Next morning Niebeldingk sat at his desk and reflected with
considerable discomfort on the experience of the previous evening.
Suddenly he observed, across the street, restlessly waiting in the
same doorway--the avenging spirit!
It was an opportune moment. It would distract him to make an example
of the fellow. Nothing better could have happened.
He rang for John and ordered him to bring up the wretched fellow and,
furthermore, to hold himself in readiness for an act of vigorous
expulsion.
Five minutes passed. Then the door opened and, diffidently, but with a
kind of professional dignity, the knight of several honourable orders
entered the room.
Niebeldingk made rapid observations: A beardless, weatherworn old face
with pointed, stiff, white brows. The little, watery eyes knew how to
hide their cunning, for nothing was visible in them save an expression
of wonder and consternation. The black frock coat was threadbare but
clean, his linen was spotless. He wore a stock which had been the
last word of fashion at the time of the July revolution.
"A sharper of the most sophisticated sort," Niebeldingk concluded.
"Before any discussion takes place," he said sharply. "I must know
with whom I am dealing."
The old man drew off with considerable difficulty his torn, gray,
funereal gloves and, from the depths of a greasy pocket-book, produced
a card which had, evidently, passed through a good many hands.
"A sharper," Niebeldingk repeated to himself, "but on a pretty low
plane." He read the card: "Kohleman, retired clerk of court." And
below was printed the addition: "Knight of several orders."
"What decorations have you?" he asked.
"I have been very graciously granted the Order of the Crown, fourth
class, and the general order for good behaviour."
"Sit down," Niebeldingk replied, impelled by a slight instinctive
respect.
"Thank you, I'll take the liberty," the old gentleman answered and sat
down on the extreme edge of a chair.
"Once on the stairs you--" he was about to say "attacked me," but he
repressed the words. "I know," he began, "what your business is.
And now tell me frankly: Do you think any man in the world such a fool
as to contemplate marriage because a frivolous young thing whose
acquaintance he made at a supper given to 'cocottes' accompanies him,
in the middle of the night, to his bachelor quarters? Do you think
that a reasonable proposition?"
"No," the old gentleman answered with touching honesty. "But you know
it's pretty discouraging to have Meta get into that kind of a mess.
I've had my suspicions for some time that that baggage is a keener,
and I've often said to my sister: 'Look here, these theatrical women
are no proper company for a girl--'"
"Well then," Niebeldingk exclaimed, overcome with astonishment, "if
that's the case, what are you after?"
"I?" the old gentleman quavered and pointed a funereal glove at his
breast, "I? Oh, dear sakes alive! I'm not after anything. Do you
imagine, my dear sir, that I get any fun out of tramping up and down
in front of your house on my old legs? I'd rather sit in a corner and
leave strange people to their own business. But what can I do? I live
in my sister's house, and I do pay her a little board, for I'd never
take a present, not a penny--that was never my way. But what I pay
isn't much, you know, and so I have to make myself a bit useful in the
boarding-house. The ladies have little errands, you know. And they're
quite nice, too, except that they get as nasty as can be if their
rooms aren't promptly cleaned in the morning, and so I help with the
dusting, too ... If only it weren't for my asthma ... I tell, you,
asthma, my dear sir--"
He stopped for an attack of coughing choked him.
With a sudden kindly emotion Niebeldingk regarded the terrible avenger
in horror of whom he had lived four mortal days. He told him to
stretch his poor old legs and asked him whether he'd like a glass
of Madeira.
The old gentleman's face brightened. If it would surely give no
trouble he would take the liberty of accepting.
Niebeldingk rang and John entered with a grand inquisitorial air. He
recoiled when he saw the monster so comfortable and, for the first
time in his service, permitted himself a gentle shake of the head.
The old gentleman emptied his glass in one gulp and wiped his mouth
with a brownish cotton handkerchief. Fragments of tobacco flew about.
He looked so tenderly at the destroyer of his family as though he had
a sneaking desire to join the enemy.
"Well, well," he began again. "What's to be done? If my sister takes
something into her head.... And anyhow, I'll tell you in confidence,
she is a devil. Oh deary me, what I have to put up with from her! It's
no good getting into trouble with her! ... If you want to avoid any
unpleasantness, I can only advise you to consent right away.... You
can back out later.... But that would be the easiest way."
