CHAPTER IX

IT WAS full of this resolve, with an uplifted consciousness of my

own virtue, that I started next morning beside her upon our homeward

way. The day was very bright; and the bare trees, with here and there

a yellow or red leaf, showed against a sky of palest blue. There

was a frost about us, and our horses were fresh and full of pranks,

as we wound down the rocky paths. My wife, too, was in a skittish

humour, which irritated me a little as being ill-assorted to my own

high-strung feelings and my secret sense of magnanimity. She mocked at

my solemn face, she sang ends of silly songs to herself. I would have

spoken to her of what was on my heart; I would have had her grateful

to me, conscious of her own sin and my generosity. But I could get

her to hearken to no serious speech. She called me “Monsieur de la

Faridondaine,” and plucked a bunch of ash berries as we rode, and

stuck them over one ear, and asked me, her face dimpling, if it was

not becoming to her. And then, when I still urged that I would talk of

grave matters, she pulled a grimace, and fell to mimicking Schultz

with “Jawohl, Gnädigster Herr,” till I was fain to laugh with her and

put off my sermon till the audience was better disposed.

But my heart was something sore against her. And when we reached home,

I found _that_ awaiting me which awoke a flame of the fierce resentment

of the first hour of discovery. It was a letter from my mother in

answer to the wild, inflated, triumphant lucubration I had sent her on

the eve of my wedding-day. I had, of course, not attempted to undeceive

her—in fact, as I have already set down, it was only within the last

twenty-four hours that I had settled upon a definite plan of action.

My dear mother, who dearly loved, as she herself admitted, the princes

of this earth, was in a tremendous flutter at my exalted alliance. I

read her words, her proud congratulations, with a feeling of absolute

nausea. My brother, she wrote, was torn betwixt a sense of the

increased family importance and the greenest envy, that I, who had paid

no price of honour for the gaining of them, should have risen to such

heights of grandeur and wealth. Not hearing from me since the great

announcement, she had ventured (so she confessed) to confide my secret

to a few dear friends, and “it had got about strangely,” she added

naïvely. The whole Catholic world, the whole English world of fashion,

was ringing with the news of the great Jennico match. In fact, the

poor lady was as nearly beside herself with pride and glory when she

wrote to me, as I had been when I gave her the news. I did not—I am

glad to say this—I did not for a second waver in my resolution of

fidelity to my wife, but I told myself, with an intolerable sense of

injury, that I could never face the shame of returning to England

again; that the full sacrifice entailed upon me was not only the

degradation of an unsuitable alliance, but that hardest of trials to

the true-blooded Englishman, perpetual expatriation!

In this grim and bitter temper I marched into the room where I now sit,

and drew back the curtain from my uncle’s picture and took forth the

pedigree from its hidden recess. The old man wore, as I knew he would,

a most severe countenance.

But I turned my back upon him in a disrespectful fashion I had never

dared display during his life, and spread out again that fateful

roll of parchment on the table before me, while with penknife and

pumicestone I sought to efface all traces of that vainglorious entry

that mocked me in its clear black and white. The blood was surging in

my head and singing in my ears, when I heard a light step, and looking

up saw Ottilie. She could not have come at a worse moment. She held

letters in her hand, which upon seeing me she thrust into her pocket

with a sly look and something of a blush. She too, it seemed, had

found a courier awaiting her; the secretness of the action stirred the

heat of my feelings against her yet more. But I strove to be calm and

judicial.

“Ottilie,” I said, “come here. I have to converse with you on matters

of importance.”

She drew near me; pouting and with a lagging step, like a naughty child.

“That sacred pedigree,” she said, and thrust out her under-lip. She

spoke in French, which gave the words altogether a different meaning,

and in my then humour I was hugely shocked to hear such an expression

from her lips.

“You behave strangely,” I said, with coldness, not to be mollified by

the half-pleading, half-mischievous glance she cast upon me, “and you

speak like a child. There has been enough of childishness, enough of

folly, in this business. It is time to be serious,” I said, and struck

the table with my flat palm as I spoke.

“Well, let us be serious,” she retorted, slapping the table too, and

then sat down beside me, propping her chin upon her hands in her

favourite attitude. “Am I not serious?” she proceeded, looking at me

with a face of mock solemnity. “Well, Mr. my husband, what do you wish

of me?”

“Have you ever thought, Ottilie,” said I, “of the position you

have placed me in? I have been obliged to-day to come to a grave

resolution—I have had to make up my mind to give up my country and

remain here for the rest of my life. It is in direct defiance to my

uncle’s commands and last wishes, and it is no pleasant thing to an

Englishman to give up his native land.”

“If so, why do it?” she said coolly. “I am quite willing to go to

England. In fact, I should rather like it.”

“Because, before heaven, madam,” said I, irritated beyond bounds, “you

have left me no other alternative. Do you think I am going home to be a

laughing-stock among my people?”

“Then,” she said with lightning quickness, “you broke your promise of

secrecy. It is your own fault: you should have kept your word.”

Struck by the irrefutable truth of this remark, although at the same

time my wrath was secretly accumulating against her for this systematic

indifference to her own share in a transaction where she was the chief

person to blame, I kept silence for a moment, drumming with my fingers

on the table.

“Eh bien!” she said at last, with a note of amusement and tender

indulgence in her voice as a mother might speak to her unreasonable

infant. “This terrible resolution taken, what follows? You have

effaced, I see, your entry in the famous pedigree, and you would now

fill it up with the detail of your real alliance? Is that it?”

I glanced up at her: her eyes were dancing with an eager light, her lip

trembling as if over some merry word she yet forbore to speak. Her want

of sympathy in sight of my evident distress was hard to bear.

“Yes,” I answered, “the pedigree must be filled up. I don’t even know

your whole name, nor who your father was, nor yet your mother. I have

your word for it, however,” I said, and the sentence was bitter to me

to speak, “that your family was originally of burgher origin.”

“Put down,” she answered, “Marie Ottilie Pahlen, daughter of the

deceased Herrn Geheimrath Baron Pahlen, Hof Doctor to his Serene

Highness the Reigning Duke of Lausitz.”

The pen dropped from my hand.

“Your father was a doctor?” I asked in an extinguished voice.

“Ennobled,” she returned promptly, “after successfully piloting his

Serene Highness through a bad attack of jaundice.”

“And your mother?” I murmured, clinging yet to the hope that on the

mother’s side at least the connection might prove a little more worthy

of the House of Jennico.

She hesitated and glanced at me. Once more I seemed to see some

inner source of mirth bubble on her lip; or was it only that she was

possessed by the very spirit of mischief? Anyhow, she forced her smile

to gravity again and answered me steadily, while her eyes sought mine

with a curious determined meaning at variance with the mock meekness of

the rest of her countenance.

“Put down, Monsieur de Jennico,—’and of Sophia Müller, likewise

deceased,’ and add if you like, ’once personal maid to her Serene

Highness the Dowager Duchess, Marie Ottilie of Lausitz.’”

I sat like a man struck silly, and in the tide of fury that swept

over me my single lucid thought was that if I spoke or moved I should

disgrace myself. And she chose that moment, poor child, to come over to

me and place her arms round my neck, and say caressingly in my ear:

“Write it, write it, sir, and then tell me that, seeing that I am I,

and that I should not be different from myself were I the daughter of

the Emperor, all this matters little to you since we love each other.”

I put her from me: my hands were trembling, but I was very gentle.

I brought her round to face me, and she awaited my answer with a

triumphant smile. It was that smile undid me and her. She made too sure

of me—she had conquered me too easily all along.

“You ask overmuch,” I said when I could command my voice enough to

speak, “you take overmuch for granted. You forget how you have deceived

me; how you have betrayed me. I am willing,” I said, “to believe you

have not been all to blame, that you were encouraged and upheld by

another, but this does not exonerate you from the chief share in a very

questionable transaction.”

The words fell cuttingly. I saw how the smile faded from her face, saw

how the pretty dimple lingered a second like a pale ghost of itself,

and then was lost in the droop of her lip, which trembled like a

chidden babe’s. And I took a cruel joy to think I had hit her at last.

But in a second or two she spoke with all her old courage.

“It is well,” she said, “to blame where blame is due. If you wish to

blame any one for our marriage, blame me alone. The other Ottilie

never received your letter; never knew you wanted to marry her; had

nothing to say to what you call my betrayal of you. She would have

prevented this marriage if she could. Nay, I will tell you more: I

believe she might even have married you had I given her the chance.

But I knew you would marry her solely because of her position, of her

title; that you had no love for her beyond your insane love of her

royal blood. I thought you worthy of better things; I thought you could

rise above so pitiable a weakness; I thought you could learn of love

that love alone is worth living for! And if you have not learned, if

indeed, my scholar, you have been taught nothing in love’s school, if

you can lay bare your soul now and tell yourself that you would rather

have had the wife you wanted in your overweening vanity than the wife

I am to you, why then, sir, I have made a grievous mistake, and I am

willing to acknowledge that I have committed an irrevocable wrong both

to you and to myself.”

