'She is a woman, take her all in all!We ne'er shall look upon her like again.'
'She is a woman, take her all in all!We ne'er shall look upon her like again.'
But we will not conceal it from each other, she is not exactly in her sphere among us. Her eloping with me was a piece of magnanimous folly, which she does not repent, it is true, she is too proud for that, and--" here he straightened his shoulders and replaced his hat on his flowing locks--"and too happy in her marriage with me. Nevertheless, she is an aristocrat, and the best among us have a drop of gypsy blood in our veins. If she could have resolved to act--with her appearance, her superb voice--I am sure that she would now be completely absorbed by her new profession, and it would have been a great gain to me. But nothing would induce her to do this. Now she sits alone during the many hours that I am occupied, for the boy is a little aristocrat, too, and so quiet--I would rather have had a girl, you know. Girls can be used in the business much younger, and there is no such need of educating them. Well, as I said, it is only for her sake--she is really a pearl of her sex, and never complains. But I should like to see her shining in a suitable setting. Posterity weaves no garlands for the actor, and his contemporaries only too often twine for him a crown of thorns. That they wound her forehead, too, is painful to me. I am really a kind-hearted fellow. It is not true that genius makes people wicked and selfish. You will yet be convinced of it."
I replied that I should not have much time to become acquainted with all his good qualities, as I intended to continue my journey the following day.
In fact, all these disclosures made my heart so sore that I wished myself a hundred miles away.
He instantly took my arm again and led me on. "We will discuss that subject further. I will not impose any restraint upon you, but, you know, temptation is really violence, and I think you will be able to endure our society for a few weeks at least. Come to the theatre tonight. It is not our worst performance. True, when I think of the difficulties with which a traveling company must contend, and how differently I might fill the office of a priest of art, had not envy and intrigues forced me away from the great theatres--"
Here he launched forth into descriptions of his former triumphs, to which I listened with only half an ear.
I remained only half an hour in the club-room, to which he conducted me mainly to show the distinction he enjoyed among these worthy citizens. His game of dominoes, at which I was merely a spectator, wearied me, and his drinking three small glasses of rum to one cup of coffee completely destroyed my dawning good opinion of him. I pleaded a headache, which would not allow me to endure the smoke-laden atmosphere of the room, and, as he was entirely absorbed in a conversation with several enthusiastic admirers, he dismissed me without opposition by one of his royal gestures of the hand.
I sauntered in a very miserable mood through the little city and out of the gate.
The day was beautiful, the air had been cooled by a light shower while we were drinking our coffee, and the neighborhood of the little town, with its fields and meadows dotted with fruit-trees, was well worth seeing. But my mind was closed against the perception of anything pleasant.
I could not help constantly saying to myself: "So she lives here, with this man, among these people! And she has before her a long life, which can never again tend upward to the heights, but always downward, slowly paralyzing the mind and soul."
For the unruffled cheerfulness of her manner at the table had not deceived me an instant. True, the life she had led in her uncle's house was by no means what she deserved. Yet, in those days, amid all the oppression, all the repugnance to so much that was base, her eyes had sparkled with joyous pride, and her head was held proudly erect on her strong shoulders. Now it drooped slightly as though under an unseen burden, and her large eyes often wandered to the floor as though seeking something that was lost.
My grief for her was so intense that it even crowded the old passionate love into a corner of my heart, especially as I had taken a solemn vow to see in her only the wife of another. Nay, I believe, if I had found her perfectly happy, with head erect and laughing eyes, I would have uprooted the weeds of envy and jealousy from my poor soul forever.
True, Uncle Joachim had said: "Whatever folly a woman like her may commit, she will not allow herself to succumb to it." He knew her well. But how much secret misery a human being may have to endure, even though he or she "bears the inevitable with dignity."
Absorbed in these thoughts, I had walked a long distance, and was already considering whether I should not let the "Ancestress" go, and find some pretext for taking my departure that very evening, when I saw Frau Luise herself, with her little boy, approaching me by the shady path that led through a wood. The child was frisking merrily around his mother, but she walked slowly with bowed head, and seemed to answer his questions very absently. She had put on a small hat that had slipped back from her head, and a blue sunshade rested carelessly on her left shoulder. She came slowly forward without looking up, until the child noticed me, and with a sudden exclamation ran to her and seized her hand; then, with a friendly nod, she paused.
At first we talked of indifferent matters, the weather, the pretty location of the city, and the superior fertility of the soil to that of her native region. This brought us to the persons we had both known there, and about whom she had been kept informed by Uncle Joachim. I learned that my former pupil had been placed in the cadet barracks, and that his sister was betrothed to Cousin Kasimir. Mademoiselle Suzon had quitted the castle a few weeks after my departure, to return no more. She passed quickly over this point, but a contemptuous curl of her lower lip betrayed that she had been informed of the whole affair. A young English lady had now taken the Frenchwoman's place; she did not know whether she could play chess, but she seemed to fill her predecessor's position satisfactorily in every other respect. Sometimes the new pastor--the old one had gently fallen asleep in death--came to the castle in the evening and held devotional exercises for an hour. Everything else remained unchanged. The veteran peacock had spread his tail for the last time the previous winter, and she was keeping some of his feathers as a relic.
Then for a time we relapsed into silence. The dear child walked gravely along between us, holding a hand of each. When we came out of the wood, we saw a meadow thickly besprinkled with autumn flowers. "Run, Joachimchen, and pick a beautiful bouquet for Uncle Johannes," said the mother.
The child obeyed, climbing merrily over the little slope by the road.
"He is so bright," said Frau Luise, "he hears everything, and already understands more than is well, or at least has his little confused thoughts about all sorts of subjects. And I must tell you something that is to remain a secret between ourselves. I have never so thoroughly despised any one from the depths of my heart as Uncle Achatz, and it was a punishment to me even to breathe the same air. When I came to his house--only a few months after my mother's death--he had the effrontery to persecute me with offers of love. He wished to get a divorce and marry me. You can imagine that I longed to go out into the wide world then; but pity for my aunt, who is a saint-like sufferer, withheld me. During those sorrowful years I learned that man has no other source of strength and peace than his conscience, his love of truth, and the quiet communion with his God, who, it is true, answers us not when we chatter to him overmuch, but when we listen in the deepest silence. He commanded me to interfere when a good and innocent person was shamefully insulted in my presence. 'The measure is full!' cried a voice in my heart. 'You must no longer breathe the air of this house, where all human dignity is trampled under foot.' So I did what I could not help doing. I knew I was undertaking no easy task, and those who charged me with frivolity never knew me. Now, with God's assistance, I will perform it. And he has given me something that has helped me through many a trying hour and will aid me year after year."
Her eyes wandered to the child, who had already gathered a handful of flowers, and with sparkling eyes was holding them up to show them to his mother.
"The dear little fellow!" I said.
"Yes, if I did not have him! He has never caused me a single sorrow. He constitutes my entire happiness."
"Yourentirehappiness, Frau Luise?"
The question had scarcely escaped my lips ere I regretted it. What right had I to tear the veil she had drawn over her fate?