Niebeldingk laughed heartily.
"Yes, you can laugh," the old gentleman said sadly, "that's because
you don't know my sister."
"But _you_ know her, my dear man. And do you suppose that she may have
other, that is to say, financial aims, while she----"
The old gentleman looked at him with great scared eyes.
"How do you mean?" he said and crushed the brown handkerchief in his
hollow hand.
"Well, well, well," Niebeldingk quieted him and poured a reconciling
second glass of wine.
But he wasn't to be bribed.
"Permit me, my dear sir," he said, "but you misunderstand me
entirely.... Even if I do help my sister in the house, and even if I
do go on errands, I would never have consented to go on such an
one.... I said to my sister: It's marriage or nothing.... We don't go
in for blackmail, of that you may be sure." "Well, my dear man,"
Niebeldingk laughed, "If that's the alternative, then--nothing!"
The old gentleman grew quite peaceable again.
"Goodness knows, you're quite right. But you will have
unpleasantnesses, mark my word. ... And if she has to appeal to the
Emperor, my sister said. And my sister--I mention it quite in
confidence--my sister--"
"Is a devil, I understand."
"Exactly."
He laughed slyly as one who is getting even with an old enemy and
drank, with every evidence of delight, the second glassful of wine.
Niebeldingk considered. Whether unfathomable stupidity or equally
unfathomable sophistication lay at the bottom of all this--the
business was a wretched one. It was just such an affair as would be
dragged through every scandal mongering paper in the city, thoroughly
equipped, of course, with the necessary moral decoration. He could
almost see the heavy headlines: Rascality of a Nobleman.
"Yes, yes, my dear fellow," he said, and patted the terrible enemy's
shoulder, "I tell you it's a dog's life. If you can avoid it any
way--never go in for fast living."
The old gentleman shook his gray head sadly.
"That's all over," he declared, "but twenty years ago--"
Niebeldingk cut short the approaching confidences.
"Well, what's going to happen now?" he asked. "And what will your
sister do when you come home and announce my refusal?"
"I'll tell you, Baron. In fact, my sister required that I _should_
tell you, because that is to--" he giggled--"that is to have a
profound effect. We've got a nephew, I must tell you, who's a
lieutenant in the army. Well, he is to come at once and challenge you
to a duel.... Well, now, a duel is always a pretty nasty piece of
business. First, there's the scandal, and then, one _might_ get hurt.
And so my sister thought that you'd rather----"
"Hold on, my excellent friend," said Niebeldingk and a great weight
rolled from his heart. "You have an officer in your family? That's
splendid ... I couldn't ask anything better ... You wire him at once
and tell him that I'll be at home three days running and ready to give
him the desired explanations. I'm sorry for the poor fellow for being
mixed up in such a stupid mess, but I can't help him."
"Why do you feel sorry for him?" the old gentleman asked. "He's as
good a marksman as you are."
"Assuredly," Niebeldingk returned. "Assuredly a better one.... Only it
won't come to that."
He conducted his visitor with great ceremony into the outer hall.
The latter remained standing for a moment in the door. He grasped
Niebeldingk's hand with overflowing friendliness.
"My dear baron, you have been so nice to me and so courteous. Permit
me, in return, to offer you an old man's counsel: Be more careful
about flowers!"
"What flowers?"
"Well, you sent a great, costly bunch of them. That's what first
attracted my sister's attention. And when my sister gets on the track
of anything, well!" ...
He shook with pleasure at the sly blow he had thus delivered, drew
those funereal gloves of his from the crown of his hat and took
his leave.
"So it was the fault of the Indian lilies," Niebeldingk thought,
looking after the queer old knight with an amused imprecation. That
gentleman, enlivened by the wine he had taken, pranced with a new
flexibility along the side-walk. "Like the count in _Don Juan_,"
Niebeldingk thought, "only newly equipped and modernised."
