"By the way, Cousin," cried a sharp, high voice, over Prince Emil"s shoulder, a voice issuing from a pair of very thin lips shaded by a reddish moustache, "do you know that you have the very model of this picture on your own estates?"

The Countess, with a strangely abrupt, nervous movement, pushed the copy aside and hastily turned to replace her own portrait on the wall.

The gentlemen tried to aid her, but she rejected all help, though she was not very skillful in her task, and consequently was compelled to keep her back turned to the group a long time.

"It is possible--I cannot remember," she replied, while still in this position. "I cannot know the children of all my tenants."

"Yes," the jarring voice persisted, "it is a boy who is roaming about near your little hunting-castle."

Madeleine von Wildenau grew ghastly pale.

"Apropos of that hunting box," the gentleman added--he was one of the disinherited Wildenaus--"you might let me have it, Cousin. I"ll confess that I"ve recently been looking up the old rat"s nest. Schlierheim will lease his preserves beyond the government forests, but only as far as your boundaries, and there is no house. My brother and I would hire them if we could have the old Wildenau hunting-box. We are ready to pay you the largest sum the thing is worth. You know it formerly belonged to our branch of the family, and your husband obtained it only forty years ago. At that time it was valueless to us, but now we should like to buy it again."

The Countess shivered and ordered more wood to be piled on the fire.

She had unconsciously drawn nearer to Prince Emily as if seeking his protection. Her shoulder touched his. She was startlingly pale.

"The recollection of her husband always affects her in this way," the prince remarked.

"Well, we will discuss the matter some other time, _belle cousine_!"

said Herr Wildenau, sipping a gla.s.s of Chartreuse which the servant offered.

Prince Emil"s watchful gaze followed the little scene with the closest attention.

"Did you not intend to have the little castle put in order for your father"s residence, as the city air does not agree with him in his present condition?" he said, with marked emphasis.

"Yes, certainly--I--we were speaking of it a short time ago," stammered the Countess. "Besides, I am fond of the little castle. I should not wish to sell it."

"Ah, you are _fond_ of it. Pardon me--that is difficult to understand!

I thought you set no value upon it--the whole place is so neglected."

"That is exactly what pleases me--I like to have it so," replied the Countess in an irritated tone. "It does not need to have everything in perfect order. It is a genuine forest idyl!"

"A forest idyl?" repeated the cousin. "H"m, Ah, yes! That"s a different matter. Pardon me. Had I known it, I would not have alluded to the subject!" His keen gray eyes glittered with a peculiar light as he kissed her hand and took his leave.

The others thought they must now withdraw also, and the Countess detained no one--she was evidently very weary.

The prince also took leave--for the sake of etiquette--but he whispered, with an expression of friendly anxiety, "I will come back soon." And he kept his promise.

An hour had pa.s.sed. Madeleine von Wildenau, her face still colorless, was reclining on a divan in a simple home costume.

Prince Emil"s first glance sought the little table on which stood the crayon picture of the infant Christ--it had vanished.

The Countess followed his look and saw that he missed it--their eyes met. The prince took a chair and sat down by her side, as if she were an invalid who had just sustained a severe operation and required the utmost care. He himself was very pale. Gently arranging the pillows behind her, he gazed sympathizingly into her face.

"Why did you not tell me this before?" he murmured, almost inaudibly, after a pause. "All this should have been very differently managed!"

"Prince, how could I suppose that you were so generous--so n.o.ble"--she could not finish the sentence, her eyes fell, the beautiful woman"s face crimsoned with shame.

He gazed earnestly at her, feeling at this moment the first great sorrow of his life, but also perceiving that he could not judge the exquisite creature who lay before him like a statue of the Magdalene carved by the most finished artist--because he could not help loving her in her sweet embarra.s.sment more tenderly than ever.

"Madeleine," he said, softly, and his breath fanned her brow like a cooling breeze, "will you trust me? It will be easier for you."

She clasped his hand in her slender, transparent fingers, raising her eyes beseechingly to his with a look of the sweetest feminine weakness, like a young girl or an innocent child who is atoning for some trivial sin. "Let me keep my secret," she pleaded, with such touching embarra.s.sment that it almost robbed the prince of his calmness.

"Very well," he said, controlling himself with difficulty. "I will ask no farther questions and will not strive to penetrate your secret. But if you ever need a friend--and I fear that may happen--pray commit no farther imprudences, and remember that, in me, you possess one who adds to a warm heart a sufficiently cool head to be able to act for you as this difficult situation requires! Farewell, _chere amie_! Secure a complete rest."

Without waiting for an answer, like the experienced physician, who merely prescribes for his patients without conversing with them about the matter, he disappeared.

The countess was ashamed--fairly oppressed by the generosity of his character. Would it have been better had she told him the truth?

Should she tell him that she was married? Married! Was she wedded?

