CHAPTER XXVI. HOW ATHENS TOOK THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE PERFIDIOUS RUDOLPH.
Rudolph’s disappearance with Photini created rather more than a nine days’ wonder at Athens. This is one of the privileges of living in a small and talkative town where private affairs spread like fire, and scandal is an excitement only second to that of the election of the mayor. But it must be confessed that this was a big scandal, and worth all the ejaculations, comments, and emphatic censure it provoked. The baron shrugged his shoulders and smiled: it may be allowed he was not prepared for this sweeping descent on the part of the innocent Rudolph. But, as he remarked to his wife:
“It’s always your well brought up and virtuous youths who take the rapidest strides to the deuce! I told Ottilie, years ago, that she was bringing up that boy to be a very dainty morsel for any adventuress that might happen to catch him.”
“Well, my dear, we must admit,” said the baroness, “that the Natzelhuber did not put herself to any considerable trouble to catch Rudolph. I’ve not the slightest doubt that the boy was only longing to be caught, and not wishing to escape it.”
“That is ever the way,” remarked her amiable husband, “with our inconsistent sex. Our normal condition is longing or grumbling. Either we are crying out against the adventuresses who wish to catch us, or we are railing against those who won’t; and when we are caught, we are still crying out that we are caught. The child, you perceive, is father to the man. Watch an infant with his pets: he fondles and maltreats the confiding kitten that rubs itself against him, and deserts it to run after the butterfly. The butterfly won’t be caught and he howls dismally, if he doesn’t go into a fit, and proceeds to strangle the tabby. Thus it has been with your engaging nephew. Mademoiselle Andromache represents the confiding kitten, deserted for Selaka’s daughter, the unattainable butterfly, and Photini stands for the domestic tabby. Only the tabby in question possesses very formidable claws, which she is too likely to use upon the slightest or even upon no provocation from the faithless Rudolph. He will then return to us a sadder and a wiser man. Perhaps when that time comes, it will not be so very difficult for us, with the aid of Mademoiselle Veritassi, should that delightful young lady be still free, to anchor him in the placid waters of matrimony.”
“As for Mademoiselle Veritassi,” said the baroness, “it is always the girls who come off the worst in these matters. They stand there ready victims for the worn and jaded rakes who have sown their wild oats. That wild-oat period is an abomination, Baron, and the theory has done more to injure young men than anything else.”
“Madame, I am not responsible for the errors of civilisation. The period which you so aptly describe as the wild-oat period, is doubtless a sad one to contemplate for those like you and me, who have passed to the other side, where it is to be hoped there are no wild oats to be sown. But I am not so sure of that. However, I have not the slightest doubt, should Rudolph settle down with Mademoiselle Veritassi, that he will make her as good a husband as any other. Certainly she will find him very pliant and easy to manage. He is wealthy, too, and I suppose a young woman cannot ask anything better than a husband she can easily manage, and a purse she can draw heavily upon,” said the baron, and continued to smoke his morning cigar without any unwonted discomposure.
The baroness went on her round of visits in a saddened spirit, thinking of that young life wrecked on its threshold, and feeling that her sister Ottilie, watching from above, might perhaps consider that she in some manner or another, was responsible for the boy’s fall. She was a good woman in her way, though a worldly one. Whatever might be her opinion of the morals of the young men with whom she associated, she would gladly have shielded poor Rudolph from any such acquaintance with life as theirs. Having no child of her own, she loved the boy with a tender and maternal love.
“It is very dreadful,” she said at dinner to her husband.
“My dear, let us be thankful that it is not worse,—it might have been,” said the cheerful philosopher.
“Worse!” interrogated the baroness.
“He might have married her.”
This appalling suggestion silenced the baroness.
Some days later, a letter came from Rudolph from Cape Juan. Already there was a breath of cynicism in it, startling to those who had known him in his not far distant period of girlish and fastidious shrinking. The baron read it attentively, and then said:
“It seems to me, my dear, your Arcadian nephew is going to the devil as fast as brandy and Photini will help him.”
And that was all he said, adding that probably in a year, at the most, Rudolph would reappear in their midst, hardened, cynical, and worldly wise.
The outrage inflicted on Athens in the respected person of her chief citizen still lifted the voice of uproarious censure, and the Turkish Embassy had to interfere on behalf of Daoud Bey, who made good his escape.
In the meantime, how has it been faring with the victim, Andromache? In the first flush of separation, Rudolph was as regular a correspondent as the postal arrangements of the Peloponnesus allowed. His letters breathed artless affection and most gratifying regrets. They described everything he saw at considerable length, and Andromache read them as young ladies will read their first love letters, answered them as candidly, making proper allowance for maidenly reticence; and then devoted herself, with much ardour, to discussing Rudolph with her mother and Julia. All the while the trousseau was progressing rapidly. What dresses to be tried on! what quantities of linen to be embroidered what choice of lace! There was confusion in the little house overlooking the French school, and Themistocles found it more necessary than ever to seek the quiet and seclusion of his own chamber, and there to meditate upon the young lady in the next street and play endless and torturing variations of Schubert’s Serenade. And O what a glorious time it was for Miltiades! how he boasted of his sister’s brilliant future at the mess-table, and walked the town, or rode on his coal-black charger, with his friend Hadji Adam, the light of excitement in his eye strong enough to dazzle the rash beholder! Alas! that these simple joys should be dashed to the ground in disappointment and humiliation! Letters came more rarely upon the second separation, and their tone was more curt and less confiding. There was even a strain of self-reproach in them which Andromache was too unsuspecting to construe. But these signs of storm passed unnoticed by Miltiades. The letter fever, we know, soon declines with young men absent from their lady-loves, and as the months passed the fever gradually abated, and Rudolph, the faithless, lapsed into silence.
