Fickle Fortune

'He made use of an expression which displeased me. I called him to account at once; one word led to another, and finally we agreed to settle our little difference by meeting this morning. You see no great damage has been done. I shall perhaps have to wear my hand in a sling for a week or so, and Senden has got off as cheaply, with just a graze on the shoulder.'

'So that is why you stayed all night? Why did you not send a message over to me? I would have gone to you.'

'To act as second? That was not necessary. Our host offered me his services–and as the mourning relative you could always arrive time enough.'

'Edmund, do not speak so lightly on grave subjects,' said Oswald impatiently. 'A duel always involves the hazard of a life.'

Edmund laughed.

'Good heavens! I ought to have made my will, I suppose, have summoned you to my side to take a solemn leave of you, and have left a touching message of farewell for Hedwig? Bah! the thing is to keep one's self as cool as possible, and just trust to one's luck for the rest.'

'You do not appear to have taken your adversary's words so coolly. What was the real ground of offence?'

The young Count's face darkened, and he replied with some warmth of tone:

'The subject of our old Dornau lawsuit was broached. They were joking me about my very practical idea of uniting the contending parties in matrimony. I laughed with them and entered quite freely into the spirit of the joke, until Senden remarked very pointedly that as the two properties were to be joined together so peaceably at last, the great efforts formerly made to this end turned out, after all, to have been unnecessary; it was so much trouble wasted.'

'You know that the Baron proposed to your future wife and was refused,' said Oswald, with a shrug of the shoulders. 'He naturally feels a certain degree of irritation, which he cannot help showing on every occasion.'

'His remark was levelled at my mother,' said Edmund warmly. 'It is no secret that she opposed the marriage between her cousin and Herr Rüstow, and openly declared herself on the side of the angry father. She has, as you know, a lofty idea of her class-privileges, and she then felt it incumbent on her to uphold the principles she professes. This is why I esteem so highly the sacrifice she is now making for me. Senden's speech implied that she had been actuated by interested motives, and had influenced Uncle Francis in the making of his will, in the hope that Dornau might fall to me. Could I submit to that, I ask it of you?'

'You go too far. I do not believe that Senden had any such arrière-pensée.'

'No matter, I understood him in that sense. Why did he not recall his words when I asked for an explanation? It may be that I was rather too warm, but on that point I can brook no insinuations. You reproach me frequently with my heedlessness and frivolity, Oswald, but even they have a limit. Once past that boundary, I am apt to take matters even more to heart than you.'

'I know,' said Oswald slowly. 'There are two subjects on which you feel seriously and deeply–the point of honour and–your mother.'

'The two are one,' retorted Edmund sharply.

'He who offends her by even the shadow of a suspicion rouses all the spirit in me, and makes me desperate.'

He sprang up as he spoke, and stood before his cousin, drawn up to his full height. The habitual gay, careless expression had vanished from his features, giving place to one of set, stern gravity, and his eyes flashed in his passionate excitement.

Oswald was silent. He was standing by the writing-table, and had already grasped the papers, ready to push them aside and draw forth the picture, but as the young Count's last words fell on his ear he paused involuntarily. Why must such a discussion have arisen at this precise moment?

'It never occurred to me that any such interpretation could be placed on that will,' went on Edmund; 'or I should at once, at the time of my uncle's death, have refused the bequest, and never should have allowed the suit to be instituted. If Hedwig and I had remained strangers, and the court had awarded Dornau to me, I believe the calumny would have thriven and prospered, until they had made me out to be the accomplice of a fraud.'

'It is possible to be the victim of a fraud,' said Oswald in a low tone.

'The victim?' repeated the young Count, stepping quickly up to his cousin. 'What do you mean by that?'

Oswald's hand rested heavily on the papers which overlay his great secret, but there was nothing to indicate the emotion within him. His voice was cold and unmoved, as he replied:

'Nothing. I am not alluding to Dornau. We know perfectly well that my uncle acted in accordance with his own will and judgment–but the instrument was drawn up in favour of a nephew, passing over the daughter and her rights. Calumny, of course, takes advantage of the scope afforded it, and hints at undue influence. In such a case, it would, no doubt, be considered only natural that a mother should lay aside any scruples, and act in the interest of her son.'

'But that would have been fortune-hunting of the most flagrant description,' cried Edmund, blazing up anew. 'I really do not understand you, Oswald. How can you speak so indifferently of such a possible view of the case, of the disgrace it would entail? How should you qualify a scheme formed to oust the rightful heir that another might succeed to his place and property? I should call it a swindle, a dishonourable, an infamous action, and the mere thought that such a suspicion should be coupled with the name of Ettersberg makes my blood boil within me.'

Oswald's hand slid slowly from the table, and he stepped back a little into the shadow, beyond the circle irradiated by the lamp.

