By Wit of Woman - Arthur W. Marchmont (e textbook reader .TXT) 📗

to send for, please."

He wrote down the name of a Dr. Armheit and his address, and I sent off James Perry at once. "What has been decided?" I asked next. "Where is the Duke? He should be told of Gareth."

"I will speak to you presently," said the General, very kindly.

Count Gustav laughed maliciously. "You have made a mess of things for yourself as well as for the rest of us, thank heaven. It serves you right. Karl has——"

"Stop, if you please, Count Gustav, this is for me to explain," broke in the General very angrily. "Be good enough to leave it to me."

"Why? What do I owe to you or to this meddler here that I should hold my tongue at your bidding? She has set herself against us, and must take the consequences. The Duke has about as much affection for you, as I have; and neither of us relishes the honour you would do us by becoming a member of our family."

"Silence, sir," exclaimed the General, hotly.

"Not at your bidding, or that of any other man."

"Nothing that this—this gentleman can say can affect me, General," I said, smoothly.

The words seemed to add fuel to Count Gustav's anger. "My wife shall not stay in your house and in your care," he said with great heat.

"The moment the doctor says she may leave the house, she can go—but not before."

"Oh, it's only another lie," he cried, passionately; and raising his voice he called loudly: "Gareth, Gareth. I am waiting for you. I, Gustav; Gareth, I say, Gareth."

"You may kill her," I murmured, wringing my hands.

As if gloating over my trouble, he sneered: "You act well; but we'll see;" and he called again loudly: "Gareth, Gareth, come to me."

I caught the sound of her footsteps above. The door of her room opened and she answered: "I am coming, Gustav;" and a moment later she came down the stairs and threw herself into his arms.

"She told me you were too ill to come to me, but I knew it was false. You feel well enough to come away with me?"

"Yes, of course, if you wish it. I must go with him, Christabel; he is my husband," she cried, wistfully. "He called me."

The General saw her condition as plainly as I.

"She is more fit to be in bed than to leave here," he said.

"Do you suppose I cannot take care of my own wife, sir?" cried Gustav, fiercely. "Get your hat, Gareth."

She left his arms and began to climb the stairs.

"Mrs. Perry will bring it, Gareth," I said, hastily.

But there was no need for it. She clung to the balustrade feebly and turned back to look at Gustav.

"I'm afraid—I'm—I'm——" No more; for the next instant he had to catch her in his arms to save her from falling. She smiled to him as if trying to rally her strength. "My head," she murmured; and then the hand which was pressed to it dropped, and she fainted.

"You had better carry her up to bed," said his Excellency, practically.

"She has only fainted and will be better in a minute," answered the Count. "She shall not stay here;" and he carried her into one of the rooms and laid her on a couch, standing between me and her to prevent my approach. Every action appeared to be inspired by hatred of me instead of care for her.

Happily the doctor soon came, and his first words after he had examined her were that she must be carried at once to bed.

"I wish to remove her from the house," said Count Gustav.

"It is impossible," was the brusque, imperative reply.

"It is necessary."

"It is for me to say what is necessary in such a case," declared the doctor; and being a strong as well as a masterful man, he picked Gareth up in his arms and told me to show the way to her bedroom.

And in this way she was given back into my care.

CHAPTER XXIX A SINGULAR TRUCE

It was more than an hour before I could go down to General von Erlanger, and I carried a heavy heart and a bad report of Gareth's condition.

"She is very ill," I told him. "The doctor fears brain fever. At best but fragile, recent events have so preyed upon her that the climax to-day found her utterly broken in nerve and strength. I have left her muttering in half-delirious terror of her father's anger. Where is Count Gustav?"

"Gone away with the doctor, to return later. And now of yourself, Christabel?"

"In the presence of this I feel I do not care. I gathered the gist of all from what Count Gustav said. What was decided? Did the Duke know that Count Stephen was living?"

"No. The thing was planned by his supporters, as he told you last night, to make sure of his leadership being secure at a time when, owing to the Emperor's illness, it seemed that the hour was at hand for the Patriots' cause to be proclaimed. They meant to kill the Count, but some one saved him, and then Katona was persuaded to undertake his guardianship."

"What is to be done?"

"The Duke is a broken man. The knowledge of his favourite son's guilt; the break-up of his plans; the bitterness of the loss of virtually everything he cared for in life has completely unstrung him. He has sent Katona to take Count Stephen to him; he has given Gustav the option of voluntary exile or public exposure; and he has reinstated Karl in his position as elder son and his heir."

"It is only right. I am glad," I said.

"Glad?" he echoed, with a meaning glance.

"Yes, very glad."

"Your tone is very confident. You know what it carries with it—for you, I mean?"

"I do not care what it means to me. It is right."

