CHAPTER XXXII.
The following morning at an early hour Willibald von Eschenhagen walked through the park, which he wanted to see--at least so he had told his uncle.
The large, forest-like park which was situated directly before the city, was indeed worth seeing, but Willibald paid no attention to the landscape, which did not look very inviting this bleak November day.
Without a glance to right or left he walked quickly forward, taking aimlessly now this and now that path, without noticing that he repeatedly returned to the same spot. It seemed as if he wished with this stormy walk to calm an inner unrest; he had really gone out to be alone in the free, open air.
The young lord tried to persuade himself that it was only the meeting again with the friend of his youth that had taken him so completely out of his composure. He had not heard anything of Hartmut for fully ten years--did not even dare to mention him at home, and now he suddenly saw the lost one again, with the halo of a growing poetical glory around his head. Deeply and wonderfully changed in appearance and manner, in spite of all he was still the Hartmut with whom he had played his boyish games so often. He should have recognized him at the first glance without having been prepared for the meeting.
Wallmoden, on the contrary, seemed to be disagreeably surprised at yesterday's success. He had hardly spoken during the drive home; his wife as little. She had stated in the carriage that the hot air of the theatre had given her an intolerable headache, and retired immediately upon their arrival home. The Ambassador followed her example, and when he gave his hand to his nephew, who wished him good-night, he said curtly: "Our understanding remains the same, Willibald. You are to keep silence toward everybody, whoever it be. Look out that you do not betray yourself, for the name Rojanow will be in everybody's mouth during the next few days. He has had luck again this time--like all adventurers."
Willibald had accepted the remark silently, but he still felt that it was something else which gave the author of Arivana this success.
Under other circumstances he would have considered this work as something unheard of--incomprehensible--without understanding it, but, strange to say, the understanding for it had dawned upon him yesterday.
One could fall in love without the solemn approval of the respected parents, guardians and relations; it happened not only in India, but it happened here sometimes, too. One could also incautiously and hastily burden oneself with a vow and break it--but what then?
Yes, then came the doom which Hartmut had pictured so horribly and yet so fascinatingly. Willy was transporting in earnest the highly romantic teachings of Arivana into Burgsdorf affairs, and the doom suddenly assumed the features of Frau von Eschenhagen, who, in her wrath, was surely worse than an angry caste of priests.
The young lord heaved a deep sigh. He thought of the second act of the play, when, from the circle of Hindoo girls who marched to the place of sacrifice, a delicate figure had stepped forth, inexpressibly charming in the white, flowing garments, and the wreath of flowers in her curls. His eyes had hung riveted upon her, who appeared but twice or thrice upon the stage, but after that her song had sounded from the banks of the moonlit river. It was the same clear, sweet voice which had enchanted the listener at Waldhofen, and now the old mischief, which he had struggled down and thought forgotten, was back again. It stood before him with giant size, and the worst of it was that he did not even consider it longer as a mischief.
The tireless walker now came for the third time to a small temple, open in front, and in which stood a statue, while a bench in the background invited one to rest.
Willibald entered this time and sat down, less from a desire to rest than to be able to follow his thoughts undisturbed.
It was, perhaps, ten o'clock in the morning, and the paths were at this hour almost deserted. Only a solitary pedestrian--a young man elegantly dressed--walked leisurely and with apparent aimlessness along the paths. He seemed to be expecting some one, for he glanced impatiently now toward town, and now toward the Parkstrasse which bordered the park for some distance.
Suddenly he came toward the temple and took his stand behind it, where he could keep the path in view without being seen.
In about five minutes a young lady came from the city--a delicate, graceful figure, in dark cloak and fur cape, with her fur cap pressed closely down upon her curly head, and a muff in her hand, from which peeped a roll of music. She was passing the temple quickly, when suddenly she uttered an ejaculation of displeased surprise:
"Ah--Count Westerburg!"
The young man had approached and bowed.
"What a happy coincidence! How could I hope that Fraulein Marietta Volkmar would take so early a walk in the park!"
