Transcriber's notes:

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GERTRUDE'S MARRIAGE

W. HEIMBURG

TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN

BY MRS. J. W. DAVIS

ILLUSTRATED

NEW YORK

WORTHINGTON CO., 747 Broadway

1889

COPYRIGHT 1889 BY
WORTHINGTON COMPANY

GERTRUDE'S MARRIAGE.

CHAPTER I.

"Really, Frank, if I were in your place I shouldn't know whether to laugh or cry. It has always been the height of my ambition to have a fortune left me, but as with everything in this earthly existence, I should have my preferences.

"Upon my word, Frank, I am sorry for you. Here you are with an inheritance fallen into your lap that you never even dreamed of, a sort of an estate, a few hundred acres and meadows, a little woodland, a garden run wild, a neglected dwelling-house, and for stock four spavined Andalusians, six dried-up old cows, and above all an old aunt who apparently unites the attributes of both horses and cows in her own person. Boy, at least wring your hands or scold or do something of the sort, but don't stand there the very picture of mute despair!"

Judge Weishaupt spoke thus in comic wrath to his friend Assessor Linden, who sat opposite him. Before them on the table stood a bottle of Rhine wine with glasses, and the eyes of the person thus addressed rested on the empty bottle with a thoughtful expression, as if he could read an answer on the label.

It was a large room in which they were sitting, a sort of garden-hall, furnished very simply and in an old-fashioned style, with two birchen corner-cupboards, which in our grandmother's time served the purpose of the present elegant buffets, and which, instead of costly majolica, displayed painted and gold-rimmed cups behind their glass doors; with a large sofa, whose black horse-hair covering never for a moment suggested the possibility of soft luxurious repose; with six simply-constructed cane-seated chairs grouped about the large table, and finally, with several dubious family portraits, among which especially to be noted was the pastel portrait of a youthful fair-haired beauty, whose impossibly small mouth wore an embarrassed smile as if to say: "I beg you to believe that I did not really look so silly as this!" And over all this bright orange-colored curtains shed a peculiarly unpleasant light.

The door of the room was open and as if in compensation for all this want of taste, a wonderful prospect spread itself out before the eye. Lofty wooded mountain tops, covered with rich foliage which the autumn frosts had already turned into brilliant colors, formed the background; close by, the neglected garden, picturesque enough in its wild state, and shimmering through the trees, the red pointed roofs of the village; the whole veiled with the soft haze of an October morning, which the rays of the sun had not yet dispersed. The regular strokes of the flails on the threshing floors of the estate had a pleasant sound in the clear morning air.

The young man's dark eyes strayed away from the wine-bottle; he started up suddenly and went to the door.

"And in spite of all that, Richard, it is a charming spot," he said warmly. "I have always had a great liking for North Germany. I assure you 'Faust' is twice as interesting here, where the Brocken looks down upon you. Don't croak so like an old raven any more, I beg of you. I shall never forget Frankfort, but neither shall I miss it too much--I hope."

"Heaven forbid!" cried the little man, still playing with the empty wine-glass. "You don't pretend to say--"

But Linden interrupted him. "I don't pretend anything, but I am going to try to be a good farmer, and I am going to do this, Richard, not only because I must, but because I really like this queer old nest; so say no more, old fellow."

"Well, good luck to you!" replied the other, coming up to his friend and looking almost tenderly into the handsome, manly face.

"I have really nothing to say against this playing at farming if I only know how and where.--You see, Frank, if I were not such a poverty-stricken wretch, I would say to you this minute: 'Here, my boy, is a capital of so much; now go to work and get the moth-eaten old place into some kind of order.' Things cannot go on as they are. But--well, you know--" he ended, with a sigh.

Frank Linden made no reply, but he whistled softly a lively air, as he always did when he wished to drive away unpleasant thoughts.

"O yes, whistle away," muttered the little man, "it is the only music you are likely to hear, unless it is the creaking of a rusty hinge or the concert of a highly respectable family of mice which have settled in your room--brr--Frank! Just imagine this lonely hole in winter--snow on the mountains, snow on the roads, snow in the garden and white flakes in the air! Good Heavens! What will you do all the long evenings which we used to spend in the Taunus, in the Bockenheimer Strasse, or in the theatre? Who will play euchre with you here? For whom will you make your much-admired poems? I am sure they won't be understood in the village inn. Ah, when I look at you and think of you moping here alone, and with all your cares heavy upon you!"

He sighed.

"I will tell you something, Frank, joking aside," he continued. "You must marry. And I advise you in this matter not to lay so much stress on your ideal; pass over for once the sylph-like forms, liquid eyes and sweet faces in favor of another advantage which nothing will supply the place of, in our prosaic age. Don't bring me a poor girl, Frank, though she were a very pearl of women. In your position it would be perfect folly, a sin against yourself and all who come after you. It won't make the least difference if your fine verses don't exactly fit her. You wouldn't always be making poetry, even to the loveliest woman. O yes, laugh away!"

He brushed the ashes from his cigar. "In Frankfort--if you had only chosen--you might have done something. But you were quite dazzled by that little Thea's lovely eyes. How often I have raged about it! When a man has passed his twenty-fifth year he really ought to be more sensible."

Frank Linden was obstinately silent, and the little man knew at once that he had as he used to say, "put his foot in it."

"Come, Frank, don't be cross," he continued, "perhaps there are rich girls to be had here too."

"O to be sure, sir, to be sure," sounded behind him, "rich girls and pretty girls; our old city has always been celebrated for them."

"Both gentlemen turned toward the speaker."

Both gentlemen turned toward the speaker; the judge only to turn away at once with an angry shrug, Frank Linden to greet him politely.

"I have brought the papers you wanted," continued the new-comer, a little man over fifty with an incredibly small pointed face over which a sweet smile played, a sanctimonious man in every motion and gesture.

"I am much obliged, Mr. Wolff," said Frank Linden, taking the papers.

"If there is anything else I can do for you--Miss Rosalie will testify that I was always ready to help your late uncle."

"I am a perfect stranger here," replied the young squire, "it may be that I shall require your help."

"I shall feel highly honored, Mr. Linden--Yes, and as I said before, if you should want to make acquaintances in the city there are the Tubmans, the Schenks, the Meiers and the Hellbours and above all the Baumhagens--all rich and pleasant families, Mr. Linden. You will be received with open arms, there's always a dearth of young men in our little city. The gentlemen of the cavalry--you know, I suppose--only want to amuse themselves--shall be only too glad in case you--"

The judge interrupted him with a loud clearing of his throat.

"Frank," he said, dryly, "what tower is that up there on the hill? You were studying the map yesterday!"

"St. Hubert's Tower," replied the young man, going towards him.

"Belongs to the Baron von Lobersberg," interposed Wolff.

"That doesn't interest me in the least," muttered the judge, gazing at the tower through his closed hand for want of a glass.

"I have the honor to bid you good-morning," said Wolff, "must go over to Lobersberg."

The judge nodded curtly; Linden accompanied the agent to the door and then came slowly back.

"Now please explain to me," burst out his friend, "where you picked up that fellow--that rat, I should say, who pushes himself into your society so impudently."

Frank Linden's dark eyes turned in astonishment to the angry countenance of the judge.

"Why, Richard, he was my uncle's right-hand man, his factotum, and lastly, he has something to say about my affairs, for unhappily, he holds a large mortgage on Niendorf."

"That does not justify him in the impertinent manner which he displays towards you," replied his friend.

