CHAPTER III.
Schnetz, who all this time had never ceased to stride up and down the room, now stepped up to the old man.
"Sit still where you are, Herr Schoepf," he said. "Stay here where it is cool until you are thoroughly rested. Meantime I will go and find the girl, and talk to her. She has a liking for me, possibly because I have never tried to win her favor."
With these words he left the old gentleman. He first searched through the house and garden after the frightened bird, but finally had to make up his mind to go into the wood after her.
After much unsuccessful searching and calling, he finally saw her white face and red hair shimmering from out the green shadows, in a little cleared spot on the gentle slope of the grove, from which she could command a view of the entrance of the park.
"What a trouble you are making, Zenz!" he shouted to her. "What are you running about in the lonely wood for all the forenoon, when there is enough to be done in the house? Old Katie has worked as hard to find you as if you had been a needle in a haystack."
The girl had hastily sprung from the mossy seat on which she had been crouching, and seemed to be holding herself in readiness to dart away. Her round cheeks had suddenly flushed crimson.
"Is he still there?" she asked.
"Who? Don't be so childish, Zenz. The idea of running away from a good old man, as if he were Satan himself!"
"I won't go home till he has gone," she said, with a defiant shake of her head. "I know what he wants. He wants to lock me up in his hateful, lonely house, where no sun or air gets in. But I have never done him any wrong, and I won't go--I won't bear it--I'd rather have him kill me right here."
"You're out of your senses, girl! Do you know him? What do you know about him?"
She did not answer immediately. He saw how wildly her young breast heaved, how her eyes were fixed on the ground, and how her teeth bit the little twig she held in her hand.
"He is the father of my mother!" she finally burst out, her face taking on a look of intense hatred. "He drove my poor dear mother out of his house because of me--that is, before I ever came into the world. Oh, he is so stern! My mother never dared to go back to him as long as she lived. Then, when she was going to die, she wrote a letter to her father asking him to take care of me, and she made me promise by all that was holy to carry this letter to my grandfather as soon as she was dead; and I promised I would, though I never could get up much love for him, and no one can blame me for it either. But, when I came to Munich, I felt terribly forlorn and forsaken at first, for I didn't know a soul, and I thought to myself I'll just take a look at him and see what he's like. So I waited in front of his house, with my packet in my pocket, until he went out in the evening. I tell you truly, Herr Lieutenant, I was so miserable and unhappy that even if he had only looked just the least bit kind I would have been very glad to go up and say to him: 'I am Zenz; people say I am the very image of my poor dear mother, and my dear mother was your daughter, and now she is dead and sends you this letter!' But when he came out of his house so stern and still, and looked neither to the right or left, but only stared at the ground, just as if he didn't care anything at all for the dear world all about him--hu! it made my flesh creep! Nothing in the world shall ever force me to have anything to do with him, thought I to myself; and I let him go by as if he had been a perfect stranger. Still, I thought I would leave the letter for him, so I made some inquiries about him of his landlady; And I heard from her that he hides in his lodgings like an owl in a hollow tree; no one comes to see him, and he goes to see nobody; he gets no letters and he writes none. There was a little looking-glass hanging in the landlady's room, and I happened to see my face in it, and it looked to me as if I had an ashy-gray skin and faded hair. I think most likely the glass was colored blue, but for all that I felt as if it was warning me--'This is the way you'll look before long, if you shut yourself up with your grandfather in his dark den where no sunbeam will ever reach you.' So I went away and took good care not to deliver my packet, for it might have betrayed me. And that very same evening I got acquainted with Black Pepi, and went to live with her, and never sent him my poor, dear mother's packet until I went into the country. But how he found out where I was, or what he wants of me--for he must have the sense to see that I don't want to have anything to do with him--I--"
"Zenz," interrupted the lieutenant, "be a sensible girl, and at least get acquainted with your only relation before you rebel against your mother's last wish. I can assure you you wouldn't have any fault to find with him; and if he should treat you like a prisoner or try to coerce you in any way--are not your old friends at hand? Do you suppose that Herr Rossel, or the baron, or I myself, would suffer any one to ill-treat our little Zenz? If you could only hear the old gentleman talk, and see how sorry he is for all he did and did not do for his daughter, and how anxious he is to atone for it to his grandchild! No, Zenz, you are too sensible a girl to be so childishly frightened by the spectres your own imagination has called up. And, besides, what do you think is going to become of you when the summer is over and we all go back into the city again?"
He waited a moment for her answer. But as none came, and she seemed to be lost in thought, he drew a step nearer, and, taking one of her hands, said, in his truehearted way:
"I know what you are thinking, my child. You are in love with the baron, and you are thinking you will remain near him as long as it is possible, and then perhaps he will love you in return; and you have no thought for anything else. But you ought also to tell yourself how miserably it must all end at last. He won't marry you--you must make up your mind to that--and what will be the upshot of such an unhappy love you have seen, unfortunately, in the case of your poor mother."
