Chapter XII The Burgrave’s Farewell
“—What means this, my lord?
—Marry, this is miching mallecho; it means mischief.”
(Hamlet).
Countess Betty had the megrims and declined to appear at supper. For a sufferer, however, she had a bright eye, and she moved about her room with the alacrity of a busy bird. She was alone, some belated notion of prudence having bade her dismiss her handmaiden during the final preparation. Her eyes were taking in wistfully the dimensions of the small travelling-bag (which was all that, in conscience, she could allow herself, since Cousin Kielmansegg would have to carry it himself down the precipitous roads) and the numberless objects which, at the last moment, seemed to her indispensable, when there came a tap at her window. She started—and only the sense of unacknowledged guilt weighing on her soul kept her from screaming aloud for help—when she perceived, pressed against the uncurtained pane, a man’s face. The next instant, however, she had recognized the wandering fiddler. She hurried towards him.
“A message?” she cried eagerly, as she opened the casement.
The man swung himself in and sat on the deep window-seat. His face was wet with rain. He gazed upon her for a second, quizzically, and when he spoke it was not in reply.
“Here I come,” said he, “by the ivy, at the risk of my neck, I, whom your worthy lord and master threatened to have flogged and thrown to the dogs, if he caught me up here again! What a foolish plight should I be in, had I counted upon your tender heart sparing a tremor for my perils! It is enough to make a man desire to walk in by the door for the rest of his life!”
“But, in heaven’s name,” she exclaimed, having but a matter-of-fact spirit, in spite of its dainty envelope, “you did climb up all the way to tell me something. Was it not a message?”
He bowed.
“From him?”
He laid his hand on his heart. “From myself,” he answered.
She glanced at him and then at her bolted door in renewed alarm. He read her thought.
“God forbid!” quoth he, smiling with an air that put him, in his poor raiment, at an extraordinary distance above her. “I should not so presume, madam.—Are you aware,” he pursued in another tone, “that your husband’s confidential Jäger was in intimate conversation with Count Kielmansegg’s postilion in the village to-day?”
“Mercy!” she cried, reading the portent.
“After which, my dear madam, he climbed the hill in a company that lightened the way for him, having, in fact, his arm round the trim waist of your own handmaiden.”
Countess Betty sank on a couch, white to her lips.
“Your trusted handmaiden,” repeated the fiddler, emphatically.
“Alas! if I had hesitated,” said the lady, piously turning up her eyes to the vaulted ceiling, “this would decide it; I dare not risk another night in this castle.”
“Taking risk for risk,” said the musician, carelessly, “if I were timid, I should prefer the waiting hazard.”
“You mean?” she panted, round-eyed, in quick apprehension.
“I mean,” said he, “that it is raining exceedingly hard, and that between this and the foot of the crag you will get wet, madam; so wet as to extinguish for ever the most ardent flame.”
The Burgravine rose with dignity. “I will have you know, sir, that I am merely accepting Count Kielmansegg’s protection back to my own family, because I know I can trust to his honour.”
“Quite so,” said Geiger-Hans, in a soothing voice. “And it is, of course, infinitely preferable to set forth by night in secret, with a handsome young man, than to summon any more aged or nearer relative to your help! A father, maybe—or a brother? But it is raining, as I say, madam, very hard. So much for the start. And I am afraid when you arrive in Austria your noble family may consider your journey ill-managed.”
Her bosom heaved.
“It is very unjust,” she moaned, “that you men can do everything, whereas we poor women——” She paused on the brink of tears.
“Ah!” he retorted, “you women are the crystal cups that hold the honour of the house! That is why we must set you in a shrine, madam. To-night it is still sanctuary in your presence, and I can still kneel before you. To-morrow——?”
The colour rushed into her face. She tried to speak with haughtiness, but her voice faltered.
“To-morrow—what then?”
“It is inconceivable how much wiser it would be for you to remain under a husband’s roof on such a night!”
There came a knock at the door. With squirrel nimbleness the fiddler twisted round and vanished. The Burgravine took a rapid survey of the room, whisked the bag into a cupboard, the jewel-cases on the top of it, and went to the window to close it.
