More than a month had passed since the festivities. Herr Berkow, coming
down "to surprise his children," as he said, had scarcely found the
pleasure he had hoped for in his visit, which was certainly rather
premature. He had gone back to the city after a few days to settle the
arrears of business awaiting him there, and now he was expected to
return to the chateau, for a second and, this time, for a longer stay.
Nothing was changed in the life of the young people; it was, if
anything, more divided, colder, more "aristocratic" than at first. On
both sides the end of the honeymoon was looked forward to with
considerable longing; it had been arranged that they should stay in
their country retreat until such time as the fine summer weather should
make a longer journey desirable. They would return from their travels
in the autumn, and definitively take up their residence in the capital,
where their future abode had already been prepared for them by Berkow
with much lavish expenditure.
The morning shift was just finished, and Ulric Hartmann was on his way
back to his father's house. He had been obliged to moderate his usual
swift pace, for at his side walked Herr Wilberg, also going home from
his office. This gentleman had been lucky enough to catch Ulric up, and
had attached himself to him. It was rather surprising to see one of the
officials on such familiar terms with the Deputy Hartmann, who enjoyed
but little sympathy among his superiors; still more surprising was it
that such familiarity should come from Herr Wilberg, unless indeed the
old saying that "extremes meet" be taken as an explanation.
There was, however, another reason here. The chief-engineer little knew
what his jokes had brought about, but his laughing hints as to the
subject-matter for a ballad had, unfortunately, fallen on a too
receptive soil. Wilberg had made up his mind to treat the subject
poetically, but he was still in doubt as to whether the masterpiece
should be in the form of a ballad, an epic, or a drama. At present one
thing only was settled, namely, that it should unite in itself the
combined excellences of all three styles.
Unhappily for Ulric, his energetic and courageous act had awakened in
the future author's mind the notion that the miner was exactly fitted
for a hero of tragedy, and Wilberg now dogged his footsteps
perpetually, in order to study this most interesting character. When
Ulric further took it into his head to refuse the considerable sum
offered him with a disdainful pride which abashed even the Director,
the romantic halo about him grew so strong in the poet's eyes that
nothing could shake or diminish his admiration, not even the
inconsiderate rudeness of the object of it, nor the cutting remarks of
those in authority, who hardly approved of such an intimacy.
Ulric could not be said to meet him half-way, or in any manner to
facilitate his "studies;" he tried often impatiently to shake off the
company thus forced upon him, as one tries to free one's self from a
troublesome fly, but it availed him little. Herr Wilberg was determined
to see in him a hero, a rough, wild, undisciplined sort of hero, it is
true, but still a hero; and the more this view of him was justified by
his behaviour, so much the better pleased was the would-be author, who
only studied him the more closely for each such fresh development of
character.
At last the young miner shrugged his shoulders, and resigned himself to
the inevitable. Custom did its work, and there grew up at length
between the two a sort of familiarity, not over respectful on Ulric's
part.
The wind was still blowing rather cold from the north. Herr Wilberg
prudently buttoned up his coat, and tied the ends of his thick woollen
scarf carefully together, as he said with a sigh,
"What a lucky fellow you are, Hartmann, with your health and strength
of iron! You can go up and down the shafts from heat to cold, and come
out afterwards into this biting wind, whilst I have to protect myself
from every variation of temperature. And I get so nervous, so shaken,
so irritable! That is the way when the spirit gains too great dominion
over the body. Yes, Hartmann, it is the press of thought and feeling
that does it!"
"I think, Herr Wilberg, it is more likely your everlasting tea-drinking
that is the cause of it," replied Ulric, with a rather compassionate
glance at his weakly little companion. "If you go on swallowing that
hot, thin stuff morning and evening, you will never get strong."
Wilberg glanced up aloft at his adviser with a look of infinite
superiority.
"You do not understand, Hartmann. I could not possibly bear such a
heavy diet as yours. My constitution would not stand it, besides, tea
is of great service to the mental faculties. It quickens me, it
stimulates me when the day's work is done, and when in the quiet
eventide the Muses draw near"----
"You mean, when you are making your verses," interrupted Ulric, drily.
"So that is what the tea is for? Well, they are just what I should
expect from it."
It was fortunate that the poet was just then busy trying to fix in his
memory a rhyme which had come into his mind. He hardly heard the
insulting remark, but turned to his companion next minute in quite a
friendly way.
"I have something to beg of you, Hartmann, to desire, to demand!" said
he, reaching his climax in well-graduated tones. "Something which you
must agree to, no matter at what cost. You are in possession of an
article which is perfectly worthless to you, but which would make me
the happiest mortal under the sun. You must give it up to me."
"What must I give up to you?" carelessly asked Ulric, who, as usual,
when Wilberg was talking, had only half listened.
Herr Wilberg blushed, sighed, looked down, sighed a second time, and,
after these preliminaries, thought fit to proceed to speech.
