Читать книгу A German Pompadour - Hon. Marie Hay - Страница 11

'Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott.'

On the following afternoon Wilhelmine was sitting disconsolately in her attic. The book she was reading had fallen from her hands, and her eyes rested on the ugly blue walls of her room. She reviewed in her mind the events of the previous day; the scene in the church, and her subsequent departure therefrom, which she had managed so deftly that, though Müller was in the graveyard when she came out, she had evaded him, and joining Anna, who was waiting for her near the porch, she had succeeded in passing the pastor without staying to hear what he evidently wished to say. Frau von Grävenitz chid her sharply for interrupting the sermon, but she was silenced by Wilhelmine's angry retort and reminder of Müller's misdeeds. The Sunday afternoon and evening had passed without any unwonted occurrence. Wilhelmine was tortured by the fact that she had not told her mother of Friedrich's letter; she had not recovered it from Müller, though twice she had sent the servant-maid to demand its restitution.

She intended to reveal the whole story to her mother, when Monsieur Gabriel returned with the promised money; for she guessed that the object of his journey to Schwerin was the procuring of the sum. The light was failing rapidly, and Wilhelmine felt intensely dreary and sad. She turned over the leaves of the book which lay on her lap; it was a volume lent her by Monsieur Gabriel, a book written by Blaise Pascal. Her eye was caught by a sentence, and she read the wise words of the great thinker: 'Love hath its reasons which reason knoweth not.' Again her attention wandered from the page; her thoughts were busy with the possibilities of her destiny. With bitterness she realised that, for her, Love must be either a renunciation of ambition, a life passed with some simple countryman, or else a career, a profession, an abnegation of quiet days. Which should she strive for? 'What does it avail a man though he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?' The words came back to her; but no, she was not made for peaceful days, she would weary of them inevitably.

She heard a knock on the house door and, shaking off her unusual depression, she hurried downstairs. Monsieur Gabriel stood in the corridor explaining in his scholarly foreign German to the servant-maid, that it was absolutely necessary for him to see Fräulein von Grävenitz, even if madame her mother could not receive him, as he had a matter of importance to communicate. He smiled when he saw Wilhelmine—that good smile of his, which was at once so kind, so bright, and yet so unutterably sad.

'Ah! dear child!' he said, in French, 'I bring you good news. I have procured the money.'

Wilhelmine went quickly up to him, and taking his hand in both of hers, she drew him into the prim little dwelling-room where Frau von Grävenitz received her rare guests. 'How can I ever thank you?' she said as she closed the door.

'By thinking of me when you are far away,' he answered, 'and sometimes by sending me a letter to lighten my gloom.'

'Yes!' she said eagerly; 'but tell me how you procured this great sum?'

'I had a few old trinkets,' he answered, 'which I had carried with me from France. They were hidden in my travelling chest, and I had not even looked at them these many years. They reminded me of another life, a life which has nothing to do with the old schoolmaster of Güstrow,' he added with a sigh. He laid a packet on the table, cut the string with his knife, and began to undo four long rolls within, disclosing the bright edges of twenty-five golden gulden in each roll. 'Twenty-five, fifty, seventy-five, a hundred,' he counted out.

Wilhelmine looked curiously at the coins; she had seldom seen gold pieces before, and never in a large quantity. She laid her hand on one of the rouleaux. 'Gold is power, they say,' she murmured.

'The getting of gold is pain,' the old man answered, and he took her hand in his, drawing hers away from the golden heap.

At that moment the door opened silently, and Frau von Grävenitz stood on the threshold. She looked from one to the other, she saw the money on the table, and Wilhelmine's sparkling eyes and flushed cheeks. Monsieur Gabriel's face she could not see, for it was turned away from her towards Wilhelmine; but she could see that he held her hand in his, and all her suspicions re-awoke.

