CHAPTER VII.
It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. Frau von Wallbach sat in the drawing-room, in her usual place by the fire, and stared at the flames, which, after many vain efforts, had at last been successfully kindled; and, notwithstanding the terrible uproar that raged round the castle, was on the point of forgetting her annoyance in a refreshing afternoon nap, when Signor Giraldi was announced, having only just arrived.
"He might as well have stayed away another hour," said Frau von Wallbach. "Well, it is all the same to me; let dinner be got ready for him, François, and then ask him to come here."
"Signor Giraldi particularly wishes to see you at once, ma'am."
"Very well; it is all the same to me today."
Frau von Wallbach had just time to turn her head towards the door as she leant back in her chair, when Giraldi entered. He was still in his travelling dress, having only thrown down his wet cloak in the hall; his black beard, which was usually so carefully arranged, was wild and dishevelled; his calm, dark eyes glowed with a lurid fire; his usually impassive face, that had seemed chiselled in yellow marble, was furrowed and agitated.
"Dear me, how strange you look!" said Frau von Wallbach.
"I must apologise," answered Giraldi; "but I have been travelling since last night, perpetually detained by the most provoking hindrances, and I arrive here at last to learn that the Baroness, with whom I have to talk upon the most important and urgent affairs, is not at home. You can imagine----"
"Do sit down," said Frau von Wallbach. "You make me quite nervous by standing about like that, and talking so quickly."
"I must apologise again," said Giraldi.
"Not at all. I only remained here to receive you, although I tell you fairly that I had rather not have done so."
"Then I will not take up another moment of your valuable time----"
"Do sit still, and don't make any speeches. I never make any, as you know, and am not at all inclined for them to-day. Oh yes, you may look at me as scornfully as you please. I dare say you think me, as other people do, half a child or a fool; but children and fools speak the truth, and the truth, my dear Signor Giraldi, is, that if you had not intermeddled and set everything at sixes and sevens, Carla would be Ottomar's wife by this time, and everything would be properly arranged, while now she is out in this dreadful weather--you must have met them I should think--riding with the Count, although I told her to the Count's face that it was scandalous, to say nothing of her catching her death of cold."
"You cannot possibly hold me responsible for the irresistible impulse which makes heart meet heart," answered Giraldi, with an attempt at his usual supremely ironical smile, which only resulted, however, in an evil grimace.
"Hearts!" said Frau von Wallbach; "stuff! The little heart that Carla ever had was Ottomar's, and no one else's; and there would have been quite enough for matrimony, at least I know some that have done very well with less. And as for the Count, good heavens! at first she was always telling me that he talked such nonsense, and my husband said so too, and old Countess Kniebreche and every one; and then you came and cried him up to the skies, and of course what you said must be true, and so you have got your own way so far. And why? because it suited you that Ottomar should not marry, but should continue his careless way of living, and get into all sorts of troubles and scrapes, and that you should have him in your power. And you have succeeded very nicely, as Carla would say. But I don't think it nice at all, but perfectly horrid of you; for Ottomar has always been pleasant and good-natured to me, and I like him a thousand times better than the Count; and if I had never respected Elsa before, I should now that I see she does not care one bit for the Count, but has declared honestly, as the Baroness told me and Carla this morning in Elsa's name, that she is going to marry her sailor, although it is rather a strange proceeding for a Fräulein von Werben; but that is her affair; and she has gone with the Baroness to see him at Wissow, or whatever the name of the place is, which is quite right, I think, under the circumstances. I was to tell you this, and that they would be back in a few hours; and now I will add a few words from myself. You think, perhaps, that you have done something very fine by upsetting Ottomar's and Carla's engagement; and I dare say you are not less pleased at Elsa losing her inheritance in this way, but you are very much mistaken. The Baroness and Elsa are one, heart and soul; and if Ottomar chooses to marry Captain Schmidt's cousin, the Baroness will have no objection, and she will make the brother and sister her heirs, whatever the trustees may say. If I were in her place I should do the same thing. And now here comes François to tell you, I suppose, that your dinner is ready. I wish you a good appetite."
Frau von Wallbach's last words were spoken without the least touch of sarcasm, in the same lazily comfortable way as the former ones, with her pretty head resting sideways against the back of her chair, and her eyes turned away from Giraldi and looking at the ceiling, as if it were all written up there and she were merely reading it off.
