Black Diamonds: A Novel

CHAPTER XXXIX
THE UNDERGROUND WORLD

"Sir," he said to Ivan, with suppressed irritation, "you promised that in a fortnight the conflagration in our mine would be extinguished. The time is up, and I have not seen that anything has been even attempted."

"That is very probable," returned Ivan, quietly.

"Do you maintain still that everything is progressing satisfactorily?"

"I do."

"Can I see for myself what has been done?"

"Where you are standing it would be impossible for you to judge."

"Well, let me go where I can see something."

"Do you really wish to go below? It is not a pleasant place."

"Where you go, so can I; for my part, I don't care if it was hell itself."

"It is not unlike what hell must be."

"Well, I am resolved to pay it a visit. I want to make the acquaintance of the devil; perhaps I could make an arrangement with him to supply us with coal."

"You may come on one condition: if you accompany me you must understand that I cannot let you stand gaping about. There is not room in the place for more than two people, and they must both work."

"I am not afraid of work. I am the devil for work."

"Very good, then, come along," said Ivan; "and if the other gentlemen would like to accompany us to where the machines are working they can follow us."

The others seized the opportunity.

Ivan made them put on miners' dress. They were then hoisted into the crane, and descended into the shaft. Each one had a safety-lamp fastened to his belt and wore a thick felt hat.

Ivan led them through the different windings of the pit until they came to the iron door of the cavern in which, not long since, the pond used periodically to come and go. The middle of this space was now filled by a large mill-like machine, which was kept in motion by an endless strap worked from above. In this mill some substance was being ground, and, when reduced to fine powder, was carried, by means of certain mechanical contrivances, through a pipe and over a bridge, where it disappeared from view.

Ivan led his guests through still more tortuous ways. Once they descended the shaft of a well; once they mounted high ladders, finding themselves when they had done so in a small chamber, not measuring six feet in circumference, in which two miners were waiting—an old and a young man.

"Now," said Ivan to Spitzhase, "here is our dressing-room; we must put on our costume."

"What! have we another change of clothes?"

"Yes, we have to don a coat of mail in the tournament in which we are going to take part; we require armor."

At a sign from him the miners came forward and began to prepare the two gentlemen. The equipment was something similar to that of a fireman—a coat and stockings, the outer stuff being made of asbestos, while the space between that and the lining was filled with pulverized charcoal; the hands and arms were also covered with long gloves made of asbestos, the fingers being air-proof.

"We could pass for knights," said Spitzhase, jestingly.

"Wait until you see our helmets," returned Ivan.

The miners brought two helmets made of glass, each of which had a hollow space with twelve joints and three apertures. Ivan explained the use of these.

"The place into which we are about to descend is full of coal-gas. We must have an apparatus which will enable us to pass through fire and to dive under water."

Spitzhase began to repent that he had been so venturesome, but he was ashamed to turn back now, and he had a certain amount of pluck.

"We need," continued Ivan, "an apparatus which is a combination of the diver's and the fireman's dress. To the glass helmet, which will be attached to the coat-collar by means of air-proof caoutchouc, there will be fastened two tubes, through one of which the necessary amount of air will be conveyed to us, and through the other the bad air will be expelled. The ends of both the tubes will remain here, while we drag them after us in the same manner as does the diver. Although all bad air escapes from our helmets, still we shall find the air rather warmer than it is up here, and it will smell like vulcanized india-rubber; still we cannot suffocate. To this third aperture an elastic tube will be fixed, which unites both helmets; through this tube each will hear what the other says, for the glass is so thick that no sound penetrates it, and when you have it on your head you will with difficulty hear what is said by me."

Spitzhase had begun to feel very uncomfortable, for now the miner proceeded to adjust the glass helmet to his head. When the tubes were being fixed into the three apertures he perceived that he had become suddenly stone deaf. He saw the lips of the two commissioners moving, but not one word could he hear. He no longer belonged to the world. Only one sound reached him, and that was the voice of the man to whose head he was fastened.

