We had an excellent meal: fish from the river, fowl from the poultry-yard—we heard the clucking of the doomed hen, and the indignant remonstrances of her companions—a capital omelette, and country cheese and butter. With these comfortable things we had a bottle of honest wine of unknown vintage, but palatable and generous; and when the meal was over we sat and smoked in a kind of animal ease begotten of the past labor and present comfort. The storm lashed the panes, and though the time of year was but late August, and the hour not beyond six of the afternoon, it was so dark we could scarce see across the road. Yet every flash of lightning that hung with its blue, quivering light in the skies for two or three seconds at a time showed the fortress to either of us who chose to look out of window; and tired and bodily contented as I was, I never saw its gloomy form thus gloomily illuminated; but my first feeling on beholding it came back to me, and with it the guide's phrase: “The end of your journey, gentlemen!” The Austrian government would have seen to that if any merest guess of our purpose had occurred to the stupidest of its officials. I speak of Austria as she was, not as she is. She has learned something in the universal struggle for freedom which has shaken Europe since I first opened my eyes upon the world. But in those days—I speak it calmly, and with something, at least I hope, of the judgment which should belong to old age—Austria was a power to be loathed and warred against by all good men, a stronghold of tyranny and cruelty, a dark land within whose darkness dark deeds were done, a country where the oppressed found no helper. I am heaping up words in vain, which is a thing outside my habits. Every student of history knows what Austria was at that time, and there are thousands still living who are old enough to remember.
We went to bed early that night in spite of thunder and lightning, rain and wind, and slept as we deserved to do after the heavy marching of the day. When I got up in the morning the mountains were smiling in a sun-bath, the river wound shining through fields of delightful green, and the fortress, ugly as it was in itself, took from its surroundings, and helped to give them back again a picturesque and pleasing look. The feeling I had first had in respect to it never came back again in its first force; and when I looked at it with the refreshment of rest in my own heart, and the brightness of the clean-washed earth and heaven about it and above it, I could afford to smile at the womanish foreboding and chill of the night before.
Brunow was still sleeping, and I was loath to disturb him; so dressing myself carelessly but without noise, I went down-stairs, and there munched a fragment of black bread and drank a draught of milk. Then having tried in vain to say that I wanted a towel, I contrived to express myself to the landlord's pretty daughter by signs. I pointed out-of-doors, made a pantomime of undressing, diving, and swimming, and then a further pantomime of rubbing myself down. At this she understood, supplied me with what I wanted, and led me to the door, whence she pointed to the left, and then seemed by a sweeping motion of the hand to indicate a turning to the right. I took the way thus signalled, and in a very little time found myself in a sequestered spot by the water-side, which looked as if it might have been made for my purpose. A great boulder as big as a moderate-sized house protected the place from view on the village side, and the place was bowered in trees. A short, soft grass made a delightful footing, and on the opposite side of the river a fallen tree had been trimmed into convenient shape for diving from. A narrow track worn through the grass showed that this place was frequently approached. I was seated and in the act of unlacing my heavy mountain boots, when I heard a cheery and melodious voice singing; and, looking up, I saw at a little distance through the trees a young Austrian officer in undress, strolling at an easy pace towards me. He, too, had evidently come out for a morning dip, for he was swinging a towel in his right hand, and was lounging straight towards the river.
As he came nearer I saw that he was handsome in an effeminate sort of way, with a slight lady-like sort of figure, a blond mustache, so light in color as to be almost invisible at a distance, and fine girlish eyes of a light blue. As he saw me in turn he gave me a good-morning in a cheery tone, and I returned his salutation. He noticed my accent at once and said,
“Ah! An Englishman?” I answered, “Yes;” and having disembarrassed myself of the heavy boots, stood up to throw off my jacket. “And a soldier?” he said. Then speaking in English this time, but with a very laughable and halting accent—an accent, I should be inclined to say, almost as laughable and halting as mine sounded to him. “I mak yeeoo velkom at my place.”
At this I asked him if the place were private and I an intruder, but this little bit of English, took him altogether out of his depth.
“I speak English abominably,” he said in fluent and accurate French; “properly speaking, I do not know it at all. May I ask if you speak French?”
French and Spanish are the only two foreign languages of which I know anything, but I speak them both with ease, though I dare say with little elegance. I repeated my question, and he, with great good-humor, responded that he had no claim upon the place, and was delighted to find a companion of similar tastes; I went on undressing without more ado, and in a minute more was ploughing about in the water, the first nip of which had an icy and almost maddening delight in it. I found out later on that the stream came almost straight from the mountain-tops of ice and snow.
“You would not have bathed here five or six hours ago,” said my companion, as he swam beside me. “The storm lasted but two hours, yet the river was raging here until long after midnight. It falls, however, as soon as it rises, and now, except for the wet banks, you would hardly guess that it had been in flood.”
I had reason to remember what he said not very much later on, at a moment perhaps as anxious as any I have ever had to face in my life. But that will come in its place, and I only notice it here because it was one of those odd things in life that we all notice at one time or another, that at our first accidental meeting the man whose business it was to guard the prisoner I had come to rescue should give me a bit of comforting knowledge in this way. For my companion turned out to be none other than that Lieutenant Breschia of whom Brunow had spoken. When my swim was finished he gathered up his clothes in a neat bundle, and holding them in the air in one hand, paddled himself easily across with the other, and dressed beside me.
“It is ambition of mine,” he said, in a laughing, boyish way, which made his manner very charming and natural, “to learn your English tongue. But I am stupid with it, and whenever I meet an Englishman I waste my chances and converse with him in one of the tongues I know already. You are great masters of language, you Englishmen.”
I told him that we bore a very indifferent reputation in that respect, and that next to the French, who in that one regard are the most intractable people in the world, we were probably less acquainted with foreign languages than any people in Europe. He looked surprised.
“I think, sir, you rate yourselves too low. May I offer you a cigar? I can assure you of its quality, for I import my own. It is true that I have not met many Englishmen in my time, but I have met none who have not been admirable linguists. A friend of mine, an Englishman, who was in this neighborhood but a few weeks ago, is one of the finest I have known. He may perhaps be known to you. Have you ever met, may I ask, the honorable Brunow?”
This gave me a little inward start, and I had begun to guess already at the identity of my companion. I bit the end from the cigar I had accepted from him a moment before, and asked,
“The Honorable George Brunow?”
“That is he,” cried the young fellow, delightedly. “You know him?”
“He is my companion,” I replied. “I left him asleep at the auberge less than an hour ago.”
“You are the friend of my friend Brunow!” he exclaimed. “Sir, I am delighted to meet you. And Brunow is here again? What news! And do you stay long? Oh, once again life will be bearable. In this dull hole, sir, I pledge you my most sacred word of honor, a man has but one contemplation; his thoughts are all towards suicide. Figure for yourself the