CHAPTER XXXIX.
BEFORE THE CRISIS.
The cattle lowed and the sheep-bells tinkled, and the springing blades of wheat waved in the wind. The eldest daughter of the family was again walking in the garden, surrounded by her brothers and sisters. What has become of the glad brightness of your eye and the hearty child's laugh, Lady Ilse? Your countenance has become serious and your demeanor subdued; your looks scan critically the men about you and the paths that you tread, and calm commands sound from your lips. Your home has not made your heart light, nor given you back again what you lost among strangers.
But it zealously exercises its right to be loved by you and to show you love; it recalls familiar images to your soul, and old recollections awake at every step; the people whom you fostered faithfully in your heart, the animals that you cared for, and the trees that you planted, greet you, and labor busily to cover with bright colors what lies gloomily within you.
The first evening was painful. When Ilse, accompanied by her neighbor, entered her home a fugitive, striving to conceal what tormented her, amidst the terror of her father and the inquisitive questions of her brothers and sisters, anger and dismay once more threw their black shadows over her. But on the breast of her father, under the roof of a secure house, together with the feeling of safety, her old energy revived, and she was able to conceal from the eyes of her loved ones that which was not her secret alone.
Another painful hour came. Ilse was sitting late in the evening, as years before, on her chair opposite her father. After her story was told, the strong man looked down anxiously, used hard words concerning her husband, and cursed the other. When he told her that even in her father's house danger threatened her, when he desired her to be cautious at every step, and when he told her that in her childhood there had been a dark rumor that a maiden from the house on the rock, a child of a former possessor, had been the victim of a distinguished prince, she raised her hands to heaven. Her father seized them and drew her towards him.
"We are wrong to forget in an uncertain future how mercifully Providence has guarded you. I hold you by the hand and you stand on the soil of your home. We must do what the day requires, and trust everything else to a higher Being. As for the talk of strangers we care not; they are weather-cocks. Be calm and have confidence."
The younger children chattered innocently; they asked about the charming life at the capital, they wished to know accurately what their sister had gone through, and above all how the Sovereign of the country had treated Ilse, he whom they thought of as a holy Christ, as the unwearied dispenser of joy and happiness. But the elder ones were more cautious in their language without exactly knowing why, with that kind of natural tact which children show towards those whom they love. Ilse accompanied her sister Clara through the upper floor, they arranged the room for the guests who were expected, and placed an immense bunch of flowers in the room which Mr. Hummel was to occupy. Her brothers took her through the kitchen-garden into the narrow valley, and showed her the new wooden bridge over the water to the grotto, which their father had built as a surprise for Ilse. Ilse passed by the swollen brook, the water rushed yellow and muddy over the rocks, it had overflowed the small strip of meadow by its banks and flowed in a strong stream down the valley to the town. Ilse sought the place where she once, under the foliage and wild plants, lay concealed, when she read in the eyes of her Felix the acknowledgement of his love. This cosy nook was also flooded; the stream ran muddily over it, the flowers were broken down and washed away, the alder bushes covered to their upper branches, and reeds and discolored foam hung round them: only the white stem of a birch rose out of the devastation, and the flood whirled round its lowest branches.
"The flood is passing away," said Ilse, sadly; "in a few days the ground will again be visible, and where the verdure has been injured the mild rays of the sun will soon restore it. But how will it be with me? There is no light so long as he is not with me, and when I see him again how he will be changed? How will he, so serious and zealous, bear the cold wind of adversity that has passed through his life and mine?"
Her father watched her carefully; he talked to her more frequently than formerly. Whenever he returned from the field he told her of the work that was doing on the farm; he was always taking care not to touch on thoughts that might give her pain, and the daughter felt how tender and loving was the attention of the busy man. Now he beckoned to her from a distance, and near him was walking a thick-set figure, with a large head and comfortable aspect.
"Mr. Hummel!" exclaimed Ilse, joyfully, and hastened with winged footsteps towards him. "When will he come?" she called out, with eager expectation.
"As soon as he is free," replied Hummel.
"Who detains him there?" said the wife, looking sorrowful.
Mr. Hummel explained. At his report the wrinkles on Ilse's forehead disappeared, and she led her guest into the old house. Mr. Hummel looked astonished at the tall race that had grown up on the rock: he looked with admiration on the girls and respectfully at the heads of the boys. Ilse did not to-day forget what becomes a good housewife in welcoming a guest. Mr. Hummel was happy among the country people, and delighted with the flowers in his room; he took the sprightly lad Franz upon his knee, and made him drink almost too much out of his glass. Then he went through the farm with the proprietor and Ilse; he was clever in his judgment, and he and his host recognized in each other sound common sense. At last Ilse asked him frankly how he was pleased with her home.
"Everything is magnificent," said Hummel; "the development of the family, their curly heads, the flowers, the cattle, and the domestic arrangements. Compared to the business of H. Hummel, it is like a gourd to a cucumber. Everything capacious and abundant, only to my taste there is too much straw."
Ilse was called aside by her father. "The Prince is preparing to depart. He has expressed a wish to speak to you first. Will you see him?"
"Not to-day. To-day belongs to you and our guest, but to-morrow," said Ilse.
On the morning of the day following, Professor Raschke entered his friend's room prepared for the journey.
"Has the Magister disappeared?" he asked, anxiously.
"He has done what he was obliged to do," replied Werner, gloomily. "Whatever his future life and fortune may be, we have done with him."
Raschke looked anxiously on the furrowed countenance of his colleague.
"I should like to see you on the road to your wife, and better still, with her on the road back to us."
"Have no doubt, friend, that I shall seek both roads as soon as I have a right to do so."
"Ilse counts the hours till your return," said Raschke, in still greater anxiety; "she will not be at rest till she has fast hold of her loved one."
"My wife has long been deprived of rest while she was with me," said the Scholar, "I have not understood how to defend her. I have exposed her to the claws of wild beasts. She has found from strangers the protection that her own husband refused her. The indifference of her husband has wounded her in that point which it is most difficult for a woman to forgive. I have become a mere, impotent dreamer," he exclaimed, "unworthy of the devotion of this pure soul, and I feel what a man never should feel--ashamed to meet my excellent wife again." He turned his face away.
"This feeling is too high-strained, and the reproaches that you angrily make yourself are too severe. You have been deceived by the cunning prevarication of a worldly wise man. You yourself have expressed that it is ingloriously easy to deceive us in things in which we are not cleverer than children. Werner, once more I entreat of you to depart with me immediately, even though by another road."
