Felix Lanzberg's Expiation Part 25

Papa Harfink had long since ordered his spring water, when at last Juanita "found it."

"There it is!" cried she. "Will you read it?"

Eugene von Rhoeden refused. Raimund read it aloud.

It was an article in a scandalous journal which appeared in Vienna early in the sixties, but since then had failed or been suppressed. In that impertinent tone of cheap wit which seeks intellect in mockery, knowledge of human nature in cynicism, the story was told of a very arrogant young blue blood who in a weak hour had forged his father's name and who "now could further cultivate his talent for drawing in the prison of T----."

The name of the young man was given as Baron L----. Some one had written "Lanzberg" above it.

"That is not possible!" cried Raimund.

"Oh, if you please--if you please--possible!" screamed Juanita. "It is all true--perfectly true!"

"I once heard something of that," declared Harfink, senior, whom the whole story troubled very little, and who had not enlightened Susanna.

Rhoeden was silent.

"And this despicable rascal has dared to marry into our honest family!"

cried Raimund, beside himself.

"Susie knew of it! He-he-he!" burst out Mr. Harfink, who now only too gladly accused the deceased.

"My mother knew it!" Raimund struck his forehead. "Linda surely does not know it!"

"Leave her in her delusion," said Eugene, sweetly. "One cannot change matters in the slightest, and all these years Felix has behaved so blamelessly, so n.o.bly, so----"

He knew that his praise of Lanzberg would bring forth a new burst of rage from Juanita.

"Indeed!" now repeated the Spaniard, with malevolent emphasis, "n.o.bly, blamelessly!" and seized the paper.

"No; Linda must know it; I shall write to her this very day!" cried Raimund.

"That you will not do," said Eugene, firmly.

"Why?"

"Because it would be vulgar." With that Eugene rose and took his hat.

Juanita had meanwhile added to the time-obliterated pencil-mark a new, heavier one, had wrapped up the paper with remarkable deftness, and addressed it.

"Will you put that in the post-box?" she asked.

"No, my dear madam," he replied, gravely, bowed and left. Behind him he heard the voice of the Spaniard: "Caro, Caro--to the post--but immediately!"

Through the damp evening shadows he trotted to Iwanow. He enjoyed the pleasant conviction of having behaved throughout as an eminently upright man, and also the pleasant conviction that he had attained his aim.

At a turn of the road, castle Traunberg shone gray and ghost-like between the dark old lindens. Eugene took off his hat, smiling ironically, and murmured, "Good evening, Linda!"

XXIII.

Linda knocked in vain at her husband's door. In spite of her coaxing requests she had not been admitted. More and more horrible thoughts occurred to her. In ever more interesting colors her imagination painted her husband's secret. She expected that he would appear at tea; he excused himself, and did not leave his room again that day. She grew more and more excited--she did not sleep that night, only towards morning did she close her eyes.

Felix was no longer in the house when she had risen; he had ordered a horse saddled at six o'clock that morning, and had ridden over to Lanzberg.

Linda grew impatient. "Can I find old letters anywhere?" thought she.

"In any case I must look through the attic rooms some day." She ordered the keys of the upper story. Mrs. Stifler, the housekeeper, looked upon it as understood that the young wife would require a guide for her wanderings, and prepared to accompany her. But, pleasantly as she treated all the servants, and especially those who had been in the family from one generation to another, Linda declined the old woman's company.

At first she had difficulty in finding the right key for the different keyholes. As the rooms for the most part opened into each other, and only the doors into the corridor were locked, that was soon overcome.

None of the rooms were quite empty and none were fully furnished. An odor of mould and dry flowers and close, oppressive air filled them. On all objects dust lay like a gray seal of time. Some of the rooms had such thick curtains that only here and there a bluish white streak of light lay on the floor, amid the dark shadows; others, and the most, had neither curtains nor blinds, and the light in them was dazzlingly bright. There stood a gilded carved arm-chair with brocade covering of the style brought from France in those days when Maria Theresa called the Pompadour "_ma chere cousine_," and near by a whole row of spindle-legged chairs with lyre-shaped backs in the stiff style of the Empire. And the arm-chair looked handsome and arrogant, the chairs hideous and pretentiously solid--and both alike were long ago unavailable and did not know it! Alabaster and porcelain clocks with pillars for ornaments, and thin Arabian figures on large white dials, slept away the time on yellow commodes with inlaid wood arabesques.

