Problematic Characters Part 6

"In Grunwald! I am glad to hear that. You will be able to give me the information I want. The thing is this--but I fear I am troubling you with indiscreet questions."

"Not at all! I should be very happy, indeed, if I could be of the slightest service to you."

"You are very kind. The thing is this: I want to send my son, who is about Bruno's age----"

"Oh, aunt, he is three years younger than I am," cried Bruno, balancing himself on a swing at some little distance.

"What keen ears the child has!" said Melitta, lowering her voice.

"Well, I want to send my son Julius to Grunwald to college. Or rather, I have to do it, because his tutor, a Mr. Bemperlein, who has been six years at my house, has obtained a place as minister, and is going to leave us in a few days. Now I do not know--but here comes the baroness, and I must postpone for some other time my thousand and one questions about all kinds of things, of which I know as little as my good Bemperlein. I never knew how things look in a great city, and he has long since forgotten what he may have known. Here we shall never find an opportunity. What do you say, doctor--could you do me the honor to pay me a visit some one of these days? Perhaps to-morrow afternoon?"

Oswald--bowed a.s.sent.

"I have asked the doctor to pay me a visit to-morrow," said Melitta, turning to the baroness, who had just come back into the room with Mademoiselle Marguerite. "It is about that affair in Grunwald. You have no special engagement, I hope, for to-morrow afternoon, for I should not like to make Doctor Stein lose too much."

"We, an engagement!" said the baroness. "Don't you know our quiet life, my dear Melitta? On the contrary, I think a little diversion of that kind will be very welcome to the doctor, who must have begun to be tired of the uniformity of our life here. I had thought myself of proposing a visit to you, Doctor Stein,--to our minister, who is, I fear, a little hurt that you have not yet been presented to him."

"Well, we can do both things very easily," said Melitta; "to-morrow is Sunday; the Reverend Mr. Jager will be delighted if you increase the small number of his hearers by your presence. If you go through the forest you will find Berkow only half an hour's walk from Faschwitz. I would ask you at once to dine with me, but I know the minister's wife will not let you off so cheap. Well, what do you say, doctor?"

"I can only express my thanks to the ladies, that they are kind enough to dispose of my time so much better than I could possibly have done myself," replied Stein, with a polite bow.

"That means, the wise man yields to inevitable fate," said Melitta, laughing. "And here comes the baron with Malte, and we can go in to dinner, a step which I am perfectly ready to take."

The dinner was set on the terrace, which had been added to the chateau on the side towards the garden, and which ran the whole length of the building. A tent protected the guests against the sun. The evening was beautiful. The sun was near setting. Rosy lights were playing in the tops of the lofty beech-trees which surrounded the well-shaded lawn.

Swallows flew about, das.h.i.+ng to and fro through the clear atmosphere. A peac.o.c.k came, attracted by the well-known clattering of plates, and took his place at the foot of the terrace, where he picked up the bread-crumbs which the baron threw him over the stone bal.u.s.trade.

The conversation was much more lively than usual. The baroness could make a very agreeable hostess when she chose, and was by no means so entirely free from vanity that she should have remained inactive when she feared to be neglected for the sake of Melitta. Melitta herself was in her most amiable humor; she jested and laughed, she teased and was teased, unconcerned and innocent, like a mere child. Oswald did not dream, while abandoning himself willingly to the charm of Melitta's attractions, that his presence contributed largely to the greater cheerfulness. And yet this was exactly the case. There are few women who are perfectly indifferent to the impression which they produce on the company in which they are, and Melitta was certainly not one of those few. Her disposition was rather to be easily excited, and to be bribed by pleasing forms and clever words, in a manner which is utterly unintelligible to colder natures. Oswald was perhaps not exactly what the world calls a handsome man; but yet nature had not neglected him, and the good society in which he had always moved had added to the innate gracefulness of his manners. All this surprised Melitta the more agreeably, as she had not expected it in a man of such humble pretensions. Oswald appeared to her every moment of greater importance; she began to fear that her brusque invitation had been out of place, and yet she was charmed with the idea of seeing the young man at her own house. She felt flattered when she met more than once, Oswald's admiring glance across the table; and yet she always cast down her long silky eyelashes, searching and eloquent as her eyes generally were.

