Fickle Fortune Part 10

'Quite true, they must be shaken off. Only that is much more easily said than done. They who have never been otherwise than free, hardly prize their liberty, looking upon it as a thing of course. They cannot understand how others will strive and struggle for years, will stake life itself to secure that precious guerdon. But, after all, the efforts matter little, if the end be but attained.'

He turned away, and seemed to be attentively watching the swallows in their rapid flittings to and fro. A fresh silence ensued, lasting longer, and putting Hedwig's patience to a still severer test than those which had previously occurred. These lapses in the conversation were strange and intolerable to her. Really, this Oswald von Ettersberg was an audacious personage. In the first place he presumed to reprimand her with regard to her meeting with Edmund; then he declared sharply, and with an emphasis which was almost insulting, that nothing should now induce him to remain on in his cousin's house; then he began to talk of dungeons and all sorts of disagreeable things, and finally lapsed into absolute silence, giving himself up to his meditations as completely as though a young lady, his cousin's promised wife, were not in his company. Hedwig thought the measure of his rudeness was filled, and she rose to go.

'It is time for me to be returning,' she remarked shortly.

'I am at your service.'

Oswald moved forward, intending to escort her, but she waved him back with an ungracious gesture.

'Thank you, Herr von Ettersberg. I know the way perfectly.'

'Edmund expressly charged me to see you home,' objected Oswald.

'And I release you from the obligation,' rejoined the young lady, in a tone which plainly said the young Count's wishes were not as law to her when opposed to her own will. 'I came alone, and will go back alone.'

Oswald retreated at once.

'Then you must make haste to reach Brunneck,' he said coolly. 'The clouds are gathering yonder, and in half an hour we shall have rain.'

Hedwig looked inquiringly at the threatening clouds. 'I shall be home long before then; and if it comes to the worst, I think nothing of being caught in a spring shower. The swallows have reappeared, you know--have told us that spring is coming at last.'

The words were spoken almost in a tone of challenge, but the gauntlet was not taken up. Oswald merely bowed with an air of constrained politeness, thereby forfeiting the young lady's last remnant of indulgence. She, in return, strove to infuse the utmost chilliness into her parting salutation, after which she hastened away, light and swift of foot as a roe.

This haste was not induced by fear of rain, for when she had left the hill-side well behind her, Hedwig slackened her pace. She only wished to get out of the neighbourhood of this unbearable 'Mentor,' who had tried to extend his system of education to her, and had been guilty of considerable rudeness in the attempt. He had not even raised any serious objection when she declined his escort. She had fully meant it, but the merest politeness demanded some words of regret at her decision. Yet there had been nothing of this; he was visibly delighted at being relieved of a troublesome office. This spoilt young lady, whose beauty, and perhaps also whose wealth, had won for her on all sides attention and lavish homage, looked on such indifference almost in the light of an insult, and she had not fully recovered from the vexation it caused her when she issued from the forest and saw Brunneck lying before her in close vicinity.

Oswald, remaining behind alone, seemed altogether to forget the rain he had prophesied. He stood motionless, with folded arms, leaning against the trunk of a tree, and made no sign of setting out homewards.

The clouds grew heavier and more lowering; the whole forest was now shrouded in mist, and the swallows almost swept the ground with their wings as they shot by to and fro. Patches of white might here and there be seen bearing witness still to the night's h.o.a.rfrost; but beneath, amidst all this mist and rime, a great work was going on. The life-germs hidden away in a thousand unsuspected buds and leafless branches were secretly, silently stirring; it wanted but the first balmy breath, the first glow of sunshine, to awaken all Nature from her long slumber. Ungenial as the air might be, there was in it just a touch, a faint suggestion of spring, and a whisper of spring ran through the bare forest. All around mysterious powers were active, weaving their chains, arraying their forces, unseen, unheard, yet felt and understood even by the lonely self-absorbed man who stood gazing dreamily out into the cloudy distance.

A while ago, as he pursued his solitary way through the woods, all had been void and desolate. Not a sound had reached his ears of the language which was now so distinct and eloquent to him. He knew not, or would not know, what had so suddenly opened his understanding; but the harsh, aggressive look died out of his face, and with it faded away the remembrance of a dreary, joyless youth--faded away the rancour and bitterness of spirit which dependence and neglect had engendered in a proud, strong nature. The soft, half-unconscious dreams, which visit others so frequently, had spun their magic web around the cold, impenetrable Oswald. It was, perhaps, his first experience of them, but the spell was therefore the more irresistible.

Overhead the swallows were still busy, flitting incessantly to and fro through the heavy, rain-charged air. The happy chirping of their tiny throats, the wonderful whisperings about him, the low voice in his own breast, all repeated in constant refrain that message which other lips had so triumphantly proclaimed: 'Spring is coming, really coming to us at last.'

CHAPTER V.

In the course of a few days the plan of campaign devised by Edmund and Hedwig was carried into execution. The young people made their important disclosure, declaring their sentiments in most unambiguous terms, and the effects produced were precisely those expected. First came a simultaneous outburst of indignation at Brunneck and at Ettersberg; then followed reproaches, prayers, threats; finally an irrevocable fiat was issued on either side. The Countess solemnly announced to her son, the heir, that she once for all refused her consent to such a marriage; and Fraulein Hedwig Rustow, on making her avowal, encountered a small hurricane, before which she was fain for a while to bow her head. The Councillor grew fairly distracted with wrath when he heard that an Ettersberg, a member of the family he hated, and his adversary in the Dornau suit, was to be presented to him as a son-in-law.

The parental displeasure, though most pointedly expressed, unfortunately made but small impression on the young people.

