CHAPTER XVII.
Coffee had just been served in Frau Wollnow's pleasant little balcony room in the second story. The gentlemen had gone down-stairs to smoke a cigar in the office, but the ladies were still sitting at the table, from which the pretty young servant-girl was removing the dishes. The three children, who could not become accustomed to the altered arrangements of the household--coffee was generally served in the sitting-room below--romped noisily around, to Frau Wollnow's great amusement, while Alma Sellien smoothed a frown of displeasure from her white forehead with her soft dainty hand.
"Couldn't you send the children away now?"
"The children!" said Frau Wollnow, casting an astonished glance from her round brown eyes at her brown-eyed darlings.
"I'm always a little nervous in the morning; and to-day must be doubly cautious, as I have a country excursion in prospect."
"Pardon me, dear Alma; I forgot you were not accustomed to the noise. It is not always so bad; but since Stine left me day before yesterday--dear me, I can't blame her; the good old thing wants to get married, and to a young man who might almost be her son, so she certainly has no time to lose. She has gone back to her parents. The wedding will take place in a fortnight. It was hard enough for her to leave the children--"
"You were going to send the children away, dear!"
The children were sent away. Alma Sellien leaned back in the corner of the sofa exhausted, and said, closing her soft blue eyes as it half asleep: "I am sure this will be another disappointment."
"What, dear Alma?" asked Frau Wollnow, whose thoughts were still with her children.
"My husband is so terribly enthusiastic about him; he's always enthusiastic about men I afterwards think horrible."
"You will be mistaken this time," cried Frau Wollnow, who, engrossed in this interesting subject, even failed to hear her youngest child crying upon the stairs; "your husband has said too little rather than too much. He is not only a handsome man--which, for my part, I consider of very little consequence--tall, and of an extremely elegant, graceful bearing, which harmonizes most admirably with the gentle, yet resolute expression of his features, the mild, yet steady gaze of his large deep-blue eyes, and even the soft, but sonorous tone of his voice."
"You are surely turning poetess," said Alma.
Ottilie Wollnow blushed to the roots of the curly bluish-black hair on her temples.
"I don't deny that I am very, very--"
"Much in love with him," said Alma, completing the sentence.
"Why yes, if you choose to say so; that is, as I love everything good and beautiful."
"An excellent theory, which I profess myself, only unfortunately in practice we must always be withheld by the opposition of our husbands. Yours did not seem to be quite so much delighted with your protégé."
"My good Emil!" said Frau Wollnow, "we don't agree in a great many things, and, dear me, it is certainly no wonder; he has been obliged to work so hard all his life, that it has made him a little grave and pedantic; but he is a thoroughly good man, and in this case you are entirely mistaken; at heart he is even more interested in Gotthold than I, or, if that is saying too much, quite as much so."
"It did not seem so."
"But it was only seeming. He is afraid of compromising his dignity if he talks as he really feels. I have found that all people who have had a sorrowful youth are so. Even the heart, so to speak, needs to have had its dancing lessons, and when it has had none, when it has always been compelled to beat under the pressure of straitened, gloomy surroundings, as in my poor Emil's case, people never overcome it all their lives. But what I was going to say is, that this time there is a special reason for it. My good Emil certainly never told even me--dear, kind man, as if I would have taken it amiss--that thirty or thirty-five years ago he was once very deeply in love with Gotthold's mother, when they lived in the same house in Stettin--it is a long and very romantic story."
"Oh! oh!" said Alma, "who would ever have given your husband credit for that?"
"Why," cried Ottilie, "you are entirely mistaken in Emil; his nature has a freshness, a power, a youthful fire--"
"How happy you are!" said Alma with a faint sigh.
"I hope you are no less so; but I wanted to explain why Emil always becomes so quiet when the conversation turns upon Gotthold. That is the reason of it, and then he has taken it into his head that this visit to the Brandows must turn out unlucky for him--Gotthold. You know Gotthold used to be in love with Cecilia; nay, between ourselves, I am sure he loves her still. But now, tell me yourself: can you see any great misfortune in that?"
"Not at all; I only think it rather improbable; you know I have never been able to share your enthusiasm about Cecilia, and don't see why all the men are to be in love with her. Her husband evidently isn't; at least I know a lady to whom he devotes himself whenever he meets her, in a way that proves his heart is not very strongly engaged in any other quarter."
"If he has one. Forgive me, dear Alma, you are a prudent woman, and I am sure you love your husband; but Brandow is really an extremely dangerous man. Possessed of the most attractive manners, when he chooses to adopt them; always lively and humorous, even witty, yet sensible when the occasion requires him to be so; and moreover bold, fearless, an acknowledged master of all chivalrous arts--and such things always impose upon us women--in a word, a dangerous man. Good Heavens, would it have been possible, under any other circumstances, to understand how the aristocratic, poetic Cecilia could have fallen in love with him! But what does all this avail without true love, and I do not believe Carl Brandow is capable of the feeling. Now let a man such as I have described Gotthold to be, enter the home of such a couple,--a man, moreover, who has scarcely conquered a boyish love for the wife,--indeed, if one reflects upon it, one can hardly blame my husband: such passionate natures, and in the loneliness of country life,--it really seems as if scales had fallen from my eyes. And Gotthold has not written a word all this week! Still waters run deep, but may not deep waters perhaps be still? And I have actually been the cause of it by my unlucky mania for pictures!"
