“And now,” he said, “for the conclusion; I think it is my turn.”
Uncle Ernst looked up, like a lion whose victim has stirred again; the General answered his dark and threatening glance by a melancholy smile, and his deep voice sounded almost soft as he continued:
“It seems to me that we have exchanged the parts which are usually taken by the man of the people and the aristocrat. The man of the people remembers minutely a wrong that was done him a generation back, and has forgiven nothing; the aristocrat has not indeed forgotten, but he has learnt to forgive. Or do you think that he has nothing to forgive? You said one must have experienced what you did on that night, in order to understand it. Well! can you, on the other hand, place yourself in the position of a man who saw, on that night, all that he held honourable and holy, all for which he had lived and for which his ancestors had shed their blood, fall to pieces in shameful ruin, and chaos take its place? But he has learnt more than merely to forgive; he has learnt to value the good qualities of his opponents wherever he can find them; he has learnt no longer to shut his eyes to the weaknesses of his own party; he has seen that the struggle must be fought out on different ground, on the ground of right and justice, and that the victory will remain with that party which understands how to seize first on this ground and to take the strongest root. For this reason the excesses committed by his party find no more inflexible judge than himself; for this reason he demands that everyone shall be in private life an example and pattern of conduct and morals, and shall act justly, let it cost him what it will. What it has cost me to make this advance to you today, you must leave me to decide with myself and with my God—it is more and less than you can understand. Enough that I am here, and ask you to forgive my son, if on this matter, from a false, culpable, but not unnatural regard to the circumstances in which he is born, he has allowed himself to deviate from the straight road that led him to the father of the woman he loved. I ask you not to let the children suffer because the fathers have stood face to face with weapons in their hands; I ask you, in the name of my son, for your daughter’s hand for my son.”
Uncle Ernst started back like a traveller before whom a piece of rock falls, blocking his path, while the precipice gapes near him, and no return is possible.
Without, the storm raged; the clock struck . Uncle Ernst collected himself; the rock must be removed—it must!
“I have sworn that this hand shall wither sooner than that it shall touch the hand of General von Werben.”
“But hardly by the God of goodness and mercy?”
“I have sworn it.”
“Then remember what is written, ‘That man is like the grass, that today is, and tomorrow is cast into the oven.’ We are neither of us any longer young; who knows how soon the morrow will come for us?”
“May it come soon, is my wish!”
“Mine also, perhaps, but till then? Remember that the father’s blessing builds the children’s house; but that we have no power to loose the bonds of two hearts that have found one another without our help—perhaps against our wish and will. Consider that the responsibility of the curse which must ensue from these unhallowed bonds henceforth rests on your head.”
“I have considered it.”
“And I have done my duty.”
The General bowed in his usual stately and dignified manner, and moved, courteously escorted by Uncle Ernst, towards the door. There he stood still:
“One thing more; the failure of consent on the part of the fathers hinders a marriage at least in this case, in which a portionless officer is the suitor. None the less will my son consider himself bound till your daughter herself releases him. I take it for granted that your daughter will not do this, unless her father exercises compulsion over her.”
“I take it for granted also that General von Werben has exercised no compulsion on his son, in obtaining authority from the latter to make the proposal with which he has just honoured me.”
The stern eyes flashed, he had his opponent in his grasp; the crisis must come now. A look of pain passed over the General’s face.
“The supposition would not be quite correct; the sense of duty was stronger in the father than in the son.”
He was gone. The wild fire in the eyes of him who remained behind had changed to a joyful gleam.
“I knew it! The brood are always the same, however they may boast of their virtue. Down! down! down with them!”
He stood there, bending forward, moving his powerful arms, as if his enemy in reality lay at his feet. Then he drew himself up. His arms sank, the gleam disappeared from his eyes. The victory was not his yet; another struggle was before him, the hardest, the struggle with his own flesh and blood.
XIII
For Ferdinanda the night had had no terrors, the morning no darkness. In her soul was brightest day, for the first time for many months; for the first time, indeed, she thought, since she knew what a passionate, proud, ambitious heart beat in her bosom. They had often told her—in former days, her mother; later, her aunt, her friends, all—that it would one day bring her unhappiness, and that pride went before a fall; and she had always answered scornfully, “Then I will be unhappy; I will fall, if happiness is only to be had at the mean price of humility,
