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"I think it is," said Obenreizer, dryly. "Permit me, Mr. Vendale. Madame Dor." The elder lady by the stove, with the glove stretched on her left hand, like a glover's sign, half got up, half looked over her broad shoulder, and wholly plumped down again and rubbed away. "Madame Dor," said Obenreizer, smiling, "is so kind as to keep me free from stain or tear.
"I ask you to confer upon me the greatest of all favours I ask you to give me her hand in marriage." Obenreizer dropped back into his chair. "Mr. Vendale," he said, "you petrify me." "I will wait," rejoined Vendale, "until you have recovered yourself." "One word before I recover myself. You have said nothing about this to my niece?" "I have opened my whole heart to your niece.
Obenreizer's resolution was necessarily Vendale's, seeing that he stood at bay thus desperately: He must be ruined, or must destroy the evidence that Vendale carried about him, even if he destroyed Vendale with it. The state of mind of each of these two fellow-travellers towards the other was this.
Whatever the born mountaineer read in the weather-tokens that was illegible to the other, he kept to himself. "Shall we get across to-day?" asked Vendale. "No," replied the other. "You see how much deeper the snow lies here than it lay half a league lower. The higher we mount the deeper the snow will lie. Walking is half wading even now. And the days are so short!
Oppressed by private anxieties of their own, Marguerite and Vendale appeared to feel the influence of the speechless friend. The whole responsibility of keeping the talk going rested on Obenreizer's shoulders, and manfully did Obenreizer sustain it. He opened his heart in the character of an enlightened foreigner, and sang the praises of England.
Vendale tried to think coherently, tried to speak coherently, tried to pick up the iron-shod staff he had let fall; failing to touch it, tried to stagger on without its aid. All in vain, all in vain! He stumbled, and fell heavily forward on the brink of the deep chasm.
"I protest against the conditions you impose on me," he began. "Naturally," said Obenreizer; "I dare say I should protest, myself, in your place." "Say, however," pursued Vendale, "that I accept your terms. In that case, I must be permitted to make two stipulations on my part. In the first place, I shall expect to be allowed to see your niece."
"Without excepting anybody?" repeated Obenreizer. As he said the words, he walked away again, thoughtfully, to the window at the other end of the room, looked out for a moment, and suddenly came back to Vendale. "Surely they must have forgotten?" he resumed, "or they would have excepted me?" "It is Monsieur Rolland who writes," said Vendale. "And, as you say, he must certainly have forgotten.
And all the while Sir John and the rest were riding round, full three miles to the right, and back again, to get into Vendale, and to the foot of the crag. When they came to the old dame's school, all the children came out to see. And the old dame came out too; and when she saw Sir John, she curtsied very low, for she was a tenant of his. "Well, dame, and how are you?" said Sir John.
Vendale turned to the corner by the window, in which Marguerite had placed herself with her work. There, as if she had dropped from the ceiling, or come up through the floor there, in the old attitude, with her face to the stove sat an Obstacle that had not been foreseen, in the person of Madame Dor! She half got up, half looked over her broad shoulder at Vendale, and plumped down again.
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