Debit and Credit Part 44

"Ah! it is useless to speak to him!" cried Bernhard, in deepest distress; "he does not even understand my words."

"I will understand every thing," gasped out Ehrenthal, "if you will only give me back your hand."

"Will you relinquish your plan about the estate?" asked Bernhard.

"Speak not of the estate," besought the old man.

"In vain!" murmured Bernhard, turning away and hiding his face in his hands.

Ehrenthal sat by him annihilated and sighing deeply. "Hear me, my son,"

said he, at length; "I will see if I can not get him another estate that he can buy with his remaining means. Do you hear me, my son Bernhard?"

"Go!" cried Bernhard, without anger, but with the energy of intense grief. "Go, and leave me alone!"

Ehrenthal rose and left the room, walking up and down vehemently in the next, wringing his hands, and talking to himself. Then he opened the door, approaching Bernhard's bed, and asked, in a piteous voice, "Wilt thou not give me thy hand, my son?" But Bernhard lay silent, with averted face.

It was with a beating heart that Anton, two days later, gave his name to the baron's servant.

"Wohlfart!" cried the baron, and the recollection of the letter returned disagreeably to him; "bring him in." He met Anton's low bow rather coolly. "I am obliged to you," said he, "for a letter lately received, and you must excuse my having, on account of much business on hand, left it unanswered."

"If," began Anton, "I now take the liberty of calling with reference to the same subject, I implore you not to look upon it as intrusive. I come here charged with a message from a friend of mine who feels the most devoted respect for you and your family. He is the son of Ehrenthal the merchant. He himself is prevented from waiting upon you by illness, and therefore implores you, through me, to make use of the influence he possesses with his father. In the event of your thinking it probable that he may be of use, may I request you to communicate your wishes to him?"

The baron listened eagerly. Now, when every thing forsook him upon which he had himself relied, strangers began to interfere with his fate--this Itzig, for instance, and Wohlfart, and now Ehrenthal's son. "I know but little of the young man," said he, with reserve; "I must request you, first of all, to explain to me how I happen to have the honor of exciting such an unusual amount of interest in his mind."

Anton replied with some warmth "Bernhard Ehrenthal has a n.o.ble heart, and his life is stainless. Having grown up among his books, he understands little or nothing of his father's business matters, but he is under the impression that the latter is led on by wicked advisers to act the part of an enemy toward you. He has influence over his father--his fine sense of rect.i.tude is much disturbed--and he ardently wishes to hold back a parent from proceedings which he himself considers dishonorable."

Here was help. It was a breath of fresh air piercing through the choking atmosphere of a sick-room; but the fresh air made the patient uncomfortable. These honorable men, so ready to condemn all that did not approve itself to their own sense of honor, had become distressing to the baron. At all events, he would not expose himself to this Wohlfart--the very essence, no doubt, of scrupulous conscientiousness.

And, accordingly, he replied with affected cordiality, "My relations to the father of your friend are precisely such as might be facilitated by the kindly intervention of one mutually interested in us both. Whether young Ehrenthal, however, be the proper person, I can not decide.

Meanwhile, tell him that I am grateful for his sympathy, and that I purpose calling upon him at his own time to consult him on the subject."

Upon which announcement Anton rose, the baron accompanying him to the door, and, wonderful to say, making him a low bow.

It was the result of no accident that, as Anton pa.s.sed through the ante-chamber, Lenore should enter it. "Mr. Wohlfart!" she cried, with delight, and hurried to him. "Dear young lady!" cried he; and they met as old friends.

They forgot their interval of separation; they were as of old, partners in the dance. Both said how much they had altered since then, and while they said so, all the intervening years dropped off unperceived from each.

"You wear upright collars again," cried Lenore, with a slightly reproachful voice. Anton instantly turned them down.

"Have you got the hood you then wore? It was lined with red silk, and it became you exquisitely."

"My present hood is lined with blue," said Lenore, laughing. "And only think, the little Countess Lara is to be married next week! She and I were talking of you not long ago; and Eugene, too, has written to us about you. How enchanting, that you should have become acquainted with my brother! Come this way, Mr. Wohlfart; I must hear how the time has pa.s.sed with you." She led him into the drawing-room, and made him sit by her on the sofa, looking at him with those smiling eyes, whose light used formerly to make him so happy. Much in him had changed since then; perhaps another maiden occupied his imagination now; but when he looked upon the mistress of his early youth, the wild, high-spirited girl matured into the n.o.ble and graceful woman, all the feelings of the past revived, and he breathed with rapture the perfumed air of the elegant saloon.

"Now that I see you," said Lenore, "it seems to me as if our dancing-lessons had only been yesterday. That was a pleasant time for me too. Since then I have had much sorrow," added she, drooping her head.

Anton lamented this with a fervor which made her look up brightly again.

"What has brought you to my father?" inquired she, at length, in an altered tone.

Anton spoke of Bernhard, of his long sickness, and deep regard for her family, not concealing that she herself was the chief cause of it, which made her look down, and fold the corners of her handkerchief together.