Prohibited, as a matter of course, from holding any further communication, they calmly within the hour sat down to write to each other, having, with a wise prevision of coming events, already fixed on a plan for the safe conveyance of their letters.

Councillor Rustow was striding angrily up and down the family sitting-room at the Brunneck manor-house. Hedwig had thought it wise to retire and leave her infuriated parent to himself for a while. The worthy gentleman, finding his daughter beyond his reach, turned fiercely upon his unhappy cousin, whom he bitterly accused of having, by her unpardonable weakness and folly in favouring the acquaintance, paved the way for all that had occurred.

Fraulein Lina Rustow sat in her accustomed place by the window and listened, going on steadily with the needlework she had in hand. She waited patiently for a pause to supervene. When at length her exasperated cousin was compelled to stop and take breath, she inquired, with perfect imperturbability:

'Tell me, in the first place, Erich, what objection you really have to offer to this marriage?'

The master of the house came to a sudden stand. This was a little too much! For the last half-hour he had been giving expression in every possible way to his anger, his fury, his indignation, and now he was coolly asked what objection he really had to offer to the marriage.

The question so amazed and upset him that for a moment he could find no fitting answer.

'Upon my word, I do not understand why you should be so angry,' went on the lady, in the same tone. 'There is evidently a sincere and mutual attachment. Count Ettersberg, in himself, is a most charming person. That unhappy lawsuit, which has so tried your temper during the whole of the winter, will be brought to the simplest conclusion; while, in a worldly point of view, the match is in every respect a brilliant one for Hedwig. Why do you set yourself so strongly against it?'

'Why--why?' cried Rustow, more and more incensed by this calm, argumentative tone of hers. 'Because I will not suffer my daughter to marry an Ettersberg. Because, once for all, I forbid it--that is why!'

Aunt Lina shrugged her shoulders.

'I do not think Hedwig will surrender to such reasons as those. She will simply appeal to the example of her parents, who married without the father's consent----'

'That was a very different matter,' interrupted Rustow hotly. 'A very different matter indeed.'

'It was a precisely similar case, only that in that instance all the circ.u.mstances were far more unfavourable than they are now, when really prejudice and obstinacy alone stand in the way of the young people's happiness.'

'Well, these are nice compliments you are heaping upon me, I must say,' cried the Councillor, breaking forth anew. 'Prejudice!

obstinacy! Have you any more flattering epithets to bestow on me?

Don't hesitate, pray. I am waiting to hear.'

'There is no speaking sensibly to you to-day, I see,' observed the lady, tranquilly resuming the work which for a few minutes had been discontinued. 'We will talk of this another time, when you have grown calmer.'

'Lina, you will drive me mad with that abominable composure of yours, which is nothing but affectation. Put that confounded sewing stuff away, do. I can't endure to see you drawing your thread in and out as primly as though there were nothing amiss, while I--I----'

'Feel inclined to pull the whole house about our ears. Don't take the trouble; it will stand after all, you know, just as firm on its foundations as ever.'

'Yes, it will stand, though everyone prove rebellious, though even you set yourself in open opposition to me, the master. Thank G.o.d, I have an ally, and a strong one, in the Countess-mother over at Ettersberg.

She will show more obstinacy even than I, you may depend upon it. We can't endure each other; we are doing our very best to hara.s.s and torment each other by raising fresh quibbles in the lawsuit; but on this point we shall, for once, be agreed. She will soon bring her son to reason, and I am glad of it. It meets my views exactly. I shall act in the same way by my daughter.'

'I do not suppose that the Countess will give her consent very readily,' said Aunt Lina, in a pensive tone. 'To obtain that from her must be Edmund's business.'

'Edmund!' repeated Rustow, whose indignation was constantly being roused afresh. 'Dear, dear! how very familiar we are, quite like relations already! You regard him altogether in the light of a nephew, I suppose. But you will find yourself mistaken. I say no, and I mean no, so that is all about it.'

With these words he stormed out of the room, banging the door to behind him with a crash which set all the windows jarring. Aunt Lina must indeed have conquered 'her nerves,' for she did not start at the noise, but merely looked after the angry man with a shake of the head, and murmured to herself:

'I wonder how long it will be before he gives in!'

There was certainly less noise and bl.u.s.ter at Ettersberg, but the prospects of the young pair were not on that account more hopeful. The Countess thought the matter serious enough to warrant her in sending for her brother, Baron Heideck, who, in all cases of difficulty, was her stay and counsellor. He answered her summons in person, so Count Edmund had now to contend with the allied forces of mother and guardian.

The latter, who had arrived from the capital a few hours previously, was closeted with the Countess in her own boudoir. He was several years older than his sister, and while she had preserved an almost youthful appearance, a premature look of age, on the contrary, was to be remarked in him. Cold, grave, and methodical in speech and bearing, his outward man at once denoted the bureaucrat of high standing. He listened attentively and in silence to the Countess as she made her report, which concluded in rather desponding terms.

'As I told you in my letter, there is nothing whatever to be done with Edmund. He persists stubbornly in this marriage-scheme, and is constantly urging me to give my consent to it. I really did not know what better course to take than to send for you.'

'You did quite right,' said the Baron; 'for I fear that, left to yourself, you would not have the necessary firmness to resist your darling, and refuse him his heart's desire. I think, however, we are agreed in this--the alliance in question must be prevented at any pains or any cost.'

'Certainly we are,' a.s.sented the Countess. 'The only point to be discussed is _how_ we are to prevent it. Edmund will shortly come of age, and he will then be absolute master, free to follow his own will.'

'Hitherto he has submitted to yours,' remarked the Count. 'His love for you is paramount.'

'Has been hitherto!' said the Countess, with a rush of bitter feeling.