Once in my room, I threw off my coat, loosened my collar, and made myself quite comfortable before commencing a letter to Overberg.

Suddenly there came a polite rap at my door, and, when I opened it, who should stand before me but Major Frank in person. She was dressed in her riding-habit, and brought me an inkstand, which she placed on the table, then took a chair quite at her ease, though she could see I was not pleased at being surprised in my shirt-sleeves. However, I put on my coat and demanded the object of her visit, as I scarcely believed her sole object was to supply me with an inkstand; and I pointed out to her I had got my own writing-case with me. My freezing manner seemed to disappoint her, so she said—

“I wished to ask a favour of you, but I see I disturb you.”

I was still silent.

“Have you a strap amongst your luggage which I can use as a riding-whip? You know I have lost mine.”

“I can lend you my ruler. Will that do?”

She grew very red, and after a pause she said—

“I see you are in no humour to render me a service.”

“I am always ready to serve a lady who exercises the privileges of her sex. Why did you not send for me, if you wished to ask me anything?”

“Ah!” she exclaimed, in an injured tone, “my want of etiquette causes your ill-humour. I have come into your room. Well, pass it over—you know I am so little of ‘a lady.’”

“That’s only too true, Major.”

“Major!” she repeated angrily, opening her large eyes in astonishment. “I thought you disliked my nickname.”

“Not since I have seen the soldier in action. But I should like to know to which class of majors you belong, tambour-major or sergeant-major? For I believe the command of a regiment is usually given to a man of refinement—to a person, in fact, who can make himself respected by his gentleman-like behaviour and dignity; but after the scene I witnessed this morning——”

“Leopold!” she cried, deadly pale, her lips quivering, “this is a personal insult. Do you mean it as such?”

I was surprised at the change, for I had expected her to wreak her anger on me now. But she sat quite still, as if nailed to her chair; so I continued—

“My remarks only apply to the disagreeable character it pleases you to assume.”

Still no answer. And I began to be embarrassed in my turn, which embarrassment was only increased by her breaking out in a plaintive tone—

“Leopold, you strike deeper than you suppose.”

“Francis,” I cried, changing my tone, “believe me, it is not my intention to wound you; I wish to cure you.”

I was going to take her hand, when she sprang up as if she had received an electric shock, and said in her bitterest tone—

“I will not be cured by you; I am what I am, and don’t you waste your precious time on such a disagreeable creature as you think me to be.”

“Oh, Francis! I am not deceived in you, and I will try to cure you in spite of yourself. When you made such a terrible scene in my presence this morning, I understood you. It meant this: He is staying here to study the character of Major Frank; well now, he shall see it in all its rudeness and insufferableness, and we shall see how long he will stay in spite of me. Miss Mordaunt, I have seen through your intentions, and I am not to be frightened away by the rude mask you have put on.”

“A mask! I am no masker!” she cried, stamping her foot with rage. “You, Jonker van Zonshoven, come from the Hague, a town full of maskers, to tell me this, me whose chief defect or merit—which you like—is to have broken with all social hypocrisies, me whose chief pride is to speak my mind plainly without regard of persons. I did not think it necessary to measure my words in your presence; it appeared to me you had made yourself one of the family, and I thought it best you should know the relationship in which we stand to each other.”

“Just so,” I replied, smiling. “You acknowledge that in raising your voice several notes too high when you gave those two humiliated men a piece of your mind, your real object was to drive a third person out of the house. Be sincere, Francis, confess the truth.”

I tried in vain to look her in the face whilst I spoke. She had turned her head away, and was kicking the leg of the table.

“I observe, and not for the first time, that you can be disagreeable when you like,” she remarked, after a long pause.

“I confess it; but an evasion is not an answer, Francis.”

“Well then, yes, it is true; I wished you to leave for your own sake. But never believe, Leopold, whatever stories you hear about me, that I am deceitful, that I would play a part. I was myself when I made the scene—violent, angry, and burning with indignation. I have my whims and fancies, that I know; but I never feign—that would ill become me; for, I may say, I have too much good in me to act falsely. Yet there are so many contradictory feelings in me that I sometimes stand surprised at myself. And let me tell you, Leo, I came here to seek consolation from you, but your tone and your words have bitterly disappointed me, so much so that for a moment I have asked myself whether you were one of those snobs in patent-leather boots, who, while expressing horror at an ungloved hand, are yet not afraid of soiling its whiteness by boxing your wife’s ears. Because I did not observe the form of sending a servant to ask you to come to my room, you receive me as you did, and repulse me with mocking words!”

It was now my turn to feel piqued, and I should have answered sharply had I not succeeded in controlling myself.

“Pardon me, Francis, I should consider myself the greatest of cowards to strike a woman; but it was no question of a woman just now. We were speaking of Major Frank—Major Frank who is angry when reminded of the privileges of the fair sex, because he will not be classed amongst ‘the ladies,’ and who, in my opinion, ought not to be surprised when, after his own fashion, one tells him the truth roundly, and without mincing matters.”

Francis listened this time without interrupting me. She was staring at the panes of the window, as if to put herself in countenance again; her paleness disappeared, and, turning round, she said, without anger, but with firmness—

“I confess, Leopold, it is not easy to contradict you; and now I think we are quits. Are we again good friends?”

“There’s nothing I desire more ardently; but, once for all, with whom? with Major Frank or——”

“Well, then, Francis Mordaunt asks for your friendship.”

She offered me both her hands, and her eyes filled with tears she could no longer keep back. How gladly I would have kissed them away, and pressed her to my heart and told her all! But I could not compromise my commencing victory.

“Should I have spoken to you in this way, Francis, if I had not been your sincere friend?”

“I see it now, and I have need of a sincere friend. Well then, the Captain is ruining himself for our sakes; and grandfather, in a most cowardly fashion, lends himself to such doings. Is it not horrible?”

“It is very wrong, I admit.”

“Now, suppose the General were to die—I should be left shut up in this place for life with the Captain. When he has rendered himself poor for our sakes, I cannot send him away. Now do you understand I had reasons for being angry this morning?”

“That you had reasons, I don’t dispute; but the form——”

“Come, come, always the form!”

“I don’t say the form is the main thing, but a woman who gives way to such fits of violence puts herself in the wrong, even though she have right on her side. Just think for a moment what a scene if the Captain had retaliated in the same coarse language of the barracks, which he has probably not forgotten.”

“I should like to see him try it on with me!”

“However, he had a perfect right to do so. I agree you are right in principle; but let me beseech you to change your manner of proceeding. The gentleness of a woman is always more persuasive than the transports of passion. You have told me your early education was neglected; but you have read Schiller?”

“Die RÄuber,” she replied, tauntingly.

“But not his ‘Macht des Weibes,’ nor this line—

She shook her head in the negative.

“This part of your education has been much neglected.”

“I will not deny it.”

“But it is not yet too late. Will you listen to my advice?”

“Not now; I have already stayed too long here, and—and—you stay at the Castle——”

“As long as you will keep me, Francis.”

“Well, stay as long as you can—that is, if you can fall in with our ways. I am going out for a ride; I need fresh air and movement.”

“Apropos the service you came to ask of me—the strap?”

“Oh, I shall pluck a switch. The Captain came to offer me a whip, and——”

“And you would rather accept it at my hands,” I said, laughing.

“No; but I should like to borrow ten guilders of you for a couple of days.”

I handed over my purse, and told her to take out of it as much as she required. What a strange creature! What a comic conclusion to our battle!

I also felt as if a little fresh air would do me good, and so I walked off to the village post-office with my letter to Overberg.