Unfortunately, the next day was to give him ample occasion for practising that wicked art.
For that very morning, as he returned from his meeting with Baumann, who had been waiting for him in the forest at the appointed place to take his letter, he could not deny himself the pleasure of walking about a little in the garden. He intended only to stay a few minutes, to walk just once around on the great wall, but he had now made the turn twice from the great portal back again to the great portal, and was beginning to make it for the third time, for the morning was really delightful, and, if his eyes did not deceive him, a light dress was shining through the trees and shrubs on the other side. Probably one of the village girls at work in the garden. How he was surprised, therefore, when he found soon after that it was Miss Helen! He could not think of avoiding her. There were only a few flights of steps leading down into the garden. There was nothing left, therefore, but to cross his hands behind his back and to saunter slowly on, watching the birds as they fluttered about in the branches, and the ducks below in the moat, and to be a little surprised when he met Miss Helen precisely at the same time and the same place as yesterday.
Miss Helen returned his bow with that calm reserve which harmonized so well with the somewhat sombre character of her beauty, although it seemed almost too cold and too haughty for a girl of her youthful age. Perhaps her greeting would not have been quite so formal if Oswald had not on purpose suppressed every trace of pleasant excitement. Then followed a short conversation, by no means overflowing with cleverness, on the weather, and a few indifferent questions on Oswald's part about the promenade of last night, with short answers by Helen. Then once more a polite and cool exchange of formal phrases. Miss Helen continued her walk; Oswald had finished his promenade, which he "always enjoyed between six and seven on the wall,"--a statement by no means founded on truth,--and went back to his room. "What a pity," he said to himself, "that such splendid beauty should hold, after all, but an ordinary soul! What would Professor Berger say, if he saw his lovely bud unfolded now into a dark-red rose? Would he weave another wreath of sonnets and press it on her rich hair? Good, dear Berger, was it a suggestion of your good or your evil angel, both of whom continually struggle for the mastery in your great soul, to send me here into the camp of our enemies? I was to return laden with trophies, scalps of slain Iroquois which we were to hang up in our wigwams to feast our eyes--what would you say if you heard of the narrow escapes your Uncas has had from being scalped himself? But I will keep one promise: I will not fall in love with this early praised beauty--no, and if she were as clever as she is beautiful."
When Oswald came down to dinner he was most pleasantly surprised to find Doctor Braun, who had come a few minutes before, and had accepted the baroness' invitation to stay to dinner.
The doctor appeared in a larger circle to as much advantage as in private; an easy, sociable, and refined man, who evidently had very unusual powers of conversation and perfect self-possession. And what was still more attractive, and really won Doctor Braun the hearts of all, at least of all men of sense, was his real or apparent unconsciousness of all these advantages. Nothing was evidently farther from him than to make an exhibition of himself; on the contrary, he took pleasure in leading others to a clearer understanding of their views, and thus he was not less a good and patient listener than a skilful speaker--two virtues rarely found united.
Oswald saw with surprise that if the doctor distinguished any one in the company, it could only be Miss Helen, and with still greater surprise, that the young lady, when speaking to him, laid aside a part of her haughty reserve. They had made music together before dinner, playing a sonata for four hands; then Helen had sung a few songs, while the doctor accompanied her. At table they sat by each other, and conversed with animation about the different styles of music; the doctor displaying a thorough knowledge of composition, and Miss Helen at least a lively appreciation of matters of music; and when he took leave, directly after dinner, she regretted his eagerness to go so warmly, and begged him so earnestly to be sure and send the promised music very soon,--no, rather to bring it himself, so that they might play it together,--that the doctor might have boasted of a great success if it had been his intention to make a favorable impression on the young lady.
"You are not fond of music?" he asked Oswald, whom he had accompanied to his room for the few minutes till the horses should be ready.
"No, and the harmony of sweet notes has so few attractions for me that I closed my window last night when Miss Helen sang that barcarolle which seemed to give you such delight."
"That is indeed remarkable. I do not remember ever having heard such a--what shall I say--such a mystic alto voice."
"Might not the beauty of the performer affect the impartiality of the judgment?"
"No; I assure you I judge quite impartially, although I must admit that such spiritual beauty seems to belong more to the realm of dreams than to stern reality."
The doctor had taken a seat in Oswald's arm-chair, and blew the smoke of his cigar, which he had just lighted, in blue clouds through the open window.
"Hers is a beauty," he said, "that would drive a painter to despair, because her most delicate bloom cannot be expressed by lines and colors; music alone can translate it. I wish Beethoven had seen her, or Robert Schumann, and then you ought to hear the ghost-like, demoniac composition which she would have inspired!"
"But which of us is now the enthusiast?" asked Oswald, smiling; "you or I?"
"You!" said the doctor, "for the highest grade of ecstasy is silence. He who still finds words for his enthusiasm has the reins still in his hands. And then I can see a beautiful girl and admire her, without enjoying, as you see, my cigar any the less. But you are capable of forgetting eating and drinking and everything else, of throwing yourself head over heels into the Charybdis of your enthusiasm, without bestowing a thought upon the way out!"
"Are you quite sure of that?"