“One moment, one moment!” she called, as the knocking was discreetly repeated, and paused with her hand on the casement. Certainly it was most uncomfortable weather! Then she opened the door. Sidonia entered.
“Little aunt, is your head better?”
“Yes, child, yes. You have supped? Is it so late?” Before the girl could answer, the bell of the castle clock began to boom nine strokes. “Nine o’clock!” shrieked the Burgravine. “What’s to be done?” She struck her forehead with a distraught air. “I dare not trust that false Eliza,” she murmured in her mind. Then her eye met Sidonia’s candid gaze, and she caught her hand. “Listen, child; you shall do something for me. Count Kielmansegg is going away to-night.”
The girl’s pupils widened, her face grew paler, but she did not speak.
“’Twas I bade him leave. Your uncle’s causeless jealousy...”
The girl nodded. The Burgrave, in truth, had been no pleasant companion that night. He had drunk heavily, and alternated between glowering spells of silence and loud and almost offensive pleasantries aimed at his guest, both of which had, not unnaturally, considerably embarrassed Count Kielmansegg.
“’Twas my duty!” (Oh, how virtuous felt the Burgravine of Wellenshausen!) “I had promised him (poor youth, he is my cousin!) that I would bid him ‘Good-bye.’ But now”—(positively Countess Betty thought her niece must perceive the halo growing round her head)—“now it has struck me that if your uncle heard of it, he might misconstrue—— My dear, you must go and tell Count Steven from me——”
“I?” cried Sidonia, and started.
“You must,” insisted the lady, harshly. “He is waiting in the east tower. Tell him this: ‘My aunt has sent me to say “Good-bye” for her; it is better so.... It is better so.’ Do not forget to say that. What are you waiting for, girl? Go! Perhaps you are afraid of the rain!” cried the Burgravine, scornfully, and seized the travelling-cloak that was lying ready on the bed. “Here, put this on; wrap the hood over your head. Now run, there is not a moment to be lost.”
There was, perhaps, more urgency, more fear, in her voice and manner than she had been aware of, for Sidonia, after a quick look at her, gathered the folds of the cloak about her and fled upon her errand. The Burgravine drew a long sigh of relief, then rang her hand-bell sharply.
“Eliza,” said she to the responsive damsel, and, on the spot, froze her with a glance for the impertinent air of confederacy with which she had entered, “light up a fire and serve supper to me. My head is better. Trim the candles and give me ‘La Nouvelle Héloise? How you stare, wench! Have you fallen in love, perhaps, that you do your work so ill to-day?”
Steven’s reflections, as he waited in the best-sheltered corner of the deserted tower, listening to the beat and gurgle of the rain, were of an unsatisfactory description. The folly of weakness is the worst of follies, the realization of it the most galling. He was about—no use in trying to blink the fact—he was about to ruin his own life; to take upon himself an intolerable burden; to commit, technically at least, a crime against hospitality; to put a stain upon his ancient name; and all without receiving in return the slightest gratification or being able to proffer, even to himself, the exoneration of any approach to passion. The mere thought of the long, intimate drive was a bore; the prospect of a possible life-long companionship with the Burgravine intolerable.
Geiger-Hans, mysterious wretch that he was, had much to answer for. And yet, had Steven followed his advice (he had, in honesty, to admit this) things would not be at this pass.
She came in upon him with a rapid step and a rustle of wet garments, stopped at the mouth of the passage, and said in a loud whisper:
“Are you there, Herr Graf?”
As he went forward, she clutched his wrist with a cold hand.
“Hush,” she cried, “I think I heard steps behind me!”
Both listened, not daring to breathe. Oh, what a situation for a youth whose pride it had been to hold his head high in the world!
Nothing was heard, however, save the wild, dismal murmur of the rain over the land, and the nearer drip and patter.
“No, there is nothing,” he said, and reluctantly passed a limp arm round her shoulders. To his surprise, they were jerked from his touch with resentment. The next moment, however, by a mutual movement, they caught at each other; for there came an unaccountable grinding about their ears, and almost immediately the solid ground gave way under their feet.
