if you will open the ledger and see that the entry is right. I don't know
what you think, but my idea is that we keep too much money lying idle in
these prosperous times. What do you say to using half of the customary
fund for investment? By the by, our day for dividing the profits is not
your day in London. When my father founded this business, the sixth of
January was the chosen date--being one way, among others, of celebrating
his birthday. We have kept to the old custom, out of regard for his
memory; and your worthy husband entirely approved of our conduct. I am
sure you agree with him?"
"With all my heart," said Mrs. Wagner. "Whatever my good husband thought,
I think."
Mr. Keller proceeded to count the Fund. "Fifteen thousand florins," he
announced. "I thought it had been more than that. If poor dear Engelman
had been here--Never mind! What does the ledger say?"
"Fifteen thousand florins," Mrs. Wagner answered.
"Ah, very well, my memory must have deceived me. This used to be
Engelman's business; and you are as careful as he was--I can say no
more."
Mr. Keller replaced the money in the safe, and hastened back to his own
office.
Mrs. Wagner raised one side of the ledger off the desk to close the
book--stopped to think--and laid it back again.
The extraordinary accuracy of Mr. Keller's memory was proverbial in the
office. Remembering the compliment which he had paid to her sense of
responsibility as Mr. Engelman's successor, Mrs. Wagner was not quite
satisfied to take it for granted that he had made a mistake--even on the
plain evidence of the ledger. A reference to the duplicate entry, in her
private account-book, would at once remove even the shadow of a doubt.
The last day of the old year was bright and frosty; the clear midday
light fell on the open page before her. She looked again at the entry,
thus recorded in figures--"15,000 florins"--and observed a trifling
circumstance which had previously escaped her.
The strokes which represented the figures "15" were unquestionably a
little, a very little, thicker than the strokes which represented the
three zeros or "noughts" that followed. Had a hair got into the pen of
the head-clerk, who had made the entry? or was there some trifling defect
in the paper, at that particular part of the page?
She once more raised one side of the ledger so that the light fell at an
angle on the writing. There was a difference between that part of the
paper on which the figures "15" were written, and the rest of the
page--and the difference consisted in a slight shine on the surface.
The side of the ledger dropped from her hand on the desk. She left the
office, and ran upstairs to her own room. Her private account-book had
not been wanted lately--it was locked up in her dressing-case. She took
it out, and referred to it. There was the entry as she had copied it, and
compared it with the ledger--"20,000 florins."
"Madame Fontaine!" she said to herself in a whisper.
CHAPTER XI
The New Year had come.
On the morning of the second of January, Mrs. Wagner (on her way to the
office at the customary hour) was stopped at the lower flight of stairs
by Madame Fontaine--evidently waiting with a purpose.
"Pardon me," said the widow, "I must speak to you."
"These are business hours, madam; I have no time to spare."
Without paying the slightest heed to this reply--impenetrable, in the
petrifying despair that possessed her, to all that looks, tones, and
words could say--Madame Fontaine stood her ground, and obstinately
repeated, "I must speak to you."
Mrs. Wagner once more refused. "All that need be said between us has been
said," she answered. "Have you replaced the money?"
"That is what I want to speak about?"
"Have you replaced the money?"
"Don't drive me mad, Mrs. Wagner! As you hope for mercy yourself, at the
hour of your death, show mercy to the miserable woman who implores you to
listen to her! Return with me as far as the drawing-room. At this time of
day, nobody will disturb us there. Give me five minutes!"
Mrs. Wagner looked at her watch.
"I will give you five minutes. And mind, I mean five minutes. Even in
trifles, I speak the truth."
They returned up the stairs, Mrs. Wagner leading the way.
There were two doors of entrance to the drawing-room--one, which opened
from the landing, and a smaller door, situated at the farther end of the
corridor. This second entrance communicated with a sort of alcove, in
which a piano was placed, and which was only separated by curtains from
the spacious room beyond. Mrs. Wagner entered by the main door, and
paused, standing near the fire-place. Madame Fontaine, following her,
turned aside to the curtains, and looked through. Having assured herself
that no person was in the recess, she approached the fire-place, and said
her first words.
"You told me just now, madam, that _you_ spoke the truth. Does that imply
a doubt of the voluntary confession----?"
"You made no voluntary confession," Mrs. Wagner interposed. "I had
positive proof of the theft that you have committed, when I entered your
room. I showed you my private account-book, and when you attempted to
defend yourself, I pointed to the means of falsifying the figures in the
ledger which lay before me in your own dressing-case. What do you mean by
talking of a voluntary confession, after that?"
"You mistake me, madam. I was speaking of the confession of my
motives--the motives which, in my dreadful position, forced me to take
the money, or to sacrifice the future of my daughter's life. I declare
that I have concealed nothing from you. As you are a Christian woman,
don't be hard on me!"
Mrs. Wagner drew back, and eyed her with an expression of contemptuous
surprise.