Now, as she spoke, I was torn by a strange mixture of feelings, and

my love for her contended with my pride, my wounded vanity, my sense

of injury. I could not in truth answer that I would rather have been

wedded to the Princess, for one thing had these weeks made clear to me

above all things, and that was that married life with her would have

been intolerable. But my anger against the woman I did love in spite

of myself was not lessened by the tone of reproachful superiority she

assumed; and because of the truth of her rebuke it was the harder for

my self-love to bear. Before I could muster words clear enough and

severe enough to answer her with, she proceeded:

“Come, Basil, come, rise above this failing which is so unworthy

of you. Throw that musty old pedigree away before it eats all the

manliness out of your life. What does it mean but that you can trace

your family up to a greater number of probable rascals, hard and

selfish old men, than another? Be proud of yourself for what you are;

be proud of your forefathers, indeed, if they have done fine deeds of

valour, or virtue; but this cant about birth for birth’s sake, about

the superiority of aristocracy as aristocracy—what does it amount to?

It is to me the most foolish of superstitions. Was that old man,” she

asked, pointing to my uncle, who frowned upon her murderously—“was

that old man a better man than his heiduck János? Was he a braver

soldier? Was he a better servant to _his_ master? Was he more honest

in his dealings? shrewder in his counsel? I tell you I honour János

as much as I would have honoured him. I tell you that if I love you,

I love you for what you are, not because you are descended from some

ignorant savage king, not because you can boast that the blood of the

worst of men and sovereigns, the most profligate, the most treacherous,

the most faithless, Charles Stuart, runs in your veins—I hope, sir, as

little of it as possible.”

I sprang to my feet. To be thus rated by her who should be kneeling for

forgiveness! It was intolerable.

“I think,” I thundered, “that, considering your position, a little

humility would be more becoming than this attitude! You should remember

that you are here on tolerance only; that it is to my generosity alone

that you owe the right to call yourself an honest woman.”

“What do you mean?” said she, as fiercely as I had spoken myself.

“I mean,” said I—“I mean, madam, that you are what I choose to make

you. That marriage you so skilfully encompassed is, if I choose it, no

marriage.”

She put her hands to her head like one who has turned suddenly giddy.

“You married me before God’s altar,” she said in a sort of whisper;

“you married me, and you took me home.”

I was still too angry to stay my tongue.

With a bitter laugh, “I married the Princess,” I said, “but I took the

servant home.”

A burning tide of blood rushed to her brow; I saw it unseeing, as a

man does in passion; but I have lived that scene over and over again,

waking and dreaming, since, and every detail of it is stamped upon my

brain. Next she grew livid white, and spread out her hands, as though a

precipice had suddenly opened before her; and then she cried:

“And this is your English honour!” and turning on her heel she left me.

The scorn of her tone cut me like a whip. I swore a mighty oath that

I would never forgive her till she sued for pardon. She must be

taught who was master. In solitude she should reflect, and learn to

rue her sins to me—her audacity—her unwarrantable presumption—her

ingratitude!

All in my white heat of anger I summoned János and bade him tell his

mistress’s nurse that I had gone into the mountains for a week. And

then I ordered a fresh horse, and followed only by the old man, dashed

off like one possessed into the rocky wastes.

Alone in the solitary hut, by that hearth where but the night previous

my heart had overflowed with such tenderness for her, I sat and

nursed my grievances and brooded upon my wrongs till they grew to

overpowering size and multiplied a thousandfold; and curious it is that

what I thought of most was the bitter unfairness to me, the monstrous

injustice of her contempt, at the very moment when I had meant to

sacrifice my life and prospects to her. I told myself she did not love

me, had never loved me, and worked myself to a pitch of frenzy over

that thought. The memory of her announcement on this afternoon, the

full knowledge of her deceit, the confession of her worse than burgher

origin, weighed not now one feather-weight in my resentment. That I had

cast from me as the least of my troubles; so can a man change and so

can love swallow up all other passions! No doubt, I told myself, she

was mocking me now in her own mind; no doubt she reckoned that her poor

infatuated fool would come creeping back with all promptitude and beg

for her smile. She should learn at last that she had married a man; not

till I saw her down at my very feet would I take her back to my breast.

All next day I hunted in a bitter wind and in a bitter temper. There

were clouds arising, my huntsmen told me, that looked very like snow

clouds, and I must beware being snowed up upon the height. I was in

the humour to welcome hardship and even danger, and so the whole day

we rode after an old rogue boar and came back in darkness, at no

small risk, empty handed, and the roughness of my temper by no means

improved. Next day the weather still held up, and again I hunted.

My men must have wondered what had come over their erstwhile genial

master. Even my uncle could not have shown them a harder rule or ridden

them with less consideration through the hardest of ways in the teeth

of the most fiendish of winds.

That night, again, I sat and brooded by the leaping flame of the pine

logs, but it was in a different mood. All my surly determination, my

righteous indignation, had melted from me, leaving me as weak as water.

Of a sudden in the closest heat of the chase there had come to me an

awful vision of what I had done; a terrible swift realisation of the

insult I had flung at the face of the woman who was indeed the wife of

my heart and love. Oh, God, what had I done? I had sought to humble

her—I had but debased myself! Through the whole day her words, “Is

this your English honour?” had rung a dismal rhythm in my ear to the

beat of my horse’s hoofs on the hard ground, to the call of the horn

amid the winding rocks. The vision of her faded smile, of her dimple

paled to a pitiable ghost, of her babyish drooping lip, and then of her

white face struck with such scorn, haunted me to madness. I sickened

from my food as I sat to my supper, and put down my cup untasted. And

now as the wind whistled and the foreboded storm was gathering upon us,

the longing to see her, to be with her, to kneel at her feet—yes, _I_

would now be the one to kneel—came upon me with such violence that I

could not withstand it.

I ordered my horses. I would listen to no remonstrance, no warning.

I must return to Tollendhal, I said, were all the powers of darkness

leagued against me. And return I did. It was a piece of foolhardiness

in which I ran, unheeding, the risk of my life; but the Providence that

protects madmen protected me that night, and Janos and I arrived in

safety through a gale of wind and a fall of snow that might indeed have

proved our death. All covered with rime I ran into the house and up to

the door of her room. It was past midnight, and there I paused for a

moment fearing to disturb her.

Two or three of the women came pattering down the passage to me and

with expressive gestures addressed me volubly; one of the girls was

weeping. I could not understand a word they said, but with a new

terror I burst open the door of the bedroom. In this appalling dread I

realised for the first time how I loved my wife!

The room was all empty and all dark; I called for lights. There was no

trace of her presence; her bed had not been slept in. Like a maniac

I tore about the house, seeking her, shrieking her name, demanding

explanations from those to whom my speech meant nothing. I recked

little of my dignity, little of the impression I must create upon

my household! And at last János, his wrinkled face withered up and

contorted with the trouble he dared not speak, gave me the tidings that

the gracious lady had gone. She and her nurse had set forth on foot and

left no message with any one.

What need is there for me to write down what I endured that black

night? When I look back upon it it is as one may look back upon some

terrible nightmare, some hideous memory of delirium. She had left me,

and left me thus, without a word, and with but one sign. The cursed

pedigree was still spread upon the table where we had quarrelled. I

found upon it her wedding ring. A great cross had been drawn over the

half-written entry of our marriage. That was all, but it was surely

enough. The jewels I had given her were carefully packed in their cases

and laid upon a table in her room. Her own things had been gathered

together the day of her departure, which was the day I left her, and

they had been fetched the next morning by some strange servant in an

unknown travelling coach. More than this I have not been able to glean,

for the storm has rendered the ways impassable; but it is rumoured that

the Countess de Schreckendorf is dead, and that the Princess also has

left the country.

I have no more to say. It is only two nights ago since I came home to

such misery, and how I have passed the hours, what needs it to set

forth? At times I tell myself that it is better so, that she is false

and base, and that I were the poorest of wretches to forgive her. But

at times again I see the whole naked truth before me, and I know that

she was to me what no woman can be again. And my uncle looks down at me

as I write, with a sour frowning face, and seems—strange it is, yet

true—to revile me now with bitter scorn, not for having kept her, the

roturière, but for having driven her from my castle!

“Thou hadst her; thou couldst not hold her,” he seems to snarl.

Old man, old man, it is your teaching that has undone me; do you

reproach me now that it has wrought my ruin?

* * * * *

Basil Jennico flung his pen from him; the logs in the hearth had burnt

themselves to white ash; his candles were guttering in their sockets,

and behind the close-drawn curtains the faint dawn was spreading over a

world of snow. The wind still howled, the storm was still unabated.

“Another day,” groaned he, “another hateful day!” He flung his arms

before him and his head down upon them. So sleep came upon him; and

so old János, creeping in a little later, red-eyed from his watchful

night, found him. The sleeper woke as the man, with hands rough and

gnarled, yet tender as a woman’s, strove to lift him to an easier

attitude; woke and looked at him with a fixed semi-conscious stare.

“Ottilie!” he cried wildly, and suddenly brought back to grey reality

stopped and clasped his head. There was in the old servant’s hard and

all but immutable face so wistful a yearning of kindred sorrow that,

suddenly catching sight of it in the midst of his despair, the young

man broke down and fell forward like a child upon that faithful breast.

“Courage, honoured master,” said János, “we will find her again.”

PART II

CHAPTER I

MEMOIR OF CAPTAIN BASIL JENNICO (A PORTION, WRITTEN EARLY IN THE YEAR

1772, IN HIS ROOMS AT GRIFFIN’S, CURZON STREET)

HOME in England once again, if home it can be called, this set of hired

chambers, so dreary within, with outside the lowering fog and the

unfamiliar sounds that were once so familiar. It is all strange, after

eight years’ exile; and the grime, the noise, the narrow limits, the

bustle of this great city, weary me after the noble silence, the wide

life, at Tollendhal.

