Clear the Track! A Story of To-day

"Whom you love," said Dernburg, with bitter irony, "you were about to say."

"Yes, I do love her!" cried Victor, drawing himself up to his full height, and his eye met clearly and openly that of the infuriated man. "This became clear to me the moment when I met again as a blooming girl the child who still lived in my memory. After what you have said nothing is left for me but to leave your house, never to enter it again; but in bidding farewell, I at least challenge your faith in the truth of my feelings for Maia–although she is lost to me."

There was intense anguish, genuine emotion manifest in these last words, which would have convinced anybody else but Dernburg. But that grave, earnest man there at the desk had never known the frivolities of youth, and hence had no idea how to make allowance for its errors. Perhaps, too, he, was convinced at this moment, but he could not pardon any one for presuming to court his darling for the sake of her wealth.

"I am not authorized to judge of your feelings, Sir Count," said he, with a coldness that forbade any further attempt at reconciliation: "and yet I understand perfectly why you should avoid Odensburg after this conversation. I am sorry that we must part thus, meanwhile as things stand, there is no help for it."

Victor answered not a word, but silently bowed and withdrew. Dernburg looked after him moodily.

"He, too!" murmured he half aloud. "The honest, open-hearted fellow, who, in earlier days, did not know the meaning of calculation! Everything goes to destruction in this wild chase after wealth, that they call good fortune!–"

At the foot of the broad staircase, that led to the upper story, stood Wildenrod and Eric, engaged in conversation. The latter had just come in from the park, and, meeting with Oscar, poured out his heart to him.

"I am afraid Cecilia is seriously unwell," said he excitedly. "She complains of severe headache and looks dreadfully pale, but has forbidden me in the most positive manner from having Hagenbach called. She protests that a few hours of undisturbed repose will restore her quicker than anything else. I saw her only a few minutes after her arrival, and have not been able to learn where she has really been, for she preserves an obstinate silence on the subject."

Oscar smiled and shrugged his shoulders. "And you, I suppose, are beside yourself over it. I told you awhile ago, that you must calculate upon the self-will of our spoilt little princess. When Cecile is in a bad humor, she stretches herself on the sofa and will have naught to do with anybody; happily she does not keep in this mood long, I can tell you that for your comfort. Your father, to be sure, is of opinion that you must break her of such whims, but you are not the man for this, my dear Eric. There is nothing, then, left for you to do, but to possess your soul in patience, and already make preliminary studies for the pattern husband, which you will undoubtedly make."

Eric looked at him in amazement. "What has come over you, Oscar? Your face fairly beams with joy. Has something very pleasant happened to you?"

"Who knows–perhaps!" said Oscar, with a flash of his dark eyes. "And therefore I want to take you in hand. You do look desperate. I have always had a great deal of influence over my sister, and shall give her to understand how unwarrantable a thing it is of her to make you taste already the miseries of the married state–properly she has no right to do this, until after the wedding is over. You see if she does not appear at dinner in as good spirits as ever, and then you, too, I trust, will wear a different face–you poor, maltreated lover, who take so much to heart the caprices of his ladye-love."

He laughed with a superior air, and waving back a salutation, he mounted the stair. Eric looked at him, shaking his head dubiously. Such radiant gayety of mood was not at all natural to Oscar von Wildenrod, who was hardly recognizable to-day. What could have happened to him?

Up in the parlor, the Baron was met by his sister's maid, who informed him that her lady had given her strict orders not to allow her to be disturbed, under any circumstances–without exception, no one was to be admitted. Not even Herr Dernburg.

"Pshaw, such orders do not include me, you know, Nannon," said Wildenrod, cutting her speech short, without ceremony. "I want to speak to my sister. Open the door!"

Nannon courtesied, and obeyed, for she knew very well that the Baron was not one to brook contradiction. Without further ceremony, he entered his sister's chamber, which was next door.

Cecilia lay upon the sofa, with her face buried in a cushion. She did not stir, although she must have heard the opening and shutting of the door, but her brother evinced no surprise at this, and quietly drew nearer.

"Are you once more in an ill-humor, Cecile?" he asked, still in a playful tone. "You really do treat Eric in a most unwarrantable manner. He has just been pouring his laments into my ears."

