The Northern Light Part 42

Falkenried shrugged his shoulders contemptuously:

"Still acting a comedy? you need give yourself no trouble; I know all.

Wallmoden laid before me the proofs of the game which Zalika Rojanow and her son played in Paris. I know the sources from which the money came on which you lived after she had lost her fortune. She was greatly sought after for her peculiar accomplishments, for she was very skillful. He who paid the highest price--secured her services!"

Hartmut was completely overwhelmed.

This then was the solution of Wallmoden's riddle. He had not understood the amba.s.sador, and had thought his insinuations of a different nature.

He could understand his mother's hypocrisy now, her evasions, her kisses and flatteries when he pressed her with questions. This last was indeed the worst of all--and the last vestige of respect for her who had borne him died within him as he listened to his father's recital.

The silence which ensued was awful. It continued for several minutes, and when Hartmut spoke again his voice seemed to have lost all sound, and the words came brokenly--scarcely audibly--from his lips:

"And you believe that I--that I--knew it?"

"I do," the colonel answered shortly.

"Father, you cannot, you must not believe that, it would be too terrible. You must believe me when I tell you that I had not the slightest premonition of such a disgrace. I believed that part of our fortune was saved, I did indeed--you must believe that, father."

"No, you did not," responded Falkenried, more coldly than ever. Hartmut threw himself upon his knees.

"Father, by all that is sacred in heaven and earth--oh, do not, do not look at me that way--you will drive me mad. Father, I give you my word of honor--"

A wild, hideous laugh from his father interrupted him.

"Your word of honor--you gave that at Burgsdorf. Let us end this comedy; you cannot deceive me. You leave me with one lie, you return to me with another. You have become the genuine son of your mother. Go your own way, and I'll go mine. But one thing I tell you, I command you! Never venture to connect the name of Falkenried with the dishonored name of Rojanow. Never let the world know who you are. Remember this warning, otherwise my blood be upon your head--for I will make an end of it all."

With a cry of despair, Hartmut sprang up and would have rushed to his father, but the latter held him back with his hand.

"Perhaps you think that I love life. I have borne it because I must, and I felt that it was my duty. But there is a point where duty ends, you know it now--so act accordingly."

He turned his back to his son and stepped again to the window. Hartmut spoke no word; in silence he turned and left the apartment.

The ante-chamber was not lighted, but the dim, distant light from the northern sky fell upon the face of a woman, who stood pale as death near the window, and whose eyes gazed with a look of indescribable anguish at the face of the miserable man who entered the room. He saw her, and a single glance told him that she knew all. His cup was full! The woman whom he loved had been a witness to his terrible humiliation.

Hartmut never knew how he succeeded in leaving the castle; he only knew that he was suffocating within four walls and must have air. But when he realized where he was and who he was, he was lying in the deep snow at the foot of an old fir tree. It was night in the forest, a cold, icy night, the heavens were illuminated with a deep red glow which centered in the north and sent up its long, gleaming sheet of flame.

It was summer again, the sultry July days were half over.

The forest trees cast long, cool shadows from their green and sombre depths, while the sunbeams danced in and out among the branches through all the silent, bright days.

Ostwalden, the estate which Herbert von Wallmoden had purchased immediately before his death, had been empty and deserted until within the past few days, when the young widow, accompanied by her sister-in-law, Frau von Eschenhagen, had arrived. Adelheid had left the South German capital soon after her husband's death, and had gone to her old home accompanied by her brother, who had hastened to her side as soon as he heard of the sad accident. Her short marriage had only lasted eight months and now in her twentieth year she wore the weeds of widowhood.

Regine had been easily persuaded to accompany her sister-in-law. She had never changed her ultimatum regarding her return to Burgsdorf, and it is needless to add, Willibald had not changed. Adelheid asked her to go home with her and she had gone, feeling that her threat had as yet borne no fruit.

Frau von Eschenhagen believed she could effect a revolution of feeling in Willibald's heart by this move. But his newly acquired firmness had not been fleeting, though he tried every argument to persuade his mother to return to Burgsdorf and to think kindly of his future wife--but all to no purpose. Regine had no thought of yielding an inch, and now, mother and son had not seen one another for many months.

There had been no formal betrothal to Marietta. Willibald felt that he owed his cousin and uncle the consideration of not having a second betrothal follow so closely upon the first. Then Marietta's contract with the Court theatre bound her for the next six months, and as her engagement was a secret there, it was thought advisable to keep it so until she had left the theatre forever. The young singer had but just returned to her grandfather's house, where Willibald was also expected soon. Frau von Eschenhagen knew nothing of all this, or she would hardly have accepted an invitation which brought her into the neighborhood of Waldhofen.

The day had been hot and sunny, but the late afternoon hours brought a refreshing breeze, and swayed the drooping branches of the trees which overhung and shaded the road leading from Ostwalden through the Rodeck forest. Along this road, two men were trotting their horses; the one in gray jacket and hunting cap was the head forester, Herr von Schonau, the other in a light summer riding suit, which set off his slender figure to advantage, was Prince Adelsberg. They had met accidentally, and soon discovered that they were bound for the same place.

