The Northern Light Part 46

"You are again in Germany, and I had no warning of it? You bad boy, to keep me two whole months without any news! Have you come to see me off and say good-bye?"

Hartmut had not responded cordially either to the greeting or embrace; he was gloomier than ever, and there was no sign of joy in his face over this meeting.

"I have come directly from the station," he said. "I almost feared I would not find you, and so much depended on my doing so."

"Why didn't you write or telegraph that you were coming? I wrote to you at once when war was declared. You were in Sicily, were you not?"

"No, I left there as soon as the war seemed to me inevitable, so I did not get your letter. I have been in Germany a week."

"And only come to me now?" said Egon reprovingly.

Rojanow paid no heed to his friend's reproof; his eyes were fastened on his uniform with consuming jealousy.

"You are already in the service I see," he said hastily. "I, too, am anxious to enter the German army."

Nothing he could have said would have surprised Egon so effectually. In great astonishment he stepped back a pace.

"In the German army? You, a Roumanian?" "Yes, and that is why I come to you; you can make my entrance possible."

"I?" said the prince, his amazement increasing each moment. "I'm only a young lieutenant myself. If you are really in earnest you must apply to some high officer in command."

"That I have done already, in various places, in the neighboring states, but no one will take a stranger. A hundred questions are asked, above all one is treated with suspicion and distrust; no one seems to understand my decision."

"To speak openly, Hartmut, neither do I," said Egon earnestly. "You have always shown the greatest aversion to Germany. You are the son of a land whose court circles have always followed French manners and customs; the people have always been closely allied to France, so the distrust and suspicion are easily explained. But why do you not go to the duke in person, and prefer your request? You know how much he would do for the poet who wrote 'Arivana.' All you will have to do will be to obtain an audience, and that will be granted as soon as your name's sent in. An order from him would silence every objection."

Rojanow's eyes sank to the ground, and his dark, frowning brow grew blacker as he answered:

"I know it, but I can ask nothing of him. The duke would ask the same questions as the others. I dare not refuse him an answer, and I could not tell him the truth."

"Nor me?" asked the prince, as he stepped up to his friend and placed his hands on his shoulders. "Why do you wish to fight under the German flag?"

Hartmut drew his hand across his brow as if to smooth out something, then he answered with a gasp:

"Because it means deliverance or--death."

"You return as great a mystery as when you went away," said Egon, shaking his head. "You have avoided my questionings; can you not tell me your secret now?"

"Only get me into the army and I'll tell you everything!" cried Rojanow, feverish with excitement. "I care not under what conditions, only get me in the army. Don't speak to the duke or to any of the generals, only get me into some subordinate command. Your name, your kinship to the reigning house will make your recommendation of great value. They will not be captious when Prince Adelsberg solicits a place for a friend."

"But they'll be sure to ask me the same questions they asked you. You are a Roumanian--"

"No, no!" exclaimed Rojanow, pa.s.sionately. "Have you never seen, never felt that--I am a German?"

The effect of this declaration was not so great as Hartmut had feared.

The prince looked steadily at him for a minute, then he said:

"I have thought that for some time. The man who wrote 'Arivana' never learned the German language as part of his education; it was born in him. But you bear the name of Rojanow--"

"That was my mother's name, she belonged to a Roumanian Bojarin family.

My own name is--Hartmut von Falkenried."

"Falkenried? That was the name of the Prussian officer who came from Berlin with the secret despatches to the duke. Is he a kinsman of yours?"

"He is my father."

The prince glanced sympathetically at his friend, for he saw how it wrung his very soul to make this confession. He felt that here lay hidden a family drama, and desirous to avoid all show of curiosity concerning it, he only said:

"Take your own name as the son of your father; then every regiment in Prussia will be open to you."

"No, that would close them forever--I ran away from the cadet academy over ten years ago."

"Hartmut!" There was atone of horror in the exclamation.

"Ah, you are like my father. You regard me as a criminal. You who were reared in freedom know naught of the severities and restraints of that inst.i.tution, of its tyrannies, to which every one within its walls has to bow in blind obedience. I endured it as long as I could, then I left it, for my soul demanded freedom and light. I appealed to my father in vain; he but tightened the chains--so I tore them apart and went away with my mother."

His manner was wild and excited as he told his short, fateful story; but his eyes, anxious and watchful, never left his listener's face. His father, with his fierce, severe code of honor, had cursed him, but his friend, who adored him, who had professed such a deep admiration for his genius, surely he would understand him, and how he had been driven to take such a step. But this friend was silent now, and in his silence lay his sentence.

"And you, too, Egon?" In the tone of the questioner, who had waited a long minute, and waited in vain for some word, there was inexpressible bitterness. "You, who have so often said to me that nothing should hamper the poet's flight, that he must break all bonds which would bind him to the earth. That's what I did, and it's what you would have done in my place."

The young prince drew himself up proudly, and answered decisively:

"No, Hartmut, you are in error there! I would perhaps have escaped from a severe school,--but from military service never!"

There were again the same old hard words he remembered as a boy--"the military service"--"the service of arms!" All the blood in his body rushed to his head.

"How did it happen you were not an officer?" continued Egon. "The cadets are promoted while very young in the north! Then in a few years you could have resigned. Just at the age, too, when life was beginning, and been free--with honor."

Hartmut was dumb; that was what his father had said to him once, but he would not wait. The barriers were an obstruction, and he threw them down, not recking that he trampled duty and honor in the dust at the same time.

"You do not understand how many things pressed upon me at the time," he explained with difficulty. "My mother--I will not complain, but she has been my fate. My father was divorced from her when I was little more than a baby, and I thought she was dead. Then suddenly she appeared in my life and I was tossed and torn by her hot mother love and her extravagant promises of freedom and happiness. She alone is accountable for my broken word--"

"What broken word?" asked Egon, excitedly. "You had not yet taken the oath?"

"No, but I had promised my father to return, when he permitted me a last interview with my mother."

"And instead of doing so, you ran away with her?"

"Yes."

The answer was almost inaudible, and then followed a long pause. The young prince spoke no word, but a deep, bitter pain lay on his sunny face, the bitterest of his lifetime, for in this minute he lost the friend he had loved so pa.s.sionately.

Hartmut began again, but did not look at his friend while he spoke.

"Now you understand why I will force myself into the army at any price.

On the battle-field I can expiate my boyhood's offense. When I saw in Sicily that war was imminent, I flew in haste to Germany. I hoped to be able to enter the service at once. I did not dream of the difficulties which I should encounter; but you can help me if you will."

"No, I cannot," said Egon, coldly. "After what I now know it would be an impossibility."