"Hard on you?" she repeated. "Do you know what you are saying? Have you
forgotten already how I have consented to degrade myself? Must I once
more remind you of _my_ position? I am bound to tell Mr. Keller that his
money and mine has been stolen; I am bound to tell him that he has taken
into his house, and has respected and trusted, a thief. There is my plain
duty--and I have consented to trifle with it. Are you lost to all sense
of decency? Have you no idea of the shame that an honest woman must feel,
when she knows that her unworthy silence makes her--for the time at
least--the accomplice of your crime? Do you think it was for your
sake--not to be hard on You--that I have consented to this intolerable
sacrifice? In the instant when I discovered you I would have sent for Mr.
Keller, but for the sweet girl whose misfortune it is to be your child.
Once for all, have you anything to say which it is absolutely necessary
that I should hear? Have you, or have you not, complied with the
conditions on which I consented--God help me!--to be what I am?"
Her voice faltered. She turned away proudly to compose herself. The look
that flashed out at her from the widow's eyes, the suppressed fury
strug
gling to force its way in words through the widow's lips, escaped
her notice. It was the first, and last, warning of what was to come--and
she missed it.
"I wished to speak to you of your conditions," Madame Fontaine resumed,
after a pause. "Your conditions are impossibilities. I entreat you, in
Minna's interests--oh! not in mine!--to modify them."
The tone in which those words fell from her lips was so unnaturally
quiet, that Mrs. Wagner suddenly turned again with a start, and faced
her.
"What do you mean by impossibilities? Explain yourself."
"You are an honest woman, and I am a thief," Madame Fontaine answered,
with the same ominous composure. "How can explanations pass between you
and me? Have I not spoken plainly enough already? In my position, I say
again, your conditions are impossibilities--especially the first of
them."
There was something in the bitterly ironical manner which accompanied
this reply that was almost insolent. Mrs. Wagner's color began to rise
for the first time. "Honest conditions are always possible conditions to
honest people," she said.
Perfectly unmoved by the reproof implied in those words, Madame Fontaine
persisted in pressing her request. "I only ask you to modify your terms,"
she explained. "Let us understand each other. Do you still insist on my
replacing what I have taken, by the morning of the sixth of this month?"
"I still insist."
"Do you still expect me to resign my position here as director of the
household, on the day when Fritz and Minna have become man and wife?"
"I still expect that."
"Permit me to set the second condition aside for awhile. Suppose I fail
to replace the five thousand florins in your reserve fund?"
"If you fail, I shall do my duty to Mr. Keller, when we divide profits on
the sixth of the month."
"And you will expose me in this way, knowing that you make the marriage
impossible--knowing that you doom my daughter to shame and misery for the
rest of her life?"
"I shall expose you, knowing that I have kept your guilty secret to the
last moment--and knowing what I owe to my partner and to myself. You have
still four days to spare. Make the most of your time."
"I can do absolutely nothing in the time."
"Have you tried?"
The suppressed fury in Madame Fontaine began to get beyond her control.
"Do you think I should have exposed myself to the insults that you have
heaped upon me if I had _not_ tried?" she asked. "Can I get the money
back from the man to whom it was paid at Wurzburg, when my note fell due
on the last day of the old year? Do I know anybody who will lend me five
thousand florins? Will my father do it? His house has been closed to me
for twenty years--and my mother, who might have interceded for me, is
dead. Can I appeal to the sympathy and compassion (once already refused
in the hardest terms) of my merciless relatives in this city? I have
appealed! I forced my way to them yesterday--I owned that I owed a sum of
money which was more, far more, than I could pay. I drank the bitter cup
of humiliation to the dregs--I even offered my daughter's necklace as
security for a loan. Do you want to know what reply I received? The
master of the house turned his back on me; the mistress told me to my
face that she believed I had stolen the necklace. Was the punishment of
my offense severe enough, when I heard those words? Surely I have
asserted some claim to your pity, at last? I only want more time. With a
few months before me--with my salary as housekeeper, and the sale of my
little valuables, and the proceeds of my work for the picture-dealers--I
can, and will, replace the money. You are rich. What is a loan of five
thousand florins to you? Help me to pass through the terrible ordeal of
your day of reckoning on the sixth of the month! Help me to see Minna
married and happy! And if you still doubt my word, take the pearl
necklace as security that you will suffer no loss."
Struck speechless by the outrageous audacity of this proposal, Mrs.
Wagner answered by a look, and advanced to the door. Madame Fontaine
instantly stopped her.
Wait!" cried the desperate creature. "Think--before you refuse me!"
Mrs. Wagner's indignation found its way at last into words. "I deserved
this," she said, "when I allowed you to speak to me. Let me pass, if you
please."
Madame Fontaine made a last effort--she fell on her knees. "Your hard
words have roused my pride," she said; "I have forgotten that I am a
disgraced woman; I have not spoken humbly enough. See! I am humbled
now--I implore your mercy on my knees. This is not only _my_ last chance;
it is Minna's last chance. Don't blight my poor girl's life, for my
fault!"
"For the second time, Madame Fontaine, I request you to let me pass.