She withdrew her hand from his; but looked at him quietly, and almost with something of her old light-heartedness.
"You mean well by me, sir," she said. "But I am not so foolish as I may look. I never imagined for a moment that he would marry me; he wouldn't even love me, no, not if I had saved his life and should be near him ever so long. He loves some one else--I know that for certain--and I don't blame him for it a bit, and if I choose to go on liking him, in spite of all that, it is my affair, and nothing that anybody says will make any difference. Until he is well again, and can get up and go about, I am going to stay out here; and no one knows better than you that I don't eat my bread in idleness, and that you are not able to get along without me. Just tell this to my--to the old gentleman; and as to what may happen afterward, why, that is something none of us can tell yet. But I won't let myself be caught, and if he should use force--I would jump into the lake sooner than let myself be made a slave of!"
She turned sharply on her heel and began very calmly to walk up the hill, no longer as if to flee, but merely because she had spoken her last word. Schnetz had always had a secret liking for her, though he had no very high opinion of her understanding or her virtue. But he could not help feeling a certain respect for her as she had just shown herself to him.
"She knows what she wants, at all events," he growled, "and won't allow herself to be deceived, not even by her own poor heart. There is good blood in the little red fox."
Upon returning to Schoepf he exerted himself to the utmost to convince the old gentleman that, for the present, it was useless to try and do anything. But he promised to do his best to reconcile the girl to the thought that she could no longer be her own mistress, but must consent to be taken under the protection of a loving grandfather. It touched him to see how much the old man was encouraged and cheered by the thought that she would come to him in the end. He even began to make plans for the external arrangements of their future life together. As if this were a matter that would not brook the slightest delay, he could not be prevailed upon to stay even until the heat of the day was over. He must go back at once and look for larger and more cheerful lodgings, and must buy some furniture, so that he would be prepared to receive his grandchild just as soon as she felt like coming to live with him. Besides, he did not want to be the cause of the poor child's wandering about in the woods any longer, for it was clear she would not enter the house again until he had gone.
Schnetz accompanied him through the park. When they were almost at the gate he asked:
"Don't you propose to take any steps to find out the whereabouts of the child's father? Or do you know that he has died since all this happened?"
The old man stood still, and his eyes took on that stern expression which had scared off Zenz that night in the street.
"The scoundrel!" he cried in a loud voice, passionately striking the gravel path with the umbrella that he always carried in summer. "The miserable, perjured villain! Can you seriously suppose that I would let myself be outdone in pride by my dead daughter, who would have nothing to do with the author of all her misery, since he appeared to have forgotten her? Do you think me capable of such a thing as sharing this living legacy of my daughter, that I have just found again as if by a miracle, with that robber of women's honor--admitting even that he would not now choose to deny all share in it? I would rather--"
"My good Herr Schoepf," coolly interrupted Schnetz, "in spite of your white hairs, you are rather more passionate than is consistent with the interest of your grandchild. Now what if anything should happen to you, and the good girl should a second time be left an orphan in the world? In case the worst should happen, she ought at least to know just where she stands; to say nothing of the fact that it can never do any harm to a child to know to whom it is indebted for the doubtful privilege of belonging to this world."
The old man reflected for a moment. His manner grew more gentle.
"You are right," said he at last. "Scold away at me; it is the old artist blood in me that will never listen to reason--not even when all art is passed, and only a little drudgery is left. But that scoundrel--if you knew how cordially we received him into our home! Though there again our pride came into play, for he was a baron, and up to that time we had had no intimates of higher rank than artists, except a few officers; and besides this he was a stranger, a North German, and he pleased us immensely; for he was such a lively, wide-awake, chivalrous young gentleman, a great hunter, and he used to be always saying he would never rest until he had hunted lions in Africa--"
"Good God! Hunted lions? And his name--don't tell me, my good friend, that his name was--"
"Baron F----. I had actually forgotten the name, until I found it in my poor Lena's testament. Heaven knows what ever became of him, and whether he was punished for his mad whim, and for all the wrong he inflicted upon my poor child, by dying a miserable death under the African sun, torn to pieces by wild beasts. The name seems to strike you. Can it be that you have ever met the wretch?--or perhaps you even know where he is?"
Schnetz had recovered himself in a moment. He reflected that at best it would be quite superfluous, while it might perhaps be extremely disastrous, if he told the old gentleman in what intimate relations he stood to the individual in question. Neither did he see that it would be of any advantage to the girl, if, before she had begun to feel any love for her grandfather, she should find a father who would be even more of a stranger to her, and who would be able to count still less upon her filial affection. And besides, in the interest of his unsuspecting old tent-comrade, he shrank from making any premature disclosures.
He answered, accordingly, that it was true the name was not altogether unknown to him; indeed, so far as he knew, the father of the girl was still living; it was possible, however, that they would be doing her a poor service if they should be over hasty in enlightening her on the subject. The first thing to be done was to induce her to become reconciled to her grandfather.