"O my dear little Judge," said the young man in excuse, "he looks on me as a newcomer, an ignoramus in the sacred profession of farming. You--"

"And I consider him a shady character! And some day, my dear boy, you will say to me, 'Richard, God knows you were right about that man--the fellow is a rascal.'"

"Do you know," cried Frank Linden, between jest and earnest, "I wish I had left you quietly in your lodging in the Goethe-Platz. You will spoil everything here for me with your gloomy views. Come, we will take a turn through the garden; then, unfortunately, it will be time for you to go to the station, if you wish to catch the Express."

He took the arm of his grumbling friend and drew him with him along the winding path, on which already the withered leaves were lying.

"I am sure the fellow has a matrimonial agency somewhere," muttered the judge, grimly.

As they turned the corner of the neglected shrubbery, they saw an old woman slowly pacing up and down the edge of the little pond.

"For Heaven's sake!" began the little man again, "just look at that figure, that cap with the monstrous black bow, that astonishing dress with the waist up under the arms, and what a picturesque fashion of wearing a black shawl--and, goodness! she has got a red umbrella. My son, she probably uses it to ride out on the first of May--brr--and that is your only companion!"

It was indeed a remarkable figure, the old woman wandering up and down with as much dignity as if one of the faded pastel pictures in the garden hall had suddenly come to life.

"Shall I call her?" asked Frank Linden, smiling.

"Heaven forbid!" cried the other. "This neighborhood of the Blocksberg is really uncanny--your Mr. Wolff looks like Mephistopheles in person, and this--well, I won't say what--she is really a serious charge for you, Frank."

The wonderful figure had long since disappeared behind the bushes, when the young man answered, abstractedly,

"You see things in too gloomy a light, Richard. How can this poor, feeble old woman, almost on the verge of the grave, possibly be a burden to me? She lives entirely shut up in her own room."

"But I will venture to say that she will be forever wanting something of you. When she is cold the stove will be in fault, when she has rheumatism you will have to shoot a cat for her. She will meddle in your affairs, she will mislay your things, and will vex you in a thousand ways. Old aunts are only invented to torment their fellow-men. But no matter, make your own beer and drink it all down. But I think it must be time to go, the Express won't wait."

Linden looked at his watch, nodded, and went hastily to the house to order the carriage.

His friend followed him thoughtfully; at length he muttered a suppressed, "Confound it! Such a splendid young fellow to sit and suck his paws in this hole of a peasant village! What sort of a figure will he cut among the rich proprietors of this blessed country? I wish his old uncle had chosen anybody on earth for his heir, only not him--much as he pretends to like it. What a career he might have made! And now he will just bury himself in this hole--confound Niendorf! If I only had him at home in gay Frankfort--O--it is--"

A quarter of an hour later the friends were rolling towards the city in a rather old-fashioned carriage. Behind them was the quiet little Harz village, and before them rose the many-towered city.

They had not far to go; they reached their destination in an hour's time, and the carriage stopped before the stately railroad station. Silently as they had come they got the ticket and had the baggage weighed, and Linden did not speak till they reached the platform.

"Greet Frankfort for me, Richard, and all my friends. Write to me when you have time. See that I get my furniture and books soon, and many thanks for your company so far."

The judge made a deprecating gesture. "I wish to Heaven I could take you back with me, Frank," he said, in a softer tone. "You don't know how I shall miss you. You know what a bad correspondent I am, you are much better at writing than I, and you will have more time for it, too--"

The whistle and the rumbling of the approaching train cut him short; in another moment he was in a coupé.

"Good-bye, Frank--come nearer for a moment, old fellow--remember if you are ever in any serious difficulty, write to me at once. If I should not be able to help you myself--you know my sister is in good circumstances--"

One more hand-shake, one more look into a pair of true, manly eyes, and Frank Linden stood alone on the platform. He turned slowly away, and walked towards his carriage. He had his foot on the step when he bethought himself, and ordered the coachman to drive to the hotel, for he had something to do in town.

He was so entirely under the influence of the uncomfortable feeling which parting from a friend creates, that he took the road into town in no very cheerful mood. On entering the city he turned aside and followed a deserted path which led along the well-preserved old city wall. He did not in the least know where he was going; he had nothing to do here, he knew no one, but he must look about a little in the neighboring town. It seemed, in fact, well entitled to its reputation as an old German imperial city; the castle, with the celebrated cathedral, towered up defiantly on the steep crags; several slender church towers rose from out the multitude of red pointed roofs, and the old wall, broken at regular intervals by clumsy square watch-towers, surrounded the old town like a firm chain.

He took delight in the beautiful picture, and as he walked on his fancy painted the magnificent imperial city waking out of its slumber of a thousand years. After awhile he stopped and looked up to one of the gray towers.

"Really it is almost like the Eschenheim Gate in Frankfort," he said half aloud; "what wonderful springs the thoughts make!"

Suddenly he found himself back in the present; scarcely four weeks ago he had passed through that beautiful gate, without dreaming that he would so soon see its companion in North Germany. Like lightning out of blue sky this inheritance which made him possessor of Niendorf had come upon him. How it had happened to occur to his grandfather's old brother to select him out of the multitude of his relatives for his heir still remained an unsolved problem, and he could only refer it to the especial liking for his mother whom the eccentric old man had always shown a preference for.

He had felt when he received the news as if a golden shower had fallen into his lap; it is difficult living in a city of millionaires on the salary of an assessor. And then--he had received a wound there in that brilliant bewildering life, and the scar still made itself felt at times--for instance when an elegant equipage dashed by him--black horses with liveries of black and silver and on the light-gray cushions a woman's figure, dark ostrich feathers waving above a face of marble whiteness, the luxuriant gold brown hair fastened in a knot on the neck and ah! looking so coldly at him out of her great blue eyes. After such a meeting he felt depressed for days. "A milliner's doll, a heartless woman," he called her bitterly, but he had once believed quite the reverse a whole year long till one morning he saw her betrothal in the paper. She married a banker who had often served as the butt of her ridicule. But--he had a million!

Ah, how gladly had he gone out of her neighborhood, how rejoiced he had been to turn his back on the great world, with what happiness he had written to his mother and what had he found!

But no matter! The steward whom he had for the present seemed a capable fellow; he would not spare himself in any respect and then--Wolff. He could not understand what had set Weishaupt so against the man.

He had now been wandering for some time through the busiest streets of the town. He asked for the hotel where his coachman was to wait for him. He now entered the marketplace in the midst of which the statue of Roland stands. A stately Rathhaus in the style of the Renaissance stood on the western side of the square, and lofty elegant patrician houses with pointed gables surrounded it; some adorned with bow-windows, some with the upper stories overhanging till it seemed as if they must lose their balance. Only two or three buildings were of later date, and even in these care had been taken to preserve the mediaeval character.

Agreeably surprised, Linden stopped and his glance passed critically over the front of the lofty building before which he had chanced to pause. Three tall stories towered one above another; over the great arched doorway rose a dainty bow-window which extended through all the stories and stretched up into the blue October sky as a stately tower, finished at the top with a weather-vane. The window in the bel-etage was divided into small diamond panes--that was an "æsthetic" dwelling, no doubt. In the second story rich lace curtains shimmered behind large clear panes, and a very garden of fuchsias and pinks waved and nodded from the plants outside. If a lovely girl's face would only appear above them now, the picture would be complete.

But nothing of the kind was to be seen, and casting one more glance at the artistic ironwork of the staircase, the attentive spectator turned and crossed the market-place to the hotel in order to dine. As it was already late he was the only guest in the spacious dining-room. He ate his dinner with all speed, and began his wanderings through the streets again.