"No," replied the Scholar, decidedly; "I have all my life long been clear in my relations with other men. I cannot do things by halves. If I feel a liking, the pressure of my hand and the confidence that I give does not leave a moment's doubt of the state of my heart. If I must give up my relation to any one, I must have the reckoning fully closed. I cannot leave this place as a fugitive."
"Who demands that?" asked Raschke. "You only go like a man who turns his eyes away from a hateful worm that crawls before him on the ground."
"If the worm has injured the man, it is his duty to guard others from the danger of like injury, and if he cannot guard others, he ought to clear his own path.
"But if he incurs new danger in the attempt?
"Yet he must do what he can to satisfy himself," exclaimed Werner. "I will not allow myself to be robbed of the rights that I have against another. I am called upon by the insult to my wife; I am called upon by the ruined life of a scholar, whom we both lament. Say no more to me. Friend, my self-respect has been severely wounded, and with reason. I feel my weakness with a bitterness that is the just punishment for the pride with which I have looked upon the life of others. I have written to Struvelius, and begged his pardon for having so arrogantly treated him in the uncertainty that once disturbed his life. Here is my letter to our colleague. I beg you to give it to him, and to tell him that when we meet again I wish to have no words upon the past, only he must know how bitterly I have atoned for having been severe with him. But, however much patience and consideration I may require from others, I should lose the last thing that gives me courage to live, if I went from here without coming to a reckoning with the lord of that castle. I am no man of the world who has learnt to conceal his anger beneath courtly words."
"He who seeks to call a man to account," exclaimed Raschke, "should have the means of getting firm hold of his opponent, otherwise what should be satisfaction may become a new humiliation."
"To have sought this satisfaction to the utmost," replied Werner, "is in itself a satisfaction."
"Werner," said his colleague, "I hope that your anger and indignation will not draw you into the thoughtless vindictiveness of the weak fools who call a brutal playing with one's own life and that of others satisfaction."
"He is a prince," said the Professor, with a gloomy smile; "I wear no spurs, and the last use I made of my bullet mould was to crack nuts with it. How can you so mistake me? But there are things which must be expressed. There is a healing power in words; if not for him who listens to them, yet for him who speaks. I must tell him what I demand of him. He shall feel how my words are forced down into his joyless heart. My speaking out will make me free."
"He will refuse to hear you," exclaimed Raschke.
"I will do my best to speak to him."
"He has many means of preventing you."
"Let him use them at his peril, for he will thereby deprive himself of the advantage of hearing me without witnesses."
"He will set all the machinery that his high position affords him in motion against you; he will use his power recklessly to restrain you."
"I am no bawling soothsayer who will attack Cæsar in the open street, to warn him of the Ides of March. My knowledge of what will humble him before himself and his contemporaries, is my weapon. I assure you he will give me opportunity to use it as I will."
"He is going away," said Raschke, anxiously.
"Where can he go to that I cannot follow him?"
"The apprehension that you will excite in him will drive him to some dark deed."
"Let him do his worst; I must do what will give me peace."
"Werner!" cried Raschke, raising his hands, "I ought not to leave you in this position, and yet you make your friend feel how powerless his honest counsel is against your stubborn will."
The Professor went up to him and embraced him. "Farewell, Raschke. As high as any man can stand in the esteem of another, you stand in mine. Do not be angry if, in this case, I follow more the impulse of my own nature than the mild wisdom of yours. Give my greeting to your wife and children."
Raschke passed his hands over his eyes, drew on his coat, and put the letter to Struvelius in his pocket. In doing so he found another letter, took it out, and read the address. "A letter from my wife to you," he said; "How did it come into my pocket!"
Werner opened it; again a slight smile passed over his face. "Mrs. Aurelia begs me to take care of you. The charge comes at the right moment. I will accompany you to your place of departure; we will not forget the cap or cloak."
The Professor conducted his friend to the conveyance; they spoke together, up to the last moment, of the lectures which both wished to give in the approaching term. "Remember my letter to Struvelius," were Werner's last words, when his friend was seated in the carriage.
"I shall think of it whenever I think of you," said Raschke, stretching out his hand from the carriage.
The Professor went to the castle for a last conversation with the man who had called him to his capital. The household received him with embarrassed looks. "The Sovereign is just starting on a journey, and will not return for some days; we do not know where he is going," said the Intendant, with concern. The Professor, nevertheless, desired him to announce him to the Sovereign, his request was urgent; the servant brought as an answer that his master could not be spoken to before his return; the Professor might impart his wishes to one of the aides-de-camp.
Werner hastened to the adjacent house of the Lord High Steward. He was taken into the library, and gave a fleeting glance at the faded carpet, the old hangings, which were covered with engravings in dark frames, and on the large bookshelves, with glass doors, lined within, as if the possessor wished to conceal what he read from the eyes of strangers. The High Steward entered hastily.
"I seek for an interview with the Sovereign before his departure," began the Professor, "I beg of your Excellence to procure me this audience."
"Pardon my asking you your object," said the High Steward. "Do you wish again to speak to a sufferer concerning his disease?"
"The diseased man administers a high office, and has the power and rights of a healthy one; he is answerable to his fellow-men for his deeds. I consider it a duty not to go from here without informing him that he is no longer in a condition to perform the duties of his position."
The Lord High Steward looked with astonishment at the Scholar.
"Do you insist on this interview?"
"What I have learned since my return here from the country compels me to do so; I must seek this interview by every possible means in my power, whatever may be the consequences."
"Even the consequences to yourself?"
"Even these. After all that has passed, the Sovereign cannot refuse to hear me speak before I go."
"What he ought not to do he will yet try to do."
"He will do it at his peril," replied the Professor.
The High Steward placed himself in front of the Professor, and said, impressively:
"The Sovereign is going to Rossau to-day. The plan is secret. I accidentally learnt the orders, which were given at the princely stables."
The Scholar started.
"I thank your Excellence from my heart for this communication," he exclaimed, with forced composure. "I will endeavor to send a speedy warning beforehand. I shall not start, myself, till your Excellence has seconded my efforts to speak to the Sovereign before his journey."
"If you seek an audience through me," said the High Steward, after some consideration, "I will, as an officer of the Court, and from personal esteem for you, immediately convey your wish to the Sovereign. But I will not conceal from you, Professor, that I consider a criticism from you upon past events as very risky in every point of view."