As the old man was, at heart, entirely of this opinion, he took his leave, evidently feeling much comforted and full of glad hopes; though he still lingered a little, secretly hoping he might catch at least another distant glimpse of the shy little creature. But the girl took good care to keep out of sight. So that at last, with a quiet sigh, her grandfather had to set out upon his homeward way. Schnetz stood at the gate, looking after him.
"A mad farce, this life of ours!" he growled under his mustache. "The only thing still wanting is that my old lion-hunter should come riding past his father-in-law, smoking a cigar and gazing complacently at the white-haired old boy, who would be powdered still whiter by the dust kicked up by his nag's hoofs; and that then he should stop here in the park gate, and make inquiries of Zenz in regard to the health of our patient, playfully pinching the child's cheek just as he would any other pretty servant girl's, or giving her a pourboire if she held his horse for him for ten minutes. And then his niece, our proud little highness! What big eyes she would make if I should tell her that the little red-haired waiter-girl was her own, though not exactly her legitimate, cousin!"
CHAPTER IV.
Week after week had passed away. The autumn was approaching; the rose-bushes on the little lawn shed their last buds, and at evening a stealthy white mist crept over the lake, and for a whole week the opposite shore and the distant mountains beyond disappeared completely behind a dull, gray rain that spread a curtain over lake and land. When at last it was drawn away the same landscape was indeed there, but in different colors; much yellow was scattered among the tall beech woods; the waves of the lake, usually of a transparent green, were changed to a dull gray, and on the summits of the Zugspitz and the Karwendelgebirge could be seen the melancholy white of the first snow.
Even Rossel, who usually regarded the surrounding landscape with great indifference, and who declared the symbolical relations of Nature to our moods to be a sentimental prejudice, expressed himself to Kohle with great displeasure concerning the raw air and the disgusting, clinging fog, which, as he asserted, had come so early this year out of pure malevolence, knowing that they were obliged to stay out here on account of their sick friend. Then, too, the stoves, which had not been used for many years, refused to draw; and they were soon forced to give up heating the dining-room.
Nevertheless Kohle, whose inner fire was still unquenched, would not allow himself to be deterred from working away at his Venus allegory; though Rossel had now lost all interest in it, and even accompanied the progress of the work with open sneers at the idea of their attempting to naturalize the naked beauty under such a foggy sky.
But then when the autumn sun bethought itself of its might once more, and, at high noon at least, awakened for hours all the charms of a most glorious Indian summer, Rossel still continued in a bad humor, which he was only careful to conceal in Felix's presence. Schnetz soon got at the true cause of his low spirits--the almost contemptuous coldness with which Zenz treated him. His singular passion, which had sprung originally from an artistic whim, was only inflamed the more by this. And now that he had learned the secret of her birth, he grew very melancholy, actually lost his appetite, and, with the exception of the hours he spent with Felix, shut himself up from every one, not even making his appearance at meals. Schnetz came to the conclusion that he had made a formal offer of marriage to the little red-haired witch, and had been dismissed without ceremony.
This strange child bore herself with great coolness in the midst of all these temptations and perplexities. It is true she no longer laughed as much as she had in the summer. Yet she never made her appearance with red eyes, or with any other signs of secret grief, and even when she had to wait on Felix her face was cheerful and unembarrassed. But on the very first day that the convalescent was allowed to go down into the garden, leaning on Schnetz's arm, she unexpectedly appeared before them, her little hat on her head and in her hand a little traveling-bag containing her few possessions, which she had sent over from the inn across the lake. She very quietly announced that she was about to return to the city, as she could be of no further use here. The Herr Baron was as good as well, and within the last few weeks old Katie had so far succeeded in breaking herself of her taste for schnapps as to be perfectly able to look after the household without other assistance. When Schnetz asked her whether she meant to go to her grandfather she answered, with a fleeting blush, that "she did not know yet herself; she had managed to get along without him hitherto, just as he had without her. She wouldn't swear that she wouldn't go to him; she must get to know him better first. But she would never let herself be robbed of her liberty!"
Felix had listened in amazement, for he had not yet been initiated into old Schoepf's history. He spoke very kindly to the good child, and held her hand for a moment tenderly in his. She suffered him to retain it without returning his gentle pressure, and looked quietly past him as though she would say: "That is all very fine, but it can do me no good." Then she allowed Schnetz to exact a promise from her that she would write him her address as soon as she found a lodging-place, and, with a last "Adieu, and a quick recovery!" she marched out of the gate with such a quick and resolute step that it would never have entered any one's head to suppose that this was a parting at which her heart had bled.
Rossel, of whom she took no leave, sank into still deeper melancholy when he learned of her departure, and the innocent Kohle, who was always the last to notice anything that was going on about him, contrived to pour oil on the fire by exhausting himself in eulogies of this remarkable girl, who was missed now in every nook and corner. He was forced to content himself with immortalizing, from memory, her little nose and golden mane, as he called it, in the scene at the cloister; in which effort he succeeded but poorly, according to the judgment of Fat Rossel.