Behind the Rathhaus he plunged into a labyrinth of narrow streets and alleys, then passing through an archway he entered unexpectedly a square surrounded by tall linden trees half stripped of their leaves, which, grave and solemn, seemed to be watching over a large church. It seemed as though everybody was dead in this place; only a few children were playing among the dry leaves, and an old woman limped into a sunny corner, otherwise the deepest silence reigned.

A side door of the church stood open; he crossed over and entered into the silent twilight of the sacred place; he took off his hat, and, surprised by the noble simplicity of the building, he gazed at the slender but lofty columns and the rich vaulting of the choir. Then he walked down the middle aisle between the artistically carved stalls, brown with age. He delighted in them, for he had the greatest admiration for the beautiful forms of the Renaissance, and he was doubly pleased, for he had not expected to find anything of the kind here.

Here he suddenly stopped; there at the font, above which the white dove soared with outspread wings, he saw three women. Two of them seemed to be of the lower class; the elder, probably the midwife, held the child, tossing it continually; the other, in a plain black woollen dress and shawl, a young matron, looked at the child with eyes red with weeping; a third had bent down towards her; the sexton, who was pouring the water into the basin, concealed her completely for the moment and Linden saw only the train of a dark silk dress on the stone floor.

And now a soft flexible woman's voice sounded in his ear: "Don't cry so, my good Johanna, you will have a great deal of comfort yet with the little thing--don't cry!

"Engleman, you had better call the clergyman--my sister does not seem to come, she must have been detained; we will not wait any longer."

The speaker turned towards the mother, and Frank Linden looked full into the face of the young girl. It was not exactly beautiful, this fine oval, shaded by rich golden brown hair; the complexion was too pale, the expression too sad, the corners of the mouth too much drawn down, but under the finely pencilled brows a pair of deep blue eyes looked out at him, clear as those of a child, wistful and appealing, as if imploring peace for the sacred rite.

It might often happen that strangers entered the beautiful church and made a disturbance--at least so Frank Linden interpreted the look. Scarcely breathing, he leaned against one of the old stalls, and his eyes followed every movement of the slender, girlish figure, as she took the child in her arms and approached the clergyman.

"Herr Pastor," sounded the soft voice, "you must be content with one sponsor, for unfortunately my sister has not come."

The clergyman raised his head. "Then you might, Mrs. Smith--" he signed to the elder woman.

Frank Linden stood suddenly before the font beside the young girl; he hardly knew himself how he got there so quickly.

"Allow me to be the second sponsor," he said.--"I came into the church by chance, a perfect stranger here; I should be sorry to miss the first opportunity to perform a Christian duty in my new home."

He had obeyed a sudden impulse and he was understood. The gray-haired clergyman nodded, smiling. "It is a poor child, early left fatherless, sir," he replied. "The father was killed four weeks before its birth--you will be doing a good work--are you satisfied?" he said, turning to the mother. "Well then--Engelman, write down the name of the godfather in the register."

"Carl Max Francis Linden," said the young man.

And then they stood together before the pastor, these two who a quarter of an hour ago had had no knowledge of one another; she held the sleeping child in her arms; she had not looked up, the quick flush of surprise still lingered on the delicate face, and the simple lace on the infant's cushion trembled slightly.

The clergyman spoke only a few words, but they sank deep into the hearts of both. Linden looked down on the brown drooping head beside him, the two hands rested on the infant's garments, two warm young hands close together, and from the lips of both came a clear distinct "Yes" in answer to the clergyman's questions. When the rite was ended, the young girl took the child to its weeping mother and pressed a kiss on the small red cheek, then she came up to Linden and her eyes gazed at him with a mixture of wonder and gratitude.

"I thank you, sir," she said, laying her small hand in his for a moment. "I thank you in the name of the poor woman--it was so good of you."

Then with a proud bend of her small head she went away, the heavy silk of her dress making a slight rustling about her as she walked. She paused a moment at the door in the full daylight and looked back at him as he stood motionless by the font looking after her; it seemed as if she bent her head once more in greeting and then she disappeared.

Frank Linden remained behind alone in the quiet church. Who could she be who had just stood beside him? A slight jingling caused him to turn round; the sexton was coming out of the sacristy with his great bunch of keys.

"You want to shut up the church, my friend?" he said. "I am going now." Then as if he had thought of something he came back a few steps. "Who was the young lady?" was on his lips to ask, but he could not bring it out, he only gazed at the glowing colors in the painted glass of the lofty window.

"They are very fine," said the sexton, "and are always much admired; that one is dated 1511, the Exodus of the children of Israel, a gift from the Abbess Anna from the castle up there. They say she had a great liking for this church, and it is the finest church far and wide too, our St. Benedict's."

Frank Linden nodded.

"You may be right," he said, abstractedly. Then he gave the man a small sum for the baby and went away.

Soon after, his carriage was rolling away towards home. The outlines of the mountains rose dark against the red evening sky, and the church-tower of Niendorf came nearer and nearer.

Nothing seemed strange to him now as it had been this morning; the first slight happy feeling of home-coming was growing in his heart. On the top of the hill he turned again and looked back at the city, where the castle looked to him like an old acquaintance, and hark! The faint sound of a bell was wafted towards him on the evening breeze; perhaps from St. Benedict's tower?

CHAPTER II.

Gertrude Baumhagen had quickly crossed the quiet square, had opened a door in the opposite wall, and was at home. She passed rapidly through the box-edged path of the old-fashioned garden, and across a quiet spacious court into the house. In the large vaulted hall, she found her brother-in-law standing beside a tall velocipede. He was dressed elegantly and according to the latest fashion, a costly diamond sparkled on the blue cravat, while he wore another on his white hand. He was fair-haired, with pink cheeks, and a small moustache on his upper lip, and was perhaps about thirty. A servant was occupied in cleaning the shining steel of the bicycle with a piece of chamois leather.

"Are you going for a ride, Arthur?" asked the young girl, pleasantly.

"I am going to make off, Gertrude," he replied, peevishly. "What on earth can I do at home? Jenny has got a ladies' tea party again to-day by way of variety--and what am I to do? I am going with Carl Röben to Bodenstadt--a man must look out for himself a little."

"I am just going up to your house," said the young girl. "I am cross with Jenny and am going to scold her."

"You will be lucky then if you don't come off second best, my dear sister-in-law," cried Arthur Fredericks, laughing.

She shook her head gravely, and mounted the broad staircase, whose dark carved balustrade harmonized well with the crimson Smyrna carpet which covered the steps, held down by shining brass rods. Huge laurel-trees in tubs stood on either side of the tall door, which led to the first floor. On the left, the staircase went on to the upper story. Gertrude Baumhagen pressed on the button of the electric bell and instantly the door was opened by a servant-maid in a brilliantly white apron, while a clear voice called out,

"Yes, yes, I am at home--you have come just in time, Gertrude."

In the large entrance hall, which was finished in old German style, a young matron stood before a magnificent buffet, busied in taking out all manner of silver-plate from the open cupboard. She wore a dainty little lace cap on her light brown hair, and a house-dress of fine light blue cashmere, richly trimmed with lace. She was very pretty, even now when she was pouting, but there was no resemblance between the two sisters.

"You are not even dressed yet, Jenny?" cried the young girl. "Then I might have waited a good while in the church. It was really very awkward, your not coming."

The young matron stopped and set down the great glass dish encircled by two massive silver snakes, in dismay. Then she clapped her hands and began to laugh heartily.