"Quite sure; I have studied you of late thoroughly, and I have found that you are one of the finest specimens of a species of our race, which is quite common in our day--descendants of the departed Doctor Faust,faustuli posthumi, so to say, who have cut off their long doctors' beards and exchanged the romantic costume of the Middle Ages for the modern dress coat, without, however, losing their relish for all kinds of enjoyment, and, like Faust, starving in the midst of enjoyment."
"Problematic characters, Baron Oldenburg calls them," said Oswald.
"A capital definition," answered the doctor. "To be sure, the baron ought to know, for he belongs to the brotherhood, and I dare say he ranks high among them. At least I judge so from what I hear, for I have never spoken to him, and seen him only once."
"The baron is an enigmatic character, whom it is very difficult to judge fairly."
"How else could he be a problematic character? I am told you are one of the baron's special friends--one of the few he has on earth. And that is why I speak frankly. I cannot approve it, that a man of such eminent talents should waste his life in idleness--in a kind of busy idleness, the greatest reproach, in my opinion, that can be made against a man in our day, when there is so very much to be done."
"How can the poor baron help it, if the bread and butter of every day's life are not to his taste?"
"Do you think I like it?" said Doctor Braun, and he flushed up and his eyes sparkled; "do you think that the great god Apollo, when he watched the cattle of Admetus, and ate the mean food of a slave in the shade of an oak-tree, did not long for the ambrosia and nectar on the golden tables in the house of Zeus? Nevertheless he bore his fate and endured it, as a greater one did after him. But I have always thought that the true lot of man upon earth is to be subject to all that is human, and yet never to forget the heavenly part within him; to contend until death with the raving wolves of tyranny and falsehood, and to bear the cross of all that is vulgar and mean, for the sake of that which follows after Golgotha."
The doctor had risen; he walked a few times up and down the room with rapid strides; then he stopped before Oswald and said, with heart-winning kindliness: "Pardon me if I have offended you by one or the other word I have spoken; perhaps I have been inconsiderate. But it always excites me to see a superior man remain idle or follow false lights. The former is the sin against the Holy Ghost, the gravest of all our sins; the other is less grave, but almost equal. I absolve you from the former, but I cannot but declare you guilty of the latter. You know what I told you the other day about your position here; now, after having seen you myself in this circle, I consider it still more objectionable. Give it up before it is too late! It may be unwarrantable indiscretion in me to speak to you thus, but you know we physicians have the privilege of being indiscreet. Are you angry?"
"I should be the greatest fool if I were so weak," replied Oswald. "On the contrary, I am very grateful to you for the sympathy you show me, and which I am not deserving, I fear. But I think you look upon things as a little too dark----"
"Only too dark?" said the doctor, laughing; "I do not see them gray nor black; I do not see them at all; I am blind, purblind, in both eyes. Adieu,mon cher, adieu! If after some days you should not feel quite as well as you do at this hour, send for me! You shall see I am not a doctor for the well only, but also for the sick!"
With these words the doctor hastily left the room, and a moment afterwards Oswald heard the grating of the wheels on the gravel before the portal of the château.
We all know that it is the fate of good advice invariably to come too late, or only at the moment when it ought to be followed at once, but for one or the other reason cannot well be followed. The doctor's advice was excellent; even Oswald saw that, especially as he had always thought in the same way about his false position in this high and noble family. But he could not find the way out of this labyrinth; at least not for the moment. It was so natural that of late his love for Melitta should have made him forget everything else, and lead him to consider a measure which might remove him from her as the greatest misfortune. And even now, when Melitta's journey and Baron Berkow's impending death surrounded the present and the future alike with dark mystery, he could not possibly decide on a step which was as important for Melitta as for himself. And then, leaving Melitta out of the question, he had no plausible reason for abandoning a position which he had bound himself to retain for several years, unless he should resort to a violent rupture. Such acoup d'état, however, would always have been painful and repulsive to a Hamlet-like nature, such as Oswald's was; and now, when the baroness evidently made efforts to live in peace and harmony with all the world, he could not even find an adversary to pick up the gauntlet that he might choose to throw down for the purpose.
Besides, he had quite recently shown a most lively interest in the plans of the baroness for the education of the boys, up to the time when they should be ready for the proposed tour through Germany, France, England, and perhaps also Italy. This interest would now appear absurd or worse, if it should turn out that he never meant to carry out these plans. He had also readily acquiesced in the desire of the baroness to resume with Miss Helen several branches of study which she had pursued at the boarding-school, and these lessons, which the baroness proposed to attend for her own improvement, were to begin on the very next day.
And, setting all this aside, he should have had to leave Bruno if he went away from Grenwitz;--Bruno, whom he really loved like a brother, whose brilliant talents he hoped to develop, and whom he desired most ardently to introduce into the realm of science, and afterwards into life itself.
The little trip seemed to have had a most happy effect upon Bruno, as upon all the others. He had lost much of his sombre reserve; he sought out company which he had formerly avoided, in common with Oswald, and persuaded his teacher even to take part in promenades and other joint excursions of pleasure. He did not suspect that Oswald was by no means making a sacrifice when he yielded to his entreaties, but only pretended to be reluctant in order to excuse himself in his own heart for his inconsistency. When Oswald teased Bruno about this new interest in persons and things which had formerly been indifferent to him, the latter replied that he did not know what had happened to him; but that he felt like a bird who, after being kept in a cage, had recovered his freedom; like a flower when the sun was coming out, after storm and rain. And really Bruno was merry like a bird, and, in his joyousness, beautiful like a flower which is just opening to the light of day. One could not help admiring the glorious boy; his kind ways were as irresistibly charming as his defiance was repelling and at times offensive. All agreed on this one point, that a great change had taken place in Bruno, but how it had been brought about no one knew and no one suspected.