The intervention of the young officer placed the whole affair upon
an intelligible basis. It remained only to treat it with entire
seriousness. Niebeldingk, according to his promise, remained at home
until sunset for three boresome days. On the morning of the fourth he
wrote a letter to the excellent old gentleman telling him that he was
tired of waiting and requesting an immediate settlement of the
business in question. Thereupon he received the following answer:
"SIR:--
In the name of my family I declare to you herewith that I give you
over to the well-deserved contempt of your fellowmen. A man who can
hesitate to restore the honour of a loving and yielding girl is not
worthy of an alliance with our family. Hence we now sever any further
connection with you.
With that measure of esteem which you deserve,
I am,
KOHLEMAN, _Retired Clerk of Court_.
Knight S.H.O.
P.S.
Best regards. Don't mind all that talk. The duel came to nothing. Our
little lieutenant besought us not to ruin him and asked that his name
be not mentioned. He has left town."
Breathing a deep sigh of relief, Niebeldingk threw the letter aside.
Now that the affair was about to float into oblivion, he became
aware of the fact that it had weighed most heavily upon him.
And he began to feel ashamed.
He, a man who, by virtue of his name and of his wealth and, if he
would be bold, by virtue of his intellect, was able to live in some
noble and distinguished way--he passed his time with banalities that
were half sordid and half humorous. These things had their place.
Youth might find them not unfruitful of experience. They degraded a
man of forty.
If these things filled his life to-day, then the years of training and
slow maturing had surely gone for nothing. And what would become of
him if he carried these interests into his old age? His schoolmates
were masters of the great sciences, distinguished servants of the
government, influential politicians. They toiled in the sweat of their
brows and harvested the fruits of their youth's sowing.
He strove to master these discomforting thoughts, but every moment
found him more defenceless against them.
And shame changed into disgust.
To divert himself he went out into the streets and landed, finally, in
the rooms of his club. Here he was asked concerning his latest
adventure. Only a certain respect which his personality inspired saved
him from unworthy jests. And in this poverty-stricken world, where
the very lees of experience amounted to a sensation--here he
wasted his days.
It must not last another week, not another day. So much suddenly grew
clear to him.
He hurried away. Upon the streets brooded the heat of early summer.
Masses of human beings, hot but happy, passed him in silent activity.
What was he to do?
He must marry: that admitted of no doubt. In the glow of his own
hearth he must begin a new and more tonic life.
Marry? But whom? A worn out heart can no longer be made to beat more
swiftly at the sight of some slim maiden. The senses might yet be
stirred, but that is all.
Was he to haunt watering-places and pay court to mothers on the
man-hunt in order to find favour in their daughters' eyes? Was he to
travel from estate to estate and alienate the affection of young
_chatelaines_ from their favourite lieutenants?
Impossible!
He went home hopelessly enough and drowsed away the hours of the
afternoon behind drawn blinds on a hot couch.
Toward evening the postman brought a letter--in Alice's hand.
Alice! How could he have forgotten her! His first duty should have
been to see her.
He opened the envelope, warmly grateful for her mere existence.
"DEAR FRIEND:--
As you will probably not find time before you leave the city to bid me
farewell in person. I beg you to return to me a certain key which I
gave into your keeping some years ago. You have no need of it and it
worries me to have it lying about.
Don't think that I am at all angry. My friendship and my gratitude are
yours, however far and long we may be separated. When, some day, we
meet again, we will both have become different beings. With many
blessings upon your way,
ALICE."
He struck his forehead like a man who awakens from an obscene dream.
Where was his mind? He was about to go in search of that which was so
close at hand, so richly his own!
Where else in all the world could he find a woman so exquisitely
tempered to his needs, so intimately responsive to his desires, one
who would lead him into the darker land of matrimony through meadows
of laughing flowers?
To be sure, there was her coolness of temper, her learning, her
strange restlessness. But was not all that undergoing a change? Had he
not found her sunk in dreams? And her tears? And her kiss?
Ungrateful wretch that he was!
He had sought a home and not thought of the parrot who screamed out
his name in her dear dwelling. There was a parrot like that in the
world--and he wandered foolishly abroad. What madness! What baseness!
He would go to her at once.
But no! A merry thought struck him and a healing one.
He took the key from the wall and put it into his pocket.
He would go to her--at midnight.