Clear the Track! Part 16

As she spoke, her eye involuntarily sought the desk, above which a large photograph took the main place on the wall. Some sweet yet painful memory must have been linked to that picture, for it was decorated by a mourning veil of black c.r.a.pe, and below it was a bowl full of sweet violets, that seemed like a sacrificial offering.

That glance did not escape the doctor's sharp eyes. As though accidentally he stepped up to the desk and began to inspect the likenesses to be found there, while he dryly remarked:

"Every man has his troubles, but they are far better borne with good-humor than with wailing and mourning. Ah! there is the picture of the little lady--very like! And her brother by her side--remarkable, that he does not resemble his father in the least. Whom does that photograph represent?" He pointed to the picture draped in mourning.

This unexpected question seemed to embarra.s.s Leonie, she blushed faintly and answered with a somewhat unsteady voice:

"A--a relation."

"Your brother, perhaps?"

"No, a cousin--quite a distant relation."

"Ah, indeed?" drawled Hagenbach.

The remote relation seemed to interest him, he examined very narrowly the features of the very pale and lank young man, with sleek hair and eyes romantically upturned, and then continued in an indifferent tone:

"That face has a familiar look to me. I must have seen it before somewhere."

"You are in error as to that." Leonie's voice quivered perceptibly. "It has been long since he was counted among the living. He has lain in his grave for years: the hot deserts of Africa."

"Heaven rest his soul!" said the doctor with provoking equanimity. "But what took him to Africa and into the desert? Did he go as an explorer perhaps?"

"No, he died a martyr to a holy cause. He had attached himself to a mission to the heathen, and succ.u.mbed to the climate."

"I can only say he might have done a cleverer thing!"

Leonie, who had just carried her handkerchief to her eyes, overcome with emotion, stopped, utterly shocked at his lack of feeling:

"Doctor!"

"Yes, I cannot help thinking so. Miss Friedberg. I deem it very superfluous, in the first place, to be going away off to Africa to convert the black heathen, while so many white heathens, are roving around here in Germany, who know nothing of Christianity, although they are baptized. If your cousin had preached the Word of G.o.d, as a well-installed pastor to his own people----"

"He was not a minister, but a teacher," the angry lady managed to put in.

"Never mind; then, emphatically, he should have taught the dear school-boys the fear of G.o.d and flogged them into it, too, if needful.

Cla.s.ses have little enough of that nowadays."

Leonie's face betrayed the indignation she felt at this mode of expression, but reply was spared her, however, for at this moment came a timid knock at the door, and immediately afterwards Dagobert entered, but was hardly allowed to pay his respects to the lady; his uncle calling out to him, in his threatening voice, just as soon as he laid eyes on him:

"No English lesson to-day. Miss Friedberg has just declared that she is 'nervous through and through,' and nerves and grammar do not agree."

The young man must have valued this instruction highly, for he was quite shocked at this announcement. But Leonie said most positively:

"I beg pardon, stay, dear Dagobert! Our English studies are not to suffer from my bad feelings, we shall have our accustomed lesson. I'll go for our books." So saying, she got up and went into the next room.

The doctor, with a vexed look, followed her with his eyes. "I never did have such a contrary patient! Always the embodiment of contradiction!

Hark ye, Dagobert, you are tolerably well-informed--what sort of a man is the one hanging yonder?"

"Hanging? Wh.o.r.e?" asked the horror-stricken Dagobert, while, shuddering, he looked across at the trees in the park.

"Why, you need not be thinking directly of a rope," said his uncle. "I mean that picture over the desk, with the crazy decoration of c.r.a.pe and violets."

"It is a relative of Miss Friedberg, a cousin----"

"Yes, indeed, quite a remote one! She has told me that, too, but I know she must have been engaged to him. Tiresome enough he looks to have been. Do you know his name, perhaps?"

"Miss Friedberg told it to me once--Engelbert."

"So the man was named Engelbert, too!" cried the excited doctor. "The name is just as sentimental as that unbearable face. Engelbert and Leonie--they match splendidly together! How the two would have sat and cooed together like a pair of turtle-doves!"

"He is dead, poor man!" remarked Dagobert.

"Was not of much account in life," growled Hagenbach, "and does not seem to have had specially good nourishment either, before he hied him to the desert. What a wretched woe-begone face it is! I must away now, give my compliments to Miss Friedberg. Much satisfaction may you get out of your 'nervous' English hour."

So saying the doctor picked up hat and cane and left. Ill-humoredly he descended the stairs, that sentimental "man of the desert" seemed to have thoroughly spoiled his temper. Suddenly he stood still.