"You remember the day when you came to her ladyship's rescue! Ah,
Hartmann, what a pity it is you should have no adequate conception of
the poetry involved in such a situation! If I had been in your place!
But we will leave that. She offered you her handkerchief when she saw
you were bleeding. You kept it in your hand, while the others were
looking to your wound. Good Heavens! you cannot possibly have forgotten
such a circumstance as that!"
"Well, what do you want with the handkerchief?" asked Ulric, suddenly
attentive.
"I wish to possess it," murmured Wilberg, casting down his eyes with a
melancholy air. "Ask from me what you will, but let me have that
precious souvenir of the woman I adore!"
"You!" cried Ulric, in a tone which made the other spring back and look
anxiously round to see that no one was by.
"Don't shout like that, Hartmann! You need not be so horrified because
I say I adore the future proprietor's wife. It is something far
different from what you are accustomed to consider as love. It is--but
you do not know what a platonic affection means.
"No, I don't," returned the miner, shortly, increasing his pace, and
evidently desirous of breaking off the conversation.
"You cannot possibly understand it," declared Wilberg, with much
self-satisfaction, "for you cannot, and never will, rise to that pure
elevation of feeling of which only highly-cultivated minds are capable,
that feeling which, without a hope, without a desire, can content
itself with adoring in silence from afar. Or what do you think a man
should do else, if he loves a woman who belongs to another?"
"Overcome his love," said Ulric, in a low voice, "or"----
"Or?"
"Strike the other man down."
Herr Wilberg beat a hasty retreat to the other side of the road, where
he remained standing transfixed with horror.
"What brutality! What appalling principles! So you would seal your love
by assault and murder? You are a man to be feared, Hartmann! And you
can say such a thing as that with the tone, the look of .... Her
ladyship was right when she said you were like one of Nature's untamed
elements which"----
"Who said so?" broke in Ulric, looking at him darkly.
"Her ladyship. 'A wild untamed element,' she said, and the description
was most striking, most apt, Hartmann"-- The young man ventured a
little nearer his companion, but timidly still, and approaching him by
degrees. "Hartmann, I could forgive you everything, even what you said
just now, but the one thing I cannot forgive is your conduct to _her_.
Have you alone no eyes for her beauty and grace, which disarm the very
roughest of your comrades, that you should avoid the sight of her, as
if it would bring you ill-luck? If her carriage appears in the
distance, you turn round and get out of the way; if she rides by, you
step into the house nearest at hand, and I warrant, you make that long
round every day past the Director's house, for no other reason than
that you might meet her once at the park-gates and be obliged to take
off your cap to her. Oh, this stubborn, bitter class-hatred, which
spares not even women! I repeat it to you, Hartmann, you are a man
greatly to be feared."
Ulric was silent. Contrary to his wont, he submitted to these
reproaches without answering a syllable, and by so doing, he
strengthened Wilberg in the delusion that his arguments had at last
produced some effect. Encouraged by this, he began again,
"But to return to the real matter in hand. The pocket-handkerchief"----
"How should I know where the thing is?" interrupted Ulric, roughly. "It
is lost, or Martha may have given it back. How should I know!"
Wilberg was just going to launch out into indignation at the
indifference with which an object, in his eyes of such priceless worth,
was treated, when he suddenly perceived Martha standing before her
uncle's house. He shot down on her like a hawk, and began to question
her as to where the said handkerchief might be hidden, whether she had
really given it back, or whether, within the range of possibility, it
might yet be found.
The girl seemed not quite to understand him at first; when she found
out what it was all about her face darkened perceptibly.
"The handkerchief is there still," she said, decidedly. "I thought to
do well one day when I took it out and washed the stains from it, but
Ulric raved like a madman, because I had even touched the thing. He has
got it in his chest."
"Oh! so it was only a pretext for refusing me?" said Wilberg, with a
reproachful look at Ulric, who had listened with suppressed anger, and
who answered almost with a sneer:
"Make up your mind to it, Herr Wilberg, the handkerchief is not for
you."
"And why not, may I ask?"
"Because I mean to keep it," said Ulric, laconically.
"But, Hartmann"----
"When I once say no, I mean it. You might know that, Herr Wilberg."
Wilberg lifted his hands and eyes towards Heaven, as though calling on
it to witness the offence done him; but suddenly his arms fell down
inert, and he drew himself up quickly, as a voice said behind Martha,
"Can you not inform me, my dear .... Ah, Herr Wilberg! I am
interrupting a most animated conversation."
The person addressed stood speechless, overcome at least as much by
despair as by delight at this unexpected meeting; for the distressing
consciousness was on him, that he, who hitherto had only confronted her
ladyship in the faultless attire of full-dress, must now stand before
her, arrayed in a blue paletot and green comforter, to say nothing of a
nose tipped by the cutting wind with a most unbecoming red. He knew how
unfavourable this combination of colour must be to him; not an hour ago
he had vowed to himself that he would exchange the green comforter for
one of a more flattering hue, and now a mischievous chance had brought
him before the eyes of his ideal!
