CHAPTER IX.
It was close upon midnight when Irene's uncle returned, in his open wagon, from a trip to the Ammersee. The old lion-hunter was in glorious spirits; he had made several bull's-eyes at the shooting-match; had made love to the ladies; and had found a willing ear for his most fabulous African hunting-tales even among the men. Even his famous story of how he had aimed a double-barreled English rifle at a lioness, and had fired two shots so rapidly one after the other, that the ball from the right barrel shot out the animal's right eye, and that from the other the left--even this narrative, about whose truthfulness some doubts had occasionally been expressed, was apparently swallowed in all faith. The champagne had done all the rest; so that the happy man started out of the sweetest dreams when his carriage drew up before the wicket-gate of the Starnberg villa.
He was surprised to see that the balcony-room was still lighted up. It was not in the least like Irene to allow an affectionate anxiety for her night-owl of an uncle to keep her awake, and all signs of light were extinguished in the neighboring houses. Then it occurred to him that perhaps Schnetz had decided to stay out overnight, and to sit up until his return. He was glad of this, for it would afford him an opportunity to give an account of his triumphs to a connoisseur in such matters; and he was therefore disagreeably disappointed when, upon his entering the little salon up-stairs where the light was burning, his young niece alone advanced to meet him.
Her face looked so strangely agitated, her manner was so excited, that his champagne spirits departed on the instant, and he asked, in great alarm, what had happened, and what had become of friend Schnetz? and why Irene, who was evidently unwell, had not gone to bed?
Speaking rapidly and with difficulty, she gave him an account of what had passed. Not until she had finished the story did the name of him who had played the chief rôle in this bloody catastrophe pass her lips.
But the effect produced by her account was very different from what she had expected.
Instead of expressing horror and sympathy the lively gentleman ran around the room uttering a cry of joy, rubbing his hands and behaving himself generally in such a delighted way, that Irene regarded him with amazement, and finally asked him whether he had been listening to her, or whether his thoughts were still with the merry hunting-party he had just quitted.
"No, no! my dearest child," he cried, suddenly halting before her. "You suspect me wrongly. Unfortunately I am accustomed to being misunderstood by you, and to being accused of a frivolity which sometimes overtakes me even in those moments when my proud little niece assumes her most tragic tone. But, believe me, Irene dear, I see no reason in this whole catastrophe that you have told me of to change my way of thinking. That our Felix has lost a few drops of blood will not do the scapegrace any particular harm, perhaps, and will take the wildness out of him a little. At the worst, there will be no immediate bad consequence--for that I can trust my good old Schnetz; and Providence will not be so foolish as to send such a fine young fellow over the bourn by such a miserable knife-scratch as this. And if we escape with a simple fright, the whole situation will be left in the best condition imaginable to repair some foolish errors that we have made. Come, my child! Look me in the face, and confess that in secret you are of my opinion."
She looked him directly in the eyes, but with a sad expression.
"We misunderstand one another again, uncle."
"Say, rather, you don't think it becoming to wish to understand my honest and candid opinion. But, since you are ten times brighter and more diplomatic than an old hunter and soldier like myself--"
"I entreat you, uncle--"
"You can't fail to understand, without any further explanations on my part, that it amuses me enormously to see our youngster Felix, whom I imagined to be wandering about God knows where, a sighing and rejected suitor, suddenly turn up next door to us. Do you mean to tell me that chance has arranged all this so skillfully? Pooh, pooh!--you can't cheat me. I tell you he has been traveling after us, and has secretly followed his old flame, whom he still worships, into the primeval forests of Starnberg and across the tempestuous lake of Würm; and, since there was no other way of making up to you again with any self-respect, he has adopted the very wisest course, and one that never fails in its effect upon you soft-hearted souls, namely, that of creeping into your sympathy by means of a few ounces of spilt blood, of which article, by-the-way, he still possesses a very fair abundance. And now--"
"Unless you want me to leave the room, uncle, spare me these perfectly groundless insinuations. Have I not told you that he had no suspicion of our plan to make a stay in Munich, and that Schnetz told me how he entered a studio with his old friend Jansen, with the intention of becoming a sculptor? But even if it were all just as you have arranged it in your own mind--what difference would it make in my resolution? Hasn't this unfortunate meeting proved the truth of all that I said to myself when I gave him back his promise?--has it not confirmed my belief that we could never be happy together? And yet, you imagine I would think differently of him because he now lies dangerously ill, and perhaps dying, of wounds which were undoubtedly given him by his rival, that peasant fellow--in a fight--about a tavern-waiter--"
Her voice failed her; she turned away to repress her tears; but her passionate pain overcame her, and, bursting into uncontrollable sobbing, she sank back on a chair near the open door leading on to the balcony.