Cecilia remained silent and motionless, until Wildenrod finally lost patience.

"Will you not at least have the goodness to look at me? I should like to ask you in general–" he hushed, for his sister suddenly sat bolt upright, and he looked into a face so pale and distorted, that he almost shrank back in dismay.

"I have something to say to you, Oscar," said she, softly. "To yourself alone. Nannon is in the parlor–send her away, that we may be undisturbed."

Oscar knitted his brows,–he could not yet believe that anything serious was in question; but in his joyous mood, he was more inclined than usual to indulge the whim of another. He therefore went into the parlor, sent the maid away on a message, and then turned back.

"Am I finally to learn what all that signifies?" he asked, impatiently. "Where in the world were you, Cecile, and what means this early morning trip to the mountains? Dernburg has already noticed it with much displeasure! You must know that Odensburg is not the place for such escapades."

Cecilia had gotten up, and said not a word in her own defense, but breathed out in a whisper:

"I have been on the Whitestone."

"On the Whitestone?" exclaimed Oscar. "What foolhardiness! What incredible rashness!"

"Let that be, the question is about something else," she interrupted him vehemently. "I met up there with–with that friend of Eric's youth, and he has said things to me,–Oscar, what happened between you two the first time that you met?"

"Nothing!" said the Baron, coldly. "Perhaps I did see him then; it is possible; one easily overlooks such people. At all events, I did not speak with him, and did not know that he was witness of a painful event that took place on that evening."

"What sort of an event was it?"

"Nothing for your ears, my dear, and therefore I should not like Runeck to talk with you on the subject. By the way, tell me exactly what he did say."

The question was apparently thrown off indifferently, and yet keen suspense was apparent in the dark eyes of the questioner.

"He seemed to take for granted my cognizance of the affair, and passed on to make insinuations which I did not rightly understand, but behind which looked something horrible."

"How? Did he dare to?" said Oscar, flaring up.

"Yes, he did dare to impugn your honor, and treat me as your accomplice. He spoke of knowing more about your life than would be agreeable to you; he called us adventurers–do you hear? adventurers! But you will have your revenge, will give him the answer that he deserves, and avenge both yourself and me!"

Wildenrod had turned pale. He stood there with darkened brow and clinched fists, but he was silent. The passionate outburst of indignation, and wrath, that Cecilia had looked and hoped for, did not come.

"Did he actually say that to you?" he slowly inquired at last.

"Word for word! And you–you make no answer?"

Wildenrod had recovered his self-possession. He shrugged his shoulders with a mocking air of superiority. "What answer am I to make? Would you have me take such nonsense seriously?"

"He was in sober earnest, and if, as he maintained, proofs are lacking up to this time–"

"Actually?" Oscar laughed, scornfully and triumphantly, while he drew a deep, long sigh of relief.

"Well, let him search for those proofs; he will not find them!"

Cecilia supported herself on the back of the chair by which she stood. That sigh of relief had not escaped her, and her eyes were fixed upon her brother in deadly anguish.

"Have you no other answer, when your honor is assailed? Will you not call Runeck to account?"

"That is my affair! Leave it to me to get even with that man! What is it to you?"

"What is it to me, when you and I both receive a deadly insult?" cried Cecilia, beside herself. "To call us adventurers, to whom Odensburg is to fall a prey. Shall a man dare to say such a thing and go unpunished? Oscar, look me in the eye! You shrink from chastising that man. You are afraid of him! Alas! alas!"

She broke out into a wild and passionate fit of sobbing. Oscar stepped quickly up to her, and his voice fell to a low and angry whisper.

"Cecilia, use your reason! You behave like a madwoman. What has come over you, anyhow? You have been like a different person since this morning."

"Yes, since this morning!" repeated she passionately. "Since I awoke, and oh! what a bitter awakening! Do not evade me! You told me that our fortune was gone, and I was thoughtless enough not once to inquire how it came, that, in spite of this, we lived on a grand scale. When was it lost? In what way? I will know!"

Wildenrod looked at her darkly, that threatening tone in his sister was as new to her as her whole behavior; he must henceforth give up treating her as a child.

"Would you know when our fortune was lost?" asked he roughly. "At the time when our house broke with a crash. And our father–laid hands on himself."

