Through Night to Light Part 18

Albert shrugged his shoulders.

"Two years' interest of the sum represented by the two estates of Stantow and Baerwalde. You must know best, of course, what the legacy is worth to you."

"But that is atrocious!" cried Felix, still running about in the room; "atrocious!"

"Don't hollow, Grenwitz; your people might hear you down in the kitchen. Sit down, if you please, and let us talk the matter over like men who know the world."

The unconquerable coolness and the cutting irony with which Albert uttered these words acted like a douche upon Felix's violent agitation.

He sat down, and said, in a calmer tone:

"My aunt will never listen to such a demand."

"I should be sorry, for your sake, and for your aunt's sake, if you were not to accept my offer. I can only make you both responsible for the consequences."

"You speak as if it depended on no one but yourself who was to have the two estates!"

"And on whom else can it depend?" replied Albert, and his lips seemed to grow thinner, his nose more pointed, and his whole face sharper, as he spoke: "I tell you, I have made the net so close and so strong--leaving only a few meshes open on purpose till I should hear your decision--that I can draw it together at any moment, right over your head, and you may struggle as you may; it will not break, but you will die. You know, Grenwitz, that I have rather a good head for such things, and you know also that I have no cause to show you the shadow of generosity."

"Me! I have no personal interest whatever in the whole matter."

"Do you think I am a child, Grenwitz? Don't you want to marry Miss Helen? and are not the two estates to be the dower of the young lady?"

"I marry Helen! Who says so? I don't dream of it."

"Well, then, don't marry her; hand the young beauty over to the man whom you have more reason to hate than all other men--who is even now your favored rival--at least evil report has it so--and who will lose nothing, I am sure, in Miss Helen's eyes, if he can present himself a second time as her cousin, and the lawful heir of a very considerable fortune."

Felix had turned alternately white and red as his adversary was inexorably punis.h.i.+ng him with these words. His vanity, deeply wounded by the allusion to his fatal encounter with Oswald, writhed like a worm on which somebody has trod. He could not but confess that for the moment Albert was by far the stronger of the two, and that he, who was so proud of his cleverness and adroitness, was utterly helpless in the power of an adversary whom he had in reality always despised.

"Lower your demands a little, Timm," he said, in a subdued voice. "I must confess it is a matter of the very greatest importance for me to bury the whole affair in silence, and if it depended on myself alone I might not be unwilling to pay you the sum which you demand. But you know my aunt, and you know that she would rather let matters go on to the last point than to make such an enormous sacrifice. I tell you, Timm, it can't be done; upon my word, it can't be done. And what do you want with so much money at once? You will lose it in a few unlucky nights at roulette, and then you are poorer than you ever were before.

Come, now, I'll make you an offer. We will pay you for one year four hundred dollars a month, and at the end of the year six thousand dollars in a lump."

"Altogether ten thousand eight hundred dollars," replied Albert. "Won't do; and besides, what security can you give me that all the payments will be made?"

"The doc.u.ments, which in the mean time you may retain in your possession and which you are not expected to hand over till the six thousand dollars are paid."

"Well!" said Albert, "it is not much; but among good friends we ought not to insist too strictly. I accept."

"Let us make it out in writing."

"Why? If we do not wish to keep our word, we'll break it, anyhow; and besides, a paper of that kind might, if it should fall into the hands of the wrong person, commit the family of Grenwitz more seriously than they would like, and would, after all, but put one more weapon in my hands. You see I am perfectly candid."

"_Bon!_" said Felix. "Do you want the first four hundred at once?"

"I should think so."

Felix rose, took one of the lights, and went to a bureau which was standing back in the room, opened a drawer, took a few packages of bank-notes from it and placed them on the table before Albert.

"Count them!"

"It is not necessary," said Albert, slipping the parcel into his pocket; "your aunt never makes a mistake in counting. Well, Grenwitz, that matter is nicely arranged; now let us have a bottle of wine upon it--I have talked so much I am quite thirsty. If you permit me I will ring the bell."

"Pray do so!"

Felix ordered the servant who came to bring a bottle of Hock and two gla.s.ses.

Felix was rather pleased to see that Albert was in better humor; he had another question to ask yet, which no one could answer as well as he could.

"You have seen, Timm," he said, filling the gla.s.ses, "that I have met you half way, as far as I could. One service is worth another. Will you do me a favor?"

"Let us hear."

"Then tell me, how is little Marguerite?"

"What interest have you in her?"

"Well, I do have an interest in her."

"And why do you think I know anything about her?"

"Because I have observed you both at Grenwitz, and besides--well, for divers other reasons."

"For instance?"

"I will be frank with you. From sheer ennui I had begun at Grenwitz already to pay her some attentions, and afterwards, during my sickness, I saw still more of the little thing, till it ended in my thinking the girl really very charming and prodigiously attractive. But she pretended to be so very reserved that I suspected at once she had a serious attachment. Now I cannot think of any one else who could have been in my way but yourself."

"Very complimentary," said Albert. "I am, indeed, as good as engaged to the young lady."

"But, Timm, are you going to run into your ruin with your eyes open?

You and a wife! and worse than that, a poor wife!--what has become of your former principles? Upon my word, I should not have thought you could be so mad."

"Nor I, myself," replied Albert, emptying his gla.s.s and filling it again.

"Are you in love with the girl?"

"There you ask me more than I know myself."

"Look here, Timm, I will make you an offer. We are, it seems, in the way of speculating. Let me have the girl, and I a.s.sume the three hundred dollars which you have borrowed from the poor little thing."

"Who says so?" said Albert, furiously.

"Your fury just now, for one; besides that, however, little Louisa, Helen's maid, and my own man's lady love, who happened to see it, when Marguerite gave you the money in the park at Grenwitz."

"Nonsense!" said Albert, who could not repress his anger at this inconvenient exposure.

"Don't be angry!" said Felix; "rather be glad that you find somebody who is willing to relieve you of this troublesome burden. What do you say?"

"We will talk about that another time," said Albert, rising and taking his hat. "Farewell, Grenwitz."

"Good-by, Timm! Be reasonable, and come and see your old comrade as soon as you can."