Frau von Rosen a.s.sented. "But yet it is hard," she rejoined; "and if anything has estranged them from each other, be sure it is the result of the grand state in which they are obliged to live. Love is more likely to nourish amid simple, comfortable surroundings."

The next day the family and their guests were taking their coffee when the post-bag was brought in. There was a general distribution of letters and newspapers, and among the former was a thick envelope for Alma from Adela Hohenstein.

There had been a brisk correspondence carried on of late between the two girls, and Alma was as familiar with Adela's quiet life in her country home as was Adela with Alma's walks and rides with her guests, and even with the conversations carried on among them.

"It is very charming here," Adela wrote. "My plants and my animals flourish finely. Papa is contented, and we love each other dearly.

But--you see there is a but--it is very quiet. The people about us are strangers to us, and those whom we know are far away. I go to walk just when you do, but I am quite alone. Since my Fidele died I have not even a dog, for the one I have now is too stupid to care to go with me.

While I walk, papa writes his book, which, however, between ourselves, will not come to anything, because poor papa has forgotten so much. But it gives him pleasure, and so I let him believe that it will be good, and go to walk alone. And sometimes I am quite low in my mind and could envy you your guests. Not Walter, of course, but Dr. Nordstedt is so nice; and even Walter is a human being, and an old acquaintance besides. Papa, too, thinks--but then he had better write you himself what he thinks. I only want to tell you that I am no longer so seriously angry with Walter as I told you I was in Berlin. I have been thinking about it since I have been so much alone, and I have reflected that it is folly to be angry with any one for as long as I have been vexed with Walter. To be sure, you do not know the cause I had for anger, and I certainly had good cause; but nevertheless I am angry with him no longer, and he need not refuse papa's invitation on my account.

You may tell him so."

Alma read this strange letter twice, and just as she finished it Herr von Rosen said, "Baron Hohenstein has written to me, Dr. Nordstedt, asking whether you and Walter will not stop and pay him a little visit on your way home. He says he has received so much hospitality in your house that he should like to requite it. You will go directly past his retreat, and----"

"Don't decide against this plan; I have something to tell you from Adela," Alma whispered to Walter, who was just opening his lips to declare that the visit would be impossible.

Dr. Nordstedt read the Freiherr's kind invitation, and then declared, with a glance at Walter, the state of whose mind he guessed, although he knew nothing of it positively, that he felt inclined to go. After breakfast Alma took occasion to deliver Adela's message to Walter. The young man hesitated at first whether to rejoice or be vexed. Adela was no longer angry with him! As if she had ever had any cause to be so. He had laid his heart at her feet, and she had thrust it from her. The bitterest moments of his life he had experienced upon her account. No human being had ever so grieved and wounded him as she had done. And now she sent him word that she was no longer angry with him. What a confusion of ideas there must be in that fair curly head! But in spite of his vexation his heart beat faster, and there was a joyous light in his eyes. Was not a desire to see him again at the bottom of her message? Did she not say "I am no longer angry with you" only because pride and mortification kept her from saying, "Do not be angry with me any longer"? Of what avail was it that he had so often convinced himself that he would forget her,--nay, that he had forgotten her? Her image was more vividly distinct than ever in his mind, and in spite of all his self-remonstrances he was delighted at the thought of this visit, and counted the days that must elapse before it could begin.

One day Herr von Rosen invited him to drive with him to Rollin, where he and Alma had long owed a visit. Dr. Nordstedt stayed with Frau von Rosen, and the three others set out upon a lovely afternoon. How strange were Walter's sensations upon seeing the fine old pile once more! The memories connected with it took more vivid shape in his mind.

