The beginning of winter found everything the same as usual at the Parsonage. The Candidate had not succeeded in raising the money for the continuation of his studies. He therefore was preparing calmly to spend the winter term under the paternal roof.
He decided to employ the many hours of leisure which stretched before him, in settling on authorship as his calling in life, and to write an epoch-making work, which would raise him with one bound to the highest pinnacle of fame. The work was to be of a scientific character, and to give shape and method to the floating chaotic ideas of modernity.
A public career lay open to him also. All you had to do to be elected to the Reichstag, was to sit down and write a few social pamphlets on prostitution, or the duel question; and if the ministry did not see its way after that to give you an appointment, you must become active in opposition, not that miserable half-hearted opposition of abortive Liberalism, but the firebrand kind of Lassalles, which bore upon it the imprint of genius, and left plenty of time over for love adventures.
Altogether it had been easier for an Oswald Stein. In those days, as an adherent of the Sturm and Drang party, one knew what to be at. To cut a path for freedom from the barricades, and then get hewn down by the truncheons of tyranny. But since the seventies there had been no tyrants; and people no longer stirred up revolutions. It was considered neither gentlemanly nor "modern."
The only consolation that he found in this whirling chaos of emotions was love. For Kurt loved and was beloved! The blessed knowledge had been conveyed to him in a gilt-edged note sealed by a rosebud, the sort of stationery affected by very young ladies. One day at the end of September it had been delivered to him by the goose-herd at the farm and had run as follows--
"Dear Herr Kandidat,
"The song 'Smiling Stars,' which you dedicated to me, is quite charming. Unfortunately my brother took it away from me before I got hold of it. I must warn you against my brother, for he is very angry with you; and I am rather afraid he may challenge you. That would be so awful, I think it would kill me. I beg of you, therefore, not to send me any more poems; or if you do, please don't address them to Halewitz. On the road between Halewitz and Wengern there are some milestones with figures on them. The stone that I mean has the figures 24 on it. Will you please bury your poems in the earth behind the stone, and as a sign that you have buried them make a little cross out of twigs, and stick it up in front of the stone. Then I should know directly when I come by. And I entreat you to keep this a secret till your dying day, for I am strictly watched. Even Hertha keeps a look-out on me--ah, it is dreadful.
"With kind regards,
"Yours sincerely,
"E. V. S.
"P.S.--Please do it soon."
This was the beginning of a lively correspondence between Elly and the Candidate, which was conducted partly in verse and partly in prose, and left nothing to be desired in fire and ardour.
Kurt's opinion of himself rose tremendously under its influence. Oswald Stein now had the advantage of him in nothing. In case Melitta--that was to say, Felicitas--persisted in scorning him, at least the little fair girl, who was so madly in love with him, still remained. He had forgotten her name in the book, but he would call her "Elly" for the nonce.
Elly's sentimental scrawls provided him with enough amusement to kill time. They alternated between poetic gush, such as one finds in novels, and comical outbursts of alarm. "Myrtle wreaths," "the song of the nightingale," and "starlit spheres," were phrases as numerous as "stabs of conscience," "suicide and desperation." Twice already she had implored him to end the correspondence, and to set her free; but there was always a fresh communication behind the milestone.
Kurt was amply employed in consoling and encouraging her, and forecasting the golden time when they would be united for ever. Seriously he had no hopes of anything of the kind happening. It was not likely the proud clod of a squire would be so good-natured and accommodating as to lay his still half-baby youngest sister in Kurt's arms; and it would be derogatory for a man of his talent and prospects to take her without leave, and hamper himself with an unprofitable bride. He had difficulties enough to contend with without that.
His old father (set up to it, probably) was beginning to cast a disapproving eye on his son's manner of life, and veiled allusions concerning "the lilies of the field," and "loaves and fishes," made him feel very uncomfortable. One day in the middle of October the bomb burst.
