The Lonely House Part 12

I had intended at this hearing to confine myself to what I had dictated in the Judge's deposition, but I could not keep my resolution. When the Judge asked me if Franz Schorn, of whom I had seen much in the last few weeks, had never told me his reason for avoiding me in the forest, I could not reply in the negative, and I was forced to a.s.sent, and to relate the conversation I had had with Franz and his betrothed. I could not conceal that each had requested me to say nothing of the meeting in the forest. Such an interview as this of mine with the Judge is very curious. The witness knows that every word he utters is upon his oath, and also that it may decide the fate of a fellow mortal. Every consideration vanishes before such a responsibility, and I could have none for the Judge. I had to acknowledge to my examiner that Anna and Franz had given as a reason of the request for my silence that the Judge's hatred of the young man was so intense that he would surely use my meeting with Franz as evidence against him.

The Judge shook his head thoughtfully on hearing this; he evidently did not credit their explanation. Had I cherished no suspicion? Had it never occurred to me as odd that Franz Schorn should have wounded his hand? I could not deny that such a suspicion had occurred to me, but I could declare with a good conscience that it had vanished entirely after I had come to know Schorn better.

What was the reason that after this first awakening of suspicion I had not informed the authorities of my meeting with the young man in the neighborhood? Why had I withheld this information until the day before yesterday? This keen questioning forced me to an exact reply. I told of how I had desired to give information immediately of my meeting with Schorn, and I gave Herr Foligno's reason for begging me not to insert it in an official deposition, and as a natural consequence I related the reasoning by which he had induced me to render to him my official statement.

"Strange; very strange," said the Judge, more to himself than to me.

"Herr Foligno has allowed personal considerations, personal feelings to influence his official action. Very unjustifiable!"

He was silent for a while and then questioned me further with continued and frightful thoroughness. I did not wish to speak of the adventure in the cave, but when the interview was over, I had told everything that I knew about my fall, my rescue, and the accusations made by Schorn and the Judge with regard to the cut ends of rope. After the official paper had been read to me and I had signed it, the Judge offered me his hand.

"Your testimony has been of the greatest importance, Herr Professor,"

he said gravely. "You have so far confirmed suspicion against Schorn that the young man's arrest is an unavoidable necessity, but at the same time you have proved to me that an influence has been at work in this unfortunate affair which I must investigate further. Whatever may be the true history of the strange adventure in the cave, Schorn undoubtedly saved your life and you owe him grat.i.tude for it. If you wish to testify this, you can do so by preserving profound silence with regard to your testimony of to-day as well towards the friends as to the foes of Herr Schorn, and, of course, to Judge Foligno. He has nothing to do further with the official investigation; he must in his turn appear as a witness, and it is especially desirable for the establishment of the truth that your testimony with regard to him should remain unknown. May I hope that you will promise me inviolable secrecy towards Herr Foligno, Herr Professor?"

"Certainly, most willingly; but what am I to reply when Herr Foligno questions me? He wanted to send you an account of the adventure in the cave, and only desisted at my express desire."

"Do not let this consideration influence you. It is of the greatest importance in the investigation that the Judge should know nothing of your testimony with regard to the adventure in the cave. If he asks you, tell him the simple truth; it is unlawful for witnesses to discuss together their testimony, and he is henceforth a witness like yourself.

Tell him that I told you this, and that I enjoined it upon you to refuse even the slightest information with regard to your testimony."

With this counsel, which I determined to follow implicitly, the Judge took his leave. He left me in an indescribable agitation, which increased when the District Judge paid me a visit immediately after. He came, as he told me frankly, to learn how the investigating Judge had received my testimony. When I told him of the promise which I had given, he was greatly surprised.

"I! A witness like all the rest?" he cried indignantly. "These government officials are so puffed up with pride and self-conceit that they don't know what they are about. They owe to me, to my activity, to my research, every ray of light cast upon the darkness of the crime, and now they push me aside, rob me of the reward of my discovery, and regard me as a simple witness; but they shall not succeed; I will not submit; and you, too, Herr Professor, you need not feel yourself bound by a promise which no one had a right to exact from you; you may without fear tell me anything that you desire."

