"No. But I"--suddenly he opened his dark eyes wide and looked at her firmly--"I should like to know something about my mother. Now you can speak--I'm listening."
"Of your--your"--she stammered, it came so unexpectedly. Alas, the sun, the Venn sun. She would have preferred to have been silent now; now she had not the courage she had had before.
But he urged her. "Tell me." There was something imperious in his voice. "What is her name?--Where does she live?--Is she still alive?"
Käte looked around with terrified eyes. "Is she still alive?"--she could not even answer that. Oh yes, yes, surely--of course--she was still alive.
And she told him all. Told him how they had got him away from the Venn, had fled with him as though he had been stolen.
As she told him it she turned pale and then red and then pale again--oh, what a passion he would fly into. How he would excite himself. And how angry he would be with her. For they had never troubled about his mother since they left the Venn, never again. She could not tell him any more.
He did not ask any other questions. But he did not fly into a passion as she had feared; she need not have defended her action when he remained silent for some time, positively make excuses for it. He gave her a friendly glance and only said: "You meant well, I feel sure of that."
As they went down the steps leading from the park to the town he offered her his arm. He led her, to all appearances, but still she had the feeling as if he were the one who needed a support--he tottered.
The cemetery at Sestri lies behind the marchese's garden. The white marble monuments gleamed through the grey of evening; the white wings of an enormous angel rose just above the wall that encircles the park. Käte looked back: did not something like a presentiment seem to be wafted to them from there--or was it a hope? She did not know whether Wolfgang felt as she did or whether he felt anything, but she pressed his arm more closely and he pressed hers slightly in return.
She heard him walking restlessly up and down his room during the night that followed the evening they had spent in the garden of Villa Piuma. She had really made up her mind to leave him alone--she had looked after him much too much formerly--but then she thought he was still a patient, and that the agitation he must have felt on hearing her story might be injurious to him. She wanted to go to him, but found his door locked. He only opened it after she had repeatedly knocked and implored him to let her come in.