XIV
About the time all this was taking place, something else occurred which most of you will readily recall. It happened at the time the King and Queen were married.
That was a time of many processions, when arches of honor were erected in all the squares, and when there arose, everywhere, the peculiar odor of spruce-boughs and of burning illuminants.
And the life of the King and Queen was far different from that of Little Johannes. They had to be decked often with beautiful clothes, and then as often to be undressed, to parade, to sit in state, to listen to wearisome harangues, to live through long dinners, and to be forever bowing and smiling. Such was their life.
To Johannes all this excitement and these joyful festivities seemed but a motley background against which his own sombre trouble was all the more sharply in relief. Although everybody was concerned about the King and Queen, and no one at all about Little Johannes, he yet found himself and his own sorrow none the less important.
You are aware that these festivities lasted for several weeks, and took place in every town in the land. In the evening of the day about which I last told you, there was a great display of fireworks on the beach, and Johannes, with the entire household, went to see it.
And there, in the midst of all that crowding and shouting, he had, for the first time, a chance to speak with the beloved friend who had caused him so much suffering. Marjon he had not seen, and he knew not if she was gone; but the countess seemed as friendly and as cheerful as ever, and she had not questioned him.
On the terrace from which they watched the golden columns rush skyward with a hiss, and the “pin-wheels” sizzle and fizz, accompanied by the “a-a-a-ahs!” of admiration from the dark, moving mass of people—there, he ventured in an undertone to speak to her.
“What did you really think of me yesterday, Mevrouw?”
“Well,” replied the countess, rather coldly, continuing to look at the fireworks, “you have not come up to my expectations, Johannes.”
“What do you mean? Why not?” asked Johannes, sick at heart.
“Oh, you know very well. I was aware that you had plain connections, and were not descended from a distinguished family; but I hoped to make that good, in some degree, through my own influence. Yet I had not thought you so ordinary as that.”
“But what do you mean?”
The lady cast a disdainful glance upon him.
“Would you care to hear it spoken, word for word? Liaisons, then—with inferiors. And at your age, too. How could you?”
In a flash Johannes comprehended.
“Oh, Mevrouw—but you mistake—completely. I am not in the least enamored of that girl, but formerly she was my little comrade, and she thinks a great deal of me. She saw that I was unhappy yesterday, and then she came to sympathize with me.”
“Sympathize?” asked the countess, hesitatingly, and not without irony, of which Johannes, however, was unconscious.
“Yes, Mevrouw. But for her, I should have done desperate things. She prevented me. She is a brave girl.”
Then he told her still more of Marjon.
Countess Dolores believed him, and became more friendly. In that caressing voice which had caused Johannes so much unhappiness, and which even now completely fascinated him, she asked:
“And why were you so desperate, my boy?”
“Do you not understand? It was because of what you told me yesterday.”
She understood well enough, and Johannes thought it charming in her to be willing to listen so kindly. But although she felt flattered she pretended not to know what he meant—as if such an idea were unthinkable.
“But how can that make you feel so desperate, my boy? I have not said, however, that you must leave my house on account of it.”
“If that should take place, Mevrouw, do you fancy that I could remain with you? Did you think I could endure that? But it is not going to be, is it? It was only a jest. Tell me that it was! You were only teasing me! Tell me that you were only teasing me!”
It was all too clear now, and she could dissemble no longer. Half in kindness, half in compassion, she said:
“But, my boy, my boy, what has got into your head?”
Johannes rested his hand on her arm, and asked, imploringly:
“You were not in earnest, were you?”
But she freed her arm gently, saying:
“Yes, Johannes, I was in earnest.”
And now he knew that he was hoping against hope.
“Is there no hope for me?”
The countess smilingly shook her head.
“No, dear boy, not the least. Put the thought quite away from you.”
The last of the rockets rushed up with a startling hiss, to burst in the black sky with a soft puff, and expire in a shower of brilliant sparks. Then it was all over. The band played “Wilhelmus of Nassau,” and the dark throng surged and pressed more vehemently, while on all sides the street-boys whistled shrilly and shouted to one another: “J-a-a-a-n!” and “Gerrèt!”
Johannes, stunned by renewed pain, passed on through the cheering like one deafened and stupefied.
His hostess, now full of sympathy, said:
“Do you remember, Johannes, what we promised Father Canisius? He was to teach you who Jesus is, was he not? Will you go to church with me to-morrow? That will best console you.”
A wicked thought passed through Johannes’ head. He wished to ask a question, but he could not utter the hated name.
“Is any one else going?”
“Yes, the man to whom I am engaged. He also is now convinced that peace is only to be found in the Holy Church. He is Catholic, as are myself and my children.”
Johannes said not another word that evening; but he slept more peacefully than the night before.