It was with no lightening of my thoughts that I saw the white cliffs of

old England break the sullen grey of the horizon, with no patriotic joy

that I set foot on my native soil again, but rather with a heavy, heavy

heart. What can this land be to me now but a land of exile? All that

makes home to a man I have left behind me.

I hardly know why I have resumed the thread of this miserable story.

God knows that I have no good thing to narrate, and that this

setting forth, this storing, as it were, of my bitter harvest of

disappointments, can bring no solace with it. And yet man must hope as

long as life lasts; and the hope keeps springing up again, in defiance

of all reason, that, somehow, some day, we shall meet again. Therefore

I write, in order that, should such a day come, she may read for

herself and learn how the thought of her filled each moment of my life

since our parting; that she may read how I have sought her, how I have

mourned for her; that she may know that my love has never failed her.

This it is that heartens me to my task. Moreover, all else is so

savourless that I know not how otherwise to fill the time. I have been

here five weeks; there are many houses where I am welcome, many friends

who would gladly lend me their company, many places where young men can

find distraction of divers kinds and degrees; but I have not succeeded

in bringing myself to take up the new life with any zest: I had rather

dwell upon the past in spite of all its bitterness, than face the

desolation of the present.

It was on the third day of the great storm that the pen fell from my

hand at Tollendhal, and for four and twenty hours more that self-same

storm raged in violence. One word of my old servant’s had brought me

on a sudden to a definite purpose. I was full of eager hope of tracing

her, of finding her, once it were possible to start upon the quest. For

the gale which kept me prisoner must have retarded her likewise; and

even with two days’ start, I told myself, she could not have gone far

upon her road.

But I reckoned without the difficulties which the first great snowfall

of the year, before the hard frost comes to make it passable for

sledging, was creating for us in these heights where the drifts fill to

such depth. Day and night my fellows worked to cut a way for me down to

the imperial road; and I worked with them, watched, encouraged them,

and all, it seemed, to so little purpose that I thought I should have

gone mad outright. The cruel heavens now smiled, now frowned, upon our

work, so that, between frost and thaw and thaw and frost, the task was

doubled, and my prison bars seemed to grow stronger instead of less.

In this way it came to pass that it was full ten days from the time

that she had left Tollendhal that I was at length able to start forth

in pursuit.

My first stage was of course to the castle of the old Countess

Schreckendorf, where I found the place well-nigh deserted, its mistress

having been, even as I had been informed, a fortnight dead and buried.

But there was a servant in charge of the empty, desolate house, and

from her I gleaned tidings both precise and sufficient.

The Princess had remained quietly at Schreckendorf during the weeks

which had followed upon my marriage, but on the day previous to our

return to Tollendhal from the shooting-lodge, a couple of couriers had

arrived at the Countess’s gates close one upon the other, bringing, it

would seem, important letters for the Princess, who had been greatly

agitated upon receipt of them. She had hastily despatched a mounted

messenger to my wife, whether with a private communication from herself

or merely to forward missives addressed to her from her own home I know

not; but at any rate the papers which Ottilie had hidden from me that

fatal day were brought her by this man. After she left Tollendhal a few

hours later, my wife had arrived at Schreckendorf in a peasant’s cart.

That same evening two travelling coaches, bringing ladies, officers,

and servants, had made their appearance at the castle; it was one of

these coaches which went to the stronghouse next morning and bore away

Ottilie’s belongings. In the afternoon the whole party, including my

wife, had set forth in great haste for the north, despite universal

warning of the gathering storm. There could be no doubt but that their

destination was Lausitz, most probably the Residence itself, Budissin.

When I had ascertained all this I promptly decided upon my course.

Taking with me János only, I instantly started for the next post-town,

where we were able to secure fresh horses, and whence we pushed on the

same night some twenty miles farther.

Not until the sixth evening, however, despite our extraordinarily hard

travelling, did we, mounted upon a pair of sorry and worn-out nags,

find ourselves crossing the bridge under the towered gates of Budissin.

That was then the sixteenth day from the date of my wife’s flight.

It seemed a singularly deserted town as we stumbled over the cobbles of

the streets, with the early dusk of the November day closing in upon

us—so few people passed us as we went, so few windows cast a light

into the gloom, so many houses and shops presented but blank closed

shutter-fronts. János knew his way, having ridden with my uncle in all

this district during the late war. There was a very good inn, he told

me, on the Burg Platz, in the shadow of the palace; and as nothing

could suit my purpose better, to the “Silver Lion of Lusatia” we

therefore turned our horses’ heads.

It was cheering, after our long wayfaring, and the dismal

nightmare-like impression of our passage through the empty town, to see

the casements of that same “Silver Lion” shine afar off ruddily; and

my heart leaped within me to discern, dimly sketched behind it, the

towering outline of the palace, wherein, no doubt, my lost bird had

found refuge.

The voice of the red-faced host who, at sound of clattering hoofs

before his door, came bustling to greet us as fast as his goodly bulk

would allow, struck on my ear with cheering omen.

“God greet ye, my lords!” he cried, as he lent a shoulder for my

descent; “you are welcome this bitter night to fireside and supper.

Enter, my lords; I have good wine, good beds, good supper, for your

lordships, and the best beer that is brewed between Munich and Berlin.

Joseph, thou rag, see to his lordship’s horses; wife, come greet our

worshipful visitors!”

I write down the jargon much as I heard it, for, as I write, I am back

again at that moment and feel once more the glow of hope which crept

into my heart, even as the genial warmth of the room unbent my frozen

limbs. I had reached my journey’s end, and the old rhyme in the play,

“journeys end in lovers meeting,” rang a merry burden in my thoughts.

I marvel now that my hopes should have been so forward; that I should

have reckoned so much more upon her woman’s love than upon her woman’s

pride. Indeed, I had not deemed my sin so great but that my penitence

would amply atone. So I was all eagerness to satisfy my hungering heart

by tidings of her, and could hardly sit still to my supper—though

we had ridden hard and I was famished—till I had induced mine host

to sit beside me and crack a bottle of his most recommended Rhenish,

which should unloose a tongue that scarcely needed such inducement. For

her sake, that no scandal might be bruited about her fair name, I had

determined to proceed cautiously.

“You have a fine town here, friend,” said I, “so far as I can judge

this dark night.”

“Truly, your lordship may say so,” said he, and smacked his lips that I

might understand how great a relish this fruit of his cellar left on a

man’s palate.

“But it has a deserted look,” said I idly, just to encourage him in

talk; “so many houses shut up—so few people about.”

He rolled the wine round his mouth in a reflective manner, then

swallowed it with a gulp, and threw an uneasy look at me. At the same

instant there flashed upon my mind what, strange as it may seem, I

had clean forgotten in the turmoil of my thoughts and the hurry of my

pursuit: the reason for the very state of affairs I was commenting

on—the plague of smallpox, the malady that had driven the Princess to

my land! Ay, in very truth the town had a plague-stricken look, and I

felt myself turn pale to think my wife had come back to this nest of

infection.

“The sickness,” said I then quickly,—“has it abated here? Nay, I know

all about it, man, and have no fear of it. But how fares it in the town

and in the palace?”

“Oh, the sickness!” quoth mine host with a great awkward laugh.

“His lordship means these few little cases of smallpox. Na, it had

been nothing, and is all over now; only folk were such cowards and

frightened themselves sick, and families fled because of this same

foolish fear. Now myself, as his lordship sees, myself and my family

and my servants, we have not known a day’s ill-health, because we kept

our hearts up and drank good stuff. ’It is,’ as I said to his Highness

himself, who never left the place, but went out in our midst, the noble

prince, and spat at fear (besides that he had already had it, like

myself),—’it is the wine,’ said I, ’or the beer, if you know where to

get it, that keeps a man sound.’ And his Highness says to me——”

But here I interrupted the speaker in a voice the trembling of which I

could not control.

“Is the Duke at the palace now, then, with all his household?”

“He has been so, my lord,” said the man eagerly, “up to the last week;

so long, indeed, as there was a suspicion of illness among us. But

now he is at the summer castle, Ottilienruhe, near Rothenburg. ’Tis

but three leagues from the town. The Princess, sir, is always fond

of Ottilienruhe, even in this cold weather. And as she has but just

returned from visiting at another Court, his Highness, her father, has

gone to join her thither. Our Princess, sir, is a most beautiful young

lady; nay, if you will allow me, I will show you a portrait of her,

which we have framed in my wife’s room. A beautiful young lady, sir!

There will be rare festivities when she weds her cousin, the Margrave

of Liegnitz-Rothenburg. We have his portrait, too—a very noble

gentleman! I would show you these pictures; I think you would admire

them.”

But I arrested him with a gesture, as, in the hopes of distracting my

attention from an awkward topic, he was about to roll his bulk in quest

of these treasures.

I had no wish, indeed, to feast my eyes upon that face, the lineaments

of which, with all their beauty, I could not bear to recall. What was

it to me whom _that_ Ottilie married? If they had had a portrait of my

Ottilie, indeed!... But, sweet soul, she had told me herself of her

obscurity and unimportance.

“And so,” said I, “they are at the summer palace, your reigning family?”