"There now!" she cried, "this whole day I have been going about the house with a feeling that there was something I had to do, and I couldn't think what it was. O that is too rich! Caroline, you might have reminded me!" she continued, turning to the maid, who was just laying a heavy linen table-cloth on the massive oak-table in the middle of the room.

"Mrs. Fredericks laid down to sleep and said expressly that I was not to wake her before four o'clock," said the maid in her own defence.

"Well, so I did," yawned the young matron; "I was so tired, his lordship was in a bad temper, and the baby was so frightfully noisy. It is no great misfortune, either; I can easily make up for it by sending her something tomorrow."

"Why, Jenny! Have you forgotten that it was I who told Johanna that you and I would be godmothers? I thought it was our duty--the man was killed in our factory."

"O fiddle-dedee, pet," interposed Mrs. Jenny, "I hate that everlasting god mothering! I have already three round dozens of godchildren as surely as I stand here---poor people are not required for that purpose, I assure you. Come, I have finished here now, we will go to the nursery for awhile, or"--casting a glance at the old-fashioned clock--"still better, mamma has had some patterns for evening-dresses sent her--wait a minute and I will come up with you; the company won't come yet for an hour and a half."

She turned round gracefully once more as if to survey her work. The buffet shone with silver dishes, a bright fire burned in the open fireplace, the heavy chandelier as well as the sconces before the tall glass were filled with dark red twisted candles, and as Caroline drew back the heavy embroidered portière, a room almost too luxuriously furnished became visible--a room all crimson; even through the stained glass of the bow-window the evening light sent red reflections in the labyrinth of chairs and sofas, lounges and tables, while white marble statues stood out against the dark green of costly greenhouse plants.

"It looks pleasant, doesn't it, Gertrude?" said the young wife. "I have not opened the great drawing-room because there will be only a few ladies. The wife of the Home Minister has accepted. Are you coming in for an hour?"

"No, thanks," replied the young girl, mounting the stairs with her sister to her mother's apartment. "Send me the baby for awhile, I like so much to have him."

"Oh, yes, the young gentleman shall make his appearance," nodded Mrs. Jenny, "provided he doesn't sleep like a little dormouse."

"Do you go in to mamma," said Gertrude. "I will change my dress and then come."

The rooms were the same as in the lower story, also richly furnished, though not in the new "aesthetic" style, yet they were not less elegant and comfortable. The sisters separated in the ante-room, and Gertrude Baumhagen went to her own room. She occupied the room with the bow-window, but here the daylight was not broken by costly stained glass: it came in, unhindered, in floods through the clear panes, before which outside, numberless flowers waved in the soft breeze. Directly opposite were the gables of the Rathhaus; like airy lace-work, the rich ornamentation of the towers was marked out against the glowing evening sky.

This bow-window was a delightful place; here stood her work-table, and behind it on an easel, the portrait of the late Mr. Baumhagen. The resemblance between the father and daughter was visible at a glance; there was the same light brown hair, the intellectual brow, the small, fine nose, and the eyes too were the same. She had always been his darling, and it was her care that fresh flowers should always be placed in the gold network of the frame. And where she sat at work her hands would sometimes rest in her lap and her eyes would turn to the picture. "My dear, good papa!" she would whisper then, as if he must understand.

To-day also, she walked quickly towards the bow-window and looked long at the picture. "You would have done that too," she said, softly, "wouldn't you, papa!" An earnest expression came suddenly into the young eyes, something like inexpressible longing. "No, every one is not like mamma and Jenny; there are warm human hearts, there are hearts that feel compassion for a stranger's needs, for whom the detested--" she stopped suddenly her small hands had clenched themselves and her eyes filled with tears.

She began to pace up and down the room. The soft, thick carpet deadened the sound of her footsteps, but the heavy silk rustled after her with an anxious sound.

What humiliations she had to endure daily and hourly from the fact of being a rich girl! She owed everything to the circumstance of having a fortune. Jenny had just now declared to her again that she had only been godmother, because--Ah, no matter, she knew better. Johanna was too modest. But she had not yet recovered from that other blow. A week ago there had been manœuvres in the neighborhood, and the colonel with his adjutant had had his quarters for two days in the Baumhagen house. She could not really remember that she had spoken more than a few commonplace words to the adjutant, and twenty-four hours after the troops had left the city--yesterday--a letter lay before her filled with the most ardent protestations of love and an entreaty for her hand. She had taken the letter and gone to her mother with it, with the words: "Here is some one who wishes to marry my money. Will you write the answer, mamma? I cannot."

Now she was dreading the mention of this letter. She was not afraid that her mother would try to persuade her. No, no, she had always been independent enough not to order her life according to the will of another, but the matter would be discussed and the division between mother and daughter would only be made wider than ever.

She started; the door opened and her sister's voice called: "Do come, Gertrude, I can't make up my mind about that new red."

The young girl crossed the hall and a moment after stood in her mother's drawing-room, before her mother, a small woman with almost too rosy cheeks, and an exceedingly obstinate expression about the full mouth. She sat on the sofa beneath the large Swiss landscape, the work of a celebrated Düsseldorf master--Mrs. Baumhagen was fond of relating that she had paid five hundred dollars for it--and tossed about with her small hands, covered with diamonds, a mass of dress patterns.

"Gertrude," she cried, "this would do for you." And she held out a bit of blue silk. "It is a pity you are so different, it is so nice for two sisters to dress alike."

"What is suitable for a married woman, is not fit for a girl," declared Mrs. Jenny. "Gertrude ought to get married, she is twenty years old."

"Ah! that reminds me,"--the mother had been turning over the patterns during the conversation,--"there is that letter from your last admirer, I must answer it. What am I to write him?--

"See here, Jenny, this brown ground with the blue spots is pretty, isn't it?--It is really a great bore to answer letters like that; why don't you do it yourself?"

"I am afraid my answer would not be dispassionate enough," replied the girl, calmly.

"Do you like him?" asked her sister.

The young girl ignored the question.

"I am afraid I might be bitter, and nothing is required but a purely business-like answer, as the question was purely one of business."

"You are delicious!" laughed the young wife. "O what a pity you had not lived in the middle ages, when the knights were obliged to go through so long a probation! Little goose, you must learn to take the world as it is. Do you suppose Arthur would have married me if I had had nothing? I assure you he would never have thought of it! And do you suppose I would have taken him if I had not known he was in good circumstances? Never! And what would you have more from us? we are a comparatively happy couple."

Gertrude looked at her sister in surprise, with a questioning look in her blue eyes.

"Comparatively happy?" she repeated in a low tone.

"Good gracious, yes, he has his whims--one has to put up with them," declared her sister,

"Pray don't quarrel to-day," said Mrs. Baumhagen, taking her eye-glass from her snub-nose; "besides I will write the letter. It is for that I am your mother." She sighed.

"But in this matter I think Jenny is right. Gertrude, you take far too ideal views of the world. We have all seen to what such ideas lead." Another sigh. "I will not try to persuade you, I did not say anything to influence Jenny; you both know that very well. For my own part I have nothing against this Mr. Mr.--Mr.--" the name did not occur to her at once.

The young girl laughed, but her eyes looked scornful. "His address is given with great distinctness in the letter," she said.

"There is no great hurry, I suppose," continued her mother. "I have my whist-party this evening; if I am not there punctually I must pay a fine; besides, I don't feel like writing." She yawned slightly.

"The evenings are getting very long now--did you know, Jenny, that an opera troupe is coming here?"

Jenny answered in the affirmative, and added that she must go and dress.

"Good night," she cried, merrily, from the door; "we shall not meet again to-day."

"Good night, mamma," said Gertrude also.

"Are you going down to Jenny?" asked Mrs. Baumhagen.