And so, in spite of the cheerful autumn days, the atmosphere in the villa was none of the brightest. Even in the case of the convalescent Felix, the more he felt his strength increase, the less did he seem to rejoice in the new lease of life that had been granted him. Those words of greeting from his old love, that had made him so happy in his feverish dreams, had vanished from his memory upon his return to perfect consciousness. He only knew that her uncle had received daily bulletins of his condition, and that they would not leave Starnberg until all danger was over. But they might easily have shown as much sympathy as that to a stranger, with whom they had chanced to stand in merely formal relations. For the rest, in what respect had the situation been changed by his adventure? Altogether to his advantage? A life and death struggle with a boatman about a waiter-girl! Surely a dubious test, that, of the correctness of his principles regarding looseness and freedom of morals; a new proof of how correctly she had acted when, with a single sharp cut, she severed her life from his. And now, under what pretext could he give her an explanation of the real origin of the whole affair? And what further interest could she take in the doings of one whom she had wholly given up? What did it concern her whether, in pursuing his own wild courses, he showed himself more or less unworthy of her?
But the pride which rebelled against making any overtures secretly gnawed at his heart. More than once, after the wound in his hand permitted him to scribble a few letters, he had sat down to write to her uncle. In doing so, he could certainly put in a word in explanation of the very innocent occasion of his bloody adventure. But in the midst of his writing it would seem to him as if, according to the old saying, he were making the evil worse with every excuse. And then, could he ever hope to explain away that sin--which was in her eyes the heaviest--his dancing with the girl?
So he tore up the letters he had begun, and, gnashing his teeth, resigned himself to the fate of suffering unjustly, and being better than he seemed.
But one day when, by some chance or other, he found himself sitting alone on a bench in the garden with none of his watchers near--for they took care to keep him out of the reach of all conversation--he saw, with a glad throb at heart, her uncle gallop up and gleefully wave his hand to him over the park-gate. He stood up, and, with a faint blush, half of weakness, half of confusion, advanced several steps to meet the well-known face.
The lively old gentleman rushed upon him, and embraced him so cordially that Felix had to smilingly beg for forbearance, on account of his scarcely-healed wounds. Whereupon the uncle excused himself in great alarm, and, carefully supporting the patient, led him back to the bench, where he asked him, with the most candid curiosity, for all the particulars of the unfortunate occurrence.
"A blessed land, this Bavaria!" he cried, rubbing his hands. "Upon my word, there is no need for a man to go beyond the 'Pillars of Hercules,' or among the red-skins: he can have plenty of slaughter nearer home, in his own German fatherland! But now, out with the truth about this girl who was the cause of the whole scrape. The moment I heard you were wounded I asked: Où est la femme? When I learned she had crossed over with you in the boat, and had been nursing you--No, don't deny it, you young sinner! The little witch--she is said to have red hair, too, and red hair always was dangerous to you--ha, ha! Do you still remember that crazy, mysterious adventure--the one with the red-haired Englishwoman at the sea-shore?--ha, ha! And now, again--But what's the matter with you, my dear boy? You turn red and white in a breath--maybe you've been staying out a little too--"
Felix rose to his feet with evident exertion. His brow was clouded; his eyes glared strangely at his jovial old friend.
"Uncle," he said, "you have been wrongly informed. However, that makes no difference. The girl, who is no more to me than that mad fool of a boatman, has left the house again, and with that it is to be hoped this whole wretched affair will be at an end. But that you should touch upon that other matter again, when you know how painful the remembrance of it is to me--"
"I beg a thousand pardons, my dear boy! It slipped from me, as it were. You know that, in spite of my fifty-one years, I am the same incorrigible old étourdi; but now I swear by all the gods and goddesses, never again will I make even the slightest allusion--Why, he has grown quite pale!--this firebrand of a fellow! Look here, my dear boy, you ought to take much greater care of yourself, and guard yourself much more carefully against excitement. I had been meaning to propose to you to come over and stay with us, for, after all, we have the best right to nurse you; but since you really are weaker than I thought, and as certain emotions might perhaps--"
Felix stared at him in blank amazement. Then he burst out in a forced laugh.
"You are joking, uncle. Or perhaps, after all, you are speaking with more design than you would have me believe. I go and live--with you! You are very kind; but really, well as I know that all is over, still I should hardly like to guarantee that certain emotions might not--"
He broke off, and passed his hand over his forehead.
"You are right, my boy," replied the uncle, seriously. "It is still a little too soon. Still, sooner or later this whole absurd, lagging affair must be set right, and the sooner, the better, in my opinion. Just think it over. The country is just the place for arranging such a matter easily and comfortably. If you would prefer to speak with her alone first, you have only to give me a wink."