"But I am thoroughly impressed with the conviction that the criticism must be made," exclaimed the Professor.
"To the Sovereign alone, or before others?" asked the High Steward.
"If the ears and mind of the Sovereign remain closed, then before the world. I shall thus fulfil an imperative duty to all who might suffer from the dark fancies of this disordered mind; a duty from which I, as an honest man, cannot escape. If calm remonstrance will not move him, I shall publicly arraign him before the rulers and people of our nation. For it is not to be borne that the conditions of ancient Rome should again rise to life among our people."
"That is decisive," replied the High Steward.
He went to his bureau, took out a document, and presented it to the Scholar.
"Read this. Will you renounce a personal interview with the Sovereign if this paper is signed by his hand?"
The Professor read, and bowed to the High Steward.
"As soon as he ceases to be what he has been, I shall consider him merely as an afflicted man; in this case my interview with him would be useless. Meanwhile I repeat my request to procure an audience before the Sovereign's departure."
The High Steward took back the document.
"I will endeavor to act as your representative. But do not forget that the Sovereign travels to Rossau in another hour. If we ever see each other again, Mr. Werner," concluded the old lord, solemnly, "may both our hearts be free from anxiety about that which sometimes one esteems lightly, as you do at this moment, but which one does not willingly allow one's self to be robbed of by the intervention of another."
The Professor hastened to the inn and called for his servant.
"Show me your fidelity to-day, Gabriel: none but a messenger on horseback can arrive at Bielstein in time. Do your best, take courier's horses, and put a letter into the hands of my wife before the Court carriages arrive there."
"At your command, Professor," said Gabriel, with a military salute, "it is a hard ride even for a hussar; if I am not detained in changing horses, I trust to be able to deliver the letter in due time."
The Professor wrote in haste, and despatched Gabriel; then he returned to the dwelling of the High Steward.
The Sovereign was lying wearily on his sofa, his cheeks pale and his eyes dim--a thoroughly sick man.
"I had formerly other thoughts, and could, when I had touched the keys, play more than one melody; now everything changes itself into a discordant measure: she has gone, she is in the neighborhood of the boy, she laughs at her foolish wooer. I see nothing before me but the track on the high road that leads to her. A strange power eternally strikes the same notes within me, a dark shadow stands near me and points with its finger incessantly to the same path; I cannot control myself, I hear the words, I see the road, I feel the dark hand over my head."
The servant announced the High Steward.
"I will not see him," said the Sovereign, imperiously. "Tell his Excellence that I am on the point of departing for the country."
"His Excellence begs admittance, it is a question of an urgent signature."
"The old fool," murmured the Sovereign, "usher him in."
"I am unfortunately much pressed for time, your Excellence," he called out to him, as he entered.
"I do not wish to make a long demand upon the time of my most Serene Lord," began the courtier. "Prof. Werner begs that your Highness will consent to receive him before his departure."
"What is the cause of this importunity?" exclaimed the Sovereign; "he has already been here, and I have refused him."
"I must be permitted to make the respectful remark that after all that has passed, the honor of a personal interview cannot well be refused him. Your Highness would be the last to approve of so marked a violation of seemly considerations."
The Sovereign looked vindictively at the High Steward.
"All the same, I will not see him."
"Besides these considerations, it is not advisable to refuse this interview," continued the old lord, with emphasis.
"Of that I am the best judge," replied the Sovereign, carelessly.
"This person has become privy to certain things, the exposure of which, for the sake of the princely dignity, must be avoided, even at a heavy sacrifice, for he is not bound to keep the secret."
"No one will listen to an individual, and a dreamer at that."
"What he will divulge will not only be believed, but will excite a storm against your Highness."
"Gossip from bookworms will not hurt me."
"This person is a highly-respected man of character, and will use his observations to demand of the whole civilized world that the possibility of similar occurrences at this Court should be made impossible."
"Let him do what he dare," cried the Sovereign, with an outbreak of fury, "we shall know how to protect ourselves."
"The exposure may yet be guarded against; but there is only one last and radical remedy."
"Speak out, your Excellence; I have always respected your judgment."
"What inflames the Professor," continued the courtier, cautiously, "will become generally known; at all events it will produce a great sensation and dangerous scandal; nothing further. It was a personal observation only that he was compelled to make at the foot of the tower; it was a conjecture only which he gave vent to beneath the same tower. According to his assertion, two attempts have been made, and yet neither has been followed by evil consequences. To be able to provoke the public judgment of the civilized world on such grounds is doubtful. However upright the narrator may be, he may himself have been deceived. Your Highness remarks rightly that the irritation of a single scholar would occasion disagreeable gossip, nothing further."
"Most admirable, your Excellence," interrupted the Sovereign.
"Unfortunately there is one important circumstance that I have not yet added. With respect to that personal observation at the foot of the tower, the Scholar has a witness, and I am that witness. When he calls upon me for my testimony and speaks of my personal observation, I must declare that he is right, for I am not accustomed to consider half-truth as truth."
The Sovereign started.
"It was I who restrained the hand," remarked the courtier; "and because that simple scholar is in the right, and because I must confirm his views concerning the state of my gracious master's health, I tell you there is only one last and radical remedy." The High Steward took the document out of the portfolio. "My remedy is, that your Highness should, by a great resolve, anticipate the storm, and high-mindedly consent to make this declaration the expression of your will."
The Sovereign cast a look on the paper, and flung it away from him:
"Are you mad, old man?"
"Insanity has not yet been discovered in me," replied the High Steward, sorrowfully. "If my gracious master would but weigh the circumstances with his usual acuteness! It has unfortunately become impossible for your Highness to carry on the duties of your high calling in the way you have hitherto done. Even if your Highness considered it possible, your faithful servants are in the painful position of not partaking of this opinion."
"These faithful servants are my High Steward?"
"I am one of them. If your Highness will not consent to give your princely approbation to this project, consideration for that which is dearer to me than your Highness's favor will forbid my remaining in your service."
"I repeat the question, have you become insane. Lord High Steward?"
"Only deeply moved; I did not think that I would ever have to choose between my honor and my service to your Highness."
He took out another document from the portfolio.
"Your resignation," exclaimed the Sovereign, reading. "You should have added to it, 'with permission.'" The Sovereign seized the pen. "Here, Baron von Ottenburg, you are released from your office."