'What is this?' she said: 'Monsieur Gabriel, why are you bringing money to my daughter?' Both Wilhelmine and her friend started. 'For her journey to Stuttgart, madame,' he answered. 'Her journey?' said the old woman, 'what journey? What do you mean?'

'Ah! Mademoiselle Wilhelmine has perhaps not had time to communicate her plans to you, madame,' he replied courteously. 'She told me of her brother's letter, and as I thought that madame had perhaps not got so large a sum of money at her disposal at the moment, I have ventured to make a little gift to my favourite pupil, to enable her to accept her brother's proposition. Believe me, madame, I esteem it an honour to be of service to one whose wonderful gift of music has made my poor life so much happier than it could have been otherwise.'

'Wilhelmine, what is the meaning of this?' cried Frau von Grävenitz in her sharpest tones. 'You have received a letter from my son, of which you have not informed me! You plan things with a stranger, and I am told nothing! You receive money from a man—what for, I should like to know? I dare not say what terrible thoughts all this awakens in me. Give me your brother's letter immediately!' Her voice had risen higher and higher, till she almost screamed the last words.

'I cannot give you the letter, mother,' Wilhelmine returned quietly, 'I have lost it.'

'Monsieur Gabriel,' said Frau von Grävenitz, 'perhaps you have got it? I command you to hand it over to me.'

'Madame, I am astounded! Indeed, I have not got the letter, though Mademoiselle Wilhelmine showed it to me on Saturday morning.'

'Yes! Saturday morning!' Frau von Grävenitz retorted with a sneer. 'Of a truth, you and my daughter have reason to remember that day. You are a corrupter of youth, and an evil man, Mr. Schoolmaster, and a purloiner of letters as well.'

Monsieur Gabriel looked from the irate lady to her daughter, in consternation and bewilderment. 'I fear, madame, that I do not understand you,' he said gently; 'you labour under a misapprehension. I have never had the letter in my possession. As for your other accusation, I think you are led away by your anger. Indeed, I do not know the meaning of your words, madame.' His calmness only served to madden Frau von Grävenitz further. She turned away from him, and seizing Wilhelmine roughly by the shoulder, she hissed in her ear: 'Give me the letter, you wanton!' Wilhelmine started violently, and Monsieur Gabriel made a step forward, as though to defend her; his face flushed deeply, and he said in a steady voice: 'Madame de Grävenitz, such an accusation, even from a mother's lips, is a thing to which no woman has the right to submit.' But Frau von Grävenitz was beyond hearing; her features were distorted by rage, and her mouth twitched convulsively. 'How dare you address me?' she screamed; 'you are my daughter's seducer—go—leave my house, and take the wages of my daughter's sin with you!' She came up to the table, and with a sweep of her arm scattered the gold to right and left.

'Mother!' cried Wilhelmine, 'you are mad!'

'Madame,' said Monsieur Gabriel, 'I can but obey your command to depart,' and with a profoundly respectful bow to Wilhelmine, he quitted the apartment with quiet dignity.

Frau von Grävenitz continued her fierce monologue for some time, without interruption. Wilhelmine stood watching her, till an involuntary breathless pause in her mother's torrent of words gave her the opportunity of speech. 'You have always been unjust to me, mother,' she said, in a hard, cold voice; 'and to-day you have insulted me, in the presence of one you called a stranger. Yes; Friedrich wrote, proposing that I should go and seek a more prosperous life in Wirtemberg. Yes; I told Monsieur Gabriel. Yes; he said he would give me the money for my journey. I warn you that I shall go, and it will be of no avail if you attempt to hinder me.'

'You will not go,' said Frau von Grävenitz harshly. 'The money you have earned by your dishonour I shall give to the poor.'

'It is not yours to give,' answered Wilhelmine coldly.

'We shall see,' replied her mother grimly, and commenced an undignified scramble beneath the table, as she gathered up the scattered gold pieces. When she had found all, and carefully counted it out, she placed it in an oaken cupboard, double locked the door thereof, and placed the key in her pocket, Wilhelmine watching her the while.