And yet the cause would hardly have escaped an acute observer, nor Oswald himself, if he had not been fully occupied with his own affairs. The very first conversation with Bruno on the evening of his arrival might have furnished him the key. As then Helen's name was continually reappearing in his recitals, so now all he said and did had some reference to Helen, although he was instinctively careful to place others in the foreground, and to appear least interested in Helen herself--just as a bird tries to lure the pursuer away from his nest by his anxious fluttering to and fro. For not only shame is born in secret; love springs forth in the same way, especially when the heart that bears it is still young and innocent, so innocent that it hardly knows what is going on, and only feels the one thing, that a god has touched it. "What is the matter with the boy?" they asked, when they saw how his eyes shone, how bold and proud his carriage was, how elastic his step; when they heard his voice, which was now as soft as the evening breeze, and then, in the excitement of a game, or whenever his energy was roused, as clear and powerful as the sound of a trumpet.
And if it really looked at times as if Bruno had abandoned his secluded habits only for his cousin's sake, this could surprise the others all the less, as everybody seemed to have undergone some change, and was ready to worship the newly risen star. Why else was the baroness now all mildness and goodness? Why did she now always appear with a smiling face at table, and endeavor not to let the conversation die out during the meal? Why did the baron annoy the silent coachman by ordering the fat bays whenever anybody but uttered a wish to visit this or that remote place--an order which before the trip would have been looked upon as an event? Why had Mr. Timm, for the first time, drawn forth his dress coat from its corner in his trunk, and assumed, as it looked, with the coat a less careless and easy manner? Why did Miss Marguerite's voice sound less sharp now than formerly? And why had she just now remembered that there were in her wardrobe a few pretty bows, which had lain there unused for years? Why did even Malte pay attention to the game when they played at graces, and try to catch the hoops occasionally?
Did Miss Helen know that she was the cause of all these great and small changes? It was hard to tell whether Miss Helen observed anything at all; whether she was in good or in bad humor; even whether certain members of the company existed or not, as far as she was concerned. Her calm proud air rarely varied, and the smile she occasionally deigned to show was so fleeting in its very beauty that it never betrayed the share which the heart had in it. To her parents she was in all respects the attentive and obedient daughter; to her brother the older sister, who, if she knew how to respect his foibles, would also insist upon being respected by him; to Mademoiselle Marguerite she was the kind mistress, who is always fully conscious of the difference in their relative positions; to Oswald and Albert quite the young lady, who has been fully instructed how low the bow of a person in a humbler position of life ought to be--and only to Bruno she was more cordial; in her intercourse with him alone she gave up something of her haughty reserve, which at other times seemed to be as much a part of herself as the dark color of her magnificent hair, and the deep brilliancy of her large gray eyes.
But even if the baroness complained to her husband of the very great reserve in Helen's manner, and often remarked that her long absence from home seemed, after all, to have alienated her in some degree from her family, the fault lay less with the young lady than with the baroness herself. It had been her own wish to keep Helen so many years from the paternal house; it was she who had explained to her weak husband, when he longed for his dear child, how very advantageous it would be to Helen to be trained early in the strict discipline of a school, and to remain there as long as possible. Long ago, already when the little girl had affectionately leaned against her, she had only replied with a cold air and a few cool French phrases, until the child, growing older, had seen how hopeless the effort was to reach her mother's heart, and abandoned the hope to soften it by her caresses. The poor girl had to pay dear for the misfortune of not being a boy, and of being unable to contribute anything towards securing the entail to the family, and she would probably have been allowed to live a long time yet in exile if her mother had not suddenly conceived the plan of making her, after all, useful for that purpose by marrying her to Felix, the heir-presumptive of the estate. The energetic woman doubted not a moment that she would be able to carry out her project. Felix had not only approved of it highly, but taken already all the steps which the clever baroness had suggested to him as necessary for success. He had thrown up his commission; he had left the city, the theatre of his deeds, and gone to his estates, perhaps in order to look at the place where the beautiful forests once stood which he had mercilessly cut down to pay his most pressing creditors. Baron Felix was in the habit of promising anything and everything to those who lent him money--why should he not promise the baroness to marry her daughter if she engaged to pay his debts and to help him to make his exhausted and ill-managed estates once more productive? On that side, therefore, there were no difficulties to encounter. On Helen's side she expected as little trouble, or rather, up to this time, she had never thought of the possibility of resistance. She had forgotten that she had not seen her daughter for three years; that three years can make great changes, and, among others, can make a proud young lady of seventeen of a timid and submissive child of thirteen. She had forgotten that Helen had learnt not to tremble any more before her mother, and had become far too independent, thanks to her training by a strict but high-toned governess, to submit her will thussans façonto that of another, whoever he might be.