There were the two old lindens beside the court-yard gate stretching their leafy arms above the tall old wooden crucifix, and upon the other side was the ancient oak, in which the storks were wont to build. But between these unchanged trees two brand-new gothic gate-posts had lately been erected, and as the carriage rolled along the avenue Walter saw that the old house had been decorated with all kinds of turrets and bow-windows. The arbour of clematis had been replaced by a sloping terrace; the elder-bushes in front of the house had been exchanged for closely-trimmed acacias, and instead of the climbing roses, which had been killed by the various renovations, the shield and baronial crest of the Hohensteins were conspicuous between the windows of the upper story. A footman in elegant livery received the guests. The hall was redolent of fresh paint and new carpets, and the doors creaked upon their hinges, as though discontented with the new order of affairs, but no footstep could be heard upon the luxurious rugs and carpets. Hugo Hohenstein received them in the hall in his customary _blase_ but not inelegant manner. He conducted Alma to the drawing-room, and presented the party to his wife, who greeted them with a curtsey that was needlessly low, but maintained towards them generally an air of cool reserve, which finally had a paralyzing effect upon them all. The young hostess had perhaps not received a satisfactory amount of attention from her husband's acquaintances, and was fearful of compromising herself; at all events, she was evidently embarra.s.sed, perfectly courteous but perfectly cold, so that when the gentlemen retired to smoke a cigar, Alma found it very difficult to carry on a conversation.

She admired several treasures of art that were displayed on shelves and brackets, as well as the entire arrangement of the drawing-room. Frau von Hohenstein replied that it was all very simple, and that she was sure that Fraulein von Rosen was accustomed to a far greater degree of elegance. But something in her expression gave the lie to her words, and Alma's heart grew heavy, for she could not but remember, as these conventional phrases were being exchanged, the many delightful talks she had had with Adela in this very room.

"Walter's sensations were very similar to Alma's, while Hugo Hohenstein conducted the gentlemen through the gardens, where stiff flower-beds but poorly replaced the rose-hedges. The trees in the park, too, were much thinned, and part of the pond had been drained to give place to more trim flower-beds.

"When the pond was drained a ring was found," said Hugo,--"a golden ring, set with a blue or green stone. I have it now; and I should like to know how it came in the pond."

The blood mounted to Walter's cheeks, but he said nothing, until shortly afterwards, when he was shown the ring in the smoking-room.

Then he could not refrain from remarking, "I think your sister, Fraulein Adela, used to wear that ring. If I am not mistaken, there is a date engraved upon it,--the date of your parents' betrothal----Ah!

there it is: 'August 28, 1830.' Does that coincide with your knowledge on the subject?"

"To be sure! I never thought of that. Really, it is remarkable how stupid everything is when one comes to investigate it. Some interest attached to the ring so long as no one knew how it came in the pond.

But now that we know all about it, it turns out to be perfectly commonplace."

"Would you like to see my collection of weapons?" he asked, after a while. "I have some rare pieces." He opened a cabinet and displayed its contents to his guests. "They really are fine, are they not?" he said.

"I am thinking now of making an Egyptian collection. I intend going to Egypt; it is a fearful bore to stay at home forever."

"Ah!" said Herr von Rosen. "What does your lady wife say to that?"

Hugo von Hohenstein looked at his neighbour with undisguised astonishment, then he smiled with an air of superiority. "_Mon Dieu!_"

he said, "we did not marry to be bored. My wife will probably visit a French watering-place, or something of the sort." He suppressed a slight yawn, and thought how impossible it was to be entertained by these _gentilshommes campagnards_, who, with their old-fashioned ideas, were really quite out of place in the modern world.

Herr von Rosen ordered his carriage.

"_a propos_, since you are shortly to pay my governor a visit, my dear Eichhof, why not take the ring with you?" said Hugo.

"Walter had already thought of doing so, but had not made up his mind how to propose it. He took the ring, and his heart beat fast. Fate willed that the ring he had cast away in anger should now be returned to him; he would accept the omen,--it was the talisman of his good fortune that he had thus regained. Therefore on the drive home to Schonthal he was in the gayest humour, while Herr von Rosen and Alma could not recover from the impression the visit had made upon them.

They had had a fleeting glimpse of a modern fashionable marriage, and both were prompted to make a comparison which pained them.

"He is going to Egypt and she to France," Herr von Rosen thought, "and this they call not being 'bored.' And my daughter and my son-in-law, too, have put miles between them. Are they afraid of being 'bored'?

Good heavens! have home-life and home-happiness lost all charm for the young people of the present day?"

