Читать книгу "O Thou, My Austria!" - Ossip Schubin - Страница 17

Uncle Karl finally yielded to Harry's entreaties, and allowed him to enter the army. That very autumn after the summer which Lato and Fainacky passed at Komaritz he was to enter a regiment of hussars.

It had been a problem for Uncle Karl, the taming of this eager young nature, and I think he was rather relieved by the military solution thus afforded.

As Harry of course had nothing to do in town before joining his regiment, he stayed longer than usual this year in Komaritz,--stayed all through September and until late in October. Komaritz was quite deserted: Lato had gone, the Pole had gone; but Harry still stayed on.

And, strange to say, now, when we confronted our first long parting, our old friendship gradually revived, stirred, and felt that it had been living all this time, although it had had one or two naps. How well I remember the day when he came to Zirkow to take leave of us--of me!

It was late in October, and the skies were blue but cold. The sun shone down upon the earth kindly, but without warmth. A thin silvery mist floated along the ground. The bright-coloured leaves shivered in the frosty air.

On the wet lawn, where the gossamers gleamed like steel, lay myriads of brown, red, and yellow leaves. The song-birds were gone, the sparrows twittered shrilly, and in the midst of the brown autumnal desolation there bloomed in languishing loveliness a white rose upon a leafless stalk.

With a scarlet shawl about my shoulders and my head bare I was sauntering about the garden, wandering, dreaming through the frosty afternoon. I heard steps behind me, and when I looked round I saw Harry approaching, his brows knitted gloomily.

"I only want to bid you 'good-bye,'" he called out to me. "We are off to-morrow."

"When are you coming back?" I asked, hastily.

"Perhaps never," he said, with an important air. "You know--a soldier----"

"Yes, there is a threatening of war," I whispered, and my childish heart felt an intolerable pang as I spoke.

He shrugged his shoulders and tried to laugh.

"And, at all events, you, when I come back, will be a young lady with--lovers--and you will hardly remember me."

"Oh, Harry, how can you talk so!"

Rather awkwardly he holds out to me his long slender hand, in which I place my own.

Ah, how secure my cold, weak fingers feel in that warm strong hand! Why do I suddenly recall the long-past moonlit evenings in Komaritz when we sat together on the garden-steps and Harry told me ghost-stories, in dread of which, when they grew too ghastly, I used to cling close to him as if to find shelter in his strong young life from the bloodless throng of spirits he was evoking?

Thus we stand, hand in hand, before the white rose, the last which autumn had left. It droops above us, and its cheering fragrance mingles with the autumnal odours around us. I pluck it, stick it in Harry's button-hole, and then suddenly begin to sob convulsively. He clasps me close, close in his arms, kisses me, and murmurs, "Do not forget me!" and I kiss him too, and say, "Never--never!" while around us the faded leaves fall silently upon the grass.