‘And you?’
‘I,’ replied Falkenberg, with an assumption of indifference, ‘oh, I never live in the country in winter. I detest it. Frankfort must be my Hauptquartier. My manager is loading me with reproaches for my neglect of money-matters, and I feel there is justice in his complaints. I shall be very much engaged for at least a couple of months to come. I may find time to run over to Lahnburg and see you, once or twice; but you must not expect me to be very attentive. You know,’ he concluded, smiling, and glancing at her again, ‘six weeks–or, rather, two months ago, I did not suppose I should be married to you, and I made all sorts of engagements, public as well as private–the former at least must be kept. Well, what do you say to my plan?’
‘What do I say?’ she repeated, in a voice full of emotion; ‘I say that you are too generous, Rudolf, too chivalrous. Believe me, if I had not so lately gone through what I have done, I would offer you more than words of gratitude–I would lay my very life at your feet.’
‘Don’t agitate yourself; that is forbidden,’ he replied, trying to smile with cheerful indifference. Perhaps a ray of hope had inspired him–some faint idea that she might say, ‘Are not you also coming to Mein Genügen?’ If that had been the case, he promptly repressed the feeling, and added:
‘All I ask of you is to get well, and try to be contented, in your own way. Do not think of me. Perhaps that may come in the future. Nay, do not cry, Sara. I cannot bear to see that.’
‘Do not scold me. I almost think I begin to see my way now. They say that much is granted to those who watch and pray.’
She spoke the last words half to herself.
‘That is true, in a sense, if not literally,’ he replied. ‘Well, I will see after a carriage to take you by the noon train to-morrow to Lahnburg; so tell Ellen to have everything ready. Now I must go. I will take your letters, if they are ready.’
Sara wished he would not go at that moment, but something prevented her from speaking out her wish, and he departed.
‘I must be in some wonderful dream,’ she repeated to herself, when she was alone. ‘It is too wildly impossible to be true. And yet, how well I know that he has been here. He never comes without bringing with him a purer, rarer atmosphere. He looks at things, and tells you how he sees them, and they are never quite the same afterwards. Now with Jerome–Hyperion to—’ She paused abruptly, biting her lip, and thinking, ‘After all, I never saw which was Hyperion. I have no right to sneer. Shall I ever love him? Surely, at any rate, the remembrance of that other love will wear off enough for me to be able to say to my husband, “Come, let us travel hand in hand at last!” Heaven send it, at least!’