"Is this merely your private opinion, or are you perhaps acting--"
"Under higher orders? Not yet, unfortunately. But you know my diplomatic talents. If you will only give me full powers--"
"I am sorry, uncle, but I really am too weak to talk any longer in this jesting way of matters which, after all, have their serious side too. Excuse me for to-day; I must go back to the house; and, in conclusion, I must beg of you not to exert yourself at all in my interest. You see I am quite well, under the circumstances--as well as I could wish all men were--and after I have passed a few weeks more in the country--"
He tried to speak lightly; but he sank back upon the bench, and could only motion with his hand for the old baron to leave him, for a sudden throbbing pain in his wounded breast deprived him of speech. The uncle stammered out a few frightened words, and then hastened back to his horse, which he had tied outside the park-gate. He mounted thoughtfully, and rode off shaking his head. There were some things about the young people of nowadays that went beyond his comprehension.
CHAPTER V.
A few weeks after this meeting, Felix wrote Jansen the following letter:
"Villa Rossel, last of October.
"The spirit moves me to talk with you, old Dædalus; and as my physician has seriously impressed me with the duty of sparing my lungs, I may neither look you up myself nor tempt you to come out here to me. So I must force you to puzzle out these awkward copy-book letters of mine, in which you will recognize the handwriting of your pupil as little as you will his customary style.
"For, between ourselves be it said, things still look rather blue and gloomy to me. Our friends won't have told you this; before them I have played the lively, joyous Hotspur, merely in order to make them think there would be no danger in leaving me out here alone. I can no longer reconcile it to my conscience to exile my good host from the city, even though he does put such a good face on the matter; and then there is Kohle too--hard as it is for him to tear himself away from his bare walls, he can't go on with his work until he has first made the necessary designs. What do I lack here except that one thing which is lost to me forever? You need not fear that I shall become a prey to misanthropy or schnapps, like old Katie. I should be ashamed to show myself to Homo, who is looking at me now while I write, with his wise, sensible, true-hearted eyes. Perhaps he is asking me to send you his love.
"But to stay out here awhile in solitude will be of equal service to my slowly-healing breast and to my poor, somewhat discouraged soul. Don't let yourself be deceived, old Hans, by what our friends try to stuff into your head: that my anxiety about whether I shall soon be able to use my hand again in the service of the arts is gnawing at my heart. More has been injured in this case than a finger-muscle or a joint; my hopeful confidence has been shattered--that courage and audacity with which I came to you in the summer. If I had ten sound hands I would bethink myself ten times before I again sent them to school to you, for I am as good as convinced that at the very best they would only have acquired mechanical proficiency; while a true work of art requires much more, for which they would hardly have the right sort of tools.
"You prophesied this to me in the first hour of our reunion. Then I set myself up to be wiser than my master. And now can you guess how I found out that you were right? I know it is mortifying, but I must confess it. During all the pleasant weeks I passed in your workshop I never once felt so much myself, never felt myself so 'at the height of my existence'--as Rossel would call it--as in those moments when I was bringing an oarless boat safely to shore, and afterward when I was struggling, hand-to-hand, to defend my life against a furious, murderous scoundrel.
"That a man maybe a very tolerable bully and desperado, and at the same time be a great sculptor, your celebrated Florentine predecessor, Benvenuto, has shown. Though then, to be sure, the days of a nobility of force were not yet over, and many things were demanded of a complete man which are now divided among many by our present system of division of labor. Artistic creation and practical execution are now distinct, and you were quite right in saying that the clay in which I was called upon to work was to be found in public life.
"But where shall I find a material that will not melt away under my hands?
"You would be no worse off in a desert of sand than I am in this bureaucratic, well-regulated, red-tape civilization of ours, that never permits a man to dig into the lump and stamp his own individuality upon this commonplace routine; and, after all, it is that alone which could give any personal satisfaction to a man constituted as I am--this feeling, akin to the one you have in art, of having created something which every other man could not have produced just as well by merely following a certain formula.
"It may be that my experience in my own narrow little fatherland has given me a false idea of what a man inclined to action has to hope and to fear in this Old World of ours. Perhaps if I could find a position in the North German Confederation!--but even that wouldn't help me; at least I have known Prussian Landraths with whom I would not have changed places--men, the highest aim of whose ambition was to succeed to a chief magistrate's position, with a white head and a soul grown gray in the dust of official documents.
"No, my dear fellow, Schnetz unquestionably used the right expression. I have stumbled into the wrong century. I should have done very well in the middle ages, when the old savage and unruly spirit was everywhere to be found side by side with a struggling civilization, and when one could be a good citizen and yet go armed to the teeth. But since this wretched anachronism cannot now be helped, I will at least do my best to seek out a place where a bird of my plumage won't be stared at like a strange fowl in a hen-yard, and crowed over by every well-conditioned cock.