The girl shook her head.

"What are you going to do all the evening?"

"I don't know, mamma. I have all sorts of things to do. Perhaps I shall read."

"Ah! Well, good night, my child."

She waved her hand and Gertrude went away. She took off her silk dress when she reached her room and exchanged it for a soft cashmere, then she went into her pretty sitting-room. It was already twilight and the lamps were being lighted in the street below. She stood in the bow-window and watched one flame leap out after the other and the windows of the houses brighten. Even the old apple-woman, under the shelter of the statue of Roland, hung out her lantern under her gigantic white umbrella. Gertrude knew all this so well; it had been just the same when she was a tiny girl, and there was no change--only here inside it was all so different--so utterly different.

Where were those happy evenings when she had sat here beside her father--where was the old comfort and happiness? They must have hidden themselves away in his coffin, for ever since that dreadful day when they had carried her father away, it had been cold and empty in the house and in the young girl's heart. He had been so ill, so melancholy; it was fortunate that it had happened, so people said to the widow, who was almost wild in her passionate grief, but she had gone on a journey at once with Jenny, and had spent the winter in Nice. Gertrude would not go with them on any account. Her eyes, which had looked on such misery, could not look out upon God's laughing world,--her shattered nerves could not bear the gay whirl of such a life. She had stayed behind with an old aunt--Aunt Louise slept almost all day, when she was not eating or drinking coffee, and the young girl had learned all the horrors of loneliness. She had been ill in body and mind, and when her mother and sister had returned, she learned that one may be lonely even in company, and lonely she had remained until the present day.

Urged by a longing for affection, she had again and again tried to find excuses for her mother, and to adapt herself to her mode of life. She had allowed herself to be drawn into the whirl of pleasure into which the pleasure-loving woman had plunged so soon as her time of mourning was over. She had tried to persuade herself that concerts, balls, and all the gayeties of society really gave her pleasure and satisfied her. But her sense of right rebelled against this self-deception. She began to ponder on the vacuity of all about her, on this and that conversation, on the whole whirl around her, and she grew less able to comprehend it. She could not understand how people could find so much amusement in things that seemed to her not worth a thought. The art of fluttering through life, skimming the cream of all its excitements as Jenny did, she did not understand. To wear the most elegant costume at a ball, to stay at the dearest hotels on a journey, to be celebrated for giving the finest dinners--all that was not worth thinking about. Once she had asked if she might not read aloud in the evenings they spent alone, as she used to do when her father was alive. After receiving permission she had come in with a radiant face, bringing "Ekkehard," the last book which her father had given her. With flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes, she had read on and on, but as she chanced to look up there sat Jenny, looking through the last number of the "Journal of Fashion," while her mother was sound asleep. She did not say a word but she never read aloud again.

The large tears ran suddenly down her cheeks. One of those moments had suddenly come over her again, when she stretched out her arms despairingly after some human soul that would understand her, that would love her a little, only a little, for herself alone. She had grown so distrustful that she ascribed all kindness from strangers to her wealth and the position which her family held in society. She was quite conscious that she was repellent and unamiable, designedly so--no one should know how poor she really felt. It was not necessary for them to know that she wrung her hands and asked, "What shall I do? What do I live for?" She had inherited from her father a delight in work, a need for being of use--every responsible person feels a desire to be happy and to make others happy--but she felt her life so great a burden, it was so shallow, so distasteful, so full of petty interests.

She quickly dried her tears and turned; the door had opened and an old servant entered.

"You are forgetting your tea again, Miss Gertrude," she began, reproachfully. "It is all ready in the dining-room. I have brought in the tea so it will cool a little, but you must come now."

The young girl thanked her pleasantly and followed her. She returned in a very short time, nothing tasted good when she was so alone. She lighted the lamp and took a book and read. It had grown still gradually outside in the street, quarter after quarter struck from St. Benedict's tower, until it was eleven o'clock. A carriage drove up--her mother was coming home.

Gertrude closed her book, it was bedtime. The hall-door closed, steps went past Gertrude's door--but no, some one was coming in.

Mrs. Baumhagen still wore her black Spanish lace mantilla over her head. She only wished to ask her daughter what all this was about the christening this afternoon. The pastor's wife had told her a story of a curious kind of godfather; the pastor had come home full of it.

"Jenny did not come," explained the young girl, "and a strange gentleman offered to stand."

"But how horribly pushing," cried the excited little woman. "You should have drawn back, child--who knows what sort of a person he may be."

"I don't know him, mamma. But whoever he may be, he was so very good; he never supposed, I am sure, that his kindness could be misunderstood."

"There," cried Mrs. Baumhagen, "you see it is always so with you--you are so easily imposed upon by that sort of thing, Gertrude,--really I get very anxious about you. Did you know that Baron von Lowenberg--I remember the name now--is a distant connection of the ducal house of A.? Mrs. von S---- knows the whole family, they are charming people. But I will not influence you, I am only telling you this by the way. Sophie tells me an invitation has come from the Stadträthin for to-morrow. One never has a day to one's self. You will come too? It is about the Society festival; you young girls will have something to do.

"Jenny had a light still," she continued, without noticing her daughter's silence. "Arthur brought home Carl Röben, who came for his young wife, and Lina was just coming up out of the cellar with champagne.--I beg you will not tell any one about that scene in the church to-day; I have asked the pastor's wife to be silent too.

"Good night, my child. Of course the tea wasn't fit to drink at Mrs. S---- as usual."

"Good-night, mamma," replied Gertrude. She took the lamp and looked at her father's picture once more, then she went to bed. She awoke suddenly out of a half-slumber; she had heard the voice so distinctly that she had heard in the church to-day for the first time. She sat up with her heart beating quickly. No, what she had experienced today had been no dream. Like a ray of sunshine fell that friendly act of the unknown into this world of egotism and heartlessness. And then she staid long awake.

CHAPTER III.

The storms of late autumn came on among the mountains, heavy showers of rain came down from the gray flying clouds and beat upon the dead leaves of the forest and against the windows of the dwelling-houses. Frank Linden sat at his writing-table in the room he had fitted up for himself in the second story, and his eyes wandered from the denuded branches in the garden to the mountains opposite. His surroundings were as comfortable as it is possible for a bachelor's room to be--books and weapons, a bright fire in the stove, good pictures on the walls, the delicate perfume of a fine cigar, and yet in spite of all this the expression on his handsome face was by no means a contented one.

He thrust aside a great sheet full of figures and took up instead a sheet of writing-paper, on which he began rapidly to write:--

"My Dear Old Judge:

"How you would scoff at me if you could see me in my present downcast mood. It is raining outside, and inside a flood of vexatious thoughts is streaming over me. I have found out that playing at farming is a pleasure only when one has a large purse that he can call his own. The expenses are getting too much for me; everything has to be repaired or renewed. Well, all this is true, but I do not complain, for in other ways I have the greatest pleasure out of it. I cannot describe to you how really poetic a walk through these autumn woods is, which I manage to take almost daily with old Juno, thanks to the permission of the royal forester, with whom I have made friends.

"And how delightful is the home coming beneath my own roof!

"But you, most prosaic of all mortals, are probably thinking only about venison steaks or broiled field-fares, and you only know the mood of the wild huntsman from hearsay.

"But I wanted to tell you how right you were when you declared of Wolff: 'Hic niger est! Be on your guard against this man--he is a scoundrel!' Perhaps that would be saying too much, but at any rate he is troublesome. He sent me yesterday a ticket to a concert and wrote on a bit of paper: 'Seats 38 to 40 taken by the Baumhagen family--I got No. 37.' Then he added that the Baumhagens were the most distinguished and the wealthiest of the patricians in the city--evidently those who play first fiddle there.