The baroness saw this almost at the first glance, when she met her daughter in the reception-room of the Institute at Hamburg. There was nothing to be said against the carriage of the young lady, who advanced towards her mother neither too hastily nor too slowly, who kissed her hand, and then, as if awaiting further orders, remained there calmly and composedly. But the big eyes looked so firm and so proud, and the words fell so well measured from her lips, that the mother felt she could no longer count upon childlike submission or loving obedience from this daughter, who looked to her almost a stranger. The great project which she bore in her head quite ready, suddenly appeared to her in a very uncertain light, and the first words she said to her husband were: "I think, dear Grenwitz, we shall have to be very cautious with our plan about that match. You would oblige me by leaving the matter entirely in my hands. An awkward beginning, nay, even a hint at the wrong time, might spoil it all,"--a suggestion which the old gentleman was very willing to obey, as even his strong faith in Anna Maria's infallibility had not been able to quiet all his scruples about the proposed match.
The baroness saw that if Felix should not find favor in Helen's eyes--and such a case was at least possible--nothing could be done by intimidation or violence, and that gentle measures were not merely the safest but the only way. This is what made her so kind, after her fashion, so exceedingly kind to her daughter; and in order that the others might not find out her purpose, or in order to keep in practice, she was kind to them also. It was strange, however, that this sunshine of favor seemed to warm her least for whom it was specially intended; Helen did not change her calm, measured manner, her coldly polite formality, in the least; the boarding school, which the baroness had always praised to the skies, had evidently produced in Helen a model young lady.
And yet this heart, apparently so cold and inaccessible, was well able to feel warmly. When she took leave of her friends and her beloved governess she had wept burning tears, though she dried them instantly when her mother remarked on them,--she showed her father many little attentions not easily suggested by mere politeness, and she could give money to a poor child and then take him by the hand and speak kindly to him. Her friends, of whom, however, she had only few, never found cause to complain of heartlessness in her, and the letters she wrote from Grenwitz proved that she was neither cold nor reserved with those she loved. Thus she wrote, among others, to Mary Burton, a pretty young English girl, whom she loved best of all her friends, and who had had a great influence over her:
"But those aretempi passati, my dear Mary! I have now to learn to enjoy my music alone, and to submit patiently to the company of people among whom you are not. I miss you everywhere; I miss some of the others also, and I do not yet see how it will be possible for me to be happy without you. Do not think, however, that they are unkind to me here! On the contrary, I must acknowledge that my good people here have all met me most kindly. I did not expect anything else from papa, you know--but, you have read my mother's letters! You thought they resembled each other like so many flakes of snow. But she also is much less severe than she used to be, and I may do and not do what I like, a thing we always thought would be perfect bliss when we were at school. My rooms are in the first story of the old castle, just above the garden, and a door opens from my salon right upon it. Thus I can live quite undisturbed, although I can reach the sitting-rooms through a passage by a few steps. You know I was always afraid I would not be able to indulge here in my favorite amusement of playing at night, when everything is quiet. I have no such fear now, and I have enjoyed my music every night since I have come here. I disturb nobody, unless it be a couple of gentlemen who live somewhere above me in the same part of the castle, but who fortunately belong to the class of men whom we candidly call nobodies. They are the tutor, a certain Mr. Stein, and a surveyor, whom papa employs, and who enjoys the aristocratic name of Timm. Both might pass for handsome, or, to tell the truth, I almost suspect you would call Mr. Stein 'handsome and very gentlemanly indeed,' but you need not think for all that that either of them has made an impression upon me. I have an antipathy against people in such subordinate positions, as I dislike calico dresses and false jewelry. They may do for governesses and such people, but not for us. I see them at dinner and in the evening--otherwise I ignore their existence. I sometimes meet Mr. Stein in the morning, when he takes his early walk in the garden. For the birds are singing here so close to my windows that I must get up, whether I choose or not. I would rather not meet him, but what can I do? The poor man has to give six or seven lessons in the forenoon, and so I cannot well forbid him to enjoy the only morning hour he has free; and if I were to go later I should lose the cream of the morning. I have to submit, you see, and can only say,Non sono rose senza spine!However, this Mr. Stein, although only an imitation diamond, is so well polished that a less practised eye might well take him for genuine. He has more self-control and better manners than we generally find with people of low birth. He has a way of telling you a compliment or an impertinence with the calmest air in the world, as if he did not care in the least who you might be, which amuses me at times.