"I did not dream of meeting your Highness here," said Schonau. "I understood you were not coming to Rodeck at all this summer. I saw Stadinger day before yesterday and he certainly didn't expect you then."

"Stadinger made a great hue and cry because I came upon him so unexpectedly," answered the prince. "To hear him you'd think it was his own castle and I was intruding. And then I walked from the station, and he considered that a most undignified proceeding. But the heat at Ostend was unbearable; the sun just poured down on the strand, and an irresistible longing came over me for my own cool forest home. Thank the Lord, I am rid of the heat and noise of that Babel at last."

His Highness had not cared in this instance to tell the truth. A certain attraction in his immediate neighborhood, of which he heard accidentally, had started him from the North Sea at a moment's notice.

Stadinger in a report which he sent his master concerning certain matters at Rodeck, had mentioned that preparations were being made at Ostwalden for the reception of the young widow. And it was in consequence of his own gossipy letter that the steward was disagreeably surprised by the prince's sudden appearance. The head forester seemed somewhat sceptical about the prince's fancy for his "cool forest home,"

for he said banteringly:

"Then I am greatly surprised that our Court remains so long at Ostend.

The duke and d.u.c.h.ess are there, and Princess Sophie with a royal niece, a kinswoman of her late husband, I hear."

"Yes, with her niece." Prince Egon turned suddenly and looked at his companion.

"Herr von Schonau, I see you are about to congratulate me. If you do I'll demand satisfaction on the spot, right here in the middle of the forest."

"I don't intend to get into any difficulty with you," laughed his hearer. "But the papers speak very openly of an impending betrothal at Court, and that the d.u.c.h.ess and Princess Sophie are charmed with the prospect."

"My beloved aunt has many desires which I fear will never be gratified,"

said the prince, coolly. "Her obedient nephew doesn't always fall in with her views, and that's the case in this affair. I went to Ostend because I had to; in other words, because the duke invited me, and I could not refuse; but the air did not agree with me, and I prize my health above all things. I didn't feel well from the first, so at last I resolved--"

"To break loose," interrupted the head forester. "That was very like your highness, but how will you calm your kinsfolk at Court?"

"Oh, well, I can make it all right with them if they feel aggrieved. As far as that goes," continued the prince, with seeming frankness, "I made up my mind last winter to spend part of the summer here, and when Stadinger wrote me that some alterations were going on, I determined to come on to Rodeck myself to superintend them."

"Superintend the putting up of a new chimney?" questioned the head forester in surprise. "The old one smoked last winter, so Stadinger determined to put in a new one, but that don't require any attention from you."

"What does Stadinger know about it ?" said the prince angrily. He wished the "old bear" would hold his tongue about what went on at Rodeck. "I have many changes in view. We are pretty near our destination, I see."

With that he started his horse on at a faster gait, and the head forester followed his example, for Ostwalden lay before them. The great building which Herr von Wallmoden would have made so magnificent, had he lived, was an old, rambling castle, with two high towers, one on either side, which gave the building a very picturesque appearance, surrounded as it was by a wild, partially overgrown park. The present mistress of the place, so it was said, intended to make few changes, but she would not sell the place. What mattered a country-seat more or less to the heiress of the Stahlberg millions.

The gentlemen found on their arrival that Frau von Wallmoden was walking in the park, and Frau von Eschenhagen was in her room. The young prince announced that he would seek the lady of the house, while the head forester turned his steps toward his sister-in-law's room.

He had not seen Regine since the previous winter. As he entered the room he said in his wonted hearty manner:

"Here I am. I didn't think it worth while being announced to my sister-in-law, although she does avoid my house with contempt. I don't believe in hunting pretexts for quarrels, so have ridden over in this hot sun to have an explanation."

Regine reached out her hand to him. A pa.s.sing glance would reveal no change in her in these last six or seven months; she was the same strong, determined woman as ever. But there was a change, nevertheless.

Heretofore her severity and harshness had always been tempered by a certain winning cheerfulness, but that was gone now. She had not yielded, but--she had suffered. She was estranged, perhaps forever, from her only son, who was the idol of her mother's heart.

"I have nothing against you, Moritz," she said heartily. "I knew you would be true to the old friendship in spite of all that you and your daughter were made to suffer; but of course it is very painful for me to go to Furstenstein; you must see that."

"On account of the broken engagement? Well you can console yourself about that. You saw and heard at the time how good naturedly Toni took the matter. She played the _role_ of guardian angel much better than that of sweetheart, and she wrote you several times that she had no regrets and so did I. But, I am sorry to say, our a.s.surances have amounted to nothing."

"No, but I know how to appreciate your rare generosity."

"Rare generosity!" repeated her brother-in-law laughing. "Well, perhaps a jilted bride and her father do not always want to speak a good word for a recreant lover, but that is not the case this time, and who knows but we may be able to persuade the mother to see as we do. Toni and I have both remarked that Will never was a man until now, and that--forgive me, Regine, but I must say it--he owes his manhood to little Marietta."