CHAPTER XVIII

On reaching the highroad Boleslav saw the figure of a girl come out from the shadow of the churchyard yews, and advance to meet him with hesitating footsteps.

The moment to which he had looked forward with tender yearning for eight years had come at last, yet his heart beat no quicker. "You ought to be pleased; congratulate yourself," he said inwardly. "She loves you! She saved you ... has freed you from Regina." And something echoed sadly within him, "From Regina!"

The contour of the too slender figure was sharply defined against the moonlit background. The shoulders looked angular, and her hips fell in straight, ungraceful lines from the high-waisted bodice.

He jumped over the ditch, and held out both his hands to her. With a prudish simper she placed hers behind her back.

"Don't be so impetuous," she lisped.

He was amazed. The action chilled him, and almost excited his contempt; but he was ashamed of the emotion, and tried to suppress it.

"You have kept me waiting a long time, Regina."

The face she turned on him was illuminated by the moon, and he saw plainly how insignificant and meagre it had become. She tossed her head scornfully.

"My name is _Helene_," she said. "I am sorry you have forgotten it;"

and pouting, she turned her back.

He winced. "Pardon," he stammered; "it was a slip of the tongue."

This was certainly an unfortunate beginning. She made another grimace, but seemed disposed to accept his apology.

"Don't let us stay here," she begged. "I'm afraid."

"What of?"

"Of the churchyard ... if you _will_ know."

Again he had to struggle against a feeling of contempt. In all she said and did he found himself involuntarily comparing her with Regina, and the comparison was immeasurably to her disadvantage.

"You know how timid I am," she said, as they retraced their steps. "It was rash of me to have chosen this place for an appointment; indeed it was exceedingly rash to come at all--and if it weren't----"

Instead of finishing her sentence she cast at him an affected sidelong glance. Then, as he offered to help her over the ditch she gave a little scream and said, "No, no!"

His half-defined sensation of disappointment now gave place to blank astonishment. She gazed round her nervously.

"We can't stay here either," she whispered, "If I were caught here alone with a gentleman, I believe I should die of shame."

"Where do you wish to go, then?"

"You must decide."

"Very well. Come into the wood."

She clasped her hands together with an agitated old-maidish gesture.

"What are you thinking of?" she exclaimed. "At night ... with a gentleman!"

He rubbed his eyes. Was it really possible, what he heard and saw?

Could this be Helene, the guardian angel to whom he had looked up, as to a being belonging to another world?

But perhaps it was he who was to blame. Perhaps the language of innocence and virtue was no longer intelligible to him because of the fair savage who had perverted his tastes, and filled his imagination with impure pictures.

"Then let us walk quietly along the highroad," he said.

"But if some one comes?"

"We can see that no one _is_ coming."

"Yet some one might ..."

He was at a loss for an answer. A silence ensued, and then he said, "Won't you take my arm?"

"Oh, I don't know whether I ought," replied the love of his youth.

And again they walked on in silence. It almost seemed as if they had nothing at all to say to each other.

"Regina is waiting!" a voice cried within him.

"How silent you are!" Helene lisped, playfully pinching his elbow with two of the finger-tips that lay on his arm. "You wicked man! Haven't you a little bit of liking left for me?"

He felt he had no right to say "No." She had been true to him, had trusted his word for eight long years; he dared not prove himself unworthy now of her faith in him. When he had rea.s.sured her with a stammered "Of course, of course," she sighed, a deep-drawn, languishing sigh.

"I hear such dreadful things about you," she said, "that I don't know what to believe. Tell me it's not true."

"What?" he asked wearily.

"Ah, a girl can't discuss such matters. Immoral things, I mean. In old days you were a good, n.o.ble fellow, and I can't believe it's true that you've altered so completely."

She drew a little closer to him. In doing so, she dropped her blue silk reticule. As he stooped--with her--to pick it up, the peak of his cap brushed her face.

"Oh, take care!" she simpered, drawing back hastily.

"A thousand pardons!" he answered, in a tone of rigid politeness, and bit his lips.

"Well, you don't answer my question," she continued. "Perhaps it is true, then, what people say! I should be sorry to think that poor unhappy me had been so deceived in you. But papa always thought you would come to a bad end." She said this with such a ludicrous little air of superiority, that he could not help smiling.

She seemed to discern that she was appearing absurd in his eyes, and went on in a deeply injured tone, "Ah, it's all very well to laugh at a poor girl, whose intentions towards you are so kind, and who would give anything to prevent your ruin."

"Please, do not trouble yourself on my account," he replied.

"Now you are making yourself out worse than you are," she interposed.

"I know you have a n.o.ble nature at bottom. And if fate parts us for ever, I shall always, always keep a warm place for you in my heart. Oh, what bitter tears have I shed for you many a time! And I've prayed every night to G.o.d to keep the dear friend of my youth from sin, and from wicked revengeful thoughts, and to give him a good conscience."

"I am afraid the behaviour of the Schrandeners is not exactly calculated to cure a man of revengeful thoughts," he replied.

She turned up her sharp little nose. "The Schrandeners are an uncouth lot," she remarked. "And one can't have much to do with them. I would much rather stay altogether with my aunt in Wartenstein. There at least one a.s.sociates with respectable, well-mannered townspeople, who lift their hats to a lady when they meet her in the street. Not a single Schrandener, with the exception of Herr Merckel, and Felix of course, dreams of doing such a thing. Felix," she added with a sigh, "has the manners of a gentleman and an officer." Then as if something had suddenly recalled the events of the afternoon to her mind, she screamed, wrung her hands and said, "Oh, Boleslav, Boleslav!"