But she raised it herself.
"No," she said, "you must not misunderstand me. The child is not the sole blessing I possess, but he is really my onlyentirehappiness. You do not yet know my husband thoroughly. He is a noble-hearted man, and would do anything for my sake, so far as he could anticipate my wishes. But his profession makes him see the world in a different light, and think other objects desirable. That is usually the case between married people, and must be accepted. Have you ever or anywhere found entire happiness? We must strive to receive the patchwork with our whole souls, then the gaps will be filled, and, as the words run in Faust, 'the insufficient becomes an event.' Stay with us a few days. You will then judge many things differently."
I did not know what to answer, but a cry of terror from the boy relieved me from my dilemma. We saw him suddenly spring aside, stumble over a clod of earth, and fall, still holding the flowers tightly in his little hand. I was at his side in an instant, lifted him, and saw that an ugly fat toad, which had jumped clumsily into the ditch, had frightened him. He was still trembling in every limb, but already smiled again and held out the bouquet to me.
"His nerves are so sensitive," said his mother, as she smoothed the little bare head. "If he could only be more in the open air. But all my time is so occupied that I can scarcely manage to spend an hour out of doors with him every afternoon. And his father lives so entirely in his art that he does not see it."
She became absorbed in her thoughts, while I walked by her side, carrying the boy in my arms. He soon climbed on my shoulders and pretended I was his horse, till his shouts and laughter even called a smile to his mother's grave face.
Just before reaching the city, we again walked decorously side by side. I took my leave outside the house. Should I see her at the theatre? No, she always remained at home and her husband went with his colleagues to the club-room, so she could not receive me, but hoped to see me early in the morning, or at any rate at dinner.
I dared not at once bid her farewell forever; nay, I no longer believed I should have the courage to set out on my return the next morning. The child had won my heart.
Of course I spent the evening at the theatre. The hall of the Schützenhaus had been hastily fitted up, and for the first time I admired Gottlieb Schönicke's skill in placing shabby and faded scenery and properties in the best light. My free ticket admitted me to the most desirable place, which consisted of three rows of rush-bottomed chairs, but I purposely took my seat on one of the back benches where the humbler folk, the tradesmen, and resident farmers of the little town, gave themselves up to the enjoyment of the play. The house was packed; the large receipts would have warranted a better illumination. But it was the rule not to light more than eight lamps in the proscenium and one on every other pilaster, and I must confess that the illusion was more perfect than in the broad glare of the gas in the theatres of the capital.
I do not intend to deliver a discourse on the drama, and shall avoid adopting the style of the countless romances of theatrical life, especially as--apart from the external differences caused by the changed methods of travel--the lives of these strolling players have remained essentially the same since the days of Wilhelm Meister. Besides, they are perfectly familiar to the world in general and possess little interest. Only, for truth's sake, I must observe that the "renowned" Spielberg company did honor to their name. Spite of inadequate accessories and acting, the wonderful drama created by a classically poetic imagination, still under the influence of romance, exerted a fascination which even the lachrymose specter of Madame Selmar, and the hypochondriacal, sepulchral tones of her husband, who played Count Idenko von Borotin, could not destroy. Spielberg was a superb Jaromir, and I now understood that his fervent chest-voice might irresistibly charm the heart of a girl of twenty. In the scenes with Bertha particularly--whose character, as personated by Fräulein Victorine, had a touch of witchery--his tones possessed a pathos that brought storms of applause from the audience which, however, on appearing before the foot-lights, he acknowledged--as became so great an artist--with merely a quiet bend of the head.
During the performance his eye had discovered me in my dark corner, and ere he left the stage he made a significant gesture as if to say, "I expect to meet you again." But this was by no means agreeable to me. I only hated him the more because he had extorted from me some degree of admiration; besides, I longed to be alone in order to determine whether to go or stay.
So I let the audience quit the hall, that I might not be accosted, with provincial courtesy, by any of the inhabitants who chanced to notice that I was a stranger, and was the last of all to emerge into the open air.
It was a beautiful star-lit summer night, warm and still; the only sound was the patter of the heavy dew trickling from the branches of the trees in the Schützen Park. I paused outside, enjoying the same sense of comfort we have while awake in bed between two dreams, in the consciousness that we are still enjoying our bodily existence. Only the day before yesterday I had been sitting on the bench in the parsonage garden, beside the dear sensitive girl from whom the sudden outburst of the flame of a hapless attachment had driven me, and to-day I was here amid these totally unfamiliar surroundings, with the old fire once more burning beneath the ashes, and must again save myself by flight if I were not to perish utterly.
I saw the actors, who meantime had changed their clothes and washed off their rouge, emerging from a little back door, heard their loud conversation, and once even the call for "Doctor Johannes." Then the little group dispersed under the trees toward the city, and, after a sufficiently long interval separated us, I too set out on my way home.
Suddenly I heard a light footstep behind me, and a low, musical voice said: "Are you in such a hurry, Herr Doctor, that you can't even look round at a defenseless lady, far less offer her your arm and your company?"
At the same moment a hand was slipped through my arm, and by the uncertain starlight I looked into Victorine's big, mournful eyes.
"I was belated," she said, "and now I am glad to still find a companion. Besides, I should like to become a little better acquainted with you, for at dinner, when the manager's wife is present, my mouth feels as though it were sewed up. Come, you needn't be afraid that anything will be thought of it, if we are seen taking this nocturnal promenade. We sha'n't meet even a cat, and you probably care no more what Mrs. Grundy thinks of you than I do."
Her light tone, so strangely belied by her melancholy eyes, was extremely repulsive to me: So I answered very coldly and a trifle maliciously:
"I only wonder that Herr Daniel leaves the knightly service to another."
"He!" she replied, with a short laugh, which, spite of her beautiful voice, sounded very unmusical. "In the first place, he did not play to-night, and was not even at the hall. And then, though he usually pays me some little attention, we have had a quarrel to-day. You are mistaken if you fancy he is in love with me. It's only old custom that makes us keep together. His heart, such as it is, belongs to a very different person."
"May I ask--?"
"Why not? It is an open secret. He's infatuated with Frau Spielberg, though she's such a cold fish that it always makes me shiver merely to look at her. She behaves, too, as if he were not in existence, and when he gets into a rage about it he pours out his whole heart to me, and it does him good to have me laugh at him. That is our whole relation. Perhaps I ought not to speak to you so frankly about it. You are her relative, and of course revere her as though she were a saint. But I can't help it; she is insufferable to me, with her Canoness airs and woful face the instant the company begins to be a little merry, and one or another goes a shade too far. She ought to have kept away from the stage. But she felt her human nature once when she threw herself into Spielberg's arms. Why does she put on her governess manner now?"
As I made no reply--feeling disgusted by these blasphemies--she chattered on, clinging still more closely to my arm.