"Thus he asked me yesterday, when we met the third time at the same hour and the same place on the great wall, and had exchanged the same phrases about the weather, if it would not be better hereafter to say simply: 'As yesterday,' unless the weather should have changed. We should thus avoid meeting in silence, which was always painful for people staying at the same house, and yet reduce the cost of conversation to a minimum, a saving which was not unimportant even for the cleverest among us--and an ironical bow. That was pretty strong; but, as I tell you, he says these things with such a quiet smile that it is hard to tell whether he is in earnest or not. They all seem to have a certain respect for him here, even mamma. But with Bruno he stands on a very peculiar footing, and it is really a beautiful sight to see them saunter through the garden, arm in arm, not at all like tutor and pupil, but rather like two intimate friends, a real Orestes and Pylades. This touching friendship, however, does not prevent Bruno from playing at being my knight on every occasion. The boy reads in my eyes what I want, or rather he guesses it and knows it even without my looking at him. At times this almost frightens me. When I think during the promenade: I might as well lay aside my shawl! Bruno is sure to say: Shall I carry your shawl, Helen? At table he sits at my side, and only hands me what I like; the other dishes he lets pass, and says: I know you don't eat that, Helen! He is a darling of a boy, although that name hardly suits him, for he will soon be sixteen, and he is tall and strong like a youthful Achilles. I believe he would go through the fire for me; into the water he jumped only yesterday for my sake. We were walking in the evening on the wall, and the wind blew my straw hat into the moat. My poor hat! I cried. Do you want it? asked Bruno.--Why, of course, I said--but only jesting, for I knew the moat is quite deep, and at that place it was some twenty feet wide. The hat was floating towards the middle. Bruno was down the wall in an instant, and into the water. I was frightened, and I believe I actually cried out. Don't be troubled, said Mr. Stein, fortunately no one else was present,--Bruno swims like a Newfoundland dog, and even if he should not return, he would have died like a knight in the service of the fair. That is always a consolation.--Fortunately, Bruno came swimming back after two or three anxious minutes. Mr. Stein helped him on shore, and then they went off laughing, and left me quite alone--a touching picture, no doubt, with the soaked hat in my hand. But Mr. Stein seems to be quite offended at me for having exposed his pet to such danger. At least he did not appear this morning at the promenade; at table he was quite monosyllabic, and begged me to excuse him from the lesson in literature, which he gives me twice a week, because he had 'a headache.' This fortunately did not prevent him from standing out in the garden, in the broiling afternoon sun, for half an hour or more, as I noticed from my window. He remained there almost immovable, with folded arms, staring into the basin of a fountain, from which a Naiad looked smiling down upon him.--He is a strange kind of a saint...."
The young lady had no doubt intended to state nothing but the truth in this letter, which evidently revealed more of her innermost soul than she probably supposed, but as to the reason for Oswald's sombre and absent-minded ways she was nevertheless mistaken.
It was the evening of the same day on which Helen was watching Oswald near the fountain of the Naiad, from her window, that in a room of the Hôtel Bellevue, at N., a place celebrated on account of Doctor Birkenhain's famous asylum for insane persons, a lady and a gentleman were sitting near a door opening upon a balcony. Twilight had come; guests were returning, dust-covered, from their afternoon excursions; from time to time a carriage rolled by, in which beautiful ladies were sitting, comfortably reclining on soft cushions. Then the street became more quiet, and over the gardens rose the evening star in the saffron-colored sky. The lady in the balcony door sat with her eyes fixed on the star; the gentleman, who sat further back in the room, looked at her. Both had not spoken a word for the last half-hour; now the gentleman rose, came close up to the lady's chair, and said in a low tone:
"I must go, Melitta."
"When will you call to-morrow?"
"I shall not come again to-morrow; I shall leave N. this very evening."
"But you promised to stay as long as possible, that is, till the appointment with the Brown Countess forced you to return?"
"I meant to do so, but it is useless. I have had a long conversation to-day with Doctor Birkenhain; he thinks it impossible that Berkow will awake again before he dies. And suppose he should be roused, what does it help him if I am present? The other day I came in twice, and what did he want? Nothing--to ask me if the testament was securely kept! That was all!"
"But he might change his last will----"
"No. At the time when he wrote his last will, before myself and old Baumann, he was still in possession of his mind, though sick and feeble; he made you his sole heir, as he was bound to do. He knew he owed you at least that sign of repentance. He meant to say by that: I am not quite as bad as you thought me; I see at least that I have made you very unhappy, and I would try to undo what I have done, if it were in my power."
"Let us drop that subject!" said Melitta, rising and leaning over the railing of the balcony to look down into the dark street. Then she came back into the room and said:
"Do you go straight back to Cona?"
"No, I mean to spend the time that is left me by going up the Rhine; perhaps I shall come back here on my return."
"Then leave Czika here, will you? As a pledge that you do come back."
"Do you really wish it, Melitta?"
"You have once more been very kind to me."
"Then it is simply from gratitude?"
"And--friendship."
"Farewell, Melitta!"
"Happy journey, Oldenburg!"
The baron went slowly towards the door; there he stopped, and came back once more to say:
"Have you always been convinced that I was your friend, Melitta?"
"Yes."
"Have you always been convinced that I loved you?"
Melitta was silent.
"No? Never, at any time?" asked the baron, in a low voice.
"Let us bury the past!"
"No, Melitta, let us speak of it. I may not find another such opportunity in my life. No, no! For our old friendship, or whatever you call it, is dead, since I was fool enough to let you see that I loved you--and there is no bridge to span that abyss. For the moment we are united by common distress; as soon as I leave this room we shall be strangers again to each other. Melitta, by our former friendship, by the memory of our common youth and its happiness, tell me, did you never believe that I loved you?"
"I do not know----"
"That is hard," said the baron, "that is hard." He sank into a chair, leaned his arm on the back, and hid his face in his hand.
He rose again, walked up and down with long strides, crossing his arms on his breast, and said, as if speaking to himself: "Why should men complain, who love and are loved again, if they are cheated out of their hopes in one way or another? Why do they complain who love and are not loved again, but at least have the consolation of seeing that their grief is respected, and that others pity their suffering? No--to love, as a son of earth can love, with all his soul, with every drop of blood in his veins, and then to learn--not that he is not loved again--pshaw, that is nothing--but that he is looked upon as a pretender, a mere trifler--ha, ha, ha!--that is real bliss such as is dealt out to the poor devils who are undergoing torture."