"You know what my opinion is concerning millionaires--anything to escape their neighborhood.

"Well, in short, I was vexed and sent him back the ticket with the remark that I was the most unmusical person in the world. He has already made several attacks of that nature on me, so I suppose there must be a daughter.

"And now to come at length to the aim of this letter--you know that Wolff has a heavy mortgage on Niendorf, at a very high rate of interest. I simply cannot pay it, and wish to take up the mortgage; would your sister be willing to take it at a moderate rate? I am ready to give you any information.

"And what more shall I tell you? By the way, the old aunt--you did her great injustice; I never saw a more inoffensive, more contented creature than this old woman. A niece who comes to Niendorf every year on a visit, and whom she seems very fond of, her tame goldfinch, and her artificial flowers make up her whole world. She asked quite anxiously if I would let her have her room here till she died. I promised it faithfully. She has been telling me a good many things about my uncle's last years. He must have been very eccentric. Wolff was with him every day, playing euchre with him and the schoolmaster. He died at the card-table, so to speak. The old lady told me in a sepulchral voice that he actually died with clubs and diamonds in his hands. He had just played out the ace and said, 'There is a bomb for you!' and it was all over. I believe she felt a little horror of this endings herself. I am going now into the city in spite of wind and rain to make a few calls. I have got to do it sooner or later. I shall take the steward with me; he will bring home a pair of farm-horses that he bought the other day. Perhaps I may happen to stumble on my unknown little godmother that I wrote you about the other day; so far luck has not favored me."

He added greetings and his signature, and half an hour later he was on his way to the city in faultless visiting costume.

Arrived in the hotel he inquired for a number of addresses, then began with a sigh to do his duty according to that extraordinary custom which Mrs. Grundy prescribes as necessary in "good society," that is, to call upon perfect strangers at mid-day and exchange a few shallow phrases and then to escape as quickly as possible. Thank Heaven! No one was at home to-day although it was raining in torrents. From a sort of natural opposition he left the Baumhagens to the last; he belonged to that class to whom it is only necessary to praise a thing greatly in order to create a strong dislike to it.

Just as he was on the point of making this visit, he met Mr. Wolff. "You are going to the Baumhagens?" he asked, evidently agreeably surprised. "There--there, that house with the bow-window. I wish you good luck, Mr. Linden!"

Frank had a sharp answer on his lips but the little man had disappeared. But a woman's figure stepped back hastily from the bow-window above him.

"Very sorry," said the old servant-maid. "Mrs. Baumhagen is not at home." He received the same answer in the lower story although he heard the sounds of a Chopin waltz.

He heard an explanation of this in the hotel at dinner. A great ball was to take place that evening, and such a festival naturally required the most extensive preparations on the part of the feminine portion of society; on such a day neither matron nor maiden was visible. Nothing else was spoken of but this ball, and some of the gentlemen kindly invited him to be present; he would find some pretty girls there.

"I am curious to know if the little Baumhagen will be there," said an officer of Hussars.

"She may stay away for all I care," responded a very blond Referendary. "She has a way of condescending to one that I can't endure. She is perfectly eaten up with pride."

"She has just refused another offer, as I heard from Arthur Fredericks," cried another.

"She is probably waiting for a prince," snarled a fourth.

"I don't care," said Colonel von Brelow, "you may say what you like, she is a magnificent creature without a particle of provincialism about her. There is race in the girl."

Frank Linden had listened with an interest which had almost awakened a desire in him to take part in the ball. He half promised to appear, took the address of a glove-shop and sat for a couple of hours in lively conversation. After the lonely weeks he had been spending it interested him more than he was willing to confess.

"I am really stooping to gossip," he said, amused at himself. When he went out into the street, darkness had already come down on the short November day, the gas-lamps were reflected back from the pools in the street, the shop-windows were brilliantly lighted, and five long strokes sounded from the tower of St. Benedict's.

He went round the corner of the hotel into the next street, and walked slowly along on the narrow sidewalk, looking at the shops which were all adorned with everything gay and brilliant for the approaching Christmas holidays.

"Good-evening!" said suddenly a timid voice behind him. He turned round. For a moment he could not remember the woman who stood timidly before him, with a yoke on her shoulder from which hung two shining pails. Then he recognized her--it was Johanna.

"I only wanted to thank you so very much," she began, "the sexton brought me the present for the baby."

"And is my little godchild well?" he asked, walking beside the woman and suddenly resolving to learn something about "her" at any price.

"Oh, thank you, Mr. Linden; it is but a weakly thing--trouble hasn't been good for him. But if the gentleman would like to see him--it isn't so very far and I'm going straight home now."

"Of course I should," he said, and learned as he went along, that she carried milk twice a day for a farmer's wife.

"Does the young lady come to see her godson sometimes?"

"Ay, to be sure!" replied the woman. "She comes and the baby hasn't a frock or a petticoat that she hasn't given him. She is so good, Miss Gertrude. We were confirmed together," she added, with pride.

So her name was Gertrude.

They had still some distance to go, through narrow streets and alleys, before the woman announced that they had reached her house. "There is a light inside--perhaps it is mother, the child waked up I suppose. My mother lives up stairs," she explained, "my father is a shoemaker."

The window was so low that a child might have looked in easily, so he could overlook the whole room without difficulty.

"Stay," he whispered, holding Johanna's arm.

"O goodness! it is the young lady," she cried, "I hope she won't be angry."

But Frank Linden did not reply. He saw only the slender girlish figure, as she walked up and down with the crying child in her arms, talking to him, dancing him till at last he stopped crying, looked solemnly in her face for awhile and then began to crow.

"Now you see, you silly little goosie," sounded the clear girl's voice in his ears, "you see who comes to take care of you when, you were lying here all alone and all crumpled up, while your mother has to go out from house to house through all the wind and rain;--you naughty baby, you little rogue, do you know your name yet? Let's see. Frank,--Frankie? O such a big boy! Now come here and don't cry a bit more and you shall have on your warm little frock when your mother comes." And she sat down before the stove and began to take off the little red flannel frock.

"She sat down before the stove and began to take off the
little red flannel frock."

"Ask if I may come in, Johanna," said Linden. And the next moment he had entered behind the woman.

A flush of embarrassment came over the young girl's face, but she frankly extended her hand. "I am glad to see you, Mr. Linden--mamma was very sorry that she could not receive you this afternoon. You--"

He bowed. Then she belonged to one of the houses where he had called to-day. But to which one?

"Do you know, I never knew till to-day that you were living in the neighborhood," she continued brightly. "I was standing in our bow-window when you came across the square, and saw you inquiring for our house."

"Then I have the honor to see Miss Baumhagen?" he asked, somewhat disturbed by this information.

"Gertrude Baumhagen," she replied. "Why do you look so surprised?"

With these words she took her cloak from the nearest chair, put a small fur cap on her brown hair and took up her muff.

"I must go now, Johanna, but I will send the doctor to-morrow for the baby. You must not let things go so,--you must take better care or else he may have weak eyes all his life."

"Will you allow me to accompany you?" asked Linden, unable to take his eyes off the graceful form. And that was Gertrude Baumhagen!

She assented. "I am not afraid for myself, but I am sure you would never find your way out of this maze of streets into which my good Johanna has enticed you. This part about here is quite the oldest part of the town. You cannot see it this evening, but by daylight a walk through this quarter would well repay you. I like this neighborhood, though only people of the lower class live here," she continued, walking with a firm step on the slippery pavement.