'Any such suspicion would do you the keenest injustice, truly,' he said emphatically; 'but the world is generally prompt to think evil. No doubt, it often makes evil discoveries. In our sphere especially there are so many dark family histories which lie hidden for years, and then suddenly one day spring to light. So many, who hold a brilliant position and enjoy great consideration, carry about with them the consciousness of guilt which would utterly crush and annihilate them, were it to be found out.'

'Well, I could not do it,' said the young Count, turning his frank, handsome face full upon his cousin. 'I must bear an unsullied brow before the world, must feel myself to be without reproach, that I may breathe freely, and boldly meet the slander I despise–there would be no living for me else. Dark family histories! They are, no doubt, more plentiful than we wot of, but I would suffer no such lurking shadow in our annals, not though I myself must set to work to drag it to light.'

'And suppose silence were imposed on you–for the sake of the family honour?'

'It would probably kill me; for to live with the knowledge that there was a stain on our escutcheon would be, I think, to me a thing impossible!'

Oswald passed his hand across his brow, which was covered with a cold sweat. In keen and terrible suspense he followed his cousin's every movement. Perhaps no interference of his would be necessary; perhaps accident might relieve him of the onerous task which he felt must be fulfilled in one way or another. Edmund had gone up to the writing-table, and as he spoke on, he took up some of the papers unthinkingly, and threw them aside without looking at them. One minute more and he would probably discover the little case, the shape of which must necessarily attract his attention–and then–then would come the catastrophe.

'At all events, it will be seen what view I take of such innuendoes, and the lesson Senden has had will serve for others. Nothing is sacred to calumny, no object, however pure and lofty, not even one which to most minds is the ideal of all that is good.'

'Ideals may fade, idols crumble to the dust,' remarked Oswald. 'You have had no experience of that at present.'

'I was speaking of my mother,' said the young Count, with deep feeling.

Oswald made no reply, but it was well that he was standing in the shade; at least the other saw not the torture this interview inflicted on him. It happened so rarely that Edmund appeared in serious mood, and to-day of all days he was grave and earnest of speech, showing the deeper side of his nature. And all the time his right hand was busy, mechanically turning over the papers on the table, approaching nearer and nearer the fatal spot. Oswald's arm twitched, ready to drag the unsuspecting man back from the abyss which yawned before him–but he checked the impulse, and remained motionless in his place.

'You can understand now why I desire to keep this meeting from my mother's knowledge, notwithstanding its harmless issue.' Edmund continued. 'She would inquire, as you do into its origin, and the truth might wound her. Whilst I am to the fore not the very shadow of offence shall come near her. I would give my life rather than hear her aspersed by a calumnious word–give my life, aye, readily, willingly.'

Separately, one by one, he had taken up the papers and thrown them aside. Now he had come to the last sheet, that beneath which the picture lay, but suddenly Oswald's hand was upon his, grasping it with a grasp of iron, and impeding any further movement.

'What is it?' asked Edmund in astonishment. 'What is the matter with you?'

For all answer, Oswald threw his arm about him and drew him away.

'Come, Edmund, let us go to the sofa yonder.'

'What, you draw me violently from the table simply for that? One would have thought a mine was about to explode. Have you any combustibles, any train laid over there?'

'Possibly,' said Oswald, with a strange smile. 'Let those papers be. Come.'

'Oh, you need fear no indiscretion on my part,' declared the Count, with a sudden outbreak of tetchiness. 'There was no need to place your hand on your papers in that prohibitory manner. I did not look at them, and if I touched them, I did it mechanically. You appear to have secrets, and I, no doubt, am disturbing you when you would wish to be sorting your letters and putting them in order. It will be better for me to go.' He moved away, as though to leave the room; but Oswald held him by the arm, though he tried angrily to free it.

'No, Edmund, you must not leave me so–not to-day, old fellow.'

'Indeed, it is the last evening you have to spend here,' said Edmund, half wrathful, half appeased. 'You are doing all you can to show me how little that affects you.'

'You do me injustice. The separation is more painful to me than you can imagine.'

Oswald's voice shook so audibly that Edmund looked at him in surprise, and all his anger vanished.

'Why, what ails you, Oswald? You are as pale as death, and have seemed so strange all the evening. But I can guess: you have been searching among these letters and papers, which, no doubt, belonged to your parents, and they have awakened many sad memories.'

'Yes, much that is very sad,' said Oswald, drawing a deep breath; 'but it is over now. You are right, they were old memories which put me out of tune. I will drive the troubling thoughts from me, and altogether make an end of them now.'

'Then I really will go,' declared Edmund. 'I forgot that you might still have much to arrange and set in order. We shall meet to-morrow morning. Good-night, Oswald.'

He held out his hand to his cousin, but the latter, assuredly for the first time in his life, took him in his arms, and held him for a moment in a tight embrace.