The Undying Past Part 63

The old man looked after him, shaking his head. "What a young scamp it is!" he said, full of admiration. "I was just such another."

Kurt, filled with bitter feelings, climbed up to the attic. He threw himself on his bed to reflect on his position, and also to await the dinner hour. There was baked ham with dumplings for dinner,--a dish which could be cooked in no university town so excellently as in the parental house. It was sad that the ham came to an end so soon, and that his father announced there would before long be one less to feed at the table.

When Kurt had composed himself a little, he went the round of neighbouring estates to see what was to be done in the money line.

"How brutal it is," he thought, "that a man's fine ambitions should be chased away by sordid cares!" And while he plodded along the rain-drenched country roads, it became clearer than ever that pessimism was the only philosophy of life worthy of consideration. He resolved to air his views in some great work which should take the form either of "Childe Harold" or "The Philosophy of the Unknown."

Grey clouds raced over the sky, the wind whistled across the furrows, and ravens circled weirdly above the dung-hills. Everything was vast and dreary, like his mood.

The proceeds of his first day's crusade was a ten-mark piece, lent by the newly appointed bailiff at Ellernthal--a novel of Zola's, also lent, and a fit of the blues.

The second day he fared no better, and on the third there seemed to be little doubt that his credit for ten miles round had been exhausted.

Now he became so utterly disconsolate that he thought of taking his life. But the same day he received a gilt-edged note, which bore a certain family resemblance to Elly's missives, only there was no rosebud. The signature was Hertha von Prachwitz.

"She too?" he thought, and an indescribable feeling of satisfaction ran through his veins.

Hertha urgently requested an interview of ten minutes with him, and named as a place of meeting the churchyard at Wengern, and the hour six in the evening.

"One knows pretty well what those urgent interviews mean," he thought, twisting his moustache with a smile. After all, any one who was invited to a rendezvous with countesses need not despair.

To dodge those who might spy on his movements, he took a longish walk towards evening, from which he tried to return un.o.bserved, for the churchyard was only a few steps distant from the parsonage.

On the stroke of six he emerged from the shadow of the church porch, and saw Hertha's figure darkly silhouetted in the late twilight as she sat waiting on a tombstone. His heart beat riotously in delighted antic.i.p.ation. He approached her with his hat in his hand. "What a fascination and charm there must be about my person," he reflected, "if even this haughty highflyer succ.u.mbs to it!"

Hertha shot up at sight of him. She wore her old grey cloak, and had drawn the hood over her head and tied it under the chin. She was painfully excited. Her hands clasped the grave railings convulsively.

Her eyes flashed in the darkness.

"You will think that this is a strange proceeding, Herr Kandidat," she said, in a trembling voice.

"Oh no, not at all," he a.s.sured her with a gallant bow.

"Ordinarily," she went on, "girls like me are not in the habit of appointing to meet people...."

She halted. There was something in her tone which made him feel a trifle less triumphant; it was almost as if she would have said, "people of your position."

"Wait a bit," he thought; "I'll soon bring her down."

"But your stupid conduct to my cousin," she continued, "compels me to speak very seriously to you."

Kurt felt very much as if a bucket of cold water had been hurled at him. It was evident what had happened. Elly had told tales, and Hertha, whether jealous or not, had made up her mind to put obstacles in his way.

"I beg pardon, countess," he said, raising his hand in dignified protest. "This is a matter of a very private nature. I don't know how far and by what means you have gained the confidence of your cousin Fraulein Elly, and I, for my part, cannot flatter myself that I have your confidence; therefore, if you will allow me----"

He raised his hat as a sign that he desired to end the conversation.

"Listen to me, if you please, Herr Kandidat," said Hertha, and her eyes flashed wrathfully. "If you adopt this tone towards me, it will be the worse for you."

"You talk in riddles," he replied, with a smirk.

"I am ready to express myself as plainly as you like," said Hertha. "I have run over here secretly, and at great risk, and you thought of going away and leaving me in the lurch like a naughty schoolboy."

In his most cavalier style he begged her pardon, and submitted to hear what was coming.

"Why don't you leave my cousin alone?" asked Hertha, measuring him with a scornful eye from head to toe.

"I love Fraulein Elly," he replied, "and I will annihilate all who thwart my love."

"Don't be so impertinent, Herr Kandidat. No one will believe you."

"They shall be made to believe," he said; "when two young hearts love, who shall come between them?"

Hertha shrugged her shoulders. "Elly does not love you, Herr Kandidat,"

she said.

"I happen to possess proofs to the contrary," he replied, with another polite bow.

"Ah! You mean the silly letters?" asked Hertha. "If she hadn't begun to write them behind my back, I should long ago have put a stop to it.

Yesterday she came to me and implored me to save her, and I mean to save her, Herr Kandidat, even if it should cost me my life."

"Save her from what, if I may venture to ask, countess?"

"From you, Herr Kandidat. She has begged you more than once to leave her in peace, and told you that you frightened her. But you have continued, in spite of that, to bombard her with your crazy letters, verses, and stuff. The verses aren't even original, and the rest is all lies. So now you know what I think, Herr Kandidat."

Kurt gnawed his moustache. It seemed as if the prospect of a double defeat lay before him. But he would not lose the battle without a last struggle.

"My good breeding prevents my answering a lady in the tone which you have chosen to adopt towards me. But I should be glad to know why, if your cousin Fraulein Elly holds me in such detestation, and finds my letters so senseless, has she demeaned herself to invite me to enter into a correspondence with her? And why, up to the present, has she not disdained to answer my letters?"

Hertha bit her lips. It was no easy task to defend Elly's folly.

A silence ensued. The autumn wind moaned in the larches, and brought down with every gust a shower of fine p.r.i.c.kly rain.

Hertha appeared to herself unspeakably stupid and silly. If she had had her riding-whip, she would have loved to bring it about the ears of the youth, who maintained his dandified air, and was straining every muscle to impress her as a model of gentlemanly forbearance. But it would not have helped matters.

"You don't answer me!" exclaimed Kurt Brenckenberg at last, triumphantly. "Then, naturally, I draw my own conclusions."

"Good gracious! Herr Kandidat," said Hertha, elevating her shoulders contemptuously, "do you imagine I am going to dispute with you? Elly has not had my experience of life. She is still a silly young thing, and it was very wrong of you to take advantage of her silliness. She thought that she was bound to answer your letters. That is the long and short of it. And now I will give you a piece of advice. Don't dare come near her again, or write notes, or sing songs in the park, or carry on any more of that nonsense. For if you do, I will tell my brother the whole story, and he will point out to you clearly your duty in the matter. Good evening, Herr Kandidat!"

She drew her skirts together and pa.s.sed by him, with the dead leaves fluttering around her.

For a long time Kurt stared blankly after her. The slender, upright, girlish figure was silhouetted in picturesque outline against the sulphur-coloured sky, and then vanished behind the churchyard wall.

"What a dog's life it is!" he murmured. "One begins to think one has a heart, and then it all comes to nothing."

He sat down on the edge of a grave and brooded. The wind howled, and the dry leaves came whirling down like autumnal spirits. He reflected on fame, heroism, the madness of love, and the perishableness of all earthly things.

"When a man has no money, he is nearly as good as dead," he quoted sadly, and then stood up, for supper-time was drawing near.