But not the most passionate warmth, nor the bitterest attack could have so upset the composure of the man who had sat before her gnawing his white lips, without interrupting her by a word, and who now rose to leave the room with a silent bow, as this imperturbable calmness and blunt sincerity affected him from a woman whom he had hitherto considered a nonentity, as the emptiest of all empty-headed dolls, and who now dared to tell him this to his very face; to unfold the web of intrigue which he had toiled so hard to spin with all the energy of his crafty mind, and to show him the gaps which his sharp eye had overlooked, his most watchful art had not succeeded in covering, and then calmly to tear it from top to bottom like some worn-out rag!
He had hardly entered the dining-room, where a place had been laid for him at one corner of the large table, before he gave free vent to the fury which had nearly choked him. He stamped, he swore, he tore his beard, like a madman, thought François, who handed him his soup as calmly as if monsieur's wild gestures had been a gymnastic exercise which every gentleman was in the habit of practising before sitting down to dinner after a fatiguing journey and a long drive.
"Why don't you speak?" shrieked Giraldi.
"I am waiting for monsieur's permission."
"Speak, then!"
"I have written all my observations to monsieur with such minuteness----"
"You have written nothing that was worth reading! You did not write me one word about the intimacy that has sprung up between madame and her niece, and which you must have seen if you had eyes in your head. You are either a fool or a traitor."
"I am unfortunate----"
"Don't let me hear any of your confounded long words! I have no time for them. What else do you know?"
"Besides what I told monsieur on his arrival, I know absolutely nothing of importance. Ah! by-the-bye, I had almost forgotten that!"
François slapped his forehead suddenly. He had not forgotten it for a moment; he had been considering all the time that monsieur was in the drawing-room with Frau von Wallbach, whether he should say it or not. He could not speak without betraying madame as he had betrayed monsieur, but for what purpose take money from both if not to betray both? So far everything had gone on well; all he had to consider was that each step to right or left should be well paid; and if he were not greatly deceived, now was the moment to take another step on monsieur's side.
"Will you speak?" cried Giraldi, shaking his fist at him.
"I have forgotten it after all," said Francois, looking with impudent coolness into Giraldi's face, that was white with passion.
Giraldi dropped his arms,
"How much?" he ejaculated.
"I cannot do it cheaply, monsieur. The matter, in case I can recollect it, is one of the utmost importance for monsieur, and as madame has been lately so extraordinarily kind to me, and has given me, through Madame Feldner, so many sterling proofs of her kindness, and monsieur will of course not trust me in future, but this will undoubtedly be the last service which I shall render monsieur----"
"How much!" shrieked Giraldi.
"Ten thousand francs, monsieur."
Giraldi pulled out a pocket-book from which he took a handful of bank-notes, and threw them on the table.
"Count them!"
"There are three thousand thalers, monsieur."
"Take them and speak!"
François smoothed the notes carefully, put them no less carefully into one side of his pocket-book, and said, as he took a paper from the other side:
"Monsieur's generosity is adorable, as usual. I should be most deeply ashamed if I were not convinced that monsieur would take this as a fully sufficient equivalent."
And, with a low bow, he handed Giraldi the paper--a copy of Elsa's telegram to her father.
François had hoped that the terror which must now be painted on monsieur's expressive face would produce an interesting variety in the scene; but he flattered himself in vain. Monsieur, who had been trembling all over with rage and fury, and who had gesticulated and raved like a madman, now stood, after glancing in his own rapid fashion over the paper, looking as calm and composed as François had ever yet seen him; and asked, in his usual low inquiring voice:
"When and where was this sent out?"
"This morning, at five o'clock, from Prora, by a man on horseback, whom I sent myself, after I had taken a copy of the open note."
"Then your news is not worth a farthing. The telegraphic communication between Berlin and Sundin has been interrupted since four o'clock this morning."
"Just so, monsieur. That was what the clerk said who received the telegram, after he had inquired at Sundin and received the answer that he might telegraph through Grünwald; there might be some chance there. Inquiry made at Grünwald. Reply, 'Yes, and on through Stettin.' The messenger, an old trustworthy servant, one of the late Herr von Warnow's, monsieur, took note of everything, and reported it all to mademoiselle in my presence, adding that according to the clerk's report the telegram would reach Berlin rather late, but certainly in the course of the morning."