Could she be called a wife? She had played a farce with herself and Freyer, a farce in which, from her standpoint, she could not believe herself.

On their flight from Ammergau they had hastened to Prankenberg, surprised the old pastor in his room, and with Josepha and a coachman who had grown gray in the service of the Wildenau family for witnesses, declared in the presence of the priest that they took each other for husband and wife.

The old gentleman, in his surprise and perplexity, knew not what course to pursue. The countess appealed to the rite of the Tridentine Council, according to which she and Freyer, after this declaration, were man and wife, even without a wedding ceremony or permission to marry in another diocese. Then the loyal pastor, who had grown gray in the service of the Prankenbergs, as well as of his church, could do nothing except acknowledge the fact, declare the marriage valid, and give them the marriage certificate.

So at the breakfast-table, over the priest"s smoking coffee, the bond had been formed which the good pastor was afterwards to enter in the church register as a marriage. But even this outward proof of the marriage between the widowed Countess Wildenau and the Ammergau wood-carver Freyer was removed, for the countess had been right in distrusting her father and believing that his advice concerning the secret marriage was but a stratagem of war to deter her from taking any public step.

On returning from the priest"s, her carriage dashed by Prince von Prankenberg"s.

Ten minutes after the prince rushed like a tempest into the room of the peaceful old pastor, and succeeded in preventing the entry of the "scandal," as he called it, in the church register. So the proofs of the fact were limited to the marriage certificate in the husband"s hands and the two witnesses, Josepha and Martin, the coachman--a chain, it is true, which bound Madeleine von Wildenau, yet which was always in her power.

What was this marriage? How would a man like the prince regard it?

Would it not wear a totally different aspect in the eyes of the sceptic and experienced man of the world than in those of the simple-hearted peasant who believed that everything which glittered was gold? Was such a marriage, which permitted the exercise of none of the rights and duties which elevate it into a moral inst.i.tution, better than an illegal relation? Nay, rather worse, for it perpetrated a robbery of G.o.d--it was an illegal relation which had stolen a sacred name!

But--what did this mean? To-day, for the first time, she felt as if fate might give the matter the moral importance which she did not willingly accord it--as if the Deity whose name she had abused might take her at her word and compel her to turn jest into earnest.

Her better nature frankly confessed that this would be only moral justice! To this great truth she bowed her head as the full ears bend before the approaching hail storm.

Spite of the chill autumn evening, there was an incomprehensible sultriness in the air of the room.

Something in the brief conversation with Herr Wildenau and especially in the manner in which the prince, with his keen penetration, understood the episode, startled the Countess and aroused her fears.

Why had Herr Wildenau gone to the little hunting-box? How had he seen the child?

Yet how could she herself have been so imprudent as to display the picture? And still--it was the infant Christ of Raphael. Could she not even have one of Raphael"s heads in her drawing-room without danger that some one would discover a suspicious resemblance!

She sprang from the cushions indignantly, drawing herself up to her full height. Who was she? What did she dread?

"Anything but cowardice, Madeleine," she cried out to herself. "Woe betide you, if your resolution fails, you are lost! If you do not look the brute gossip steadily in the eye, if so much as an eye-lash quivers, it will rend you. Do not be cowardly, Madeleine, have no scruples, they will betray you, will make your glance timid, your bearing uncertain, send a flush to your brow at every chance word.

But"--she sank back among her cushions--"but unfortunately this very day the misfortune has happened, all these people may go away and say that they saw the Countess Wildenau blush and grow confused--and why?--Because a child was mentioned--"

She shuddered and cowered--a moan of pain escaped her lips!

"Yet you exist, my child--I cannot put you out of the world--and no mother ever had such a son. And I, instead of being permitted to be proud of you, must feel ashamed.

"Oh, G.o.d, thou gavest me every blessing: the man I loved, a beautiful child--all earthly power and splendor--yet no contentment, no happiness! What do I lack?" She sat a long time absorbed in gloomy thought, then suddenly the cause became clear. She lacked the moral balance of service and counter-service.

That was the reason all her happiness was but theft, and she was forced, like a thief, to enjoy it in fear and secrecy. Her maternal happiness was theft--for Josepha, the stranger, filled a mother"s place to the boy, and when she herself pressed him to her heart she was stealing a love she had not earned. Her conjugal happiness was a theft, for so long as she retained her fortune, she was not permitted to marry! That was the curse! Wherever she looked, wherever she saw herself, she was always the recipient, the pet.i.tioner--and what did she bestow in return? Where did she make any sacrifice? Nothing--and nowhere! Egotism was apparent in everything. To enjoy all--possess all, even what was forbidden and sacrifice nothing, must finally render her a thief--in her own eyes, in those of G.o.d, and who knows, perhaps also in those of men, should her secret ever be discovered!