Marietta stood still and measured the speaker from head to foot. Her voice had a half-angry, half-contemptuous sound as she answered:
"I do not believe in this coincidence, Herr Count. You cross my path too often and persistently for that, although I have shown you sufficiently how annoying your attentions are to me."
"Yes, you are endlessly cruel to me," said the Count, reproachfully, but with undeniable impertinence. "You do not accept my calls, refuse my flowers and offerings, and do not even return my greetings when I pass you by. What have I done to you? I have ventured to lay homage at your feet in the form of jewels, which you returned to me----"
"With the request that you discontinue such impertinences once for all," interrupted the young girl vehemently. "I protest, besides, against your continued advances. You have actually lain in wait for me here."
"Mon Dieu! I only wished to beg your pardon for that boldness," assured Count Westerburg, apparently submissive, but at the same time he stepped into the middle of the narrow path, so that it was impossible to pass. "I might have known that you are unapproachable, for everybody protests that none protects her name so jealously as you, beautiful Marietta."
"My name is Fraulein Volkmar!" cried Marietta, angrily. "Keep your flattering speeches for those who allow such things to be told them. I shall not do it, and if your advances do not cease I shall have to call in protection."
"Whose protection?" sneered the Count. "Perhaps that of the old lady with whom you live and who is always and everywhere at your side, except in your walk to Professor Marani. The singing studies at the old gentleman's are not dangerous, and that is the only walk you take alone."
"Then you knew that I went to the Parkstrasse at this hour! Then it is actually an attack! Please let me pass. I wish to go."
She tried to pass by him, but the young man stretched out his arms so that he filled the path.
"You will assuredly permit me to accompany you, mein Fraulein. Only look, the path is quite lonely and deserted; there is not a soul around. I really must offer you my escort."
The path seemed, indeed, quite deserted, and another girl might have been intimidated by this reference to her defencelessness, but the little Marietta only drew herself up undauntedly.
"Do not dare to attempt to follow me by even a step." she cried in deepest anger. "Your escort is just as unbearable to me as your presence. How often must I tell you that?"
"Ah, so angry!" cried the Count with a malicious smile. "Well, I shall not have ventured this attack for nothing. I shall at least repay myself with a kiss from those charming, angry lips."
He actually prepared to fulfil his threat, approaching the quickly retreating girl, but at that moment, propelled by an awful blow, he flew to one side and fell full length upon the damp ground, where he remained lying in a very pitiable plight.
Startled at this unexpected and stormy succor, Marietta turned around, and her face, flushed from insult and anger, bore expression of great amazement as she recognized her deliverer, who now stood at her side, looking wrathfully at the form upon the ground, as if it were his highest desire to quite finish him.
"Herr von Eschenhagen--you!"
In the meantime Count Westerburg had struggled painfully to his feet and now drew near his aggressor threateningly.
"How dare you! Who gives you the right----"
"I advise you to remain ten feet away from this young lady," interrupted Willibald, placing himself in front of Marietta, "or you will fly off again, and the second blow might not prove as soft as the first."
The Count, a slender, far from powerful man, measured the giant before him, whose fist he had already felt, but one look was enough to convince him that he would come out second best in an encounter.
"You will give me satisfaction--if you are worth it," he hissed in a half-choked voice. "Probably you do not know whom you have before you----"
"An impudent fellow whom one chastises with pleasure," said Willy stolidly. "Please remain standing where you are, or I will do it now. My name is Willibald von Eschenhagen. I am lord of Burgsdorf, and can be found at the mansion of the Prussian Ambassador if you should have more to tell me---- If you please, mein Fraulein, you may trust yourself unhesitatingly to my protection. I pledge myself that you will not be molested further."
And now something unprecedented, unheard of, happened. Herr von Eschenhagen, without stammering, without showing embarrassment of any kind, offered his arm with a genuinely chivalrous movement to the young lady, and carried her off without concerning himself further about the Count.