"The Duke is very bitter against you, Christabel."

"He would scarcely be human if he were not. In a sense this is all my doing. I have brought it about, that is. But he cannot harm me, nor prevent my dear father's memory from being cleared. True, it seems he can influence Count Karl."

His Excellency smiled with deliberate provocation. "Possibly; yet Karl, although not a Patriot, is still a rebel."

"He has gone with his father," I answered, with a shrug.

"That is not fair. The Duke was too ill to go alone."

"He came with you, General."

He shook his head. "Christabel! If matters were not so sad here, I might almost be tempted to put that forbidden question."

"If you were so minded, I might not now forbid it, perhaps."

"I think I am glad to hear you say that. The girl in you can perhaps scarcely help resenting Karl's going away just now; but then any girl can be unjust at such a moment."

"Are you pleading for him?"

"Oh, no; there is no need. You will do that very well yourself when you are alone."

"You are very provoking."

"All I mean is that"—he paused and smiled again—"Karl is and will remain a rebel."

"I must go to Gareth now," I said.

I gave him my hand and he held it. "I am going with the news of her to the Duke; and when there I shall see—the rebel. Shall I give him any message?"

"No—except that I am glad," I answered steadily.

"That, of course; and—that he had better come as soon as he can for the reasons;" and with a last meaning glance he was leaving, when I asked him to let the Colonel know of Gareth's serious condition.

I was full of anxiety for Gareth, and I had been so greatly wrought upon by the events of the day that, as I had assured the General, my own concerns seemed too small to care about; and yet I could not put them away from me. "Karl was a rebel; Karl was a rebel." Over and over again the words came back to me, and all that they meant, as I stood by the window at a turn of the staircase, looking out and wondering.

Yes, it had hurt me that at such a time he had left the house without waiting to see me; but—he was a rebel. He had gone at the stern old Duke's bidding; but—he was a rebel and would come again. The Duke hated me, and as Gustav had said would never sanction our union; but then—Karl was a rebel.

The sun might shine, or the rain might fall; political plans might succeed or they might fail; great causes flourish or be overthrown; Karl was a rebel—and we should find our way after all to happiness. Love must have its selfish moments; and to me then that was just such a moment, despite all the troubles in the house.

For Gareth we could do nothing but watch, and nurse, and wait. She was very restless; very troubled in mind as her wayward mutterings showed; very weak—like a piece of delicate mechanism suddenly over-strained and broken.

An hour later Count Gustav returned, and I went down to him. The doctor had convinced him of the seriousness of Gareth's condition, and I was glad to find him less self-centred and more concerned for her.

"While Gareth is here, Count Gustav, there must be a truce between us," I said. "And she cannot possibly be moved."

"I know that now," he agreed.

"Then there must be a truce. For her sake all signs of the strife between us must be suppressed. She may ask me about you; and you about me. She has grown to care for me in the last few days; and it will help her recovery if we can make her believe the trouble that divides us all is ended. It rests with us to give her this ease of mind."

"I am not quite the brute you seem to think," he answered.

"I have my own opinion of you and am not likely to alter it—but for her sake I am willing to pretend."

"You are very frank."

"The terms of our truce are agreed, then?"

"Just as you please," he said, with a shrug.

"There is another thing to be done, somehow. Her father must be brought to agree also."

"Shall I go on my knees to him?" he sneered.

"I care not how it is done so long as it is done. But her mind is distracted by the thought of the breach between you two—and of her need to choose between you."

"That was not my doing," he rapped out.

"I see no need for a competition as to who has done the most harm," I retorted, coldly. "The question now is how that harm can best be repaired. Gareth is very ill—but worse in mind than in body; and she will not recover unless her mind is eased."

"Not recover?" he cried, catching at the words. "There is no need to talk like that. Dr. Armheit does not take any such serious view as that."

"Could Dr. Armheit be told all the facts?"

"My God!" he cried under his breath; and turning away looked out of the window.

In the silence I heard a carriage drive up to the door. "Here is the doctor, I expect. You can tell him and get his opinion when he knows."

But it was not the doctor. It was Karl with Colonel Katona; and James Perry showed them in.

On the threshold the Colonel, catching sight of Gustav, stopped abruptly, with a very stern look, and would not have entered the room had I not gone to him and urged him.

"There is something to be done here which is above all quarrels, Colonel. You must come in, please."

"I have told him that Gareth is ill," said Karl.

"What do you mean, Miss von Dreschler?" asked the Colonel, with a very grim look at me.

I struck at once as hard as I could. "Gareth's life is in danger, and it rests largely with you whether she shall live or die."

He pressed his lips tightly together for a moment. "In plainer terms, please."

"Dr. Armheit, who knows only that she has had a shock and has something on her mind, says that she is very ill. We