However, for all that, what could possibly happen to her behind the counter? n.o.body had ever dared to raise the drop leaf and pa.s.s through.

And surely she was safe behind the bookcase L to N, where she could not even be seen.

The colonel's visit seemed to have acted like a cold douche on his men, despite--or, perhaps, on account of--the guarantee he had given for their good behaviour. Not one of them came to visit her again.

"Is that a sign of the protection he is to favour me with?" Lilly wondered.

Something was missing, she did not know what.

A week pa.s.sed, and one day the younger sister, who held watch every morning for possible billets-doux, threw an envelope at Lilly's feet, saying:

"Something else again, with a coronet on it, you flirt, you!"

"Flirt" was one of the milder t.i.tles of honour that the sisters lavished upon her.

Lilly opened the letter and read:

"My dear Miss Czepanek:--

Remembering the interview that took place between us recently, I take the liberty of making a proposition to you. The position of private secretary and reader with me is open. Would you be inclined to accept it? Since I am an unmarried man, it would be in better form for you not to live in my house, but I pledge myself to provide for your maintenance in a suitable and respectable family. Your guardian, whom I took the opportunity to consult in the matter, has given his consent to the plan.

--Respectfully yours, Freiherr von Mertzbach, Colonel and Commander of the----Regiment of Ulans."

So here it was--her fate!

It was there, on the other side of the gleaming snowy street, beckoning and calling to her:

"Come out of your hole. I will show you life. I will show you something new."

But then she pictured herself sitting at the colonel's great desk writing at his dictation. She saw his eyes drilling her, searching her soul, and threatening, always threatening. The pen would fall from her fingers, she would have to jump up and run away, but she would not be able to; the eyes would hold her in a spell.

So Lilly sat down and wrote a very correct letter declining his proposition. She fully appreciated, she said, the honour he did her, but she felt she was not qualified to a.s.sume so difficult a position, and she thought that even if she was not so well off she did better by remaining in her modest situation, since she could fulfil the duties it involved. "Very gratefully yours, Lilly Czepanek."

Done! Peace at last restored--as much peace as the bad sisters permitted.

Christmas was drawing near. It cannot be stated with accuracy that the preparations in the Asmussen household produced an atmosphere of mirth.

For weeks Mrs. Asmussen had been sighing over the bad times and the nuisance of having to give everybody in the world a gift. The sisters discussed as frequently and as loudly as possible the question whether it was necessary for refined and aristocratic young ladies to share a Christmas tree with low and vulgar hussies. There was no indication whatsoever of those gladsome mysteries that at this time brighten the saddest of human habitations.

Lilly knitted a brown sweater for her mother, bought her two picture puzzles, a box of sweets, and a wooden vase for flowers--objects of china, being breakable, were not desired--and sent them to the asylum.

At this time her thoughts frequently wandered from her mother to her father, who had now been gone four and a half years, and in that time had given no sign of his existence.

In the forlorn condition she was in, her confidence in his return waxed strong. Christmas eve, about six or seven, he would suddenly enter, snow covering his havelock, and draw her into his embrace with that demonstrative ardour peculiar to him. She almost breathed in the fragrance always streaming from his anointed locks. That was one way.

Another was, a servant would bring a little package as a preliminary greeting. Inside would be costly material for a dress. A hat would come, too. She needed it badly.

After the others had gone to sleep she would fetch from the bottom of her trunk the score of the Song of Songs and softly hum the more beautiful arias.

There were some pa.s.sages which always made her cry. Oh, she cried a great deal these nights. Yet at this very period a tiny, hesitating sense of happiness found its way into her being.

It was a lovely, dreamy feeling of being lifted up, of growing wings, of astonished listening to inner voices, which sounded sweet and familiar as words from a mother's lips, yet strange, like a gospel from the mouth of one who was still to come.

Now and then she found herself kneeling in her nightgown, but not praying, merely dreaming, with arms outspread and rapturous eyes raised to the lamp, as if the salvation she was awaiting would approach from somewhere up there.

Thus, after all, she celebrated Christmas in the quiet of her soul.

Christmas eve was at hand.

At the eleventh hour a few gifts were sc.r.a.ped together. The sisters ran about like wild animals making their preparations. They even bestowed a few kindly words on Lilly, who showed her grat.i.tude by winking when the older sister had to look for something near the cash box. Lilly knew there was not much inside, and should anything be missing later she would replace it from her own funds.

A few minutes before suppertime she was summoned to the back room, where the Christmas tree was already lit. The company was embarra.s.sed.

The sisters held out their hands. Mrs. Asmussen, who was already sitting over her medicine gla.s.s, delivered a few dignified words about the significance of Christmas in general and her misfortune in particular in having to forego the company of so splendid a husband on such an occasion.

Then everybody asked everybody else's pardon because the presents were not more munificent. First of all, there had been a "must," which ought not to exist for refined souls, and which at first caused great chagrin.

Then all of a sudden time had grown short. Besides, the ap.r.o.n with the red edge was very decent--they themselves had long been wanting one like it--and the pen-wiper was not to be despised, either. Above all, business had been bad.

"I am ashamed to say, I have nothing at all to give," Lilly answered.

But what she was most ashamed of was that she now felt kindly disposed toward the sisters.

"I haven't a bit of character," she thought, as she bit into the marchpane which the older, the wickeder one, offered her.

The library bell rang. A lackey loaded with parcels stumbled in and asked:

"Does Miss Czepanek live here?"

Lilly's heart leapt.

"From papa--actually from papa!" she rejoiced.

For a few moments she scarcely dared touch the packages. She ran about the room helplessly pa.s.sing her hands over her hair. She did not venture to undo the cords until urged on by the sisters. They stood next to her, staring with great, greedy eyes.

The things those boxes contained! A light cloth dress trimmed with lace, a delicate foulard dress, a pink silk petticoat, black patent leather and tan shoes, six pairs of glace and undressed kid gloves, some of them elbow length, three kinds of collars, a fichu of Valenciennes lace to wear with empire gowns, books, writing paper, conserved fruit, and more things, and still more, many more--the boxes seemed bottomless. Even the hat she had hankered for was there, a simple shepherdess shape of light grey felt, which shape had always been most becoming to the grand style of her features. It was trimmed with light brown ribbons and silver-tipped pompons.

A veritable trousseau!

The sisters began to pull long faces. Lilly, too, soon ceased to rejoice. She was full of apprehension. All she wanted now was to find a letter, a card, some token of the sender's personality, which surely accompanied the gifts. She groped for it nervously. Though she had long given up all thought of her father and his return, an instinct of self-preservation impelled her to pretend in the sisters' presence that it was he, and only he, who had poured this flood of treasures over her.

At last--underneath the gloves--she found an envelope and ran off to the library with it.

There beneath the hanging lamp she drew out a visiting card and paled with fright as she read:

"Freiherr von Mertzbach, Colonel and Commander of the----Regiment of Ulans," followed by a few lines in the heavy, bold strokes with which she was acquainted: "from the depths of his own loneliness wishes his lonely little friend an hour of Christmas joy."

She returned to the back room, where the sisters, green with envy, received her with a chilly smile, while Mrs. Asmussen, nodding over the steaming gla.s.s, dropped fragments of mysterious words.

"The things actually do come from papa," said Lilly, amazed at the strange, stifled sound of her own voice.

The sisters gave a short laugh, and silently began to put the gifts back into the boxes.