"I think I can set your mind at rest, so far as that goes," said Alma. "I have found that men always have some reason for doing what they wish; if it isn't one thing, it's another. And then this evening, or to-morrow morning at latest, if we spend the night at Dollan, I can bring you the very latest and most exact news about all these interesting complications. I only fear they will prove less interesting than you expect."
"Lucky Alma!" said Ottilie sighing; "how much I should like to go with you. But my husband would never allow it."
"'Allow' is a word a husband should never be permitted to use to his wife," said Alma, as she slipped her wedding-ring up and down her slender finger.
The conversation between the two ladies was interrupted by Assessor Sellien, who hastily entered the room.
"Why," said his wife, "have you come back already? Is the carriage here? I haven't put on my travelling-dress yet."
"The carriage is not here," said the Assessor as he seated himself between the two ladies, and raised his wife's hand, which hung loosely over the back of the sofa, to his lips; "I only came to ask whether you would not prefer to stay here."
"Stay here!" said Alma, hastily starting from her lounging attitude in the sofa corner. "What has got into your head, Hugo?"
"You have one of your headaches, dear child, and a very bad one; I noticed it some time ago."
"You are entirely mistaken, dear Hugo; I feel unusually well this morning."
"And this terrible weather," said the Assessor, looking thoughtfully through the open door that led to the balcony; "there, it is raining again; I don't understand how ladies can expose themselves so."
He rose and shut the door.
"Brandow will send a close carriage in any case," said Alma.
"So much the worse," cried the Assessor. "You could not endure an hour in a close carriage, poor child. And then those terrible roads--I know them! To cross Dollan moor after it has rained all night--it's actually dangerous."
"I will not expose you to the danger all alone," said Alma smiling.
"That is very different, dear child. Men must follow wherever duty calls."
"And the prospect of a good dinner--"
"In a word, dear Alma, you would do me a favor if you would stay here."
"I have not the least inclination to do you this favor, dear Hugo, and now what else is there, if I may ask?"
The Assessor had risen and walked up and down the room.
"Well, then," he said pausing, "you know how unwilling I am to deny you anything; but this time I really cannot allow you to go."
Alma looked at her husband in astonishment; Ottilie, who could no longer control herself, burst into a merry laugh, exclaiming:
"'Allow' is a word a husband should never be permitted to use to his wife."
"Perhaps the word is not exactly suitable," said the Assessor; "but it does not alter the fact. And the fact is, that your husband has just given me certain information, which makes Alma's accompanying me this time appear not only undesirable, but even impossible. And your husband, my dear lady, is entirely of my opinion."
"But Emil's solicitude carries him entirely too far," cried Frau Wollnow angrily; "poor Cecilia has not deserved this. That is attacking a woman's reputation, not only unnecessarily, but without the slightest reason. If people are so excessively strict, they will be obliged to give up all society."
"I don't understand you, dear madam," said the Assessor, "at least I do not know what connection Frau Brandow's reputation could have with this very disagreeable affair."
"Then I don't understand you," replied Ottilie.
"It will be best," answered Sellien, "in order to avoid further misunderstandings, to tell the ladies plainly what the point in question really is. True, Herr Wollnow charged me to be cautious; but the flattering obstinacy with which my wife rejects my timid attempts to induce her to stay here, compels me to withdraw from my diplomatic position. Herr Wollnow has just informed me that my confident expectation that Brandow would have the ten thousand thalers ready, which I was to receive from him to-day, is all an illusion. To be sure, Brandow wrote me about a fortnight ago, and made no secret of his embarrassments; but he's such a clever fellow, and has always helped himself out of his scrapes when the pinch came; at any rate, he made no answer to my encouraging letter, and as I said before, I supposed he would not let me come for nothing, but on the contrary have everything ready. Now, however, I hear from your husband that matters are very different, in fact quite desperate. Brandow's credit is entirely exhausted. Herr Wollnow says that nobody could be found on the whole island who would lend him a thaler, since the two Plüggens and Redebas, who have kept his head above water so long, declared yesterday in Wollnow's counting-room that their patience was exhausted, and he would not get another shilling from them. Instead of that, they were to get something from him, that is, they were to receive a very large sum within a few days. They mentioned fifteen thousand thalers; but Herr Wollnow thinks there was probably a little exaggeration about it. But even if this was the whole amount of Brandow's indebtedness--which is undoubtedly not the case--he is still a lost man. The convent confidently expects that Brandow will pay his two years' rent to-morrow. If he does not, it will certainly make use of its right, and proceed to expel him from Dollan, and then Brandow will be as thoroughly and completely ruined as a man can be."