"Take one end of the hose upon your arm," shouted the voice into his helmet; yet the sound seemed to come from a long way off, or as if out of a tunnel.

Mechanically he took the coil on his shoulder.

"Let us go," shouted Ivan, taking the other end of the coil on his shoulder, and, opening a thick oak door, which had hitherto escaped Spitzhase's observation, they passed through.

The two commissioners had heard nothing that had passed between the two "knights"; but when they saw the oak door open they hurriedly asked the miners whether the foul air did not come in. The older workman reassured them; the carbon was much heavier than oxygen, and even thicker than hydrogen. The foul air remained below, where the two divers had gone. They might have every confidence so long as the safety-lamps burned. Meantime, the others had penetrated into a roomy cavern, the walls of which proved it had not been made by the hands of men, but was a natural formation. Each partition of the wall fitted into another, like the blocks of a puzzle, and each block was as smooth as a steel mirror. They were masses of coal set obliquely one upon another. The cavern was bridged over with thick, strong wooden planks. The gearing strap, which had made its way from the cavern in serpent-like fashion, had set a wheel in motion, and the noise of the clapper resounded under the bridge, and made a sound as if it were working in deep water. From this bridge a narrow path led obliquely into the stone layers. Once beyond the entrance into this dark path the lamps ceased to burn; the coal-gas had begun its sway. Upon the bridge an electric machine was placed, whose brilliant light was shaded by a wire screen.

The old miner set the machine working, and the light flashed into every nook and cranny of the subterranean cavern. It lighted up the narrow tunnel which, for the last month, Ivan had been boring from his own mine to that of his neighbor. He had told no one what he had been doing, but now the work was almost finished; it only required to be broken through. This work, which would take another week to complete, needed to be done in a diver's equipment. The length of the narrow tunnel was perfectly illumined by the electric machine, as if in the broad light of the sun. Where it turned out of its course high looking-glasses of polished steel were placed in positions which reflected the light itself until it faded away to a faint glimmer. The two divers could now hardly discern an object.

"We shall soon be in darkness," said Spitzhase to Ivan.

"We shall have light enough," returned Ivan; and he led the way farther into the tunnel.

Spitzhase was forced to follow, for his head was fastened to Ivan's head. Wonderful pair of Siamese twins! If the pipe that bound them together were to break, both were dead men.

"Halt!" cried Ivan. "Here is the pump. Give me the pipe."

In the half-darkness a little machine three feet high was discernible; it was provided with a spring wheel. This suction-pipe had been brought here only the day before. Ivan took the caoutchouc coil from his companion's shoulder, and screwed the pipe to the aperture of the machine; then he set the wheel in motion, and in a few seconds it, with the heavy balls attached, was revolving with velocity. Then he took the end of the pipe and gave the coil back to Spitzhase with this difference: instead of putting it over his arm he hung the hose over his neck. Spitzhase felt as if the pipe were about a hundredweight heavier, and that it had grown suddenly stiff.

"Forward! quick march!" shouted Ivan into his helmet.

"It begins to be hot as hell itself," grumbled Spitzhase, who was suffering horribly.

"Because we are in a part of the mine where the fire has been put out."

Both the men wore on their feet glass slippers, otherwise they would have felt that the ashes through which they were wading were glowing with heat.

The india-rubber hose hung round Spitzhase's neck. It grew darker and darker, until at last it was as dark as Erebus.

"I can see nothing," shouted Spitzhase.

"You are safe if you follow me," returned Ivan.

It began to grow somewhat lighter. The light, however, was rose color; there was twilight, then, in the bowels of the earth.

Spitzhase complained he could hardly draw his breath.

"That will get better presently," said Ivan, encouraging him.