Alma on her part thought of the cool courtesy with which Hugo Hohenstein and his wife treated each other, and then her thoughts travelled to Thea and Bernhard. Would they at some future day treat each other thus, or even more coldly and stiffly? She longed to see Thea again; now when her first sharp pang for Lothar's death was past, and when her mother was so nearly well, the secret in which she was a sharer weighed heavily upon her youthful soul. The world was so fair and sunny, and people were so kind, and Dr. Nordstedt--no, he had nothing to do with it; but she felt so calmly happy that her heart was full of grat.i.tude to G.o.d for this lovely world. But then, when she remembered Thea and Lothar, she felt that she was wrong to be happy and to enjoy. Oh, there was so much sorrow in the world after all!

And to-day, after the visit to Rollin, she felt in a particularly melancholy mood. Rollin had impressed her as so sadly changed, she missed Adela everywhere; she thought of how changed too Eichhof would be when Thea finally returned thither, and she remembered that their guests were to leave Schonthal on the morrow.

Occupied with these thoughts, she went out alone in the evening into the park, while the rest were sitting on the veranda. Frau von Rosen soon reentered the house, and asked her husband to come with her, as she wished to speak with him. Nordstedt and Walter were left alone.

Nordstedt drummed with his fingers upon the garden-table, near which he sat, in a nervous way quite unlike him. He arose once or twice, then seated himself and drummed again, saying, at last, "I will go find Fraulein Alma; the evening is damp, she may take cold."

"Well, then, come," said Walter, evidently regarding his companionship as indispensable.

Nordstedt stood one moment in silence, then put both hands upon his young friend's shoulders, and said, gently, "Let me go alone; I have something to say to Fraulein Alma."

"Nordstedt, is it possible?" Walter e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, having already during his visit at Schonthal made up his mind that it was not Adela who had wrought the change in Nordstedt which had so surprised and annoyed him in Berlin.

Nordstedt looked abroad into the moonlight. "Much is possible, my dear fellow; nothing is certain!" he said. And without another word he descended the steps of the veranda and walked alone: the moonlit path towards the park.

CHAPTER XXII.

A CRISIS.

It was very lonely at Castle Eichhof. On lovely summer afternoons the servants would sit in the pleasantest nooks in the garden discussing old times and new ones, and the windows of the second story were closely curtained, and looked as if they had all kinds of secrets to keep. Thea had not yet returned, and Bernhard's visits to his home were very short, and when he did come he occupied his bachelor apartments.

His railway scheme gave him a great deal to do, and even if this had not been the case he could not have borne to stay long in his lonely castle.

It was fortunate that the Wronskys were at home this summer! Although their estate, Panienka, was more than two miles distant from Eichhof, Bernhard was their frequent guest.

Wronsky, who was much too undecided a character to insist upon his own way when it was not agreeable to his wife, was extremely glad that she had chosen to spend this summer at home, for he dearly loved his ease and good eating. He looked up to his wife much as he did to his old schoolfellow Bernhard, and if he thought it the great blessing of his life that he had won the hand of his beautiful, clever, and proud Julutta, none the less did he feel himself greatly honoured by Bernhard's frequent presence in his house. In his unpretending _bonhommie_ he thought it but natural that his friend should prefer his wife's society to his own. Bernhard's influence over his good-natured friend dated from their school-days; he had always been first in his cla.s.ses, while Wronsky had contentedly remained at their foot. And Julutta? She smiled when she perceived Bernhard approaching, but it was a strange, contemptuous smile, very different from the one with which she greeted him when he stood before her. Latterly she had not smiled when he appeared, but had bidden him welcome with eyes that were large and serious, and with a certain shy confusion in her manner. The more embarra.s.sed she seemed, the warmer and the firmer was his clasp of her hand, the more frank and cordial did he become, until she, too, adopted his tone, and they talked together like good friends and comrades. At least so Bernhard would have said, and he forced himself to believe that so it was. Yes, Julutta's blush when he touched her hand, the liquid brilliancy of her eyes, the pathetic tone of her voice when she talked with him, all this was only friendship. True it was, however, that Julutta could not only talk and blush with a grace all her own, but could also observe and combine with a cleverness beyond that of other women.

Bernhard took a certain credit to himself for never mentioning Thea in his conversations with Julutta, for concealing the ruined sanctuary of his home from the eyes of his friend.