"Without an answer to my entreaties? Am I not even worthy of an answer?"
"Your entreaties are an insult. I forgive you the insult."
Madame Fontaine rose to her feet. Every trace of agitation disappeared
from her face and her manner. "Yes," she said, with the unnatural
composure that was so strangely out of harmony with the terrible position
in which she stood--"Yes, from your point of view, I can't deny that it
may seem like an insult. When a thief, who has already robbed a person of
money, asks that same person to lend her more money, by way of atoning
for the theft, there is something very audacious (on the surface) in such
a request. I can't fairly expect you to understand the despair which
wears such an insolent look. Accept my apologies, madam; I didn't see it
at first in that light. I must do what I can, while your merciful silence
still protects me from discovery--I must do what I can between this and
the sixth of the month. Permit me to open the door for you." She opened
the drawing-room door, and waited.
Mrs. Wagner's heart suddenly quickened its beat.
Under what influence? Could it be fear? She was indignant with herself at
the bare suspicion of it. Her face flushed deeply, under the momentary
apprehension that some outward change might betray her. She left the
room, without even trusting herself to look at the woman who stood by the
open door, and bowed to her with an impenetrable assumption of respect as
she passed out.
Madame Fontaine remained in the drawing-room.
She violently closed the door with a stroke of her hand--staggered across
the room to a sofa--and dropped on it. A hoarse cry of rage and despair
burst from her, now that she was alone. In the fear that someone might
hear her, she forced her handkerchief into her mouth, and fastened her
teeth into it. The paroxysm passed, she sat up on the sofa, and wiped the
perspiration from her face, and smiled to herself. "It was well I stopped
here," she thought; "I might have met someone on the stairs."
As she rose to leave the drawing-room, Fritz's voice reached her from the
far end of the corridor.
"You are out of spirits, Minna. Come in, and let us try what a little
music will do for you."
The door leading into the recess was opened. Minna's voice became audible
next, on the inner side of the curtains.
"I am afraid I can't sing to-day, Fritz. I am very unhappy about mamma.
She looks so anxious and so ill; and when I ask what is troubling her,
she puts me off with an excuse."
The melody of those fresh young tones, the faithful love and sympathy
which the few simple words expressed, seemed to wring with an unendurable
pain the whole being of the mother who heard them. She lifted her hands
above her head, and clenched them in the agony which could only venture
to seek that silent means of relief. With swift steps, as if the sound of
her daughter's voice was unendurable to her, she made for the door. But
her movements, on ordinary occasions the perfection of easy grace, felt
the disturbing influence of the agitation that possessed her. In avoiding
a table on one side, as she passed it, she struck against a chair on the
other.
Fritz instantly opened the curtains, and looked through. "Why, here is
mamma!" he exclaimed, in his hearty boyish way.
Minna instantly closed the piano, and hastened to her mother. When Madame
Fontaine looked at her, she paused, with an expression of alarm. "Oh, how
dreadfully pale and ill you look!" She advanced again, and tried to throw
her arms round her mother, and kiss her. Gently, very gently, Madame
Fontaine signed to her to draw back.
"Mamma! what have I done to offend you?"
"Nothing, my dear."
"Then why won't you let me come to you?"
"No time now, Minna. I have something to do. Wait till I have done it."
"Not even one little kiss, mamma?"
Madame Fontaine hurried out of the room without answering and ran up the
stairs without looking back. Minna's eyes filled with tears. Fritz stood
at the open door, bewildered.
"I wouldn't have believed it, if anybody had told me," he said; "your
mother seems to be afraid to let you touch her."
Fritz had made many mistaken guesses in his time--but, for once, he had
guessed right. She _was_ afraid.
CHAPTER XII
As the presiding genius of the household, Madame Fontaine was always
first in the room when the table was laid for the early German dinner. A
knife with a speck on the blade, a plate with a suspicion of dirt on it,
never once succeeded in escaping her observation. If Joseph folded a
napkin carelessly, Joseph not only heard of it, but suffered the
indignity of seeing his work performed for him to perfection by the
housekeeper's dexterous hands.
On the second day of the New Year, she was at her post as usual, and
Joseph stood convicted of being wasteful in the matter of wine.
He had put one bottle of Ohligsberger on the table, at the place occupied
by Madame Fontaine. The wine had already been used at the dinner and the
supper of the previous day. At least two-thirds of it had been drunk.
Joseph set down a second bottle on the opposite side of the table, and
produced his corkscrew. Madame Fontaine took it out of his hand.
"Why do you open that bottle, before you are sure it will be wanted?" She
asked sharply. "You know that Mr. Keller and his son prefer beer."
"There is so little left in the other bottle," Joseph pleaded; "not a
full tumbler altogether."
"It may be enough, little as it is, for Mrs. Wagner and for me." With
that reply she pointed to the door. Joseph retired, leaving her alone at
the table, until the dinner was ready to be brought into the room.
In five minutes more, the family assembled at their meal.
Joseph performed his customary duties sulkily, resenting the
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