The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1883-09-01

last hedge, else he would have had some dA-
ficulty in getting home. He pushed on,
however, and reached the entrance; but
when he endeavo red to rest his foot on the
strrup to alight, he found it absolutely I'M
possible, and amid the lamentations of the
servants who had gathered around, he had
to let himself be taken down from his horse
and be dragged, as he said, like a bundle to
his bed
When he was duly unbooted and exam
med, the supreme differance with which he
allowed himself to be handled and moved
about, spite of the paleness of his face did
not lessen the fact that he had seriously
fractured his tibia.
the bone-setter was sent for, in conform
ity with a precept of the Countess, who
preferred a bone-setter at hand to the first
surgeon in the world 800 miles off hor-
y-complicated dressing bristling with
splints and bandages, was applied to the leg,
with very respectful but formal injunctions
not to move, and to remain in bed for SIX
weeks.
Six weeks! and the sporting season good,
and flights of partridges started every min
ute by the Counts dogs, hunting now for
their own pleasure, the door of the kennel
being seldom closed, the horses neighing
from sheer WEAKNESS, and the grooms giving
themselves lumbago Frightening up the trap
pings that were now to be unused.
The Countess was good reader, spite OF
her eye-glass; she read untiringly, the result
OF which was to send the patient to sleep
in fallible result; simply an affair of time,
often in ten minutes, sometimes an hour.
Serge's breathing would become regular, the
fever that colored his cheek bones would
gradually disappear. and then the good
mother, closing the book, would go about
her duties as mistress of the house, leaving
Mavra in charge of her son.
Gradually the needle of Mavra's embroidery
work would slacken its notion and for long
hours her eyes remain fixed on the face OF
the sleeping young Count. Daylight would
decline, and no candles be brought, lest the
healing rest should be disturbed.
Seated in the window in the deepening
shadow, the outlines of her figure relieved
against the pale blue autumn sky in which
her dear stars were fast gathering, Mavra
would lose herself in a vague infinite
ecstasy as she sat gazing at her sleeping
young master, whom her heart only could
now see. At the first sign of his awakening
she was on her feet with her hand upon the
bell. On the arrival OF the lamp MaVra
would withdraw to the work-room. At night
in her dreams she would continue her spir-
itual, almost mystical contemplation Of the
beautiful fair head asleep on its pillow.
When Serge got well, she was the prey of
of an implacable, unconscious immortal love.
Henceforth she belonged to her idol. Pres
him alone she breathed. She would have
almost hated the convalescence that day by
day was taking him from her, had not the
young mans weakness obliged him fire.
quently to seek her aid. Supporting himself
with stick in one hand, and resting the
other on Mavra's shoulder, he would walk
round his room. She was happy and proud
the day when to give the Countess a surprise,
she led him thus into the little salon, where
the Countess, thinking he was asleep, was
reading a devotional book. The agitated joy
Of the mother and the nervous gayety of the
son brought tears to the eyes of the young
peasant girl; but stoical, like all her race she
drove her tears back to her heart
Serge walked alone with stick, then with
out stick, limping little; by-and-by his
firm elastic tread was heard again on the
waxed oak floor. The northern early winter
was come, snow already blocking up from
time to time the seignorial mansion, then
melting under the breath of a warmer wind
till the great winter blockade finally set in.
One day sledge lined with fur, drawn by
spirited horses, blinking the bells that stud
ded the harness. drew up before the door.
Serge and his mother stepped into it, waving
friendly farewell to the household that
crowded around with noisy benedictions.
The Countess was to pass the winter at st.
Petersburg, where her son was to resume his
service in the huasars of Grodno. When
they were gone, when the heavy gate which
Mavra had opened one beautiful August day
was shut, and the snow fell slowly in large
fakes, rejecting the colors of the prism, ii
shut out ali the outer world from the in
mates of the seigporial mansion.
Mavra returned to her EN- broidery frame,
no longer under the orders of the good Dacka,
but under the capricious, ftful superintend-
ence of housekeeper charged in the interval
with the work-room department. Life was
not so easy, but what mattered it to Mavra
that there should be more harShness or less
kindness? She did not live in the present.
Her waking hours were passed in an limo
cent ecstasy that wore her away without suf-
fering. She did not know this was love.
Had she known it, no amount of prayers or
tears would have been enough to expiate
her objectionable sin. She loved just as
flowers blossom; her ideal was exalted, her
dream pure, and she lived upon them. One
less chaste would have died. And as re-
CARDS the young Count he had no idea OF all
this.
The Countess came back in spring, and the
house resumed its grand. hosptabe ways.
Mavra was profoundly touched to find that
her mistress, far from having forgotten in
quired kindly after her. She returned to
her personal attendance upon the Countess
with more devoted fervor than ever
Later on, the young master was to
come back. Dacka conveyed in q
mysterious manner that he had something
better to do than to bury himself in the
country In the evening she confded tc
the laundress, in interminable whispers, Sc
crets that were no doubt interesting, but
which Mavra made no attempt to overhear
being by nature and taste discreet and re-
served
On the eve of ST. John, when young girls
plat crowns of flowers, which they throw
into the river to see if they are to be married
within the year, Mavra went like the 9th
ers to consult tate after this graceful fash
ion. She never dreamed of marriage; it was
closed world to her. into which she had nc
desire to penetrate; but she would plat {
crown and watch it through the eddies Of
the capricious stream. The girls had thrown
in their garlands. Mavra's got entangled in
flowers that young lad of twenty had just
flung in. He was a carpenter. The tive
crowns whirled round in company, and van