But Julutta heard and saw what he never told her. Why it was she did not indeed know, but she did know that he was not happy in his marriage, and from the moment when she first became aware of this she smiled no more upon Bernhard as formerly, but her earnest gaze told him, "I know that you suffer, and I suffer with you." And in spite of himself he understood this language, and the longer Thea remained away, and the wider the breach became that separated them, the better did he learn to comprehend what Frau Julutta's eyes said to him.

When he returned to his lonely home was it any wonder that Julutta's image pursued him thither? At first he had pitied her, then he had admired her intellect, and now he could no longer banish from his mind the expression of her eyes, the strange, bewildering charm of her beauty. He saw her before him as he rode slowly home on moonlit summer nights through the fragrant meadows; he saw her still when he entered his lonely house. He had felt so secure, so superior, with regard to this woman, and now? Bernhard would not a.n.a.lyze, would not even reflect upon, his present sentiments towards her. Why should he? Has not many a one, seeing his every hope in life wrecked, sought forgetfulness in the intoxicating bowl? And Bernhard sought to forget; and if he suspected that his senses were bewildered, he never dreamed of throwing aside the goblet. This bewilderment should never reach the point of intoxication; Bernhard never could forget that Julutta was the wife of the friend of his youth; no, beyond a certain point Bernhard was still sure of himself.

In this sense of security he drove over to Panienka one sultry afternoon. The sun was near its setting as he reached the pine forest bordering on the park, but the air was still oppressively hot, and not a breath stirred the ferns that grew on the roadside. Not a bird twittered, not a squirrel was seen climbing the gray trunks, not a human being encountered the vehicle, and the crunching of its wheels on the road was the only sound that disturbed the breathless silence. The air was filled with the strong fragrance of the pines, and across the blue strips of sky visible among the tree-tops stretched isolated gray clouds like menacing fingers foreboding a storm. Bernhard did not see them. He leaned back in the carriage, gazing into the gray-green forest twilight without really seeing that either. The dreamy quiet of nature seemed to have infected him. Suddenly he sat upright. There was more light between the trunks of the trees, a gray wall draped with trailing hop-vines appeared, and then two red gateposts,--that was the little side-entrance to the park at Panienka. The carriage was just about to turn into a broad avenue of chestnuts, which led to the castle court-yard, when he told the coachman to stop. He thought he heard himself called by name. He stood up, and thus could see over the wall.

Across the green lawn stretching between the wall and a little pond came the slender figure of a woman, who beckoned to him. In her white trailing dress and her gold-gleaming hair she looked like the nymph of the cool forest pool whose waters glistened behind her.

"Where are you going, Count Eichhof?" exclaimed Julutta. "My husband is at R----, and it is so insufferably warm in-doors that I have taken refuge here by the pond. If you will come and drive away the gnats with a cigar I shall be grateful to you."

Bernhard sprang from the carriage and approached the little gate.

Julutta leaned upon the wall, which just there was low and crumbling.

"Tell them to bring us some fruit and wine from the castle," she called out to the coachman. Then she went to the gate and opened it to admit Bernhard. So soon as she was alone with him her self-possession vanished. She offered him her hand without looking at him, she spoke of the heat of the weather, of Bernhard's long drive, excused herself for thus detaining him, perhaps against his will, and then congratulated herself upon his visit,--all this so hastily spoken, and in such bewitching confusion, that Bernhard could not but see that she was embarra.s.sed, and that she wished to conceal or overcome her embarra.s.sment by talking quickly. They had reached a charming spot, a seat half surrounded by low rocks, and looking upon the little forest lake. A small waterfall plashed close by and diffused a refreshing coolness, so that Bernhard after his warm drive involuntarily drew a deep breath.

"It is charming here," he said; "and you come to me like a kind fairy who lives in an enchanted forest and who conducts weary wanderers into her fairy home, where it is always cool and delightful."

Julutta laughed. "Only favoured wanderers," she said.

"I thank you, gentle fairy," Bernhard said, earnestly. She blushed and looked away from him towards the water. For an instant he gazed at her admiringly, and then, as if forcing himself to look at something else, he took up a little book lying on a rustic table. He read the t.i.tle-page,--"Pages from the Life of a Good-for-Nothing," by Eichendorff. "Ah, have you been reading this midsummer night's dream of Eichendorff's on this sultry summer day?" he asked.