"Our father!" The eyes of the young girl opened wide, and were full of horror. "He did not die from–a stroke of apoplexy?"

"That was what they told the world, the neighborhood, and you, the eight-year old child–I know better. Our estate had long been involved in debt, ruin was only a question of time, and when it actually came, father seized his pistol–and left us behind–beggars."

As unsparing as these words sounded, there was an undercurrent of dull grief in them, showing that the man still suffered at the recollection, after the lapse of twelve years.

Cecilia did not shriek, did not weep, her tears seeming suddenly to be stanched. She only asked dispiritedly: "And then?"

"Then the honor of our name was saved by the personal interposition of the king. He bought the estate and satisfied the creditors. Your mother obtained a pension from his bounty, and alms of residence in the place where she had been mistress, and I–well I went out into the wide world, to seek my fortune."

A momentary silence followed; Cecilia had dropped into a chair, and had clasped both hands before her face. Finally Wildenrod resumed: "That hits you hard, I well believe, but at the time it hit me yet harder. I had no suspicion of how it stood with us, and now to be snatched from supposed wealth, from a brilliant station in life, from a grand career, in order to be confronted by poverty and misery–you do not know what that means. They offered me this and that office, either in the postal service or as collector of taxes in some remote province, offered me, whose glowing ambition had dreamed of the highest aims, beggarly positions, in which body and soul would have been destroyed in the tread-mill of a wretched existence. I was not made for that. I cast everything behind me and forsook Germany, to at least save appearances, and produce the impression that the sale of property and my resignation of office had been voluntary."

Cecilia slowly let her hands drop, and straightened herself up. "And yet you maintained your position in society? We were regarded as rich the three years that I passed with you, and were surrounded by splendor and luxury."

Wildenrod had no answer to this timid and reproachful question; he avoided meeting his sister's eye.

"Let that be, Cecilia!" said he after a while. "It was a fierce, desperate struggle to maintain that station which I did not want to give up at any price, and many a thing happened in so doing that had better not be talked about. But I had no choice. In the struggle for existence it is either sink or swim. Never mind!" He took a long breath. "Now all that trouble is over, you are Eric's betrothed bride and I–have something delightful to communicate to you."

He did not, however, get the opportunity to make his communication at present, for at the door of the parlor a gentle knock was heard, and directly afterwards Eric's voice asked:

"May I come in at last?"

"Eric," exclaimed Cecilia in dismay. "I cannot see him–not now!"

"You must talk with him," whispered Oscar softly, but dictatorially. "Is your behavior to strike him as yet more peculiar? Only for a few minutes."

"I cannot! Tell him, I am sick, or asleep, or anything you choose!"

She wanted to spring to her feet, but her brother again drew her down upon her seat, while he called out in a cheerful tone:

"Just come in, Eric! Here am I–being indulged with a half-hour's audience, by this gracious lady!"

"So I heard from Nannon!" said Eric, in a reproachful tone, as he entered, after passing through the parlor. "Is your door to remain locked to me, when it is open to Oscar? Dear me, how pale and disturbed you look! What happened on that unfortunate expedition? I implore you, speak!"

He had seized her hand and looked into her face, with deep solicitude. Her little hand trembled in his, but there followed no answer.

"You ought rather to scold her, although I have already done so sufficiently myself," said Wildenrod. "Do you know where she has been this morning? Why, on top of the Whitestone!"

"Lord of heaven!" cried Eric, horrified. "Is that true, Cecile?"

"Literally true! Of course she was dizzy on the way back, came down half dead and is now sick from overexertion and the agony endured. She was ashamed to confess to you and the doctor, but you had to learn about it."

"Cecilia, how could you treat me so?" said the young man reproachfully. "Did you not think of my distress, my despair, if anything had happened to you? Had I only suspected that it was more than a jest that time when you threatened to climb it, in your talk with Egbert and me–what is the matter with you?"

At the mention of that name, Cecilia had shuddered; now a couple of tears rolled over her cheeks, while she murmured: "Pardon me, Eric–pardon me!"

Eric had never before seen his beloved weep, nor ever heard her plead for pardon. With overflowing tenderness he kissed her hands. "My Cecile, my darling girl, I am not scolding you, I only beg of you, never, never again to undertake such an adventure. You promise me that, do you not? Done! And now–"

"Now we will indulge her with a little rest. Try to sleep a few hours, Cecile; that will soothe your overtaxed nerves. Come, Eric!"

