What the young man wanted was,--not to clasp his betrothed in his arms,--all that he wanted by this prolongation of his ride was the postponement of the interview with his mother. When he reached Rautschin he stopped short and looked up at the windows of the castle. He thought of the first happy days of his betrothal in Paris; image after image passed before his mind with beguiling sweetness;--for a moment he forgot everything.
The windows of the corner drawing-room where the family were wont to pass their evenings were open;--he listened. He could hear them talking, and could distinguish Zinka's soft, somewhat veiled tones, and the sweet, childlike voice of his betrothed, but without catching her words;--once he heard her laugh merrily, almost ungovernably. When was it that he had last heard that very laugh? He shuddered,--it was on the evening of his betrothal in the Avenue Labédoyère--when Zoë Melkweyser had unfolded her ridiculous mission.
And from out the past resounded distinctly on his ear; "Gabrielle and the son of the Conte Capriani--! Gabrielle and the son of Capriani!"
He struck his forehead with his fist.--Over the low wall on this side of the castle, that separated the park from the road, hung the branch of a rose-bush heavy with Marèchale Niel roses. Oswald plucked one, kissed it, and tossed it through the open window of the drawing-room. "Good-night, Gabrielle!" he called up.
When she came to the window to bid him welcome, she saw only a horseman enveloped in a cloud of dust trotting quickly past the castle in the direction of the little town.
CHAPTER XI.
Night had set in, and Oswald had not yet returned to Tornow. The Countess was waiting for him, sitting beside a table whereon stood a lamp with a rose-coloured shade. Georges had told her that her boy had gone round by the way of Rautschin, which she had thought quite natural, but none the less was she anxious for his return.
The clock struck a quarter past ten; perhaps he had returned after all and had not come to her. But no, he would certainly have come to ask after her health; he had thought her looking ill to-day, and had been anxious about her, had tenderly begged her to lie down for a while to recover the sleep that she had lost on his account. She had tried to smile at him unconcernedly, but it had been a hard task; a casual remark by Pistasch that morning had informed her of Oswald's interview with Capriani in Prague, at which no one else had been present, and which had agitated him excessively. She divined his misery. His love for her, and his confidence in her were so unbounded that he regarded his torturing suspicion as an idée fixe. Perhaps this temporary distress of his would pass away without its cause ever being mentioned between them. God grant it might! But if not? If he should come to her to-day or to-morrow and say 'Mother I cannot of myself be rid of this,--forgive me, mother, if I lay down at your feet this burden that oppresses me, and beg you to soothe my pain!'
She shuddered as this possibility occurred to her. What answer should she make? 'Shall I have the strength to lie?' she asked herself, and then she told herself, 'I must find the strength; what do I care about myself? My whole life for years has been falsehood and deceit,--but he must have peace--his life I must save!'
She knew that if she could succeed in uttering this lie calmly, his suspicion would be laid at rest forever, that no evidence in the world would prevail with him against her word. How she should continue to live on after this lie, was quite another thing, but she could die, and God knew she would willingly lay down her life for her child.