And though I had hugged the thought of her dear living presence so

close to me this night, behind yonder palace walls, I nevertheless

rejoiced to learn that she was safer harboured.

“The Princess has her retinue with her, I suppose?”

“Oh, ay,” said the innkeeper, rising as he spoke and clacking his

tongue again over the last drop of his wine. “Though our Princess is

so simple a lass, if I may say so without disrespect, and loves not

Court fashions. But she has one favourite companion, and they are as

sisters together, so that when one sees her Highness, one may be sure

the Fräulein is not far distant. Oh, ay, sir, they have returned from

their travels together, though I have heard it rumoured that one or two

of her Highness’s attendants have been left behind, dead or ailing. Na,

it is better to stay at home: strange places are unwholesome!”

He opened the stove door and shoved in two or three great logs, and I

turned and stretched my limbs to the warmth with lazy content, and, for

the first time for many a long day and night, a restful heart.

To-morrow I should see her. When I slept that night I dreamed golden

dreams.

* * * * *

The next day dawned upon a world all involved in creeping grizzling

mist, that seemed to ooze even into the comfortable rooms of the

“Silver Lion”; that wrapped from my view the lofty towers of the palace

beyond my window, and damped even my buoyant confidence. My good János

had the toothache, and though it was not in him to complain, the

sight of his swollen, suffering face did not further encourage me to

cheer. A little before noon we mounted to ride forth to Ottilienruhe

in the dismal weather. Our garments, despite the heiduck’s endless

brushing, bore many traces of our hard journey. We cut but a poor

figure, I thought, in these stained, rusty clothes; and the young

lord of Tollendhal was ill-mounted upon the wretched jade, which had,

nevertheless, faithfully served him upon his last cruel stage. The

poor nag was yet full weary, and stumbled and drooped her head, while

János’s white-faced bay might have stood for the very image of starving

antiquity.

I winced as I thought of Ottilie’s mocking glance; but the haste to see

her overcame even my delicate vanity.

Following my host’s directions, who marvelled greatly at our

eccentricity that we should leave a warm stove door and good cheer from

mere travellers’ curiosity on such a day, we pattered forth through

the town again—through streets yet more ghost-like in their daylight

emptiness than they had seemed yestereven; pattered once more across

the wood of the bridge beneath which the sullen waters ran, without

appearing to run, as grey and leaden as the heavens above.

And after two hours’ dreary tramp along a poplar-bordered, deserted

road, we saw before us the gilded iron gateway of Ottilienruhe. Beyond

there was a vision of French gardens; of bowling-greens all drenched;

of flat terraces whereon the yews, fantastically cut, stood about like

the pieces of a chessboard. Beyond that again rose the odd Grecian

porticos and colonnades, the Chinese cupolas, appertaining to the

summer pleasaunce of the reigning house.

It might have looked fair enough under bright skies in summer weather,

with roses on the empty beds and sunshine on the little yellow spires;

but it seemed a most desolate place as it lay beneath my eyes that

noon. I told myself I should find sunshine enough within, yet my heart

lay heavy in my breast.

A sentry, with his pointed fur cap drawn down over his eyes, with

the collar of his great-coat drawn up above his ears, so that of his

countenance only the end of a red nose was visible to the world,

marched up and down before the gates, and, as we made ready to halt,

challenged us roughly.

At the sound of his call two more sentries appeared at different

points, and tramped towards us with suspicion in their bearing.

Evidently the Duke was well guarded. I rode a few steps forward, when,

to my astonishment, it being full peace-time, the fellow brought his

musket to the ready, and again cautioned me to pass on my way.

“But my way is to the palace,” I bawled to him defiantly, despite

the consciousness that the doubtful impression I must myself create

could not be mitigated by the sight of János behind me. For I am

bound to say that in the plain garb I had insisted on his donning,

now much disordered, as I have said, by our travels, with the natural

grimness of his countenance enhanced by a screw of pain, a more

truculent-looking ruffian it would have been hard to find.

But so far I did not anticipate any more serious difficulty than what

a few arguments could remove: and I carried a heavy purse. So I added

boldly:

“I have business at the palace.”

The man lowered his weapon and came a step nearer.

“Whence come you?” he asked more civilly.

“From Budissin,” said I.

The musket instantly went up again, and its bearer retreated hastily a

couple of paces.

“‘Tis against orders,” he said, “because of the sickness; no one from

Budissin may pass the gates.”

The sickness again! I had, then, by my impetuosity, my haste to follow

in her traces, but raised a new barrier between us.

I dismounted, threw my reins to János, and advanced upon the soldier.

“But, friend,” said I——

The fellow covered me with his weapon.

“Stand!” he cried roughly; “stand, or I fire!”

I stood back stock-still. Here was a quandary indeed!

“But, my God!” I cried to him, “I am a traveller. I have but passed

through the town. I have come these eighty leagues upon urgent

business, and I must see some one who I am told is in the palace.”

So saying I drew forth a louis d’or, a stock of which I kept loose for

such emergencies in my side pocket, and tossed it to the rascal.

“Now get me speech with a person in authority,” said I.

With one hand, and without lowering his fire-lock, he nimbly caught the

coin on the fling and placed it in his mouth, after which he shook his

head and remarked indistinctly:

“‘Tis no use.”

And then at last my sorely-tried patience broke down, impotent

otherwise in front of his menacing barrel. I cursed him long and

loud with that choiceness and variety of epithet of which my own

squadron-life experience as well as my apprenticeship to my great-uncle

had given me a command.

The clamour we made first drew the other soldiers, and next a little

dapper officer from the guard-room behind the inner gate, who ran out

towards us, and at the utmost pitch of his naturally piping voice

demanded in the name of all gods, thunders, and lightning-blasts what

the matter was.

My particular sentinel’s utterance was something impeded by the louis

d’or in his cheek, and I was consequently able to offer an explanation

before him. Uncovering my head and bowing, I introduced myself in

elegant phraseology, though of necessity, for the distance between us,

in tones more suited to the parade ground than to a polite ceremony,

and laid bare my unfortunate position. I bewailed that through my brief

halt in Budissin, ignorant of the infection, I had evidently made

myself amenable to quarantine, and requested his courteous assistance

in the matter.

My name was evidently quite unfamiliar to his ears, but, perceiving

that he had to deal with an equal, the little officer at once returned

my salute with an extra flourish, and my civility by ordering the

sentry to stand aside. Then, advancing gingerly in the mud to a more

reasonable interval for conversation, he informed me, with another

sweeping bow, that he was Captain Freiherr von Krappitz, and that,

while it would be his pleasure to serve me in every possible manner, he

regretted deeply that his orders were such that he could only ratify

the sentry’s conduct.

“And are there no means, then,” cried I “by which I can communicate in

person with any resident of the palace?”

“In person,” said the officer “I regret, none. His Serene Highness’s

orders are stringent, and when I tell you that our Princess is actually

behind these walls, you will understand the necessity. The sickness has

been appalling,” he added.

He must have seen the blank dismay upon my countenance, for his own

sharp visage expressed a comical mixture of sympathy and curiosity, and

again approaching two steps he proceeded:

“I could perhaps convey some message. I shall soon be relieved from

duty here. The person you wish to see is——?”

“It is a lady,” said I, flushing.

This was what the little gentleman had evidently expected. Suppressing

a grin of satisfaction, he gave another salute and placed himself

quite at my disposal. But I had an unsurmountable objection to announce

my real relationship to the woman who had fled from my protection.

Courteous as my interlocutor was, and honourable and kind as he seemed

to be, I could send no message to my wife through him.

“If you will see to the safe delivery of a letter,” said I, “I should

be grateful indeed.”

His face fell.

“It is possible, perhaps,” he said dubiously, “but less easy of

accomplishment. There will be the necessity of disinfection. If you

think your billet-doux—forgive me for supposing you to be a sufferer

from the tender passion, and believe me I speak with sympathy” (here he

thumped his little chest and heaved from its restricted depths a noisy

sigh)—“if you think your billet-doux will not lose of its sweetness by

a prolonged immersion in vinegar, I will do what I can. Nay, I think I

can promise you that your letter will be delivered, if you will kindly

inform me who the fair recipient is to be.”

Again I hesitated. I would not call her by her maiden name; to speak

of her as my wife, to bawl my strange story on the high road, was not

only intolerable to my pride, but seemed inadvisable and certainly

imprudent in my ignorance of her attitude at the Court.

“It is,” said I, “one of your Princess’s Court ladies.” And here his

volubility spared me further circumlocution.

“It can certainly not be,” he cried, “that you have formed an unhappy

attachment for the Frau Gräfin von Kornstein? There remains then only

the young Comtesse d’Assier, Fräulein von Auerbach and her sister, and

Fräulein Ottilie Pahlen—these are all of our fair circle that are now

in attendance at the palace.”

“It is the last lady,” I said, and was at once glad of my own

circumspection and troubled in my mind that she should be keeping her

secret so well.

“Mes compliments,” said he with a smirk, but I thought also with a

shade of patronage, as if by mentioning her last he had also shown her

to be the last in his worldly esteem. Once, doubtless, this would have

galled me.

“Then if I write now,” I cried, “and you, according to your kind offer,

take charge of my letter, how soon can it be in her hands?”

“But as soon as the guard has relieved me, good sir, am I free to act

the gallant Mercury—pity it is that these sordid details of sickness

and quarantine should come to spoil so pretty an errand. This was a

fair Court for Cupid before the ugly plague came on us. Yes,” he added,

“I have seen days!”