The latter followed, evidently very unwillingly, but since Cecilia, too, urged him to go with feverish impatience, he submitted. Oscar accompanied him as far as the stairs, and then went into his own room. Hardly, however, had the sound of the young man's steps died away outside, than he returned to his sister, after bolting the parlor door.

"How can you be so wanting in self-control?" said he, in a suppressed voice. "A blessed thing it was that I was by your side. Under these circumstances, the best thing to do was to make a clean breast of your mountain adventure. But the thing now is to ward off another danger. Without proof, Runeck will not venture to undertake anything against us, and meanwhile things are coming to a pass that must necessitate a rupture between him and Dernburg. Until then–well, I have been equal to worse emergencies!" These last words once more betrayed all the rash self-confidence of the man, who had already often staked everything upon the one card and won the game.

Cecilia had risen from her seat; her eyes were fastened upon him, with a singular expression in them. "Then we shall be no more at Odensburg," said she. "Do not flare up so, Oscar! I do not want to know what you conceal from me; what you said to me was enough. You must arm yourself against a danger that threatens you on the part of Runeck–he told the truth, then–he can accuse you. But I shall not be an adventuress, who has thrust herself in here and who will one day be driven away in shame and disgrace–do you hear?–I shall not! Let us begone, no matter whither, under some pretext or other–only away from here, at any price!"

"Are you out of your senses?" cried Wildenrod, while he seized her arm, as though he had to hinder her from taking to flight that very moment. "Away? Whither? Think you that I can again open to you our former mode of life? That is past–my sources of revenue are at an end!"

"I hate to think of those sources of revenue," cried Cecilia, trembling. "I want to work–"

Oscar laughed aloud and bitterly. "With those hands, perhaps? Do you know, what it is to toil for daily bread? One has to be brought up to it–people like us would starve at it."

"I cannot stay here, though, now, when my eyes are opened, I cannot! Do not try to force me, else I'll tell Eric this very hour, that I do not love him, never have loved him; that our engagement has been solely your work."

Oscar turned pale. Cecilia had outgrown his power, nothing was to be effected here by commands and threats, so he caught at a last expedient.

"Do so, then," said he suddenly with a cold, resolute look, "destroy yourself and me with you! For, so far as I am concerned the question here is 'to be or not to be.' An hour ago I became engaged to Maia."

"To whom?" Cecilia looked at him, as though she did not comprehend his words.

"To Maia. She loves me, and all left for me to do now, is to obtain Dernburg's consent. If you break with Eric, and tell him the truth, then to me, too, Odensburg will be closed forever and then–I follow the example of our father."

"Oscar!" It was a shriek of horror.

"I'll do it, my word upon it! Think you that it has been easy for me to lead the life of an adventurer, for me, a Wildenrod? Do you know what I suffered before it came to that? How often I sought afterwards to burst my bonds and soar upwards? Always in vain! And now at last deliverance draws near, salvation through the hand of a sweet child, now, at last, I grasp the long-sought, so ardently desired happiness–and at the very moment, when I am about to clasp it in my arms, it is again to be torn from me! Am I to be thrust back and put under the old ban? That is what I cannot endure. Rather the end!"

There was an iron determination upon his features and in his tone; that was no empty threat. Cecilia shuddered.

"No," whispered she, with failing voice. "No, no, anything but that!"

"Is what I require of you anything so dreadful?" asked Wildenrod, more mildly. "You are only to be silent and forget this unhappy hour! I wanted to save you from the life into which I had to lead you, ere your eyes were opened to its nature, and now I save myself with you. I cast behind me the past, and begin a better life. Here at Odensburg a grand new field opens before me, and Dernburg is to find in me what his son could never be to him. You will be Eric's wife; he loves, idolizes you; you can make him happy, and yourself be happy at his side!"

He had stooped over her, and his voice had a tender sound. The eyes of his sister were uplifted to him with an expression of infinite woe.

"How am I now to endure Eric's presence with his demonstrations of affection? Just now those few minutes put me on the rack. And if I meet Runeck again, and have to read in his eyes the same contempt as I did early this morning, without being able to feel that he is the slanderer of the innocent–contempt from that Runeck!"