They had now turned the corner of the road, and the terrible tragedy of hell itself lay before them. Yes, hell itself was there. A burning labyrinth, in whose glowing passages the prismatic colors changed every moment. The blue-green flames leaped from the ground and blended with the flames of brilliant scarlet which played upon the burning wall, and again faded in the far distance into a deep purple color. It was like a fairy transparency at a pantomime. Through the fissures and crevices sheets of white sun-rays poured like molten silver. Amid the glowing coals there seemed to rise shapes as of demons dancing, creatures with green hair and red beards, and from the red sulphate of the vaulting there fell slowly a golden shower, a melting rain of sparks. From the clefts in the side walls the gas, let loose from all restraint, hissed like so many demoniacal serpents, and kindled a subterranean flame of its own. Out of the depths of the pit a waterspout of fire shot suddenly, sending in every direction a shower of sparks. Over the whole floated a milk-colored cloud, which filled the vault with a nebulous vapor, wandering as a will-o'-the-wisp here and there, and threatening every moment to envelop the rash visitors to hell in its chill embrace. Spitzhase, alarmed out of all control, pressed closer to the wall; fright was overcoming him.

"Let go the hose!" shouted Ivan. The hose fell like a serpent unchained, wriggling backward and forward. "Now follow me. Hold the pipe on your arm;" and he drew Spitzhase after him.

He was constrained to follow, although his heart was in his mouth; their heads were fastened to each other. If he had had sufficient strength to free himself from this terrible companionship, it would have in no way helped him, for the carbon would have killed him instantaneously.

Mechanically he allowed himself to be drawn on. Hell with all its horrors disclosed itself to his affrighted gaze. His companion seemed to fear nothing. Was he a human being, or a fiend, who was in reality possessed of power over the demons of hell? He dragged him to the very border of the fiery lake; then he took from his shoulder the hose, which lay in rings and coils, and, opening the mouth of the stop-cock, directed its force at the bosom of hell. The hose shot forth a flash like a diamond; the water-spirit fell into the glowing Gehenna.

"Hold tight!" shouted Ivan.

And from the force which the stream from the pipe exercised upon the burning mass the air was filled with dark clouds of smoke, which peopled the still brilliantly lighted cavern with strange, unearthly, spectral-like shadows, which, dissolving suddenly into steam, covered the two adventurous visitors with a damp moisture. One of them tottered.

"Fear nothing," calls out the other; "we are quite safe here."

"It is suffocating; I am burning!" cried Spitzhase.

"Do not be afraid; follow me," said Ivan, and drew his trembling comrade after him over the wet rocks, over the charred, burning mounds. Every spot where he saw the flames rising he directed the hose, and a shower of cool, refreshing water fell from the india-rubber pipe upon the burning, seething demoniacal flames. The gas hissed, the hot steam boiled round them, the flames, beaten down in one place, sprang up in another, but on they went. He was afraid of nothing. "Forward! go on! forward!" The mysterious clouds hovered over him.

"We are lost!" moaned the other poor mortal, whose fear began to be uncontrollable. He fell on his knees.

"You of little faith," said the conqueror of hell, "get up. Let us go back." And he lifted him up, as the Redeemer did Peter on the stormy Sea of Galilee.

Then he rolled the hose once more round his neck, and took it back to the suction-pump; this he closed, and then led his comrade again to the little room where they had put on their equipment.

Spitzhase sank back when he reached this haven. When his helmet was taken off he panted like a man who was suffocating for want of air. Ivan looked at him compassionately.

The miners gave each of them a glass of fresh lemonade to drink, and rubbed their temples with vinegar. They then undressed them to the skin, put them into a tub of cold water, took them out in two seconds, and rubbed them with coarse towels. Spitzhase began to recover his senses.

As they put on their usual clothes Ivan said to him, "Well, sir, how did you like being below?"

Spitzhase was no fool, but he answered, good-humoredly, "I wouldn't have missed going down for a hundred gulden, but I would pay twice that sum rather than go there again."

"Now you know what to write to your board of directors. Paul, take this gentleman home. I remain here to continue the work."

Spitzhase wrote a glowing account of what he called "the fight with the world of spirits" to the Vienna papers.

The next day Ivan said to the commissioners, "We have now laid pipes four inches in diameter to work upon the very heart of the fire. So soon as I am ready we shall set the high-pressure machine at work. This will empty in four hours ten thousand buckets of fluid on the burning mass."

