Nordeck was silent. The same apprehension had forced itself on his mind in that hour of parting. Count Morynski might rally from the effects of his wounds and long confinement, but the defeat of that cause, to which he had dedicated his life, was a blow but too likely to prove mortal. When, years before, he had gone out into banishment, he could oppose to his fate the mental and physical strength of a man in his prime; but now that strength was sapped and failing--who could tell how long the last remnants of it might hold good!
"Your father will not be alone," returned Waldemar, at last. "My mother is going to him, and I only now begin to see all that we owe her for this resolution of hers. It takes a heavy care from both of us. You know her love for her only brother; she will be the staff and support he needs."
Wanda's gaze was still riveted on the ship, now a mere speck in the far-off distance.
"And you are to lose the mother you have so lately found?" said she, in a low voice.
His brow clouded over at the remembrance.
"You do not think that is a light matter to me? No; yet I fear she is right. Our natures are too similar for one willingly to bend to the other, and were we to live together, concessions must be made. Were I of her people, or she of mine, there would be need of none; she would take pride then in all that I undertook. My success would be hers--I should be carrying out her wishes as well as my own--as it is, I should find her will constantly opposed to mine. To clear a path for new institutions at Wilicza, I must begin by breaking down those she has set up. We can stretch out our hands to each other across the gap, and feel at last that we are mother and son; we cannot walk on side by side through life. She has seen this more clearly than I, and has chosen what is best for us. The decision, to which she has come, will alone insure our lasting reconciliation."
The young Countess raised her dark tearful eyes to his face. "Have you forgotten my father's warning? The unhappy national feud, that cause of dissension which has hitherto torn our family into two, exists between us also. It made your parents miserable."
"Because they had no love for each other," replied Waldemar, "because cold calculation on either side had bound them together by the closest tie which can connect two human beings. How could peace come of such a union? The old strife was sure to blaze out anew, more hotly than ever. But we can bring other forces into the field. I have won my bride in the teeth of this national hostility, and I shall be able to defend my happiness from its influence. If our marriage is really a venture, it is a venture we may fearlessly make."
The light morning clouds sailing over the heavens became more and more lucent, and the East flushed radiant with the dawn. A rosy glow spread over the whole horizon, and the waves shone as though edged with liquid gold. Then came one bright sudden flash, the first herald of the rising sun, and immediately following it, the great luminous planet rose from the waves, mounting slowly higher and higher, until it orbed itself above them, appearing in clear and perfect majesty. Rose-tinted rays quivered in the chill, pure morning air, and the surface of the water, a minute ago so dark and drear, gained a deep, wonderful blue. With the sunrise light and life streamed forth over earth and sea.
The first beams fell on the Beech Holm, dispersing the remnants of white mist which still hovered between the trees; they sank on to the dew-covered grass, they fluttered off into the forest, until nothing was left of them but a light vaporous gauze, thin as air. The wind rustled among the crests of the mighty beeches, which gently bent before it, murmuring softly to each other. On this occasion they whispered no gloomy complaint of decay and death as on that memorable day by the forest lake--memorable, for was it not there, mid the autumnal woods, in the falling twilight, out of the bosom of the shadowy mists, that the dream vision had arisen, faint picture of that scene which now appeared in glowing reality, the sea-washed Beech Holm of poetic story, lying bathed in the golden sunlight?