"You see, even you yourself can not defend her. She is a positive injury to the manager. He used to be such a pleasant, courteous man, a genuine artist. Now he, too, poses as a Philistine and tutor, all by the orders of his aristocratic wife. She would prefer to have the whole company live in the same house, like a great cloister, to be able to continually watch over them. And most of them are cowardly or obliging enough to submit to it. But Herr Daniel, Herr Laban, and my insignificant self don't care for such an institution for small children. We always lodge at the hotel, and so you have the honor of being only three doors away from me; your room is No. 6, mine No. 2. I hope we shall be good neighbors."
I could not command my feelings sufficiently to enter into this light tone, so I began to speak of something entirely different, and praised--which I could do with a clear conscience--her acting that evening.
"Nonsense!" she interrupted, "you can't be in earnest; for, between ourselves, I played abominably to-night, I was so vexed by the scene with Daniel, whom I had been lecturing because he confessed his jealousy of you. Besides, I hate such sentimental parts, which unfortunately I have to play most frequently. Before I joined Spielberg's company--I was still very young--I was very fond of acting the merry little coquettes, the gayer they were the better, and best of all were parts like those of Parisian grisettes. But the manager thought my face exactly suited the heroines of tragedy, so now I am continually obliged to moan and roll my beautiful eyes toward heaven, as, for instance, to-morrow in 'Cabal and Love.' I have finally become indifferent to it, and, after all, we learn to act best the characters most unlike our own."
I did not feel at all tempted to enter into a conversation upon the art of acting and its higher demands with this girl. Meantime we had reached our hotel, at whose open door the waiter received us with a meaning face. I had evidently risen in his esteem, since I had the honor of escorting the youthful leading lady home the very first evening.
On our way up-stairs she said: "I don't know whether I can venture to invite you to drink a cup of tea with me. I should be obliged to send you away in half an hour at any rate, for I must read over my part of Luise Miller once more before I sleep."
I excused myself, on the plea that I had a letter to write. She quietly shrugged her shoulders.
"As you please, Herr Doctor, or rather, as you must. I forgot that you are a kinsman of Frau Spielberg. So good-night, and no offense!
'Thou'rt ill, ah, return,Return to thy room!'"
'Thou'rt ill, ah, return,Return to thy room!'"
she declaimed from the rôle of Bertha, then dropped me a mocking courtesy and glided into the door of No. 2.
I ordered supper to be brought to No. 6, not because I was hungry, but to show the waiter that I had not availed myself of the favor of this envied neighbor. Then I stood a long while at the open window, gazing out into the narrow street and at the opposite houses, the homes of the worthy citizens who led their quiet lives so contentedly, without dreaming of tempests like those that raged in my heart and brain.
One light after another disappeared, the footsteps of some belated pedestrian echoed less and less frequently from the pavement below; at last no sound arose save the hoarse voice of the night-watchman calling the tenth hour. The house, too, which was so slightly built that its walls told every secret, had become perfectly still. I was just unpacking my knapsack to make my toilet for the night, when I heard in the corridor a stealthy step which stopped a few doors away from mine, then a low knock, and after a short time a suppressed voice said, "Victorine. Open the door! I have something to tell you!"
Of course, I could not hear the answer. The colloquy lasted some time, the request for admittance being several times repeated, sometimes in urgent, sometimes in coaxing tones, ere the closed door opened and was noiselessly shut again.
The study of the rôle of Luise Miller would scarcely be pursued in company.
This incident had the effect of sending me to bed, firmly determined to turn my back as speedily as possible upon a world to which I did not belong. I woke in the morning with the same resolution, and only hesitated whether I should be expected to take a verbal farewell or might depart with merely a written one.
But, while I was sitting at breakfast pondering over this weighty question, some one knocked at my door, and a personage of no less importance than Konstantin Spielberg himself entered.
Though he had sat up till late in the night with several of the town dignitaries and some of his colleagues, and had drunk a great deal of liquor, he looked so fresh, so full of strength and cheerfulness, that again I could not help admiring him. He first kindly reproached me for having so slyly deserted him the evening before. It had been my own loss; he would have made me acquainted with some very intelligent people; and his colleague Laban's witticisms had been like a perfect shower of fireworks. But I should be forgiven if I would do him a great favor.
"A favor?" I asked. "If only I have time to grant it. I shall leave in half an hour."
That would be impossible in any case, he answered, arranging his locks before the mirror. I must see him that night as the President; it was one of his best parts, though he had resigned Ferdinand to Herr Daniel. But, if I really had any friendly feeling for him, I must help him out of a great difficulty. The prompter was to play Luise Miller's mother. Gottlieb Schönicke usually filled her place on such occasions, but owing to his carouse the night before he had become so hoarse that he could scarcely utter an audible word. So, if the performance was to take place, I must consent to fill this part and accompany him to the rehearsal at once.
All reluctance and pleas of my unfitness for this responsible post were futile. And as, in the depths of my heart, I had sought some pretext for beingcompelledto stay, at least for one more day--ere I took my leave, never to return--I finally allowed myself to be dragged away, and half an hour later was standing behind the scenes with the prompter's book in my hand.
Tall Herr Laban greeted me very cordially, and told me he yet hoped to see me appear in different parts. It was a pity to waste my gifts: figure, play of expression, voice, and taste for acting, all urged me toward the stage, and the company was in great need of new talent for the characters which he himself, nowinvita Minerva--he pronounced the words with a faultless accent--was compelled to fill, though Nature had originally intended him for a comedian.
Victorine gave me a careless nod, and studiously held aloof. Her friend treated me with marked hostility, and was the only person who constantly found fault with my prompting, for which the manager quietly reproved him. Most of the members of the company performed their parts at the rehearsal indifferently enough. Frau Selmar, however, personated her Milford with a clear voice and through every shade of meaning, and Laban gave an extremely clever performance of his Hofmarschall Kalb.
Gottlieb Schönicke remained invisible. Whether he was sleeping off his intoxication, or the story of his condition was merely a fiction to induce me to act with them, I have never been able to determine.
After the rehearsal the actors unceremoniously dispersed; the manager had some arrangements to make in the dressing-room, and I was no little surprised when allowed a glimpse of this holy of holies to find only a single, tolerably large room, divided by a few screens and a sheet hung over a rope, into two dressing-rooms, one for the men, the other for the women. In the broad light of day all this disorderly collection of mirrors, rouge-pots, and clothes-presses looked uncanny enough, and I hastily beat a retreat. But, as I was passing through the empty auditorium of the theatre, I saw with astonishment Frau Luise sitting on one of the rear benches.
"You here?" I exclaimed. "And absent yesterday evening? Do you attend such unattractive rehearsals?"
"I never go to the theatre during the evening performances," she answered, rising. "I will not allow the suspicion that I do not consider the acting of the company worth looking at, so I sometimes come to the rehearsals, which also serves the purpose of enabling me to call my husband's attention to many points when we are alone. True, it is of little use," she added, with a resigned smile; "these second-rate people, among whom we are placed, are the very ones that have an exalted opinion of their own talent and knowledge of art. But I feel in a certain sense responsible for the acting of my husband, who is a genuine artist, and I know that my opinion is not a matter of indifference to him.
