Linda Tressel

"What is the meaning of this?"

"I don't love him. I can't love him. I will do anything else that you please. He may have the house if he wants it. I will promise; – promise never to go away again or to see anybody." But she might as well have addressed such prayers to a figure of stone. On such a matter as this Madame Staubach could not be other than relentless. Even while Linda was kneeling at her feet convulsed with sobs, she told the poor girl, with all the severity of language which she could use, of the vileness of the iniquity of that night's proceedings. Linda had been false to her friend, false to her vows, false to her God, immodest, unclean, had sinned against all the laws by which women bind themselves together for good conduct, – had in fact become a castaway in very deed. There was nothing that a female could do more vile, more loathsome than that which Linda had done. Madame Staubach believed that the time had come in which it would be wicked to spare, and she did not spare. Linda grovelled at her feet, and could only pray that God might take her to Himself at once. "He will never take you; never, never, never," said Madame Staubach; "Satan will have you for his own, and all my prayers will be of no avail."

There were two days such as this, and Linda was still alive and still bore it. On the third day, which was the fifth after her return from Augsburg, Herr Molk came to her, and at his own request was alone with her. He did not vituperate her as her aunt had done, nor did he express any special personal horror at her sin; but he insisted very plainly on the position which she had made for herself. "You see, my dear, the only thing for you is to be married out of hand at once, and then nobody will say anything about it. And what is the difference if he is a little old? girls forget to think about that after a month or two; and then, you see, it will put an end to all your troubles; – to all your troubles." Such were the arguments of Herr Molk; and it must be acknowledged that such arguments were not lacking in strength, nor were they altogether without truth. The little story of Linda's journey to Augsburg had been told throughout the city, and there were not wanting many who said that Peter Steinmarc must be a very good-natured man indeed, if, after all that had passed, he would still accept Linda Tressel as his wife. "You should remember all that of course, my dear," said Herr Molk.

How was it possible that Linda should stand alone against such influence as had been brought to bear against her? She was quite alone, for she would not admit of any intimacy with Tetchen. She would hardly speak to the old woman. She was quite aware that Tetchen had arranged with Ludovic the manner of her elopement; and though she felt no anger with him, still she was angry with the servant whose duplicity had helped to bring about the present misery. Had she not fled with her lover she might then, – so she thought now, – have held her ground against her aunt and against Peter. As things had gone with her since, such obstinacy had become impossible to her. On the morning of the seventh day she bowed her head, and though she did not speak, she gave her aunt to understand that she had yielded. "We will begin to purchase what may be necessary to-morrow," said Madame Staubach.

But even now she had not made up her mind that she would in truth marry the man. She had simply found it again impossible to say that she would not do so. There was still a chance of escape. She might die, for instance! Or she might run away again. If she did that, surely the man would persecute her no further. Or at the last moment she might stolidly decline to move; she might refuse to stand on her legs before the altar. She might be as a dead thing even though she were alive, – as a thing dead and speechless. Oh! if she could only be without ears to hear those terrible words which her aunt would say to her! And then there came another scheme into her mind. She would make one great personal appeal to Steinmarc's feelings as a man. If she implored him not to make her his wife, kneeling before him, submitting herself to him, preferring to him with all her earnestness this one great prayer, surely he would not persevere!