"I have seen quite enough of the New World to know that I shall be more in my proper place there than here. Don't imagine for a moment that I over-estimate that promised land; the positive, human, heart-quickening possessions and enjoyments that it has to offer are few. But of this very same unattractive nothing, from which something can be made, there is blessed superabundance there.
"Consequently, I have made up my mind, as the Yankees say, to cross the wide water again, and to settle down there permanently. Salutary and necessary as this step is for me, I know well that parting is not such an easy matter. And for that very reason I want to make my preparatory studies for it out here in the deepest solitude. I want to accustom myself to doing without all sorts of things, and at the same time to let my body get as hardy again as it is necessary to have it over there.
"I hope to attain this result in a few months. And then, before I shake the dust of the Old World off my shoes, I will come to you again, my oldest, best, and truest friend. All was not as it should have been between us; but for that no one was to blame but time itself, which did not leave us just as we were when we parted ten years ago, but has brought to each of us many strange experiences, such as even the best of friends can only understand when they have borne them together. And how much has happened even in the last few months, which each is forced to keep locked up in his own breast! To you has been accorded a great happiness; to me have come all sorts of renunciations and bitter experiences. Such things do not go well together. But, now that you have almost seen the last of me, allow me, at least a little more than heretofore, to share in your happiness, and to bask, though but for so short a time, in our old friendship. Hereafter I shall have plenty of time to sit in the shade.
"Remember me to Fräulein Julie. I have only exchanged a few words with her. But when I say that I think her worthy your love, you will know how highly I esteem her.
"This is the third day that I have been scribbling at this letter. After every half-page, my wound begins to give warning again. However, to hold a sword or to cock a musket is not such exhausting work as to guide a pen. Old Berlichingen managed to get along, though in a far worse plight.
"Remember me to our friends; I look forward with the greatest pleasure to seeing them again, and to celebrating my last German Christmas with you all. And now good-by, old fellow! Hic et ubique,
"Your Felix."
CHAPTER VI.
When Jansen received this letter he was at work in his studio making a bust of his child. Julie sat at his side looking on; little Frances crouched in a high chair and asked a great many droll, sage questions; and in spite of the gray autumn sky it was cozier in the large room than in the old days, when the summer air came wafted in through the wide-opened windows. Even now a sparrow flew in, now and then, through the only open pane, and a great nosegay of autumn flowers stood on the window-sill. A small fire flickered in the stove, and Julie's beautiful face and the child's wise eyes gave out a warmth which had once been sadly wanting here. Yet, notwithstanding this, Jansen's brow still remained clouded; and he left it to his friend to answer the questions of the child, while he worked on in silence.
For weeks she had been aware of this shade upon his spirits without having been able to discover its cause, and to cheer him up she had begged him for a bust of the child. Heretofore she had never come to his studio unless accompanied by Angelica. Now she came every day with the child, who was passionately fond of her, staid the whole forenoon, and then took little Frances home with her to dinner, which was always a fresh treat to the little one. Yet delighted as her friend was at this arrangement and at this confidential intercourse with his beloved, the shadow that rested on his spirits did not depart. At last she asked him directly what it was that oppressed him. She earnestly besought him to tell her, claiming it as her just right; for unless he did so she would be compelled to think that she herself was the cause of his sadness. The fresh outburst of passion with which he greeted this speech, and which she herself was continually obliged to keep within bounds, ought to have satisfied her on this point. But his strange depression was still left unexplained. She must have patience with him--he had entreated of her time and time again. Things would get better and come out all right in the end. He loved her far too well to embitter her life with all the wretched troubles he had to deal with. If she could help him in any way he would not spare her or be ashamed to call upon her for aid.
And now when he had finished reading Felix's letter, he handed it, in silence, to his sweetheart, and stepped to the window while she read. For a time it was perfectly still in the great room; little Frances had clambered down from her high chair, and was busily engaged in dressing and undressing a doll that Julie had given her only that morning. No sound could be heard but the singing of the fire in the iron stove and the hopping of the birds on the shelf above, where the plaster casts stood.
Even after Julie had read the letter to the end, she did not at once break the silence. Not until some time had elapsed did she send the child up to Aunt Angelica with her love, and the question whether she might be allowed to stay up there for a quarter of an hour. Then she stepped up to the window where Jansen stood in silence, laid her hand on his shoulder, and said:
"Now if I should guess what it is that secretly troubles you, my dearest friend, would you confess it to me then?"
He turned, and passionately folded her in his arms. "Julie!" he said--"what good would that do? There are some difficulties that are insurmountable. I can only feel sure you have not vanished from the world when I hold you to my heart, press my lips to yours, feel my hand in yours--"
"Be still!" she said, smiling, and gently disengaging herself from him. "I didn't send Frances away for you to forget all that you have so solemnly promised me. Let us be sensible, my dear friend--indeed we must be. Sit down over there, and try, for once, to listen to me, instead of looking at me. Do you know, I consider it positively discourteous of you to pay no attention to my wisest words, merely because, after such a long acquaintance, your eyes still find something about me to 'study?'"
