"If my aunt at one time made me the unconscious instrument of her plans, you should accuse her, and not me," she replied, in a low tone; and, as she uttered them, some invisible power seemed to rob her words of their sting. "I suspected nothing of it. I was a child following the impulses of my caprices, but now"--she raised her head proudly--"now I am accountable to no one for what I do and leave undone, and the words I spoke just now were spoken on my own responsibility alone. You are right, they were not intended for Waldemar Nordeck; since he and I met, he has never given me cause to seek or even to wish for a reconciliation. My object was to force the master of Wilicza into raising for once his closed vizier. There is no need for that now. This interview of ours has taught me what I suspected before, that we have in you a bitter, a merciless adversary, who will use his power at the decisive moment, even though in so doing he must trample all family, all natural ties under foot."
"To whom should these ties bind me, pray?" asked Waldemar. "To my mother, perhaps, you think? My mother and I know very well how matters stand between us. She is less disposed than ever to forgive me for inheriting the Nordeck wealth, instead of her younger son. Or perhaps to Leo? Well, it may be that some brotherly love exists between us; but I do not think it would hold good if our ways should chance to cross, at all events not on his part."
"Leo would willingly have met you as a brother, if you had not made it too hard for him," interrupted Wanda. "You were always reserved and distant even with him; but there were times formerly when he could draw nearer you, when the fact that you were brothers could be discerned. But now it would be asking too much of his pride to endeavour to break through the icy barrier you oppose to him and to all those about you. It would be quite in vain for your mother and brother to come to you with demonstrations of affection; they would be met by a hard indifference which cares neither for them nor for any one in this world."
She stopped, for Waldemar was standing close to her side, and his eyes were riveted on her.
"You judge very correctly, very unsparingly," he said, slowly. "Have you never asked yourself what has made me hard and austere? There was a time when I was not so, at least not to you--when a word, a look could guide me, when I lent myself patiently to every whim. You might have done much with me then, Wanda--almost anything. That you were not willing, that my handsome, chivalrous brother even in those days carried off the palm was, after all, but natural. What could I have been to you? But you must understand that the events of those days formed a crisis in my life, and a man, who--like myself, for instance--has no turn for constant melancholy, naturally grows hard and suspicious after such an experience. Now, indeed, I look upon it as a piece of good fortune that my boyish romance was nipped in the bud--else my mother would infallibly have conceived the idea of repeating in our persons the drama which was performed here twenty years ago, when a Nordeck brought home a Morynska as his bride. You, a girl of sixteen, would possibly have submitted to the expressed will of your family, and I--should have shared my father's fate. From that we have both been preserved, and now the whole thing is over and buried in the past. I only wished to recall to your mind that you have no right to reproach me if I seem hard to you and yours.--Will you let me go with you now to the forester's house?"
Wanda followed him in silence. Angry and ready for the fray as she had been at first, the turn finally taken by the conversation had struck the weapons from her hand. To-day again they parted as foes, but they both felt that henceforth the nature of the struggle between them was changed--possibly the struggle itself would not on that account be a less arduous one.
Shrouded in its own misty breath, the meadow lay more and more closely hedged around by the dusky evening shadows. Over the lake the white cloud still hovered, but now it was only a formless, ever-shifting mass of vapour. The dream-picture which had risen from it, had vanished once more--whether it were forgotten could only be known to the two who walked on together silently side by side. Here in the dreary autumnal forests, in the eerie twilight hour, the old sea-legend from out of the far north had been wafted over to them, whispering anew the prophecy, "He who has once looked on Vineta will know no rest all his life for a longing to see the fair city again, even though he himself should be drawn down by it into the depths."
CHAPTER V.
The two rooms in the Castle occupied by Dr. Fabian looked out on to the park, and were in some measure shut off from the rest of the house. There was a special reason for this. When the Princess caused the hitherto unused apartments of her first husband to be put in readiness for that husband's son, some thought was naturally given to the ex-tutor who was to accompany him, and a room was prepared in consequence. It was rather small and very noisy, for it lay next to the main staircase; but, according to the lady's notion, it was just suited to the Doctor. She knew that at Altenhof very little fuss had been made about him, especially by his former pupil. There must have been a considerable change in this respect, however, for on his arrival Waldemar had declared the accommodation to be quite inadequate, had caused the visitors' rooms on the other side of the house to be opened, and had sequestrated two of them to his friend's use. Now these rooms had been specially fitted up for Count Morynski and his daughter, who often spent whole weeks at Wilicza. Of this fact the young owner of the place could not possibly be aware; but when Pawlick, who now filled the office of major-domo at the Castle, opened his mouth to reply, Waldemar stopped him with a brief inquiry as to whether the apartments in question formed part of the Princess's suite, or of Prince Leo's. On receiving an answer in the negative, he declared very decidedly, "Then Dr. Fabian will occupy them at once." That same day the corridor which ran close by, where the servants were constantly passing up and down, was closed, and the order given that in future they were to go round by the other staircase, in order not to disturb the Doctor by running to and fro--and so the matter was settled.
The Princess said no word when informed of these occurrences. She had laid it down as a rule never to contradict her son in trifles. Other rooms were immediately prepared for her brother and niece. Still it was natural that she should look upon poor Fabian, the innocent cause of this mishap, with no very friendly eyes. She never made this apparent, it is true, for both she herself and the whole Castle soon came to know that Waldemar was exceedingly sensitive on the subject of his old tutor, and that, though he claimed little attention for himself, any failure of respect towards the Doctor would be most sharply reproved by him. This was almost the only point on which he asserted his right to command; but on this head he spoke so emphatically that every one, from the Princess down to the domestics, treated Dr. Fabian with the utmost consideration.