"Besides, dear friend," she added, after a pause, "you can not imagine how lonely I am. So completely without society, except the company at the dinner-table, I sometimes feel the necessity of sharing some sphere of life, even though I might desire it to be a different one."
Then she thanked me for having granted her husband's request, and we left the theatre together. On our way, while she frequently glanced back to see if her husband were not at last following us, I told her that I had determined to continue my journey to-day, and now positively intended to take my departure on the morrow.
"You are right," she answered. "What should detain you here? You are not fitted for these surroundings."
Then, after a pause, she added: "Write to me if you change your residence. I should always like to know where you are to be found, for I have one earnest desire, which I have long secretly counted on you to fulfill. When you have a parish, or a good wife, such as I desire for you, I should be glad to put my son in your charge."
"Do you intend to part with the child?"
"Yes, dear friend," she replied, her brows contracting with an expression of pain. "How I am to bear it I do not know. But my resolution is fixed. He must grow up in a perfectly pure atmosphere. While he is a child, I guard him myself. But how long will that be? Even now it is almost impossible for me to reconcile all my duties. When I go to the rehearsals I am compelled to trust him to Kunigunde, who is an excellent person, but does not always take the right course with him, and he shall not accompany me to the theatre. It would be worse than if I were to give him brandy to drink, instead of milk."
Then we grew silent. "Poor woman!" a voice in my heart continually repeated; "you are indeed lonely."
Meantime we had returned to the town, and then something happened, whose memory even now makes my heart throb faster.
When we entered the courtyard of the commandant's residence, my companion's first glance sought the windows of her room. She suddenly grasped my arm as if to save herself from falling, and I asked in alarm if she were ill. But, as I looked up, a thrill of horror ran through my frame also. For at the open window I saw the child, who had climbed out on the sill, clinging with one little arm to the sash and stretching out the other toward a drooping chestnut bough, whose ripening nuts had probably roused his longing. As in his eagerness he held one little foot suspended in the air, he seemed fairly hovering aloft with but the feeblest support, and an icy chill crept down my back.
Suddenly I heard the mother say in her gentlest voice: "Wouldn't it be better for me to get you the beautiful chestnuts, Joachimchen? You shall have a whole handful, if you are a good boy and climb down again at once. Do what your mother tells you, my darling. I am coming up directly. Then you shall show Uncle Johannes how to make a chain of chestnuts."
The smiling boy looked down at us, nodded to his mother, cautiously drew first his foot and then his arm back from the giddy height, and quickly disappeared inside the dark frame of the window.
My own heart had fairly stopped beating. When I could breathe again, I wanted to tell my companion how much I admired her for having had courage to repress any cry of terror that might have startled the little one and perhaps hurled him to destruction. But the words died on my lips, for the next instant she had thrown her arms around my neck, and, with her face hidden on my breast, burst into such convulsive sobs that I was forced to exert all my strength, to support the tall, noble figure in its helpless emotion.
She did not regain her self-control until we heard steps in the gateway, then, still clinging to my arm, she hurried into the rear building and up the stairs. "Not a word about it to anybody!" she whispered. At the top she stood still, panting for breath, and passed her hand over her eyes. At last she rushed to her room, on whose threshold the child met her, and clasped her sole happiness in her arms with a cry of rapture in which all the pent-up excitement of the mother's heart found utterance.
When, soon after, her husband entered, nothing but her unwonted pallor and a tremor, which still ever and anon ran through her limbs, could have betrayed to him that anything unusual had occurred. He, however, in his jovial self-satisfaction, was so exclusively absorbed in himself--having just purchased a new neck-tie which he meant to wear at dinner--that he noticed no change in her. And there was no one else at the table who took any special heed of her, except a young girl of fourteen--the daughter of the Selmar couple--who had been too ill to appear at dinner the day before. She went to Frau Luise, pressed her hand affectionately, and anxiously asked if she were well. "Oh! perfectly well," replied the happy mother, smiling, as she kissed the girl's cheek and inquired about her own doings. The dinner passed off very much like the one of the previous day, except that the manager regretted he could not drink my health in a glass of wine as a token of gratitude for my admirable prompting. But the rigid law of the household prohibited all spirituous drinks until the evening--and he cast a glance of comic terror at his wife.
I saw that she found it difficult to maintain her assumed cheerfulness, and when we rose her knees trembled. So I suggested in a low tone that she should lie down for a time and trust the boy to me for the afternoon. She assented with a grateful glance and pressure of the hand.
When, at the end of a few hours, I brought the child--with whom I had formed the closest friendship--back to his mother, I found her sitting by the very window at which she had gazed with so much horror. She was still quiet and pale, like a person just recovering from a dangerous illness, but I had never seen her look more beautiful and charming, and felt that the duty of self-defense required me to take leave of her now. I could not come to her room after the play, so we shook hands without uttering what was oppressing each heart; I kissed the child, for the last time as I supposed, and, in a mood well worthy of compassion, left these two beloved beings expecting never to see them again.
When the evening performances ended, amid great applause--which most of the company had honestly deserved, even Victorine, whose Madonna eyes were obliged to make up for the deficiencies in her soul, while Daniel's acting, in its fervent sensual vehemence, if it did not depict the "German stripling," presented a very attractive young hothead--I attempted to again slip out unnoticed, but was detected by the manager's watchful eye, and, as tall Laban joined him, was helplessly carried off between them and dragged to the club-room. Protest as I might, Spielberg insisted upon treating me, and while doing so presented me to his acquaintances in the little town with great ceremony as a young dramatic student, whom he hoped to secure for his own stage. Meantime, one bottle of doubtful red wine followed another, and while I took a very moderate share I marveled at the celerity with which the great actor emptied one glass after another at a single draught, without the slightest flush appearing on his face. During all this time his stories of various events in his theatrical career seemed inexhaustible, and his frank delight in his own genius sparkled so innocently in his eyes, that it was impossible to feel vexed with him or avoid listening with a certain interest to his marvelous anecdotes, as one would to the tales of the "Arabian Nights."
At last the regular guests had all dispersed, even Laban had departed, but the great actor still detained me and made a sign to the sleepy waiter, upon which he instantly set a bottle of champagne upon the table. "It's no-use, cousin," he said, in a sonorous bass voice, which, it is true, now sounded a little husky; "we have a solemn act to perform. I have vowed not to go to bed until I have drunk to a pledge of fraternity with you in foaming sack. Come and pledge me! You are a fine fellow, only you haven't yet found it out yourself. When you have been in my company a few weeks, you will strip off the chrysalis and wonder at yourself as your wings bear you from flower to flower. Even if you often fly too near a light and scorch yourself a little, that is better than your pastoral tepidity. Your health, my heart's brother! Let us drink eternal friendship!"
Spite of my intense reluctance, I could not avoid his cordial embrace. Then he grew quieter, and, with apparent business-like gravity, began to discuss the capacity in which I was to enter his company. He spoke of new pieces its members were to study, the revision of older ones, for which he himself lacked time, and finally of his plan for including light operas in his repertory, for which he could not dispense with a conductor.