"In your presence, do you say? How came that?"
François shrugged his shoulders.
"Mademoiselle knows how to appreciate my knowledge in such matters--an old courier, monsieur! To speak the truth, I had myself given the messenger the necessary instructions."
"Why were you not sent?"
François smiled.
"The night was very stormy, monsieur; I am not fond of roughing it. I said I could not ride, and did not know the way."
"But you can ride, and you know the way to Wissow?"
François bowed.
"How far is it, to ride?"
"If one rides fast, one may do it in half an hour."
"Even through the storm?"
"I think so, monsieur."
"And how long would the ladies be, driving?"
"Like the rider, they must take the longest road over the hill and through the villages, monsieur; that could not take less than an hour, monsieur."
Giraldi had taken out his watch and was making a calculation. He put back the watch.
"It is just twenty minutes past four. You must be ready in ten minutes, at latest, to take a letter from me to madame at Wissow."
"Impossible, monsieur; even this morning, at eleven o'clock, Frau von Wallbach, who was bent upon going away, could not get horses; nobody will supply them, monsieur."
"There are the horses which brought me."
"Impossible, monsieur; I saw them, and they are quite exhausted. It must be a good, fresh horse, monsieur, a riding horse. There are none such in the stable."
"You can find one if I give you another thousand thalers in case madame is back at the castle before six o'clock."
"Two thousand, monsieur."
"Good. And now, paper and ink--quick!"
François brought the required materials in a moment from the next room, and Giraldi was already writing at the table beside his untouched dinner, when François left the dining-room to prepare to earn the second sum, if possible, of which he had serious doubts.
Giraldi wrote:
"Your drive to Wissow is a subterfuge or a flight. I forgive your vacillation, even your desertion, which can only be a passing error, for the sake of the love which you bear me, and which I bear you. And if your love is extinct (mine is not!) the accompanying letter, which I copy for you (the original, which I cannot trust to the messenger, I retain in my own hands), will awake new flames from the ashes, as he has awoke to life for us, in whose death I could never believe. And as my faith was the stronger, so am I in all things stronger, and would make unrestrained and pitiless use of that strength, no longer for myself, but for our son. You know me, Valerie! As the clock strikes six, I leave the castle for ever, with the Warnow property, which I carry about me to the last thaler, and which now belongs to mother and son, or to the son alone if it should appear that he has no mother. But it cannot, it will not be. I implore to this end the most holy, the sorrow-laden Mother of God. She who bore all the pangs of maternity will guide a mother's heart!
"Giraldi.
"Warnow. Half-past four in the afternoon."
He took a letter from his pocket, which he had received last night when he got home from Philip's party, and had first found time to read in the waiting-room at the railway station, and wrote, with a hand that flew like lightning over the paper:
"With failing hands, and eyes darkened by the shadow of death, I write this: Antonio Michele is your son. A very aged woman in Arsoli, who has been known since she suddenly appeared in this place, seven and twenty years ago, under the name of Antonia Falcone, but whose real name is Barbara Cecutti, and who was the mother of that Lazzaro who carried off your child from Pœstum, confessed this to me yesterday on her death-bed. She was found by the woman Michele in a ravine of the hills above Tivoli, on the verge of starvation, the stolen child beside her almost at the last gasp too, the wounded Lazzaro having breathed his last an hour before, during their flight. The woman Michele took pity upon these unfortunate creatures; the two women swore, on the Host, the one never to say that she had received the child from Barbara, and the other that she had given him to the Michele, so that Barbara might wear out the end of her life undisturbed by the police, and that Father Michele might make no inquiries after the parents of the child, whom his wife pretended to have found on the hills, exposed, like Moses on the shores of the Nile, by a poor girl whom she knew well, but whose name she would not mention. She had never had any children herself, though she had longed for them, and would not part with this one at any price. She carried her secret with her to the grave. Barbara Cecutti also is now no more; and you, my dear sir, receive this legacy from the dead at the hand of a dying man. The ways of God are wonderful! Let us praise His mercies! Amen!
"Ambrosio."
