The Sign Of Flame Part 28

"Herr Rojanow--I----" She was about to utter a refusal, but he interrupted her, and continued in low, but pa.s.sionate, tones:

"What is a single flower to you, broken carelessly, and which you will allow to fade as carelessly? But to me leave me this token, gracious lady; I--I beg for it."

He stood close beside her. The charm which he, as a boy, had unconsciously exerted when he made people "defenseless" with his coaxing, he, as a man, recognized as a power which never failed, and which he knew how to use. His voice bore again that soft, suppressed tone which charmed the ear like music; and his eyes--those dark, mysterious eyes--were fixed upon the girl before him with a half gloomy, half beseeching expression.

The paleness of her face had deepened, but she did not answer.

"I beg of you," he repeated, more lowly, more beseechingly, as he pressed the glowing flower to his lips; but the very gesture broke the spell. Adelaide suddenly drew herself up.

"I must ask you, Herr Rojanow, to return the flower to me. I intended it for my husband."

"Ah, so? I beg your pardon, Your Excellency."

He handed her the flower with a deep bow, which she accepted with a barely noticeable inclination of the head. Then the heavy white train glided past him, and he was alone.

In vain! Everything glided off this icy nature.

Hartmut stamped his foot angrily. Only ten minutes ago he had pa.s.sed such harsh judgment on all women, without an exception, to the Prince.

Now he had sung again that charming tune which he had tried so often successfully, and had found one who resisted it. But the proud, spoiled man would not believe that he could lose the game which he had won so often, when just here he was so anxious to win it.

And would it really remain only a game? He had not as yet accounted to himself for it, but he felt that the pa.s.sion which drew him to the beautiful woman was mingled at times with hatred.

They were conflicting emotions which had been deeply stirred when he walked by her side through the forest--half admiring, half repellent.

But it was just that which made the chase so interesting to the practised huntsman.

Love! The high, pure meaning of the word had remained foreign to the son of Zalika. When he learned to feel, he was living at his mother's side, she who had made such shameful play of her husband's love; and the women with whom she a.s.sociated were no better. The later life which she led with her son, unsettled and adventurous, with no firm ground under their feet, had finally crushed out the last remnant of idealism in the young man. He learned to despise before he learned to love, and now he felt the merited humiliation given him to be an insult.

"Struggle on," he muttered; "you battle against yourself. I have seen and felt it; and the one who does that, does not conquer in such a struggle."

CHAPTER XXIV.

A slight noise at the entrance caused Hartmut to look up. It was the Amba.s.sador who appeared on the threshold, casting a searching glance into the room. He came for his wife, whom he thought still there.

He started at sight of Hartmut, and for a moment seemed undecided. Then he said, half audibly: "Herr Rojanow."

"Your Excellency."

"I should like to speak to you privately."

"I am at your service."

Wallmoden entered, but took up his position so as to keep the entrance in view. It was hardly necessary, for the doors of the dining room had just been thrown open, and the whole a.s.sembly floated there. The salon adjoining the tower room was already empty.

"I am surprised to see you here," the Amba.s.sador began in suppressed tones, but with the same insulting coldness which he had shown at the first meeting, and which brought the blood to the young man's brow. He drew himself up threateningly.

"Why, Your Excellency?"

"The question is superfluous. At any rate, I request you not to again force me into the position I was brought into a short while ago, when Prince Adelsberg introduced you to me."

"The forced position was mine," returned Hartmut, just as sharply. "I will not a.s.sert that you consider me an intruder here, for you, best of all, know that I have a right to this intercourse."

"_Hartmut von Falkenried_ would have had a right, of course; but that has changed."

"Herr von Wallmoden!"

"Not so loud, if you please," interrupted the Amba.s.sador. "We might be overheard, and it would surely not be desirable to you that the name I just now uttered should be heard by outsiders."

"It is true that at present I carry my mother's name, to which I surely have a right. If I laid aside the other, it happened out of consideration----"

"For your father," finished Wallmoden, with heavy emphasis.

Hartmut started. This was an allusion which he could not bear yet.

"Yes," he replied, curtly. "I confess that it would be painful to me if I were forced to break this consideration."

"And why? Your role here would be played out, anyway."

Rojanow stepped close to the Amba.s.sador with a pa.s.sionate gesture.

"You are the friend of my father, Herr von Wallmoden, and I have called you uncle in my boyhood; but you forget that I am no longer the boy whom you could lecture and master at that time. The grown man looks at it as an insult."

"I intend neither to offend you nor to renew old connections, which neither of us consider as existing," said Wallmoden, coldly. "If I desired this conversation, it was to declare to you that it will not be possible to me, in my official position, to see you in intercourse with the Court, and be silent when it would be my duty to enlighten the Duke."

"Enlighten the Duke! About what?"

"About several things which are not known here and which have probably remained unknown to Prince Adelsberg. Please do not fly into a pa.s.sion, Herr Rojanow. I would do this only in an extreme case, for I have to spare a friend. I know how a certain incident hurt him ten years ago, which is now forgotten and buried in our country, and, if all this should come up again and be brought into publicity, Colonel Falkenried would die of it."

Hartmut blanched. The defiant reply did not cross his lips. "He would die of it." The awful word, the truth of which he felt only too well, forced aside for the moment even the insult of the remark.

"I owe my father alone an account of that occasion," he replied in a painfully suppressed voice; "only him and n.o.body else."

"He will hardly ask for it. His son is dead to him; but let that rest.

I speak especially now of later years; of your stay at Rome and Paris, where you lived with your mother in lavish style, although the estates in Roumania had had to be sacrificed at a forced sale."

"You seem to be all-knowing, Your Excellency!" hissed Rojanow in great anger. "We had no idea that we were under such conscientious surveillance. We lived upon the balance of our fortune which had been rescued from the wreck."

"Nothing was rescued; the money was entirely lost--to the last penny."

"That is not true," interrupted Hartmut, stormily.

"It is true. Am I really better informed about it than you?" The voice of the Amba.s.sador sounded cuttingly sharp. "It is possible that Frau Rojanow did not want her son informed of the source from which she derived her means, and left him in error about it intentionally. I know the circ.u.mstances. If they have remained unknown to you--so much the better for you."

"Take care not to insult my mother," the young man burst forth; "or I shall forget that your hair is gray, and demand satisfaction."

"For what? For a statement for which I can produce the proofs? Lay aside such foolishness, of which I shall take no notice. She was your mother, and is dead now; therefore we will go no deeper into this point. I should only like to put this question to you: Do you intend, even after this conversation, to remain here and appear in the circle into which Prince Adelsberg has introduced you?"