I listened without protesting, save by interjections and shrugs of the shoulders. Meantime, he emptied the bottle almost alone and called for a second, but I rose and resolutely declared I was going home.
"A plague on all cowardly poltroons!" he cried, staggering to his feet. "Virtue exists no more!" Then followed a torrent of classical quotations in a voice that made the windows rattle. Yet his gait was so unsteady that I hastily sprang forward to support him. When we were in the dark street, he passed his arm around my shoulders and tottered along the road like a blind man. "Say nothing to her about it, brother," he stammered, "nothing about the champagne. She hates champagne, though in other respects she's a good wife; it's pure jealousy, ha! ha! She thinks my heart belongs to the Widow Clicquot--a worthy dame, in truth, who never reads me a curtain-lecture, but her purse must be filled with gold if we want to win her favor, ha! ha!--and the father of a family, you know. Never get married, brother! 'Long hair, short wits,'" and he began to sing the champagne aria in the midst of the death-like silence of the Goose-Market.
When, with some difficulty, I at last succeeded in getting him up the stairs to his lodgings, he became as still as a mouse, and trembled from head to foot. "Don't tell her!" were the last words he whispered. Then, forcing himself to stand erect, he gently opened the door.
"Good-evening, my angel," he stammered, and was going up to her to embrace her. She silently rose and looked at him with a sorrowful gaze, which suddenly seemed to sober him. "Well, well," he said, "it's hardly one o'clock--we don't act to-morrow--I've done a good business, too, haven't I, cousin? He'll stay with us, sweetheart; I've engaged him as dramatist and conductor, at a monthly salary of twelve thalers for the present--that will please you, I think. But now good-night, cousin! I'm perfectly sober, only I couldn't tell the town how one becomes President. So I'm going to take a long sleep, for the torture of the day was great."
Amid all the confusion of his brain, he still retained sufficient chivalrous courtesy to take his wife's hand and kiss it. Then he staggered through the side door into the sleeping-room, and we could hear him fall on the bed without undressing.
I cast a hasty glance at his wife, who stood gazing into vacancy.
"Good-night, Frau Luise," I said. "You will see me again to-morrow."
"To-morrow?"
"Certainly. To-morrow, and every day until you yourself send me away. Perhaps I may yet make myself useful here--though not as conductor."
After that night I no longer led my own life.
My existence seemed only valuable when I made myself a slave, soul and body, in Frau Luise's service, coming to her aid wherever her own grand and lofty strength failed.
In reality I was making no sacrifice by this self-abnegation. For, as I have already confessed, my own aims and purposes had vanished, as a light on which a nocturnal traveler depends suddenly proves a will-o'-the-wisp, and flickers into a marsh mist. I felt averse rather than inclined to enter a pulpit, and I had not sufficient love or talent for any art or science to induce me to devote my life to it. Clearly, as though written on the wall by some spectral hand, the sentence stood before me: "You are a mediocre man from whom the world has nothing to hope in the way of happiness or enlightenment. Rejoice if some good human being can warm his hands by your little flame."
I also perceived the correctness of my opinion by the fact that this discovery, instead of wounding me, created a sense of peace I had hitherto lacked. Rarely have I awaked in a mood so joyous, feeling as it were new-born, as on the morning after I had placed myself at the service of this noble woman. And the difficulties in regard to my former occupation which still embarrassed me were to be dispelled in the simplest way.
With my breakfast a letter was brought in, which had been forwarded from the estate I had left, as I had said I should remain in this place for several days. A former fellow-student, a very admirable and intelligent man, wrote that some weakness of the throat compelled him to give up his profession as a preacher. Until he could determine how to shape his future life, he desired to seek a position as tutor in a family, and begged me to aid him as far as possible. I instantly wrote to my employer, informing him that I could not return to his house for reasons which at present I could disclose to no one, but which he would certainly approve if I could ever confide the whole truth to him. At the same time I proposed in my place the college friend, for whose character and education I could amply vouch.
I took leave of him and his whole family, who had become so dear to me, and requested him to send my property to me except the books, which I would leave for the present in my successor's care. Then I wrote a few cordial lines to my friend the pastor. As I added the farewell message to his dear daughters, the sorrowful face of the eldest again appeared before me in the most vivid hues, and her earnest eyes seemed to say: "You do not know what happiness you are losing."
But I was proof against any temptation to return.
Early that very morning I hurried to Herr Spielberg's rooms. He received me in a Turkish dressing-gown, with his brightest face, and, when I inquired how he had slept, answered, laughing: "You probably expected to find me a quiet fellow, cousin. But you must know that champagne and I are on the best of terms. When we do fall out, however, champagne always gets the worst of it; or to quote Julius Cæsar:
'We were two lions litter'd in one day,And I the elder and more terrible.'
'We were two lions litter'd in one day,And I the elder and more terrible.'
"But, good-morning. I hope you haven't slept off overnight what we arranged yesterday. How much salary did I promise you? I don't remember. But I won't play the rogue to you at any rate."
I told him that I would remain only on two conditions: first, that I should have entire liberty to do nothing except what I felt competent to accomplish; and secondly, that there should never be any question of wages. I had saved enough, during my three years as a tutor, to live without earning anything for a time.
He made no reply, only shook his ambrosial locks thoughtfully and struck my shoulder with his hand, like a prince accepting the homage and service of a vassal. Then he called his wife, who was in the adjoining room, dressing the boy.
She entered with her usual calm expression and, avoiding my eyes, held out her hand. The boy ran to me and threw his arms around my neck. "What do you say, dear," cried the artist, "he has really determined to stay. Of course, it is solely on your account, for he would not throw up his profession for my sake. Well, I hope you will treat him kindly.
'This lad--no angel is from sin more free,Craving thy favor, I commend to thee.'"
'This lad--no angel is from sin more free,Craving thy favor, I commend to thee.'"
With these words he rose, smiling, leaving me to decide whether the quotation referred to my character of Fridolin, or to Joachimchen, who expressed great delight on hearing that Uncle Johannes would take him to walk immediately.
After her husband had left the room, Luise came to me and said in a low tone: "I can not approve your decision, Johannes. But I am so weary that I have not the strength to combat it."
I shall avoid giving a minute description of the time that now followed. No one can feel disposed to pursue the destinies of such a strolling company, the alternations of good and evil fortune, or the coming and going of its members, in greater detail--nay, even for theatrical history the list of its plays would have no value, as it was not at all regulated by the spirit of the time, nor even by the fashion, but patched together from new stock and shabby rubbish, as chance and the difficulties of stage-setting permitted.
During the first few months the enterprise remained in about the same stage of prosperity as I had found it. Then, by the withdrawal of the Selmars and their charming daughter, it fell several degrees, soon rose again by advantageous engagements, and then declined in consequence of our worthy stage-manager's being made helpless for months by a fall from a high scaffold. These fluctuations corresponded with the ebb and flow in the cash-box, and, but for the wise economy of the manager's wife, there would often have been a failure in the payment of salaries. But the name of Spielberg always possessed sufficient attraction to fill the house tolerably well, and make amends for the recreant members. The most faithful were those from whom I should have least expected loyalty--Laban, who, with all his apparent frivolity and jesting, felt a sincere and warm reverence for Frau Luise, and the young couple, whose stay, it is true, was due to less honorable traits of character.