Many family portraits of long-ago generations hung on the walls, mostly oil paintings, the men all standing in very narrow coats with very large revers, their hands on their hips, their eyes contracted to that narrow exclusive gaze which overlooks all unpleasant circ.u.mstances of life and worldly affairs, characteristic of the manly _ancien regime_; the women all seated, with broad sleeves and curls arranged in the English fashion; in the eyes that charming, unabashed gaze which on their side characterizes the women of the _ancien regime_, a gaze which sees in poverty only picturesque objects at the side of their path; a gaze which, mild and loving as it is, yet pains because it is accustomed to nothing but the beautiful, expects nothing but the beautiful, and therefore humiliates misery and hideousness.

Linda felt embarra.s.sed at so much of the past; a certain hesitation, which did not accord with her indiscreet, egotistical, pushing nature, paralyzed her hands, while she, prying into Felix's secret, opened old chests and pulled out drawers.

She found trophies of the hunt, an old brocade gown, in a wardrobe a bridal wreath and a half dozen old riding boots; she found old notes, books, alb.u.ms full of copied poems, books of Latin and Greek exercises, and an ambitious plan for dramatizing Le Cid, in round, childish writing, old bills, receipts, but she found no old letters.

In one of the last rooms she discovered a newer secretary, which was ornamented with painted porcelain tablets, on which pink and sky-blue ladies walked in brilliant green landscapes. Linda opened every drawer, knew how to fathom the most secret compartments, and finally discovered a bundle of old letters tied with a black ribbon. Her heart beat rapidly; she was about to hurry away when a picture with face turned to the wall attracted her attention. The dust upon it was more recent than upon the other objects. Not without difficulty she turned it around, and uttered a little "Ah!" of admiration.

The picture was no better painted than most modern family portraits, but it represented the handsomest young man who ever wore the green uniform of the Austrian Uhlans, of '66. The carriage of the young officer, who sat there carelessly, with head slightly bent forward and sabre between his knees, was well portrayed. Linda thought that she had never seen a more fascinating man; the pleasant mouth, the shy and yet confident glance, the nave arrogance of the whole expression--all pleased her. Who could that be? She went down stairs and commanded two servants to bring the picture to the drawing-room at once. One of the servants--it was Felix's old valet--permitted himself to remark, "The Baron did not like the picture, and in consequence had banished it to the second story."

Linda insisted that her command should be executed. "Do you know whom the picture represents?" she asked, as she pa.s.sed.

The old man seemed surprised and hesitated. "The Baron, himself."

"Ah!" Linda bit her lips, and made a gesture of dismissal.

When the man had gone away with the servant to fetch the picture, Linda laughed to herself, gayly--the joke seemed to her delicious.

Scarcely was she alone when she bent over the letters. They were written in a flippant, haughty tone which harmonized well with the portrait. The first dated from a Polish garrison; in all was evident the nave selfishness of a good-hearted but uncommonly indulged man.

The letters pleased Linda very well. From time to time she glanced at the portrait, which, in accordance with her wishes, had been brought in.

"What a pity that I did not know him at that time," said she, and then added, shrugging her shoulders, "at that time he would scarcely have wished to have anything to do with me."

When Felix returned from his ride he found in the vestibule, among other letters arrived in the morning, an old newspaper in a wrapper addressed in very poor writing to his wife.

He looked at it, read the post-mark, Marienbad--he recognized Juanita's writing. His heart throbbed violently. The idea of suppressing the paper flashed through his mind; he seized it, then a kind of fury with himself overcame him. He was weary of striving to prevent his last great humiliation, and like one in deep water who, when the waves reach up to his throat, weary of exertion, defiantly flings himself into the horrible element in order to make an end of it, so he sent the paper to his wife himself, by a servant. Then he went to his room. He seated himself at his writing-desk, and resting his head on one hand, with the other mechanically smoothing a newspaper which lay before him, he waited, half with dread, half with longing, like a criminal condemned to death, for the message which should summon him to the gallows.

Then he heard a fearful, piercing scream. "Ah!" said he, "she knows it!" Will she come to him? There is a rustle in the corridor, the door of the room is flung open, and Linda enters, or rather bursts in. Her face is distorted; a lock of loosened hair hangs over her ashy pale cheeks.

"It is a calumny, it cannot be true!" she cried, and threw the paper which Juanita had sent her before him upon the table.

He is silent. Her vanity believes in him until the last moment; has expected an explanation from him, but he is silent.

She grasps his shoulder. "For G.o.d's sake is it true that you were sentenced to two years' imprisonment for forgery?"