The First Violin Part 4

"Thank you. My views upon the subject are quite different. When I go abroad I shall go in a different capacity to that you are going to a.s.sume. I will let you know all about it in due time."

"Very well," said I, almost inaudibly, having a vague idea as to what she meant, but determined not to speak about it.

The following day the curtain rose upon the first act of the play--call it drama, comedy, tragedy, what you will--which was to be played in my absence. I had been up the village to the post-office, and was returning, when I saw advancing toward me two figures which I had cause to remember--my sister's queenly height, her white hat over her eyes, and her sunshade in her hand, and beside her the pale face, with its ragged eyebrows and hateful sneer, of Sir Peter Le Marchant.

Adelaide, not at all embarra.s.sed by his company, was smiling slightly, and her eyes with drooped lids glanced downward toward the baronet. I shrunk into a cottage to avoid them as they came past, and waited.

Adelaide was saying:

"Proud--yes, I am proud, I suppose. Too proud, at least, to--"

There! Out of hearing. They had pa.s.sed. I hurried out of the cottage, and home.

The next day I met Miss Hallam and her maid (we three traveled alone) at the station, and soon we were whirling smoothly along our southward way--to York first, then to London, and so out into the world, thought I.

CHAPTER VI.

"Ein Held aus der Fremde, gar kuhn."

We had left Brussels and Belgium behind, had departed from the regions of _Chemins de fer_, and entered those of _Eisenbahnen_. We were at Cologne, where we had to change and wait half an hour before we could go on to Elberthal. We sat in the wartesaal, and I had committed to my charge two bundles, with strict injunctions not to lose them.

Then the doors were opened, and the people made a mad rush to a train standing somewhere in the dim distance. Merrick, Miss Hallam's maid, had to give her whole attention to her mistress. I followed close in their wake, until, as we had almost come to the train, I cast my eyes downward and perceived that there was missing from my arm a gray shawl of Miss Hallam's, which had been committed to my charge, and upon which she set a fidgety kind of value, as being particularly warm or particularly soft.

Dismayed, I neither hesitated nor thought, but turned, fought my way through the throng of people to the waiting-room again, hunted every corner, but in vain, for the shawl. Either it was completely lost, or Merrick had, without my observing it, taken it under her own protection.

It was not in the waiting-room. Giving up the search I hurried to the door: it was fast. No one more, it would seem, was to be let out that way; I must go round, through the pa.s.sages into the open hall of the station, and so on to the platform again. More easily said than done.

Always, from my earliest youth up, I have had a peculiar fancy for losing myself. On this eventful day I lost myself. I ran through the pa.s.sages, came into the great open place surrounded on every side by doors leading to the platforms, offices, or booking offices. Glancing hastily round, I selected the door which appeared to my imperfectly developed "locality" to promise egress upon the platform, pushed it open, and going along a covered pa.s.sage, and through another door, found myself, after the loss of a good five minutes, in a lofty deserted wing of the station, gazing wildly at an empty platform, and feverishly scanning all the long row of doors to my right, in a mad effort to guess which would take me from this delightful _terra incognito_ back to my friends.

_Gepack-Expedition_, I read, and thought it did not sound promising.

Telegraphs bureau. Impossible! _Ausgang._ There was the magic word, and I, not knowing it, stared at it and was none the wiser for its friendly sign. I heard a hollow whistle in the distance. No doubt it was the Elberthal train going away, and my heart sunk deep, deep within my breast. I knew no German word. All I could say was "Elberthal;" and my nearest approach to "first-cla.s.s" was to point to the carriage doors and say "Ein," which might or might not be understood--probably not, when the universal stupidity of the German railway official is taken into consideration, together with his chronic state of gratuitous suspicion that a bad motive lurks under every question which is put to him. I heard a subdued bustle coming from the right hand in the distance, and I ran hastily to the other end of the great empty place, seeing, as I thought, an opening. Vain delusion! Deceptive dream of the fancy! There was a gla.s.s window through which I looked and saw a street thronged with pa.s.sengers and vehicles. I hurried back again to find my way to the entrance of the station and there try another door, when I heard a bell ring violently--a loud groaning and shrieking, and then the sound, as it were, of a train departing. A porter--at least a person in uniform, appeared in a door-way. How I rushed up to him! How I seized his arm, and dropping my rugs gesticulated excitedly and panted forth the word "Elberthal!"

"Elberthal?" said he in a guttural ba.s.s; "_Wollt ihr nach Elberthal, frauleinchen!_"

There was an impudent twinkle in his eye, as it were impertinence trying to get the better of beer, and I reiterated "Elberthal," growing very red, and cursing all foreign speeches by my G.o.ds--a process often employed, I believe, by cleverer persons than I, with reference to things they do not understand.

"_Schon fort, Fraulein_," he continued, with a grin.

"But where--what--Elberthal!"