"It is no joyful thanks that I express to your Highness for it. But now it is done, I, Hans von Ottenburg, express to you my respectful request that your Highness would still, at this hour, be pleased to sign the other document. For in case your Highness should hesitate to fulfil the earnest entreaties of a former servant, this same request, from now on, will be forced upon your Highness's ear in many ways, and by persons who would not use so much consideration for your Highness as I have hitherto done. Till now there has been one who has begged of you, a professor,--now there are two, he and I,--in another hour the number will become burdensome to your Highness."
"A former High Steward, a rebel!"
"Only a petitioner. It is your Highness's right, of your own free will, to make the high decision to which I endeavor to influence you. But I beg you once more to consider that it can no longer be avoided. Your Highness's Court will, in the next hour, be brought front to front with the same alternative as myself; for my regard for the honor of these gentlemen and ladies will compel me, on the same grounds which have led to my decision, not to be silent with respect to them. Without doubt, the gentlemen of the Court will, like me, approach your Highness with earnest entreaties, and, like me, will resign in case their entreaties are unsuccessful, and without doubt your Highness will have to find new attendants. Respect for the honor and the office of those who rule under you will oblige me to make the same communication to your Highness's ministers. True, these also might be replaced by less important servants of the State. But further, from loyalty and devotion to your Highness's house, from anxiety about the life and welfare of the Hereditary Prince and his illustrious sister, as well as from attachment to this country in which I have grown gray, I see myself obliged to appeal to every Government connected with ours for an energetic enforcement of this my request. As long as I was a servant of the Court, my oath and allegiance compelled me to silence and careful regard for your Highness's personal interests. I am now relieved from this obligation, and I shall from henceforth advocate the interests of our people in opposition to those of your Highness. Your Highness may yourself judge what that would lead to; this signature may be put off, but can no longer be avoided. Every delay makes the situation worse; the signing will no longer appear as the voluntary act of a high-minded decision, but as a necessity forced upon you. Finally, let your Highness bear in mind that the Professor has made in the Tower Castle another important observation,--another with respect to the conduct of a certain Magister; it is my destiny to know much which does not belong to the secrets of my department."
The Sovereign lay on his sofa, with his head turned away. He folded his hands before his face. A long oppressive silence intervened.
"You have been my personal enemy from the first day of my reign," suddenly put in the Sovereign.
"I have been the faithful servant of my gracious master; personal friendship has never been my portion, and I have never simulated it."
"You have always intrigued against me."
"Your Highness well knows that I have served you as a man of honor," replied the Baron, proudly. "Now, also, when once more I beg of you to sign this document, I do not stand upon the right which many years of confidence give me with your Highness; I do not advance as an excuse for this repeated importunity the interest that I have been entitled to take in the dignity and welfare of this princely house; I have another ground for relieving your Highness from the humiliation of a public discussion of your Highness's state of mind. I am a loyal and monarchically-minded man. He who has respect for the high office of a prince is under the urgent necessity of guarding this office from being lowered in the eyes of the nation. This he must do, not by concealing what is insupportable, but by extirpating it. Therefore, since that scene in the tower, there has been this struggle between me and your Highness, that I, in order to maintain your Highness's exalted office, must sacrifice your Highness's person. I am determined to do so, and there consequently only remains to your Highness the choice of doing that which is inevitable, of your own free will, and honorably in the eyes of the world, or dishonorably and at the instance of importunate strangers. The words are spoken; I beg for a speedy decision."
The old lord stood close before the ruler. He looked firmly and coldly into the restless eyes of his former master, and pointed with his finger fixedly to the parchment. It was the keeper conquering the patient.
"Not now--not here," exclaimed the Sovereign, beside himself. "In the presence of the Hereditary Prince I will take counsel and come to a decision."
"The presence and signature of your ministers are necessary for the document, not the presence of the Hereditary Prince. But as your Highness prefers signing in the presence of the Prince, I will do my self the honor of following your Highness to Rossau, and beg one of the ministers to accompany me for this object."
The Sovereign looked reflectively down.
"I am still a ruler," he exclaimed, springing up; and seizing the signed resignation of the High Steward, he tore it up. "High Steward von Ottenburg, you will accompany me in my carriage to Rossau."
"Then the minister will follow your Highness in my carriage," said the old lord, calmly. "I hasten to inform him."
CHAPTER XL.
ON THE ROAD TO THE ROCK.
Towards the quiet country town which pious colonists had once built about the monastery walls of praying monks, and towards the rock on which the heathen maiden had once whispered oracles to her race, were now hastening along different roads horses and wheels, together with living men who were seeking the decision of their fate; here joyful, rising hopes--there downward, declining powers; here the pure dream of enthusiastic youth--there the destructive dream of a gloomy spirit. In the valley and over the rock hovered the spirits of the country; they prepared themselves to receive the flying strangers with the hospitality of home.
The early dawn sent its pale glimmer into Laura's study; she stood by her writing-table, and cast a lingering look on the familiar book in which, with rapid hand, she had written the concluding words. She fastened the book and the Doctor's poems together, and concealed them under the cover of her trunk. She cast another look on the sanctuary of her maiden life, and then flew down the stairs into the arms of her anxious mother. It was a wonderful elopement--a quiet Sunday morning, a mysterious light, gloomy rainclouds, contrasting strongly with the deep red glow of morning. Laura lay long in the arms of her weeping mother, till Susan urged her departure; then she passed into the street, where the Doctor awaited her, and hastened with him into the carriage; for the carriage was ordered to wait in a deserted place around the corner, and not before the house; upon this Laura had insisted. It was a wonderful elopement--a modest, sedate traveling-companion, the object of the journey the house of a loved friend, and, lastly, a large leather bag containing cold meat and other victuals, which Mrs. Hahn herself carried to the carriage, in order that she might once more kiss her son and Laura, and bless them amid tears.
Spitehahn had for several days found it difficult to bear his lonely existence; since the departure of the learned lodgers he had been much disturbed, but when the master of the house also disappeared, there was no one to recognize him. This morning he cast cold glances on Laura as she hovered round her sorrowing mother, and looked askance at Susan when she carried the great traveling-trunk to the carriage; then he sneaked out into the street in order to give expression to his hatred of the neighboring house. But when Mrs. Hahn hastened to the carriage with the leather bag, he saw that something was wrong and he crept after his neighbor from across the way; and whilst she mounted on the step of the carriage to warn her Fritz of the sharp morning air, and to kiss Laura once more, he sprang upon the footboard and ensconced himself under the leather apron of the coachbox, determined to abide his time. The coachman seated himself, and supposing the dog belonged to the travelers, cracked his whip and started off. Another look and call to the mother, and the adventurous journey began.
