had wellnigh crushed him for weeks beneath
its weight fell from him. Hilda was not even legally his sister, nor
was Heydeck his father, but a stranger, to whom he was bound neither by
the law of the land nor by that of nature. His brain reeled at the
thought that if the sick man's words were true there was no longer any
obstacle to separate him from his love.
The doctor perceived how deep was the impression produced upon Delmar
by his words, but he ascribed his agitation to a false cause. "I see,"
he said more kindly than was his wont, "that my information pains you
because it annihilates your hopes, but I could not spare you. You must
know the entire truth that you may not proceed to false measures in
dealing with Herr von Heydeck,--measures which might defeat your
object. This object there is a chance of your attaining if you will
follow my advice. I will put into your hands proof that you are not the
son of Herr von Heydeck, and it may be the very means of enabling you
to induce the cowardly old miser to leave you his name and title."
"Give me this proof, Herr Doctor," Delmar cried, in the greatest
agitation, "and I assure you that at no price will I consider it dearly
bought! Ask what you will for this proof, and I will give it you!"
Paul's eager words called forth a melancholy smile upon the doctor's
shrunken features. "That is a fine promise, but valueless to me," he
rejoined. "Four weeks ago I would have thanked you for it; to-day it
moves me not at all. In a few days this miserable body of mine will be
six feet deep in the ground. I have all I want till then, and all that
you have could not induce me to do your bidding against my will. But I
will be revenged upon my wicked wife, who made my home a hell, who
poisoned my life! I will atone for the wrong I did you. You have been
my benefactor in this illness, my friend Atzinger tells me that you
have sent a carriage for him daily, and given him a generous fee for
attending me. I will show my gratitude to you. Listen to me, and I will
tell you what you ought to know, and give you the proof which you
need." The doctor then told his tale; he spoke in low, measured words,
husbanding his forces, for he felt that he needed all the strength that
he could muster. The import of his communication was as follows:
When Herr von Heydeck bought Reifenstein and passed some weeks there
with his handsome wife, Dr. Putzer was a gay young fellow; he had
studied well, understood his profession, and hoped to lead a pleasant
life in Tausens. He soon found however that the position of a village
doctor was by no means so pleasant or so lucrative as he had supposed,
and that its income would never afford him the social enjoyments which
he desired. He was fond of a glass of good wine, and he needed
periodicals and scientific books to aid him in his studies. He had no
mind for a hermit's life. The paltry fees which he received from his
peasant patients but poorly sufficed for half his needs; he became
deeply involved in debt, out of which he racked his brains in vain to
find any means of extricating himself. Under these circumstances he
thought it most fortunate that the wealthy Herr von Heydeck should buy
Reifenstein, and that he should be sent for to visit the castle in his
medical capacity. He took pains to recommend himself to the lord of the
castle, whose love of scientific pursuits he humoured; and he
succeeded. He became the confidant of Herr von Heydeck, who often
bewailed to him the sorrow caused him by his unworthy wife, but never
alluded to the past. It struck Putzer as very strange, this mystery
enshrouding the past of Herr von Heydeck and his handsome wife. The
husband lived in disgraceful dependence upon Madame von Heydeck's
whims, never even venturing to remonstrate when Count Menotti publicly
conducted himself as her declared lover.
The mystery was explained for the doctor when Herr von Heydeck, after
his wife's death, came to Castle Reifenstein with his child. When
Putzer was sent for to see the boy, a single glance at the child told
the physician of the criminal deception that had here been practised
upon the world. The newspapers three months before had announced the
birth of a boy; but the child who had inherited his mother's property
was at least a year and a half old, and must have been born before Herr
von Heydeck's marriage, which had taken place not quite a year
previously.
Herr von Heydeck, reading the doctor's thoughts in his face, could not
refrain from giving him his entire confidence, especially since he
needed his aid. He confessed to him that the infant was the child of
the Count Menotti, and had been born some months before his own
marriage. It was solely for the sake of bestowing an aristocratic name
upon the child that its mother had consented to marry Heydeck, after he
had promised in writing to acknowledge the child as his own within a
year after their marriage. Within that time the intelligence of Frau
von Heydeck's confinement was spread abroad in society, but the fruit
of it, a boy, was pronounced so sickly and weak that no one except the
nurse was allowed to see it.
This nurse, Rosy, was the foster-sister and confidante of Frau von
Heydeck, and had contrived the entire scheme. It was by her advice that
the marriage with Herr von Heydeck had been contracted, and to her
keeping was entrusted the document whereby Heydeck bound himself to
acknowledge the child as his own. With this in her possession she ruled
her master with a rod of iron after his wife's death.