"I do not know whether I should be justified in doing so or not," I replied, shrugging my shoulders. "I do not know the Austrian laws, but I am well aware that if I have undertaken no legal responsibility, a moral one rests upon me not to speak of my testimony after the promise which I have given. You must pardon me, Herr Foligno, if I preserve absolute silence."

He looked at me angrily and evilly. "As you please; I shall make no further request of you," he said after a little pause. "One thing I have a right to demand of you in a matter which concerns me personally.

Have you----"

"I regret that I can make no reply to any question, whatever it may be.

My promise to be silent was given unconditionally."

He cast at me a glance full of rage and left the room without saying farewell. I had deeply offended him by my persistent refusal. I sat alone with a heavy heart, discontented with myself. I had offended the man who had been so kind and courteous to me during my stay in Luttach, and I had also placed him in a perilous position by my testimony to his superior. This was a very disagreeable thought. He was not aware of it, but when he learned it, would he not have a right to be angry with me and to accuse me of a breach of confidence? I had strengthened suspicion against Franz Schorn, the saviour of my life. It was my fault that the young man was now threatened with the loss of his liberty. I was provoked with myself for my imprudent and frank expressions, and yet again, when I reflected on the late examination and the questioning I had undergone, I could not have answered differently in accordance with the truth. I had surely only fulfilled my duty as a witness. In the deepest anxiety and with torturing impatience I awaited further developments. It was desperately hard to lie there and have cold bandages on my sprained ankle. I would have given anything to be able to do something, or that the visitors whom I had found so tiresome yesterday would return to-day, but I was, and remained, alone, confined to my bed.

Two hours pa.s.sed. At last quick footsteps approached my door. Mizka entered breathless, her cheeks crimson, her eyes glowing, to tell me of what was the talk at present of all Luttach. Franz Schorn was the murderer of old Pollenz. The gentlemen from Laibach had been searching Schorn's house at his farm outside the town, and had found quant.i.ties of money, banknotes, and stock, and government bonds and other papers of value, all the wealth of the murdered man. Nevertheless Franz had denied everything, declaring that he was innocent, but his brazen falsehood had done him no good; he had been arrested, his hands fettered, and thus manacled had been brought between two gendarmes to Luttach. As he pa.s.sed the house of the doctor, his betrothed was sitting at the window. She had seen him and had rushed down into the street. She had embraced him before everybody--he, the murderer of her father! The gendarmes were obliged to unclasp her arms. She had not wept a tear; she had looked up at him with sparkling eyes when the gendarmes bore him away.

"Do not despair, Franz," she had called after him. "G.o.d will not suffer the innocent to be condemned."

Then she had quietly gone with the doctor, who led her back into the house. Franz, however, had walked on between the gendarmes, his eyes cast gloomily on the ground. He had replied not a word to the abuse which was showered on him from all sides.

"Murderer!" "Dog of a German!" and other insulting epithets had been hurled after him by an increasing crowd of common people. He did not seem even to hear them. The people were so excited against him, so infuriated that the gendarmes had the greatest trouble in shielding him from their attack, and could hardly have succeeded in doing so if the Judge himself had not protected him from a couple of savage fellows, two labourers who had been dismissed from Schorn's farm and would gladly have revenged themselves upon their former master for their dismissal. By earnest admonition and threats of punishment the Judge had succeeded in quieting the mob, a.s.suring the people that the murderer would not escape justice. He accompanied the prisoner to the court house, receiving no thanks from him for his protection. Not a word did Franz address to him.

Upon an order from Herr Foligno, Herr Gunther provided a vehicle and horses, and, accompanied by the two gendarmes, bore off the manacled prisoner. The Judge said he would be taken to prison in Laibach and kept there until the court a.s.sembled, when he would be certainly tried as a murderer and hanged.

All this Mizka detailed to me in the greatest agitation. Evidently she felt much satisfaction in the discovery of the murderer, and that it should be precisely Franz Schorn, whom every one hated, who was now delivered over to the law. Not a word of sympathy did the girl, usually so good-humoured, have for the unfortunate man; not a doubt of his guilt stirred within her; with a triumphant smile she left me after she had told her news.

"The voice of the people is the voice of G.o.d," the Judge had once said.