Hitherto, since her return from Augsburg, Peter had done very little to press his own suit. She had again had her hand placed in his since she had yielded, and had accepted as a present from him a great glass brooch which to her eyes was the ugliest thing in the guise of a trinket which the world of vanity had ever seen. She had not been a moment in his company without her aunt's presence, and there had not been the slightest allusion made by him to her elopement. Peter had considered that such allusion had better come after marriage when his power would, as he thought, be consolidated. He was surprised when he was told, early in the morning after that second hand-pledging, by Linda herself that she wanted to see him. Linda came to his door and made her request in person. Of course he was delighted to welcome his future bride to his own apartment, and begged her with as soft a smile as he could assume to seat herself in his own arm-chair. She took a humbler seat, however, and motioned to him to take that to which he was accustomed. He looked at her as he did so, and perceived that the very nature of her face was changed. She had lost the plumpness of her cheeks, she had lost the fresh colour of her youth, she had lost much of her prettiness. But her eyes were brighter than ever they had been, and there was something in their expression which almost made Peter uneasy. Though she had lost so much of her prettiness, he was not on that account moved to doubt the value of his matrimonial prize; but there did come across his mind an idea that those eyes might perhaps bring with them some discomfort into his household. "I am very glad to see you, Linda," he said. "It is very good of you to come to me here. Is there anything I can do for you?"

"There is one thing, Peter Steinmarc, that you can do for me."

"What is that, my dear?"

"Let me alone." As she spoke she clenched her small fist and brought it down with some energy on the table that was close to her. She looked into his face as she did so, and his eyes quailed before her glance. Then she repeated her demand. "Let me alone."

"I do not know what you mean, Linda. Of course you are going to be my wife now."

"I do not wish to be your wife. You know that; and if you are a man you will not force me." She had intended to be gentle with him, to entreat him, to win him by humility and softness, and to take his hand, and even kiss it if he would be good to her. But there was so much of tragedy in her heart, and such an earnestness of purpose in her mind, that she could not be gentle. As she spoke it seemed to him that she was threatening him.

"It is all settled, Linda. It cannot be changed now."

"It can be changed. It must be changed. Tell her that I am not good enough. You need not fear her. And if you will say so, I will never be angry with you for the word. I will bless you for it."

"But, Linda, you did nothing so very much amiss; – did you?" Then there came across her mind an idea that she would lie to him, and degrade herself with a double disgrace. But she hesitated, and was not actress enough to carry on the part. He winked at her as he continued to speak. "I know," he said. "It was just a foolish business, but no worse than that."

Oh heavens, how she hated him! She could have stabbed him to the heart that moment, had the weapon been there, and had she possessed the physical energy necessary for such an enterprise. He was a thing to her so foul that all her feminine nature recoiled from the closeness of his presence, and her flesh crept as she felt that the same atmosphere encompassed them. And this man was to be her husband! She must speak to him, speak out, speak very plainly. Could it be possible that a man should wish to take a woman to his bosom who had told him to his face that he was loathed? "Peter," she said, "I am sure that you don't think that I love you."

"I don't see why you shouldn't, Linda."

"I do not; – not the least; I can promise you that. And I never shall; – never. Think what it would be to have a wife who doesn't love you a bit. Would not that be bad?"

"Oh, but you will."

"Never! Don't you know that I love somebody else very dearly?" On hearing this there came something of darkness upon Peter's brow, – something which indicated that he had been touched. Linda understood it all. "But I will never speak to him again, never see him, if you will let me alone."

"See him, Linda! He is in prison, and will be sent to the quarries to work. He will never be a free man again. Ha! ha! I need not fear him, my dear."

"But you shall fear me. Yes; I will lead you such a life! Peter Steinmarc, I will make you rue the day you first saw me. You shall wish that you were at the quarries yourself. I will disgrace you, and make your name infamous. I will waste everything that you have. There is nothing so bad I will not do to punish you. Yes; you may look at me, but I will. Do you think that you are to trample me under foot, and that I will not have my revenge? You said it was a foolish business that I did. I will make it worse than foolish." He stood with his hands in the pockets of his broad flaps, looking at her, not knowing how to answer her. He was no coward, – not such a coward as to be intimidated at the moment by the girl's violence. And being now thoroughly angry, her words had not worked upon him as she had intended that they should work. His desire was to conquer her and get the best of her; but his thoughts worked slowly, and he did not know how to answer her. "Well, what do you say to me? If you will let me escape, I will always be your friend."

"I will not let you escape," he said.

"And you expect that I shall be your wife?"

"I do expect it."