I had already drawn out my tablets, and, thanking him hurriedly

(without, I fear, evincing much interest in his sentimental

reflections), turned and, making a standing desk of my horse, with the

sheet spread upon the saddle, began, all in the dreary drizzle, to

trace with fingers stiffened from the cold the few lines which were to

bring my wife back to me.

I had little time for composition, and so wrote the words as they

welled up from my heart.

“Dear love,” said I, in the French which had been the language of our

happiest moments, “your poor scholar has learnt his lesson so well

that he cannot live without his teacher. Forget what has come between

us. Remember only all that unites us, and forgive. I have, it seems,

involved myself in difficulty by passing through Budissin, and so will,

I fear, have to endure delay before being permitted sight of your

sweet face again. But let me have a word which may help me to bear the

separation, let me know that I may carry home my wife.” I signed it,

“Your poor scholar and loving husband.” Then I folded it, fastened it

with a wafer, and after a minute’s pause decided to burn my ships and

address it by the right name of her to whom I destined it—“Madame

Ottilie de Jennico, Dame d’honneur de S. A. S. la Princesse Marie

Ottilie de Lusace.”

Bending over the living desk,—the poor patient brute never budged but

for his heaving flanks,—I laid for a second, unperceived I thought, my

lips upon that name which haunted me, sleeping and waking, and turning,

with the letter in my hand, found the Freiherr watching me, with his

head upon one side and so comic an air of sympathy that, at another

moment, I should have burst out laughing.

“It is mille dommages,” quoth he as, bending his supple spine again,

he drew his sword with a charming gesture of courtesy, “that this

chaste salute should have to pass through the bitter waves of the Court

doctor’s vinegar basin before reaching the virginal lips for which it

is intended.”

“Then I may rely upon your countenance?” said I, unmindful of his mock

Versailles floweriness as I fixed my missive to the point of the sword

extended towards me for that purpose by the longest arm the little

fellow could make. I knew he would not read the tell-tale inscription

until the unpoetic process he had so feelingly lamented should have

been gone through, and I wondered something anxiously whether it would

not prove another complication, my wife in her wounded pride having

thus chosen to conceal our marriage—in truth, I might have known it:

had she not shaken off my ring? Seeing upon what grounds we had parted,

however, I dared not have addressed her otherwise, and so could see no

way but to run some risk.

“When may I hope to receive an answer?—you will forgive my

impatience,” said I, with a somewhat rueful smile, “for you have some

knowledge of the human heart, I see, and so I venture further to

trespass on your great courtesy. I will meet here any messenger you may

depute at any hour you name this afternoon.”

“Myself, sir, myself,” said the good-natured gentleman, “and in as

short a space as possible. Shall we say three o’clock?”

There were then a few minutes wanting to noon by my uncle’s famous

chronometer. Three hours seemed long, but, as we must ever learn to do

in life, I had to be content with a slice where I wanted the loaf. (Now

I have not even a crumb for my starving heart, and yet I live.)

As I had surmised, my messenger continued to hold the missive at the

extreme length of his weapon and arm, while we made our divers congees

and compliments. Thus we parted, he to withdraw to his guard-house, and

I, with my attendant, to ride back to the nearest village, with what

appetite we might for our noonday meal.

I rode alone again to the rendezvous, full early, poor fool! János

I had sent on to find lodgings for me in the neighbourhood, out of

range of infection, so that my time of purgatory need not be an hour

prolonged.

The sky had cleared somewhat and it rained no more, but there was now

a penetrating and moisture-charged wind. A little after the stroke of

three my friend of the morning came forth, waved aside the sentry as

before, and halted within the former distance, while I dismounted. His

countenance was far from bearing the beaming cordiality with which

he had last surveyed me, nor had his bow anything like its previous

depth and roundness. He drew a folded paper from his pocket, attached

it to the point of his sword, according to the process I had already

witnessed, and presented it to me, observing drily:

“I regret, sir, that there seems to be some mistake about this matter.

The Court doctor, who duly delivered the letter at the palace, informs

me that none of her Highness’s ladies-in-waiting will consent to

receive it, it being indeed addressed to some person unknown among

them. There is no lady of the name of Jennico among her Highness’s

attendants.”

I felt myself blanching.

“Am I to understand,” said I, “that Fräulein Ottilie Pahlen has

repudiated this letter?”

“My good sir,” said he, looking at me, I thought, with a sort of

compassion, as if he feared I was weak in my head, “I understand from

the Court doctor that Mademoiselle Pahlen was the lady to whom the

letter was at once offered, according to my request and yours. There is

perhaps some mystery?”—here his interest seemed to flicker up again,

and he smiled as who would say, “_confide in me_”; but I could not

bring my tongue to this humiliation, less than ever then.

I flicked the poor, vinegar-sodden, despised epistle from the point of

his sword, and, spreading it out once again, added to it in a sort of

frenzy this appeal:

“For God’s sake forgive me! You cannot mean to send me away like this.

Ottilie, write me one line, for from my soul I love you.”

Then I pasted the sheet again, and, drawing a line through the title,

wrote above it in great letters:

“Fräulein Ottilie Pahlen,” and then I said to the officer:

“You will be doing a deed of truer kindness than you can imagine,

Captain von Krappitz, if you will have this letter placed again in the

hands of Fräulein Pahlen. More I cannot say now, but some day, if my

fortune is not more evil than I dare reflect upon, I will explain.”

“Wait here half an hour,” he responded with a return of his good

nature; “I am off duty and free for the rest of the day. If I can

induce the Court doctor to attend to me—in truth, he is of a very

surly mood this afternoon—I trust you may see me return a messenger of

better tidings.”

Besides a very bubbling heat of curiosity there was real amiability in

this readiness to help me.

The half hour sped and half an hour beyond it—why do I linger upon

such details? From sheer cowardly reluctance, I believe, to describe

those moments of my great despair.

And then a cockscomb of a servant fellow, in gorgeous livery and

ribboned cue, stepped forth from the gates, sniffing a bunch of

stinking herbs, and stood and surveyed me for a second from head to

foot, grinning all over his insolent visage, till I wonder how I kept

my riding-whip from searing it across.

“Well, sir?” said I sternly.

He felt, maybe, the note of master in my voice, for he cringed a

little, and, more civilly than his countenance suggested, requested to

know if I was the gentleman with whom Captain the Freiherr von Krappitz

had recently been conversing. Upon my reply he gingerly held up a

filthy rag of paper, in which I recognised, with a failing of the heart

such as I cannot set forth in words, my own letter once more. And in

sight of my discomfiture, resuming his native impudence, he proceeded

in loud tones:

“My master bids me inform you that he can no longer be the means of

annoying a young lady whom he respects so much as Mademoiselle Pahlen.

She has requested that your letter may be returned to you again, and

declares that she knows no such person as yourself, and is quite at a

loss why she should be made the object of this strange persecution.”

The rogue sang out the words as one repeating a lesson in which he has

been well drilled.

As I stood staring at him, all other feelings swallowed up in the

overwhelming tide of my disappointment, I saw him, as in a dream,

toss the much-travelled note in the mud between us, turn on his heel,

exchange a grin with the nearest sentry, jerk his thumb over his

shoulder in my direction, tap his forehead significantly, and finally

swagger out of sight behind the little wicket.

And still I stood immovable, unable to formulate a single thought in my

paralysed brain, the whole world before me a dull blank, yet knowing

that, when I should begin to feel again, it would be hell indeed.

A shout from the sentry suddenly aroused me.

“‘Tis better,” he called, “that you should move on.”

And in good sooth what had I more to do before those gates? I mounted

my horse and rode backwards and forwards upon that wretched scrap of

paper that had been charged with all the dearest longings of my heart,

until it lay indistinguishable in the mud around it. Then I set spurs

to my jade, and we rode, a well-matched couple, away towards the

strange village where I was to meet János.

* * * * *

With the memory of that bitterest hour of his life burning so hot

within him that he could continue his sedentary task no longer, but

must rise and pace the room after the sullen way now well known to

János as betokening his master’s worst moments, Basil Jennico laughed

aloud. Pride must have a fall! God knows his pride had had falls

enough to kill the most robust of vices.

Had ever man been so humiliated, so contemned as he? Had ever poor soul

been made to suffer more relentlessly where it had sinned?

“I have been brought low, very low,” said he to himself, and thought of

the early days at Tollendhal when its young lord had deemed the whole

earth created for his use. Yet, even as he spoke, he knew in his heart

that the pride that was born in him would die with him only, and that

if it had been mastered awhile it was only but because love had been

stronger still.

When he had taken the roturière unreservedly to his heart; when he

had returned from the mountains to seek reconciliation; when he had

followed her upon her flight, had twice besought her to return to him;

when he had made his third and last futile appeal in the face of a

slashing rebuff, pride had lain beneath the heel of love. He had been

beaten, after all, by a pride greater than his own; and he knew that

were she to call him even now, he would come to her bidding in spite of

all and through all.

The boards of the narrow, irregular room creaked beneath his impatient

tread. Outside, the sounds of traffic were dying away. The last

belated coaches had clattered down the streets, the tall running

footman had extinguished his link. Basil Jennico turned instinctively

towards the south, like the restless compass-needle, a way that had

grown into a habit of late as his spirit strove to bridge across the

leagues of sea and land that lay between him and his wife.

