"What do you know about it? Do you mean to accuse me of falsehood?" his enraged mother turned on him. "What business is it of yours what I discuss with Fraulein Volkmar? Your bride's not here, you can see that for yourself, so you may go, also, and at once!"

The young heir had flushed deeply at this tone, to which he was well accustomed; but before this girl it seemed to shame him, and he looked as though he would resist his mother's authority for once. His face a.s.sumed a defiant expression, but a threatening, "Well, don't you hear me?" conquered him as usual. He turned hesitatingly, and left the room, but the door behind him remained half open.

Marietta glanced after him with a contemptuous curl of the lip and then turned back to her adversary. "You need give yourself no further uneasiness, my dear madame. I have come to Furstenstein for the last time. As the head forester had received me with his old-time cordiality, and as Antonie was as affectionate toward me as ever, I could not know that they felt that there was a stain upon me on account of the profession which I follow. Had I suspected such a thing I surely would not have inflicted myself upon them. It will not happen in the future, never again."

Her voice failed her, and her face bore a new, pained expression, while it was with difficulty she restrained the tears. Frau von Eschenhagen felt she had gone too far in her candid statement.

"I do not want to annoy you, my child," she said, unbending a little. "I only wanted to make it clear to you that--"

"Not want to annoy me when you say such things to me?" interrupted the girl with flashing eyes. "You treat me like an outcast, not fit any longer for a.s.sociation with decent people, and why? Because I earn my bread with the talent which G.o.d has given me, and give pleasure to mankind at the same time. You traduce my old grandfather who made great sacrifices to have me well educated, and who saw me go out into the world with a heavy heart. The bitter tears stood in his eyes as he clasped me in his arms, and said, as he bade me good-bye: 'Be honest and true, my Marietta. One can be that always, no matter what their road in life. When I close my eyes on this world I shall have nothing to leave you. You will have to fight your own battle. Well, I have remained honest and true, and shall remain so, even though everything is not as easy for me as for Toni, the daughter of a rich father, who only leaves her parent's home to go into her husband's. But I don't envy her the happiness of calling you mother."

"Fraulein Volkmar, you forget yourself," said the insulted mother drawing herself to her full height. But Marietta wasn't going to be silenced now, she was too excited.

"O, no, it is not I who forget myself. It was you who insulted me without cause, and the head forester and Antonie must be well under your influence to turn away from me. But no matter. I do not desire the friendship of any girl who will allow herself to be bullied and brow-beaten by a mother-in-law. I am done, once for all. Tell Toni I say that, Frau von Eschenhagen."

She turned away with a pa.s.sionate motion and left the room. In the front one, however, she could retain her composure no longer, and the hot tears, kept back so bravely until now, forced themselves from her eyes.

With a pa.s.sionate sob the young girl leaned her head against the wall and wept bitterly. She heard her name called in a low, trembling tone, and turning, she saw Willibald von Eschenhagen, in his hand the very paper which he had so hastily concealed in his pocket. It was crumpled now, but within, as he unfolded the paper, lay a delicate spray of leaves with two fragrant half-blown roses.

"Fraulein Volkmar," he stammered again. "You wished for a rose, please accept--" In his eyes and in his whole bearing one could read plainly that he deplored his mother's ruthless candor. Marietta repressed her sobs, the tears were still glistening in her eyes, as she looked up at him with an expression of disdain and contempt.

"I thank you, Herr von Eschenhagen," she said with acerbity. "You heard distinctly the words which your mother spoke to me, and whatever else they may have meant, they most certainly meant that I was to be shunned.

Why do you not obey them?"

"My mother has done you an injustice," said Willibald, half-aloud. "And she did not speak in the name of the others. Toni knew nothing about it, believe me. She--"

"Then why didn't you speak out and say so?" interrupted the girl with growing anger. "There you stood, listening to a shameful, insulting attack upon a young, defenseless girl, and hadn't enough manhood to come forward and take her part. True enough, you did attempt something of the kind, but you were well scolded, and sent off like a school-boy, and you went without a word, too."

Willibald stood like one in whose ears heavy thunder is echoing. He had felt most keenly the injustice of his mother's scathing remarks, and was trying in his timid way, to do what he could to make amends and show his good will, and here he was being soundly rated for his pains. He stood and stared at her without speaking, and his silence incensed the girl still more.

"And now you come and bring me flowers," she continued with growing excitement. "Secretly, behind your mother's back, and do you think I would accept such an insult? First learn how a man should behave when he witnesses such an iniquity, then pay attention to trifling courtesies afterwards. Now--now, I will show you what I think of you and your present." She tore the paper from his hand, rolled it like a ball and threw it upon the floor, where she stamped on it pa.s.sionately with her little foot.

"But Fraulein--" Willibald, vacillating between shame and anger, would have interfered to save his roses, but the dangerous look in the dark eyes warned him to keep back.

