He came for her several times, alone, in his high "wagon," drawn by a pair of charming light-limbed horses. It was different, her having gone with Clifford Wentworth, who was her cousin, and so much younger. It was not to be imagined that she should have a flirtation with Clifford, who was a mere shame-faced boy, and whom a large section of Boston society supposed to be "engaged" to Lizzie Acton. Not, indeed, that it was to be conceived that the Baroness was a possible party to any flirtation whatever; for she was undoubtedly a married lady. It was generally known that her matrimonial condition was of the "morganatic" order; but in its natural aversion to suppose that this meant anything less than absolute wedlock, the conscience of the community took refuge in the belief that it implied something even more.
Acton wished her to think highly of American scenery, and he drove her to great distances, picking out the prettiest roads and the largest points of view. If we are good when we are contented, Eugenia's virtues should now certainly have been uppermost; for she found a charm in the rapid movement through a wild country, and in a companion who from time to time made the vehicle dip, with a motion like a swallow's flight, over roads of primitive construction, and who, as she felt, would do a great many things that she might ask him. Sometimes, for a couple of hours together, there were almost no houses; there were nothing but woods and rivers and lakes and horizons adorned with bright-looking mountains.
It seemed to the Baroness very wild, as I have said, and lovely; but the impression added something to that sense of the enlargement of opportunity which had been born of her arrival in the New World.
One day--it was late in the afternoon--Acton pulled up his horses on the crest of a hill which commanded a beautiful prospect.
He let them stand a long time to rest, while he sat there and talked with Madame M; auunster. The prospect was beautiful in spite of there being nothing human within sight.
There was a wilderness of woods, and the gleam of a distant river, and a glimpse of half the hill-tops in Massachusetts.
The road had a wide, grassy margin, on the further side of which there flowed a deep, clear brook; there were wild flowers in the grass, and beside the brook lay the trunk of a fallen tree.
Acton waited a while; at last a rustic wayfarer came trudging along the road. Acton asked him to hold the horses--a service he consented to render, as a friendly turn to a fellow-citizen. Then he invited the Baroness to descend, and the two wandered away, across the grass, and sat down on the log beside the brook.
"I imagine it does n't remind you of Silberstadt," said Acton.
It was the first time that he had mentioned Silberstadt to her, for particular reasons. He knew she had a husband there, and this was disagreeable to him; and, furthermore, it had been repeated to him that this husband wished to put her away--a state of affairs to which even indirect reference was to be deprecated.
It was true, nevertheless, that the Baroness herself had often alluded to Silberstadt; and Acton had often wondered why her husband wished to get rid of her. It was a curious position for a lady--this being known as a repudiated wife; and it is worthy of observation that the Baroness carried it off with exceeding grace and dignity.
She had made it felt, from the first, that there were two sides to the question, and that her own side, when she should choose to present it, would be replete with touching interest.
"It does not remind me of the town, of course," she said, "of the sculptured gables and the Gothic churches, of the wonderful Schloss, with its moat and its clustering towers.
But it has a little look of some other parts of the principality.
One might fancy one's self among those grand old German forests, those legendary mountains; the sort of country one sees from the windows at Shreckenstein."
"What is Shreckenstein?" asked Acton.
"It is a great castle,--the summer residence of the Reigning Prince."
"Have you ever lived there?"
"I have stayed there," said the Baroness. Acton was silent; he looked a while at the uncastled landscape before him.
"It is the first time you have ever asked me about Silberstadt," she said. "I should think you would want to know about my marriage; it must seem to you very strange."
Acton looked at her a moment. "Now you would n't like me to say that!"
"You Americans have such odd ways!" the Baroness declared.
"You never ask anything outright; there seem to be so many things you can't talk about."
"We Americans are very polite," said Acton, whose national consciousness had been complicated by a residence in foreign lands, and who yet disliked to hear Americans abused.
"We don't like to tread upon people's toes," he said.
"But I should like very much to hear about your marriage.
Now tell me how it came about."
"The Prince fell in love with me," replied the Baroness simply.
"He pressed his suit very hard. At first he did n't wish me to marry him; on the contrary. But on that basis I refused to listen to him.
So he offered me marriage--in so far as he might. I was young, and I confess I was rather flattered. But if it were to be done again now, I certainly should not accept him."
"How long ago was this?" asked Acton.
"Oh--several years," said Eugenia. "You should never ask a woman for dates."
"Why, I should think that when a woman was relating history"....
Acton answered. "And now he wants to break it off?"
"They want him to make a political marriage. It is his brother's idea.
His brother is very clever."
"They must be a precious pair!" cried Robert Acton.
The Baroness gave a little philosophic shrug. "Que voulez-vous?
They are princes. They think they are treating me very well.
Silberstadt is a perfectly despotic little state, and the Reigning Prince may annul the marriage by a stroke of his pen.
But he has promised me, nevertheless, not to do so without my formal consent."
"And this you have refused?"