Was she thinking of him now? What was his curse was at the same time

his triumph: he defied her to forget him any more than he could forget

her! Those hours, had she not shared them with him? Come what would, no

man could lay claim to be to her what he had been. _No man—that way

madness lay!_...

He looked round at the pages scored with his writings and gave a

heart-sick sigh, and then at the door of the room beyond, wherein

stood that huge four-post bed where he had tossed through such

sleepless hours and dreamed such dreams that the waking moment held the

bitterness of death. Next he thought of the town beyond, so full, yet

to him so empty.

How to pass the time that went by with such leaden feet? The days were

bad enough, but the nights—the nights were terrible! Should he don his

most brilliant suit and hie him out into the throng of men of fashion?

Some of the Woschutzski gold would not come amiss at the dicing-table

of my Lady Brambury, or at the Cocoa-tree, or yet the Hummums, where

(his head being as strong as the best of them) he could crack a few

bottles in good company. Good company, forsooth! What could all the

world be to him for want of that one small being? He might drink

himself into oblivion, perhaps, a few hours’ oblivion, and be carried

home in the early morning and wake at midday with a new headache and

the old heartache. Pah!

Of three evils choose the least: since the great feather bed would hold

no sleep yet awhile; since to drag his misery into company was to add

fire to its fever, Mr. Jennico sat down again to his task, hoping so to

weary his brain that it would grant him a few hours’ dreamless rest.

CHAPTER II

CAPTAIN BASIL JENNICO’S MEMOIR CONTINUED

THERE is very little more to tell. The new inn wherein I found János

established was but a poor place in a poor village, a sort of summer

resort abandoned in winter-time save by its own wretched inhabitants.

The private chamber allotted to me—it was the only one—was bitter

cold, but my choice lay between that and the common room below, full of

evil smells and reeking boors and stifling stove heat.

But I was in no mood to reck of bodily inconvenience. My further

action had to be determined upon; and, torn two ways between anger and

longing, I passed the evening and the greater part of the night in

futile battle with myself.

At length I resolved upon a plan which brought some calm into my soul,

and with it a creeping ray of hope.

I would lay my case before the Princess herself. She had been ever

kindly in her dealings towards me. I had no reason to imagine but that

she was well disposed in my favour; she had had no part in her maid

of honour’s double dealings with me: I would pray her to speak to the

wayward being on my behalf, to place before her her duty towards the

husband she had herself chosen.

Thus next morning, as clearly, temperately, and respectfully as might

be, I indited my letter, sealed it upon each fold with the Jennico

coat-of-arms, and, after deliberation, despatched János with it. The

fellow had, according to my orders, purchased fresh horses, and cut a

better figure than the yesterday’s, when he set off upon his errand.

Duly and minutely instructed, he was to present himself at another

gate of the palace, and I trusted that, making good use of the purse

with which he was supplied, his mission might be more successfully

accomplished than had been mine.

And indeed, so far as he was concerned, this was the case. He came

back sooner than I had supposed it possible, to inform me that, having

been able to say he was not from Budissin, he had been received with

civility, and permitted to wait at the guard-house of the north

entrance while my letter was carried to the palace. After a short time,

the messenger who had taken charge of it had returned, demanded and

carefully noted my name, qualities, and exact whereabouts, and bidden

him go back to his master with the assurance that the Princess would

send her answer.

I waited, tramping the short breadth of my miserable room like a caged

wolf, anxiously peering every other minute through the rain-stained

window which overlooked the high road.

Reason seemed to offer but one conclusion concerning the result of

the last appeal: she would come back to me. My offence—bad as it had

been, unmanly towards the woman who had lain in my arms, unworthy of

a gentleman towards the lady whom he had resolved to acknowledge as

his wife—my offence was not one that so true a penitence might not

amply atone for. That was what reason said. But, as often as confidence

began to rise in my heart, an instinctive dread overcame it, an

unaccountable, ominous misgiving that the happiness I had once held in

my hand and so perversely cast from me was never to be mine again. And,

as the hours slowly fell away, the dread became more poignant, and the

effort to hope more futile.

János had returned with his message about noon. It must have been at

least five o’clock (for the world outside was wrapped in murky shadow)

when there came a sound on the road that made my heart leap: a clatter

of horses’ hoofs and the rumbling of a coach. I threw open my window

and thrust out my head. How vividly the impression comes back on me

now!—the cold rain upon my throbbing temples, the blinding light of

joy that filled my brain as I strained my eyes to distinguish in the

dusk the nature of the vehicle which announced its approach with such

important noise. It was a carriage, guarded by an escort of dragoons,

who rode by the door, musket on thigh. An escort! It must be the

Princess herself: the Princess come in person, the noble and gentle

lady, to bring me back my wife, my love!

Fool! Fool! Fool thrice told! for my vainglorious self-conceit, my

loving, yearning heart!

My spirits bounded at one leap to their old important, arrogant level.

I threw a hasty glance in the mirror to note that the pallor of my

countenance and the disorder of my unpowdered hair were after all

not unbecoming. As I dashed along the narrow wooden passage and down

the breakneck creaking stairs I will not say that in all the glow of

my heart, that had been so cold, there was not now, in this sudden

relief from the iron pressure of anxiety, a point of anger against the

little truant—a vague determination to establish a certain balance of

account, to inflict some mild penance upon her as a set-off against the

very bitter one she had imposed on me. A minute ago I would have knelt

before her and humbled myself to the very dust: when I reached the door

of the drinking-room I was already pluming myself upon a resolution to

be merciful.

I broke into the room out of the darkness with my head high, and was at

first so dazzled by the light within, as well as by the reeling triumph

in my brain, that for an instant I could distinguish nothing.

Then, with a sickening revulsion, with such rage as may have torn the

soul of Lucifer struck from the heights of heaven to the depths of

hell, I saw the single figure of Captain von Krappitz standing in the

middle of the floor with much gravity and importance of demeanour.

Flattened against the walls, the boors stood open-mouthed, all struck

with amazement; and the little host was bowing anxiously to the belaced

officer. Two dragoons guarded the door.

Before even a word was uttered I felt that all was over for me.

Concentrating my energies, then, to face misfortune with as brave a

front as I might, I halted before my friend of yesterday, and waited in

silence for him to open proceedings.

He bowed to me with great courtesy, looking upon me the while with eyes

at once compassionate, curious, and yet respectful, as though upon one

of newly-discovered importance, and said:

“I grieve, sir, to be the bearer of an order which may cause you

displeasure, but I beg you, being a soldier yourself, to consider me

only as the instrument which does not presume to judge but obeys. Be

pleased to read this—it is addressed to you.”

I took the great sealed envelope with fingers as cold and heavy as

marble, broke it open mechanically, and read. At first it was without

any comprehension of the words, which were nevertheless set forth in a

very free, flowing hand, but presently, as the blood rushed in a tide

of sudden anger to my brain, with a quickening and redoubled intensity

of intelligence.

“The Princess Marie Ottilie of Sachs-Lausitz,” so ran the precious

document, “has received M. de Jennico’s letter concerning a certain

lady.

“M. de Jennico has already been given clearly to understand that his

importunities are distressing.

“As the lady in question is a member of the Princess’s household, M.

de Jennico will not be surprised at the steps which are now taken to

secure her against further persecution. He is advised to accept the

escort of the officer who carries this letter, and warned that any

attempt at resistance, or any future infringement of the order issued

by command of his Serene Highness, will be visited in the severest

manner.”

In a bloody heat of rage I looked up, ready for any folly—to

strangle the poor courteous little instrument of a woman’s implacable

resentment—to find death on the bayonets of the hulking sentinels at

the door, and be glad of it, so that I had shed somebody’s blood for

these insults! But, meeting Captain von Krappitz’s steady glance, I

paused. And in that pause my sense returned.

If love itself be a madness, as they say, what name shall we give to

our wrath against those that we love! For that minute no poor chained

Bedlamite could have been more dangerously mad than I. But my British

dread of ridicule saved my life that day, and perhaps that of others

besides.

Perhaps also the real pity, the sympathy, that was stamped on the

captain’s honest face had something to say to calming me. At any rate,

I recovered from my convulsion, and awoke to the fact that blood was

running down my shirt from where I had clenched my teeth upon my lip.

I must have been a fearsome object to behold, and I have a good opinion

of Captain von Krappitz’s coolness that he should thus have stood and

faced a man of twice his size and, in such a frenzy, of probably four

times his strength, with never a signal to his guard or even a step in

retreat.

Said this gentleman then, delicately averting his eyes from my

countenance, so soon as he saw I had come to my senses:

“If you will glance at this paper you will see that my orders are

stringent, and I shall be greatly indebted to your courtesy if you

will co-operate in their being carried out in the least unpleasant

manner possible. Indeed, sir,” he added in my ear hastily and kindly,

“resistance would be worse than useless.”

I glanced at the paper he presented to me, caught the words: “Order

to Captain Freiherr von Krappitz to convey M. de Jennico beyond the

frontier of Lusatia, at any point he may himself choose”; caught a

further glimpse of such expressions: “formal warning to M. de Jennico

never to set foot more within the dominions of the Duke of Lausitz,”

“severe penalty,” and so forth. I glanced, and tossed the paper

contemptuously on the table.

That wife of mine had greater interest at the Court than she had been

wont to pretend, and she was using it to some purpose. She was mightily

determined that her offending husband should pay his debt to her pride,

to the last stripe of his punishment.