"I shall die first; yes; – die first. To be your wife! Oh, there is not a beggar in the streets of Nuremberg whom I would not sooner take for my husband." She paused, but again he was at a loss for words. "Come, Peter, think of it. Do not drive a poor weak girl to desperation. I have been very unhappy, – very; you do not know how unhappy I have been. Do not make it worse for me." Then the chord which had been strung so tightly was broken asunder. Her strength failed her, and she burst into tears.

"I will make you pay dearly for all this one of these days, fraulein," said Peter, as, with his hands still in his pockets, he left the room. She watched him as he creaked down-stairs, and went into her aunt's apartments. For a moment she felt disposed to go and confront him there before her aunt. Together, the two of them, could not force her to marry him. But her courage failed her. Though she could face Peter Steinmarc without flinching, she feared the words which her aunt could say to her. She had not scrupled to threaten Steinmarc with her own disgrace, but she could not endure to be told by her aunt that she was degraded.

CHAPTER XIV

Peter Steinmarc, when he went into Madame Staubach's parlour, found that lady on her knees in prayer. He had entered the room without notice, having been urged to this unwonted impetuosity by the severity of the provocation which he had received. Madame Staubach raised her head; but when she saw him she did not rise. He stood there for some seconds looking at her, expecting her to get up and greet him; but when he found that such was not her purpose, he turned angrily on his heel, and went out of the house, up to his office in the town-hall. His services were not of much service to the city on that day, – neither on that day nor on the two following days. He was using all his mental faculties in endeavouring to decide what it might be best for him to do in the present emergency. The red house was a chattel of great value in Nuremberg, – a thing very desirable, – the possession of which Peter himself did desire with all his heart. But then, even in regard to the house, it was not to be arranged that Peter was to become the sole and immediate possessor of it on his marriage. Madame Staubach was to live there, and during her life the prize would be but a half-and-half possession. Madame Staubach was younger than himself; and though he had once thought of marrying her, he was not sure that he was now desirous of living in the same house with her for the remainder of his life. He had wished to marry Linda Tressel, because she was young, and was acknowledged to be a pretty girl; and he still wished to marry her, if not now for these reasons, still for others which were quite as potent. He wanted to be her master, to get the better of her, to punish her for her disdain of him, and to bring her to his feet. But he was not a man so carried away by anger or by a spirit of revenge as to be altogether indifferent to his own future happiness. There had already been some among his fellow-citizens, or perhaps citizenesses, kind enough to compliment him on his good-nature. He had been asked whether Linda Tressel had told him all about her little trip to Augsburg, and whether he intended to ask his cousin Ludovic Valcarm to come to his wedding. And now Linda herself had said things to him which made him doubt whether she was fit to be the wife of a man so respectable and so respected as himself. And were she to do those things which she threatened, where would he be then? All the town would laugh at him, and he would be reduced to live for the remainder of his days in the sole company of Madame Staubach as the result of his enterprise. He was sufficiently desirous of being revenged on Linda, but he was a cautious man, and began to think that he might buy even that pleasure too dear. He had been egged on to the marriage by Herr Molk and one or two others of the city pundits, – by the very men whose opposition he had feared when the idea of marrying Linda was first suggested to him. They had told him that Linda was all right, that the elopement had been in point of fact nothing. "Young girls will be young before they are settled," Herr Molk had said. Then the extreme desirability of the red house had been mentioned, and so Peter had been persuaded. But now, as the day drew near, and as Linda's words sounded in his ears, he hardly knew what to think of it. On the evening of the third day of his contemplation, he went again to his friend Herr Molk.

"Nonsense, Peter," said the magistrate; "you must go on now, and there is no reason why you should not. Is a man of your standing to be turned aside by a few idle words from a young girl?"

"But she told me – You can't understand what she told me. She's been away with this young fellow once, and she said as much as that she'd go again."

