A SINGULAR TRUCE
It was more than an hour before I could go down to General von Erlanger, and I carried a heavy heart and a bad report of Gareth's condition.
"She is very ill," I told him. "The doctor fears brain fever. At best but fragile, recent events have so preyed upon her that the climax to-day found her utterly broken in nerve and strength. I have left her muttering in half-delirious terror of her father's anger. Where is Count Gustav?"
"Gone away with the doctor, to return later. And now of yourself, Christabel?"
"In the presence of this I feel I do not care. I gathered the gist of all from what Count Gustav said. What was decided? Did the Duke know that Count Stephen was living?"
"No. The thing was planned by his supporters, as he told you last night, to make sure of his leadership being secure at a time when, owing to the Emperor's illness, it seemed that the hour was at hand for the Patriots' cause to be proclaimed. They meant to kill the Count, but some one saved him, and then Katona was persuaded to undertake his guardianship."
"What is to be done?"
"The Duke is a broken man. The knowledge of his favourite son's guilt; the break-up of his plans; the bitterness of the loss of virtually everything he cared for in life has completely unstrung him. He has sent Katona to take Count Stephen to him; he has given Gustav the option of voluntary exile or public exposure; and he has reinstated Karl in his position as elder son and his heir."
"It is only right. I am glad," I said.
"Glad?" he echoed, with a meaning glance.
"Yes, very glad."
"Your tone is very confident. You know what it carries with it—for you, I mean?"
"I do not care what it means to me. It is right."
"The Duke is very bitter against you, Christabel."
"He would scarcely be human if he were not. In a sense this is all my doing. I have brought it about, that is. But he cannot harm me, nor prevent my dear father's memory from being cleared. True, it seems he can influence Count Karl."
His Excellency smiled with deliberate provocation. "Possibly; yet Karl, although not a Patriot, is still a rebel."
"He has gone with his father," I answered, with a shrug.
"That is not fair. The Duke was too ill to go alone."
"He came with you, General."
He shook his head. "Christabel! If matters were not so sad here, I might almost be tempted to put that forbidden question."
"If you were so minded, I might not now forbid it, perhaps."
"I think I am glad to hear you say that. The girl in you can perhaps scarcely help resenting Karl's going away just now; but then any girl can be unjust at such a moment."
"Are you pleading for him?"
"Oh, no; there is no need. You will do that very well yourself when you are alone."
"You are very provoking."
"All I mean is that"—he paused and smiled again—"Karl is and will remain a rebel."
"I must go to Gareth now," I said.
I gave him my hand and he held it. "I am going with the news of her to the Duke; and when there I shall see—the rebel. Shall I give him any message?"
"No—except that I am glad," I answered steadily.
"That, of course; and—that he had better come as soon as he can for the reasons;" and with a last meaning glance he was leaving, when I asked him to let the Colonel know of Gareth's serious condition.
I was full of anxiety for Gareth, and I had been so greatly wrought upon by the events of the day that, as I had assured the General, my own concerns seemed too small to care about; and yet I could not put them away from me. "Karl was a rebel; Karl was a rebel." Over and over again the words came back to me, and all that they meant, as I stood by the window at a turn of the staircase, looking out and wondering.
Yes, it had hurt me that at such a time he had left the house without waiting to see me; but—he was a rebel. He had gone at the stern old Duke's bidding; but—he was a rebel and would come again. The Duke hated me, and as Gustav had said would never sanction our union; but then—Karl was a rebel.
The sun might shine, or the rain might fall; political plans might succeed or they might fail; great causes flourish or be overthrown; Karl was a rebel—and we should find our way after all to happiness. Love must have its selfish moments; and to me then that was just such a moment, despite all the troubles in the house.
For Gareth we could do nothing but watch, and nurse, and wait. She was very restless; very troubled in mind as her wayward mutterings showed; very weak—like a piece of delicate mechanism suddenly over-strained and broken.