Still the trousseau progressed, and still the marriage preparations went forward. One day Miltiades in his barracks was informed that Rudolph had returned to Athens;—he dropped his knife and fork in astonishment. How came it that he was not aware of this? and how came it that Rudolph had not yet made his appearance in the little salon, where the Turkish bomb that had exploded at the feet of Miltiades was proudly displayed? Miltiades sat at home all the day, and waited for Ehrenstein. He was wise enough not to mention this fact to Andromache or to his mother. Perhaps there would be a very simple explanation forthcoming, and why inflict needless pain upon the women? Days went by, however, and still no Ehrenstein. By the soul of Hercules, how can a fellow be expected to stand this kind of treatment? The slaughterer of five thousand Turks sit calmly by, while his sister is being jilted in the most outrageous manner! Certainly not.
Miltiades strode the streets of Athens with a more warlike aspect than ever. The very frown of his brows was a challenge, and the glance of his eyes was a dagger: the crimson plumes of his service cap nodded valorously, his sword and spurs clanked. He twirled his moustache until all the little boys and foot passengers made way for him apprehensively. Still no Ehrenstein appeared. Then came the climax. It was an awful moment when the news exploded,—more fatal far than the Turkish bomb on the table,—that Rudolph had disappeared with Photini Natzelhuber. We will draw the veil of discretion upon the picture of a modern Theseus lashed into impotent fury, and striding through the prostrate forms of his womenfolk in hysterics.
With a Jove-like front Miltiades faced the Austrian Embassy, and held stern council with the Baron von Hohenfels. Of course there was nothing to be done. It was clearly impossible to offer money to a warrior and a hero. Such a thing as breaches of promise are here unknown, and it was equally impossible to collar Rudolph and bring him back to his deserted bride. The baron was conciliatory and courteous, as was his wont; expressed the flattering opinion that Mademoiselle Andromache was far too good for a reprobate like his nephew; hoped Miltiades would allow the baroness the honour of calling upon his mother, Kyria Karapolos, and her family; and placed himself, his house, and everything belonging to him at the disposal of the affronted captain. The interview terminated amicably—how could it be otherwise with the most diplomatic of ambassadors?—Miltiades returned to the bosom of his family, and held a parliament to debate upon proceedings.
Andromache bore her sorrow better than might have been imagined. She necessarily did a little in the way of hysterics, but soon settled down in dreary acquiescence, and spent her days embroidering and practising the piano. The practice of scales may be recommended to jilted young ladies. It soothes the nerves, dulls the imagination, and produces a useful kind of indifference. Young men in similar circumstances prefer, I believe, wine, or cards, or politics,—or worse.
This was the hour in which Maria shone. Very faithfully and lovingly did she tend her young forsaken mistress, hovered over her yearningly, invented delicacies by means of rice, jam, macaroni and tapioca, to tempt the appetite of the most hardened sufferer, sat by her for hours, silently stroking her hair and fondling her hands, and unveiled exquisite depths of tenderness and consideration. Greek servants and Irish servants are the kindest, most affectionate and most absolutely disinterested in the world.
But there was a curious hardness about Andromache’s young mouth: a permanent glitter in her dark blue eyes, that bespoke a cherished design. Of that design she spoke to nobody, but went through the day pretty much as usual, and was grateful to those who remained silent upon her shame. The Baroness von Hohenfels called, was most pathetic, effusive, and strewed her path with good-will. She called again, this time with Agiropoulos, who stared at Andromache through his eyeglass, wore an expensive orchid in his coat, and conducted himself with his usual fascinating audacity.
“Faith!” he said to the baroness. “I should not object to console the little Karapolos myself.”
“That is an idea,” said the Baroness. “I’ll marry you, and then I shall have Rudolph’s perfidy off my mind.”
“Well, now that Photini has deserted me for your charming nephew, it will be teaching Rudolph a nice lesson in military tactics,—to besiege his deserted town, and carry it by storm,—eh, madame?”
The Baroness was quite serious in her design. A little Athenian might be an impossible match for a young Austrian aristocrat, with the blood of the Crusaders, the Hapsburgs, and heaven knows of what other deeply azure sources, running through his veins;—but a common Greek merchant from Trieste, now, an amiable enough person in florid attire, but not of her world, though gracefully patronised by her! It would be a very proper match, and one which she was resolved to further. The girl was pretty—extremely pretty and young. She wanted polish, and a few months of Agiropoulos’ irresistible society would be sure to accomplish much in that way.
“Decidedly, M. Agiropoulos, I am determined to marry you. You must range yourself. You are now, I suppose, just thirty?”
“Oh, madame, grace I beseech you! Twenty-six. But you see the disastrous results of follies and the harassing cares your cruel sex imposes on sensitive young men,” said Agiropoulos, with his fatuous smile.
“Then it is of greater necessity that you should settle down at once, and devote yourself to the whims of a wife.”
“I am only eager for the day. I have been well disposed towards Mademoiselle Veritassi, but she, capricious angel, will not have me.”
The baroness felt inclined to box the fellow’s ear, but only smiled.
A few days later this airy individual left a basket of flowers for the desposyné Andromache Karapolos.