Hermann: A Novel

by E. Werner

The Count got up suddenly.

"Pardon me, grandmother, if I beg you to let it rest for to-day. My night journey has rather tired me out, I really feel the want of some rest. Allow me, now that I have seen you, to go to my room for a time."

So saying, he kissed the hand extended to him, and left the room. The Präsidentin leaned back in her arm chair, and once more thought over all the plans and hopes connected with her grandson's future alliance, this grandson who had always been the dearest to her, and who had fulfilled all her expectations so brilliantly. But it would have astonished her somewhat, had she seen how Count Hermann, in spite of his petition to be allowed to rest, had not yet thought of going to his room, but went off at once from another side to the park, and in spite of the midday-heat, wandered about in it on all sides.

Under the shade of a great plane tree, in the centre of a large grass plot, sat Gertrud with her two little charges, telling them a fairy tale. The eldest of the two children had nestled closely against her governess, and looked up into her face with the most breathless attention, as if she feared to lose a single word; the younger knelt on the grass, her two little arms upon Gertrud's lap, listening as breathlessly as her sister. It was a charming group; surely that was not the cold, grave gouvernante, who had bowed so formally, and answered so shortly. The expression of her face was now as warm and glowing as the golden sunlight itself, which played upon her countenance through the leafy screen above her, and there was something unusually gentle and lovely in her tone and attitude, as, in low tones, with head bent down to the children, she told them of elves and fairies, something which it had never been permitted for either the Präsidentin nor the Baronin von Sternfeld to see.

But Count Hermann saw it as he stood unobserved behind a clump of bushes, and watched her closely. Yes, these features had indeed fulfilled what they had promised seven years ago.

The delicate, pale, and childish form had blossomed into almost perfect beauty, and at sight of the tall, beautiful figure, the pure classic profile and rich masses of pale gold hair, Hermann could not refrain from thinking that his aunt must have been wanting in her usual sense and tact in receiving into her house a lady before whose attractions both she and every other lady must seem plain.

But he was not allowed to remain long unobserved, for one of the children noticed him suddenly, and pointed in the direction where he stood. Gertrud rose at once, and freed herself from the children's encircling arms.

An iciness seemed to creep over her countenance, under which all the warmth and life which had streamed from it a moment before, seemed suddenly to wither; cold, grave, and perfectly immoveable, she awaited the Count's approach.

He now stood opposite, and looked straight towards her. Those were the same mysterious dark blue eyes which he remembered so well, and the same shade still lay in them, but it had become only heavier and deeper. But these eyes flashed somewhat under his searching glance; was it the old (to him incomprehensible) hatred, or was it some other feeling?

Hermann, who usually saw through all matters so clearly, did not know how to interpret it; he only felt that it was hostile to him, and that the strange girl was still the same.