"And if I cannot believe that you love me, who is to blame for it? Who arranged that scene in the garden of the village Serra di Falco? You or I?"
"What?" said the baron, stopping suddenly, "are you really such a novice in love that I must give you an explanation of that farce? Do you really think that I--who do not easily overlook anything--had not long since seen you behind the myrtle hedge before I sank at Hortense's feet and invoked the sun, which had set long ago, and the moon, that was not shining, and the stars, that knew better, to witness my burning passion? Could you take that for a moment in earnest?"
"What else?"
"It was an allegory. I wished to show you: See, that is what you will have left if you refuse me. You force me, who wish to worship a saint, to seek forgetfulness in the arms of a----. Melitta, Melitta, confess! You knew perfectly well it was a farce, but you found it convenient to take it in earnest. You wished to get rid of me, and even at the price of a misunderstanding!"
"And if that had been my wish--suppose it was my wish--is not the gentleman's duty to honor the lady's will, especially if he loves that lady?"
"And did I not honor it? Did I not leave that very night at a word, at a mere sign? Have I not wandered about for three years, like Ahasuerus, in foreign countries, and have I not, after my return, avoided every opportunity to meet you, because I apprehended a misfortune? Was it my will which made us meet at the ball at Barnewitz? Was it my desire which brought us here together? No, Melitta, you cannot complain of me. I have kept my love for you concealed in my bosom for long, long years,--for I have loved you ever since I could think; since I knew that the song of nightingales and sunshine and the roaring of the waves are precious things,--and if I was fool enough to forget for a moment how hopeless my passion was, I have paid dearly for my folly. I knew as a boy already, that you loved your horse and your dog better than me, and yet I checked my pride, and yet I humbled myself again and again before you, I who never yet in all my life could utter a request to human being!"
The baron continued his restless wandering through the room for a time, and after some silence he paused again before Melitta and said:
"I humbled myself still more. I saw the woman whom my soul yearned for as Dives did for a drop of water beloved by another; I saw her return him a love for which I would have thanked God on my knees a thousand times--and I did not stir! I tried my best not to hate the fortunate man, I met him with cordiality and took him by the hand, I tried to win his confidence and his affection, not to betray him and you, but because I felt that your happiness was dearer to me than everything else, and that the man whom you loved must either be loved by me too, or die by my hand!"
"You are terrible, Oldenburg," cried Melitta, half rising from her chair; "it seems I cannot hide the secret of the innermost recesses of my soul from you."
"I am not terrible," said the baron, "I am only in the way, that is the privilege of a friend. Do not think I have obtained your secret by stealth! I have only kept my eyes open, that is all! Or do you think we do not at last learn to understand the faintest vibration in the face which we constantly see when we are awake, and, alas! but too often also in our dreams? And when we have at last abandoned all hope of being loved, we wish at least to be sure that he who is more fortunate is not unworthy of his good luck."
"Oldenburg!"
"He is not unworthy, but--I am your friend, Melitta! He is not quite worthy of you. He has many good and noble qualities, I know; but his character has not been steeled in the thrice sacred fire of misfortune, and thus he cannot appreciate good fortune. He is marvellously susceptible for all that is beautiful and graceful, and so he adores you; but this very susceptibility for all that is beautiful makes it very difficult for him not to forget a fair and lovely object for the sake of one that is fairer and lovelier. He cannot be constant. He is a poet, and the poet's love is the ideal. He is capable of pushing aside a precious jewel with contempt, if his sharp eye should notice the smallest flaw; he seizes whatever the earth offers him with eagerness, and casts it aside because it is of the earth; and even if it were divine he would despise it if it had but a remnant of earthy matter about it."
"You tell me only, Oldenburg, what I have told myself a hundred and a thousand times."
"I know I do. You cannot find it difficult to understand such characters, for they are akin to your own. But you are a woman, and women do not go to the same extreme. You are, after all, willing to submit at last, in spite of long resistance, and then you are proud of your chains; man may boast of them for a time, as long as they are new, but after a while he throws them aside. And so it will be here."
"No, no!"
"Yes, Melitta! It will be so, and--now I know what the dark storm-cloud meant which I saw the other day hang over your head. You may be sure the blow will fall upon you sooner or later, and when you are cast down by its violence and do not wish to live any longer,--though you cannot yet die,--then, Melitta, then you will perhaps be able to understand what I suffer; then you will be sorry in your heart for the wrong you have done me. Would to God you could be spared that awaking! The penalty is so enormous! But, but--you will have to pay it. Farewell, Melitta! Pardon me if I have pained you; it shall not happen again; it is the first and the last time I have spoken thus to you. Farewell, Melitta!--Melitta, have you not one kind word for me?"
Melitta had pressed her face into her hands; the twilight which reigned in the room concealed all but the mere attitude of her form--she would not or could not answer.
The baron held both his hands over her head.
"God help you, Melitta!" he said, and the voice of the proud, stern man sounded soft and mild like a father's voice.
When Melitta heard the door close behind him, she started up from her chair and stepped forward hurriedly. But halfway she paused.
