Quicksands Part 19

One look sufficed to tell Herr von Osternau that he had been robbed, and by some inmate of the castle; no one else could have known of the considerable sum in the money-box, no one else could have used false keys in the night without a forcible entrance into the castle, of which there were no traces.

It was not the loss of his money, but the thought that there was a thief beneath his roof which so disturbed Herr von Osternau that he tottered, and might have fallen had not his wife and the Lieutenant hastened to his a.s.sistance and helped him to his arm-chair.

It was but a momentary weakness, however, to which the old Herr succ.u.mbed; in an instant he was on his feet again, examining the secretary and the papers left in his box. They were all there, even a package of certificates of stock in a sugar-refinery, worth some ten thousand thalers; everything was there save the bundle of bank-notes.

The thief had been too cunning to take anything which might lead to his detection.

But who was the thief?

This question Herr von Osternau put to himself and to his wife, after informing her of his loss, and of his belief that he must have been robbed by some one of his household.

Frau von Osternau was no less shocked than her husband, she did not reply. The Lieutenant made answer in her stead. "It can be no other than that fellow, the Candidate, who left the castle this morning with the booty obtained thus in the night."

He had scarcely finished speaking when Lieschen, flushed with indignation, confronted him. Her little hand was clinched and her eyes flashed as she said, in a voice which she vainly tried to steady, "It is a vile, cowardly calumny! You would not dare to say it to his face if he were here! I should sooner believe that you were the thief than that he could be guilty of a dishonourable act!"

The Lieutenant started and turned pale at this sudden denunciation; unable to meet Lieschen's indignant eyes, he cast down his own and answered not a word.

"My child, my child, of what are you thinking?" Frau von Osternau exclaimed.

But Lieschen was not to be stopped. With flashing eyes still riveted upon the Lieutenant, she went on, "I will not have an innocent man slandered when he is not here to defend himself, and by one, too, who has always shown himself his enemy, and who may have his own ends to serve by this accusation."

"Cousin Fritz, can you allow your cousin to be thus treated by your daughter?"

Herr von Osternau had entirely recovered from the shock of his discovery, and he replied calmly and gravely to the Lieutenant's complaint: "No, neither can I allow an unfounded charge to be brought against one who, as Lieschen says, is not here to defend himself. My child is right in espousing the Candidate's cause, but her manner of doing so I cannot approve. Go to your room, Lieschen, and stay there until Cousin Albrecht consents to pardon you."

Lieschen silently obeyed the father whom she loved, but her glance at Albrecht, as she left the room, spoke of anything save a desire for pardon at his hands.

"It is infamous!" the Lieutenant exclaimed, when Lieschen had left the room; "just to whitewash a vagabond, an adventurer, dropped down among us from n.o.body knows where, I am exposed to such vile insinuations!

This Pigglewitch----"

"Has done nothing to lay himself open to the charge of a midnight robbery," Herr von Osternau interposed.

"But, cousin, you yourself said that the thief must have been one of the household. Whom else can you suspect save this fellow? The servants are honest and tried, and have been here for years, while the tutor has been here but for a short time. We know nothing of his past, he never mentions it. Such reserve betokens an evil conscience. I never trusted him. I will not repeat my suspicions, but surely they are justified by his absent-minded manner yesterday, his strange behaviour, and the fact that the robbery occurred the very night before his departure. I shall avail myself of my short time in Breslau to-day to notify the police of what has happened, and beg them to try to arrest the thief. He probably has the money still in his possession; to-morrow he will have hidden it in some safe place or will run off the day after from Hamburg or Bremen for America. Whatever is done must be done quickly."

"I strictly forbid all notice to the police. I will not have an innocent man insulted by their interference in his affairs."

"But, Fritz, will you let the thief escape with his booty? How are you to discover him if you do not call in the police, whose business it is to catch thieves?"

"I do not wish to discover him," Herr von Osternau quietly replied to his wife. "You will let the money go?"

"That is the least of my loss, although the sum was a considerable one.

What I find hardest to bear is that among those whom I have trusted there is a scoundrel, a thief. I do not wish to know him, to bring him to punishment. I can do without the money. I would rather lose it than have Castle Osternau made the subject all over the country of the talk which I hate. Therefore, I beg you to say not one word to any one about the robbery. You hear, Albrecht? You understand?"

"As you really desire it, I will promise to be silent."

"Enough. Now I will detain you no longer. Before you start I will find means to give you the advance you have asked for, and to do this I must drive to Mirbach myself. Pray have the horses put to the light, open wagon, and brought round to the door as soon as possible."

"Do you mean to drive yourself, cousin? No, you must not; you look pale and ill. The discovery has agitated you, the drive might do you harm.

Permit me----"

"You have preparations for your journey to make."

"But, Fritz, I pray you let Albrecht go with you," Frau von Osternau said, anxiously, but her husband shook his head impatiently. "Do not oppose me," he said. "I have reasons for wishing to go alone. The wagon must be at the door in five minutes; pray see to it, Albrecht."

There was no gainsaying the old Herr when he was thus decided, and the Lieutenant left the room to do as he was requested. No sooner had the door closed behind him than Herr von Osternau said to his wife, "I must go to Mirbach myself. If Pigglewitch has received the money on the note and sends it immediately by post, it will arrive with the mid-day train. I must see for myself whether he has sent it."

"I am afraid you will have your drive in vain. All excitement is, as you know, injurious to you; why will you not let Albrecht go?"

"Let him go? Do you forget what Lieschen said, Emma?"