I smiled in the bitterness of my soul. I was sane enough now, God

knows!

Well, she should have her wish, she should be persecuted no longer.

“I place myself entirely at your convenience,” said M. de Krappitz

discreetly, adding, however, the significant remark, “my order gives me

twelve hours.”

He picked up the document as he spoke, folded it carefully, and placed

it in his breast pocket.

“Oh, as for me,” said I, “I ask for no respite.” (Could I desire to

waste a second before shaking the dust of this cursed country from

my feet?) “The time but to warn my servant and bid him truss up my

portmanteau and saddle the horses. I understand,” I added, with what,

I fear, was a withering smile, “that you are kind enough to offer me a

seat in your carriage?”

“Ah, my dear sir,” returned the little man, with an expression of

relief, “what a delightful thing it is to deal with an homme d’esprit!”

And so, in scarce half-an-hour’s time, the triumphal procession was

ready to set forth. I entered the coach, the Freiherr took his seat

behind me, János, impassive, mounted his horse between two dragoons,

whilst my own mount was led by a third soldier in the rear. And in this

order we set off at a round pace for the Silesian frontier, where I

begged to be deposited.

At first my good-tempered and garrulous escort tried in vain to

beguile me into some conversation upon such abstract subjects as music

and poetry. But his well-meant efforts failed before my hopeless

taciturnity, and it was in silence that we concluded the transit

between Rothenburg and the border.

As we parted, however, he held out his hand. “Sans rancune, camarade,”

said he.

What could I do but clasp the good-natured little paw as heartily as

I might, and echo, although most untruly, “Sans rancune”? To the very

throat I was full of rancour for everything belonging to Lusatia, and I

swear the bitterness of it lay a palpable taste on my tongue.

A free man again, I threw myself upon my horse, and took the

straightest road for my empty home. János had the wit to speak no word

to me, save a direction now and again as to the proper way. And we rode

like furies through the cold, wet night.

“Breed a fine stock ...” had said my good uncle to his heir.

At least, I thought—and the sound of my laugh rang ghastly even in my

own ears—if I have brought roture into the family, I am not like now

to graft it on the family tree!

CHAPTER III

CAPTAIN BASIL JENNICO’S MEMOIR, RESUMED THREE MONTHS LATER, AT

FARRINGDON DANE

SUFFOLK, _14th April, 1772_.

I HAD thought upon that day when, in my ill temper, I irreparably

insulted my wife, that I could never bring myself to face the exposure

which a return to England would necessarily bring about. But when I

found the desolation and the haunting memories of Tollendhal like to

rob me of all I had left of reason and manliness; when, to my restless

spirit, the thought of home seemed to promise some chance of diversion

and relief, I did not hesitate. Without delay I set to work to put

matters at Tollendhal upon a sufficiently regular scale, also to have

realised and transferred to my London bankers a sum of money large

enough to meet any reasonable demand. This business accomplished, in

less than a month from the date of the ill-fated Rothenburg expedition

I found myself breathing my native air again.

Before my departure I charged Schultz—and I know I can rely upon his

faithfulness—to be perpetually on the look-out for any communication

from Lausitz, and to be ready to give any one immediate cognisance of

my whereabouts. It is a forlorn hope.

Although the humour had come upon me to go back to my own land—after

the fashion, I fancy, that a sick man deems he will be better anywhere

than where he is—and although I did not hesitate to gratify that

humour, I was, nevertheless, not blind to the peculiar position I must

occupy among my people. I had no desire to lay claim to the honours I

had so prematurely announced, no desire to present myself under false

colours, even were such an imposture likely to succeed; but neither

did I see why I should lay bare to the jeers of the fashionable world,

to the sneers of dear relatives and friends, or, more intolerable

still, to their compassion, the whole pitiful plot of that comedy which

has turned to such tragedy for me. So, when I wrote to my mother to

announce my arrival, I adopted a purposely evasive tone.

“It is deeply unfortunate,” I wrote, “that you should have broken the

bond of secrecy which I enjoined upon you when I informed you of my

intended marriage. You know too much of the world, my dear mother,

not to understand that when a commoner like myself, however well

born and dowered, would contract an alliance with the heiress of

a reigning house, it is more than likely that there may be a ’slip

’twixt the cup and the lip.’ My cup has been spilt. I come home, a

broken-hearted man, to find myself, I fear, owing to your breach of

confidence, the laughing-stock of our society. But the yearning for

home is too strong upon me to be resisted; I am returning to England

at once. If you would not add yet more to the bitterness of my lot you

will strenuously deny the report you indiscreetly spread, and warn

curiosity-mongers from daring to probe a wound which I could not bear

even your hand to touch.”

These words, by which I intended to spare myself at least the

humiliation of personal explanation, have produced an unexpected

effect. My poor mother performed her task so well that I find myself

quite as much the hero of the hour over here as if I had brought back

my exalted bride.

The mystery in which I am shrouded, the obvious melancholy of my

demeanour, the very indifference with which I receive all notice,

added, of course, to my wealth, and possibly to the belief that I

am still a prize in the matrimonial market, my extraordinary luck

at cards, when I can be induced to play, my carelessness to loss or

gain—all this has placed me upon a pinnacle which is as gratifying to

my mother as (or, so I hear, for I have declined all reconciliation

with the renegade) it is galling to my brother and his family.

But the best yet, so far as I am concerned, is that no one has dared to

put to me an indiscreet question, and that even my mother, although her

wistful eyes implore my confidence, respects my silence.

Now, having tried in vain to find a solace in the pleasures of town,

I have betaken myself to that part of the island which is the cradle

of our race, to try whether a taste of good old English sport may not

revive some interest in my life.

Often in that last month at Tollendhal, when the whole land was locked

in ice and the grey sky looked down pitilessly upon the white earth,

day by day, with never a change and scarcely a shadow, I thought of

the green winters of my youth in the old country; of rousing gallops,

with the west wind in my face, across wide fields all verdant still

and homely; of honest English faces, English voices, the tongue of the

hounds, the blast of the cracked horn, with almost a passion of desire.

It seemed to me that, if I could be back in the midst of it all again,

I might feel as the boy Basil had felt, and be rid, were it but for the

space of a good cross-country run, of that present Basil Jennico whose

brain was so weary of working upon the same useless round, whose heart

was so sore within him.

So soon therefore as the weather broke—for the winter has been

hard even in this milder climate—I accepted my mother’s offer of

her dower-house, set up a goodly stable of hunters, and established

myself at the Manor of Farringdon Dane. I have actually derived some

satisfaction from a couple of days’ sport, to which a sight of my lord

brother’s discomfiture, each time I cut him deliberately in the face of

the whole field, has added perhaps a grain.

* * * * *

_April 29th._

I am this day like the man in the Gospel who, having driven out

the devil from his heart and swept and garnished it, finds himself

presently possessed of seven devils worse than the first! The demon of

wrath I had exorcised, I believed, long ago; the fiend of unrest and

longing I had thought these days to have laid too. In spite of her too

obdurate resentment, I had no feeling for my wife, wherever she might

be, but tenderness. Now, oh, Ottilie, Ottilie! do I most hate thee

or love thee? I know not, by my soul! Yet this at least I do know:

mine thou art, and mine thou shalt remain, though we never meet again

on earth: mine, as I am thine, though the true, good race of Jennico

wither and die on my barren stock.

But what serves it to rant in this fashion to myself when I have not

even the satisfaction of hearing a contradiction—not even an excuse

to shake my fury? Small satisfaction likewise has that puling, mincing

messenger to carry back to you, my wife. Poor old man! I am fain to

laugh even in my anger when I recall his panic-stricken countenance of

an hour ago.

The hounds were to meet at ten this morning at Sir Percy Spalding’s,

not three miles from here, and so I was taking the day easy. I had but

just finished breakfast, and was standing on the steps of the porch

quaffing a draught of ale, as I awaited my horse, sniffing the while

the moist southern wind; and my thoughts for once were pleasantly

occupied—for once the gnawing canker was at rest within me. Presently

my attention was awakened by the rumbling sound of wheels; and, looking

towards the avenue, yet so sparsely be-leaved as to afford a clear view

down its whole length, I saw coming along it, at slow pace, a heavy

vehicle, which in time disclosed itself as a shabby, hired travelling

chaise, drawn by an ancient horse, and driven by that drunken scoundrel

Bateman from Yarmouth, once a familiar figure to my childish eyes. My

heart leaped. I expected no one—my mother was at Cheltenham for the

waters—no one, save, indeed, her whom I ever unconsciously await!

It was perhaps the unreasonable disappointment that fell upon me, when,

gazing eagerly for a glimpse of the occupant, as the carriage lumbered

through the inner gate, I saw that it contained but the single figure

of an old man (huddled, despite the spring warmth of the day, in furs

to the very chin) that turned me into so bitter and black a temper.

Even as the chaise drove up before the steps, and as I stood staring

down at it, motionless, although within me there was turmoil enough,

the fellows came round with my horses. Bess, the Irish mare, took

umbrage at the little grotesque figure that, with an alertness one

would scarcely have given it credit for, skipped from the chaise,

looking more like one of those images I have seen on Saxon clocks than

anything human. How she plunged and how the fool that held her stared,

and how I cursed him for not minding his business—it was a vast relief

to my feelings—and how the old gentleman regarded us as one newly come

among savages, and how he finally advanced upon me mincing—I laugh

again to think back upon it! But I had no mind to laughter then. ’Twas

plain, before he opened his mouth to speak, that my visitor hailed

from foreign parts. And at closer acquaintance the reason why, even

from a distance, he had appeared to me as something less than human,

became evident. His countenance was shrivelled and seared by recent

smallpox; scarred in a manner perfectly fantastic to behold.

