He rang the bell loudly. Some time passed before the door was opened for him. Measures had evidently been taken to baffle the curiosity of the crowd.
The door of Dorothea's apartments, however, was open. He hurried onward, finding at first no one to detain him or to give him any information.
In the cosy little room, now brilliantly lighted, where he had left his brother, stood Dorothea, evidently dressed to go out, in a gray gown, and a bonnet trimmed with pale pink roses, her cheeks ashy pale, her face hard and set in a frightful, unnatural smile.
She tried to reply, but the words would not come. The smile grew broader, and her eyes glowed. Her face recalled to him the evening at the Countess Brock's, when she looked around after her song and found herself the only woman in the room.
One or two persons had made their way into the room. Goswyn ordered them out, with an imperious air of command. "Where is he?" he asked, hoarsely. She pointed mutely to a door. He entered. It was her sleeping-room, airy, bright, luxurious; and there, at the foot of the bed, lay a dark figure, face downward, with outstretched arms.
Two officials, one of whom was writing something in a note-book, were in the room.
The servant told him it had been entirely unexpected. When her Excellency came home, she had exchanged a few words with the Herr Baron, and had then gone to dress for the theatre. The Herr Baron had gone into the other room to write a note, and then--while her Excellency was in the _salon_ putting on her gloves they had heard--a shot. Her Excellency had been the first to find him.
On the table lay two notes, one to Goswyn, the other to Dorothea.
The contents of Dorothea's Goswyn never knew: in his own note there was nothing save
Yes, he had forgiven, but his life had paid the forfeit.
The news of Otto von Sydow's sudden tragic death produced a profound impression upon old Countess Lenzdorff.
She immediately wrote a long letter to Goswyn,--eight pages of affectionate and sincere sympathy. Erika said very little about the matter, but she looked forward eagerly to Goswyn's reply.
When it came it was dry, almost formal,--the reply of a man crushed to the earth, who is not wont to discourse about his emotions and is shy of expressing himself with regard to them.