"No, no!" she murmured; "it is better so; I must not leave him a ray of hope."
She went slowly back to her chair. She sat down again and covered her face once more with her hands. And now the long pent-up tears broke in streams from her eyes. "I know it will come so," she murmured, "but why must he cruelly break the short dream of my happiness?"
The postman who carried Helen's letter in the evening to town, had been there once before in the morning of the same day. He had brought Oswald a letter from one of his friends in Grunwald, who was at the same time one of the few with whom Professor Berger was intimate. This gentleman, a teacher at the University, wrote Oswald that he thought he was bound to inform him promptly of an event which had created, the day before, the greatest consternation in the city. Professor Berger had suddenly become insane; at least no one had had the slightest suspicion of his affection. He had come, as usual, at four o'clock to deliver his lecture on Logic, and had commenced his discourse as ably and ingeniously as ever. Then his words had gradually become more and more confused, so that one student after the other had laid down his pen, staring at his neighbor in wonder and terror. "Do you know, gentlemen," he had said, "what the youth of Saïs beheld when he raised the veil that hid the great secret?--the great secret which was to be the key to all the confused riddles of life? You see, gentlemen, I take my head, I open it thus, one-half in this hand, the other in that hand, what do you see in this head of the great Professor Berger, at whose feet you sit listening to his wise words, and taking them down with hideously grating pens in your tiresome note-books? What do you see? Exactly what the youth of Saïs saw, when he raised the veil of truth: Nothing! Absolutely nothing, nothing in itself, nothing for itself! And this lesson, that all our best endeavors amount to nothing, that we spend our life's blood for nothing, that, gentlemen, deprived the youth of Saïs of his senses, that has made me mad, and will one of these days send you to an asylum, if you have any brains in your empty heads. And now, gentlemen, shut up your stupid note-books, so that the scribbling may come to an end, and join me in the noble and significative song: There is a fly on the wall, a fly, a fly!" Berger had then commenced to sing in a loud voice, beating his desk with his hands; had run along the walls of the lecture-room, trying to catch imaginary flies, and had each time opened the hand cautiously, looked in, and cried out triumphantly: "Nothing, gentlemen, you see nothing, and ever nothing!"
Oswald's correspondent closed with the news that Professor Berger had immediately been sent to the celebrated Insane Asylum of Doctor Birkenhain, in N., and that he had allowed his friends to dispose of him as they thought best, after they had persuaded him that he was going to see there the Original Nothing.
Oswald was deeply moved by the contents of that letter. He had loved and honored Berger as a friend; he had won his good-will in an unusual degree, and been allowed to see more than anybody else, perhaps, of the inner life of the eccentric man. How often had he listened to his marvellous eloquence, when he, suddenly leaving the world of logic, had entered upon a world of which all we know has been revealed to us by intuition; a world so fantastic, so fabulous, but also so divinely beautiful and pure, that Oswald forgot everything else, and fancied he was walking bodily about in this Fata Morgana, till the magician let the gorgeous image sink and vanish by a word of bitter contempt and wild despair! And now this noble mind, with all its wealth, was destroyed! This lofty intellect buried in the hideous night of insanity!
Oswald felt as if the world was out of joint--so fearful, so inconceivable appeared to him this calamity. Must not all fall to ruin if such a magnificent pillar could stand no longer? Then friendship and love also were probably nothing but fables--then it was, perhaps, also more than a mere accident which betrayed to him this morning Oldenburg's present whereabouts?--For when Oswald had glanced at the letters which the postman had taken out of his mail-bag, to select his own, he had noticed one, which was evidently directed in Oldenburg's peculiar and unmistakable handwriting. The letter was for his steward at Cona. Why should the baron not write to his steward? But Oswald also noticed the stamp, which showed where the letter came from; and that was the same town to which Berger had just been sent--the same place where Baron Berkow had been living for seven years--the same place where Melitta had now been a fortnight, two days longer than Oldenburg's mysterious journey! Melitta, in her long letter which Oswald had received through Baumann, had not said a word about the baron; Bemperlein, however, must have written Baumann all about it, and hence the old man had been so embarrassed when he mentioned the persons who had been present at Melitta's visit to her husband. Why this mysterious manner in a man who looked like frankness and candor itself? Had he received orders to the purpose, or did he know his mistress so perfectly, that he preferred not to tell the whole truth in a case like this?
These were the evil thoughts which filled Oswald's heart, as he was standing bareheaded in the hot afternoon sun, staring at the water in the fountain with the Naiad, while Miss Helen, at her writing-table, was wondering whether she was perhaps herself the cause of this troubled state of mind. But before she could come to any satisfactory conclusion about it, there came a knock at the door. The young lady immediately locked her portfolio, and seemed to be deep in Lamartine'sVoyage en Orient, when upon her invitation the door opened and the baroness entered.
"Do I disturb you, dear Helen?"
"Not at all, my dear mamma," said the young girl, rising and going to meet her mother.
"You were staying so unusually long in your room to-day, that I thought I had better see what keeps you here. Lamartine'sVoyage! Well, quite a nice book, but a little too romantic, I should say. To be sure, at my age the views of life change, and with them our views on books and men. But I am glad you are not idle, as you have the talent to occupy yourself. I was almost afraid our monotonous life here would contrast too badly with the gay animation of the Institute, and you might feel the difference unpleasantly. We can do so little for your amusement here! That was always my reply when your father wanted you to come home from boarding-school."