This last sentence rang out like a scream. Wildenrod started and fixed a strange look upon her.

"Do you dread his contempt so much?" asked he, slowly. "Rest easy, after that scene he will himself avoid any meeting; independently of that, he enters the family circle no more. Leave everything else to me! You have only to keep silent and make yourself easy. Promise me that."

"Yes," murmured Cecilia almost inaudibly.

Oscar bent down and touched her forehead with his lips. "I thank you! And now I really shall leave you alone, for I see that you can no longer stand this conversation."

He turned to go, but once more paused and gazed intently upon her face. "Egbert Runeck is our foe, a deadly foe, who wants to annihilate you and me, and if I offer him battle it must be to the knife–do not forget that!"

Cecilia gave no answer, but her whole body shook as with an ague, when the door fell to behind her brother. The truth that he no longer sought to conceal from her, had wounded her to the very depths of her soul. The gay glittering world of pleasure and fashion with which alone she had been familiar up to this time, lay shattered at her feet, the rock was riven–what did it hide in its depths?

CHAPTER XII.

THE GOAL IN SIGHT

Weeks had elapsed, spring had taken her leave and summer had come in the full blaze of her glory. At Odensburg, they had already begun preparations for the wedding festivities, which were appointed for the last days in August. After the ceremony a grand entertainment was to take place, to which the Dernburg family were to invite the whole circle of their acquaintance, and immediately afterwards the young couple were to set out on their trip to the South.

The officers and operatives belonging to the Dernburg works purposed to have their share in the festivities also. They wished to do honor to their chief upon occasion of the marriage of his son and heir. The director and Doctor Hagenbach were at the head of a committee, who planned a grand festal parade, and all had gone into the affair with spirit.

But in spite of these joyful preparations, there rested, as it were, a cloud over the Manor-house and the Dernburg family. The chief himself was out of sorts on account of various annoyances, public and private; the approaching elections to the Reichstag were beginning to attract sympathy even at his Odensburg, and he knew, only too well, that his men were being tampered with. Openly, this was not done, most assuredly he held the reins too firmly in his hand for this, but he was not able to steer clear of the secret, and on that very account dangerous, activity, with which the Socialistic party encroached step by step upon his works, that had hitherto been kept so clear of any such tendencies.

Moreover, Eric's health was again causing him grave anxiety; he had been obliged almost entirely to renounce the hope of introducing his son (as he had hoped and desired) to his future calling. The young man was perpetually ailing–needed to have his strength spared just as much now as before he went South. Such a thing as his engaging in systematic work was not to be thought of. Finally came Wildenrod's wooing and Maia's openly acknowledged love for him, which Dernburg had heard of with extreme surprise, yes, almost with indignation.

The Baron had asked her father for her hand, on the very same day that he had declared himself to the young girl, but had met with a much more decided opposition than he had expected. However much Dernburg might have been taken with him personally, Oscar was not the husband that he had selected for his daughter, and the thought of wedding the sixteen-year-old child to a man old enough to be her father, was just as repulsive to him as Maia's reciprocating this passion. His darling's entreaties availed in so far that the original No was rescinded, but just as little was he to be moved to give his consent for a speedy betrothal. He declared with all positiveness that his daughter was still much too young to bind herself already for a lifetime, saying that she must wait and put her feelings to the test; two years hence would be ample time to introduce the subject again.

Wait! That was a fatal, an impossible sentence for this man, with whom every minute counted, and yet, for the present, no alternative was left him, because Maia had been withdrawn from his influence. After that declaration he himself had received a gentle but unmistakable hint, that under these circumstances, daily intercourse between the pair was not to be kept up. But to leave Odensburg now, was equivalent to giving up his game as lost. The thing for him now to do was to be vigilant, and confront the danger which, since that threat of Runeck, had hung over his head like a thunder-cloud. And he must also stand by his sister, in order to be sure that she would keep her word with him–wrested from her, as it had been, almost by force. She was incredibly altered since that unhappy hour. Therefore he had not wanted to understand that hint, and had held his ground; but here Dernburg interposed immediately, with his wonted determination, and under pretext of her paying a visit to a friend of the family, he sent his daughter away, not to return until her brother's marriage took place.