"The devil take it!" cried Spitzhase. "Will this farce never have an end until the escaped gas blows up the colliery, and makes of it and of us a new Pompeii?"

"Do not be afraid. I have thought of this danger. We have taken care to stop all the outlets to the quarry gallery with sand-bags. We have walled up every possible fissure, crevice, and exit. The entrance to the well-shaft has been provided with a strong iron door, over which we have fastened a thick bed of clay. If, therefore, it should happen that in the gallery, where the conflagration is at its worst, and where the fluid must be poured freely, the mass of gas should develop in such force that it must explode, then the iron door will prove our salvation. It will resist all attack, and the force of the gas will be broken."

The members of the commission shook with fright. Here was a pleasant prospect! Ivan, however, had no time to spare on reassuring them; the crisis was at hand, and he had still much to do. Prudence, foresight was necessary. At mid-day he returned to the quarry gallery.

As the clock struck twelve he gave the signal at which the large suction-pump was to be set in motion. He remained from this time at his post, never leaving the machine until the work was finished. To their honor be it spoken, the three commissioners remained with him; they kept their places without moving, never speaking a word. During the awful time that followed no voice was heard but that of Ivan. Soon after the signal was given a rushing sound was heard underground, faint at first, but growing louder. It sounded as if in the distance water was pouring from an open sluice.

At first the machine was worked at only half its strength. After half an hour or so there mingled with the rushing sound a great tumult, as if many bells were vibrating in the air. The noise did not die away; on the contrary, the vibration grew every moment stronger.

The earth was in labor; the ground heaved and trembled, and those who felt its throes trembled also. The earth's sufferings were shared by her children. Only one man was calm; the master-spirit was not afraid.

With close attention Ivan watched the pendulum and the thermometer of the machine; he marked the variations in the condition of the barometer, the ozonometer, and electrometer, writing his observations in his note-book. After another hour he made a sign to the man working the machine to put on more pressure.

Thereupon arose from below a terrible uproar; it was the battle of the Cyclops. The bowels of the earth sent up a dull roar like the rolling of thunder; occasionally came a shock as of an earthquake. The houses began to rock, the tops of the tall trees and the cross upon the tower tottered, and its fall added to the anxiety felt by the entire valley. The underground fight grew every moment fiercer; the giants joined issue with their foes. They howled in rage; they put their gigantic shoulders together and tried to upset the earth. To their cries was added the bellowing of the hurricane confined in the cave, and the tumult was indescribable.

The listeners to this fearful scene looked with a stony stare of horror; they were speechless, but their look seemed to say, "What rash act have you done? Are you inciting the spirits who dwell under the earth to war against one another?"

Ivan answered with another look of calm superiority. "Fear nothing; I have my foot upon the head of the giant."

The underground battle had lasted three hours. The people were beside themselves with fright; they turned upon Ivan and cursed him.

"Do you think you are a God," they cried, "and can create an earthquake?"

Ivan paid no attention either to their fears or their curses; he gave another signal to the men at the machine—

"With the whole power!"

The machine, the outcome of the wonderful inventive genius of man, stormed the very gates of hell itself. The underground tremblings followed one another rapidly, growing stronger and stronger; the deep groaning rose to a stentorian, deafening roar.

"It is all over!" shrieked the people in the valley, and fell upon their knees.

In the air a shrill, whistling sound was now heard, as if an engine had suddenly let off steam, and out of the shaft of the company's mine there arose rapidly a white column of steam, which, as soon as it encountered the cold regions of space, shot up into the sky, where it formed itself into a white cloud, which cloud suddenly broke into a deluge of rain. At once the underground convulsion ceased, and the shrill whistling died away in the distance.

Ivan, looking round, said, quickly, "Paul, collect the rain-water; I must know what it is made of." Upon this he gave the machinist the signal to stop the machine. There was not even a drop of perspiration upon his forehead. He took the bottle of rain-water that Paul brought him and put it in his pocket. "Now, gentlemen," he said, "you can go to supper. The work is accomplished."

