How Women Love Part 19

With heavy, dulled brain, aching limbs, and a strange sense of pain in his heart, Karl staggered back to the castle and to his room. For a long time sleep fled from him. A thousand scenes hovered in a confused throng before his fancy, blending into a witch-dance in whose mazes his own brain seemed to whirl also, until the giddiness became intolerable.

He saw Ada in various transformations--now seated opposite to him at the table--then in the drawing-room--anon clasped in his arms--sometimes brightly illuminated as the queen of the ball-room--sometimes a faint, dark vision against the sombre background of the woodland--he inhaled her favourite perfume, felt the touch of her arms and her lips--he heard her voice and the melancholy music of the night watchman and the notes of the dancing tune from the ballroom, and amid these exciting delusions of the senses a restless, dream-haunted slumber at last overtook him.

It was almost noon when he awoke. At first his head felt confused and empty, but gradually he collected his thoughts, and now the experience of the previous night again stood clearly before his eyes. He suddenly recalled all his feelings during the walk through the woods, and, while dressing with the utmost haste, he exultingly repeated in a low tone again and again: "I love her! And she returns my love! And we will never part."

His first thought was to seek Ada. The mantilla, which he must return, afforded the pretext. After several inquiries he found her apartments, which were next to those occupied by the mistress of the house. Ada's maid opened the door and looked at him in surprise when he gave her the package and asked if he could see Mrs. Burgess.

"She has a headache, and probably won't be up to-day," was the curt answer, with which the door was closed in his face. This was a disappointment, and he felt very unhappy and forsaken. Yet he endeavoured to combat these feelings and mingled with the other guests.

At noon he exchanged a hurried greeting with Frau Von Jagerfeld, who looked at him intently, but said nothing when he avoided her glance.

In the afternoon he walked to Marktbreit and through the villages on the neighbouring hills, but the longing of his heart soon drove him back to the castle, where for hours he paced patiently up and down the pillared hall upon which most of the rooms occupied by the visitors opened. In the evening the guests again a.s.sembled at a banquet.

Bergmann hoped that Ada would be present, and he was not disappointed.

The summons to the meal had been given for the third time, nearly all the other members of the house-party were in the drawing-room when Ada's door at last opened. Karl rushed forward and held out his hand to her. She started, paused an instant on the threshold, then hurried past him without turning her head, and swiftly vanished.

Karl stood as if he were turned to stone, gazing after her retreating figure; then forgetting the banquet and everything else, he hastened to his room and wrote Ada a letter, in which he repeated all the expressions of love lavished upon her during the preceding night, and begged for an explanation of her recent conduct. This missive he gave to Ada's maid, with the urgent request to deliver it to her mistress that very evening before she retired. Then he went out to try to conquer his agitation by a walk in the park, and when he thought that he had regained his composure, he returned to the drawing-room to see and to talk with Ada. The meal was over, gaiety reigned throughout the various groups, and a storm of reproaches for his absence from the table a.s.sailed him on all sides. But he looked in vain for Ada. She had retired immediately after dinner.

So she was now reading his letter! Perhaps now she was answering him!

His heart throbbed wildly at this thought. He would gladly have made another attempt to see Ada in her own apartments, but he felt that he owed her due reserve, and determined to have patience until the next day.

When, on the following morning, he came out of his bed-chamber into the ante-room, he instantly saw on the table a sealed package which bore his address. He tore the wrapper with trembling hands and found within his own letter and a gilt-edged book. It was an English copy of Shakespeare's "Midsummer Night's Dream." On the first page, in a woman's delicate chirography, were the words: "A Midsummer Night's Dream. July 3, 188--. Ada." That was all. From the servant, who appeared at his ring, Bergmann learned the package had been left by Mrs. Burgess' maid early that morning. Mrs. Burgess had been gone half an hour.