Erlach Court Part 40

"To be sure. I did not think of that," the young man replies, examining the fan. "'S. O.' beneath a coronet."

"Sophie Oblonsky," says Stella.

"Of course,--the Oblonsky." The attache is seized with a fit of merriment on the instant. "The Oblonsky,--the woman who had an affair with Rohritz long ago. She seemed to me this evening to have a strong desire to throw her chains about him afresh, but"--with a significant glance at the fan--"Rohritz evidently had no inclination to gratify her. Hm! she must have been in a bad humour,--the worthy Princess!" The attache laughs softly to himself, then suddenly a.s.sumes a grave, composed air, remembering that he is with a young girl, before whom such things as he has alluded to should be forbidden subjects and his merriment suppressed. He glances at Stella. No need to worry himself; she does not look in the least horrified: her white teeth just show between her red lips, merry dimples play about the corners of her mouth, and her eyes sparkle like black stars.

She really does not understand how five minutes ago she could have wished the poor attache at the North Pole. She now thinks him extremely amusing and amiable. She feels so well, too,--so very well. Is it possible that there may be no evil omen for her in the loss of her bracelet? Nevertheless, try as she may to hope that it may be averted, a shiver of anxiety thrills her at the recollection of her lost amulet.

"If the ball were only over!" she thinks.

CHAPTER x.x.xVIII.

FOUND AT LAST.

The hour of rest before the cotillon has come; the dancing-room is almost empty. Only a few gentlemen are selecting the places which they wish reserved for themselves and their partners, and a couple of lackeys are clearing away from this battlefield of pleasure the trophies left behind, of late engagements, shreds of tulle and tarlatan, artificial and natural flowers, here and there a torn glove, etc. Edgar tells himself that his hour has come, the hour when he may indemnify himself for ennui hitherto so heroically endured. Meanwhile, he goes to the buffet to refresh himself with a gla.s.s of iced champagne, and in hopes of finding Stella.

The supper-room is in the story below the ballroom. The different stories are connected by an extremely picturesque staircase, decorated with gorgeous exotics and ending in a vestibule, or rather an entrance-hall, hung round with antique Flemish draperies.

The buffet is magnificent, and the guests who are laying siege to it, especially the more distinguished among them, are conducting themselves after a very ill bred fashion. Edgar perceives that several of them have taken rather too much of Mr. Fane's fine Cliquot.

He looks around in vain for Stella. In one corner he observes the Oblonsky, with bright eyes and sweet smiles, surrounded by a throng of languishing adorers; farther on, Stasy, in pale blue, with rose-buds and diamond pins in her hair, in a state of bliss because an American diplomatist is holding her gloves and a Russian prince her fan; he sees Therese taking some bonbons for the children. Stella is nowhere visible. He thinks the champagne poor, doing it great injustice, and, irritated, goes to the smoking-room to enjoy a cigar. The first man whom he sees in the large room is Monsieur de Hauterive. His face is very red, and he is relating something which must be very amusing, for he laughs loudly while he talks. The men standing around him do not seem to enjoy his narrative as much as he does himself. A few offensive words reach Edgar's ears:

"_La Cruche ca.s.see_--Stella Meineck--an Austrian--these Viennese girls--mistress of Prince Capito!--I have it all from the Princess Oblonsky!"

"Would you have the kindness to repeat to me what you have just been telling these gentlemen?" Rohritz says, approaching the group and with difficulty suppressing manifestation of his anger.

"I really do not know, monsieur, by what right you interfere in a conversation about what does not concern you," Cabouat manages to reply, speaking thickly. "May I ask who----"

Edgar hands him his card. The other gentlemen are about to withdraw, but Edgar says, "What I have to say to Monsieur de Hauterive all are welcome to hear: the more witnesses I have the better I shall be pleased. I wish to call him to account for a slander, as vile as it is absurd, which he has dared to repeat, with regard to a young lady, an intimate friend of my family. You said, monsieur----"

"I said what every one knows, what ladies of the highest rank will confirm, what the Princess Oblonsky has long been aware of, and the proof of which I obtained to-day."

"Might I beg to know in what this said proof consists?" Edgar asks, contemptuously.

Monsieur de Hauterive, with an evil smile upon his puffy red lips, draws from his vest-pocket a golden chain to which is attached a crystal locket containing a four-leaved clover.

With a hasty movement Edgar takes the trinket from him, and searches for the star engraved upon the crystal.

"You know the bracelet?" asks de Hauterive.

"Yes," says Edgar.

"I found it on the staircase of Prince Capito's lodgings. When I rang the Prince's bell his servant informed me that the Prince was not at home. As I was perfectly aware that he had been confined to a lounge for two days with a sprained ankle, I naturally supposed that the Prince had special reasons for wishing to receive no one. What conclusion do you draw?"

Edgar's tongue is very dry in his mouth, but he instantly rejoins, "My conclusion is that Mademoiselle de Meineck, visiting a friend, a lady, who, as I happen to know, has lodgings in that house, lost her bracelet on the landing, and that Prince Capito has no desire to receive Monsieur de Hauterive."

"Your judgment strikes me as kind, rather than acute," says Monsieur de Hauterive. "Will you kindly tell me the name of the friend lodging in Number ----?" he adds, with a sneer.

Edgar is silent.