He was about to make some further reply, when, turning, he seemed to see some one, and a.s.sumed a more respectful demeanor. I too turned, and saw at some little distance from us a gentleman sauntering along, who, though coming toward us, did not seem to observe us. Would he understand me if I spoke to him? Desperate as I was, I felt some timidity about trying it. Never had I felt so miserable, so helpless, so utterly ashamed as I did then. My lips trembled as the new-comer drew nearer, and the porter, taking the opportunity of quitting a scene which began to bore him, slipped away. I was left alone on the platform, nervously s.n.a.t.c.hing short glances at the person slowly, very slowly approaching me. He did not look up as if he beheld me or in any way remarked my presence. His eyes were bent toward the ground: his fingers drummed a tune upon his chest. As he approached, I heard that he was humming something. I even heard the air; it has been impressed upon my memory firmly enough since, though I did not know it then--the air of the march from Raff's Fifth Symphonie, the "Lenore." I heard the tune softly hummed in a mellow voice, as with face burning and glowing, I placed myself before him. Then he looked suddenly up as if startled, fixed upon me a pair of eyes which gave me a kind of shock; so keen, so commanding were they, with a kind of tameless freedom in their glance such as I had never seen before.

Arrested (no doubt by my wild and excited appearance), he stood still and looked at me, and as he looked a slight smile began to dawn upon his lips. Not an Englishman. I should have known him for an outlander anywhere. I remarked no details of his appearance; only that he was tall and had, as it seemed to me, a commanding bearing. I stood hesitating and blushing. (To this very day the blood comes to my face as I think of my agony of blushes in that immemorial moment.) I saw a handsome--a very handsome face, quite different from any I had ever seen before: the startling eyes before spoken of, and which surveyed me with a look so keen, so cool, and so bright, which seemed to penetrate through and through me; while a slight smile curled the light mustache upward--a general aspect which gave me the impression that he was not only a personage, but a very great personage--with a flavor of something else permeating it all which puzzled me and made me feel embarra.s.sed as to how to address him. While I stood inanely trying to gather my senses together, he took off the little cloth cap he wore, and bowing, asked:

"_Mein Fraulein_, in what can I a.s.sist you?"

His English was excellent--his bow like nothing I had seen before.

Convinced that I had met a genuine, thorough fine gentleman (in which I was right for once in my life), I began:

"I have lost my way," and my voice trembled in spite of all my efforts to steady it. "In a crowd I lost my friends, and--I was going to Elberthal, and I turned the wrong way--and--"

"Have come to destruction, _nicht wahr_?" He looked at his watch, raised his eyebrows and shrugged his shoulders. "The Elberthal train is already away."

"Gone!" I dropped my rugs and began a tremulous search for my pocket-handkerchief. "What shall I do?"

"There is another--let me see--in one hour--two--_will 'mal nachsehen._ Will you come with me, Fraulein, and we will see about the trains."

"If you would show me the platform," said I. "Perhaps some of them may still be there. Oh, what will they think of me?"

"We must go to the wartesaal," said he. "Then you can look out and see if you see any of them."

I had no choice but to comply.

My benefactor picked up my two bundles, and, in spite of my expostulations, carried them with him. He took me through the door inscribed _Ausgang_, and the whole thing seemed so extremely simple now, that my astonishment as to how I could have lost myself increased every minute. He went before me to the waiting-room, put my bundles upon one of the sofas, and we went to the door. The platform was almost as empty as the one we had left.

I looked round, and though it was only what I had expected, yet my face fell when I saw how utterly and entirely my party had disappeared.

"You see them not?" he inquired.

"No--they are gone," said I, turning away from the window and choking down a sob, not very effectually. Turning my damp and sorrowful eyes to my companion, I found that he was still smiling to himself as if quietly amused at the whole adventure.

"I will go and see at what time the trains go to Elberthal. Suppose you sit down--yes?"

Pa.s.sively obeying, I sat down and turned my situation over in my mind, in which kind of agreeable mental legerdemain I was still occupied when he returned.

"It is now half past three, and there is a train to Elberthal at seven."

"Seven!"

"Seven: a very pleasant time to travel, _nicht wahr_? Then it is still quite light."

"So long! Three hours and a half," I murmured, dejectedly, and bit my lips and hung my head. Then I said, "I am sure I am much obliged to you.

If I might ask you a favor?"

"_Bitte, mein Fraulein!_"

"If you could show me exactly where the train starts from, and--could I get a ticket now, do you think?"

"I'm afraid not, so long before," he answered, twisting his mustache, as I could not help seeing, to hide a smile.

"Then," said I, with stoic calmness, "I shall never get to Elberthal--never, for I don't know a word of German, not one," I sat more firmly down upon the sofa, and tried to contemplate the future with fort.i.tude.

"I can tell you what to say," said he, removing with great deliberation the bundles which divided us, and sitting down beside me. He leaned his chin upon his hand and looked at me, ever, as it seemed to me, with amus.e.m.e.nt tempered with kindness, and I felt like a very little girl indeed.

"You are exceedingly good," I replied, "but it would be of no use. I am so frightened of those men in blue coats and big mustaches. I should not be able to say a word to any of them."