第100章

Ashamed to mention it, because it may have sounded too absurd, Icould not prevent my constructive imagination indulging in its vagaries, and with this secret conviction I resolved to await events, and in case suspicion from other quarters should ever designate the probable assassin, I might then come forward with my bit of corroborative evidence, should the suspected assassin be the stranger of the archway.

By twelve o'clock a new direction was given to rumor.Hitherto the stories, when carefully sifted of all exaggerations of flying conjecture, had settled themselves into something like this: The Lehfeldts had retired to rest at a quarter before ten, as was their custom.They had seen Lieschen go into her bedroom for the night, and had themselves gone to sleep with unclouded minds.From this peaceful security they were startled early in the morning by the appalling news of the calamity which had fallen on them.

Incredulous at first, as well they might be, and incapable of believing in a ruin so unexpected and so overwhelming, they imagined some mistake, asserting that Lieschen was in her own room.

Into that room they rushed, and there the undisturbed bed, and the open window, but a few feet from the garden, silently and pathetically disclosed the fatal truth.The bereaved parents turned a revealing look upon each other's whitened faces, and then slowly retired from the room, followed in affecting silence by the others.Back into their own room they went.The father knelt beside the bed, and, sobbing, prayed.The mother sat staring with a stupefied stare, her lips faintly moving.In a short while the flood of grief, awakened to a thorough consciousness, burst from their laboring hearts.When the first paroxysms were over they questioned others, and gave incoherent replies to the questions addressed to them.From all which it resulted that Lieschen's absence, though obviously voluntary, was wholly inexplicable to them; and no clew whatever could be given as to the motives of the crime.When these details became known, conjecture naturally interpreted Lieschen's absence at night as an assignation.But with whom? She was not known to have a lover.Her father, on being questioned, passionately affirmed that she had none; she loved no one but her parents, poor child! Her mother, on being questioned, told the same story--adding, however, that about seventeen months before, she had fancied that Lieschen was a little disposed to favor Franz Kerkel, their shopman; but on being spoken to on the subject with some seriousness, and warned of the distance between them, she had laughed heartily at the idea, and since then had treated Franz with so much indifference that only a week ago she had drawn from her mother a reproof on the subject.

"I told her Franz was a good lad, though not good enough for her, and that she ought to treat him kindly.But she said my lecture had given her an alarm, lest Franz should have got the same maggot into his head."This was the story now passing through the curious crowds in every street.After hearing it I had turned into a tobacconist's in the Adlergrasse, to restock my cigar-case, and found there, as everywhere, a group discussing the one topic of the hour.Herr Fischer, the tobacconist, with a long porcelain pipe pendent from his screwed-up lips, was solemnly listening to the particulars volubly communicated by a stout Bavarian priest; while behind the counter, in a corner, swiftly knitting, sat his wife, her black bead-like eyes also fixed on the orator.Of course I was dragged into the conversation.Instead of attending to commercial interests, they looked upon me as the possible bearer of fresh news.Nor was it without a secret satisfaction that I found Icould gratify them in that respect.They had not heard of Franz Kerkel in the matter.No sooner had I told what I had heard than the knitting-needles of the vivacious little woman were at once suspended.

"Ach Je!" she exclaimed, "I see it all.He's the wretch!""Who?" we all simultaneously inquired.