"I thought so!" exclaims de Hauterive. "And you would debar me from mentioning what any unprejudiced person must admit, that----" But before he can utter another word his cheek burns from a blow from Edgar's open palm.

The next moment Rohritz leaves the smoking-room, and goes out into the vestibule, longing for solitude and fresh air.

There, among the antique hangings, the Australian ferns, and the Italian magnolias, among the bronze, white-toothed negroes that bear aloft lamps with ground-gla.s.s shades shaped like huge flower-cups, he stands, the little bracelet in his hand. He feels stunned; red and blue sparks dance before his eyes, and his throat seems choked. He would fain groan aloud, or dash his head against the wall, so great is his distress. He cannot believe it; and yet all a lover's jealous distrust a.s.sails him. He is perfectly aware that his defence of Stella was pitiably weak, his invention of a female friend lodging in Number ---- clumsy enough; he knows that everything combines to accuse her.

Has he been deceived for the second time in his life? Whom can he ever trust, if those grave, dark, child-like eyes have been false? And suddenly in the midst of his torment he is possessed by overwhelming pity.

"Poor child! poor child!" he says to himself. "Neglected, dragged about the world, without any one to care for her, fatherless, and the same as motherless!" Should he judge her? No, he will defend her, hide her fault, protect her from the whole world. But a stern voice within asks, "What protection do you mean? Will you--dare you offer her the only thing that can save her from the world,--your hand?" He is tortured.

No, he cannot. And yet how desperately he loves her! Why did he not take her in his arms when she lay at his feet in the little skiff, and shield her next his heart forever? He must see her; an irresistible longing seizes him; yes, he must see her,--insult her, mistreat her, it may be,--but clasp her in his arms though he should kill her.

"Why are you standing here, like Oth.e.l.lo with Desdemona's handkerchief?" he suddenly hears his brother ask, close beside him.

He starts, closes his fingers over the bracelet, and tries to a.s.sume an indifferent air.

"Where is Stella?" inquires Therese, who is with her husband.

"How should I know?" asks Edgar.

"But some one must know! some one must find her!" she exclaims, in a very bad humour. "The Lipinskis have gone home, and have placed her in my charge, and I must wait until she is found before we too can go home. Ah, do you want to dance the cotillon with her? Pray find her, and as soon as you have done so we must go home,--instantly! I do not want to stay another moment." And, in a state of evident nervous agitation, Therese suddenly turns to her husband, and continues, "I cannot imagine, Edmund, how you could bring me to this ball!"

"That is a little too much!" her husband exclaims, angrily. "Had I the faintest desire to come to this ball? Did I not try for two long weeks to dissuade you from coming? But you had one reply for all my objections: 'Marie de Stele is going too.' Since you are so determined never, under any circ.u.mstances, to blame yourself, blame the d.u.c.h.ess de Stele, not me."

"Marie de Stele could not possibly know that a Russian diplomatist would bring that woman to this ball and present her as his wife."

"Neither could I," rejoins her husband.

"A man ought to know such things," Therese retorts; "but you never know anything that everybody else does not know, you never have an intuition; although you have been away from your own country for fifteen years, you are the very same simple-minded Austrian that you always were."

"And I am proud of it!" Edmund e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.es, angrily.

"Be as proud as you please, for all I care," says Therese, as, at once angry and exhausted, she sinks into a leathern arm-chair. "But now, for heaven's sake, find Stella Meineck, that we may get away at last."

Edgar has already departed in search of her. He pa.s.ses through the long suite of rooms, for the most part empty because all the guests are in the dining-rooms at present.

"They neither of them know anything yet," he says to himself, bitterly, and his heart beats wildly as he thinks, "If she can only explain it all!"

He searches for a while in vain. At last he enters the conservatory. A low sound of sobbing, reminding one of some wounded animal who has crept into some hiding-place to die, falls upon his ear. He hurries on.

There, in the same little boudoir where he had lately been with the Princess Oblonsky, Stella is cowering on a divan in the darkest corner, her face hidden in her hands, her whole frame convulsed with sobs.

"Baroness Stella!" he says, advancing. She does not hear him. "Stella!"

he says, more loudly, laying his hand on her arm. She starts, drops her hands in her lap, and gazes at him with such terrible despair in her eyes that for an instant he trembles for her reason. He forgets everything,--all that has been tormenting him; his soul is filled only with anxiety for her. "What is the matter? what distresses you?" he asks.

"I cannot tell it," she replies, in a voice so hoa.r.s.e, so agonized, that he hardly knows it for hers. "It is something horrible,--disgraceful! It was in the dining-room I was sitting rather alone, when I heard two gentlemen talking. I caught my own name, and then--and then--I would not believe it; I thought I had not heard aright then the gentlemen pa.s.sed me, and one of them looked at me and laughed, and then--and then--I saw an English girl whom I knew at the Britannia, in Venice--she was with her mother, and she came up to me and held out her hand with a smile, but her mother pulled her back,--I saw her,--and she turned away. And then came Stasy----" Her eyes encounter Rohritz's. "Ah! you have heard it too!" She moans and puts her hands up to her throbbing temples. Her cheeks are scarlet; she is half dead with shame and horror. "You too!" she repeats. "I knew that something would happen to me at this ball when I found I had lost my bracelet again, but I never--never thought it would be so horrible as this! Oh, papa, papa, I only hope you did not hear,--did not see; you could not rest peacefully in your grave." And again she buries her face in her hands and sobs.