Clear the Track! Part 5

"Pardon me, I forgot it. May you be happy, as happy as you deserve to be! But I must go to your father, who is expecting me, and requires, you know, undeviating punctuality."

He evidently wanted to cut short this interview. Eric, too, remembered now what was impending, and the subject that was to be brought into discussion.

"Father is in his library," he remarked, "and you know he will not be disturbed there. He has summoned you from Radefeld----do you know why?"

"I suspect so, at least. Has he spoken to you about it?"

"Yes, and from him I heard the first word on the subject, Egbert--for heaven's sake, be on your guard. You know my father, and are aware that he will never tolerate such a bent in his works."

"In general he tolerates no other bent than his own," rejoined Egbert coldly. "He never can nor will comprehend, that the boy, who has to thank him for education and culture, has become a man, who presumes to have his own views, and go his own way."

"This way seems to diverge very widely from ours," said Eric sadly.

"But you did not give me the slightest intimation of this in your letters."

"Why should I? You had to be spared and guarded against excitement, and you would not have understood me, either, Eric. You have always shunned all the questions and conflicts of the present, while I have confronted them, and, of late years, stood in the very midst of them. If, thereby, a gulf has opened between us, I cannot help it."

"Do not say between _us_, Egbert! We are friends and must remain such, let happen what will. Think you that I have forgotten to whom I owe my life? Yes, I know you do not like to be reminded of it, but it ever abides in my memory--the plunge into the ice-cold flood, the deadly anguish, when the rus.h.i.+ng waters overwhelmed me, and then the rescue, when your arm encircled me. I did not make it easy for you; I clutched you so convulsively, that I hardly left you room to move, and put you in extreme peril. Any other would have shaken off the dangerous burden, but you did not let me go, you held me with your mighty strength, and worked your way forward until we reached the blessed sh.o.r.e. That was an heroic deed for a lad of sixteen years."

"It put my powers as a swimmer to a good test, that was all," answered Runeck, declining any claim to merit. "I shook the water from my clothes and was all right again, while the shock and chill brought on you an illness that well-nigh proved fatal."

He broke off, for, just now Dernburg entered with a book in his hand, and responded to the young engineer's greeting as composedly as if there was no agitating subject to be broached between them.

"You enjoy meeting after your long separation, do you not?" asked he.

"You see Eric for the first time to-day--how do you find him?"

"He looks rather delicate yet, and will have to be prudent for a while longer, it seems to me," said Runeck, with a glance at his friend's pale face.

"The doctor is of the same opinion. And to-day you do look especially feeble, Eric! Go to your room, and take a good rest."

The young man looked irresolutely from one to the other. He would gladly have stayed, to interpose some soothing word between these two, if the discussion grew too hot; but his father's direction sounded very peremptory, and now Egbert, also, said in a low tone:

"Go, I implore you."

With a sensation of bitterness Eric submitted, feeling that there was something humiliating in the compa.s.sionate indulgence, and that it extended further than to his bodily condition. He had never been treated by his father as an equal, capable of independent action, and properly, not by his friend either. Now he was sent away to take his rest, which meant, that they wanted to spare him from being witness to a scene that would almost a.s.suredly be stormy, and he--he, indeed, allowed himself to be thus dismissed, depressingly conscious that his presence would be superfluous and useless!

The other two found themselves alone. Dernburg had seated himself, and again taken in hand the drawings of the Radefeld aqueduct, that he once more proceeded to inspect.

"I have decided upon carrying out your plan. Egbert," said he. "It is the best of all laid before me, and solves all the difficulties in an astonis.h.i.+ng manner. I have to consider further on a single point; but, taken as a whole, the plan is excellent, and it is to be carried into effect forthwith. Will you undertake its superintendence? I offer you the appointment."

The young engineer seemed to be surprised; he had probably expected a totally different introduction; unmistakable satisfaction was depicted upon his features, at this recognition, emanating from his chief, who was usually so chary with his praise.

"Very gladly," replied he; "but this much I know, the chief-engineer has the affair already in hand. I was commissioned by him to attend to the outworks."

"But if I now decide differently, the chief-engineer has nothing to do but to submit;" declared Dernburg emphatically. "It depends only upon yourself, whether you shall undertake the execution of your own plan, and, in this regard, there is certainly another matter to be discussed and cleared up first."