"O Julie!" he said, and a sad smile passed over his face. "If words could only help--if the sense and understanding and all the strength of soul of a noble woman could but avail against the treachery and unreasonableness of gods and men! But speak, and I will close my eyes and listen."
"Do you know, you and your young friend are sick of one and the same illness?" she now said, for he had covered his eyes with his hand and taken a seat on the sofa, while she stood leaning upon the window-sill.
"I and Felix? I don't understand you."
"You have both come into the world too late, you are both wandering anachronisms, as he says of himself alone in his letter. His energy and your artistic nature to-day no longer find the soil and air that are good for them, and that they deserve. When I look about me, dearest, I say to myself: 'Where are now the people, the prince, the century to appreciate this power, to lay commissions, reward, honor, and admiration at the feet of this creative spirit? to post sonnets on the door of his workshop, to make a passage for him when he strides among the multitude, as we read that the ancients did, and the great men, under the rule of the famous popes and the pomp-loving princes?'--Oh! my dearest friend, I could weep tears of blood when I think how, instead of all this, you live here, appreciated only by a circle of good friends and enthusiastic disciples, and are made the butt of stupid malice or blind ignorance in all the newspapers! And then, when a demand arises for the production of some work to adorn a square or a building, wretched quacks, who are not worthy to unloose the latchet of your shoes, come running up by all sorts of back-stairs and secret ways, and steal the prize away from you, and you remain hidden in the dark! Now, don't shake your head! I know how you think about the applause of the masses, and how little you begrudge it to the poor wretches who hear no divine voice within them. But be honest now--if this monument"--she mentioned the name of a man to whom a statue had just been erected, on which occasion Jansen's application had, as usual, been rejected--"if this commission had fallen to you--and then another had followed close upon that--how differently you would stand in your own esteem when you had become a central figure of your time! To say nothing of the fact that then you would be able to close the factory, as you call it, next door, and would have no need to strike a blow of the mallet that did not come straight from the heart!"
She had talked herself into a state of great excitement; and now, when he looked up at her, the shining brightness of her look and the soft glow of her cheeks enraptured him. But he controlled himself and remained seated.
"What you say is all very wise and true," he said. "But for all that you don't quite hit the sore spot. I have known all this ever since my eyes were first opened to what went on around me, to what some people produce and other people admire. Yet in spite of that I have become what I am, and what I could no more have helped becoming than I could have helped coming into the world. Remember, too, how much better off I am than our friend Felix. As far as the outside world goes, we are both hampered and confined. The age has as little appreciation of high art as of the great personal activity toward which all his powers and wishes urge him. But I can at least put before myself and a half dozen true friends what there is in me, even if it has no fuller life than this; while our friend's special strengths can only reveal themselves in putting him at odds with everybody.
"And, when I look about me here, will not all these dumb creatures of mine continue to be my companions through life? I sometimes seem to myself like a father who has a number of daughters, all of them well brought up and each dear to his heart; and yet, loath as he is to lose any one of them out of his sight, it seems harder and harder to him, as the years go by, that no one of them finds a husband, and they all remain under his roof unprovided for. However, that is fate, and one learns to accept whatsoever the irresponsible powers bestow upon us. But that which comes from mortals--"
He suddenly sprang up, ran his hand through his hair, and stepped so close to his sweetheart, that Julie, little as she feared him even in his anger, involuntarily retreated a step.
"Felix was right," he said, in a hollow voice. "There is only one way of escape. These chains or others--we can never be free except on the other side of the ocean. Julie, if you could only make up your mind, if you feel as terribly in earnest as I do for our happiness--"
"My friend," she interrupted him, "I know what you would say. But the more earnestly I long for your--our happiness--the more must I insist upon our striving to attain it in a perfectly prosaic and sober way. Your friend is a born adventurer, a circumnavigator--a world conqueror. Your world and mine is this studio. Can we take it with us in the ship? And do you think a finer sense of art is to be found among the Yankees or the red-skins than among our countrymen? No, my dearest Jansen, I think that with courage and good sense we shall be able to free ourselves even on this side of the water. You men are masters in despairing, we women in hoping. And, besides, the end of our year of probation is still far enough off."