Even the jovial mood of her good-hearted foster-father was not proof against this passionate outburst of long-suppressed feeling. He had always regarded the girl's self-possessed bearing with amazement, and had secretly attributed to her a certain coldness of heart, for she had never given him an insight into the struggles and storms of her young life. And now she sat before him like a child that has given way to its grief, deaf, apparently, to all comforting words and caresses.
"You will bring things to such a pass," he cried, in ludicrous desperation, "that I shall be forced to take up my old trade, and go out lion-hunting again in my old age. Upon my word it's less wearing work than having anything to do with a pair of estranged lovers, who will neither come together nor yet separate entirely. The thing worked passably as long as you were able to face it out. After all, although I always looked upon it as a piece of foolishness for you to give such a lover his dismissal, just because he didn't want to kiss the slipper before his marriage: still, I supposed you must know what you were about, and it was impossible for me to supply a mother's place toward you, and explain how we men ought to be managed. At all events, things ran smoothly, and we went on living peacefully together. But now, when the ice suddenly breaks and you lose all control over yourself--tell me, what in the world am I to do? My experience with wild animals has made me something of a savage; but I instantly become the most cowardly and chicken-hearted of domestic animals if a woman--and particularly one I care so much for--begins to cry in my presence."
She suddenly drew herself up, shook back her curls and passed her hand across her eyes.
"You shall not have to complain of it again, uncle," she said, in a determined tone; "most assuredly, never again. You are right; it is foolish to cry about something that was all over long ago. You will never, never see me do it again."
"My brave girl!" he said, embracing her and kissing her wet cheek, a liberty he very seldom ventured to take. "I am glad you still care a little for your old uncle. But now, go to bed, for it has grown so late--"
"To bed!--in this terrible state of anxiety? What are you thinking of, uncle? Will it be possible for you to sleep?"
"Why not, you little goose? Ay, the sleep of the righteous, for I have done my duty to-day, and have shown how our race can shoot--"
"And you can deep before you know how he is?--and what the doctor has said? I should have sent over to inquire before this, but the people of the house are all asleep, and my maid Louisa is a stranger here and would not be able to find the place."
"And you think I myself--well, I must confess!--at one o'clock at night, tired to death by all my laurels--"
"Uncle, unless you want to see me die of anxiety--"
She threw herself into his arms, and clung to him in such helpless entreaty that he could not resist. Sighing, and bitterly cursing in his heart the feminine caprice which could first cast off a fine young fellow and then make her life hang on his, he left the house once more.
She called down to him from the balcony, gave him the directions for finding the nearest way to the physician's house, and then stood there motionless, in the cool night air, waiting for his return.
He came back in a quarter of an hour, but brought no comforting intelligence. The physician had not yet returned from Rossel's villa, and would, in all probability, spend the night there. He had made the physician's wife, whom he had routed up out of her sleep, promise faithfully to send news the first thing in the morning.
So there was no help for it, the night had to be passed in the most agonizing state of uncertainty.
But before the sun had long been shining across the lake, the physician came in proper person; led, not only by the message that had been left for him the night before, but also by a note that Schnetz had commissioned him to deliver to his old comrade and brother-in-arms. In this missive, in his own odd style, he supplemented the physician's bulletin by all sorts of details. The wound in the hand, he said, in conclusion, was, it was to be hoped, of no great account; a sinew had been grazed, but not cut through, so that the determination of this noble youth to augment the number of breadless stone-hewers would, in all probability, not be defeated by the brutal intervention of a Bavarian fist. The physician, on the other hand, reported that the wound in the left shoulder was not altogether without danger, as the stab had reached the extremity of one of the lungs, and a long rest and course of nursing would be necessary before the arm could be used again. For the rest, the patient would receive the best of care in Herr Rossel's villa; his blood and circulation were in a thoroughly healthy condition, and serious danger was quite out of the question.
The doctor, who had never before seen the baron and the beautiful, silent Fräulein, and who found nothing strange in her sympathy, as she had formed one of the party on the day before, soon took his leave, with a promise to keep them regularly informed about the case. Scarcely had he gone, when Irene declared she would not go away from the place until all danger was over; but that then she would not breathe the air on this side of the Alps a moment longer--it weighed upon her spirits.
Her uncle had to give her his word of honor that he would consent to this arrangement, and also that he would not let Schnetz observe how deeply they were both interested in the wounded man, but would explain their sympathy as arising from pure philanthrophy. And it really was nothing more than that, she said.
Even though every inner bond was severed between them, still, she would never be able to answer for it to her conscience if she should start off before the question whether he might not possibly need her had been definitely set at rest.