DISQUIETING NEWS
I stared at the man incredulously.
"Herr Pendennis has departed, and the Fraulein has not been here at
all!" I repeated. "You must be mistaken, man! The Fraulein was to arrive
here on Monday, at about this time."
He protested that he had spoken the truth, and summoned the manager,
who confirmed the information.
Yes, Herr Pendennis had been unfortunately indisposed, but the
sickness had not been so severe as to necessitate that the so
charming and dutiful Fraulein should hasten to him. He had a telegram
received,--doubtless from the Fraulein herself,--and thereupon with much
haste departed. He drove to the Friedrichstrasse station, but that was
all that was known of his movements. Two letters had arrived for Miss
Pendennis, which her father had taken, and there was also a telegram,
delivered since he left.
Both father and daughter, it seemed, were well known at the hotel, where
they always stayed during their frequent visits to the German capital.
I was keenly disappointed. Surely some malignant fate was intervening
between Anne and myself, determined to keep us apart. Why had she
discontinued her journey; and had she returned to England,--to the
Cayleys? If not, where was she now? Unanswerable questions, of course.
All I could do was to possess my soul in patience, and hope for tidings
when I reached my destination. And meanwhile, by breaking my journey
here, for the sole purpose of seeing her, I had incurred a delay of
twelve hours.
One thing at least was certain,--her father could not have left Berlin
for the purpose of meeting her _en route_, or he would not have
started from the Friedrichstrasse station.
With a rush all the doubts and perplexities that I had kept at bay, even
since I received Anne's post-card, re-invaded my mind; but I beat them
back resolutely. I would not allow myself to think, to conjecture.
I moped around aimlessly for an hour or two, telling myself that Berlin
was the beastliest hole on the face of the earth. Never had time dragged
as it did that morning! I seemed to have been at a loose end for a
century or more by noon, when I found myself opposite the entrance of
the Astoria Restaurant.
"When in difficulties--feed," Jim Cayley had counselled, and a long
lunch would kill an hour or so, anyhow.
I had scarcely settled myself at a table when a man came along and
clapped me on the shoulder.
"Wynn, by all that's wonderful. What are you doing here, old fellow?"
It was Percy Medhurst, a somewhat irresponsible, but very decent
youngster, whom I had seen a good deal of in London, one way and
another. He was a clerk in the British Foreign Office, but I hadn't the
least idea that he had been sent to Berlin. He had dined at the Cayleys
only a week or two back.
"I'm feeding--or going to feed. What are you doing here?" I responded,
as we shook hands. I was glad to see him. Even his usually frivolous
conversation was preferable to my own meditations at the moment.
"Just transferred, regular stroke of luck. Only got here last night;
haven't reported myself for duty yet. I say, old chap, you look rather
hipped. What's up?"
"Hunger," I answered laconically. "And I guess that's easily remedied.
Come and join me."
We talked of indifferent matters for a time, or rather he did most of
the talking.
"Staying long?" he asked at last, as we reached the coffee and liqueur
stage. We had done ourselves very well, and I, at least, felt in a much
more philosophic frame of mind than I had done for some hours past.
"No, only a few hours. I'm _en route_ for Petersburg."
"What luck; wish I was. Berlin's all right, of course, but a bit stodgy;
and they're having a jolly lot of rows at Petersburg,--with more to
come. I say, though, what an awful shame about that poor chap Carson.
Have you heard of it?"
"Yes; I'm going to take his place. What do you know about him, anyhow?"
"You are? I didn't know him at all; but I know a fellow who was awfully
thick with him. Met him just now. He's frightfully cut up about it all.
Swears he'll hunt down the murderer sooner or later--"
"Von Eckhardt? Is he here?" I ejaculated.
"Yes. D'you know him? An awfully decent chap,--for a German; though he's
always spouting Shakespeare, and thinks me an ass, I know, because I
tell him I've never read a line of him, not since I left Bradfield,
anyhow. Queer how these German johnnies seem to imagine Shakespeare
belongs to them! You should have heard him just now!
'He was my friend, faithful and just to me,'
--and raving about his heart being in the coffin with Caesar; suppose he
meant Carson. 'Pon my soul I could hardly keep a straight face; but I
daren't laugh. He was in such deadly earnest."
I cut short these irrelevant comments on Von Eckhardt's verbal
peculiarities, with which I was perfectly familiar.
"How long's he here for?"
"Don't know. Rather think, from what he said, that he's chucked up his
post on the _Zeitung_--"
"What on earth for?"
"How should I know? I tell you he's as mad as a hatter."
"Wonder where I'd be likely to find him; not at the _Zeitung_ office, if
he's left. I must see him this afternoon. Do you know where he hangs
out, Medhurst?"
"With his people, I believe; somewhere in Charlotten Strasse or
thereabouts. I met him mooning about in the Tiergarten this morning."
I called a waiter and sent him for a directory. There were scores of Von
Eckhardts in it, and I decided to go to the _Zeitung_ office, and
ascertain his address there.
Medhurst volunteered to walk with me.
"How are the Cayleys?" he asked, as we went along. "Thought that
handsome Miss Pendennis was going to stay with them all the summer. By
Jove, she is a ripper. You were rather gone in that quarter, weren't
you, Wynn?"
I ignored this last remark.
"How did you know Miss Pendennis had left?" I asked, with assumed
carelessness.
"Why? Because I met her at Ostend on Sunday night, to be sure. I
week-ended there, you know. Thought I'd have a private bit of a spree,
before I had to be officially on the _Spree_."
He chuckled at the futile pun.
"You saw Anne Pendennis at Ostend. Are you certain it was she?" I
demanded.
"Of course I am. She looked awfully fetching, and gave me one of her
most gracious bows--"
"You didn't speak to her?" I pursued, throwing away the cigarette I had
been smoking. My teeth had met in the end of it as I listened to this
news.
My ingenuous companion seemed embarrassed by the question.
"Well, no; though I'd have liked to. But--fact is, I--well, of course, I
wasn't alone, don't you know; and though she was a jolly little
girl--she--I couldn't very well have introduced her to Miss Pendennis.
Anyhow, I shouldn't have had the cheek to speak to her; she was with an
awfully swagger set. Count Loris Solovieff was one of 'em. He's really
the Grand Duke Loris, you know, though he prefers to go about incog.
more often than not. He was talking to Miss Pendennis. Here's the
office. I won't come in. Perhaps I'll turn up and see you off to-night.
If I don't, good-bye and good luck; and thanks awfully for the lunch."
I was thankful to be rid of him. I dare not question him further. I
could not trust myself to do so; for his words had summoned that black
horde of doubts to the attack once more, and this time they would not
be vanquished.
Small wonder that I had not found Anne Pendennis at Berlin! What was she
doing at Ostend, in company with "a swagger set" that included a Russian
Grand Duke? I had heard many rumors concerning this Loris, whom I had
never seen; rumors that were the reverse of discreditable to him. He was
said to be different from most of his illustrious kinsfolk, inasmuch
that he was an enthusiastic disciple of Tolstoy, and had been dismissed
from the Court in disgrace, on account of his avowed sympathy with the
revolutionists.
But what connection could he have with Anne Pendennis?
And she,--she! Were there any limits to her deceit, her dissimulation?
She was a traitress certainly; perhaps a murderess.
And yet I loved her, even now. I think even more bitter than my
disillusion was the conviction that I must still love her, though I had
lost her--forever!