"Pshaw! you haven't had to do with women as I have, or you would understand them better. Of course a young girl likes to have her little romance. But when a girl has been well brought up, – and there is no better bringing up than what Linda Tressel has had, – marriage steadies them directly. Think of the position you'll have in the city when the house belongs to yourself."

Peter, when he left the magistrate, was still tossed about by an infinity of doubts. If he should once take the girl as his wife, he could never unmarry himself again. He could not do so at least without trouble, disgrace, and ruinous expense. As for revenge, he thought that he might still have a certain amount of that pleasure in repudiating his promised spouse for her bad conduct, and in declaring to her aunt that he could not bring himself to make a wife of a woman who had first disgraced herself, and then absolutely taken glory in her disgrace. As he went along from Herr Molk's house towards the island, taking a somewhat long path by the Rothe Ross where he refreshed himself, and down the Carls Strasse, and by the Church of St. Lawrence, round which he walked twice, looking up to the tower for inspiration, – he told himself that circumstances had been most cruel to him. He complained bitterly of his misfortune. If he refused to marry Linda he must leave the red house altogether, and would, of course, be ridiculed for his attempt at matrimony; and if he did marry her – Then, as far as he could see, there would be the very mischief. He pitied himself with an exceedingly strong compassion, because of the unmerited hardness of his position. It was very dark when he got to the narrow passage leading to the house along the river, and when there, in the narrowest and darkest part of the passage, whom should he meet coming from Madame Staubach's house, – coming from Linda's house, for the passage led from the red house only, – but Ludovic Valcarm his cousin?

"What, uncle Peter?" said Ludovic, assuming a name which he had sometimes used in old days when he had wished to be impertinent to his relative. Peter Steinmarc was too much taken aback to have any speech ready on the occasion. "You don't say a word to congratulate me on having escaped from the hands of the Philistines."

"What are you doing here?" said Peter.

"I've been to see my young woman," said Ludovic, who, as Peter imagined, was somewhat elated by strong drink.

"She is not your young woman," said Peter.

"She is not yours at any rate," said the other.

"She is mine if I like to take her," said Peter.

"We shall see about that. But here I am again, at any rate. The mischief take them for interfering old fools! When they had got me they had nothing to say against me."

"Pass on, and let me go by," said Peter.

"One word first, uncle Peter. Among you, you are treating that girl as cruelly as ever a girl was treated. You had better be warned by me, and leave off. If she were forced into a marriage with you, you would only disgrace yourself. I don't suppose you want to see her dead at your feet. Go on now, and think of what I have said to you." So Ludovic had been with her again! No; he, Peter Steinmarc, would not wed with one who was so abandoned. He would reject her; – would reject her that very night. But he would do so in a manner that should leave her very little cause for joy or triumph.

We must now go back for a while to Linda and her aunt. No detailed account of that meeting between Linda and Steinmarc, in Steinmarc's room, ever reached Madame Staubach's ears. That there had been an interview, and that Linda had asked Steinmarc to absolve her from her troth, the aunt did learn from the niece; and most angry she was when she learned it. She again pointed out to the sinner the terrible sin of which she was guilty in not submitting herself entirely, in not eradicating and casting out from her bosom all her human feelings, in not crushing herself, as it were, upon a wheel, in token of her repentance for what she had done. Sackcloth and ashes, in their material shape, were odious to the imagination of Madame Staubach, because they had a savour of Papacy, and implied that the poor sinner who bore them could do something towards his own salvation by his own works; but that moral sackcloth, and those ashes of the heart and mind, which she was ever prescribing to Linda, seemed to her to have none of this taint. And yet, in what is the difference? The school of religion to which Madame Staubach belonged was very like that early school of the Church of Rome in which material ashes were first used for the personal annoyance of the sinner. But the Church of Rome in Madame Staubach's day had, by the force of the human nature of its adherents, made its way back to the natural sympathies of mankind; whereas in Madame Staubach's school the austerity of self-punishment was still believed to be all in all. During the days of Steinmarc's meditation, Linda was prayed for and was preached to with an unflagging diligence which, at the end of that time, had almost brought the girl to madness. For Linda the worst circumstance of all was this, that she had never as yet brought herself to disbelieve her aunt's religious menaces. She had been so educated that what fixed belief she had on the subject at all was in accordance with her aunt's creed rather than against it. When she was alone, she would tell herself that it was her lot to undergo that eternal condemnation with which her aunt threatened her; though in telling herself so she would declare to herself also that whatever that punishment could be, her Creator, let Him be ever so relentless, could inflict nothing on her worse than that state of agony with which His creatures had tormented her in this world.