Laura's soul trembled under the pressure of passionate feelings, which were called forth by this long-desired but dreaded hour. The houses of the city disappeared, and the poplars on the high road seemed to dance past. She looked anxiously at her Fritz, and placed the tips of her fingers in his hand. He smiled, and pressed the little hand warmly.
His cheerfulness was a support to her. She looked tenderly into his true face.
"The morning is cool," he began, "allow me to fasten your cloak."
"I am very comfortable," replied Laura, again putting her trembling hand within his.
Thus they sat silently together, the sun peeped modestly from behind his red curtains and smiled on Laura, so that she was obliged to close her eyes. Her whole childhood passed before her in fleeting pictures; and finally, she heard the significant words of her friends at her last visit. Her godmother had said to her. Return soon again, child; and Laura now felt with emotion that this return was at an immeasurable distance. Her other godmother had kindly asked, When shall we see each other again? and a touching echo sounded in Laura's heart, Who knows when? All Nature was stirring in the fresh morning: a flock of pigeons flew across the field, a hare ran along the road as if racing, a splendid cluster of blue flowers grew on the border of the ditch, and red roofs shone from among the fruit trees. Everything on earth looked green and hopeful, blooming and waving in the morning breeze. The country people who were going to the city met them, a peasant sitting on his waggon smoking his pipe nodded a good morning to Laura, who held out her hand as if she wished to send a greeting to the whole world. The milkwoman in her little cart, who was going to sell her milk, also greeted her, saying, "Good morning. Miss Laura." Laura drew back, and, looking alarmed at Fritz, said:
"She has recognized us."
"Without doubt," replied the Doctor, gaily.
"She is a gossip, Fritz; she cannot hold her tongue, and will tell all the servant-girls in our street that we are driving together along this road. This distresses me, Fritz."
"We are taking a drive," replied the Doctor, triumphantly; "going to pay a visit to some one; we are going to act as sponsors together in the country. Do not mind these trifles."
"It began by our being sponsors together, Fritz," answered Laura, tranquilized. "It has all been owing to the cat's paws."
"I do not know," replied Fritz, slyly, "whether this misfortune did not originate earlier. When you were quite a little girl I kissed you once."
"I do not remember that," said Laura.
"It was for a basket of colored beans that I brought you from our garden. I demanded the kiss, and you consented to give the price, but immediately after wiped your mouth with your hand. From that time I have liked you better than all others."
"Do not let us talk of these things," said Laura, troubled; "my recollections of old times are not all so harmless."
"I have always been kept at a distance," exclaimed Fritz, "even to-day. It is a shame. It must not go on so; I must have some serious talk about it. Travelling together as we are, it is not fitting that we should use the stiff you in talking to one another."
Laura looked reproachfully at him. "Not to-day," she said, softly.
"It is of no use now," replied Fritz, boldly. "I will no longer be treated as a stranger. I once heard the honest thou from you, but never since. It pains me."
Laura regretted that. "But only when we are quite alone," she entreated.
"I propose it for all time," continued Fritz, undisturbed, "otherwise there will be continually mistakes and confusion."
He offered her his hand, which she shook gently, and before she could stop him she felt a kiss on her lips.
Laura looked at him tenderly, but then immediately drew back and ensconced herself in a corner of the carriage. Fritz was quite different to-day from usual; he looked confident and bold. In the house he had always been modest, while Laura had more than once thought of this relation, and had written in her book: "When two human beings are united in soul they ought to let each other know it." Now he used little ceremony. He looked boldly out of the carriage, and when they met travelers did not retreat as she had done after meeting the milkwoman, but looked as if challenging notice, and greeting people first.
"I must begin about the Hindus," she said to herself, "in order to turn his thoughts to other subjects."
She asked him about the contents of the Veda.
"I cannot think of it to-day," exclaimed Fritz, gaily. "I am too happy to think of the old books. I have only one thought in my heart: 'Laura, the dear girl, will become mine.' I could dance in the carriage for joy."
He jumped up from his seat like a little boy.
Fritz was fearfully changed; she did not know him again; she withheld her hand from him, and looked at him, suspiciously, askance.
"The heavens are covered with clouds," she said, sadly.
"But the sun shines above them," replied Fritz; "it will come out again in a few minutes. I propose that we examine the great leather bag which my mother gave us; I hope there will be something good in it."
Thus did the prose of the Hahn family betray itself, and Laura observed with secret regret how eagerly the Doctor rummaged the bag. She had, however, in her excitement thought little of her breakfast, so when Fritz offered her some of its contents she extended her little hand for it, and both ate heartily.
Something darkened the seat next the coachman; a misshapen head showed itself at the window, and a discordant snarl was heard in the carriage. Laura pointed terrified at the apparition.
"Merciful heavens, there is the dog again!"
The Doctor also looked angrily at the hostile figure. "Drive him away," cried Laura; "make him run home."
"He will hardly find his way back," replied the Doctor, thoughtfully; "what would your father say if he were lost?"
"He has been the enemy of my life," exclaimed Laura; "and must we now take him with us into the world? The idea is insupportable, and a bad omen, Fritz."
"Perhaps we shall meet a wagon that will take him back again," said the Doctor, consolingly; "meanwhile we must not let him starve."
In spite of his aversion he handed him some breakfast, and the dog disappeared again under the apron.
But Laura continued disturbed.
"Fritz, dear Fritz," she exclaimed, suddenly, "you must leave me alone."
The Doctor looked at her with astonishment. The you was an orthographical error which must be atoned for. He was again about to give her a kiss, but she drew back.
"If you love me, Fritz, you must now leave me alone," she cried out, wringing her hands.
"How can I do that?" asked Fritz; "we are traveling for good into the great world."
"Get upon the box by the coachman," begged Laura, imploringly.
She looked so serious and depressed that Fritz obediently stopped the carriage, descended from it, and climbed upon the coach-box. Laura drew a deep breath, and became more tranquil. Her words had influenced him. Intractable as he was, he would do much to please her. She sat alone, and her thoughts became more cheering. The Doctor turned round frequently, knocked at the window, and asked how she was. He was very tender-hearted, and full of loving attentions.
"The whole responsibility for his health rests on me," she thought, "what hitherto his dear mother has done for him now becomes my duty. A delightful duty, dear Fritz. I will keep him from working at nights, for his health is delicate, and every day I will go walking with him, in the coldest weather, to accustom him to it."