How they were to regard me, and in what manner my position as dramatic "maid of all-work" was to be interpreted, at first caused them much perplexity. They soon learned that I was not working for money. My sole pecuniary profit consisted in my paying no board, as Frau Luise would not permit any other arrangement, and occasionally, when lodgings for all could be hired, I was not allowed to pay for my sleeping-room. In return, I made myself as useful as I could, coached green beginners in their parts, sometimes stood at the side-scenes or crouched in a subterranean box with the prompter's book in my hand, copied parts, arranged plays so that ten characters could be compressed into six, and only drew the line of my services at the one point of obstinately refusing to undertake to act any part, no matter how trivial.
At first they attributed this to arrogance, of which, spite of his unassuming helpfulness, they credited the "doctor" with a large share. But, after I had once told them that I cherished too lofty an idea of art to sin against it by bungling work, I rose no little in their esteem, and even Spielberg, who never ceased saying that I was a genius in disguise, let me alone.
The suspicion that I was following the company as a secretly favored admirer of the manager's unpopular wife had of course at first suggested itself, even to the better natures among them. But the calm irony with which the great artist crushed all allusions to such a relation did not fail to produce its effect, as well as the perfectly unembarrassed demeanor of the suspected woman herself, and my own Fridolin countenance, which expressed anything rather than the secret triumph of a favored lover.
And, indeed, I was not on a bed of roses.
Not to mention that I was forced to purchase the happiness of being daily in her society, and making myself indispensable to her by a hundred little services, at the cost of witnessing her suffering, which, it is true, she bore like a heroine, but which nevertheless constantly consumed her strength and youth--it was a most painful thing to be compelled to witness her husband's steady progress toward the ruin to which the unfortunate man opposed less and less resistance. At first I had endeavored not to lose sight of him after the play was over, striving--in the outset with mild, afterwards with the most earnest remonstrances--to recall him from his fatal passion. As he had a gentle, yielding nature, I succeeded several times in doing so. But Daniel, who with fiendish cold-bloodedness played the part of his evil genius, soon made him disloyal to his best resolves and vows, so, at the end of a few weeks, I was forced to let the evil pursue its course.
For a time the leonine constitution of which he boasted resisted the effects of his nocturnal debauches, at least so far that no traces of them were visible the following morning. Then, in the consciousness that he stood in need of forgiveness, he was courteous and affectionate throughout the day, like a little boy who fears punishment, and paid his wife all sorts of charming little attentions.
But as his weakness gained more and more control, and his nervous strength began to fail, he no longer took any trouble to deceive us about his condition, and instead of showing repentance and embarrassment, after spending half the day in bed suffering from the effects of his intoxication, he tried to conceal his evil conscience under an air of boastful defiance, and bluntly declared that genius required great stimulants, and need not be restrained by Philistine rules.
Of course, with such irregularities, which soon became the rule, no firm, careful management of the company was possible. By degrees all business cares and responsibilities were shifted to my insignificant self. It was enough if the sick lion crawled out of his den an hour before the performance, rolled his bloodshot eyes in front of the mirror, and then made his somewhat husky but all the more tragic voice resound through the theater till the puzzled spectators left the house with the acknowledgment that he had "roared well" again, and no one could easily outdo him in shaking his mane.
Nevertheless, in this disorder, the company lost its power of attraction more and more, and were obliged to change from place to place more frequently, and these numerous journeys increased the expenses and demoralized the members. I did what I could to stay the ruin, and, besides a silent clasp of the hand from the woman I loved, I was rewarded by the confidence and devotion of most of my colleagues. Only two, who watched the mischief with quiet malice, showed me their aversion more openly, the more honestly I tried to save the tottering car of Thespis from breaking down.
These two, of course, were Daniel and Victorine.
For a long time the cause of their evident dislike was a mystery to me. For the insolent young fiend could not long suppose that he had been supplanted in the favor of the object of his secret worship by the faithful squire, and his publicly-acknowledged sweetheart, disagreeable as she was to me, I treated with the utmost courtesy. The real purpose of both, and the reason I stood in their way, did not dawn on me until afterward.
Daniel's passion for the pure and proud woman was of the nature of those feelings with which fallen angels survey their former heavenly companions. He could not forgive her being so unapproachably far above him. To drag her down, gloat over her humiliation, take vengeance for the coldness with which she passed his hellish ardor by--this was the diabolical idea that haunted him day and night. He well knew it was madness to hope for its attainment so long as our wandering life pursued its usual course. But, if everything were thrown into confusion, the husband utterly ruined, the wife overwhelmed by poverty and despair, he relied on conquering the helpless woman, and, with Satanic energy, grasping her when mentally broken down as his sure prey. Whoever strove to check this development of the tragedy he could not fail to hate.
He had such power over Victorine that she shared this mood--though the infernal plot affected her too. Besides, I had made her forever my foe by remaining wholly indifferent to her charms. I will pass over the proofs I might bring forward, not because I am ashamed of myrôleof Joseph, but, even without this, I shall have occasion to speak of myself more than is agreeable to me.
I should have led no enviable existence, had not Heaven itself provided some consolation and strengthened my heart.
Whenever we settled for a few months in one of the larger cities, I always obtained a piano, which was placed in Frau Luise's room, or, if there was no space there, in the dining-room--she still maintained the rule of having the meals in common, though the Round Table constantly dwindled--and here we passed our only hours of pure, unshadowed happiness. For, when she sang and I accompanied her, the narrow walls seemed to expand, the earth, with everything base and unlovely it contained, to sink beneath us, while we ourselves floated in a sunny atmosphere where everything was harmony and peace, love and hope, and every wound that bled secretly healed at once as though touched by the hand of some enchanter.
We did not permit ourselves this delight daily, only on Sundays and when, for some reason, there was no acting. The boy, meantime, sat in a little chair and never turned his eyes from his mother while she sang; or I took him on my knee while I played the accompaniment, and he gazed wonderingly at the keys. At last I began to give him a few lessons on the piano, and was amazed to see how easily he understood everything. Oh, that child! He became more and more the one unalloyed delight of my life, for unmixed happiness in the society of his mother was impossible for me.
Afterward, during my long life as a teacher, I had an opportunity to observe many hundred boys, and to this companionship I owe a thousand pleasures. But neither before nor after did I ever meet a child like Joachimchen.
He was no prodigy in the usual acceptance of the word. No technical talent, no intellectual gift developed with extraordinary power or precocity, and, even in music--the only instruction I began in his sixth year to give him regularly--he made no remarkable progress. But the quality this young creature possessed to a far greater degree than other children of his age, was the subtlety and accuracy of his mental perceptions, by which he infallibly distinguished truth from semblance--a, if I may so express it, moral clairvoyance which enabled him to give the most striking opinions of persons and things without any precocious conceit. No trace of child-like vanity, no desire for praise, marred this innocent faculty of his soul. He was like a clear mirror, which reflected in their real outlines the images of everything that surrounded him. Any one whom he loved was sure to be pure and good; for everything base and sordid, though it approached him under the most flattering guise, instantly repelled him.