The doctor had replied, "The people's gossip is the voice of the devil." Was the Judge now proved to be right? The proof of Schorn's guilt seemed to grow clearer, and yet, strangely enough, my doubt of it grew stronger with every hour. My reason told me that there could be no room for doubt, now that upon searching his house the booty had been discovered, but my heart rebelled against even this proof. I felt for the first time that I had taken more than a fleeting interest in the young man, that there had been between us a heartfelt sympathy which forbade me in the face of all proof yet adduced, to believe in the possibility of his guilt.

I was not long left to my melancholy reflections. A visitor interrupted them. The Burgomaster came, not only to inquire after my welfare, but to tell me of the discoveries made with regard to Schorn and of all that had been going on in the town while I lay bedridden. He had not yet left me before another visitor appeared, and he was followed by a third and a fourth. All the evening cronies of the round table made up for their absence in the morning, and through the entire afternoon I was not again alone. All my visitors brought melancholy confirmation of what Mizka had told me. Even the Captain and the Burgomaster were now convinced of Schorn's guilt, and acknowledged their conviction openly.

The search in his house had brought much to light; so much money had been found that it was impossible to believe Franz had come by it honestly. His very conduct told against him--his bare-faced denial, as well as his unbroken silence when no credit was given to his words.

There was but one opinion as to his guilt, and also as to the behaviour of the Judge. Even the Judge's opponents declared that Franz owed his escape from the indignant mob to his magnanimous protection. There was also but one voice with regard to the conduct of the Laibach court. It had been admirable, particularly that of the investigating Judge, who in a single day had discovered every particular concerning Schorn's life during the last few weeks. Almost all the gentlemen and a number of other people besides, as well as Bela and Ra.s.sak, had been examined by him. The officials had said nothing of the result of their evidence, and had enjoined the strictest silence upon the witnesses, who, however, were at liberty to declare that they considered Franz Schorn guilty, and they did so. The Clerk alone, Herr von Einern, prudently withheld his opinion in the matter.

Did the doctor also believe in Franz Schorn's guilt? He and the Judge were the only ones who paid me no visit on this day. The Judge probably could not forget my refusal to answer his questions, and was still offended. I was at heart very glad that he did not come. His visit could have given rise only to unpleasant discussions; but the doctor I should like to have seen, partly to obtain medical advice for the night, and partly to learn his opinion of the discoveries concerning Schorn. My wish was fulfilled late in the evening, when it was nearly nine o'clock. The doctor came, but he was not alone. To my great surprise he was accompanied by Anna Pollenz. My astonishment when I saw the lovely Anna enter the room on the arm of her old friend must have been mirrored in my face, for Anna blushed, and the doctor, with his characteristic short laugh, which I was always glad to hear, said:

"You wonder at this strange visit so late in the evening, Herr Professor. Well, you are right. This little girl might as well have come to you to-morrow morning, at a more fitting time; but she gave me no rest until I complied with her wish and brought her to you. If I had not consented she might perhaps have come all alone, and have given occasion for all sorts of gossip in Luttach. The entire population of the town has run mad; even the most sensible are infected with the nonsense which is heard on all sides. I could not have believed it, but since Franz's arrest and removal to Laibach, even the Captain and the Burgomaster have lost faith in him and consider him guilty, and yet everything adduced against him is thorough, unmitigated bosh. Not a word of it is true. The gentlemen from Laibach are princ.i.p.ally to blame, with their arrest. They would hardly have proceeded to such extremities if the Judge had not taken care that they should hear from all sides the falsehoods invented by himself. This poor little girl has had a frightful day. Not only has her Franz been arrested--that is not the worst, for he will very soon be free again--but all the world, with the exception of the Clerk and myself, believe in Franz's guilt, and people are not ashamed to declare this openly. This makes my little Anna desperate. 'The Herr Professor, who loves Franz so much, cannot think him guilty,' she said, and insisted upon coming to you. I could not but do as she asked, and here we are. Well, perhaps it is all right; the poor child will not speak here to deaf ears, and will be soothed to see that every one does not consider Franz a murderer and thief. Sit down, my child, here in this chair, and pour out your heart to the Herr Professor. He will listen to you kindly."

I had been observing Anna during this long introduction. Her colour changed from red to pale and then to red again as the old doctor continued. Her eyes sparkled as she turned to me, and she gazed at me with an imploring expression in them. She was wonderfully lovely. My heart gave a throb. Was I altogether free from blame?