"Is the fire extinguished?" asked Spitzhase.

"Absolutely."

"And the pillar of steam yonder?"

"Will remain in the sky until midnight and then slowly damp away. Go to supper. I have something of importance to do at home."

Who cared to eat supper?

The pillar of steam still continued to rise from the shaft, and to form a cloud from which a steady downpour of rain fell continuously, occasionally interspersed by flashes of lightning; but no one thought of going indoors. The richer members of society wrapped themselves in mackintoshes, the workmen in their cloaks, and all continued to watch the strange appearance, until at last, towards ten o'clock, it began to grow smaller. The whistling sound was interrupted now and again by a piercing shriek, and sometimes a flash of lightning illumined the shadow of the pillar—the white cloud.

The steam giant then sank back; not all at once, but by degrees, into the pit from which it had arisen. Only occasionally, from time to time, its head reappeared for a second, but the whistling ceased altogether; so, too, did the heaving of the earth. The unearthly tumult was silenced. In the church the sound of the organ was heard, and voices intoning "Alleluia! Alleluia!" The people walked in procession, carrying lanterns and banners.

The commissioners made their way to the inn, where they found Ivan eating his supper. He could eat now; it struck him that he was mortal and wanted food.

"I have finished the chemical examination," he said to the other three with polite indifference, "and I can give you the satisfactory news that in the residue 0.75 of carbonic acid is to be found."

Spitzhase did not understand. "What good is it," he asked, "if seventy-five parts of carbonic acid are in the residuum?"

"To-morrow we can open both entrances to the colliery, and after the air-pumps have been settled the work can be resumed."

Alleluia! Alleluia!

CHAPTER XL
ANGELA IS EVEN WITH IVAN

The countess told him frankly all that had happened to her since they had met; how she had married the Marquis Salista; how unhappy he had made her by the pressure he brought to bear upon her grandfather, Prince Theobald, which ended in his property being sequestrated, to the ruin of the whole family of Bondavary. She had suffered greatly in consequence, and had known what privation meant; also the income of the Countess Theudelinde had been considerably diminished, and the old lady had been forced to reduce her household. This condition of affairs had shown them their former friends in their true light—among others, Salista, her husband, who had gone to Mexico, and left her to shift for herself. Then Ivan had come to the rescue. Prince Waldemar's triumphal progress had been effectually checked. The million of money placed by Prince Theobald in the Bondavara Company had regained its value. The prince had arranged with his creditors, and his affairs were once more settled. She had been reconciled to him, and lived with him. Countess Theudelinde likewise had recovered her rents. The great family of Bondavary, which had been so near ruin, was reinstated in its former position. And for its new lease of life it had to thank a certain beneficent, clever—

Here Countess Angela's letter broke off. There was, however, a postscript:

"Answer this letter. I beg for one word. Write 'I forgive you.'"

Ivan answered her immediately. He expressed his gratitude for her kind remembrance of him, but he could not imagine what he had to forgive. On the contrary, he had a lively recollection of the many kindnesses he had received from the Countess Angela Salista.

The letter was evidently written with an effort to be cold and polite. It was followed by a second letter from Angela, which ran thus:

"Do not answer me in that way. I have sinned against you. You do not reproach me, but my own heart and conscience do. To quiet these tormentors I need your pardon. Answer me sincerely. Can you ever forgive me? I should not have treated you as I did—"

Ivan answered this by a long, confidential letter. He confessed to her secrets of his heart, made to her confessions which never before passed his lips. The countess might be confident that she had never offended him. She had never forfeited the place she held in his respect.

A third letter came from Angela.

"If you can do so from your heart, write upon a piece of paper, 'Angela Bondavary, I forgive you, from my heart.'"

Ivan wrote these words and nothing else.

One evening two carriages drove into the court-yard of Ivan's house. He lived now in the handsome residence provided by the company for the director of the mines. The porter exchanged some words with the person who sat in the first carriage, and then came to Ivan with two visiting-cards.

