“You don’t mean to say that you must remain at home?” asked Hamilton, turning round quickly.
“Oh, no, I am to go with the Hoffmanns.”
“How did you happen to make that arrangement?”
Hildegarde came towards him to explain, stood for a moment behind his chair, then seated herself at the table near him, and while performing her office of waiter, entered into an unusually unrestrained conversation. They talked long and gayly, Hamilton at length beginning to think he would prefer staying at home with her to going to the fête, and was actually as much annoyed as she was surprised, when the Hoffmanns’ servant announced the carriage, and said they were waiting for her.
The day was clear and warm, the sky cloudless, and of that deep blue almost unknown in England. The sun shone brightly on the groups of merry pedestrians, who still continued to pour out of the town and its environs, towards the Thérèsian meadows. Notwithstanding the warm sunbeams, each peasant carried under his arm an enormous red or yellow umbrella. Many were furnished with cloaks, and some were dressed in the mountain costume, with which Hamilton had become acquainted at Berchtesgaden; but, in strong contrast to their picturesque appearance, there were others from the plains, with their long coats almost reaching to their heels—two large buttons between their shoulders, as if to mark the waist, and broad-brimmed, low-crowned hats. The cloth of which these most ugly garments were made was good, and in many cases fine. The hats, too, were shining, and decorated with thick gold tassels, and even the most careless observer could not fail to remark the absence of any appearance of poverty.
Hamilton rode as fast as the crowd would permit, wishing, considerately, that all nurses and children had remained at home, and wondering what business they could have at an agricultural fête and races. Then he thought of Hildegarde—Hildegarde as he had last seen her, gay and unrestrained, laughingly giving her opinion of the Hoffmanns, and relating with what self-possession Mademoiselle de Hoffmann had spoken of her intended marriage; and then she had taken the half of his bunch of grapes with a sort of unconscious familiarity flattering from its rarity. He had for some time been aware of a change in her manner, and he now began to hope that a feeling of good-will towards himself had been the cause; in this, he was, however, partly mistaken—the reconciliation or explanation with her step-mother had mostly effected the change. She felt that she had been unjustly prejudiced against both, and, ever ready to act from impulse, she now went from one extreme to the other, and at once gave Madame Rosenberg credit for virtues which she scarcely possessed—blamed herself unnecessarily, and received any remains of severity on the part of her step-mother, as a deserved punishment for her former unwarrantable dislike. Madame Rosenberg had not been insensible to the alteration which had taken place—she had more than once observed to her husband, “That Hildegarde was really a warm-hearted girl, and not nearly so often in a passion as she used to be. There was nothing like a mother’s care to form a girl’s character; she now understood how to manage her, and expected in time to like her quite as well as Crescenz.”
Hamilton, on reaching the Thérèsian meadow, looked round for the object of his thoughts—in a crowd of eight or ten thousand persons, the search was not immediately successful. The royal family had long been on the tribune, and the King was distributing the last prizes as Hamilton arrived. A movement in the crowd soon after commenced, which denoted preparations for the races; Hamilton rode towards the place where the jockeys were assembled, but when there, his horse became suddenly restive—he shied, reared, pranced, leaped forwards and sideways, and Hamilton, had he not been a practised rider, would have found it no easy matter to keep his seat. At length the animal seemed to become aware of the power of his rider, for his capers ceased by degrees, and he merely bent his head and tore up the ground with his fore-foot. Hamilton was about to return to the interrupted inspection of the jockeys and their horses, when a voice close to him observed, “You seemed alarmed for the safety of your English friend, mademoiselle—ask him if he will not give his horse to our servant, and look at the races from the carriage.”
Hamilton turned quickly round, and found that these words had been addressed by Madame de Hoffmann to Hildegarde; he rode close up to the latter, and said in a low voice, “I have been looking for you in vain the last half-hour, and just as I had given up the search, I find myself beside you—pray, present me to your friends; you have made me really wish to be acquainted with them.”
Hildegarde complied with his request, while an officer, who was sitting opposite to her, and who was instantly recognised by Hamilton as the admirer of the candlesticks and coffee-pots in the brazier’s shop, waited for a moment and then said, “I hope you mean to include me; if you do not choose to allow me to come under the denomination of friend, you cannot refuse to admit my right to that of relation, and very near relation, too.”
Hamilton looked astonished, and Hildegarde coloured slightly as she laughingly added, “My cousin, Count Raimund.”