She looked out of the carriage, the wind was stirring the leaves; she knocked at the window:
"Fritz, it is windy, you have no shawl on."
"I shall no longer use one," called out the Doctor, "this effeminacy must be shaken off."
"I beg of you, Fritz, not to be so childish. Put one round you, or you will certainly catch cold."
"With a you, I will certainly not put it on."
"Take it, my darling Fritz, I beg of thee," entreated Laura.
"That sounds quite different," said Fritz.
The window was opened, and the shawl put out.
"He is firm as a rock," said Laura, seating herself again. "Complaisant as he appears, he knows well what he chooses to do, and, contrary to his own convictions, will not give in, even to me. That is all for the best, for I am still a childish creature, and my father was in the right; I need a husband who will look more calmly on the world than I do."
It began to rain. The coachman put on his cloak, and Fritz spread his plaid and enveloped himself in it. She became very anxious about Fritz, and again knocked at the window.
"It is raining, Fritz."
This the Doctor could not deny.
"Come in, you will get wet and catch cold."
The carriage stopped, and Fritz obediently got down and entered it, while Laura wiped away the raindrops on his hair and shawl with her pocket-handkerchief.
"You said you four times," began Fritz, reprovingly. "If it continues thus, you will have a large reckoning to pay."
"Be serious," began Laura, "I am in a very solemn mood. I am thinking of our future. I will think of it day and night, dearest one, that you may not feel the loss of your mother. Your dear mother has always taken your coffee up to you, but that is unsociable, you shall come over to me and take your breakfast with me; your Hindus must grant this half-hour to me. About ten o'clock I shall send you over an egg, and at dinner-time you will come over again to me. I shall take care that the cooking is good; we will live simply, as we are accustomed, and well. Then you shall tell me something about your books that I may know what my husband is occupied with, for this is a wife's right. In the afternoon we will take a walk together in the streets."
"What do you mean?" asked Fritz, "'over there,' 'here,' 'in the streets'? Surely we shall live together."
Laura looked at him with open eyes, and a blush slowly mantled over her face up to her temples.
"We cannot, as man and wife, live in different houses?"
Laura held her hand before her eyes and remained silent. As she did not answer, Fritz drew her hand quietly from her face, and large tears rolled down her cheeks.
"My mother," she said, softly, as she wept.
So touching was the expression of her grief, that Fritz said, sympathizingly:
"Do not grieve, Laura, about her, we will live where you like, and exactly as you think fit."
But even these kind words could not comfort the poor soul, whose maidenly anxieties cast a shadow over her future. The colored haze with which her childish fancy had invested her free life in the neighborhood of her loved one, had been dissolved.
She sat silent and sad.
The coachman stopped before a village inn to refresh himself and his horses. The young landlady stood at the door with her child in her arms; she approached the carriage and civilly invited them to alight. Laura looked anxiously at the Doctor; he nodded, the carriage door was opened. Laura seated herself on a bench in front of the door, and asked the young woman questions about her family, in order to show the self-possession of a traveller. The woman answered, confidently:
"This is our first child, we have been married scarcely two years. Excuse me, but I suppose you are a young married couple."
Laura rose hastily, her cheeks glowed a deeper red than the rising sun, as she answered with a low "No."
"Then you are engaged without doubt," said the woman, "that can be seen at once."
"How could you discover that?" asked Laura, without raising her eyes.
"One sees evidence of it," replied the woman, "the way in which you looked at the gentleman was significant enough."
"A good guess," exclaimed the Doctor, gaily; but he also colored slightly.
Laura turned away and struggled for composure. The secret of her journey was apparent to every one. It was known in the city and was spoken of in the villages. Her betrothal had been settled by the talk of strangers. Yet her parents had not laid her hand in that of her lover, nor had any of her friends wished her happiness, but now the stranger on the high road came and told her to her face what she was.
"If the woman had known all,--how that I was eloping secretly with Fritz Hahn, without betrothal or marriage,--how would she have looked upon me?" thought Laura.
She entered the carriage before the coachman had finished feeding the horses, and again tears flowed from her eyes. The Doctor, who did not anticipate this change of mood, was about to enter, when Laura, quite beside herself, exclaimed:
"I beg of you to sit by the coachman, I feel very sad."
"Why?" asked Fritz, softly.
"I have done wrong," said Laura. "Fritz, I should like to return. What will that woman think of me? She saw right well that we were not engaged."
"But are we not?" asked the Doctor, astonished. "I consider myself as decidedly engaged, and the friends to whom we go will clearly look upon the affair in that point of view."
"I conjure you, Fritz, to leave me alone now; what I feel I cannot confess to any human being; if I become calmer I will knock at the window."
Fritz again climbed on the coach-box, and Laura passed a sorrowful hour in the solitude of her carriage.
She felt something strange on her cloak, looked with alarm at the empty seat, and started when she saw the demon sitting next her, the enemy of her life, the red dog. He stretched out his forefeet, and raised his moustache high in the air, as if he would say: "I am carrying you off. The Doctor is sitting on the box, and I, the mischief-maker, the misanthropist, who have caused so much sorrow to this poetic soul, who have been cursed in her journal in both prose and verse, I, the common and unworthy being who used to lie at her feet, sit by her side the gloomy figure of her fate, the spectre of her youth, and the bad omen of her future life. I lie in the place where, in her childish poetry, she has long dreamt of another, and I mock at her tears and anxiety." He licked his beard and looked from under his long hair contemptuously at her. Laura knocked at the window, resolved to leave the carriage herself and sit upon the box.
Meanwhile the mothers sat anxiously in the hostile houses. Since her daughter had left, Mrs. Hummel trembled for fear of the anger of her husband. She knew from Laura that he had not objected to the journey to Bielstein, and only wished to appear unconscious of it in order to maintain his defiant character towards his neighbors. But of what was to follow, he would give no information; when it came to a decision as to what was to become of Laura and the Doctor, she felt there was everything to fear from him. Mrs. Hummel had encouraged the journey in order to compel the consent of the family tyrant; but now she felt distrustful of her own cleverness. In her sad perplexity she put her mantle on, over her morning dress, and hastened out of the house to seek consolation from her neighbor.
