Part 22 (1/2)

Edith turned hastily away toward the window.

”There is the signal for the train! We have only a few minutes; let us bid each other farewell! Don't look so mournful, Danira, and don't grieve about me. I have no intention of going into a convent or sorrowing all my life. It must be delightful to devote yourself heart and soul to the man of your choice, but that destiny isn't allotted to everybody. It can't be done, as George says.”

Just at that moment Gerald entered to tell them that the train was coming. He saw a bright face and heard only gay, cordial parting words.

A few minutes after, Edith was seated in the car, nodding one more farewell through the window; then the train rolled on again and instantly disappeared from the gaze of those left behind.

George had quitted the station with Jovica to take her to his lieutenant's lodgings, where she was to wait for Danira.

There was an immense throng in the great open square outside. All the country people had flocked thither, each one trying to find his or her relatives among the returning soldiers. Everywhere were joyous meetings, shouts of delight, clasping of hands, and embracing, and whoever got into the midst of the residents of his native village, who usually went in troops, was almost stifled with tokens of friends.h.i.+p.

George had hitherto escaped this fate, but now a portly farmer and his equally corpulent wife, worked their way through the throng straight toward him, shouting his name while still a long distance off.

”By all the saints! there are my parents!” cried the young Tyrolese, joyously. ”Did you really take the long journey here? Yes, here I am, alive and kicking, and have brought my whole head back with me! That's saying something, when a fellow returns from Krivoscia.”

The farmer and his wife instantly seized upon their son and wanted him to walk between them, but Jovica, who, during the exchange of greetings, had remained behind him, now suddenly appeared. She had been frightened by the noise and crowd that surrounded her on all sides, and when she saw that her George was to be taken away she clung to his arm, beseeching him in the Slavonic tongue not to leave her.

The parents looked greatly surprised at the sudden appearance of the young girl who clung so confidingly to their son. Luckily Jovica's extremely childish figure prevented them from suspecting the real relation between the pair.

Yet the farmer frowned, and his wife said slowly: ”What does this mean?”

”This means--this is what I've brought back from my journey,” replied George, who saw a storm rising which he wished for the present to avoid. Yet he did not release ”what he had brought,” but held her firmly by the hand.

”What does this mean? How came you by the child?” cried the farmer angrily, and his wife sharply added:

”The girl looks like a gipsy! Where did you pick her up! Out with the whole story.”

Jovica, who during the journey had greatly enlarged her knowledge of the language, understood that the people before her were George's parents, but she also perceived their unkind reception. Tears filled her dark eyes, and she timidly repeated the words of greeting she had been taught ”How do you do?” But the foreign accent completely enraged the mother.

”She can't even speak German,” she cried furiously. ”That's a pretty thing! Do you mean to bring her to us at the Moosbach Farm?”

”I won't have it!” said the farmer emphatically. ”We want no foreign gipsies in the house. Let the girl go, and come with us; we're going home.”

But George was not the man to leave his Jovica in the lurch. He only drew her closer to his side and answered with resolute defiance:

”Where the girl stays I shall stay, and if she cannot come to the farm I'll never return home. You must not scold me about Jovica, my dear parents, for, to tell the truth, I have chosen her for my wife.”

His parents stood as if they had been struck by a thunderbolt, staring at their son as though they thought people might lose not only their heads but their wits in Krivoscia. Then a storm burst forth on both sides; it was fortunate that, in the general rejoicing, each person was absorbed in his own friends, and everybody was shouting and talking as loud in delight as Farmer Moosbach and his wife in their wrath, or there would have been a great excitement.

At last George, by dint of his powerful lungs, succeeded in obtaining a hearing.

”Give me a chance to speak for once!” he cried. ”You don't know Jovica at all; she's a splendid girl, and even if she is still a pagan--”

He went no further. The thoughtless fellow had used the worst possible expedient. His mother fairly shrieked aloud in horror at the fatal word, and the farmer crossed himself in the face of his future daughter-in-law.

”A pagan! Heaven help us! He wants to bring a pagan into the house.

George, you are possessed by the devil!”

Jovica was trembling from head to foot. She saw only too plainly that she was the object of this aversion and began to weep bitterly, which destroyed the last remnant of George's patience.

”My dear parents,” he shouted, with a furious gesture, as if he longed to knock the ”dear parents” down, ”I've always been an obedient son, but if you receive my future wife so, may a million--”