An hour later Count Gustav returned, and I went down to him. The doctor had convinced him of the seriousness of Gareth's condition, and I was glad to find him less self-centred and more concerned for her.
"While Gareth is here, Count Gustav, there must be a truce between us," I said. "And she cannot possibly be moved."
"I know that now," he agreed.
"Then there must be a truce. For her sake all signs of the strife between us must be suppressed. She may ask me about you; and you about me. She has grown to care for me in the last few days; and it will help her recovery if we can make her believe the trouble that divides us all is ended. It rests with us to give her this ease of mind."
"I am not quite the brute you seem to think," he answered.
"I have my own opinion of you and am not likely to alter it—but for her sake I am willing to pretend."
"You are very frank."
"The terms of our truce are agreed, then?"
"Just as you please," he said, with a shrug.
"There is another thing to be done, somehow. Her father must be brought to agree also."
"Shall I go on my knees to him?" he sneered.
"I care not how it is done so long as it is done. But her mind is distracted by the thought of the breach between you two—and of her need to choose between you."
"That was not my doing," he rapped out.
"I see no need for a competition as to who has done the most harm," I retorted, coldly. "The question now is how that harm can best be repaired. Gareth is very ill—but worse in mind than in body; and she will not recover unless her mind is eased."
"Not recover?" he cried, catching at the words. "There is no need to talk like that. Dr. Armheit does not take any such serious view as that."
"Could Dr. Armheit be told all the facts?"
"My God!" he cried under his breath; and turning away looked out of the window.
In the silence I heard a carriage drive up to the door. "Here is the doctor, I expect. You can tell him and get his opinion when he knows."
But it was not the doctor. It was Karl with Colonel Katona; and James Perry showed them in.
On the threshold the Colonel, catching sight of Gustav, stopped abruptly, with a very stern look, and would not have entered the room had I not gone to him and urged him.
"There is something to be done here which is above all quarrels, Colonel. You must come in, please."
"I have told him that Gareth is ill," said Karl.
"What do you mean, Miss von Dreschler?" asked the Colonel, with a very grim look at me.
I struck at once as hard as I could. "Gareth's life is in danger, and it rests largely with you whether she shall live or die."
He pressed his lips tightly together for a moment. "In plainer terms, please."
"Dr. Armheit, who knows only that she has had a shock and has something on her mind, says that she is very ill. We who know what the cause is, know how much graver her condition really is. He will tell you that her chances of recovery depend upon her ease of mind; and that ease of mind can only be secured in one way. It rests with you for one and Count Gustav for the other, to secure it and save her."
He began to see my meaning and he glanced with an angry scowl at Gustav who, I am bound to say, returned the look with interest. Neither spoke, but waited for me to finish.
"I have just arranged a truce with Count Gustav to last until Gareth is strong enough to be told the facts. You two must do the same."
The Colonel drew himself up stiffly and shook his head, and Gustav quick to take fire, was about to burst in, when I continued: "Are you to think of Gareth or of yourselves? Is she to die that you may glower at one another in your selfish passion? Will it profit either of you to know that her life was sacrificed because you could not mask your tempers over her sick bed? Is this what you call love for her? You, her father; and you, her husband?"
I was beginning to win. I saw that from the slight change in the bearing of both. Hot indignation began to give place to mutual sullenness. "It is your quarrel which may kill her; your apparent reconciliation that may save her. Her mind is restless, fevered, and distraught with the horror of the cruel choice which you, her father, laid upon her. You can hear it in every murmur of her half-delirious fever as she lies tossing now. The terror of you, love born as it is, will kill her unless together you two can succeed in removing it."
With a groan the Colonel fell on to a chair and covered his face with his hands, while Gustav turned back again to the window.