The heart of Mrs. Hahn was burdened with similar cares; she also was prepared, in her morning dress and mantle, to go over to Mrs. Hummel. The women met outside the two houses, and began an exchange of motherly anxieties. They made use of the neutral ground that lay between the hostile domains for quiet intercourse, and forgot that they were standing in the street. The bells sounded and the church-goers returned, yet they were still standing together talking over the past and future. The comedian approached them elegantly dressed; as he drew near he made a dramatic salutation with his hand. Mrs. Hummel looked with anxiety at her favorite guest, she feared his conjectures and still more his sharp tongue. His face was radiant with pleasure and his gestures were sympathetic.
"What a surprise," he exclaimed, in the tone of a warm-hearted uncle; "what an agreeable surprise? The old quarrel made up; wreaths of flowers from one house to the other; the discord of the fathers is atoned for by the love of the children. I offer my hearty congratulations."
"What do you mean?" asked Mrs. Hummel, perplexed.
"An elopement," exclaimed the comedian, raising his hands.
Both mothers looked terrified.
"I must beg of you, in your remarks, to have more regard for the real state of things," replied Mrs. Hummel with offended dignity.
"An elopement," again exclaimed the gentleman triumphantly. "Quite in conformity with the humor of this house; it is a master-stroke."
"I feel confident from our old friendship," said Mrs. Hummel, "that you do not mean to insult us; but I must earnestly request you to have regard, at least, for propriety."
The comedian was astonished at the reproaches of his patroness.
"I only repeat what I have just been informed of by post." He drew out of his pocket a neat letter. "I hope that the ladies will convince themselves." He read aloud: "'I beg to announce to you the betrothal of Dr. Fritz Hahn with my daughter Laura, and their elopement this morning from her parents' house. Yours humbly, Hummel.' This quite answers to the character of our humorous friend."
The ladies stood aghast. Then the rustling of a silk dress was heard, the godmother came up hastily, her hymn-book in her hand, and called out while yet in the distance:
"What does one not live to see? You naughty people! Is it right that the friends of the family should first learn from the preacher in the church what is happening here?"
"What do you mean?" asked both ladies, quite confounded.
"That the bans of your children have been proclaimed in church to-day for the first, second, and third time. There was general astonishment, and though you have acted in so unfriendly a way as to keep it a secret, all your acquaintances were delighted. Now the whole city is full of it."
Without speaking a word the two mothers flew into each others' arms in the open street, midway between the houses. The comedian stood on one side with his hand in his breast pocket, the godmother on the other with folded hands.
It was also a troublous Sunday on the estate of Ilse's father. During the previous night a waterspout had burst on the hills, and a wild flood poured down where formerly the brook ran between the meadows. The oldest people did not remember such a rush of water. Before this the brook had been much swollen by the rains of the previous week, now it roared and thundered through the narrow valley between the manor-house and the sloping hills, and overflowed the fields where it was not defied by the steepness of the country and rocks. Furiously did the water rush and foam over the rocks and about the heads of the willows, carrying away the hay from the meadows in its course, uprooting reeds and tearing off branches of trees, and also the ruins of habitations, which, though far above, had been reached by the flood. The people of the estate stood by the edge of the orchard, looking silently upon the stream and the ruins it bore along with it. The children ran eagerly along the side of the water, endeavoring to draw toward them with poles whatever they could reach. They raised loud cries when they saw a living animal floating along. It was a kid standing on one of the boards of the roof of its stall. When the little creature saw the people standing near, it cried piteously, as if begging to be rescued. Hans put out a well-hook, caught hold of the plank, the kid sprang ashore and was taken in grand procession by the children to the farmyard and there fed.
Ilse was standing at the new bridge leading to the grotto. It had only been built a few weeks, and was now threatened with destruction. Already the supports were bending on one side. The force of the water worked against the lower end, and loosened the pegs. The foam of the water whirled round the projecting foot of the rock, which formed the vault of the grotto, and the power of the rising water made deep furrows in the flood.
"There comes some one running from the mountain," exclaimed the people.
A girl came hastily round the rock, with a large kerchief full of fresh-mowed mountain grass on her back. She stopped terrified on the platform of the rock, and hesitated about crossing the unsafe bridge.
"It is poor Benz's Anna!" exclaimed Ilse; "she must not remain there in the wilderness. Throw your burden away--be brisk, Anna, and come over quickly."
The girl passed rapidly across the bridge.
"She shall be the last one," commanded Ilse. "None of you shall attempt to go upon it, for it will not bear the pressure long."
Her father came up.
"The flood will subside to-night if fresh rain does not fall; but the injury it has done will long be remembered. Below, at Rossau, it appears still worse; it has overflowed the fields. Mr. Hummel has hastened down, as he is anxious about the bridges on the road on which his daughter is coming. In the village the water has entered some of the houses; the people are preparing to move to our farm-yard. Go down and help them," he said, turning to some laborers, and continued, in a low tone, to his daughter: "The Prince has gone to the village to examine the damage there. He wishes to speak to you; would you like to see him now?"
"I am ready," said Ilse.
She went towards the village with her father; there she ascended to the churchyard.
"I shall remain in the neighborhood," said he. "When the Prince leaves you, call me."
She stood by the side of the wall, looking at the grave of her dear mother and at the spot where the old Pastor reposed with his wife. The branches of the trees which she had planted here hung over her head. She remembered how fond her old friend had been of dilating on the fact that everything was just the same in the great world as in his village, the nature and passions of men were everywhere alike, and that one might make the same experience in their little valley as amidst the tumult of the Court.
"Here my father is master," she thought, "and the people are accustomed to obey us, his children, and to regard us as we do our rulers. And their children, too, might experience what others have had to experience, were their master an evil-minded man. Yet they may ask for justice at any moment and find protection.
"How will he, the proud man, bear that his wife should not find justice or protection from the injury which has been done to both her and him? We ought to do good to those who injure us. If the wicked Sovereign should now come to me sick and helpless, ought I to receive him in my house? and ought I to place myself by his couch, when such a mark of kindness might expose me to fresh insult? I have worn a white mantle; the stain which he has cast upon it, I see every hour, and no tears wash it away. He has taken from me my pure robe; shall I also at his bidding give him my gown? O high and honorable precept, taught me by my departed friend, I tremble to obey. It is a struggle between duties, and the thought of my Felix says to me, 'No.'
"I have done with the young Prince too, however innocent he may be. I know that he once sought encouragement from the simple woman with all the warmth of his heart, and my vanity has often told me that I have been a good friend to him in his high yet lonely life. Fearfully have I atoned for this vain pride. He also from henceforth must be a stranger to me. What can he still wish from me? I imagine that he thinks exactly as I do, and only wishes to take leave of me for ever. Well, I am prepared for it."