"For heaven's sake do not tell me that you share the suspicion at which Lieschen's words pointed so unjustifiably?"

"Lieschen's look probed her cousin's soul, he could not endure it, an evil conscience spoke in his eyes. Do you guess now why I would rather lose the money than ask the police to interfere? Their investigation might result in what the Lieutenant would hardly like. I have made many a sacrifice to preserve the name of Osternau from dishonour, I shall make this one also. There must be no whisper of even a suspicion that an Osternau could be guilty of theft."

"But you cherish such a suspicion, while your confidence in Pigglewitch, whom there are quite as many reasons for suspecting, is unshaken."

"I hope in a short time to bring you proof that the Candidate deserves my confidence; this is why I am going to Mirbach."

Frau von Osternau said no more, but accompanied her husband to the hall door, before which the light wagon was waiting.

As he drove off she followed him with anxious eyes, and then applied herself to waiting patiently for his return. Fortunately, she had not long to do so; hardly three-quarters of an hour had pa.s.sed when the vehicle again drove up to the hall door, and her husband sprang from it with an elasticity and vigour which showed that he felt stronger than before his drive.

"I was not deceived," he whispered to his wife, who had come from the sitting-room to receive him. "I do not deny, Emma," he went on, when they were alone together, "that I could not help being somewhat doubtful as I drove to Mirbach. I thought of Lieschen, of her implicit trust in Pigglewitch, of her fearful disappointment if he should be discovered to be a scoundrel who might well be suspected of theft. My heart beat faster when I asked for my letters at the post-office, and when they handed me the envelope with five seals, I was delighted. Here it is. Pigglewitch is all right, he has executed his commission promptly and well. If he had committed the robbery, he would surely have added to his gains the ten thousand marks which he sends me here, that he might carry away in his flight everything he could get. This letter is the best proof of his innocence. Do you suspect him how?"

"No; but I cannot tell whether to rejoice that I do not, and I cannot see how you can be so glad. How can you look so happy when, as you cease to suspect a stranger, your next of kin takes his place in your suspicions?"

"I gave _him_ up long ago," Heir von Osternau replied. "I keep him beneath my roof because my duty and the honour of our name link me to him, and because I owe him some indemnification for the annihilation of his hopes. The unhappy event which has just occurred does not relieve me of this duty, it must remain a secret between us two."

CHAPTER XVII.

TWO LETTERS AGAIN.

The day was an eventful one for Herr von Osternau. Scarcely had he recovered from the effects of the robbery and of the hurried drive to Station Mirbach, when he was surprised by an unexpected visit.

Herr von w.a.n.gen was formally announced by old Hildebrandt, and when he made his appearance in full dress, with a white neck-tie, and a silk hat held in his left hand, when he bowed with ceremonious observance to the mistress of the mansion and her husband, and, accepting the seat offered him on the lounge, stared into s.p.a.ce for some minutes with an air of confusion, evidently searching in vain for words in which to explain the purpose of his coming, Frau von Osternau began to suspect what those words when found would be.

At last the young man cleared his throat and raised his eyes to Frau von Osternau's face as he began: "Pardon me, madame, pardon me, Herr von Osternau, if I express myself ill, but I come--yes, I come to you as the relatives and protectors of my betrothed--no, pardon me, I have begun at the wrong end, I ought first to tell you that I am the happiest man in the world. An hour ago I had the good fortune to meet my beloved Bertha, pardon me for not saying Fraulein von Ma.s.senburg, but she is now my betrothed. She was going for a walk to the Oster-ford, where I am superintending the work, and she allowed me to walk with her. Her heavenly kindness emboldened me to confess to her my love; she, to my intense delight, did not reject it, and we are betrothed."

Herr von Osternau was unpleasantly surprised, he could not help remembering what Lieschen had said, and whilst his wife warmly congratulated the happy lover he was silent. He could not altogether approve this hasty betrothal, and after a short pause he said, "I cannot yet congratulate you, Herr von w.a.n.gen, or consider you betrothed to Fraulein von Ma.s.senburg. Your father is my old friend, I should not be doing my duty by him if I did not beg you to reflect before taking so irrevocable a step. Do you know that Bertha von Ma.s.senburg came to Castle Osternau to escape the----"

Herr von w.a.n.gen interrupted him, saying, in a tone of entreaty, "Do not, I beg of you, allude to that slander, I know everything. Bertha has told me how magnanimously she sacrificed herself for her father, bow she consented to be betrothed to a man whom she knew only by reputation, and how evil tongues attacked her upon the disappearance of Herr von Ernau. She has acknowledged to me that she struggled against her love for me so long as there was any possibility of Herr von Ernau's being alive; she was determined to sacrifice her affection to her duty. But she is free; she learned yesterday from the Lieutenant that Herr von Ernau is really dead, and she can obey the dictates of her heart, can be happy herself and can make me so. She is mine, my own fondly-loved betrothed."

"No, Herr von w.a.n.gen, I can allow of no such betrothal beneath my roof until your father and Bertha's have given their consent."

"My father has already given his," the young man rejoined, eagerly. "I should not have ventured without it to declare my love. I wrote him more than a week ago that I should try to win my Bertha, and he answered me instantly, and told me he was rejoiced that I had chosen a lovely girl of an old family. He cares nothing for worldly possessions, but he wishes his only son to marry his equal in rank. I should love my dear Bertha all the same if she were a peasant's daughter, but I am glad that she is a Von Ma.s.senburg. I am glad of this for my dear father's sake."

"But Bertha's father has not yet given his consent."