The Undying Past Part 74

This phase in Hertha caused grandmamma much uneasiness, and as she found that she could no longer win the child's confidence, she consulted Pastor Brenckenberg about her one Sunday in the vestry.

The old man gave wise advice. He stroked his fat double chin, and said, grinning--

"Don't fret, Frau von Sellenthin, it is really nothing serious. Between the ages of fifteen and eighteen, sometimes sooner, sometimes later, most young girls get a strong religious craze. It will pa.s.s off like measles. Crossing herself, too, a habit she must have acquired when a Catholic, she will grow out of. Mark my words, and have patience."

The old lady smiled, and was satisfied, but Hertha's strenuous mood continued. She had blue rings round her eyes, and gazed at the moon.

One might have thought she was ill, had not her figure, in these weeks, began to develop into beauty. The flatness of her breast yielded to rounded curves; her brown throat became fuller; her shoulders lost their angularity and took on graceful sloping lines. Her face alone remained small and sharp, and kept its bird-like, restless expression.

All the rebellious discontent and pain caused by the betrayal of her love, which inwardly devoured her, could not resist the influence of the approaching festival of peace and goodwill. While she was industriously working at her presents, love gushed forth from every pore of her being. An impulse towards goodness and forgiveness mastered her, and even stifled that burning, indescribable bitterness which, as a rule, took possession of her whenever the beautiful woman's image rose before her eyes.

The day before Christmas Eve, the painting of the pocketbook was finished, if not altogether to her satisfaction, and the photograph of Frau von Kletzingk, which she had abstracted from the family alb.u.m, graced the frame. Now the only difficulty remaining was, how to get her present to the nearest post-office in dead secrecy. Fortunately, an opportunity occurred just in the nick of time.

Grandmamma, who was preparing the servants' Christmas tables, found her supply of nuts and gingerbreads had run short, and that she had also miscalculated the number of ap.r.o.ns and woollen mittens required.

"One can't turn a dog out in weather like this," she said, "but if only I knew of some one who was going to Hoffmann's in Munsterberg I would ask him to act the part of a real Santa Claus."

Hertha, with a beating heart, offered to undertake the journey.

"My lamb is always to the fore when there is any kindness to be done,"

said grandmamma. "In the closed sleigh perhaps you won't find it too cold."

Half an hour later she was on the way. A snow-storm whirled through the air so thick that it seemed as if white towels were flapping over the sleigh windows. The fine frozen flakes, as hard as bullets, pelted against the gla.s.s as if huge shovelfuls of white sand were being hurled against it The voice of the storm whistled uncannily through the c.h.i.n.ks. Yet it was cosy and warm underneath the fur rugs, and the twilight of the confined s.p.a.ce was conducive to dreaming. It seemed to her as if a web as soft as velvet was being spun closer and closer around her, shutting her off from all the vexations of life.

She released her cramped hold on the precious pocket-book, and burying her head in the farthest corner, thought only good and n.o.ble things about him. The sleigh flew through the air like a bird, only as it inclined towards the stream did it begin to b.u.mp a little. She looked up in some alarm at the miniature icebergs with clouds of snow dancing above them on either side of the track which had now been made across the solid ice.

When she arrived in Munsterberg and the chance of sending off the pocket-book was deliciously within reach she became undecisive again.

All she had to do was to say to the young man at Hoffmann's, "Pack this for me and address it to Herr von Sellenthin," and the thing would be done.

As she was reflecting this she beheld, with a start, _his_ sleigh a few yards in front of her. She recognised him instantly, without his turning round. He wore a pea-jacket and high oilskin boots. The winter cap which grandmamma had knitted him out of grey fleecy wool was drawn over his ears. A hill of driven snow rested between his shoulders.

Hertha was not in the least prepared to meet him in Munsterberg. It was true she had not seen him at home before she came out, but that was nothing extraordinary, because he was hardly ever to be seen there, except at dinner, when he still joined the family party to eat in silence what was handed him, and then to hurry away.

Now he spotted his own horses. "Hulloa! who's that?" he cried to the coachman, who stopped while he opened the door and looked in. "Oh, it's you, child, is it?" he said, smiling wearily and sadly, but filling her with delight. His beard was encrusted with snow, and thawing drops ran over his forehead and cheeks. "Have you still got purchases to make for this evening?"

"Yes."

"Ah, that's all right. I would drive with you only I've got my own turn out. I have business at the Prussian Crown. Take care of yourself, child, and don't get cold."

He gave her his hand and shut the sleigh door. The horses moved on and he vanished.

Hertha leaned back in her corner and shut her eyes tight. She was quite decided now not to send the pocket-book. He had only to smile and all her sulks were gone. Ah! she must think of something very nice to do for him now, something extra nice.

She accomplished her shopping at Hoffmann's, which was in a tumultuous bustle. She bought ap.r.o.ns with flowery patterns, and all the woollen mittens had coloured borders, and she defrayed the extra cost out of her own purse.

While she was seeing her parcels packed into the sleigh at the door of the Prussian Crown she became aware that Leo was sitting at a little table in the window of the coffee-room. There was a bottle of wine before him, and his head was buried dejectedly in his hands. Her heart beat faster. She would have liked to ask if there was anything she could do for him on the way home, but she hadn't the courage to approach him.

The drive back was again like a dream. She could not forget how he had smiled, and how kindly and simply he had greeted her. It is Christmas, she thought, that drives all enmity out of people's hearts. And now she knew what she would do to please him. The pocket-book should lie on his plate as a token of reconciliation, and instead of _the_ woman's likeness, grandmamma's dear honest face should smile out at him from the frame. That would alter the character of the present altogether.

