Only a Girl Part 56

He took her clasped hands, and felt that she was again within his power. "Until there is a woman with sufficient force to withstand a man. They are all Brunhildas,--these mighty heroines. They fall victims to the Siegfrieds who master them. You, Ernestine, are perhaps the only woman capable of accomplishing the task calmly and with a clear mind.

You succ.u.mb to no inferior pa.s.sion, but keep your eyes fixed steadily on the mark. You will shatter the prejudices of the world, and no human being will dream who aided you in your work, I have long forgotten how to think and act for my own advantage. You are my pride, something more than my child,--the child of my mind. Your education is my work, your honour is my honour. Come then, I have been thinking of it, and believe I have hit upon an experiment that will demonstrate your idea."

"Uncle, what is it?" cried Ernestine, flushing up.

"Come into the laboratory now. We will see, upon the spot, what can be done."

"Uncle," said Ernestine, overflowing with grat.i.tude, "you give me new life! Forgive me for doubting you and doing you injustice for a moment!"

"Never mind, my dear child, it is all forgotten. I can easily imagine how others have a.s.sailed me to you, and that you gave heed to them.

Have we not all our hours of weakness?"

"Yes, oh, yes, uncle, it was an hour of weakness!" And in deep humiliation she covered her face with her hands.

"I can guess," said Leuthold calmly, with his melodious insinuating voice. "They burdened your heart,--you have been spoken to of love,--you have been sought for a wife. Is it not so?"

Ernestine made no reply.

"They knew you for the feminine Samson that you are, and would have shorn your hair, that they might call out, 'The Philistines are upon you!'"

Ernestine interrupted him. "Hush, uncle! not one word, in that tone, of a man who is sacred to me!"

"G.o.d forbid that I should offend you! I am not speaking of him, but of his lady-mother, who has him fast by her ap.r.o.n-string." And he gave her a quick, keen glance.

"And never mention his mother to me! I hate her!" cried Ernestine angrily, ascending with him the stairs to the laboratory.

Leuthold now knew enough. "I can readily understand that these people should have tried to turn you against me,--for he who seeks to win you must first remove me from his path. This they well know, and their attempt is natural. But you, with your calm power of reasoning, can soon convince yourself that they require of you no less a sacrifice than your entire self, and that unbounded, although perhaps unconscious, selfishness is the mainspring of their proceedings, while I, as long as you have known me, have treated you with thorough disinterestedness. They humiliated you in your own esteem that you might be bought at a more reasonable price. I can see by your depressed condition how they discouraged you. I will restore your confidence in yourself, and let this act of mine prove to you that I desire nothing of you but that you remain true to yourself. This is all the satisfaction I ask. And now all is right again, is it not?"

"Yes, uncle," said Ernestine, collecting her energies afresh. "And now come, let us try the experiment you spoke of."

Leuthold's light eyes sparkled with triumph as he heard these words, and together they entered the apartment containing her costly scientific apparatus.

But, exert herself as she might, her labour was all in vain. Her hands trembled, everything grew dim before her eyes. Her interest in the matter flagged; other thoughts intruded upon her mind. With superhuman resolution, she made further efforts, and the hectic spot, so alarming to a physician, appeared on either cheek. Leuthold did not notice them.

He was so absorbed in his work that he started, as if from a dream, when she fainted away by his side.

CHAPTER II.

THE WEAKNESS OF STRENGTH.

The Bergstra.s.se was quiet and lonely when Johannes returned from Hochstetten. The inmates of the houses there were all within-doors, shielding themselves from the heat of the midday sun, reflected with oppressive intensity from the white houses. Johannes leaned back motionless in the carriage, his eyes covered with his hand. He never looked up when some dogs came barking around the wheels,--indeed, he did not hear them. The exterior world was dead for him.

"_Halte-la!_" cried a voice from a carriage drawn up before his own door. "_Parbleu! il dort_."

Johannes raised his head. The Worronska was awaiting him.

His carriage stopped. He got out, and the Worronska beckoned him to her. Contrary to her custom, she was not holding the reins to-day, and was not seated upon the box.

"I am glad you are come. I came myself to see you, Professor Mollner, as I received no answer to my note,--and I was just driving away."

Johannes was confused. He had received the note she had alluded to, but had not opened it.

"Pray lend me your arm. Have you one moment for me?"

"I am at your service," said Johannes gravely, and he helped her out of her carriage.

"Will you grant me a short audience in your house,--or am I unworthy to enter this temple of science?"

Johannes opened the door for her. "My simple dwelling is but poorly adapted for the reception of such distinguished guests. I can scarcely hope that you can be comfortable here, even for a few minutes."

"How pleasant this is!" she cried, as he led the way to his office.

"Believe me, I like this much better than my marble halls, where there is no breath of true feeling."

"I should have thought that one like yourself could always collect warm-hearted friends about her," said Johannes absently, only for the sake of saying something.

The countess looked at him for an instant suspiciously. She knew in what repute she was held, and the compliment was perhaps ambiguous. But the cloud upon his brow convinced her that his thoughts were busy elsewhere. She looked in his eyes, but his gaze fell before hers, as we look away from what offends our delicacy. The countess interpreted it otherwise,---his embarra.s.sment flattered her.

"Do you call the crowd of coa.r.s.e flatterers, who once surrounded me, warm-hearted people?" she asked in a tone of disdain.

"If you found none such amongst them, I must lament that they kept all such from your side. For no man of sincere and warm heart could approach you as long as you were surrounded by such a throng."

The countess rose from the sofa, upon which she had thrown herself. "I sent them from me long ago: there is nothing to prevent the approach of any man of n.o.ble character,--but none such attempt it,--I must go half-way to seek them."

Johannes was silent. The conversation was an infinite weariness to him: he had need of all his chivalry to enable him to endure it with becoming patience.

"You are out of spirits, Dr. Mollner. Am I the cause of it?"

"What a question, countess! Could I say yes, even if you were? I must have been guilty of great rudeness towards you, if you can suspect me of such _gaucherie_."

"I certainly cannot boast of any exaggerated courtesy from you."

"I never force upon others what can have no possible value for them,"

said Johannes coldly.

The countess bit her lip. "Is that meant for me?"

"I do not see how. I said nothing that could in any way apply to you."

"Indeed?"

"It surprises me to have to a.s.sure you of it," replied Johannes, who began to divine that he had touched a sensitive spot in the countess's mind.

"Then I believe you. Now let me force upon you what can indeed have no value for you, but what people usually prize greatly,--money."

She opened a pocket-book, and counted out a number of bank-notes. "See, I have come to give you what I can for the little girl who was injured.

Here are ten thousand roubles. I have no more ready money just at present. Do you think I may offer this to the people now?"