The domain of Wilicza, to which Waldemar Nordeck was heir, was situated
in one of the eastern provinces of the country, and consisted of a vast
agglomeration of estates, whereof the central point was the old castle
Wilicza, with the lands of the same name. To tell how the late Herr
Nordeck obtained possession of this domain, and subsequently won for
himself the hand of a Countess Morynska, would be to add a fresh
chapter to that tale, so oft repeated in our days, of the fall of
ancient families, once rich and influential, and the rise of a
middle-class element which, with the wealth, acquires the power that
was formerly claimed by the nobility as their exclusive privilege.
Count Morynski and his sister were early left orphans, and lived under
the guardianship of their relations. Hedwiga was educated in a convent;
on leaving it, she found that her hand was already disposed of. This
was assuredly nothing unusual in the noble circles to which she
belonged, and the young Countess would have acquiesced unconditionally,
had her destined husband been of equal birth with herself--had he been
one of her own people; but she had been chosen as the instrument to
work out the family plans, which, at all costs, must be carried into
execution.
Some few years ago, in the neighbourhood where lay the property of most
of the Morynski family, a certain Nordeck had arisen--a German, of low
birth, but who had attained to great wealth, and had settled in that
part of the country. The condition of the province at that time made it
easy for a foreign element to graft itself on the soil, whereas, under
ordinary circumstances, every hindrance would have been opposed to it.
The after-throes of the last rebellion, which, though it had actually
broken out beyond the frontier, had awakened a fellow-feeling
throughout the German provinces, made themselves everywhere felt. Half
the nobility had fled, or were impoverished by the sacrifices they had
been eager to make in the cause of their fatherland; it was, therefore,
not difficult for Nordeck to buy up the debt-laden estates at a tithe
of their value, and, by degrees, to obtain possession of a domain which
insured him a position among the first landed proprietors of the
country.
The intruder was, it is true, wanting in breeding, and of most
unprepossessing appearance; moreover, it soon became evident that he
had neither mind nor character to recommend him. Yet his immense
property gave him a weight in the land which was but too speedily
recognised, especially as, with determined hostility to all connected
with the Polish faction, his influence was invariably thrown into the
opposite scale. This may possibly have been his revenge for the fact
that the exclusively aristocratic and Slavonic neighbourhood held him
at a distance, and treated him with unconcealed, nay, very openly
manifested contempt. Whether imprudencies had been committed on the
side of the disaffected, or whether the cunning stranger had played the
spy on his own account, suffice it to say that he gained an insight
into certain party machinations. This made him a most formidable
adversary. To secure his goodwill became a necessity of the situation.
The man must be won over at any cost, and it had long been known that
such winning over was possible. As a millionaire, he was naturally
inaccessible to bribery; his vulnerable point, therefore, was his
vanity, which made him look on an alliance with one of the old noble
Polish families with a favourable eye. Perhaps the circumstance that,
half a century before, Wilicza had been in the possession of the
Morynskis directed the choice to the granddaughter of the last
proprietor; perhaps no other house was ready to offer up a daughter or
a sister, to exact from them the obedience now demanded of the poor
dependent orphan. It flattered the rough _parvenu_ to think that the
hand of a Countess Morynska was within his grasp. A dowry was no object
to him, so he entered into the plan with great zest; and thus, at her
first entrance into the world, Hedwiga found herself face to face with
a destiny against which her whole being revolted.
Her first step was decidedly to refuse compliance; but what availed the
'no' of a girl of seventeen when opposed to a family resolve dictated
by urgent necessity? Commands and threats proving of no effect,
recourse was had to persuasion. The young relation was shown the
brilliant _role_ she would have to play as mistress of Wilicza, the
unlimited ascendancy she would assuredly exercise over a man to whose
level she stooped so low. Much was said of the satisfaction a Morynska
would feel on once more obtaining control over property torn from her
ancestors; much, too, of the pressing need existing of converting the
dreaded adversary into a ductile tool for the furtherance of their own
plans. It was required of her that she should hold Wilicza, and the
enormous revenues at the disposal of its master, in the interests of
her party--and where compulsion had failed, argument succeeded. The
_role_ of a poor relation was by no means to the young Countess's
taste. She was glowing with ambition. The heart's needs and affections
were unknown to her; and when, at sight of her, Nordeck betrayed some
fleeting spark of passion, she too believed that her dominion over him
would be unbounded. So she yielded, and the marriage took place.