"Do you see down there on the corner that house with the great stone steps in front and the bench under the tree? My grandmother was born in that house, and the tree is a Spanish lilac. Grandfather fell in love with her as she sat one evening under the tree rocking her youngest brother. She has often told me about it. The lilac was in blossom and she was just eighteen. Isn't it a perfect little poem?"

Then she laughed softly. "But I am telling you all this and I don't know in the least what you think of such things."

They were just opposite the small house with the lilac tree. He stopped and looked up. She perceived it and said: "I can never go by without having happy thoughts and pleasant memories. Never was there a dearer grandmother, she was so simple and so good." And as he was silent she added, as if in explanation, "She was a granddaughter of the foreman in grandpapa's factory."

Still nothing occurred to him to say and he could not utter a merely conventional phrase.

She too remained silent for a while. "May I ask you," she then began, "not to give too many presents to the baby--they are simple people who might be easily spoiled."

He assented. "A man like me is so unpractical," he said, by way of excuse. "I did not exactly know what was expected of me after I had offered myself as godfather in such an intrusive manner."

"That was no intrusion, that was a feeling of humanity, Mr. Linden."

"I was afraid I might have seemed to you, too impulsive--too--" he stopped.

"O no, no," she interrupted earnestly. "What can you think of me? I can easily tell the true from the false--I was really very glad," she added, with some hesitation.

"I thank you," he said.

And then they walked on in silence through the streets;--Gertrude Baumhagen stopped before a flower-store behind whose great glass panes a wealth of roses, violets and camellias glowed.

"Our ways separate here," she said, as she gave him her hand. "I have something to do in here. Good-bye, Mr.--Godfather."

He had lifted his hat and taken her hand. "Good-bye, Miss Baumhagen." And hesitatingly he asked--"Shall you be at the ball to-night?"

"Yes," she nodded, "at the request of the higher powers," and her blue eyes rested quietly on his face. There was nothing of youthful pleasure and joyful expectation to be read in them. "Mamma would have been in despair if I had declined. Good-night, Mr. Linden."

The young man stood outside as she disappeared into the shop. He stood still for a moment, then he went on his way.

So that was Gertrude Baumhagen! He really regretted that that was her name, for he had taken a prejudice against the name, which he had associated with vulgar purse-pride. The conversation at the hotel table recurred to him. He had figured to himself a supercilious blonde who used her privileges as a Baumhagen and the richest girl in the city, to subject her admirers to all manner of caprices. And he had found the Gertrude of the church, a lovely, slender girl, with a simple unspoiled nature, possessing no other pride than that of a noble woman.

Involuntarily he walked faster. He would accept the kind invitation to the ball. But when he reached the hotel he had changed his mind again. He did not care to see her as a modern society woman, he would not efface that lovely picture he had seen through the window of that poor little house. He could not have borne it if she had met him in the brilliant ball-room, with that air of condescension with which he had heard her reproached to-day. He decided to dine at home.

With this thought he had walked down the street again till he reached the flower-shop. On a sudden impulse he entered and asked for a simple bouquet.

The woman had an immense bouquet in her hand at the moment, resembling a cart-wheel surrounded by rich lace, which she was just giving to the errand-boy.

"For Miss Baumhagen," she said, "here is the card."

Frank Linden saw a coat-of-arms over the name. He stepped back a moment, undecided what to do. Then the shopwoman turned towards him.

"A simple bouquet," he repeated. There was none ready, but they could make up one immediately. The young man himself chose the flowers from the wet sand and gave them to her. It must have been a pleasant occupation for he was constantly putting back a rose and substituting a finer one for it. At last it was finished, a graceful bouquet of white roses just tinted with pink, like a maiden's blush, interspersed with maiden-hair and delicate ferns. He looked at the dainty blossoms once more, then paid for it and went back to the hotel. Then he laid the bouquet on the table, called for ink and paper, took a visiting-card and wrote. Suddenly he stopped and smiled, "What nonsense!" he said, half aloud, "she is sure to carry the big bouquet." Then he began again and read it over. It was a little verse asking if the godfather might at this late hour send to the godmother the flowers which according to ancient custom he ought to have offered at the christening, and modestly hoping she would honor them by carrying them to the ball that night. He smiled again, put it into the envelope and gave the bouquet and letter to a messenger with instructions to carry both to Miss Baumhagen. And then a thought struck him--the ball began at eight o'clock--that would be in ten minutes--he would see Gertrude Baumhagen, see--if his bouquet--nonsense! Very likely! But then he would wait. "It is well the judge does not see me now!" he whispered to himself. He felt like a child at Christmas time, so happy was he and so full of expectation as he wandered up and down the square in front of the hotel.

CHAPTER IV.

The clock struck eight. Gentlemen on foot had already been coming to the hotel for some time, then ladies arrived, and at length the first carriage containing guests for the ball rolled up, dainty feet tripped up the steps, and rich silks rustled as they walked. Carriage followed carriage; now came an elegant equipage with magnificent gray horses, a charming slight woman's figure in a light blue dress covered with delicate lace, bent forward, and a silvery laugh sounded in Linden's ear. "It is Mrs. Fredericks," he heard the people murmur behind him.

So that was her sister!

The beautiful young wife swept up the steps like a lovely fairy, followed by her husband in a faultless black dress-coat, carrying her fan and bouquet.

The carriage dashed across the marketplace again, to return in less than five minutes.

"Gertrude!" whispered Linden, drawing involuntarily further back into the shadow. A short stout lady in a light gray dress descended from the carriage, then she glided out and stood beside her mother, slender and graceful in her shimmering white silk, her beautiful shoulders lightly covered, and in her hand a well-known bouquet of pale roses. But this was not the girl of a few hours back. The small head was bent back as if the massive light brown braids were too heavy for it, and an expression of proud reserve which he had not before perceived, rested on the open countenance.

Two gentlemen started forward to greet the ladies; the first gallantly offered his arm to the mother, the other approached the young girl. She thanked him proudly, scarcely touching his arm with her finger-tips. Then suddenly this figure from which he could not take his eyes, vanished like a beautiful vision.

The encounter had left him in a mood of intense excitement. He bestowed a dollar on a poor woman who stood beside him with a miserable child in her arms, and he ordered out so big a glass of hot wine for old Summerfeld, his coachman, that the old man was alarmed and hoped "they should get home all right."

"What folly it is," said Linden to himself. And when a moment later his carriage drove up, and at the same moment the notes of a Strauss waltz struck his ear, he began to hum the air of "The Rose of the South." Then the carriage rattled over the market-place out on the dark country road, and sooner than usual he was at home in his quiet little room, taking a thousand pleasant thoughts with him.

In the manor-house at Niendorf there was one room in which roses bloomed in masses; not only in the boxes between the double windows or in the pots on the sill according to the season, but in the room itself, thousands of earth's fairest flowers were wreathed about the pictures and furniture. It had a strange effect, especially when instead of the sleeping beauty one might have expected to find here, one perceived a very old woman in an arm chair by the window, unweariedly engaged in cutting leaves and petals out of colored silk paper, shaping and putting them together so that at length a rose trembled on its wire stem, looking as natural from a little distance as if it had just been cut from the bush. Aunt Rosalie could not live without making roses; she lavished half her modest income on silk paper, and every one whom she wished well, received a wreath of roses as a present, red, pink, white and yellow blossoms tastefully intermixed. All the village beauties wore roses of Aunt Rosalie's manufacture in their well-oiled hair at the village dances. The graves in the church-yard displayed masses of white and crimson roses from the same store, torn and faded by wind and sun. The little church was lavishly decked every year by Aunt Rosalie, with these witnesses to her skill.

