On the Night of the Seventh Moon

“You were always an old meddler,” said Maximilian.

“But how dared you keep this from me?”

“Now don’t scold me. I brought her back, didn’`t I? I planned it all. I went and found her and played the tourist looking for books and making it all seem so natural. All the time I was thinking, I’ll surprise Master Lightning, and how right it was that he should have his surprise on the Night of the Seventh Moon. I’ll have a glass of wine with you, shall I?”

She did not wait for the invitation; she filled three glasses and sat down, sipping, and nibbling one of her spiced cakes.

She talked of how poor Hildegarde had worried about what had taken place in the -hunting lodge. She had made Hildegarde tell her all she knew and Hildegarde knew a great deal. She had been as interested in everything concerning the Prince as Frau Graben herself. She had kept her eyes open. She knew that the young lady was a pupil in the Damenstift when she first come to the lodge, and that when she returned she had been brought out by Ilse and Ernst and that her father had kept a bookshop in Oxford. She knew her name.

“I noted that,” said Frau Graben.

“I liked to know what my boys were up to and this was no ordinary affair. Hildegarde knew that it was different right from the start, she said. That was why she was so upset. She didn’`t like it. And that ceremony she didn’`t like at all. She said it wasn’`t right. The girl was so innocent that she believed it was a true marriage. “

“It was a true marriage,” said Maximilian.

Frau Graben stared at him and then at me.

“Mem Gott}’ she cried.

“It’s not true. It’s one of your larks. I know you, Master Lightning.”

“Dear Graben,” he said solemnly, “I swear to you that I was married to Lenchen in the hunting lodge nine years ago.”

She shook her head and then I saw her lips begin to curl. She had brought me here; she had presented me to him. This was the kind of high drama she liked to provoke. But if we were truly married! I could imagine her delight in the possibilities this was suggesting to her; and for the first time since Maximilian had walked into the room I was fully aware of the complicated situation which confronted us. Until that moment I had thought of little but the fact that Maximilian had come back to me. My reason was vindicated; I had been the victim of a wicked plot but I was not unbalanced. I had imagined nothing and I had regained my husband.

Frau Graben was saying: “It is so, then?”

“It is so,” answered Maximilian.

“And Miss Trant is your wife.”

“She is my wife, Graben.”

“And the Princess Wilhelmina?”

A shadow crossed his face. I believed he had forgotten her existence until that moment.

“She cannot be my wife since I have been married to Lenchen for nine years.”

Frau Graben said: “Mein Gott} This will shake the dukedom What have you done, Maxi? What will happen to us all now?” She chuckled, not without a degree of delight, “But you don’t care, do you? You’re bemused both of you. You don’t see anything but each other. Oh Maxi, you love her, don’t you? It does me good to see you together, that it does. Don’t forget I found her-I brought her to you.”

“You meddling old woman,” he said, “I’ll never forget you brought her back to me.”

“Tomorrow,” she said, her eyes sly, ‘that’ll be the time to face the music. ” She laughed. Tonight is the Night of the Seventh Moon. We mustn’`t forget that, must we? Oh, you’re going to be grateful to me, Maxi and you too. Miss Trant. All these years fancy! And you two pining for each other. I said to Hildegarde, ” You tell me about that room in the hunting lodge” and she told me, for she knew every piece that was in that room. So I said to myself: I’ll make another room here in Klocksburg and tonight we shall put the clock back. We’ll bring the lovers together again. The bridal chamber awaits you, my chicks. You can’t say that old Graben doesn’`t look after you.”

“You brought Lenchen here, Graben,” said Maximilian, ‘and I shall bless you for ever for that. But now we want to be alone. “

“Of course you do, and you’re going to be. I’ve got the bridal chamber ready myself.” She grimaced and tiptoed to the door, looking back as though loath to leave us.

“We always got on like a house afire, didn’`t we Miss Trant? We’ll have some talks.

She shut the door on us and we were in each other’s arms. I knew that he was, as I was, recalling those days in the lodge and the intensity of our need for each other was unendurable.

“Tomorrow we can talk,” he said.

“We will make our plans. We have to consider very carefully what we must do. Of one thing I am certain. We shall never be parted again, whatever may come. But that is for tomorrow.

He opened the door. Frau Graben was waiting there with a candle. We followed her down the stairs and she opened a door. The full moon shining through the window showed me the four-poster bed. It was a faithful reproduction of the room we had shared in the hunting lodge during our honeymoon.

And now, after nine long and weary years, we were together again.

The great moon hung heavy in the sky and I was happy as I had never thought to be again.

When the dawn was in the sky we were both awake. I knew that he felt as I did. We did not want a new day to come for we knew that it must bring with it problems. I kept thinking of the cold proud face of the woman who believed herself to be his wife.

But no matter how we wished it, the magic night was over and the day had begun.

“Lenchen,” he said, “I shall have to go back to my father’s schloss.”

“I know.”

“But tonight I will come here.”

I nodded.

“If I had not allowed them to persuade me to this marriage with Wilhelmina it would have been so much easier. I shall have to tell her.” He frowned.

“She will never understand.”

“You can prove it to her,” I said.

“I have our marriage lines. Do you remember? There was one set for you and one for me. I can produce the priest.”

They took my lines from me,” I said.

“It will not be easy, Lenchen. There is my father who is very sick. I don’t think he has long to live and this could hasten his death.”

“I begin to see what it will mean. How I wish that you had been-say, a lawyer, a doctor or a woodcutter in your little cottage. How happy I should have been then!”

“Ah, Lenchen, how fortunate these people are! They are not watched at every turn. Their actions are not the spark that sets off mighty conflicts. This is the worst possible time. Klarenbock will consider this an insult to the ruling house. It could mean war with them at a time when the French are threatening to march against Prussia, which would involve the entire German states. I must have time to think. I can only be sure of one thing. I love you, Lenchen. You have come back to me and we shall never be parted again.”

“As long as you tell me that, as long as I may be with you, I am content.”

“It must be settled soon, my dearest. I can’t bear the uncertainty.

Whatever happens we must be together . and not in secret. But I must go. They will be missing me. “

I went with him out into the early morning and watched him ride away.

As I came back into the fortress and mounted the stairs to my bridal chamber I heard footsteps behind me and I guessed who it was. Frau Graben’s hair was in iron curlers under a sleeping cap; her eyes were sparkling and she was smiling secretly, delighted with herself, with me and her Master Lightning. I thought fleetingly that she must always have lived vicariously through her boys, and therefore this must be one of the most exciting occasions of her life.

She said: “So he’s gone.”