Dame Care Part 14

For two days more the white was to be seen there--then it disappeared altogether.

On Sunday morning he took the book of poems out of his box and went with it towards the wood. At dinner-time he was still absent, and in the evening the twins, who were playing at hide-and-seek on the heath, found him whistling under a juniper-bush with the tears streaming down his cheeks.

Thus he translated the "Buch der Lieder" into his own language.

A short time afterwards he heard that Mrs. Douglas had been ordered by the doctor to make a prolonged stay in the South, and that Elsbeth would accompany her thither.

"It is all right so," he said to himself. "She will no longer haunt me, then." For a long time he was uncertain whether to send her book back or not; he would have liked to keep it, but his conscience would not allow him. He waited for a favorable opportunity of returning it till he heard that they had gone. Then he was satisfied.

CHAPTER IX.

Five years pa.s.sed away; five years full of care and trouble.

Paul toiled and moiled; he worked from early morning till late at night; his busy hands were occupied with every sort of labor, and whatever he touched throve. But he scarcely noticed this, for his mind was always taken up with the future.

The same lines of care were on his brow at all times; his eyes were cast down with the same thoughtful brooding expression as if he were looking into his own soul, and often days would pa.s.s without his having spoken a single word either at his work or at table.

He went about with the conviction that in reality all his labor was hopeless. He never could reckon on his father's grat.i.tude, and he soon learned to do without it; but it was more difficult to have patience when a whim of his father's spoiled in one hour what he had been working at with great trouble for many weeks.

When his father came home from his journeys it was not seldom that he called him a simpleton and a blockhead in the hearing of the servants, and would complain bitterly at being obliged to leave his farm in hands as incapable as his, when his duty--n.o.body knew what that duty was--called him away.

Paul was silent at such times, for deep in his heart he kept the commandment: "HONOR thy father and thy mother"--"his father for his mother's sake;" so he had reconstructed it. But his eyes pa.s.sed with a sombre, searching gaze from one servant to the other, and whomever he caught smiling or nudging his neighbor in secret malice he dismissed next morning.

There was one of the farm-servants who had been working almost the whole time at the Howdahs. His name was Michel Raudszus, and he came from Littau. He lived in a miserable hovel not far from Helenenthal, the walls of which were surrounded by piles of turf, so that the storms should not blow it down. He had a slatternly wife who had already been in prison twice, and who sent her children out to beg.

He was a silent, surly fellow, who did his work faultlessly and went off without grumbling when he was not wanted any more, but appeared again punctually as soon as there was fresh work. Paul did not like him at first, he was so laconic and reserved, and his sullen behavior had made an uncomfortable impression upon him; but then it suddenly occurred to him that he behaved in much the same way himself, and from that hour he had begun to like him heartily.

Even his father seemed to have a certain amount of respect for him, for though, when drunk, he used to beat the servants, he had never attempted to touch him. It seemed as if the look which the man cast at him from underneath his bushy brows kept him at bay.

This servant was Paul's most faithful helper. He could even trust him to sell the grain in the market, for he always knew how to get the highest prices.

Imperceptibly a great change had come over the silent Howdahs in these five years. The traces of poverty became more and more rare, and want was less often their guest at table. In the garden, where were pretty flower-beds, the pease and asparagus stood in long rows, and the defective fence had long since been replaced by a new one. The cattle were augmented every year by two or three valuable milking cows, and the milk-cart which drove into the town every morning brought home many a groschen on the first of the month.

That there was no sign of any comfort yet in spite of all this was entirely the fault of his father, who speculated with the greater part of their earnings when he did not spend it in drink.

Paul had secretly contrived that a few thalers at least were saved for his brothers and sisters every month.

His brothers needed money more than ever. Max had pa.s.sed his last examination, and was now beginning his first year's tutorship at college without salary; and Gottfried, the clerk, was out of situation for several months every year. The two wrote begging letters in every possible key, from the jovial "Fork me out thirty thalers immediately,"

to the heartrending supplication, "If you don't want me to be ruined, have mercy," etc.

Paul pa.s.sed many a sleepless night thinking how to help them, and it frequently happened that he deprived himself of something necessary so as to be able to send them the money.

Once Gottfried had written that he had no decent clothes and urgently needed a summer suit. Paul just wanted a summer suit himself, for he had outgrown his old one; sighing, he put the money which he had saved up for himself into an envelope and sent it to his brother; but in the letter accompanying it he mentioned that he was not less reduced in his wardrobe than himself. His brother showed himself magnanimous, and a fortnight later sent him a parcel of clothes and a letter, in which he said: "I enclose an old suit of mine. You, in your humble position, will probably be able to use it still."

Paul had also enabled the twins to have a better education than was to be expected from the very reduced circ.u.mstances of his home. He had urged the vicar's wife, who had formerly been a governess, to take them into the private school which she had established for the daughters of well-to-do landowners from the neighboring villages.

The money for the schooling was not the worst of it, and he could manage also to procure their books and copy-books; but it was difficult, very difficult, to keep them nicely dressed, for his pride would not allow his sisters to be behind their friends, and perhaps to be considered as beggar children.

He himself knew too well the feeling of being looked down upon to let his sisters experience the same.

His mother did not offer him any help even in these little feminine cares. She was so much cowed by her husband's abuse that she lacked the courage to buy the smallest trifle on her own responsibility.

"What you do, my son, is sure to be right," she said, and Paul drove to town and was cheated, both by the draper and the dress-maker.

The twins grew up blooming, careless, and saucily merry, without the faintest idea what a tragedy was being enacted in their immediate neighborhood. At ten years old they romped and fought with the village boys, at twelve they went with them to steal pears, and at fifteen graciously accepted bunches of violets from them.

They were known far and wide as the most beautiful girls of the neighborhood. Paul knew this well, and was not a little proud of it; but what he did not know was that they had rendezvous behind the garden fence, and that half the boys who were to be confirmed with them could boast of having kissed their sweet red lips.

CHAPTER X.

It was in the month of June on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

Trumpet music sounded softly out of the wood. A great festival was to be held there to-day. A wandering band had consented to be hired to give a concert. The country people had come from far and wide, and even the squires had not refused to partic.i.p.ate in it, for such a thing did not often happen in this quiet part of the world.

Since the middle of the day a long row of carriages had pa.s.sed the Haidehof, and old Meyerhofer, who did not like staying at home when anything was going on, had suddenly been overcome by a fit of kindness, and called out to his womenfolk to get ready as quickly as possible; he would sacrifice himself and take them to the festivity.

The twins, who had already for a long time been standing at the window, looking out with eager sparkling eyes, broke out into a loud demonstration of joy. Frau Elsbeth gave them a quiet smile and turned to Paul, who sat silently in his corner and went on cutting little sticks to tie up the flowers, as if all this did not concern him at all. "Will you not come, too?" she asked.

"Paul can drive," cried Meyerhofer, carelessly.

He thanked them and said that his coat was too shabby, and also he wanted to look after the workmen, who were to come at sunset. The next morning haymaking was to begin.

The twins looked at him, laid their heads together, and giggled; then, when he went towards the door, they hung round him, and Katie whispered,

"Listen; we know something."

"Well, what is it?"

"Something nice," said Greta, mysteriously.

"Out with it."

"Elsbeth Douglas has come home again."

And breaking out into merry laughter they ran away.

Paul at first felt very angry that they dared to mock him; then he sighed and smiled, and wondered why his heart had suddenly begun to beat so loudly.

Half an hour later his family drove away.