"Hope!" he cried, gnashing his teeth. "If a tigress had me in her claws, you might, with far more show of reason, call out to me only to give up hope with life! But this woman! Do you know a more terrible enemy of human happiness than this lie--this cold, rouged, heartless, unnatural lie? If she only hated me as immeasurably as she pretends to love me, truly, I myself should think it too soon to despair. A mortal can become satiated even with hate; and malice, too, is something of which one can get tired. But what is to be hoped when it is all merely a game, and the innermost nature of one's enemy is the nature of a comedian? Every spark of conscience has been extinguished in this wretched woman since her girlhood; her life is to her nothing but a rôle; her love and hate have become merely a question of costumes--applause and money are her highest and holiest conceptions. And she fears for both, if she lets me go free. It is flattering to her--one success more--to be able to pose before herself and the world as an injured innocent, a robbed wife, a mother whose child has been taken from her--and for that reason she refuses all my entreaties and offers with indignation, for she knows well that I would rather give up any happiness in life than let her have the child. If you had read the letters I have wasted upon her in these last few weeks! Letters which, I can truly say, were written with my heart's blood--they would have made a tigress human; and this woman---read what she answers me! I have carried on this wretched correspondence behind your back, in the hope of taking upon myself all that was bitter and humiliating--for what words have I not stooped to use!--I have borne all the agony of these last weeks, in order that I might at last lay nothing but the happy results at your feet. Now read what sort of echo came to me from that stony heart, and then say whether a man need necessarily be a master in despairing, to give up all hope here!"
He went to the large closet, unlocked a drawer, and took out several dainty-looking letters, that diffused a sweet perfume through the room. Julie read one after the other, while he threw himself down on the sofa again and stared at the ceiling. The letters were written in a regular, delicate, clear hand, and in a style which might be taken as a model of diplomatic art. There were no traces of mere declamation, of complaining or accusing. The writer had resigned herself to accept an unhappy fate, for she felt herself too weak and not cold-hearted enough to take up the battle with him: a battle in which the man to whom she had given all stood opposed to her. This she could prevail upon herself to do, for it was only her own happiness that she was sacrificing. But she could never be brought to give up her claim to her child. The day might come when the longing for a mother's love might awaken in the poor child's heart. Then no one should have it in his power to say to her: "Your mother has no heart for you; she has given you over to strangers." Upon passages like this, which were repeated in each letter, especial care had been bestowed, reminding one, here and there, of the stage, and the last rhetorical flourish just before the curtain falls. The last sheet, which had been received only a few days before, concluded as follows:
"I know all, all that you would so carefully conceal from me. It is not only your wish to have done with the past once and forever, and to give me back my freedom--for, according to your idea of my character, it would cost me no effort whatsoever to live as if all were at an end between us, especially as I do not bear your name on the stage. No, I know what it is that not only makes you wish for a complete separation from me, but that makes every delay unbearable. You have fallen into the net of a dangerous beauty. If my old love for you were not stronger than my self-love, there would be nothing I should more earnestly wish for, or would more eagerly aid by all the means in my power, than your marriage with this girl. She would justify me, would raise me to honor again in your eyes, and would force from you the confession that you had cast away your only true friend in order to nurse a serpent in your bosom. But I am nobler than it is for my advantage to be: not, I admit, altogether for your sake. The hope of seeing you return to me is too tempting for me not to be willing to help you to have this experience. But to relinquish our child to this stranger--who is said to be as clever as she is beautiful, and as beautiful as she is heartless--to give my blessed angel, who hovers near me in my dreams, to this serpent--"
Julie had involuntarily read the last few lines aloud, as if she scorned to soften down any accusation that was directed against herself. Her disgust and indignation would not permit her to finish the sentence--the letter fell from her hand.
"My dear friend," she said, "let us read no further. I must confess you are quite right; this is hopeless. Kindness is thrown away upon such an unnatural character as you so rightly called it, and force--where is the force that we could use? But as for surrendering--hopelessly, and without striking a blow--no matter how much talent I might have for despairing, if I were opposed to this woman, I would either conquer or die!"
He sprang up and seized her hand. "Julie!" he cried, "you put new life into me. Never shall she enjoy such a triumph--rather let us flee to the ends of the earth beyond the reach of her hand--rather let us go to the Yankees and the red-skins, but with you at my heart and our child in our arms--"
She shook her head earnestly. "No, no, no!" she said. "No self-imposed banishments! It is a good thing I have my thirty-one years behind me. Else this youthful enthusiast might succeed in the end in carrying me off with him, and we should make a great mistake that would soon make both him and me very unhappy. The land across the ocean is no place for you, my beloved master. You have never cared to take part in the modern, sentimental nonsense in our Old World; what sort of a figure would you cut in the midst of all the humbug of the New? And as for your giving up your art, and living only for your wife and child--how long do you suppose you could bear that? How long would it take for the woman for whose sake you had done this to become a burden to you? And even if you could rest content with such a life, do you think I would be satisfied with it? True, I have confessed that I love this man--this violent, wicked, good, precious Hans Jansen--but I want to see him as great, as famous, as proud, and as happy as it is possible for any one to be in this wretched world; to love in him not only the husband and father, but also the great master, who compels the whole world to join with me in love and admiration. Oblige me, my dearest friend, by throwing that correspondence there into the stove, and promise me not to write any more. In return I promise you that I will ponder day and night upon the best way for us to free ourselves. And if our year of probation should pass away without our having succeeded before God and man--here is my hand upon it! I will be yours--if not in the eyes of men, certainly in the sight of God; and I believe I am old enough to know what an honorable woman ought to do and to answer for."