“And so you rather incline to suppose—” She drew out the words tardily, and fixed on Herr Klann a look of ineffable softness and intelligence together.
“I do, madam,—that is my private opinion,” said he, sententiously.
“Would that account for the life he has been leading for some years back,—should we have found him passing such a long term in isolation from all the world?” asked she.
“I think so, madam, and I will tell you why. The agents employed by the regency, and in the beginning of the present reign in France, were all men of certain condition,—many of them belonged to high families, and, having ruined their fortunes by extravagance, were fain to take any occupation for mere subsistence. Some of them resided as nobles in Vienna, and were received at the court of the Empress. Others gained admittance to St. James's. They were supplied with money, both for purposes of play and bribery; and that they used such means to good account is now matter of history. When the game was played out, and they were no longer needed by the government, such men were obliged to retire from the stage whereon they had only played a part. The Duc de Senneterre went into a monastery; Count Leon de Rhode set off for the New World; and there was one taken ill in this very village, whose name I now forget, who had gone into the priesthood, and was head of a seminary in Flanders. What more likely, then, than that our friend at the bridge yonder was some great celebrity of those times, of which I hear he loves to talk and declaim?”
The hint thus thrown out made a deep impression on my mother. It served to explain not only many circumstances of Herr Robert's position, but also to account for the strange glimpses of a great and glorious future, in which at moments of excitement he would indulge. A life of intrigue and plot would naturally enough suggest ambitious hopes, and conduce to the very frame of mind which he appeared to reach. That I should become the follower of such a man, and the disciple of such a school, revolted against all her feelings. The spy, no matter how highly accredited and how richly rewarded, was, in her eyes, the most ignoble of all careers; and she would rather have seen me clad in the sheepskin of an Alpine shepherd than wearing, in this capacity, the decorations of every order of Europe.
From the moment, therefore, the suspicion crossed her mind that Herr Robert had been such, she firmly determined to withdraw me altogether from his intimacy. Nor was the step an easy one. He had become a recognized member of our little household; each evening saw him seated at our hearth or board; on every Sunday he dined with us. His little presents of wine and fruit, and occasionally of books, showed that he intended reciprocity to be a basis of our intercourse, of which, indeed, the balance lay in our favor. How, therefore, was such a state of things to be suddenly arrested? How bring to an abrupt conclusion an intimacy of which nothing had hitherto interrupted the peaceful course? This was a matter of no common difficulty, and for several days did she ponder over it to herself.
It chanced that, for the first time since her arrival at Reichenau, Herr Robert had been slightly indisposed, and being unable to come and see us, had sent for me to come each evening and read to him. At any other moment my mother would have thought no more of this, but coming now, at the very time when her feelings of doubt and suspicion were torturing her, she regarded the circumstance with actual apprehension.
At first, she thought of sending Raper along with me, in the guise of protector; but as Herr Robert had not requested his company, there seemed an awkwardness in this; then she half resolved to refuse me permission, on pretence of requiring my presence at home: this, too, would look ungracious; and when at last she did accord her leave, it was for a very limited time, and with strict injunctions to be back by an early hour.
It chanced that Herr Robert felt on this evening a more than ordinary desire to be frank and confidential. He related to me various anecdotes of his early days, the scenes he had mixed in, and the high associates with whom he was intimate; and when he had excited my curiosity and wonderment to a high degree, by gorgeous narratives of the great world, he stopped short and said: “I would not have you think, Jasper, that these dukes and princes were more gifted or more endowed than other men; the only real difference between them is, that they employ their faculties on great events, not little ones; and all their pleasures, their amusements, their very vices, react upon the condition of mankind in general, and consequently whatever goes forward in their society has a certain amount of importance, not for itself, but for what may follow it.”
These words made a profound impression upon me, leading to the conviction that out of this charmed circle life had no ambition worth striving for, no successes that deserved a struggle. From my mother I had no concealment, and before I went to my bed I told her all that the Herr Robert had said to me, and showed how deeply this sentiment had sunk into my mind.