Dr. Putzer, on his first visit at the castle, easily comprehended the
relations between the castle's lord and the pretty waiting-maid. The
young physician was taken with her handsome face and pert coquettish
ways, while her by no means spotless past was of no consequence in his
eyes. Loaded down with debts he had but one wish, and that was to
secure for himself a comfortable and assured existence; the safest way
to attain this end was by a marriage with Rosy; together they could
gain such an ascendency over Herr von Heydeck as to induce him to share
his wealth with them.
They were soon agreed, and Heydeck weakly yielded to their mischievous
influence. Rosy suggested to him that the boy's death would be the best
luck that could befall him; but Heydeck, although scarcely too
conscientious, was too cowardly to commit so grave a crime as murder.
He consented to rid himself of the boy, but not by death; he would
cause the intelligence of his death to be spread abroad, and he would
bring him up in secret, until death did actually come, as he hoped it
soon would, to the weakly, sickly child.
The doctor and his betrothed lent Heydeck their ready aid; the doctor
wrote the official certificate of the child's death,--he had spread the
report of its fatal contagious disease that no one might desire to see
the corpse,--and he fitted up the basement of the tower, whither the
unfortunate child was taken and committed to the care of the two
half-idiotic Melchers.
The scheme which had been hatched in Rosy's brain was successful: the
mock funeral took place, the boy vanished, and Herr von Heydeck was his
heir. He paid the doctor and Rosy well for their services, and upon
their immediate marriage hoped he was rid of them. Here however he was
mistaken; his crime did not go unpunished, for he never was able to
shake off the mastery maintained over him by the intriguing Rosy, not
even when he secretly conveyed the boy away from the castle and falsely
told the doctor that the child had died in Switzerland. Whenever Rosy
wanted to extort money from Heydeck she threatened him with betrayal,
not of the mock death of the child, in which crime she herself was an
accomplice, but of that first deception of Heydeck's, whereby he had
made official announcement of the birth of a child, who was in reality
already more than a year old.
Rosy could produce the proof of this deception; she had carefully
preserved the document entrusted to her by Frau von Heydeck, with a
series of letters which made the fact of the deception incontestable.
She could prove that the boy was Frau von Heydeck's illegitimate child,
and if she did so to the relatives of her deceased mistress they would
certainly come forward to assert their claims to an inheritance of
which Heydeck had illegally possessed himself.
Rosy thus held the lord of the castle in perpetual thraldom, reducing
him almost to despair in forcing him to satisfy her avaricious greed.
She was the wretched man's evil genius.
The doctor's life too was scarcely less wretched than Heydeck's; his
wife made, as he had said, his house a hell. She never ceased
tormenting and aggravating him, and he had recourse to drinking to
drown his misery. Only in forgetfulness could he find relief. The
wicked woman made a perfect slave of him; he hated her, but rarely
ventured to disobey her.
The worm will turn however, and sometimes when his courage was screwed
up with wine the doctor rebelled against the tyranny that oppressed
him. At some such moment he formed the plan of appropriating to himself
the power which his wife possessed over Herr von Heydeck, thinking
thus to make the evil woman subject to his will. He stole from her
the papers by which she ruled Herr von Heydeck, and in spite of her
rage when she missed them, bade her defiance, and never revealed the
hiding-place where the important documents were concealed.
By this bold stroke he was at least enabled now and then to intimidate
his wife by threats that he would deliver over the papers to Herr von
Heydeck; but he was never able to shake off the yoke of her stronger
nature, and his life was almost as miserable as before.
The absolute hatred with which he regarded her was fiercer than ever as
he lay ill and helpless in bed; he could not forgive her for causing
his attack by insisting upon his plunging his head beneath the cold
water, and for then leaving him neglected and alone, that she might
escape the punishment of the crime which Delmar had probably come to
Tausens to investigate.
To revenge himself upon her the doctor now handed Paul the papers,
which he had instructed Dr. Atzinger a few days previously to fetch
from their hiding-place, and which he had since kept beneath his
pillow. The worthless woman, the doctor declared, should perish in want
and misery,--she had spent everything that she had extorted from Herr
von Heydeck in dress and finery, and had only taken a small sum with
her upon her flight. With these papers her power over Herr von Heydeck
was gone,--he would certainly do nothing more for her when he knew that
she could do him no further harm.
In possession of these documents Delmar could, the doctor explained,
force Herr von Heydeck to bequeath to him his name. Through fear lest
he should lose his money and be dragged through a disgraceful lawsuit
the old coward, so said the doctor, could be made to do just as Delmar
pleased.
With a sensation of absolute rapture Delmar received the precious
papers which secured to him a happy future, from the hands of the sick
man, who never dreamed how worthless in Paul's estimation was a
high-sounding, aristocratic name.
Delmar thanked the doctor warmly, but the sick man shook his head. "I
have done this not for your sake, but my own," he said. "I know that my
detestable wife will perish in want; I am content. I pray you leave me
now, Herr Delmar, my strength is exhausted. We shall never meet again.
Farewell!"