DR. REINHARD. (Translated for the Canadian Monthly, from the German of Kleimar.) CHAPTER I. "I only wanted to speak with him once more, just once," she continued: "to solve a AH, is that you, Doctor?" said a young mystery to which his last words had given lady, rising to welcome him. "I was told, Miss Eva, that I shouid find you in the garden," he replied; so I came here and interrupted your cogitations. Will you forgive me ?" "Forgive you!" she said smiling. "Do you know that at this moment I was thinking of you, and that I-but tell me first if you have seen my aunt, and how you found her ?" "The good lady is much better, and in a few days I shall be able to discontinue my visits," he answered, as he led the young lady back to her place. He held her hand in his, and the manner in which she allowed it to remain there, showed that she looked upon him as an old acquaintance. "So you were thinking of me, Miss Eva," he continued, with a softness in the tone of his question. "But then your thoughts were not of a pleasant nature, for your look was sad when I approached you.” "O, they were mingled with many remembrances," she replied. "This is my father's birthday. A year ago he was with me. A few months afterwards you led me away from his sick bed, when the news of his illness had called me home from my cousin's. I saw him then for the last time, and he died that night." "I know it, I know it," said the Doctor, mastering his emotion with a great effort, as he saw the tears trickle down Eva's face. existence in my breast-one which I dare not mention to you." He did not reply, and she marked the shade of trouble which for a moment came over his countenance. Suddenly she turned her face towards his and said: is "I do not know why it is that my heart so open at this moment, that I should speak to you so frankly, more frankly than I have done since my father's death. Perhaps it is because you were my father's friend and can solve the mystery. Do not interrupt me, for I must now tell you what has tormented me so long. I know I can put full confidence in you." "That you can," said the Doctor, warmly. "Now for it! When I saw my father, and knelt crying at his bedside, he told me with his feeble voice, as he laid both his hands upon my forehead, 'never forget to love and be grateful to Doctor Reinhard as our dearest friend, for he saved my fortune and my honour!" "They were feverish thoughts, fancies of a weakened imagination, of a dying man, which, in health he would never have repeated!" exclaimed the Doctor, much moved. "No, no! At that moment he could not be considered a dying man; he was in full possession of his faculties, and if you had not entered just then and forbidden him to speak, I should have received an explanation of his words. You led me out of the room, and I never again saw him alive. And now, Doctor, you owe me an explanation, "His death took me by surprise. I awoke and found myself an orphan," was her mournful rejoinder. "Poor child!" said the Doctor, in a voice and you must tell me the meaning of those of deep sympathy. words. I must know for what and how to show my gratitude to you, as it was my father's will," she said, with deep emotion. He rose and took both her hands as he exclaimed "Eva, you owe me no debt of gratitude. I give you my word that it was only his imagination, weakened by illness, that made him suppose that I was the saviour of his honour, which was as stainless as that of the best man in the world. No human being would have ever dreamed of impugning it. You must put aside every thought which could cast a doubt upon it. Such thoughts are disrespectful to his memory." She gave him a pleasant look—" The portrait of my father lives enshrined in my memory, but since his death a cloud has covered it that has prevented me from always seeing the dear features clearly. If I cannot thank you for anything else, I shall thank you for having chased away this cloud. For this I shall always be grateful." "I wish you would allow the matter to pass from your memory entirely, Eva; for you must know I came to hear what you have to say on a very different subject." She looked at him with wondering expectation. He again took her hand and went on in a tone of emotion. "Eva, since the death of your father, your aunt's house has been your home. Could you make up your mind to leave this home, to belong to one whose heart has beat for you since your childhood?" She made no answer, but her hand trembled in his. “Eva, I am myself the man, who loves you, whose highest wish is to call you his own, and who now asks you, can you and will you give him your hand?" For a moment she stood astonished, almost petrified by his proposal, which took her so completely by surprise. In this man, whose age was double her own, she had seen only a fatherly friend, the friend as he had been of her father. She had trusted him with all her troubles, little and great, and had never been deceived in him, for she always received from him comfort and sympathy. And now, suddenly, this man stood before her pleading as a lover, and thus placed himself beneath her, since from her he was to hear the words on which depended his happiness for life. Her mind could not take it in, and he marked at once the paleness that came over her cheeks. Her silence troubled him, and he continued in a nervous voice. "Have I been mistaken Eva, in supposing your heart to be free, or is it that you feel you cannot love me? If it is so, say one word and I retire; for I desire your happiness as much as my own." While he spoke, she had regained her composure, and now for the first time ventured to raise her eyes to his; she saw his fixed upon her-those earnest eyes-with a wonderful