She was in this state when Tetchen crept up to her room, on that evening on which Peter had been with Herr Molk. "Fraulein," said Tetchen, "you are very unkind to me."

"Never mind," said Linda, not looking up into the woman's face.

"I have done everything in my power for you, as though you had been my own."

"I am not your own. I don't want you to do anything for me."

"I love you dearly, and I love him, – Ludovic. Have I not done everything in my power to save you from the man you hate?"

"You made me go off with him in the night, like a – like a – ! Oh, Tetchen, was that treating me as though I had been your own? Would you have done that for your own child?"

"Why not, – if you are to be his wife?"

"Tetchen, you have made me hate you, and you have made me hate myself. If I had not done that, I should not be such a coward. Go away. I do not want to speak to you."

Then the old woman came close up to Linda, and stood for a moment leaning over her. Linda took no notice of her, but continued by a certain tremulous shaking of her knee to show how strongly she was moved. "My darling," said Tetchen, "why should you send away from you those who love you?"

"Nobody loves me," said Linda.

"I love you, – and Ludovic loves you."

"That is of no use, – of none at all. I do not wish to hear his name again. It was not his fault, but he has disgraced me. It was my own fault, – and yours."

"Linda, he is in the house now."

"Who – Ludovic?"

"Yes; Ludovic Valcarm."

"In the house? How did he escape?"

"They could do nothing to him. They let him go. They were obliged to let him go."

Then Linda got up from her seat, and stood for a minute with her eyes fixed upon the old woman's face, thinking what step she had better take. In the confusion of her mind, and in the state to which she had been reduced, there was no idea left with her that it might yet be possible that she would become the wife of Ludovic Valcarm, and live as such the life of a respectable woman. She had taught herself to acknowledge that her elopement with him had made that quite impossible; – that by what they had done they had both put themselves beyond the pale of such gentle mercy. Such evil had come to her from her secret interviews with this man who had become her lover almost without her own acquiescence, that she dreaded him even though she loved him. The remembrance of the night she had passed with him, partly in the warehouse and partly in the railway train, had nothing in it of the sweetness of love, to make her thoughts of it acceptable to her. This girl was so pure at heart, was by her own feelings so prone to virtue, that she looked back upon what she had done with abhorrence. Whether she had sinned or not, she hated what she had done as though it had been sinful; and now, when she was told that Ludovic Valcarm was again in the house, she recoiled from the idea of meeting him. On the former occasions of his coming to her, a choice had hardly been allowed to her whether she would see him or not. He had been with her before she had had time to fly from him. Now she had a moment for thought, – a moment in which she could ask herself whether it would be good for her to place herself again in his hands. She said that it would not be good, and she walked steadily down to her aunt's parlour. "Aunt Charlotte," she said, "Ludovic Valcarm is in the house."

"In this house, – again!" exclaimed Madame Staubach. Linda, having made her statement, said not a word further. Though she had felt herself compelled to turn informant against her lover, and by implication against Tetchen, her lover's accomplice, nevertheless she despised herself for what she was doing. She did not expect to soften her aunt by her conduct, or in any way to mitigate the rigour of her own sufferings. Her clandestine meetings with Ludovic had brought with them so much of pain and shame, that she had resolved almost by instinct to avoid another. But having taken this step to avoid it, she had nothing further to say or to do. "Where is the young man?" demanded Madame Staubach.