Hilda had not spent her nineteen years in the glare of the Spartan publicity in which the masses live without establishing a character. Just as she knew all the good points and bad in all the people of that community, so they knew all hers, and therefore knew what it was possible for her to do and what impossible. And if a baseless lie is swift of foot where everybody minutely scrutinizes everybody else, it is also scant of breath. Sophie's scandal soon dwindled to a whisper and expired, and the kindlier and probable explanation of Hilda's wan face and downcast eyes was generally accepted.
Her code of morals and her method of dealing with moral questions were those of all the people about her--strict, severe, primitive. Feuerstein was a cheat, a traitor. She cast him out of her heart--cast him out at once and utterly and for ever. She could think of him only with shame. And it seemed to her that she was herself no longer pure--she had touched pitch; how could she be undefiled?
She accepted these conclusions and went about her work, too busy to indulge in hysteria of remorse, repining, self-examination.
She avoided Otto, taking care not to be left alone with him when he called on Sundays, and putting Sophie between him and her when he came up to them in the Square. But Otto was awaiting his chance, and when it came, plunged boldly into his heart-subject and floundered bravely about. ``I don't like to see you so sad, Hilda. Isn't there any chance for me? Can't things be as they used to be?''
Hilda shook her head sadly. ``I'm never going to marry,'' she said. ``You must find some one else.''
``It's you or nobody. I said that when we were in school together and--I'll stick to it.'' His eyes confirmed his words.
``You mustn't, Otto. You make me feel as if I were spoiling your life. And if you knew, you wouldn't want to marry me.''
``I don't care. I always have, and I always will.''
``I suppose I ought to tell you,'' she said, half to herself.
She turned to him suddenly, and, with flushed cheeks and eyes that shifted, burst out: ``Otto, he was a married man!''
``But you didn't know.''
``It doesn't change the way I feel. You might--any man might--throw it up to me. And sooner or later, everybody'll know. No man would want a girl that had had a scandal like that on her.''
``I would,'' he said, ``and I do. And it isn't a scandal.''
Some one joined them and he had no chance to continue until the following Sunday, when Heiligs and Brauners went together to the Bronx for a half-holiday. They could not set out until their shops closed, at half-past twelve, and they had to be back at five to reopen for the Sunday supper customers. They lunched under the trees in the yard of a German inn, and a merry party they were.
Hilda forgot to keep up her pretense that her healing wounds were not healing and never would heal. She teased Otto and even flirted with him. This elevated her father and his mother to hilarity. They were two very sensible young-old people, with a keen sense of humor--the experience of age added to the simplicity and gaiety of youth.
You would have paused to admire and envy had you passed that way and looked in under the trees, as they clinked glasses and called one to another and went off into gales of mirth over nothing at all. What laughter is so gay as laughter at nothing at all? Any one must laugh when there is something to laugh at; but to laugh just because one must have an outlet for bubbling spirits there's the test of happiness!
After luncheon they wandered into the woods and soon Otto and Hilda found themselves alone, seated by a little waterfall, which in a quiet, sentimental voice suggested that low tones were the proper tones to use in that place.
``We've known each other always, Hilda,'' said Otto. ``And we know all about each other. Why not--dear?''
She did not speak for several minutes.
``You know I haven't any heart to give you,'' she answered at last.
Otto did not know anything of the kind, but he knew she thought so, and he was too intelligent to dispute, when time would settle the question--and, he felt sure, would settle it right. So he reached out and took her hand and said: ``I'll risk that.''
And they sat watching the waterfall and listening to it, and they were happy in a serious, tranquil way. It filled him with awe to think that he had at last won her. As for her, she was looking forward, without illusions, without regrets, to a life of work and content beside this strong, loyal, manly man who protested little, but never failed her or any one else.
On the way home in the train she told her mother, and her mother told her father. He, then and there, to the great delight and pleasure of the others in the car, rose up and embraced and kissed first his daughter, then Otto and then Otto's mother.
And every once in a while he beamed down the line of his party and said: ``This is a happy day!''
And he made them all come into the sitting-room back of the shop.
``Wait here,'' he commanded. ``No one must move!''
He went down to the cellar, presently to reappear with a dusty bottle of Johannisberger Cabinet. He pointed proudly to the seal. ``Bronze!'' he exclaimed. ``It is wine like gold. It must be drunk slowly.'' He drew the cork and poured the wine with great ceremony, and they all drank with much touching of glasses and bowing and exchanging of good wishes, now in German, now in English, again in both. And the last toast, the one drunk with the greatest enthusiasm, was Brauner's favorite famous ``Arbeit und Liebe und Heim!''
From that time forth Hilda began to look at Otto from a different point of view. And everything depends on point of view.
Then--the house in which Schwartz and Heilig had their shop was burned. And when their safe was drawn from the ruins, they found that their insurance had expired four days before the fire. It was Schwartz's business to look after the insurance, but Otto had never before failed to oversee. His mind had been in such confusion that he had forgotten.
