Tante

by Anne Douglas Sedgwick

Madame von Marwitz leaned back her head to draw her hand across her eyes, clearing them of tears.

"But do I not know it, Franz?" she said, smiling a trembling smile at him. "Do I not know it? I have been in fault; yes; and I will make confession to you. But—oh!—my child has punished me too cruelly. To leave me without a word! At night! It was the terror of her husband that drove her to it, Franz. Yes; it has been a delirium of terror. She was ill when she went from me."

She had released him now, though keeping his hands in hers, and she still held them as they sat down at the centre table in the little room, he on one side, she on the other, she leaning to him across it; and she read in his face his deep discomfort.

"But you see, gnädige Frau," Franz again took up his theme; "she believes that you wish to send her back to him; she has said it; she could not trust you. And so she fled from you. And I have promised to take care of her. I am to take her to my mother in Germany as soon as she can travel. We were on our way to Southampton and would have been, days since, with the Mütterchen, if in the train Karen had not become so ill—so very ill. It was a fever that grew on her, and delirium. I did not know what was best to do. And I remembered this little inn where the Mütterchen and we four stayed some years ago, when we came first to England. The landlady was very good; and so I thought of her and brought Karen here. But when she is better I must take her to Germany, gnädige Frau. I have promised it."

While Franz thus spoke a new steadiness had come to Madame von Marwitz's eyes. They dilated singularly, and with them her nostrils, as though she drew a deep new breath of realisation. It was as if Franz had let down a barrier; pointed out a way. There was no confession to be made to Franz. Karen had spared her.

She looked at him, looked and looked, and she shook her head with infinite gentleness. "But Franz," she said, "I do not wish her to go back to her husband. I was in fault, yes, grave fault, to urge it upon her; but Karen's terror was her mistake, her delirium. It was for my sake that she had left him, Franz, because to me he had shown insolence and insult;—for your sake, too, Franz, for he tried to part her from all her friends and of you he spoke with an unworthy jealousy. But though my heart bled that Karen should be tied to such a man, I knew him to be not a bad man; hard, narrow, but in his narrowness upright, and fond, I truly believed it, of his wife. And I could not let her break her marriage—do you not see, Franz,—if it were for my sake. I could not see her young life ruined in its dawn. I wished to write to my good friend Mrs. Forrester—who is also Karen's friend, and his, and I offered myself as intermediary, as intercessor from him to Karen, if need be. Was it so black, my fault? For it was this that Karen resented so cruelly, Franz. Our Karen can be harsh and quick, you know that, Franz. But no! Can she—can you, believe for one moment that I would now have her return to him, if, indeed, it were any longer possible? No, Franz; no; no; no; Karen shall never see that man again. Only over my dead body should he pass to her. I swear it, not only to you, but to myself. And Franz, dear Franz, what I think of now is you, and your love and loyalty to my Karen. You have saved her; you have saved me; it is life you bring—a new life, Franz," and smiling upon him, her cheeks still wet with tears, she softly sang Tristan's phrase to Kurvenal: "Holder! Treuer!—wie soll dir Tristan danken!"

Her joy, her ecstasy of gratitude, shone upon him. She was the tutelary goddess of his family. Trust, for himself and for his loved Karen, went out to her and took refuge beneath the great wings she spread. And as she held his hands and smiled upon him he told her in his earnest, honest German, all that had happened to him and Karen; of his walking-tour; and of the meeting on the Falmouth headland at dawn; and of their journey here. "And one thing, gnädige Frau," he said, "that troubled me, but that will now be well, since you are come to us, is that I have told them here that Karen is my wife. See you, gnädige Frau, the good landlady knows us all and knows that Lotta, Minna and Elizabeth are the only daughters that the Mütterchen has—besides the little ones. I remembered that the Mütterchen had told her this; she talked much with her; it was but three years ago, gnädige Frau; it was not time enough for a very little one to grow up; so I could not say that Karen was my sister; and I have to be much with her; I sit beside her all through the night—for she is afraid to be alone, the armes Kind; and the good landlady and the maid must sleep. So it seemed to me that it was right to tell them that Karen was my wife. You think so, too, nicht wahr, gnädige Frau?"

Madame von Marwitz had listened, her deeply smiling eyes following, understanding all; and as the last phase of the story came they deepened to only a greater sweetness. They showed no surprise. A content almost blissful shone on Franz Lippheim.

"It is well, Franz," she said. "Yes, you have done rightly. All is well; more well than you yet perhaps see. Karen is safe, and Karen shall be free. What has happened is God-sent. The situation is in our hands."

For a further moment, silent and weighty, she gazed at him and then she added: "There need be no fear for you and Karen. I will face all pain and difficulty for you both. You are to marry Karen, Franz."