"Dear Sir,
"From the hand of a dying man, indeed! Our good brother Ambrosio--but just returned from his charitable mission--has this night departed, let us hope, into eternal blessedness, as no purgatory can be needed for him who was a saint on earth, I send you his bequest, and beg you to transfer to my poor convent the expression of your gratitude for the happy tidings which the grace of God has permitted you to receive by means of our brother who is now with Him.
"The Prior of the Convent of
"S. Michele at Tivoli,
"Eugenio."
Giraldi had just written the last word as the door flew open, admitting François, who wore a long cloak, below which appeared a pair of riding-boots. As he entered he exclaimed:
"Really, monsieur, I am ashamed to have doubted for an instant the luck of such a man! As I went into the courtyard, the Count's groom galloped in, who had been sent back to fetch a pocket-handkerchief which mademoiselle had forgotten! If it had only been an umbrella! In fact, monsieur, they wanted to get rid of the man; we shall hear nothing of either of them before to-morrow morning, you may take my word for it. I know the style of thing! I explained this to the man after a fashion, and he will let me have his horse. He says that neither man nor devil shall drive him out into this storm again."
"You must remain in my service, François," said Giraldi, laying his hand on the impudent fellow's shoulder. "And now--don't spare the horse."
"Monsieur may depend upon me!" answered François, putting the letter in safety. "Au revoir, monsieur!"
François hastened away, and Giraldi went to the deep bow-window which overlooked the courtyard, and watched while he mounted the handsome beast, whose bridle the groom was holding, and, waving his hand towards the window, galloped out of the yard.
Giraldi went back to the table and broke off a piece of bread, which he washed down with the glass of wine that François had poured out for him. Then he began slowly to walk up and down the great room with his arms folded across his chest.
How could he have allowed himself to be so carried away by his passion just now? What had happened for which he might not have been prepared--for which, in fact, he had not been long prepared? The weather was to blame for the disturbance of his nerves--weather only fit for northern barbarians and those in league with them! It could only have been some unfriendly demon which in the morning twilight had driven the little steamer, that was to have brought him over to the island from Sundin, against a rudderless drifting wreck, and so had forced it to turn back; an unfriendly demon who forbade the rude sailors to take his money and to venture the passage in an open boat, till at last, at half-past eleven, the steamer was repaired, and then took an hour to do the distance--half a nautical mile! Fiend against fiend! Gregorio Giraldi was the stronger. If the telegram had really reached the General at Berlin in proper time--if he left Berlin by the eleven o'clock train, he could not be at Sundin before three o'clock, or at Warnow before six. An hour! Kingdoms had been lost and won in an hour; and everything, everything else was on his side: Ottomar irretrievably entangled in the net which he had cast over him, and already at deadly feud with Wallbach, whose giddy sister was now in love with the Count, to say nothing else! the proud Elsa betrothed to a man of low degree, paying for her love with her inheritance!--the course clear from all obstacles, and at its goal the rich treasures, the great estates, which now fell to Valerie by law, and which she must leave absolutely to her own son, who had risen from the dead--that is to say, she must leave them to himself! Could she choose to do otherwise? Did any choice remain to her? Must she not submit whether she would or no? And if she wavered--one minute only alone with him--here in this room, in which so often they had in fancy stood together, which she had so minutely described to him that he knew every piece of furniture, every picture on the wall--this especially, the portrait of the man from whose arms he had scornfully torn her, that some day his picture might hang here--the portrait of the new lord, who would pull down this barbaric edifice and build a new castle--the new lord!
He stood before the picture, and looked at it with an evil smile.
"You were the last of your race, with your narrow forehead and the broad ribbon of some high order over your cold heart! and now you are mouldering in the tomb of your ancestors! And he, whom in life you could not vie with, stands still alive here, in his undiminished strength--the peasant's son, who will now be the founder of a race of princes for whom even the chair of St. Peter shall not be too high!"
A shock like that of an earthquake struck the castle. The windows rattled, the doors flew open and banged to again. The picture, to which he was looking up, and which had hung from its rusty nail for a generation past, shook and fell, so that the mouldered frame broke into fragments, and the picture itself, after standing upright for a moment, fell forward under his feet.
He sprang back.
"Do you still move, accursed dust? Down into hell to his accursed soul!"
And, as if in answer to the master's voice, from the depths of hell to which he had called, howls and yells resounded round Castle Warnow.