"Now we are quits. If Toni knows nothing about all this I am sorry, but I shall stay away for the future rather than expose myself to fresh insults. I pray she may be happy, though I should certainly not be so in her place. I am only a poor girl, but I would never marry a man who was afraid to speak without his mother's permission. No, not if he were heir to Burgsdorf ten times over."

With this she turned her back upon the heir, and a second later left the room.

"Will, what does this mean?" sounded the voice of Frau von Eschenhagen, who stood in the half-open door. As she received no answer, she crossed the room to her son's side with a step and manner which prophesied no good for that young man.

"That was a most remarkable scene which I have just witnessed. Will you be good enough to explain to me what it signifies? That little insignificant thing, bubbling over with pa.s.sion and anger, telling you the most disgraceful things to your very face, and you standing there like a sheep, taking them all."

"Because she had the right to say them," said Will, still looking down at the scattered rose leaves.

"She had what?" asked the mother, who could not believe she heard aright.

The young heir raised his head and looked at her; his face wore a new and singular expression.

"She had the right of it, mother. It is true you have always treated me like a school-boy, so how could I defend myself against such an accusation?"

"Boy, I believe you have lost your senses," said Frau Regine.

Willibald was roused now. He continued: "I am no boy, I am the heir of Burgsdorf, and twenty-seven years old. You have always forgotten that, mother, and so have I, for that matter, but I remember it to-day."

Frau von Eschenhagen gazed astonished at her son, so tractable all his life until this moment. "I verily believe you are becoming refractory.

Let us have no more of it, for you know I would never permit such a thing. What has come over you that you make such reckless a.s.sertions?

Because I have seen fit to bring this very unsuitable intercourse to an end, and dismiss this Marietta, do you take it upon yourself, as soon as my back is turned, to make formal apologies and present her with roses which you have just plucked for your bride? I don't know what's come over you. It's the first time in your life you ever acted so. Toni will be very much displeased when she learns what has become of her roses. It served you just right to have the little vixen trample them under foot.

You won't be guilty of such idiotic folly soon again, I fancy."

"I did not pluck the roses for Toni, but for Fraulein Volkmar," Will explained, defiantly.

"For--?" the name stuck in the excited woman's throat.

"For Fraulein Volkmar! She was wishing she had a rose to wear in her hair this evening, and said she could not get any in Waldhofen. So I went to the gardener and got them for her--now you know all about it, mother."

Frau von Eschenhagen stood like the pillar of salt; she had become deadly pale and for a moment the light seemed to go out; she saw such fearful possibilities that she lost all power of speech and motion. Then suddenly she regained all her old strength. She grasped her son's arm impressively, as if to make sure of him under all circ.u.mstances, and said curtly:

"Will--we will start to-morrow."

"Start where?"

"For home. We will start early, at eight o'clock, in order to catch the afternoon express, and reach Burgsdorf the day following. So go at once to your room and do your packing."

The commanding tone did not this time make the slightest impression on her son. "I do not intend to pack," he declared, doggedly.

"You will pack at once, I tell you!"

"No," said the son. "If you wish to go, mother, then go--I remain here."

This was rebellion, and it removed the last doubt in the mother's mind that there was something at the bottom of all her son's a.s.sertiveness.

She said now in her hardest tone: "Boy, wake up, be yourself again! I really don't believe you know what has come over you. But I will tell you. You are in love--in love with Marietta Volkmar."

She brought out the last words in a towering rage, but Will was not overwhelmed by them. He stood for a moment staring in surprise, as if wondering if it was really that which had overtaken him, then a light seemed to dawn upon him.

"O!" he said, drawing a deep breath, and a slight smile flitted across his face.

"O! is that your only answer?" broke forth the furious mother, who, in spite of everything, still hoped for a contradiction. "You do not even deny it. And this is what I must live to see in my own son, whom I educated so carefully and never allowed to leave my side. While I was having you watch and protect your betrothed from this infamous woman, you were acting a hypocrite. And she playing the virtuous, deeply injured part before me, that creature--"

"Mother, be silent! I will not allow that," interrupted Willibald, angry too, now.

"You will not allow it--what does that mean?"

Frau von Eschenhagen stopped suddenly and listened.

"There comes Toni, your betrothed bride, to whom you have pledged your word, who wears your ring. How do you purpose treating her?" She had at last found the right means to conquer her son, who now hung his head despondently as Antonie entered the room.

"You're here already, are you, Will?" she asked. "I thought--but what is the matter? Has anything happened?"

"Yes," said Regine, who, as usual seized the reins without fear. "We have just received a telegram from Burgsdorf which will compel us to start for home to-morrow morning. You need not be alarmed, my dear child, it is nothing serious, only a piece of stupidity,"--she laid a sharp accent upon the last words,--"a piece of stupidity which will soon right itself, and the sooner its checked, the sooner the matter'll be ended. I'll explain it all to you later, but we must go now; it can't be helped."