"Poor Cecilia! Poor, poor Cecilia!" cried Frau Wollnow, bursting into tears.
"I am sorry for her," said the Assessor, playing with his long nails. "But what can be done?"
"Emil must help them!" exclaimed Frau Wollnow, removing her handkerchief from her face a moment.
"He will beware of that, as he said just now; it is pouring water into the Danaïdes seive."
"But you, dear Herr Sellien, you are his friend; you cannot see your friend go to ruin."
The Assessor shrugged his shoulders. "Friend! Dear me, whom don't we call by that name? And my relations with Brandow are very superficial, mere business connections, if you choose to call them so; are they not, my dear wife?"
"Certainly, certainly," murmured Alma.
"And I should be giving up this very business relation if I allowed Alma to accompany me, when the situation was so critical. In the presence of ladies it is very difficult not to touch the chords of tender feeling, and it seems to me extremely desirable to avoid the possibility of doing so. Are you not of my opinion, dear Alma?"
"It is a very disagreeable affair," said Alma.
"Is it not? And why should you expose yourself to it unnecessarily? I knew my wise little wife would yield the point at last."
And the Assessor tenderly kissed Alma's hand.
"But in that case it seems to me you must stay here too, my dear Herr Assessor," said Frau Wollnow.
"I? Why? On the contrary, it is only prudent for me to appear as natural as possible. I know nothing; I suspect nothing. Of course I shall be extremely sorry when Brandow takes me aside and tells me he can't pay; but I'll wager the dinner will be none the worse for that, and taste none the worse to me. His red wine and champagne were always superb."
Frau Wollnow rose and went out upon the balcony. She must breathe the fresh air, even at the risk of having her new silk morning-dress spoiled by the rain, which was now falling quite heavily from the gray sky. "Poor, poor Cecilia!" she repeated sighing, "and there is no one who can and will save you."
She remembered that she had brought her husband a dowry of fifty thousand thalers, but she could not touch them without Emil's permission, and Emil would not allow it. Should she try to move him by throwing herself prostrate at his feet? She could almost have laughed outright at the extravagant idea, especially when she imagined the astonished expression her husband's face would wear; but the tears again sprang to her eyes and mingled with the rain-drops that beat upon her burning face. Suddenly the husband and wife within were roused from their low-toned, eager conversation by a loud exclamation from the balcony. "Gotthold, good heavens, Gotthold!"
"Where, where?" cried the Assessor and his wife with one voice, as they hurried out upon the balcony.
"There he comes," said Ottilie, pointing towards the square, across which a man with a broad-brimmed hat, pulled low over his eyes, was walking directly towards the house.
"He isn't so tall as Brandow," said Alma, who was critically inspecting the new-comer through an opera-glass.
"What can he want?" asked her husband.
"We shall soon know," said Frau Wollnow, as with a vague feeling of anxiety she pressed her two companions back into the room.
But Gotthold had only asked for Herr Wollnow, the maid-servant informed them, and she had been ordered to show him into Herr Wollnow's counting-room. The interview, whatever its purport might be, lasted much longer than was at all agreeable to the impatient waiters, and after an hour, during which the Assessor had rather increased than lessened the ladies' impatience by a detailed account of his adventures with Gotthold in Sicily, Herr Wollnow appeared alone. They were astonished, amazed, and scarcely satisfied when Wollnow said that Gotthold had only gone to the Fürstenhof to change his clothes, and would come back if his business gave him time. They wanted to know what business could be so pressing that Gotthold had selected Sunday morning for its transaction.
"The ladies must ask that of himself," said Herr Wollnow; "he has not taken me into his confidence. All I know is, that he is going to drive back to Dollan with our friends here, return to-night or to-morrow morning in the same excellent company, from which he anticipates a great deal of pleasure, and then continue his journey without further delay. It seems that the point in question concerns the hasty purchase of a few gifts, with which he wants to surprise his host and hostess at Dollan at parting; at least he wanted me to give him a sum of money which is rather large for mere travelling expenses, but I can say no more."
And Herr Wollnow, apparently with the utmost unconcern, hummed an air from "Figaro" as he left the room to avoid further questioning.
"I don't think it at all polite for him not to present himself a moment, at least," said Alma; "I've a great mind to punish him for it by not appearing at breakfast."
"Oh! pray don't," said the Assessor.
Ottilie Wollnow made no answer. She knew her husband too well to have the gloomy expression of his eyes and the cloud on his brow escape her notice, in spite of his apparent unconcern. Besides, she had a foreboding that Gotthold's interview with her husband had not been quite so innocent as it seemed, that there was something disagreeable, perhaps some misfortune impending, and above all, she was convinced that the Selliens were getting into a passion in vain, and Gotthold would not appear at breakfast.