Herr Wilberg wished himself deep down in the shafts, and yet retained
sufficient power of thought to be irritated at Hartmann, who, with all
the dust of his daily work upon him, stood like a statue, and moved
never a muscle.
Eugenie had come along the road which led by the Manager's house, and
seeing at first only the young girl, had entered the garden unnoticed.
Her last question remained a moment unanswered, for both men were
silent.
At last Martha spoke. She had cast a rapid glance at her cousin, when
the lady appeared on the scene so unexpectedly; now she turned quickly
to her.
"We were just speaking of the lace handkerchief your ladyship gave for
a bandage, and which has never been returned."
"Ah, yes, my handkerchief," said Eugenie, indifferently. "I had quite
forgotten it, but since you have kept it so carefully, child, you can
give it me back."
"I did not keep it; Ulric has it." Martha gave him another look, dark
and scrutinising as the first, and even Eugenie turned with some
surprise to the young man who had greeted her neither by word nor
gesture.
"Well, you then, Hartmann! Or do you not wish to restore it?"
Wilberg was growing more and more exasperated at Ulric's "shameful
behaviour," for he stood there motionless with knitted brows and lips
firmly closed, and just the same look of stubborn resistance on his
face as that with which he had armed himself on entering her boudoir.
One could see plainly that he was struggling with himself to keep down
the hatred he felt for his master's young wife! This time his better
nature conquered.
Herr Wilberg noticed that, at the first sound of that voice addressing
itself to him, he started, as though pricked with shame at his own
conduct, that a flush rose to his brow, and that his attitude lost
something of its defiant hostility. The sermon so lately delivered had
certainly had some effect, else how should this stiff-necked Hartmann,
whose will was of iron, and who was to be moved neither by fear nor
favour, have yielded in silent obedience to a simple question, have
turned to the house, and, after the lapse of a few minutes, come back
holding the handkerchief?
"Here it is, my lady."
Eugenie took the morsel of cambric, seeming to attach very little
importance to it.
"And now, Herr Wilberg, as I have met you here, perhaps you can best
give me the information I want. It is the first time I have come by
this road, and I find that the bridge which leads to the park is closed
by a gate. Can it be opened, or must I go back all round by the works
again?"
She pointed to a bridge at a little distance from them. It crossed a
wide ditch, which bordered the park on this side, and it was closed by
means of an iron gate.
Herr Wilberg was in despair. The gate was securely fastened; it was
done to keep the work-people, whose dwellings lay for the most part
about here, out of the park, but the gardener had the key; Wilberg
would hasten, would fly to fetch it, if only her ladyship could bear to
wait until ....
"Oh no," broke in Eugenie, rather impatiently. "You would have twice to
make the round which I want to avoid. I would rather go back."
Wilberg would not hear of it. He begged and entreated the lady to grant
him the happiness of this one small service. His pretty little speech
was brought to an abrupt conclusion by the sound of a loud crack.
Ulric had gone up to the gate and seized it with both hands. He shook
the iron rails with such force that the bolts and locks creaked again.
Finding that it did not give way promptly, his features contracted
angrily, he gave one violent thrust at it with his foot, and so made an
end of all resistance. The fastenings, which were not in the best
condition, yielded; the gate flew open.
"Good Heavens! Hartmann, what are you about?" cried Wilberg, terrified.
"You are spoiling the lock. What will Herr Berkow say?"
Ulric gave him no answer. He pushed the gate quite back and turned
quickly round.
"The way is open, my lady."
Eugenie did not look half so shocked as the young clerk. She even
laughed, as she proceeded towards the path so vigorously cleared for
her.
"Thank you, Hartmann. Do not make yourself uneasy as to the spoilt
lock, Herr Wilberg; I will take the responsibility on myself. But, as
the gate is open now, will you not take the shorter cut through the
park?"
What a proposal! Herr Wilberg did not hasten, he rushed, he flew to the
lady's side, racking his brain even in this hurried moment to find an
interesting and striking theme on which to discourse; but he was
obliged to begin with a very prosaic one, for Eugenie, turning her head
once more, looked curiously after the enigmatic being who had puzzled
her so much once before, as though she would again try to read the
riddle of his character with her grave meditative eyes.
"That Hartmann has the strength and the fury of an old Berserker. He
crashes down locks and bolts without more ado, just to"----
"Just to make my way easy," continued Eugenie, with a touch of irony,
as she looked at her companion. "You would not have been guilty of such
a forcible act of politeness?"
Wilberg protested against even the supposition of such a thing. Her
ladyship could not believe for a moment that he would have laid violent
hands on other people's property, and that too in her presence; no,
most assuredly he would not.... But she listened to his protestations
with marked abstraction, and in spite of all the pains he took to
interest her, he could not succeed in fully gaining her attention once
during their walk through the park.