Ivan, to his surprise, read the names—

Countess Theudelinde Bondavary.

Countess Angela Bondavary.

These names caused a great disturbance in Ivan's mind. What did they want? Why did they come to him? He told the porter to show the ladies in, and then, taking up the cards again, it struck him as odd that the Countess Angela's did not bear the name of her husband.

The door opened, and only one lady entered. She was dressed in mourning, and her face was covered by a thick veil, the thick crape concealing her features. It was the Countess Theudelinde. She had on a long black travelling-cloak with two capes. She came to Ivan and held out to him the finger-tips of her black glove, which he carried to his lips, while she murmured some words of greeting.

"Where is the marquise?" asked Ivan, anxiously.

"She will be here immediately; but it is very difficult to bring her in."

Ivan conducted the lady to a sofa and asked her to be seated.

"Do not go to meet her," continued the countess. "She will find her way. You will receive her kindly, won't you?"

"Oh, countess," Ivan began; but Theudelinde interrupted impatiently.

"No phrases, please. We have not come here for polite words or to exchange compliments. We come to make a request; the answer is simple. Yes or no. Angela wants to remain here."

"Here!" repeated Ivan, horrified.

"Yes, here! Do not be afraid; not in this house, but in the neighborhood. She wishes to remain near you—never to leave you—that is her desire; and she has a right to have her wishes granted."

Ivan began to think he must be dreaming; he did not know what to say, but his thoughts were distracted by a strange noise outside. Along the passage came the heavy tread of several men. The door opened and four miners came in, carrying between them a metal coffin, on the lid of which lay a white wreath of repoussé silver.

The wreath surrounded the arms of the Bondavary family, and underneath was carved in gold letters—

Angela Bondavary.

The coffin was placed upon the oak table. Ivan stood as if he were turned into a statue, his eyes fixed upon the wreath and the name underneath.

Theudelinde got up and seized his hand, saying, in a low, agitated voice:

"This is the Countess Angela Bondavary, who begs of you, as the master here in Bondavara, to find for her a small place in the family vault of the castle, where she may lie among her own people, waiting for the coming of Jesus Christ—the Bridegroom of all poor women whose lives have been desolated."

"How is it possible that she is dead?" said Ivan, who was deeply moved.

"How? Very easily! When you throw a rose into the fire, in two minutes you will only find its ashes. I had just heard her laugh; she was quite gay. Then she went too near the stove; the next moment she screamed, and I saw her enveloped in flames!"

"She was burned to death!" cried Ivan, covering his face with his hands. Then, after a pause, "Was there no one near to save her?"

"Was there no one?" answered Theudelinde. "Were you, then, asleep at midnight? Did you not hear her call, 'Ivan, help me!'? Did you not see her standing beside your bed in flames—an angel with hell in her heart? Why were you not by her side to hold her in your arms, to stifle the flames, to snatch her from the jaws of death? Where were you, who should have saved her? Now she is here, and says to you, 'I am gone. I am no one. Let us be united.'"

Ivan felt as if an iron band had been laid upon his heart.

"She lived," continued Theudelinde, "for two days. She suffered the most terrible pain. When I think of all she went through I feel as if my senses were leaving me. To the last she was conscious. She spoke— But no—why should I tell you what she said? Just before she died she asked for a pencil, and wrote a few words to you. Here they are in this envelope. Do not break the seal, do not read them, so long as I am here. I would rather give you no explanation. If you have anything to ask, ask it from her. Here is the key of the coffin; I give it to you."

Ivan recoiled from receiving such a present.

"Why should you be afraid? Why do you object to opening the coffin? There is nothing to fear. The body is embalmed, and the flames did not touch her face. You will see that she smiles."