“Gracious Powers! is the tower falling?” cried he.
Even as he clasped the figure beside him, with the instinctive, protecting action of man for woman, he was aware that the slender thing in his arms could not be the Burgravine. But at the same instant they were sliding; and before he could do aught but throw himself backwards to avoid crushing her, they were shot with giddy swiftness down a steep incline. With a shock, his feet struck level ground; he lay dazed and breathless, her weight across his breast. Stars danced before his eyes. Vaguely, as from a great distance, he heard overhead the echo of a laugh; then a thud, and once more the grinding sound, as of heavy, rusty bars. It was the laugh that brought him to his senses; too often, lately, had that laugh rung in his ears!
She raised herself in his arms.
“Are you hurt?” he cried as he lay.
“No,” she answered quickly. “Don’t get up!” He knew by the sudden change in her voice that she had flung the muffling hood from her head. “Don’t get up! don’t stir! I must find out where we are.”
He recognized now the young, clear tones. It was Sidonia, but he was past surprise. One thing alone stood clear out of his confusion: whatever it might be that had brought this about, he was glad, to the heart of him he was glad, it was not Countess Betty.
He felt the girl struggle to her feet, heard her grope with her hands above his head. There came a moment of great stillness: he knew she was listening. Unconsciously he hearkened too, and then there grew upon them, out of the solid darkness, the cry of waters, rising up with a sort of cavernous echo as from a great depth. And, with a flash, his mind leaped back to that fearsome race of brown river that swirled so strangely from the foot of the Burg-crag, just above the village bridge. He felt his hair bristle. But when she spoke again, the sound of her voice, with its extraordinary accent of decision, roused him like a stimulant.
“We are safe if we but keep where we are,” she said. “You may sit up if you like, but do not attempt to stand.” And then she added: “You do not know the place; I do.”
She sat down beside him, and in the dark he felt her close presence once more with gladness.
“What is this place, then?” he asked, unconsciously whispering.
She answered him with a simplicity which almost made him laugh:
“It is the old oubliette.”
Vague cruel memories of mediæval romance awoke in his brain. Oubliette! The word itself was suggestive, and not agreeably so.
“An oubliette is——?” he asked.
“The secret trap by which the castellan of old quietly got rid of enemies or of inconvenient prisoners. You see,” she proceeded, with her astounding composure, “through this tower, in former days, was the sally-port—there used to be no other way; and were any one whose existence interfered with the views of the Lord of Wellenshausen, passing out or in, it was easy to set the machinery in motion, with the result——” She broke off.
“Of landing him in our enviable situation,” he finished pettishly.
“Not at all,” retorted she. “It is the mercy of heaven for us that time and storm have been at work in these forgotten regions and provided us with so opportune a ledge——”
“What would have happened else?” he asked in a tone that strove to emulate her coolness.
“Sit quietly and listen.”
He felt her reach for a stone, felt the tension of her vigorous young body as she flung it. He heard the missile strike the rock sharply, rebound and then rebound again. Then, after a silence, rose a faint sound, the ghost of a splash, the gulp of greedy, far-off waters, infinitely sinister. He shuddered.
“No one knows how deep it is,” said she, “nor what lies hidden there. I can tell you, when I first discovered this pit, it terrified me. Old Martin had told me of its legends, but I had laughed at him. One day, some months ago, I scrambled in from the outside, for the old tower is falling in ruin, and explored the place. But I had no notion the old trap-stone in the sally-port still worked. Now I remember,” she cried with sudden sharpness, “seeing Uncle Ludo wandering about the place this evening——” She stopped suddenly, struck by a new thought.
“But,” exclaimed the young man, “in heaven’s name, what have I done, to...?” And then his uneasy conscience whipped him silent.
“It is a horrible trick,” resumed the girl, now with a passionate ring in her voice, “you, his guest——”
An indignant sob caught her in the throat. “You his guest!” she repeated. “Oh, whatever he thought of you, he should have remembered that! I can never forgive him.”