"I have seen that face somewhere else, I stick to that, but strange--it looked entirely different!"

With this oracular remark he shook his head with a puzzled look and left the house.

The weather out of doors did not indeed look very inviting, being one of those cold, stormy spring-days, such as occur so frequently in the mountains. It is true the landscape no longer wore the bleak, wintry aspect that it had done a few weeks before, the trees having already decked themselves in fresh green, while the first flowers were blossoming in the meadows and fields, but this blooming and growing went forward only slowly, because sunshine was lacking.

Dark ma.s.ses of cloud chased each other over the face of the sky, the rustling tree-tops bent before the wind, but this did not trouble the young girl, who, with light step, hurried forward on a narrow path through the woods.

Maia knew, to be sure, that her father did not approve of her taking such long walks unattended, but in the beginning she had confined her stroll to the park-limits, then Puck darted across the meadows and she after him, and then he went into the woods only a little distance, but it was so beautiful there under the murmuring pines, it enticed her on and on into the green solitude. What delight, to be, for once, so entirely alone, running races with the barking Puck, as if for a wager!

Absorbed in this pleasure, Maia forgot entirely about the way back, until rather rudely reminded of it.

The dark clouds, which had been already threatening the whole day long, seemed finally to determine to fulfill their promise, for it began to rain, at first softly, then harder and harder, until there poured such torrents from the sky as accompany a regular thunder-storm.

Maia had taken refuge beneath a huge fir-tree, but found protection there only for the moment. It did not last long, on account of the dripping and trickling from every limb; she stood as though under the eaves of a roof, and the heavens grew ever darker. It was no quickly pa.s.sing shower, so there was nothing for it but to run as fast as possible to the little lodge, only a quarter of a mile away, that offered a secure shelter. No sooner thought than done! The young girl rushed along over stick and stone, on the wet mossy soil, between dripping trees, finally, across a clearing in the forest, where wind and rain a.s.sailed her with full force, until, at last, breathless and thoroughly drenched, she found herself, with her four-footed companion, in a dry spot where they could bid defiance to the storm.

This lodge belonged to the forestry equipment at Odensburg, but was almost a half league from it, in the midst of the woods. In winter-time, when deep snow had fallen, they fed the hungry game here and also stored food for their cattle.

It was a small building constructed of boards and the trunks of trees joined together, with a water-tight roof and two low windows, now in the spring empty and unused, but a welcome place of refuge for the two fugitives.

Maia shook herself, so that the drops splashed in all directions. The rain had not hurt her waterproof at all, although it poured out of its folds, but her pretty hat, which she now took from her head, was so much the worse treated. The dainty thing, with its feathers and lace, was now nothing but a shapeless ma.s.s, and Puck did not look much better. His white coat was dripping, and its usually long silky hairs were hanging down in wet strands, giving him such a comically disconsolate look, that his young mistress laughed aloud.

"Only look, Puck! what a thing we have made of it!" said she in mock despair. "Why were we not sensible enough to stay in the park! How we do look, and how papa will scold! But you are to blame, you were the first to run off to the woods. Thank G.o.d, that at least we have a dry spot to sit in, else both of us would have been washed down to Radefeld, and Egbert would have had to fish us out."

She hurled the utterly spoiled hat upon the low bench that lined the wall on one side, seated herself and looked through the little window out upon the tempest. The rain was still coming down in torrents, and the wind howled around the lodge as though it would like to demolish it. Return home at present was not to be thought of. Mala yielded to the inevitable, drew the hood of her waterproof over her head, and watched Puck, who had stuck his nose through the small opening made by the door being left slightly ajar, and discontentedly followed with his eyes the falling drops.

Just then there appeared on the verge of the forest a person, who stood still for a moment and cast a searching glance around, but then started at a running pace over the clearing, straightway to the forest lodge.

Now it was reached by the stranger, who was evidently likewise a fugitive from the storm, with a bold leap he cleared the little lake that had already been formed in front of the door, and kicked this open so violently, the inquisitive Puck was driven back by the shock. But then, with a loud bark, he rushed upon the intruder, who thus presumed to contest the sole possession of the house with himself and his mistress.

"Not so fierce, you little yelper!" cried the stranger, laughing. "Are you the lord and master in this enchanted cottage, or is it that little gray dryad cowering over yonder on that bench?"

He had stooped down to grasp the little animal, that quickly eluded him and took refuge in the corner, whence was now heard a suppressed laugh and a thin little voice saying: