"I'm boring you," she said smilingly; "I'd better call for reinforcements."
And with a clear voice she called to her husband, who was in his room upstairs.
The window was thrown open and the Baron appeared, a friendly smile on his open countenance. A few minutes later he joined us in the garden. He was wearing the handsome uniform of the Guards and looked very distinguished. With his dark-blue tunic, embroidered in yellow and silver, his tall, well-knit figure, he formed an exquisite contrast to the slender woman in white who stood at his side. They were really a strikingly handsome couple; the charms of the one served but to heighten those of the other. The sight of them was an artistic treat, a brilliant spectacle.
After dinner the Baron proposed that we should accompany his wife on the steamer as far as the last customs station. This proposal, to which I gladly agreed, seemed to give the Baroness a great deal of pleasure; she was delighted with the prospect of admiring the Stockholm Archipelago from the deck of a steamer on a beautiful summer night.
At ten o'clock on the following evening we met on board the steamer a short time before the hour of starting. It was a clear night; the sky was a blaze of brilliant orange, the sea lay before us, calm and blue.
We slowly steamed past the wooded shores, in a light which was neither day nor night, but had the qualities of both, and impressed the beholder as being sunrise and sunset at the same time.
After midnight our enthusiasm, which had been kept alive by the constantly changing panorama and the memories which it called up, cooled a little. We were fighting against an overwhelming desire to sleep. The early dawn found us with pallid faces, shivering in the morning breeze. We suddenly became sentimental; we swore eternal friendship; it was fate that had thrown us together—we dimly discerned that fatal bond which was to connect our lives in the future. I was beginning to look haggard, for I had not yet regained my strength after an attack of intermittent fever; they treated me like an ailing child; the Baroness wrapped her rug round me and made me drink some wine, all the while talking to me with a mother's tenderness. I let them have their way. I was almost delirious with want of sleep; my pent-up feelings overflowed; this womanly tenderness, the secret of which none but a motherly woman knows, was a new experience to me. I poured out on her a deluge of respectful homage; over-excited by sleeplessness, I became lightheaded, and gave the reins to my poetical imagination.
The wild hallucinations of the sleepless night took shape, vague, mystic, unsubstantial; the power of my suppressed talent revealed itself in light visions. I spoke for hours, without interruption, drawing inspiration from two pairs of eyes, which gazed at me fascinated. I felt as if my frail body was being consumed by the burning fire of my imagination. I lost all sense of my corporeal presence.
Suddenly the sun rose, the myriads of islets which seem to be swimming in the bay appeared enveloped in flames; the branches of the pines glowed like copper, the slender needles yellow as sulphur; the window-panes of the cottages, dotted along the shore, sparkled like golden mirrors; the columns of smoke rising from the chimneys indicated that breakfasts were being cooked; the fishing-boats were setting sail to bring in the outspread nets; the seagulls, scenting the small herring underneath the dark green waves, were screaming themselves hoarse. But on the steamer absolute silence reigned. The travellers were still fast asleep in their cabins, we alone were on deck. The captain, heavy with sleep, was watching us from the bridge, wondering, no doubt, what we could be talking about.
At three o'clock in the morning the pilot cutter appeared from behind a neck of land, and parting was imminent.