"But I assure you, dear mamma, you trouble yourself quite unnecessarily," said Miss Helen, kissing her mother's hand respectfully. "I am very happy here, and how could it be otherwise? I am once more in my paternal home, where everybody meets me with love and kindness. I have all I can wish for. I should really be very, very ungrateful, if I were to forget that for a moment."
"You are a dear, sensible girl," said the baroness, kissing her beautiful daughter on the forehead. "You will give me great joy yet. That is my certain hope, as it is my daily prayer. Ah, my dear child, believe me, I stand in need of such a prospect, if I am not to succumb to the many cares which oppress me."
The baroness had taken a seat on a small sofa; she looked quite excited, and dried her eyes with her handkerchief.
"Why, dear mamma," said Miss Helen, with sincere sympathy, "I am only a simple, inexperienced girl, but if you feel confidence in me, tell me what it is? Even if I cannot advise or help, I can perhaps comfort you, and that would give me very great pleasure."
"My dear child," said the baroness, "you have been away from your father's house so very long,--come, sit down here, and let us have a nice confidential chat,--that you know of course very little about our circumstances. You think we are rich, very rich; but the truth is almost the contrary; at least as far as we women are concerned. The whole large fortune goes to your brother after your father's death--which God Almighty will, I hope, defer for a long time yet--I shall have nothing but the small insurance, and you, my poor child, will be left without anything at all."
"But, mamma, I have always heard that Stantow and Baerwalde belong to papa, and that he can dispose of them as he likes?"
"You are mistaken, my child; the two estates do not belong to him; they may belong to him one of these days, if the real heir does not come forward within a certain time. I cannot tell you all about that now, my dear child, because that involves certain facts connected with your uncle Harald, which are better not mentioned. Enough, we cannot count upon the two farms with any certainty. All that is left us will amount to a few thousand dollars, which your father and I have been able to lay by from the annual revenue."
"Dear mamma, I wish you would not trouble yourself about me," said Miss Helen. "I have not been spoilt in Hamburg, and the luxuries with which your kindness surrounds me here are quite new to me. I shall be able to be content with little--and then our dear papa is, God be thanked, so active and hearty again, and has so quickly recovered from his fever attack in Hamburg, that I hope we shall enjoy for a long time yet his love and his excellent management."
"God grant it," said the baroness, "but I fear we shall have to be prepared for the worst. Your father is by no means as hearty as you think. He is always suffering, although he does not let us see it. The doctor in Hamburg thought his case a very grave one. If he should be taken from us you might easily have an opportunity to prove your powers of endurance. But, dear child, you do not know what life is. It is much easier to talk of poverty than to bear it. I know it from experience; I was a poor girl when your father married me; I know what it means to have to turn a dress again and again, for want of money to buy a new one; I know what painful mortifications a poor girl of good family has to endure."
"I cannot think, dearest mamma, that things will ever be quite so bad as that. Perhaps it is because I am so young, or the fine summer-day outdoors--but I cannot see the clouds that you speak of so sadly. I shall----"
"Marry a rich and deserving man," said the baroness, with a smile which did not render her more attractive.
"But, mamma----"
"I know you meant to say something else, my child. It is a jest now, which, however, will soon change into reality, I hope. You are at an age now when a young girl may very well begin to give a place to such thoughts in her heart. Happy is she who chooses well; happier still, if she leaves the choice to her parents, who wish nothing but to see her happy, and who are aided in their efforts by the rich experience of a long life."
"But, mamma, that is a long way off yet."
"Very likely, my child; however, we cannot know what Heaven may have decreed. We have to leave these, as in fact all things in our life, to His direction.--But who in the world is that man who is standing there so immovable near that tree? I have left my glasses in my room."
"That is Mr. Stein, mamma; he has been standing there for half an hour; I believe he has grown to the place."
"A strange man, that man Stein," said the baroness. "He has something uncomfortable for me. I cannot by possibility understand him. How do you like him, dear Helen?"
"Why, mamma, I have never thought about it, and with such people there can be hardly a question about liking or not liking. I think they are all pretty much alike, and the few points of difference are so unimportant that they are hardly noticed. One is called Stein, the other is called Timm, and that is nearly all."
"You are right, dear child," said the baroness. "These people are mutes on the stage; they are only seen when the principal personages are going out. Fortunately, I can promise you soon better and more agreeable company."
"Who is that?"
"Your cousin Felix. I have just received a letter from him, the postman is still in the kitchen; you can give him a letter if you think of writing a few lines to Hamburg,--he announces his coming for to-morrow or the day after. But was not that your father's voice? Good-by, dear child; get ready; we shall dine a little earlier and go to pay some visits."
The baroness kissed her daughter on the forehead and left the room. Miss Helen drew out the letter she had so hastily hidden, in order to add: "Mamma, who has just left me, is, after all, very kind indeed. She told me of a visitor who is coming: Felix Grenwitz (the lieutenant). We shall have a little more life now at Grenwitz, for it seems we can no longer count upon Mr. Stein. Adieu, dearest, dearest Mary."