Maybe both she and Boltay thought what a pretty pair the two young people would make. Alexander (to give the young journeyman his name for the first time) was a tall, muscular, well-built fellow, with blonde curly locks, ardent blue eyes, and a bold, manly face. There was nothing slovenly or commonplace in his bearing, nor, on the other hand, did he affect gentility; but there was that quiet self-confidence about him which belongs to the man whose mind and body are equally developed. The girl was a slender, ideal creature, with languishing black eyes and a rosy, chubby face so full of colour that even round her eyes one could not detect a spot of pallor—just such a beauty, in fact, as the world is apt to make much of. They contrasted prettily enough—blonde and
brunette, blue eyes and black; he so bold, vigorous, and sedate, she so overflowing with tenderness and feeling; yet who can tell what is written concerning them in the stars?
Amongst Teresa's acquaintances was a dapper little man who was generally known, not by his real name, but by his official title—the precentor. One evening the worthy precentor happened to hear light-hearted Fanny sing the snatch of some song or other, and, surprised, connoisseur as he was, by the music of her pretty voice, suggested that he should teach her an air from the "Stabat Mater," that she might sing it in the choir at church.
Teresa trembled at the thought. Matilda at once occurred to her mind; yet, after all, it is one thing to sing frivolous love ditties on an open stage in fancy costume, face to face with a lot of lazy young loungers, and quite another to sing in the Church of God, behind a closed screen, sublime and edifying hymns for the benefit of devout worshippers, although, of course, the Evil One, who is always seeking his prey, may find his victim in the Church of God itself. Teresa, therefore, felt bound to allow Fanny to go to the precentor, who instructed her with great enthusiasm, and was never weary of praising her. The girl, indeed, rarely went there alone. Either Teresa herself, or a worthy crony of Teresa's, Dame Kramm by name, regularly accompanied Fanny to the precentor's dwelling, and in an hour's time returned to fetch her away again. That the rumour of Fanny's beauty and virtue should not have spread through the town was too much to expect. There are always a number of unoccupied young gentlemen about, whose sole mission in life seems to be to make such discoveries, and the number of these pleasure-hunters was considerably increased on the occasion of the
assembling of the Diet at Pressburg, when many of our younger conscript fathers spread the report of newly found female virtue as far as possible. Who did not know of the Meyer girls in those days?—and those who did, could not help knowing likewise that there was a fifth sister. Now, where was this last little sister hiding? Why, it was the most natural question in the world.
The girls themselves made no mystery of the matter. They explained with whom Fanny was, and where and when she might be seen. Ah! and this was much more than mere giddiness; it was shamelessness, jealousy, hatred! Matilda could not forgive Fanny for avoiding her in the street, and the others could not pardon her for possessing a treasure which they possessed no longer—innocence! What a dish for the fine palate of a connoisseur! What a rare fruit of paradise! A child of fifteen or sixteen, whose diamond soul has been cleansed from mud and filth, who is still conscious of God, and capable of pure delights, whose tender loving heart, perhaps, is in the safekeeping of some honest, romantic youth—what a fine thing to root her up unmercifully, to tear off her budding leaves one by one, hurl her back again into the mire from which she has been plucked, and make her acquainted with that new, that withering, consuming fire of infernal passion begotten among the souls of the nether world!
So the chase was let loose after the tender roe that had emerged from the garden of paradise. Swarms of those knight-errants who have nothing else to do waylaid and accosted her in the streets and byways, and offered her their flattery, their homage, their gifts, but above the head of the fairy roe rested a star, which suffered not the darts of the huntsmen to hit their mark. That star was the star of purity.
The discomfited youths, more and more angry
every day, used to meet at the Meyers' and deride one another at the failure of their endeavours. Very often, too, heavy bets on the issue of the event were offered and taken, just as if it were a horse-race or a coursing-match. At length a well-known dandy, Fennimore by name, resolved to try the effect of an open direct attack; it was, he opined, the best way of conquering the sex. So one day, when he had ascertained that Fanny was alone at home, he sent her a splendid bouquet of hot-house flowers, in which was concealed a billet-doux of the following purport: If Fanny were inclined to reward the devotion of a loving heart, she was to leave the back door of the garden open in the evening. There are cases, he argued, in which similar proposals lead most rapidly to the end desired.
The inexperienced girl, in the innocence of her astonishment, accepted the proffered bouquet. This was adroitly calculated upon by the sender. Any other missive might have aroused her suspicion and made her more cautious, but flowers harmonize so well with a young girl's disposition that how could she refuse them?