Hertha arrived home at half-past two. She was tired, but happy, and still held the pocket-book in her half-frozen fingers. There was not much for her to do. Grandmamma and the old Mamselle were arranging the presents, and the salon doors were locked. Elly, who had been fearfully lazy, and had scarcely finished in time her two yards of tatting for grandmamma, was stretched out on the sofa and began forthwith to talk nonsense. If Bruno only knew what Frank had whispered in her ear, it must come to a duel between them, and if Frank knew what Bruno had said to Kattie about her, a duel would also be the inevitable consequence.

First she said she would cry herself sick over Bruno's death, and five minutes later, over Frank's. So her chatter went on aimlessly, interlarded with all sorts of expressions which filled Hertha with contemptuous disgust. During the autumn Elly had acquired a whole dictionary of English slang, and talked of "hot flirtations," "jolly fellows," and of things being "smart" and "swagger," till Hertha was almost mad from irritation.

The latter stood at the window, from which one could see into the courtyard. She watched the drifting snow, flying clouds of which waltzed above the stables, and whipped from the slates of the roof, the white ma.s.ses clung to the fanes like linen flags. The wind howled and sighed in the trees, and on the side that faced the wind their trunks were encrusted with great icicles.

Here and there on the lawn patches of the turf were visible, and within them the withered trembling blades of gra.s.s looked like corpses brought out of their grave by magic and made to dance a weird measure. A pale light escaping from the clouds illumined the dusk uncannily. The smallest strip of sulphurous yellow showed the place where the sun had gone down.

Hertha in her happy childish years had believed that the Christchild came down to earth on a sunbeam. But there was none to be seen now. Ah!

how long ago it seemed since those days! To-day she felt old and weary of life.

Eternities of gnawing pain and suffering seemed to lie behind her. Yet before her she looked out expectantly for a sweet, vague, dreadful something, the prospect of which filled her young soul with blissful melancholy and brought tears of holy thankfulness into her eyes. It was like a low and mysterious whispering, an elegy and a song of spring in one. She thought of things that promise to blossom into vigorous life--a rose-bush covered with dewy buds; a bird's nest filled with yellow speckled eggs--such as these were the sacred hopes and secrets that lie buried and cherished in the depths of the soul.

And Christmas, after all was said and done, meant love and peace; goodwill and forgiveness.

The clock struck five, greyer became the ma.s.ses of snow outside, and more and more did the roof of the stables become one with the sky, and still he didn't come. Already the hum of many voices proceeded from the servants' hall. Impatience had brought the guests to the house long before the bell was to sound. But grandmamma had been prepared for this emergency and had ordered an enormous supply of hot coffee and buns to be in readiness.

Hertha wanted to make herself useful and went down to them. There they stood in long files exhaling the odour of fustian and warming their benumbed fingers on their coffee-mugs. Johanna's ragged school was represented in full force. At first she had intended to entertain her pupils under her own roof, not wishing to crave hospitality for them from her sullen brother. But at Hertha's earnest request and grandmamma's a.s.surances that Leo would not object, she had determined to bring her little people over to the castle for the festive evening.

Old and young greeted, beaming, the universally popular "gracious little countess." She took her favourites in turn on her lap, listened to detailed complaints of winter hardships from the mothers, and regarded herself altogether as a good angel. But time went on and he didn't come.

When it struck six the company began to stream out into the corridors and press towards the door of the salon. There they grew eager and noisy. Though each knew perfectly well that his plate would be standing ready for him in its proper place, they fought with knees and elbows to get in front of each other.

Hertha went back to the morning-room, because she was no longer needed by any one. Grandmamma was pacing up and down excitedly, Johanna was staring at the lamp, and Elly yawned and fidgeted with the fringe of the table-cloth.

"Such want of consideration," lamented grandmamma; "he must know that the people will go nearly mad at being kept waiting, he must know how they will want to see him, and yet he can't come home for once, even on Christmas Eve, but must needs go knocking about goodness knows where."

Hertha was horrified at grandmamma, who always took his part, being so irate with him to-day, and that he should have at least one person to defend him she said--

"I met him in Munsterberg this morning. He had some business to do at the Prussian Crown."

But grandmamma, growing still more wroth, exclaimed--

"Business indeed! Who transacts business on Christmas Eve?"

Hertha pictured him hurrying through the snowy stormy night towards the domestic hearth, and saw him stuck fast in a snowdrift. Her heart was nearly bursting with anxiety and pity. How her sentiments had changed since early this morning, all because of a friendly word and a Christma.s.sy smile. She glided, with the pocket-book under her ap.r.o.n, to a drawer, tossed Lizzie's photograph contemptuously into a corner, and put grandmamma's in its place.

The clock struck seven. They were getting so excited now outside that they were nearly forcing the doors open, and still there was no sound of approaching sleigh-bells.

"It can't be helped," said grandmamma, wiping away her tears; "we must celebrate Christmas without the master of the house."

"We ought to be used to it," remarked Johanna, in her bitter way.

Hertha almost hated her for saying it.

"But don't you see," replied poor grandmamma, beginning to cry again, "how doubly painful and trying it is for me? Four Christmases he has been away in America and G.o.d knows where else, and now, when he has come home, he treats me like this."

"Just wait another quarter of an hour," implored Hertha; "it's the bad weather, I am sure, that is keeping him away."

And they waited, not a quarter, but half an hour, and then the Mamselle came in.