I was winning fast now, and I went on confidently: "You can see this now, I hope. What I would have you do is to wait here until she is calmer, and then together go to her, and let her see for herself that the fear which haunts her is groundless. Let your hate and your quarrel stay outside her room; do your utmost while you are inside to make her feel and believe that you are reconciled. That will do more to win her back to health and strength than all the doctors and nurses in the empire. The trouble is in the mind, not the body. Happiness may save, where misery will kill her."
Neither answered, and in the pause some one knocked at the door. It was Mrs. Perry, come to tell me that Gareth was calmer and conscious, and was asking for me.
I told them the good news and added: "May I go and tell her you are both here waiting to see her—together?"
Neither would be the first to give way.
"I will take the risk," I said. "I will go and tell her, and then whichever of you refuses shall have the responsibility;" and without giving them time to answer I went upstairs to Gareth.
She was looking woefully wan and ill, her face almost as colourless as the linen on which she lay. She welcomed me with a smile and whispered my name as I bent and kissed her.
"I am feeling so weak, Christabel," she murmured. "Am I really ill? Or why am I here?"
"Not ill, dearest—but not quite well. That is all; and I have such news for you that it will soon make you quite well."
Her sensitive face clouded and her lips twitched nervously. "About Karl—I mean Gustav,—and—oh, I remember," and clasping her hands to her face turned away trembling.
"Remember what, dear?"
"My father—his look, oh——"
"You have been dreaming, Gareth. Tell me your dreams," I said, very firmly. "I know you have been dreaming because you spoke of your father's anger. And he is not angry with you."
She looked round and stared at me with wondering eyes.
"Not angry? Why, when I—oh, yes,—when Karl—oh, Christabel, I can't get his look out of my eyes. He said...."
I smiled reassuringly, and kissed her again. "Gareth, dear, what do you mean? Why your father and Gustav—Gustav, not Karl, dearest—are together downstairs. We have been talking about you; and they are both waiting to come and see you together."
I think I must have told the half-lie very naturally, for the change in her face was almost like a miracle.
"Is it all a dream, then?" she asked, her voice awed, her eyes bright with the dawning of hope.
"It depends what it is you dreamt, dearest. You have frightened yourself. Tell me all." I was making it hard for the two who were to come up presently; but the change in her rendered me somewhat reckless as to that.
"Has Duke Ladislas been here?"
"Oh, yes. He is Gustav's father."
"He petted me, and said I was like his own lost Gareth, and that now I was his daughter. Then I came to you to fetch Gustav to him; and after that——"
"You saw Gustav and he kissed you—and then in your delight you fainted, and I brought you up here."
"But my father——"
"You have not seen your father yet, Gareth. He is eager to see you." I told the flat lie as sturdily as I had told the other, and didn't stop to consider whether it was justified or not. I just told it.
"But he was there, and he—all but cursed me, Christabel; and oh, his eyes...."
"You have only dreamt that part, Gareth," I said, using a sort of indulgent tone. "You have been frightening yourself, dearest. You have always been afraid of what he might say to you, and—you have been imagining things."
She found it difficult to believe me, strong as her desire was to do so.
"But it was all so real, Christabel."
"It is more real that they are both waiting for me to say if I think you are strong enough to see them."
"Do you mean—oh, Christabel, how happy you have made me;" and with that, thank Heaven, she burst into tears.
She was still weeping when the doctor came; and noting the change in her, he gave a ready consent to her seeing Gustav and the Colonel for a short interview.
I took him down with me to fetch them. I told them what I had said to Gareth, and that they were to insist upon it that she had fainted when in Gustav's arms, and that everything after that was no more than her imagination.
They could not quarrel before the doctor; could indeed only look rather sheepish, as even strong and stern men can at times; so I carried my point and led them upstairs.
"Gustav and your father, dearest," I said, as I opened the door and stood aside for them to pass.
I saw her face brighten and her eyes light with a great gladness at the sight of them together and apparently friendly; and then I closed the door and left them to carry out their part of the agreement in their own way.
My face was glad too, and my heart light as I ran down to my "rebel."