Anna seated herself at her old friend's bidding beside my bed and gazed at me with a long, searching look in her dark eyes, as if to read in my face the possibility of my thinking her Franz guilty.

"You cannot mistrust him, Herr Professor," she said, "he has such a regard for you, and he saved your life."

There was not much logic in these words, but they made me ashamed of myself nevertheless. Franz could not be guilty unless she were his accomplice, and I had almost believed in his guilt. I could not endure the look of those pure, clear eyes; my own dropped before them. I was ashamed.

"If all the rest think him guilty," she continued in a tone of firm conviction, "you cannot. You believe in him, and you must feel it your duty to do everything you can to prove his innocence, for he saved your life. Therefore I come to you; I wished to speak to you before to-morrow. I shall sleep quietly, for I know that you will stand by me.

Franz told me yesterday evening that the Judge had tried to take your life; that he is your worst enemy. You will counsel me truly when I have confided to you a secret which I have kept until now, a suspicion which I have not ventured to utter even to my dearest friend and relative."

"Speak, dear child," I replied, taking her hand and pressing it cordially. "I a.s.sure you that I have no dearer wish than to establish the innocence of the saviour of my life."

"I know it and will trust you," she replied frankly. "You and my kind friend, the doctor, both of you shall counsel me," she continued, clasping my hand in one of hers and extending the other to the doctor.

"What do you mean, you strange child?" the doctor cried. "If you have a secret upon your soul, you ought to have told me of it long ago. If you needed counsel, you could always have had it from me."

"I did not dare to. Franz forbade me. Franz himself did not believe me until yesterday evening. He is innocent. He always said that my fear of Herr Foligno and my detestation of him misled me."

"Of whom are you speaking, child!" asked the doctor.

Instead of answering, Anna turned to me.

"When you reached the Lonely House on that terrible day, Herr Professor, did you not see in its neighbourhood another man beside Franz?" she asked.

"No. No one."

"I did not mean near the house itself, but on the upper path, the one leading along the rocks to Luttach?"

"I saw no one there either."

"You did not see him? I am sorry. Franz was sure yesterday that you did."

"But who in all the world should the Professor have seen!" asked the doctor curiously.

"The Judge," Anna replied. "I was sure I saw him, but I would not say so decidedly, and Franz, until yesterday, thought I might be mistaken and would not allow me to found an unjust suspicion upon an uncertain fact."

The doctor was as astonished and startled as was I by Anna's words. He desired to know more from her, and when I begged the young girl to give us her full confidence and to tell us all that she knew and believed, she yielded to our request and related what had lain so long upon her heart.

When on that dreadful day Anna had left home and was going down the path with her old Johanna to Luttach, she looked up by chance where the oaks grew thin and saw on the upper pathway a man approaching the Lonely House. She thought she recognized the Judge, but she could not be certain, for she had seen the figure only for a moment and had taken no trouble to recognize it, since she attached no importance to what she saw. The Judge had often gone to her father and had usually taken the upper pathway, wherefore she did not think of it again. Only upon hearing the terrible news of the murder of her father was the strange suspicion suddenly aroused within her that the Judge was the murderer, and this suspicion had been gradually confirmed. To hardly one other human being except to his friend the Judge, would her father have opened the locked front door. While he was alone he would have admitted no other. The Judge had known that her father had large sums of money in the house and was quite familiar with the place where they would be found.

"But had I a right upon such slight grounds to found a suspicion of a respectable man? I asked myself," Anna proceeded. "I answered no, but in spite of this 'no' I could not combat my thoughts, and it was most terrible for me that I myself was partly to blame for my father's death if my suspicion were correct. The day before the Judge had come to visit my father, and had not found him at home. My father had left word, however, that he would soon return, and I thought I ought to tell this to the visitor because it might have provoked my father to know that I had turned away his friend. The Judge then begged my permission to wait, and when I gave it reluctantly, he sat down by me in my room and began a conversation. During this conversation I told him that my father had gone to Luttach to get papers of value from the post. He would not send old Johanna because the sum in question was too large to be entrusted to so old a woman. The Judge knew also from me that my father had much money in the house, and that I was going on the following day to visit my Aunt Laucic in Luttach, when Johanna would accompany me, so that after eleven o'clock he might see my father alone. All this I told him, and it all recurred to my mind. I had myself told the murderer when his victim would be alone and when he could commit the deed."