softness of expression. Her heart seemed changed; a feeling came over her never experienced before. Why could she not love this man above all others, since he was better and nobler than all other menhim whom she had known since her father's death. The words of her departed father, too, suddenly crossed her mind. Was not the time now come for her to prove that she regarded his will as sacred? "Speak, Eva," continued the deep voice of the Doctor, “has your heart been given to another man ?" "No," she replied, in confused accents, "it is still my own." She could say no you are so taken by surprise as I must own to myself that you are. I will give you as long a time as you please to examine your heart; and if you tell me that you cannot love me, I promise not to seek to win you. On the other hand, when you have once spoken the word which unites us, I shall look upon you as mine, and mine alone, to my life's end. And now, above all things, be open and candid with me and with yourself. Search well and see whether there is not in your heart the image of another man not to be supplanted by mine." She laughed, blushed and said, "I will frankly tell you that, as a girl of fourteen and in a childish way, I loved my cousin Albert." | 66 And your cousin ?" he asked, a little disturbed. He gave her his hand and took leave, saying: "Eva, look well into your heart, and when you have once decided, let me know it without delay." She gave him a loving look, as though her choice were already made. Indeed she could not see why she should not say the decisive word at once. But he wished it otherwise, and as she had always been accustomed to follow his opinion and advice, she would not contend against his wish on this occasion. Her eyes followed him as he passed out of sight, and dwelt with pleasure on his stately figure and manly bearing. She thought too of the high estimation in which he was held by the world, and asked herself what the world would say when it was told of their engagement. She heard herself congratulated on her good fortune, and felt exalted and humbled at once, by being chosen by a man of so much importance as his bride. Bride! She smiled involuntarily at the word. "He is so good, he loves me so deeply,' "Ah, that was just the point," she replied, half laughing," he never noticed me, he had no suspicion how much his little cousin admired him, he had eyes only for grown-up beauties, with whom the handsome young lieutenant was very successful." "Eva, how has it been since you have she repeated, till tears came into her eyes. grown to be a young lady ?" "O, from that time I have thought no more of him," she replied carelessly, "besides we have not seen each other for a long time. When he was here to see his mother, just before my father's death, I, as you know, was staying with a friend." She longed to tell her secret to some one, but she felt that she could not yet speak of it at home; so much the less as her aunt's state was such that any excitement might lead to a relapse. "To my father," she said in a low voice, and taking up her hat, which lay near her, she slipped unobserved "And is it true that he is expected here ?" through a side-door of the garden, and bent asked the Doctor, quickly. "His last letter announced the return of the expedition which he accompanied from the Eastern seas. But I can scarcely say I am glad he is coming home, for what I have heard of him is not very favourable. His wildness it seems has been boundless; and life, it seems to me, can be happy only when one can really rely upon some support." "Eva, that you shall find in me," he could not help saying with all the warmth of his feelings. He suppressed other words which came to his lips. Only in his eyes could she ead, "may it soon be mine to support you." her steps to the neighbouring place of rest, where the heart which was dearest to her slept beneath the green-sward. Nearly an hour later she returned to her aunt's house, where she met a servant who told her that her aunt had been inquiring for her, and begged her to come to her room. "There is a visitor," she added, laughing, "but I must not tell who it is." As Eva entered her aunt's room, a young man in the brilliant uniform of the Roya! Navy rose from a sofa, and advancing quickly to meet her, put out his hand to her without speaking a word. "O, cousin Albert!" she exclaimed, as she looked into a pair of dark eyes which were fixed upon her, while a brightness came over the handsome features of the young man. "It is pleasant to hear you welcome me home, Eva-pleasant to see you here in my mother's house." And then he seemed to remember a painful association which his words might recall. With a quick glance he said "forgive me," bent his head and kissed her hand. She was pleased by his recollection of her bereavement, and replied: "I feel myself happy in not being left utterly alone; and though my father is dead, I have still kind hearts to protect and love me." “There are many, Eva. I know nothing in the world dearer to me than your happi ness." She looked at him a little surprised at his speaking with a warmth of feeling for which she hardly gave him credit, after all she had heard of his past life. At this point her aunt interrupted the conversation. She had watched their meeting not without emotion. "I call this a surprise," she said gaily, "which Albert has prepared for us. I did not expect him for weeks, when suddenly he appeared before me, without having given the least notice of his return." After so have spent it on the stormy sea. His mother did not understand him. She only marked a momentary cloud which passed over his brow. The change in his expression did not escape Eva's eyes; it