It would be long ere that point was reached--but he knew how to wait!
Meanwhile he drew the Countess into a whirl of the most fascinating amusements.
No word, no look betrayed the still hopeful lover! With the manner of one who had relinquished all claims, but was too thoroughly a man of the world to avoid an interesting woman because he had failed to win her heart, he again sought her society after her return. Had he betrayed the slightest sign of emotion, he would have been repulsive in her present mood. But the perfect frankness and unconcern with which he played the "old friend" and nothing more, made his presence a comfort, nay even a necessity of life! So he became her inseparable companion--her shadow, and by the influence of his high position stifled every breath of slander, which floated from Ammergau to injure his beautiful friend.
During the first months after her return she had the whim--as she called it--of retiring from society and spending more time upon her estates. But the wise caution of the prince prevented it.
"For Heaven's sake, don't do that. Will you give free play to the rumors about your Ammergau episode and the pilgrimage to Jerusalem connected with it, by withdrawing into solitude and thus leaving the field to your slanderers, that they may disport at will in the deserted scenes of your former splendor?"
"This," he argued, "is the very time when you must take your old position in society, or you will be--pardon my frankness--a fallen star."
The Countess evidently shrank from the thought.
"Or--have you some castle in the air whose delights outweigh the world in your eyes?" he asked with relentless insistence:
This time the Countess flushed to the fair curls which clustered around her forehead.
Since that time the drawing-rooms of the Wildenau palace had again been filled with the fragrance of roses--lighted, and adorned with glowing Oriental magnificence, and the motley tide of society, amid vivacious chatter, flooded the spacious apartments. Glittering with diamonds, intoxicated by the charm of her own beauty whose power she had not tested for years, the Countess was the centre of all this splendor--while in the lonely hunting-seat beyond the pathless Griess, the solitary man whom she had banished thither vainly awaited--his wife.