Ivan forced himself to raise the coffin-lid and to look on the face of the dead. There was no smile on her lips. She was calm and cold; as when she lay insensible in the wood, with her head upon a cushion of moss, so now she lay upon her white satin cushion. Ivan felt that if she could open her eyes for one minute she would look at him proudly and say, "I want nothing," and close them again. How beautiful she was, with her still, marble face, her immovable eyebrows. Ivan would not disturb its calm loveliness by even one kiss. He would have felt it to be dishonorable, and yet, if she could have come to life again, who knows—? As on the day when he had closed her dress with his breast-pin, so now he shrouded her secret with the coffin-lid. Her secret was safe with him.

"Keep the key," said Theudelinde. "The coffin, its key, and the treasure it holds are yours; that is settled. You are the master of the vault; it is your duty to take her there. You cannot escape it."

With eyes that were hot and tearless, Theudelinde looked through her veil at Ivan. He returned the glance. If either had shed a tear, or even let a sob escape, both would have burst into passionate weeping, for grief is infectious; but each one of them was resolved to show mental strength in the presence of the other. They could even command their emotions.

"Do you undertake the duty?"

Ivan bowed his head.

"Then you will perform it alone. Alive I shall never enter the family vault. You know why."

Both were silent. Then Theudelinde burst out:

"Why was I not left in my castle? Why was I undeceived when I imagined that my ancestors visited me? If I had not been shaken in my delusions I should still have been happy. I should never have gone into the world, where I have only found misery; Angela would not have come to me; my brother Theobald would not have been ruined; hell would not have been let loose in the Bondavara mines; I should have never known you; all—all would have been different!" Then, after a pause, she went on: "There is no need of a clergyman; there is no need of any ceremony. You can say some prayers. You are a Protestant—so was Angela. She became one that she might get a separation from her unworthy husband. Let them carry the coffin quietly and reverently to the family vault. There I shall leave you and it, for I shall not go inside—never, until I am dead. You will put the coffin in its place, and then I return whence I came, where I am wanted by no one."

Ivan called the miners to take the coffin again upon their shoulders, and told them to carry it through the vestibule to the private door which led into the park. The park separated the director's house from the castle.

As they walked through the winding paths of the park the trees shed their golden leaves upon the coffin and the titmice in the brushwood chanted the dirge.

Ivan walked bareheaded behind the coffin, and behind him came Countess Theudelinde.

When they reached the entrance of the vault Ivan told the bearers to put the coffin down, and, kneeling down beside it, he remained for a long time praying. God hears us if we speak to Him in a whisper; nay, He hears us, even although we do not speak, but feel.

Theudelinde bent over Ivan and kissed his forehead.

"I thank you. You walked behind her with your head uncovered. Now she is all yours." Then she returned by the winding path, as if she were afraid that Ivan would make her take away what she had brought.

Ivan placed the coffin in its resting-place and sent away the bearers; then he remained for many hours beside it. By the light of the torches he read Angela's last words to him—

"For whom shall I wait on the shore of the new world?"

Ivan sighed deeply. "Who will wait for me on the shore of the new world?"

Then he made his way back to the house. There was no trace of either the countess's travelling carriage or Angela's hearse.

CHAPTER XLI
HOW IVAN MOURNED

Ivan sent the young men at his own expense to factories abroad, where they learned the arts of civilization. He brought wood-carvers from Switzerland and lace-workers from Holstein to teach their trades to the women and children, so that they might unite artistic labor with increase of wages. For a population where every one, big and little, works either from necessity or for amusement—a people who look upon work as pleasure and who feel it no privation to be employed—such a people are ennobled by their toil.

Ivan looked after the schools. He emancipated the national teachers from the misery of their national tyrants; he rewarded the student with scholarships, the school-boy with useful prizes; in every parish he established a library and reading-room. He accustomed the people to put by the pence they could spare; he taught them how to help one another; he established in Bondavara a savings-bank and a hospital.

His own colliery was a model. The miners and himself were the joint owners, and shared the profit. Whoever was taken on in this colliery should pass an examination and work one year on trial. This rule applied to women and men alike. This trial year was not easy, particularly for the girls.