That curse of my life, that persistent hope—I believe I could get

along well enough, but ’tis the hope that kills me—began to stir

within me.

“Have I the honour of speaking to Captain Basil de Jennico?” said the

puppet in French; and before the question was well out of his mouth, I

had capped it with another, breathless:

“Come you not from Rothenburg?”

He bowed and scraped: each saw he had his answer. I was all civility

now, Heaven help me! and cordial enough to make up for a more

discourteous reception.

I ordered my horses back to the stables, dismissed the chaise, in spite

of the newcomer’s protestations, and led him within the house, calling

for refreshments for him; all the while a thousand questions, to which

I yet dreaded the answers, burning on my tongue.

I had installed him in the deepest armchair in the apartment I

habitually used; I had kindled a fire with my own hands, for he was

shivering in his furs, whether from fear, embarrassment, or cold, I

know not—maybe all three together; I had placed a glass of wine at his

elbow, which he sipped nervously when I pressed him; and then, when I

knew that I should hear what had brought him, from very cowardliness I

was mute. It seemed to me as if my courtesies embarrassed him, and that

this augured ill, although (I reasoned with myself) if she should send

me a messenger at all, I ought to anticipate good tidings.

“I am fortunate, sir,” began the old man in quavering tones, “to find

you at home. Sir, I have come a long way to seek you. I went first

to your castle at Tollendhal, where your steward, a countryman of my

own, to whose politeness I am much indebted, gave me very careful

instructions as to the road to your English domicile. A most worthy and

amiable person! I should not so soon have had the advantage of making

your acquaintance had it not been for the help he gave me. I have come

by Yarmouth, sir: the wind was all in our favour. I am informed we had

a good passage.” Here he shivered, and a yet greener shade underspread

the scars upon his brow. “But I am not accustomed to the sea, and I

have been ill, sir, lately, very ill.”

He coughed awkwardly, reached out his trembling hand for the wine, but

put down the glass again untasted.

“Surely I am right in believing,” said I, “that you come from some

one very dear to me—from one from whom I am parted by a series of

unfortunate misunderstandings?” I felt my lips grow cold as I spoke,

and I know that I panted.

“If you have a letter,” said I, “give it to me.”

I reached out my hand, and saw, with a strange sort of self-pity, that

it shook no less than had the old man’s withered claw.

“Or if you have a message,” cried I, breaking out at last, “speak, for

God’s sake!”

He drew back from my impetuosity. There was fear of me in his eye; at

the same time, I thought, with a chill about my heart, compassion.

“My good sir,” he said, between “hums” and “ha’s” which well-nigh

drove me distracted, “I believe I may say—in fact, I will venture to

assert that I have come from the—ahem, ahem!—young lady I apprehend

you speak of. I have been made aware of the—ah, hum!—unfortunate

circumstances. The young lady——.” Here he hitched himself up in his

chair and began to fumble in the skirts of his floating coat. Between

his furs and his feebleness this was a sufficiently lengthy operation

to give time for my hopes to kindle stronger again and my small stock

of patience to fail.

“You are doubtless prepared to hear,” he went on at length, “that

the young lady, being now fully alive to the consequence of

her—her—ill-considered conduct—a girlish freak, sir, a child’s, I

may say!—believes that she will be meeting your wishes, nay, your

express desire, by joining with you in an application to his Holiness

for the immediate annulment of so irregular a marriage.”

“What?” cried I with a roar, leaping from my chair. So occupied had

I been in watching the movements of his hands as he fingered a great

pocket-book, expecting him every instant to produce a letter from her

to me, that I had scarce heeded the drift of his babble till the last

words struck upon my ear.

“Annul our marriage!” I thundered, “at my desire! In the devil’s name,

who are you, and whence come you, for it could not be my wife who has

sent you with such a message to me?”

The little man had jumped, too, at my violence—like a grasshopper. But

my question evidently touched his pride in a sensitive quarter, and

roused him to a sense of offence in which he forgot his tremors.

“Truly, sir, truly, you remind me,” he said tartly. “If you will have

but a little patience, I was in the very act of seeking my credentials

when you so—ahem!—impetuously interrupted me.”

As he spoke, with a skip and a bow, which recalled I know not what

vague memory of a bygone merry hour, he drew forth a folded sheet, and,

unfolding it, presented it to me. I knew the handwriting too well to

doubt its authenticity. How often had I conned and kissed the few poor

lines she had ever written to me; ay, although they had been penned in

her assumed character!

“TO M. DE JENNICO—

“I empower M. de Schreckendorf to act for me in the affair M. de

Jennico wots of, and I agree beforehand to all his arrangements.”

(Thereto the signature.)

Not a word more; not a word of regret, even of anger! The same

implacable, unbending resentment.

I stood staring at the lines, reading them and re-reading them, and

each letter seemed to print itself like fire upon my soul. I heard, as

in a dream, my visitor pour forth further explanations, still in that

tone of injury my roughness had evoked.

“I am myself, sir, a friend. Yes, I may say a friend, an old friend, of

the young lady. Her parents—ahem!—have always reposed confidence in

me. I, sir, am M. de Schreckendorf. The very fact, I should think, of

my being in possession of this letter, of this document”—here there

was a great rattling of stiff parchment—“will assure you, I should

hope, of my identity. Nevertheless, if you wish further proof, I have a

letter to our ambassador in London, and I am willing to accompany you

to his house, or meet you there at your convenience. Indeed, it would

perhaps be more proper and correct, in every way, that the whole matter

should be settled and the documents duly attested at the residence of

the accredited representative of Lusatia. I will not disguise to you

that his Serene Highness, the Duke himself, takes—takes an interest

in the lady, and is desirous of having this business, which so nearly

affects the welfare and credit of a well-known member of his Court,

settled in the promptest and most efficacious manner. A sad escapade,

you must admit yourself!”

And all the while my heart was crying out within me in an agony, “Oh,

Ottilie, how could you, how could you? Was the memory of those days

nothing to you? Is the knowledge of my love and sorrow nothing to you?

Are you a woman, and have you no forgiveness?”

Taking perhaps my silence for acquiescence (for this messenger of

my wife, albeit entrusted with so delicate a mission, was no shrewd

diplomatist), M. de Schreckendorf here spread out with an agreeable

flourish an amazing-looking Latin document with rubrics ready filled

up, it seemed, but for certain spaces left blank, for the names, I

suppose, of the appealing parties.

“I have been led to understand,” pursued he then in tones of greatly

increased confidence, “that you entirely concur in the lady’s desire

for the annulment of this contestable union, the actual legality

of which, indeed, is too doubtful to be worth discussing. From the

religious point of view, however, one of chief importance to my young

friend (I think I may call her so), the matter is otherwise serious,

for there was, no doubt, a sacrament administered by a priest, duly

ordained, but unfortunately, through old age and natural infirmity,

wanting in due prudence, and further misled as to the identity of

one of the contracting persons. A sacrament, sir, there undoubtedly

was; but I am glad to inform you that special leading divines have

been already approached upon the subject, and they give good hope,

sir, good hope, that a properly drawn up petition, supported by the

signatures of the two persons concerned, will meet at Rome with most

favourable consideration. The ecclesiastical part of the difficulty

once settled, the legal one goes of itself.”

I was gradually becoming attentive to the run of his glib speech. I

hardly know now how I contained myself so far, but I kept a rigid

silence, and for yet another minute or two gave him all my ear.

“Such being the case,” he continued, “I need hardly trouble you to

disturb yourself by journeying all the way to London. We need proceed

no farther than Yarmouth, indeed, and there in the presence of two

competent witnesses—I would suggest a priest of our religion and some

neighbouring gentleman of substance—all you will have to do is just

to sign this document. I repeat, I understand that you are naturally

anxious likewise to be delivered from a marriage in which you have

considered yourself aggrieved: and not unnaturally.” Here the little

monster threw a sly look at me, and added: “You were made the victim

of a little deception, eh? Then in the course of a few months—Rome is

always slow, you know—you will both be as free as air! With no more

loss to either of you than the loss of—ahem!—a little inexperience.”

As free as air! _Ottilie as free as air!_ Then it was that the violence

of my wrath overflowed. That moment is a blank to my memory. I only

know that I heard the sound of my own voice ringing with shattering

violence in the room, and I came to myself again to find that, with

a strength my fury alone could have lent, I was shredding the tough

parchment between my fingers, so that the ground was strewn with its

rags. What most restored me to something like composure was the abject

terror of the unlucky messenger, who, huddled away from me in a corner

of the room, was peeping round a chair at me, much as you might see a

monkey caught in mischief. His teeth were chattering! Good anger was

wasted on so miserable an object, and indeed the feelings that swayed

me had had roots in ground such as he could never tread upon.

“Come out, M. de Schreckendorf,” I said, with a calmness which

surprised myself—but there are times when a man’s courage rises with

the very magnitude of a calamity—“you have nothing to fear from me.

You will want an answer to carry back to her that sent you. Take her

this.”