But the plans, the selfish calculations of both parties were alike to
be brought to nought. His neighbours had been mistaken in their
estimate of this man. Instead of bowing to his young wife's will, he
now showed himself as lord and master, impervious to all influence,
regardless of her superior rank; his passing fancy for his bride being
soon transformed into hatred when he discovered that she only desired
to make use of him and of his fortune to serve her own ends and those
of her family. The birth of a son made no change in their relations to
each other; if anything, the gulf between husband and wife seemed to be
only widened by it. Nordeck's character was not one to inspire a woman
with esteem; and this woman displayed the contempt she felt for him in
a way that would have stung any man to fury. Fearful scenes ensued;
after one of which the young mistress of Wilicza left the castle, and
fled to her brother for protection.
Little Waldemar, then barely a year old, was left with his father.
Nordeck, enraged at his wife's flight, imperiously demanded her return.
Bronislaus did what he could to protect his sister; and the quarrel
between him and his brother-in-law might have been productive of the
worst consequences, had not death unexpectedly stepped in and loosed
the bonds of this short-lived, but most unhappy, union. Nordeck, who
was a keen and reckless sportsman, met with an accident while out
hunting. His horse fell with its rider, and the latter sustained
injuries to which he shortly after succumbed; but on his deathbed he
had strength enough, both of mind and body, to dictate a will excluding
his wife from all share alike in his fortune and in the education of
his child. Her flight from his house gave him the right so to exclude
her, and he used it unsparingly. Waldemar was entrusted to the
guardianship of an old school friend and distant connection, and the
latter was endowed with unbounded authority. The widow tried, indeed,
to resist; but the new guardian proved his friendship to the dead man
by carrying out the provisions of the will with utter disregard to her
feelings, and rejected all her claims. Already owner of Altenhof,
Witold had no intention of remaining at Wilicza, or of leaving his ward
behind him there. He took the boy with him to his own home. Nordeck's
latest instructions had been to the effect that his son was to be
entirely removed from his mother's influence and family; and these
instructions were so strictly observed that, during the years of his
minority, the young heir only paid a few flying visits to his estates,
always in the company of his guardian. All his youth was spent at
Altenhof.
As for the enormous revenues of Wilicza, of which at present no use
could be made, they were suffered to accumulate, and went to swell the
capital; so that Waldemar Nordeck, on coming of age, found himself in
possession of wealth such as but few indeed could boast.
The future lord of Wilicza's mother lived on at first in the house of
her brother, who meanwhile had also married; but she did not long
remain there. One of the Count's most intimate friends, Prince
Baratowski, fell passionately in love with the young, clever, and
beautiful widow, who, so soon as the year of her mourning was out,
bestowed her hand upon him. This second marriage was in all respects a
happy one. People said, indeed, that the Prince, though a gallant
gentleman, was not of a very energetic temperament, and that he bowed
submissively to his wife's sceptre. However this may have been, he
loved both her and the son she bore him, tenderly and devotedly.
But the happiness of this union was not long to remain untroubled. This
time, however, the storms came from without. Leo was still a child when
that revolutionary epoch arrived which set half Europe in a blaze. The
rebellion, so often quelled, broke out with renewed violence in the
Polish provinces. Morynski and Baratowski were true sons of their
fatherland. They threw themselves with ardent enthusiasm into the
struggle from which they hoped the salvation of their country and the
restoration of its greatness. The insurrection ended, as so many of its
predecessors had ended, in hopeless defeat. It was forcibly suppressed,
and on this occasion much severity was displayed towards the rebel
districts. Prince Baratowski and his brother-in-law fled to Paris,
whither their wives and children followed them. Countess Morynska, a
delicate, fragile woman, did not long endure the sojourn in a foreign
land. She died in the following year, and Bronislaus then gave his
child into his sister's charge. He himself could no longer bear to stay
in Paris, where everything reminded him of the wife he had loved so
ardently, and lost. He lived a restless, wandering life, roving from
place to place, returning every now and then to see his daughter. At
last, an amnesty being proclaimed, he was free to go back to his native
country, where, through the death of a relation, he had lately
succeeded to the estate of Rakowicz. He now settled down on his new
property. Matters stood far otherwise with Prince Baratowski, who was
excluded from the amnesty. He had been one of the leaders of the
rebellion, and had taken a prominent part in the movement. Return was
not to be thought of for him, and his wife and son shared his exile,
until his death removed all barriers, and they too became free to make
their future home where they would.