Nowhere was a girl so looked after; not in her mother's house or in a convent or state institution was there more particularity as to manners and morals than in Ivan Behrend's colliery. Every word, every act was watched. If any one failed to be up to the mark during his year of probation, no one taunted him, nor was he despised. He was simply told to go and work in the company's colliery, where there was better pay; and the workman or workwoman imagined this was an advance, not a degradation. In the company's colliery there was certainly more freedom, the rules being less strict.

If, however, at the end of the trial year the applicant had fulfilled all requirements, he or she was received into the colony and became a shareholder, so far as the profit was in question. Besides this, a prize for virtue was given once a year, on the anniversary of the great pit-burning, to the most modest, well-conducted girl in the colony.

Ivan spent on this prize fifty ducats, and the miners on their side promised the winner a handsome wedding present.

It was, of course, an understood thing that no one went in for the prize. No one knew who was likely to get it. The elders took notes; it was their secret.

The giving of this prize was not to be attended with any ceremonial. It would take place on an ordinary working day, when all the miners would have picks and shovels in their hands, so that every one could see that the reward was not for a pretty face, but for a good heart and industrious fingers. It was to be a day of general rejoicing.

This was how Ivan mourned.

CHAPTER XLII
EVILA

"No; she wears the same holiday clothes in which she was dressed when she came a year ago; naturally they are not quite as fresh as they were. She has a little string of beads round her throat, and in her hair a narrow ribbon. At night she washes her clothes in the stream, for she has one peculiarity—she wears fresh linen every day; but she makes it up herself, so she alone has the trouble."

"Is she saving?"

"She has more in our savings-bank than any one of the girls. She would have still more, only that on Sundays she gives a whole day's wages to the beggar who sits at the church door."

"Does she go to church regularly?"

"Every Sunday she comes with us, but she never sits with the other girls; she kneels before a side-altar, covers her face with her hands, and prays all through mass."

"Is she good-tempered?"

"She has offended no one and has never been angry. Once a woman said something very offensive to her, for which we gave her a heavy fine. The woman was ready to pay it, but the girl denied that she had been offended. Soon after the woman got ill; she had no one to nurse her, because she is a solitary widow, and this girl nursed her every night, and fetched the medicine from the apothecary for her."

"Do you think she is a hypocrite?"

"She is too merry for that, and ready for a joke. Hypocrites are gloomy folk. Our people would soon find her out if she wasn't on the square; but she is a prime favorite with every one. We don't choose our words exactly, but we can make a fair guess at the girl who respects herself. We like one that gives a good box on the ear to a fellow who would make too free. Sharp with the hand, but soft with her tongue; that's our sort. And still, sometimes I have watched her when she was in quite another mood; for instance, on Sunday afternoons, when we sit under the mulberry-trees, they all get round me and make me tell them—God knows how often!—the story of how you carried the pipe of the air-pump into the gallery of the Bondavara mine, and how we all thought you were a dead man. Women and children hold their breath while I tell it. I believe I do tell that story well, for they know it by heart, and yet they cannot but listen. They take it in different ways; but this girl, I have noticed her, she covers up her face and cries the whole time."

"And is she a modest girl?"

"To ascertain this point we had to call a jury of married women. They couldn't bring forward a single charge against her. Then we got the girls together, and we pressed them very close, if there was anything with the young men, but they all said—no. And there was no need for them to deny, for a peasant girl is fitly mated with a miner, and if he wants her he can have her."

They had now reached the colliery, and went into the station-house, which stood at the corner of the branch railroad. There was now another line, which ran underground and connected the two collieries. Here Ivan found a great many of the miners. He sent for the rest, and told them work was over for the day. Men and women assembled by degrees, and only one group of girls still remained working. These had agreed not to leave off until they had driven their load of coals to the coal-hill, which lay between the entrance to the quarry gallery and the station-house where Ivan sat waiting. He could not see the girls; he could only hear their clear voices as they called to one another to make haste and get the work finished.

Some one began to sing. The melody was familiar to Ivan—one of those sad Slav airs in which the singer seems on the brink of tears; and the voice was sweet and tuneful as a bell, full, too, of feeling.