After dinner the baroness proposed a game of graces, as Melitta declared that she could remain a little longer. Bruno ran off to bring the hoops, which were neither out of place nor out of repair,--a fact which spoke volumes for the scrupulous order that reigned at the chateau. Soon the company was standing about on the lawn in a wide circle, and the graces flew around merrily through the soft, warm evening air. All, even the baron, showed more or less skill in the game, except Malte, who could never catch the hoop when it did not fall straight upon his stick. Melitta, on the other hand, never failed to avail herself of his missing, for the purpose of sending her hoop, with lightning speed, out of the regular order, at the head of some one of the other players, and Oswald noticed that he was more frequently distinguished in this way than any of the others.

In the mean time it had become nearly dark; the old baron had noticed a few dew-drops on the gra.s.s, and the evening dew was, in his opinion, sheer poison for Malte, who had suffered for some time of diphtheria when a child. He proposed, therefore, that they should all go in.

Melitta found that it was high time for her to return, and begged that her groom might be ordered to saddle the horses. Bruno had hurried away with the order; the baroness and mademoiselle had gone into the sitting-room; the baron was busy wrapping a thick shawl around Malte's throat to prevent his taking cold, and thus Oswald and Melitta found themselves alone for the first time since their short conversation before. Melitta had broken a rose from a bush which grew at the feet of the stone Flora, and stood looking thoughtfully at the brilliant flower.

"I must beg your pardon," she said suddenly, in a low, quick voice, but without raising her eyes, "that I committed the blunder of asking you _sans facon_ to pay me a visit which may give you some trouble."

"Not at all; I repeat quite sincerely now, what I before said from common politeness, that I shall be very happy indeed to be of some service to you."

"Then you will come to-morrow?"

"At your service."

"No, as I wish it!--Just see how marvellously beautiful this rose is!

Are you as fond of roses as I am?"

"I love everything beautiful," said Stein, looking not at the rose but at Melitta.

She raised her long eyelashes and looked deep and full into the young man's brilliant eyes.

"There!" she said suddenly, holding the rose towards him as if to let him smell it; but he only felt how the slim fingers of the lady touched his lips like a mere breath.

"Here are the horses, aunt!" cried Bruno.

"I am coming!" replied Melitta, and left Stein.

The rose was lying at his feet; he quickly stooped, picked it up, and hid it in his bosom.

Mademoiselle Marguerite brought Melitta her gloves, her hat, and her whip.

"Is the baroness in the parlor?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll go and say good-by to her."

The old baron, Oswald, and the boys went through the gate in the iron railing of the park into the courtyard, where a groom was walking two horses up and down. Oswald admired the beauty of the animals, especially that with the lady's saddle, a thoroughbred, and Melitta's pet--Bella.

Melitta stepped quickly out of the portal, followed by the baroness and mademoiselle. The old baron helped her in the saddle.

"Good-by! good-by!" she called out. "_Allez_, Bella!" and thus she galloped away out of the courtyard into the dim evening air.

The others had gone back into the house. Oswald alone remained, his eyes fixed upon the gate through which Melitta had disappeared, and sunk in deep thought.

"Had we not better go in, Oswald?" said Bruno, seizing his hand. "It is quite dark now."

"It is quite dark now," repeated the young man, and followed the boy dreamily.

CHAPTER VIII.

The baron had offered Oswald a carriage to drive to church, but the young man declined, remembering still the evil thoughts to which he had been tempted by the slowness of the bays on the night of his arrival.

Bruno and Malte were looking for a visit from the sons of a neighbor.

Bruno would have liked best to accompany Oswald, but as the latter begged him to stay at home, he said:

"You are very glad to get rid of me for a few hours, I know, but I know also what I shall do. I shall go into the woods, and not return home till evening."

"You will not do that, I hope, Bruno?"

"And why not?" asked the boy, angrily.

"Because you love me."

"Well, then, I'll stay here for your sake; nor will I beat stupid Hans von Plugger, and altogether behave so remarkably well that even aunty will have to be satisfied."

"Do that, my dear boy. Good-by!"

"Good-by, dearest, best of all friends!" cried the boy, and threw himself pa.s.sionately on the bosom of his only friend. Then he tore himself away and ran off into the garden, there to be alone with his wild, unbridled heart.