"If you can find a way of recommending your father to use Bernhard's influence, do so. I can not get rid of a fear that there is a conspiracy carrying on against him in Ehrenthal's office. Perhaps you will find means of letting Bernhard or me know how we can best be useful."

Lenore looked mournfully in Anton's face, and moved nearer to him. "You are to me like an old friend, and I can trust my sorrows to you. My father conceals the cause of his anxiety from my mother and me, but he is sadly changed the last few years. This factory requires much money, and he is often without any, I am sure. My mother and I pray daily that peace may be restored to us--a happy time like that when I first became acquainted with you. As soon as I can discover any thing, I will write to you," said she, with firm resolve; "and when Eugene comes home on leave, he will seek you out."

Thus Anton left the baron's house, excited by his meeting with his fair friend, and full of anxiety to serve the whole family. At the house door he stumbled upon Ehrenthal, who, in return for his distant bow, called after him to come very soon again to see his son Bernhard.

Ehrenthal had spent a miserable day. He had never, in the whole course of his life, sighed or shaken his head so much before. It was in vain that his wife, Sidonia, asked her daughter, "What ails the man, that he sighs so deeply?" It was in vain that Itzig sought to cheer his master's spirits by drawing glowing pictures of the future. All the dissatisfaction in Ehrenthal's breast exploded against his book-keeper.

"It was you who advised me to take these steps against the baron," he screamed at him on the morning after his scene with Bernhard. "Do you know what you are? You are a good for nothing fellow." Itzig shrugged his shoulders, and returned an ironical reply, which made Ehrenthal glad to bury his head in the newspaper. Longer than two days he could not endure the sight of the sorrow of his son, who got visibly worse, and only answered his father in monosyllables. "I must make a sacrifice,"

said Ehrenthal to himself. "I must give back sleep to his eyes, and put an end to his groaning. I will remember my son; and I will get the baron the Rosmin property, or I will save the money that he has invested in it, without any profit for myself. I shall lose in that way, for I might have arranged with Lowenberg so as to gain more than a thousand dollars.

I think this will please my Bernhard." And putting his hat firmly on his head, as if to crush down all rebellious thoughts, he entered the dwelling of his debtor.

The baron received his unexpected visitor with breathless terror. "The warner is scarcely gone when the enemy arrives," thought he. "He is come to require the legal surrender of the mortgage."

But what was his relief when Ehrenthal of his own accord politely requested that he might go to Rosmin on the baron's behalf, and take the necessary steps. "I will employ as my coadjutor a safe man--the Commissary Walter--so that you may see that all is done legally. You will give me authority to bid for the property, and to raise it thus to such a sum as shall insure your mortgage being covered by the purchase-money that some other will pay."

"I know that this will be necessary," said the baron; "but, for G.o.d's sake, Ehrenthal, what will be done if the property remains upon our hands!"

Ehrenthal shrugged his shoulders. "You know that I did not persuade you into the mortgage; indeed, I may say, if I remember aright, that I even dissuaded you from it. If you had taken my advice then, you would probably never have bought that mortgage."

"The thing is done, however," returned the baron, irascibly.

"First of all, baron, I must beg you to admit that I am innocent of this matter."

"That is immaterial now."

"It is immaterial to you," said Ehrenthal, "but not to me, and to my honor as a man of business."

"What do you mean by that?" cried the baron, in a tone that made Ehrenthal start. "Do you dare to insinuate that any thing can be immaterial to me about which even your honor is sensitive?"

"Why are you so irritable, baron? I say nothing against your honor G.o.d forbid that I should."

"You spoke of it, though," said the unhappy man.

"How can you thus misunderstand an old acquaintance? I only wish for your declaration that I am innocent of the purchase of this mortgage."

"Be it so," cried the baron, stamping.

"Then it is all right. And should a misfortune befall us, and you be obliged to purchase the property, we will see what can be done. It is a bad time to lend money; but still I will advance you a sum in return for a mortgage on the property."

He then proceeded to make arrangements for his departure as the baron's representative, and left him a prey to conflicting emotions.

Was he saved? was he lost? A fear came over him that this mortgage would decide his fate. He resolved to go to Rosmin himself, and not leave matters to Ehrenthal. But then came the painful thought that he must needs repose unlimited trust in this man, lest the man learn to mistrust him, and so he drifted here and there in a sea of dangers. The waves rose and threatened his very life.

That evening Ehrenthal entered his son's sick-room, and placed the newly-executed doc.u.ment on his bed. "Canst thou give me thy hand now?"

said he to his son, who looked gloomily before him. "I am to travel for the baron. I am to buy him a new estate. We have settled it all together. Here is his signature authorizing me to act for him. I am to advance him capital; if he is wise, he may again become a man of substance."

Bernhard looked sorrowfully at his father, and shook his head. "That is not enough, my poor father," said he.

"But I am reconciled to the baron, and he has himself confessed that I am not to blame for his misfortunes. Is not that enough, my son?"

"No," said the invalid; "so long as you keep that wicked man Itzig in your office, no joy can shine in on my life."