The guest who had meditated, however unwillingly, the betrayal of his host, blushed painfully under the cloak of blackness. He heard her swallow her tears and knew that she clenched her hands. After a while she went on more quietly:
“How wise it was of Aunt Betty to tell you to go away! And, oh, how glad I am that she sent me instead of coming herself to bid you ‘Good-bye.’”
Steven opened his mouth, and then closed it again dumbly.
“You would both have been killed,” she went on, sinking her voice. “Uncle Ludovic must be mad—mad with his ridiculous jealousy... and he’s been drinking overmuch. Ah, dear Lord! If I had not been with you——”
She gave a shudder. He, on his side, had no words. He was silent in shame before the exquisite innocence; silent in admiration before the self-forgetting courage of this slip of a creature, who thought nothing of her own danger. “Here, indeed, is good blood—here is the spirit of race!” he thought, touched in his most sensitive chord.
Presently, however, the humour of the grim situation struck him, and he laughed. There was Thistledown Betty, incapable even of acting up to her own unfaithfulness, snug in her bower, doubtless; and there was the outraged husband, gloating over his mediæval vengeance: Steven wished he could be present at their next conjugal meeting! Sidonia, childlike, echoed his laugh softly beside him in the dark. It struck him serious on the instant. The morrow seemed a terribly long way off.
“And now,” said he, “what are we to do?”
“Hey, good sir!” said she, “nothing but wait. We shall not die this time, Herr von Kielmansegg; for my poor uncle”—she laughed in scorn and triumph—“he does not know, I warrant, that there is a way out of this old death-trap, since there is a way in. A way other than by the hidden lake and the barque of ancient Charon. But, till the daylight comes, sir——”
“Daylight!” he exclaimed, and knew not whether he were glad or sorry at the whole night’s prospect.
“Till daylight comes, we must take patience here. For one false step would send our bodies to join the bones of the forgotten enemies of Wellenshausen.”
“So, then——”
“Then, I should say, the best thing we can do is... to go to sleep.”
Again he was mute, pierced to the innermost fibre of his manliness. It was as if her child-heart had been suddenly revealed to him—its trustfulness, its simplicity, its courage.
“If you move a little to the right, carefully,” she said, after a pause, “you will find it softer, I think. The earth has grown up there, and there are, I remember, ferns. You will really not be too uncomfortable.”
The girl was positively doing the honours of the family oubliette! There came a tender smile to his lips, and almost a mist of tenderness to his eyes.
“But you,” said he, “good fairy, guardian angel, do you never think of yourself?—Will you lean against me?” he went on, timidly.
He gathered her to him. What a slight, warm thing she was! She trembled as he passed his arms round her, and he instantly desisted. “Would you rather not?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered. He thought there was a quaver as of tears catching her breath.
All the chivalry in him leaped to her service. He drew back. With some difficulty he unwound his heavy cloak from himself. He was stiff and bruised, and the uncertainty of his balance in the blackness gave him an eerie sensation as of precipices yawning for him on every side.
“What are you doing?” she cried severely.
“Let me put this over you,” he pleaded. “And then you can roll up your own mantle and make a pillow of it—against me, thus.”
“But you—but you——”
She struggled against his covering hands so impetuously that he caught her with a grip of alarm. And the sound of the rock crumbling away and leaping into the gulf gave its significant warning.
“You must keep quiet,” said he, for the first time asserting the leadership. “And you must let me hold you and cover you. It is my duty to serve you, Mademoiselle Sidonia, my right to protect you. Sleep if you can. You will be safe, for I shall watch.”
She remained motionless a minute and then submitted without a word. He placed his arm about her; her head drooped to his shoulder; there fell silence. In time he felt her rigidity relax, heard her quick breath grow calm and regular.
“You are afraid no more,” he said gently.
“I don’t think I was afraid,” she answered him. Her voice had grown lazy; and, subtly, by the tone of it, he knew that she smiled. He felt ineffably proud of her confidence, ineffably protective towards her.