Part 20 (1/2)
”How could he be anything else!”
”And is she very fast?”
”Very,” Harry a.s.sents.
The ladies in the landau have both stretched their necks to look after the Amazon. But while the face of the blonde expresses merely critical curiosity, in her companion's dark eyes there is sad, even horrified, surprise.
The Amazon and her train disappear beneath the arched gate-way of the barracks.
”Lato!” the portly blonde calls to Treurenberg from the landau.
He does not hear her.
”Do you remember my 'Old Tom'?” he asks his friend, returning to his favourite theme.
”I should think so. A chestnut,--a magnificent creature!”
”Magnificent! A friend,--an actual friend. That fat Rhoden--a cousin of my wife's--broke his leg in riding him at a hunt. But, to speak of something pleasanter, how are they all at Komaritz? Your cousin must be very pretty by this time?” And Treurenberg looks askance at his friend.
”Very,” Harry replies, and his manner suddenly grows cold and constrained. ”But allow me to speak to your wife,” he adds. ”By the way, who is the young lady beside her?”
”H'm! a relative,--a cousin of my wife's.”
”Present me, I pray,” says Harry.
He then pays his respects to the Countess Treurenberg and to her companion, whose name he now learns is Olga Dangeri.
The Countess offers him her finger-tips with a gracious smile. Olga Dangeri, nodding slightly, raises her dark, mysterious eyes, looks him full in the face for a moment, and then turns away indifferent. The servant comes out of the post-office with a great bundle of letters, which the Countess receives from him, and with two or three packages, which he hands over to the maids.
”What are you waiting for, Lato? Get in,” the Countess says.
”Drive on. I shall stay here with Leskjewitsch for a while,”
Treurenberg replies.
”Mamma is waiting breakfast for us.”
”I shall breakfast in the Casino. My respects to your mother.”
”As you please.” The young Countess bows to Harry stiffly, with a discontented air, the horses start, a cloud of dust rises, and the landau rolls away. With his eyes half closed, Harry looks after the heavy brown carriage-horses.
”Lato, that off horse is spavined.”
”For heaven's sake don't notice it! My mother-in-law bought the pair privately to surprise me. She paid five thousand guilders for them.”
”H'm! Who persuaded her to buy them?”
”Pistasch Kamenz. I do not grudge him his bargain,” murmurs Lato, adding, with a shake of the head, ”'Tis odd, dogs and horses are the only things in which we have the advantage over the financiers.”