Yes; there was a well-spring of cheerfulness in this little human being which, in proportion to the delicacy of his physical condition, became the more refreshing to him and those who best loved him. His thoughtful views of the world, and the luster of the large eyes in the little palid face, would have roused our anxiety, had not shouts of mirth often issued from the narrow chest, while even in his quieter moments there was no trace of sickly peevishness or weariness. The little naughtinesses, almost invariably seen in an only child who is deeply loved and spoiled, were foreign to his nature. A sign, a word would guide him. It was only in the society of other children that I frequently perceived a shade of reserve and fretfulness in his manner, so I persuaded his mother not to force him into their companionship. On the other hand, he was all the more vivacious, even to the verge of ungovernable delight, when we took him out to walk. He chased all the butterflies, made friends with all the little dogs he met, and, mounted on a hobby-horse, galloped along, swinging his little riding-whip. Everybody loved him, though he was very chary of his caresses. He was shy only with his own father.
Often at dinner--the only time he spent a whole hour with him--I saw him fix a watchful gaze upon Spielberg, just when the latter in his most radiant mood was pouring forth high-sounding speeches about art and artists. The boy never uttered a word, though often, to the delight of the others, he made one of his quaint, penetrating remarks to some member of the company. Never, either to me or his mother, did he mention his father's name. But the latter, whose face always beamed with the consciousness that he was impressing every one, evidently avoided meeting the child's eyes, and, when he felt their gaze on him, became so confused that he often hesitated in the middle of a sentence and lapsed into silence. I do not remember, during all the time that we lived together, a single instance when he showed the boy any tenderness, or troubled himself in the least about him.
I had agreed with Frau Luise that, on account of the child's delicate constitution and sensitive nerves, he ought to be guarded from all mental excitement, though he was now six years old, an age when children usually begin to Study the alphabet and primers. To train him in the use of his hands, I gave him easy lessons in drawing, which he greatly enjoyed, let him practice daily half an hour on the piano, and sing with his clear little voice intervals and simple songs. During our walks I told him Bible stories, which, whatever may be thought of their historical value, ought--as the most venerable traditions from the earliest days of the Christian world--to be given every child for his journey through life, as well as the fairy lore of our nation.
Yet I was obliged to limit even this elementary instruction, because the boy's unusually vivid imagination transformed everything which was intended merely to serve for amusement into solid food for his mind. For instance, he became as much excited over the history of Joseph and his brothers as a grown person would have been by a novel. I directed his thirst for knowledge exclusively to natural objects, so far as my defective education in this department permitted, and everything seemed to be going on admirably when a slight attack of fever roused our anxiety.
The company had settled in one of the larger cities on the shore of the Baltic, where they were doing an excellent business. So the plan of instantly departing, and perhaps breaking up the threatening disease by a change of climate, could not be entertained. Besides, the physician, whom the mother questioned, did not consider the case serious, attributed all the symptoms to the child's rapid growth, and prescribed a different diet and certain strengthening measures which seemed to have a good effect.
We had formerly divided the care and training of the boy in such a way that he was never left a moment without his mother or myself. Now she would not allow me to take her place except for an occasional half-hour, and even at dinner remained in her room, while we were served by Kunigunde. For a long time she had given up the sleeping-room to her husband's sole use, and contented herself with an uncomfortable couch made up every night on the sofa, while the child's little bed stood close by her side.
He could not be allowed to see the condition in which his father usually returned at midnight.
One morning she received me with an anxious face. Joachimchen was reluctant to leave his bed, complained of headache, and did not want his breakfast. The doctor, whom I instantly summoned, soothed her as much as he was able. The fever had not increased, perhaps some childish disease was coming on, which would produce a favorable change in his whole physical condition. He prescribed some simple remedy, and we felt a little relieved.
He became no worse in the evening. But I had told Spielberg that I could not perform my duties that night, and, as the play had been acted hundreds of times, I really was not needed behind the scenes.
When at ten o'clock I felt the pulse of the child, who was lying in an uneasy slumber, I thought there was no occasion to fear a bad night, and persuaded his mother to lie down in order to save her strength. I would sit up a few hours longer, as I had some alterations to make in a new play, which was then creating a sensation--I believe it was the "Son of the Wilderness"--in order to adapt it to the scanty strength of our company.
My room in the private house where we had taken lodgings was on the same floor as the manager's, and I could be summoned by the faintest call. But for several hours everything remained quiet, and I was just thinking that I might venture to go to bed when I heard the drunkard's heavy footstep on the stairs. He had wished the sick child a good night's rest, with evident sympathy, and even now seemed to remember that he must enter softly. Nor did it surprise me that he did not go directly to his own sleeping-room as usual, but gently raised the latch of his wife's door. He wants to inquire how the boy has rested, I thought.
I had just closed my book and was preparing to retire for the night when I heard the door of Frau Luise's room thrown open, Spielberg's voice faltering unintelligible words, and shrill moans and cries for help from the boy which sent a thrill of terror through every nerve. But I had no time to reach my door, for at the same instant it was flung wide open, and the unfortunate mother, clad only in the white dressing-gown in which she was in the habit of lying down when Joachimchen needed any special care, darted in, her face death-like in its pallor, holding the wailing child in her arms.
"Protect us! Save the child!" she cried, with a terrified gesture, and as she rushed to my bed, drew back the curtains and hastily laid the boy, whose slender frame was convulsed with sobs, on it, she whispered, with a glance of intense fear: "He will follow us! Bolt the door! O, God, this too!"
She had thrown herself on her knees beside the bed, clasping her darling's quivering form closely in her arms, pressing her lips to the little pale face, and murmuring in confused words that he must be quiet, nobody would hurt him or his mother, he had only been dreaming, now he must go to sleep again, and his mother and Uncle Johannes would stay with him all night.
The child did not cease moaning, struggled into a sitting posture in her arms, and cast an anxious glance around the room as if he feared a pursuer. And in fact some one knocked at the door, but very timidly, and, as none of us answered the request to open it, silence followed, and we heard the steps retire and the door of Spielberg's room open and close.
But there was no improvement in the child's condition. He tossed convulsively to and fro, his eyes rolled without any sign of intelligence, and his face burned with fever.
"I will get the doctor, Frau Luise," I said. "I hope it is only a crisis." She made no reply, but gazed fixedly at the little one's distorted features, and endeavored by her embrace to control the convulsions that shook the slight frame.
We found them still in the same state when I at last brought the physician.
The worthy man, who felt the most sincere reverence for the poor mother, made every effort to conceal his alarm. When, after a few hours, during which he had watched the very trivial success of his remedies, he took his leave, promising to return early in the morning, and I lighted him down the stairs, he pressed my hand with a heavy sigh. "Poor woman!" he said. "The child does not suffer at all; it is not conscious. But how the mother is to bear--"
"So you have no hope--"
"There is inflammation of the brain, more severe than I have often witnessed. But nature is incalculable. Do you know how it happened that his condition changed for the worse so suddenly?"