So far he had spoken in a calm, business-like tone, but Egbert was sufficiently prepared; he knew what subject was now to be introduced, and yet he obviously did not shrink. The transient mildness that he had manifested awhile ago in conversation with Eric had long since vanished, and the stolid and determined in his character stood forth undisguised, as he now firmly met the dark looks of his chief.

"I have long since remarked that you had come back a changed man,"

resumed Dernburg; "in many respects this was to have been expected. You were three years in Berlin, and two in England, where your sphere of observation was broadened; indeed, I sent you out into the world, that you might see and judge for yourself. But now things have come to my ears, concerning which I must apply to you for more exact information.

I do not like long circ.u.mlocution, so briefly and clearly: is it true that you constantly a.s.sociate with the socialists in our town, that you publicly own yourself to be one of them, and that you are upon very intimate terms with that Landsfeld, their leader? Yes, or no?"

"Yes," said Egbert simply.

Dernburg did not seem to have expected so reckless a confession. He frowned still more darkly.

"Really! And do you say that so composedly to my face?"

"Am I to deny the truth?"

"And since when have you been a member of that party?"

"For four years."

"The thing started, then, in Berlin: I thought as much. And you have actually allowed yourself to be thus ensnared. To be sure you were very young and inexperienced, but still I would have expected you to be wiser."

One could see that the young man was wounded by the manner in which he was spoken to. Calmly, but with sharper intonation, he replied: "Those are _your_ views, Herr Dernburg; I regret that mine differ from them."

"And it is not for me to disturb myself about them, you think,"

supplemented Dernburg. "There you are mistaken, though. I do concern myself about the political opinions of my employes. But I do not condescend to enter into explanations with them. Whoever does not like Odensburg can quit. I force n.o.body to stay; but he who does remain has to submit absolutely to its regulations. Either----or! There is no third way here."

"Then I shall be obliged to choose that 'or,'" said Egbert coldly.

"Will it be so easy for you to leave us?"

The young man looked down moodily.

"I am in your debt, Herr Dernburg, I know it----"

"That you are not! If I have given you education and culture, you have saved my Eric for me; but for you I should have lost my only son. So far as that goes, we are quits, if we propose to balance accounts on a purely business basis. If that is what you propose, speak out openly, and we are done with each other."

"You do me injustice," said Runeck, with suppressed emotion. "It is hard enough for me thus to oppose you."

"Well, who forces you to do so? Only those wild ideas, that have run away with you so. Do you think it is an easy thing for me to give you up? Be reasonable, Egbert. It is not your chief who speaks to you--he would have long since cut the matter short! But for years you have been almost a child of my house."

The half-fatherly, half-masterful tone entirely missed its aim. The young engineer, with arrogant self-a.s.sertion, raised his head, as he answered:

"I _am_ possessed by those 'wild ideas,' and stick to them. There comes a time when the boy becomes of age, and I reached this state when out in the world, and I cannot go back to the irresponsibility of boyhood.

Whatever you demand of the engineer, the official, shall be done to the best of my ability. The blind subjection that you demand of the man, I cannot and _will_ not take upon myself. I must have free course in life."

"Which you have not with me?" asked Dernburg in an irritated tone.

"No!" said Egbert firmly. "You are a father to your subordinates so long as they submit themselves unquestioningly, but in Odensburg they recognize only one law--viz., your will. The director yields just as unconditionally as does the lowest laborer; no one has an opinion of his own at your works, or ever will have, so long as you are at the head of things."

"Those are pretty things, to be sure, that you attribute to me," said Dernburg fiercely. "You say, plainly, that I am a tyrant. You, to be sure, have always been allowed to take more liberties than all the rest put together--have done so, candidly, too. You never were pa.s.sively obedient, nor was such a thing required of you, either, for we'll talk of that later. Free course! There again is one of your catch-words.

With you, all is to be down, all, and then you will have free course--to destruction."

He had risen to his feet, and walked to and fro several times, like a person trying to compose himself, then he paused in front of the young man, and said with bitter scorn:

"In spite of your youth, you seem to have quite a significant part to play in your party. They make no secret of setting the greatest hopes upon you, and seeing in you one of their future leaders. Those people are not so stupid as some suppose; they know their men, and with less attractive bait would not have caught you."