The Burgomasters Wife | Page 8

the second paper
nearer his eyes.
"Peter!" she exclaimed a second time, still more eagerly, but with
timidity. "I have something to tell you."
Van der Werff turned his head, cast a hasty, affectionate glance at her,
and said:
"Now, child? You see I am busy, and there is my hat."
"But Peter!" she replied, a flash of something like indignation sparkling
in her eyes, as she continued in a voice pervaded with a slightly
perceptible tone of complaint: "We haven't said anything to each other
to-day. My heart is so full, and what I would fain say to you is, must
surely--"
"When I come home Maria, not now," he interrupted, his deep voice
sounding half impatient, half beseeching. "First the city and the
country--then love-making."
At these words, Maria raised her head proudly, and answered with
quivering lips:
"That is what you have said ever since the first day of our marriage."
"And unhappily--unhappily--I must continue to say so until we reach
the goal," he answered firmly. The blood mounted into the young wife's

delicate cheeks, and with quickened breathing, she answered in a hasty,
resolute tone:
"Yes, indeed, I have known these words ever since your courtship, and
as I am my father's daughter never opposed them, but now they are no
longer suited to us, and should be: 'Everything for the country, and
nothing at all for the wife.'"
Van der Werff laid down his pen and turned full towards her.
Maria's slender figure seemed to have grown taller, and the blue eyes,
swimming in tears, flashed proudly. This life-companion seemed to
have been created by God especially for him. His heart opened to her,
and frankly stretching out both hands, he said tenderly:
"You know how matters are! This heart is changeless, and other days
will come."
"When?" asked Maria, in a tone as mournful as if she believed in no
happier future.
"Soon," replied her husband firmly. "Soon, if only each one gives
willingly what our native land demands."
At these words the young wife loosed her hands from her husband's, for
the door had opened and Barbara called to her brother from the
threshold.
"Herr Matanesse Van Wibisma, the Glipper, is in the entry and wants to
speak to you."
"Show him up," said the burgomaster reluctantly. When again alone
with his wife, he asked hastily "Will you be indulgent and help me?"
She nodded assent, trying to smile.
He saw that she was sad and, as this grieved him, held out his hand to
her again, saying:

"Better days will come, when I shall be permitted to be more to you
than to-day. What were you going to say just now?"
"Whether you know it or not--is of no importance to the state."
"But to you. Then lift up your head again, and look at me. Quick, love,
for they are already on the stairs."
"It isn't worth mentioning--a year ago to-day--we might celebrate the
anniversary of our wedding to-day."
"The anniversary of our wedding-day!" he cried, striking his hands
loudly together. "Yes, this is the seventeenth of April, and I have
forgotten it."
He drew her tenderly towards him, but just at that moment the door
opened, and Adrian ushered the baron into the room.
Van der Werff bowed courteously to the infrequent guest, then called to
his blushing wife, who was retiring: "My congratulations! I'll come
later. Adrian, we are to celebrate a beautiful festival to-day, the
anniversary of our marriage."
The boy glided swiftly out of the door, which he still held in his hand,
for he suspected the aristocratic visitor boded him no good.
In the entry he paused to think, then hurried up the stairs, seized his
plumeless cap, and rushed out of doors. He saw his school-mates,
armed with sticks and poles, ranging themselves in battle array, and
would have liked to join the game of war, but for that very reason
preferred not to listen to the shouts of the combatants at that moment,
and ran towards the Zylhof until beyond the sound of their voices.
He now checked his steps, and in a stooping posture, often on his knees,
followed the windings of a narrow canal that emptied into the Rhine.
As soon as his cap was overflowing with the white, blue, and yellow
spring flowers he had gathered, he sat down on a boundary stone, and

with sparkling eyes bound them into a beautiful bouquet, with which he
ran home.
On the bench beside the gate sat the old maidservant with his little
sister, a child six years old. Handing the flowers, which he had kept
hidden behind his back, to her, he said:
"Take them and carry them to mother, Bessie; this is the anniversary of
her wedding-day. Give her warm congratulations too, from us