The Hereditary Prince came along the footpath from the village. Ilse remained standing by the wall of the churchyard, and bowed calmly to his greeting.
"I have made known at the capital my wish to travel," began the Prince; "I hope my request will be granted. And I have therefore come to say farewell to you."
"What you now say," answered Ilse, "shows that I have rightly judged your Highness."
"I had little opportunity of speaking to you in the city," said the Prince, shyly; "it would grieve me if you should deem me capable of ingratitude or of coldheartedness."
"I know the reasons that kept your Highness away," replied Ilse, looking down; "and I am thankful for your good intentions."
"To-day I wish to tell you, and at the same time your husband," continued the Prince, "that I shall endeavor to make what I have learnt with you useful for my future life. I know that this is the only way in which I can thank you. If you should ever hear that my people are contented with me, you may feel, gracious lady, that I have to thank, above all, you and yours for the strengthening of my sense of duty, for an impartial judgment of the worth of men, and for a higher standard of the duties of one who has to guard the welfare of many. I shall endeavor to show myself not quite unworthy of the sympathy you have accorded me. If you learn from others that it has benefited me, think kindly of me."
Ilse looked at his excited countenance; there was the gentle, honest expression which she had so often watched with anxious sympathy; she saw how deeply he felt that something had interposed between him and her, and how thoughtfully he endeavored to spare her. But she did not fathom the deep and powerful grief of the young man, the poetry of whose youthful life a father had destroyed. She did not guess that the punishment which could not reach the father had fallen upon the innocent soul of the son. The injury that the father had inflicted had clouded the happiest feeling of his young life--his warm friendship for the woman to whom he clung with enthusiastic admiration. But the kind-hearted Ilse understood the full worth of him who now stood before her, and her cautious reserve disappeared; with her old frankness, she said to him: "One must not be unjust to the innocent, nor be untrue to those whose confidence one has had, as I have yours. What I now wish for your Highness is a friend. I have seen that this is what your life needs, and I have observed, too, how difficult it is to avoid forming a low estimate of men when one's sole companions are servants."
These kind words of Ilse broke down the composure which the Prince had been struggling to maintain. "A friend for me?" he asked, bitterly. "Fate early disciplined me; I am not permitted to seek for or enjoy friendship; poison has been poured over the love that I felt. Forgive me," he suddenly said; "I am so accustomed to complain to, and seek comfort from you, that I cannot help speaking of myself, although I know that I have lost the right to do so."
"Poor Prince," exclaimed Ilse, "how can you look after the welfare of others, if your own life is void of light? The happiness which I desire for your Highness's future life is domestic love, a wife that understands you, and would become the friend of your soul."
The Prince turned aside to conceal the pain that this speech occasioned him. Ilse looked at him sorrowfully; she was once more his good counsellor as before.
A beggar-woman crept round the wall of the churchyard.
"May I beg of you to day?" began a hoarse voice, at Ilse's back. "When it is not the father, it is the son."
Ilse turned round; again she saw the hollow eyes of the gipsy, and cried out, dismayed, "Away from here."
"The lady can no longer drive me away," said the gipsy, cowering down, "for I am very weary, and my strength is at an end."
One could see that she spoke the truth.
"The troopers have hunted me from one boundary to another. If others have no compassion on me, the lady from the rock should not be so hard-hearted, for there is old fellowship between the beggar and her. I also once had intercourse with noble people, I have abandoned them, and yet my dreams ever hover over their golden palaces. Whoever has drunk of the magic cup will not lose the remembrance of it. It has again and again driven me into this country, I have led my people here--and they now lie in prison, the victims of the old memories that pursued me."
"Who is this woman?" asked the Prince.
The beggar raised her hands on high.
"In these arms I have held the Hereditary Prince when he was a child and knew nothing; I have sat with him on velvet in his mother's room. Now I lie in the churchyard on the high road, and the hands that I stretch out to him remain empty."
"It is the gipsy woman," said the Prince in a low tone, and turned away.
The beggar-woman looked at him scornfully, and said to Ilse:
"They trifle with us, and ruin us, but they hate the remembrance of old times and of their guilt. Be warned young woman, I know the secrets of this noble family, and I can tell you what they have tried to do to you, and what they have done to another who flourished before you on yonder height, and whom they placed, as they did you, in the gilded prison, over whose portal the black angel hovers."
Ilse stood bending over the beggar woman, the Prince approached her.
"Do not listen to the woman," he exclaimed.
"Speak on," said Ilse, with a faint voice.
"She was young and finely formed like you, and like you she was brought to that prison, and when the mother of this man removed me from her service because I pleased the Sovereign, I was appointed to serve the stranger. One morning I was made to ask for leave of absence from the imprisoned lady, because she was to be alone."
"I entreat of you not to listen to her," implored, the Prince.
"I listen," said Ilse, again bending down over the old woman, "speak low."
"When I came back the next morning I found a maniac in the house instead of the fair-haired lady, and I escaped from the place in terror. Do you wish to know through which door madness made its way to that woman?" she continued in a low murmur. Ilse put her ear to her mouth, but sprang suddenly back and uttered a piercing shriek, hiding her face with her hands. The Prince leaned against the wall and wrung his hands.
A loud call sounded from the carriage-road, and a man hastily approached; he held out a letter while still at a distance.
"Gabriel!" exclaimed Ilse, hastening towards him. She tore the letter from him, read it, and supported herself convulsively against one of the stones of the churchyard. The Prince sprang forward, but she held out the letter as if to stop him and exclaimed:
"The Sovereign is coming."
The Prince looked terrified at Gabriel.
"He is hardly a mile from here," announced the exhausted servant. "I overtook the princely carriage, and succeeded in getting ahead of it. The horses are struggling along the unfinished road, but the bridge between this and Rossau is now scarcely fit for horsemen or carriages; I was obliged to leave my horse behind; I do not believe they will be able to cross it, except on foot."
Without saying a word the Prince hastened down the road to Rossau. Ilse flew with her letter in her hand up the rock to her father, who came with Mr. von Weidegg to meet her.
"Go and pay your respects to your master," she called out wildly, to the Chamberlain. "My Felix comes!" she called to her father, and sank upon his breast.
People were collected near the temporary bridge between Rossau and Bielstein. Gabriel also hastened back to the water; he had met Mr. Hummel there, who was passing up and down along the bank looking across the stream.