I answered in the negative. It was not until long afterward that I learned what had occurred in the brief interval between the father's entrance and the mother's flight.
Spielberg had returned home with a clearer head than usual. When he entered his wife's room, she half arose from the sofa and laid her finger on her lips. By the light of the dim night-lamp he approached the child's bed, softly touched the little sleeping face, gazed at it a short time, and then turned to his wife, whispering: "He is doing admirably." She merely nodded, and when, in an impulse of his old tenderness and sympathy with her anxiety, he held out his hand, she kindly returned the clasp. He sat down on the edge of the bed and told her in a low tone that the play had been much applauded and the receipts large. When she asked him to go to rest, as talking might disturb the child, he answered that he was not tired, but felt inclined to have a short chat with his beloved wife. When she shook her head, he moved nearer, and, putting his arm around her, begged her to go into the next room with him for a little while. It was so long since they had had a confidential talk, and there was rarely time for one during the day. The more he urged, the more firmly she declined, till he finally threw both arms around her and whispered: "If you don't come voluntarily, I will use force! You are my wife!"
Then, as she resisted with desperate strength, he fairly lifted her up and was carrying her away, when a shriek from the child's bed suddenly made him loose his hold. The boy was sitting up, staring with dilated eyes at the nocturnal scene, and stretching out his little arms as if to aid his defenseless mother. The next instant he had sprung from the bed, climbed on the sofa by his mother's side, and, thrusting his father away with his little clinched hands, screamed: "You sha'n't kill my mother! Go away! You sha'n't hurt her!--" till, exhausted by terror, the chivalrous child succumbed to a severe attack of fever.
The boy lay in the same condition all night, without a single interval of consciousness. We had not removed him to his own little bed; my room, situated at the end of the corridor, was quieter than his mother's. Neither of us left him. His father had come in early in the morning, but, as he found the child apparently calm and received only curt answers from his wife, who did not vouchsafe him a single glance, he soon went away again. For the first time his unshadowed self-complacency had deserted him. He hung his head like an unjustly accused criminal before the judge, whom he can not hope to convince of his innocence.
The physician had returned very early. He uttered no word of discouragement, but his troubled face, after he had examined the child, so oppressed my heart that I could not even venture to ask a question. But when I went out with him he pressed my hand, whispering: "If he survives the night--but we must be prepared for everything."
The actors, who were all very fond of the little fellow, stole to the door, tapped gently, and asked me for news of him. The only one who entered the room was Daniel. He bowed silently to Frau Luise, and then stood a long time at the foot of the bed; but, after a hasty glance at the little invalid, he fixed his glowing dark eyes on the mother, who, still robed just as she had fled to me yesterday, sat beside the child, now hovering between life and death. At first she took no more notice of the intruder than of anything else that was passing around her. Suddenly she seemed to feel his scorching gaze, and looked up; the blood crimsoned her pale cheeks, and she flashed a single glance at the man she so detested. His head sank, as if he had been struck by an arrow, and he glided on tiptoe out of the room.
Victorine alone did not appear. She had never showed any affection for the child, and, besides, was to have a benefit that night, for which she wished to freshen her costume by many little devices.
No one thought of dinner. Kunigunde brought Frau Luise some food, which she did not touch. I myself hastily swallowed a few mouthfuls in the kitchen. Spielberg, who after the rehearsal had again inquired for the child, went to the hotel with the others.
So the evening approached. The boy's condition remained unchanged, except that the fever increased, and every remedy used seemed powerless. After a bath, however, which the doctor himself helped to give, he seemed somewhat quieter, and lay still and pale in my large bed, the dear little face only occasionally distorted by a slight convulsive quiver.
The father entered in street dress. For the first time his wife looked at him, and her lips parted in a question--her voice sounded hoarse and hollow after her long silence.
"Are you going to act to-night, Konstantin?"
He went up to the child and touched its pale forehead.
"He is better. His forehead is perfectly cool. I will come back as soon as the play is over."
"He isnotbetter. If, meanwhile--"
She could not finish the sentence.
He looked at me. I shrugged my shoulders and turned away to hide the tears the unhappy mother's voice brought into my eyes.
"If I could be of any assistance here," he said, hesitatingly; "it costs me a hard struggle to leave you, but you will find that the night will pass quietly, and to-morrow we shall be relieved of all anxiety."
"To-morrow!" she repeated, dully. "You are right; to-morrow we shall be relieved of all anxiety."
Turning abruptly away, she bowed her face on the pillow of the little boy, whose chest was beginning to heave painfully.
The artist had already gone to the door, but stopped, saying: "Since you prefer it, I will give up the performance. I am so agitated that it would be a poor piece of acting; and then--if he is really--no, it is better so. They must do as well as they can. Farewell!"
I felt how deeply each one of these careless words wounded her. But no sound or look betrayed that she was conscious of anything save her maternal anxiety.
Yet--when, half an hour later, a boy brought a note in which was scrawled in pencil, "I had entirely forgotten that it is Victorine's benefit. Unfortunately, it has been impossible for me to induce her to give me up, and, besides, we have a very crowded house. Let us bear the inevitable with dignity. Konstantin"--I saw by the gesture of loathing with which she crushed the sheet and flung it into the corner, that the wife possessed a vulnerable spot as well as the mother.
Still she uttered no word of comment, and the next moment seemed to have entirely forgotten it.
For the brief armistice produced by the bath had expired. The last struggle began. It lasted only a few hours, then all was over. The brave little heart had ceased to beat.
The mother sat like a statue of despair beside the bed, holding the little white hand, which no current of blood would ever again warm, and gazing fixedly at the closed eyelids and livid mouth distorted by pain that would never more utter any merry words. It was as still around us as though the night was holding its breath, in order not to rouse the mother's agonized heart from its beneficent stupor. I had thrown myself into a chair in a dark corner, and felt as though I were sinking deeper and deeper into the bottomless abyss of the vast enigma of the world.
From time to time I was forced to struggle with the temptation to rise, go to the poor woman, fall on my knees before her, and plead: "Keep your heart firm that it may not break. If you follow him into the grave, I shall perish too."
But I conquered this selfish impulse. What mattered what happened to me! What mattered anything, since this child no longer breathed!
The window stood open, the still night air--it was early in June--stole into the room, but, as the house stood in a quiet side street, rarely bore with it the sound of a human voice or a passing footstep. The play must be over, and, with silent indignation, I expected to see the artist return home to-night in the same condition as yesterday. But I had done him injustice.
His footstep echoed from the street below as firm and full of stately majesty as when he trod the boards in his most exalted characters. Beside it was another, which I should instantly have recognized as Daniel's elastic tread, even had not his voice been audible also. The words were unintelligible. But he must have been telling some amusing story, for his companion's resonant laugh interrupted him several times. They did not cease talking till they reached the door of the house.