Georg grew purple in the face and looked at his plate. Laura clapped her hands:
“And he blushes like a little girl!”
Count Alexis followed this flirtation with languid eyes and a little tired smile:
“Well, that is something our good Georg has not inherited from you.”
Evidently the Count had no illusions.
Then there was a new silence, only interrupted by the almost inimical ringing of glasses and knives. But Laura did not give in. She looked about her with bright defiant eyes. Then she suddenly turned to Hedvig and began to talk of Levy. It was really deliciously impudent of her to start just that topic. Laura teased Hedvig a little about her lawyer, warned her in playful phrases against his business genius and then said a few malevolent little truths about Jews in general.
“You see Alexis is an anti-Semite and I’ve caught it from him,” she ended up with a soft smile.
Hedvig answered nothing. She only turned white in the face. Even her perfect bare shoulders grew whiter and seemed to radiate a chill through the dark velvet of her dress. But her black eyes stared with a shy irresolute hatred into her sister’s restless eyes.
Stellan was afraid lest Hedvig should suddenly tell Laura some awful truth; he was so afraid that his glass jingled against the plate as he raised it. But Laura had already noticed a haughty expression of disgust on Elvira’s face and turned at once to her sister-in-law. She began innocently far far away in Africa, on the Nile, during Stellan’s and Elvira’s famous wedding trip. From there she went over to the little panther cubs that they had brought home and which she had seen during her call at Trefvinge. Yes, they were too sweet, those little panther cubs, though she for her own part would never have dared to take them in her arms and play with them now that they had grown so big. But Elvira had been like a mother to them from the beginning. It was really delightful to see her with her little twins, so one could imagine worse results from a wedding trip. …
That was one for Elvira. If Laura had torn off her clothes and pointed at the scars after the operation knife it could not have been more obvious. But the lady of Trefvinge Castle did not move a muscle. She only muttered quite low—so low that only those nearest to her could hear:
“My dear Laura, now you have stayed long enough in Africa. It would perhaps be good for you to think of a cooler place—say Siberia for instance.”
Laura did not trouble to catch the whisper. After her last bravado she settled down and seemed determined to be bored too.
Count Alexis seemed absentminded during the last part of the conversation. Now his soft and musical voice was heard:
“I wonder if I might have some water. … No thank you, not soda—ordinary water. …”
“Ordinary water?” grunted Peter, suddenly quite amazed.
“Yes, thank you, if you have spring water.”
“Yes, certainly, ha, ha. There is certainly spring water!”
Stellan sent one of the servants for a jug of fresh water, straight from the well.
The Count filled a champagne glass, sipped it a little and leant slightly back with half-closed eyes:
“Water is so pleasant,” he mumbled. “It taste of nothing, absolutely nothing. … And everything is so calm in Sweden. You shoot so surprisingly seldom indoors or in the streets. It is like a sanatorium. And all the ladies look like nurses, charming nurses—except Laura of course. …”
Then Count Alexis’ glance fell upon Old Enoch, who hung over the green sofa opposite him. He started as if a real live person had suddenly stood up, as if there were a hitherto unnoticed guest in the room.
“Whom does this excellent portrait represent?”
“It is our grandfather,” Stellan hastened to answer. “Enoch Selamb, a landed proprietor. He was a clever agriculturist in his day.”
The time was past when Stellan indulged in any playful truths about his ancestors.
Peter had already in secret found time to drink a good deal, and looked somewhat bloated.
“He was a damned rascal,” he cut in contentedly, “a real old rascal. You couldn’t cheat him. …”
He stopped when Stellan trampled on his feet and turned back to his bird and his wine. But Laura skittishly made the sign of the cross before her ancestor.
“Old Enoch is our patron saint,” she explained to her husband. “He ought always to have a candle burning before his picture—as before an icon. Thanks to him no Selamb can do really bad business.”
The Count’s glance travelled searchingly round the table and then back to the portrait.
“Hm,” he mumbled, “one can see the likeness.”
There was a pause again and everybody felt old Enoch’s looks directed towards him, even those who had their backs turned to the portrait.
Peter ate and drank for the whole company. The dress coat did not pinch him any more. By Jove, he began to feel at home amongst the guinea-hens and the golden pheasants. Yes this was not a bad show. “May I be damned if I ever sat down with so much money before,” he thought, “Here is Hedvig the Tragedy, who is worth at least three millions. She is lost in her pile of notes as big as herself, and there are Stellan and Elvira who are also expensive creatures, even more expensive than Hedvig, at least five millions if we count Trefvinge as worth three. And Laura, the little minx, weighs as much, if it is true that the Count has sold three big estates in Finland and Estonia.” And then there was himself, Peter the Boss … with Ekbacken and Kolsnäs and a big slice of Selambshof and all his building land and houses. He was the worst of them all, not less than eight millions. And that was calculating absurdly low, almost as if for income tax returns. He scarcely dared to confess to himself how much he owned. And if he added it all together it