She was known therefore throughout the village to young and old as "Aunt Rose" or "Miss Rose," and not seldom was she followed in her walks by a crowd of children, especially little girls, with the petition "a rose for me too!" And "Aunt Rose" was always prepared for them; the less successful specimens were kept entirely for this purpose and were distributed from her capacious reticule with a lavish hand.

Frank Linden had long been accustomed to spend an occasional hour in the old lady's society. At the sight of her something of the atmosphere of peace which surrounded her seemed to descend upon him and calmed and soothed him. She would sit calm and still at her little table, her small withered hands busied in forming the "symbols of a well-rounded life." By degrees she had related to him in a quaintly solemn tone, stories of the lives which had passed under the pointed gables of this roof. There was little light and much shade among them, much guilt, and error, a dark bit of life-history. A married pair who did not agree, an only child idolized by both, and this only son covered himself and his parents with disgrace and fled to America, where he died. The parents were left behind without hope or comfort in the world, each reproaching the other for the failure in their son's training. Then the wife died of grief, and now began an endless term of loneliness for the elderly man under a ban of misanthropy and scorn of his kind; loving no one but his dog, associating with no one except with Wolff, who brought the news and gossip of the town, and treating even him with a disdain bordering on insult.

"But you see, my dear nephew," the old aunt had added, "there are men who are more like hounds than the hounds themselves,--dogs will cry out when they are trodden upon, but the sort to which he belongs will smile humbly at the hardest kick--and William found such a man necessary to him."

It was snowing; the mountains were all white, the garden lay shrouded under a shining white coverlid, and white snow-flakes were dancing in the air. Frank Linden had come back from hunting with the steward, and after dinner he went into Aunt Rosalie's room. She rose as he entered and came towards him.

"There you see, my dear nephew, what happens when you go out for a day. You have had a visit, such a splendid fashionable visitor in a magnificent sleigh. I was just taking my walk in the corridor as he came up the stairs and here is his card,"--she searched in her reticule--"which he left for you."

Frank took the card and read. "Arthur Fredericks." "Oh, I am sorry," he said, really regretting his loss. "When was he here?"

"Oh, just at noon precisely, when most Christians are eating their dinner," she replied. "And the postman has been here too and brought a letter for you. Oh, dear, where is it now? Where could I have put it?" And she turned about and began to look for it, first on the table among the pieces of silk paper and then on the floor, assisted by the young man.

"What did the letter look like, dearest Aunt?"

"Blue--or gray--blue, I think," she replied, all out of breath, turning out the contents of her red silk reticule. She brought out a mass of rose-buds and an immense handkerchief edged with lace, but nothing else.

"Was the letter small or large?" he inquired from behind the sofa.

"Large and thick," gasped Aunt Rosalie. "Such a thing never happened to me before in my life--it is really dreadful." And with astounding agility she turned over the things on the consumptive little piano and tossed the antique sheets of music about.

"Perhaps it got into the stove, Auntie."

"No, no, it has not been unscrewed since this morning."

Frank Linden went to the bell and rung. "Don't take any more trouble about it, Auntie, the letter is sure to turn up; let the maid look for it."

Dorothy came and looked, and looked behind all the furniture, and shaking out all the curtains--but in vain.

"Well, we will give it up," declared Linden at length--"I suppose it is a letter from my mother or from the Judge--I can ask them what they had to say. Let us drink our coffee. Auntie."

"I shan't sleep the whole night," declared the little old lady in much excitement.

"O don't think any more about it," he begged her, good-humoredly. "I am sure there was nothing of any great importance in it. Tell me some of your old stories now, they will just suit this weather."

But the wrinkled face under the great cap still wore an anxious look, and the dim eyes kept straying away from the coffee cups searchingly round the room, lingering thoughtfully on the green lamp-shade. Evidently there was no hope of a conversation with her. After awhile the young man rose to go to his own room.

"Yes, go, go," she said, relieved, "and then I can think where I could have put that letter. Oh, my memory! my memory! I am growing so old."

He walked along the corridor and mounted the staircase into the second story. The twilight of the short winter day had already darkened all the comers. It was painfully still in the house, only the echo of his own footsteps sounding in his ear. It was such a day as his friend had predicted for him--horribly lonely and empty, it seemed to rest like a heavy weight on this world-remote house. One cannot always read, cannot always be busy, especially when the thoughts stray uneasily out over forest and meadow to a distinct goal, and always return anxious and doubting.

He stood in his room at the window and watched the snow flakes fluttering down in the darkening air, and fell into a dream as he had done every day for the last week. He gave himself up to it so entirely that he fancied he could distinctly hear a light step behind him on the carpet, and the soft tones of a woman's voice, saying, "Frank, Frankie!" He turned and gazed into the dusky room. What if she were to open the door now,--what if she should come in with the child in her arms? Why should it not be, why could it not be? Were these walls not strong enough, these rooms not cosy and homelike enough to hold such happiness?

He began to walk up and down. Folly! Nonsense! What was he thinking of? Oh, if he had never come here, or better still if she were only the daughter of the foreman like her grandmother, and sat on the bench before the little house under the lilac tree, then everything would be so simple. He would not for the world enter that mad race for Gertrude Baumhagen's money-bags, in which so many had already come to grief. But her sweet friendship?--

And then he fell helpless again before the charm of her eyes.

He was suffering from those doubts, from those alternating fears and hopes that torment every man who is in love. And Frank Linden in his loneliness had long since acknowledged to himself that he only wanted Gertrude Baumhagen to complete his happiness.

His was by no means a shy or retiring nature. On the contrary, he possessed that modest boldness which seems so natural to some people on whom society looks with favor. If he were owner of a large estate instead of this "hole"--as the Judge designated Niendorf--he would rather have asked to-day than to-morrow if she would be his wife, without too great a shyness of the money-bags. But as it was, he could not, he must make his way a little first, and before he could do that, who could tell what might have happened to Gertrude Baumhagen?

He bit his lip at the thought--the result was always the same. But was a true heart nothing then, and a strong will? If the Judge were only here so he could ask him--

During these thoughts he had lighted the lamp. There lay the card on the table, which Aunt Rosalie had given him. "Arthur Fredericks." He smiled as he thought of the little insignificant man to whom her sister had given her heart, and he could not think of Gertrude as belonging to him in any way. At last a return visit from him! And there were some half effaced words written with a pencil.

"Very sorry not to have met you; hope you will come to a little supper at our house the day after Christmas."

It was the first invitation to Gertrude's house. He wrote an acceptance at once. Then he remembered that he had ordered the sleigh to go to the city to do some errands there. He would send the hotel porter across with the card.

CHAPTER V.

Christmas had passed and the last of the holidays had come with rain and thaw; it stripped off the brilliant white snowy coverlid from the earth as if it had been only a festal decoration, and the black earth was good enough for ordinary days.

Mrs. Baumhagen was sitting in a peevish mood at the window in her room looking out over the market-place. She had a slight headache, and besides--there was nothing at all to do to-day, no theatre, no party, not even the whist club, and yesterday at Jenny's it had been very dull. Finally she was vexed with Gertrude who, contrary to all custom, had talked eagerly to her neighbor at dinner, that stranger who had run after her in the church that time.

It was foolish of the children to have placed him beside her.

"A letter, Mrs. Baumhagen." Sophie brought in a simple white envelope.

"Without any post-mark? Who left it?" she asked, looking at the handwriting which was quite unknown to her.