The evening meal was eaten in utter silence. Frau von Grävenitz superintended the washing up of the plates, knives, and forks; then going to the house door she fastened it securely, taking the key with her. While the old woman was occupied at the house door, Wilhelmine slipped up the stairs, with the noiseless tread of a cat, and abstracted the key from her mother's bedroom door, then passing to her attic she undressed, and, wrapping her bedgown round her, lay down on her bed. The stolen key she tied firmly in a knot of her hair, close to her head, well hidden by her thick curls. Having accomplished this, she feigned sleep. As she expected, her mother soon discovered the absence of the key, and after a fruitless search in her own room she stormed into Wilhelmine's attic, and accused her of having removed it. The girl looked at her from sleepy eyes, and denied all knowledge of the missing article. Frau von Grävenitz searched the room, and then bidding her daughter rise, she felt beneath her mattress and pillow. Then she ran her hand over her daughter's body, but she never thought of examining the waves of hair, under which the key was safely hidden. At length, she was satisfied that it was not in her daughter's keeping, and she retired to bed grumbling.

Wilhelmine listened attentively for some half-hour, then gently pushed aside the covering and noiselessly unlatched the door. She crept towards her mother's door and listened. For some time she heard nothing, but at length her patience was rewarded by the sound of a long, even breath, and she knew her mother was asleep. Wilhelmine returned to her apartment. Slowly and silently she resumed her clothes. Fortunately there was a moon, and the room was flooded with pale light. She did not put on boots, skirt, or cloak, but deposited these in a heap on the corridor floor. Then she approached her mother's door, and listened once more; the regular breaths were quite audible now. Softly she lifted the latch, and passed into the room. The moon was hidden for a moment, and the room was in utter darkness. She crouched, and carefully drew the door to behind her; it creaked, and Frau von Grävenitz moved in her sleep. Wilhelmine crouched lower, and taking a kerchief from her breast pushed it beneath the door, to steady it. She waited motionless till her mother's breathing told her that she was really asleep, and then, with noiseless tread, she approached the sleeper. The clouds shifted and the moon shone in, showing Frau von Grävenitz's face livid and deathlike in the luminous moonshine. The girl shuddered; it was like robbing a corpse, she thought. But her hesitation was momentary; she pushed her flexible hand beneath her mother's pillow, and her fingers closed on the cold iron of a key. She drew it out, but she felt rather than saw that it was not the one wanted. She was stretching out her hand to seek for the other key, when the sleeper stirred uneasily, murmuring some incomprehensible word, and Wilhelmine cowered down once more. The old woman turned round in bed, so that she faced the crouching girl; her face was now in shadow, and Wilhelmine could not see whether the eyes were open or shut. She waited for what seemed hours in that hunched-up position. After some time, the even breathing recommenced, and Wilhelmine ventured to kneel up beside the bed, but now a fresh difficulty confronted her: to reach the other key, provided it lay beneath the pillow, she must pass her hand under that portion of the pillow upon which Frau von Grävenitz's head rested. She wriggled her hand in, and the point of her fingers touched the key; but it was too far away for her to grasp it, and her efforts only pushed it further. She withdrew her hand, and waited till the clouds floated over the moon. When the welcome darkness came, she bent over her mother, and lifting the further edge of the pillow quickly found the key. Then she crept noiselessly to the threshold, took her kerchief, and shut the door silently. Safe in the corridor, she caught up her bundle of garments and groped her way down the stairs, which creaked under her, but she heard no movement in the house, though she listened attentively at the foot of the stairs. Swiftly she gained the dwelling-room, fitted the key into the oaken press, unlocked it, and took out the rolls of gold. In another moment she stood in the snow-covered street, the money for her journey safe in her hand.

Wilhelmine von Grävenitz had taken the first step of an extraordinary career.