It is the 18th of October, the "certain Baron Lanzberg's" wedding-day. The week of torture in which he could not resolve to tell the severe Elsa of his betrothal is past, and when he at length resolved upon it, he received only a sad glance and a silent shrug of the shoulders as answer from her--past are the happy hours of the betrothal time--almost past.
If the intoxication, the confusion which never becomes consciousness is happiness, then Felix was very happy in this time. Passion had numbed everything in him which did not refer to the present or to the 18th of October. He existed only in a feeling of longing and expectation. He had no time to tell himself that Linda's happy coquetries proved a very flippant conception of the serious situation--he himself had forgotten the gravity of the situation. He did not think, he only felt and saw a white, ever-changing face, a face which can smile in at least two hundred ways--felt a perpetual warm excitement, felt something like an electric shock when two soft lips touched his temples and left them quickly like butterflies which will not be caught, when two soft hands played round his neck.
Yes, ft is the 18th of October, Felix Lanzberg's wedding-day.
The wedding was to be solemnized at Castle Rineck, the Harfinks' new possession, and in a white circular chapel, with small windows shaded by ivy, and an altar-piece which was dark as the Catholic religion.
The castle is crowded with guests, mostly honest manufacturers, who are proud of their fortunes acquired by their own ability, and others also less honest, who, after they have retired from business, wish to know nothing more of their money-making past.
Needless to say, the wedding preparations were unpleasant to the infatuated Felix. The bride had joined in his request for a quiet wedding, for the contact with so much industry of which a considerable part had not yet become "finance," little pleased her; but the parents could not let the opportunity pass without displaying their wealth to the astonished throng.
The afternoon is gray and moist. Mrs. von Harfink--for the past week, no longer through the obligingness of her acquaintances, but through the obligingness of a democratic ministry thus titled--Mrs. von Harfink, then, composes a toast for her husband to deliver at the wedding dinner. Raimund stands beside the piano--to sing while sitting might injure his voice--and strives to render the cry of the Valkyrs in Wagner's worthy accents; a sympathetic poodle seconds him in this melodious occupation.
Outside in the park Linda wanders alone through the damp October air. The dead foliage lies thick on the lawn, and between the leaves shines the grass, bright and fresh as hope which lies under all the load of shattered joys of broken life, undisturbed.
The bushes, glowing in autumnal splendor, look like huge moulting birds who shiveringly lose their feathers. Many flower-beds are already empty, only a couple of stiff georginias and chrysanthemums still raise their heads proudly and solitary in the universal desolation.
Linda is quite alone; her friends, none of whom are very dear to her, are too zealously busied with cares of the toilet to disturb her solitude; they are also afraid to expose their complexions to the morning air. Linda feels no anxiety about her complexion, it is too beautiful for that. With her loosened hair which, brown as the dead leaves, falls over her back, and with the red cloak, in which she has wrapped herself, she is a bright spot in the park.