Alleluia! Alleluia!
CHAPTER XL
ANGELA IS EVEN WITH IVAN
Success brings with it fame, fortune, and universal esteem. Men worship success, and with justice.
He who has saved a great treasure, who has restored to thousands of people their country, their industry; he who has overcome a universal calamity which threatened an entire province; he who has given to thousands on the verge of beggary their livelihood, who has dried the tears of the widow and the orphan—he is near to God himself.
Honors and rewards were showered upon Ivan. The government gave him for all time the patent for his discovery. By the Joint-Stock Mining Company he was handsomely remunerated. A monster deputation obliged him to accept the place of director. Scientific societies at home and abroad elected him member. His picture and biography appeared in all the illustrated papers of Europe and America. The simple villagers in Bondathal prayed for him night and morning; and when the first train steamed out of the Bondavara station, the locomotive bore the name of "Behrend." It was only God's providence that preserved him from receiving "an order."
Perhaps the most interesting testimony, and the one most valued by Ivan, was a letter which the Countess Angela wrote to him with her own hand.
The countess told him frankly all that had happened to her since they had met; how she had married the Marquis Salista; how unhappy he had made her by the pressure he brought to bear upon her grandfather, Prince Theobald, which ended in his property being sequestrated, to the ruin of the whole family of Bondavary. She had suffered greatly in consequence, and had known what privation meant; also the income of the Countess Theudelinde had been considerably diminished, and the old lady had been forced to reduce her household. This condition of affairs had shown them their former friends in their true light—among others, Salista, her husband, who had gone to Mexico, and left her to shift for herself. Then Ivan had come to the rescue. Prince Waldemar's triumphal progress had been effectually checked. The million of money placed by Prince Theobald in the Bondavara Company had regained its value. The prince had arranged with his creditors, and his affairs were once more settled. She had been reconciled to him, and lived with him. Countess Theudelinde likewise had recovered her rents. The great family of Bondavary, which had been so near ruin, was reinstated in its former position. And for its new lease of life it had to thank a certain beneficent, clever—
Here Countess Angela's letter broke off. There was, however, a postscript:
"Answer this letter. I beg for one word. Write 'I forgive you.'"