was paiuful to her to be with him, and she took advantage of the first opportunity to escape to her room. He followed her with his eyes, and his mother who watched him closely, seeing his face brighten, ventured to ask him "how he liked her Eva ?" "She is beautiful, and seems as charming as she is beautiful." She smiled with pleasure. "Since last year your taste has changed for the better. A year ago, you know, you said that such fair-haired beauties could never entrap your heart, and that were she ten times more lovely than she was, she could not compare with the dark tresses of Emily Waldow. The young man blushed. "Pray, mother, do not speak of that. It is past and must be forgotten. Tell me what you were going to tell me, when Eva's entrance broke off our conversation-how she came here, what sad accident made her an orphan." "You heard that her father's death was caused by the bursting of a blood-vessel, the day after your departure. I wrote to you at the time about it." "You did," he answered hastily. "I re“I received,” said Albert, "quite unex-ceived the letter on the day we sailed. I pectedly a furlough on the return of the expedition, and of course hastened home as fast as possible to see you and Eva, and”he did not finish the sentence, but walked quickly up and down the room. could not reply at the time. But there were many details which you did not give me. blood-vessel was owing to any particular exYou did not say whether the bursting of the citement." "Your question," said his mother, "recalls to my mind a singular circumstance That evening, as I entered the room of my brother-in-law, I heard him say to Dr. Rein There was something strange in his manner. His questions and answers were short and abrupt; so much so, that his mother shook her head and said: "Albert, in former days you were not thus; hard, who had not left him since the beginyou are greatly changed." He gave a forced laugh. "Change is the law of the world. It is the same with men, Since those days a year has passed, and I ning of his illness, "You will promise me, Doctor, that the whole transaction shall remain a secret." To which the Doctor answered, "upon my word of honour." I often thought of those words afterwards, and once ventured to ask Dr. Reinhard the meaning of them, particularly as I had involuntarily connected them with the cause of my brotherin-law's illness. But the Doctor assured me that it was only a personal matter between of himself and his friend, and that he had given his word to keep it secret." Albert listened in silence to this account. Then he asked, “What sort of person is this Dr. Reinhard ?" "He is an eminent physician, and a man honoured by all," replied his mother warmly. "Since the death of your uncle I have chosen him as my family physician, and during my illness I have had every reason to be satisfied with my choice. Besides, Eva has in him a fatherly friend." "Eva," exclaimed the young man—and it appeared to his mother that he was in a hurry to return to that subject-"how did she bear the death of her father?" "She, poor child! She was overpowered with grief, and would have been forlorn in the wide world if the Doctor and I had not comforted her. I was anxious, too, at that time about her circumstances, for her father, as I wrote you word, died not nearly so rich as I and the world believed him to be. The only thing which he left, in fact, was an honourable name, and if you had not generously given up to her the thirty thousand dollars which came to you under his will, she would have been penniless." While his mother was speaking the young man had turned away his face. At her last words he turned quickly round and said, "Mother, no more of that. It must never be mentioned. It was not a great sacrifice, for you know at that time I came of age, and inherited six times as much. It is my wish that she may know nothing of the gift." "She knows nothing about it, and thinks that the money is her inheritance. The Doctor alone knows the truth." "The Doctor, always the Doctor," exclaimed Albert, impatiently. He was going to say more, but Eva entered the room. At her appearance his eyes lightened up as they had done when he first saw her, and his voice, when he spoke to her, was soft and full of melody. As he talked to her she could not help thinking of another soft voice which had so surprised her that day, and the portrait of her friend rose before her. She compared it with the elegant form of her cousin, and asked herself why it was that the appearance of Albert did not produce a favourable impression on her, when she could not but own that his fine figure and handsome face threw Dr. Reinhard in the shade. Even his eyes, so beautiful, and bent with so much sympathy upon her, disquieted her by the fire which burned in them. But when he spoke of his voyages, when he talked about the strange lands and people he had seen, when he told the exciting story of a storm which had nearly wrecked their ship, her attention was fixed and she hung upon his lips. But when he had ended and was himself again, she could not help saying, "Heaven be praised, Dr. Reinhard is not like Albert! What a difference there is between his sedateness and this passionate creature!" Then she asked herself how the two men would get on together, whether she could look for friendship or harmony between them, and she looked forward with great anxiety to their meeting. The next morning the Doctor paid his patient his usual visit. He entered the room ignorant that Albert was there. "Dr. Reinhard-my son Albert." Eva, who blushed at the entrance of Dr. Reinhard, looked anxiously from one to the other, and was sorry to see how coldly they received the introduction. |