Kurt, who had reposed till eleven in bed, feeling the necessity of a little light refreshment before the midday meal, went on a foraging expedition to the cupboard, the place where one would naturally expect to find a miscellaneous assortment of ham, pickled eels, cold roast veal, cold fried potatoes, and mashed turnips. He was interrupted in the business of choosing between these dainties by the old pastor, who laid a heavy hand on his shoulder, and asked whether he intended to make it his vocation for the rest of his life to eat up all the remains of the family meals.
Kurt assumed the air of an offended prince. "A man must live," he replied loftily, "or do you wish to imply----"
"Come to my study," broke in the old man.
"Very well," said Kurt, wiping his mouth. "You are my father, so I must obey you." And he made a sign to show that he bowed to the paternal authority.
"Come, now, we will speak in plain language, my boy," the old fellow began, sinking into his shabby, cushioned chair. "In all my days I have never come across such a cursed jackanapes as you are. You drink like a fish, swagger and bully like a sergeant-major--all very well, and most pleasing to me. But do you think that you can go on loafinginfinitum?"
Kurt controlled his resentment with difficulty.
"I don't understand, father," he said, "how you can call it loafing. Periods of inactive development are as necessary to the mind as the winter-time of hibernating is to Nature. While I am to all appearances idle, I work incessantly at my individuality. I cultivate my manhood; my personality is maturing. That is worth more than any book learning."
"Very well, my son," the old man replied. "Don't be discouraged. Keep up your calm impudence, and the rest will take care of itself. But, I tell you, for all that the world is a big place. Go and mature your personality somewhere else, and find another hunting-ground for your fads."
"Certainly I would, with pleasure, papa," Kurt replied, "if I had the necessary funds."
"The two months' salary the Baron von Kletzingk gave you would have been enough to live on for a whole term if you had not squandered it. You know that you needn't expect a farthing from me. Get the money as best you can, but remember, in eight days you clear out of this!"
"All right," Kurt replied with dignity, getting up. "I will go to ruin on the king's highway. But it seems a pity, just as my nature has taken a start, and I begin to be conscious of unsuspected springs of energy within me. But we won't speak about it further. The door of my father's house is to be shut on me--and with justice. Your long-suffering has been boundless, father. I thank you, and I will at once try and raise a little money. Farewell!" And he left the room.
The old man looked after him, shaking his head. "What a young scamp it is!" he said, full of admiration. "I was just such another."
Kurt, filled with bitter feelings, climbed up to the attic. He threw himself on his bed to reflect on his position, and also to await the dinner hour. There was baked ham with dumplings for dinner,--a dish which could be cooked in no university town so excellently as in the parental house. It was sad that the ham came to an end so soon, and that his father announced there would before long be one less to feed at the table.
When Kurt had composed himself a little, he went the round of neighbouring estates to see what was to be done in the money line.
"How brutal it is," he thought, "that a man's fine ambitions should be chased away by sordid cares!" And while he plodded along the rain-drenched country roads, it became clearer than ever that pessimism was the only philosophy of life worthy of consideration. He resolved to air his views in some great work which should take the form either of "Childe Harold" or "The Philosophy of the Unknown."
Grey clouds raced over the sky, the wind whistled across the furrows, and ravens circled weirdly above the dung-hills. Everything was vast and dreary, like his mood.
The proceeds of his first day's crusade was a ten-mark piece, lent by the newly appointed bailiff at Ellernthal--a novel of Zola's, also lent, and a fit of the blues.
The second day he fared no better, and on the third there seemed to be little doubt that his credit for ten miles round had been exhausted. Now he became so utterly disconsolate that he thought of taking his life. But the same day he received a gilt-edged note, which bore a certain family resemblance to Elly's missives, only there was no rosebud. The signature was Hertha von Prachwitz.
"She too?" he thought, and an indescribable feeling of satisfaction ran through his veins.
Hertha urgently requested an interview of ten minutes with him, and named as a place of meeting the churchyard at Wengern, and the hour six in the evening.
"One knows pretty well what those urgent interviews mean," he thought, twisting his moustache with a smile. After all, any one who was invited to a rendezvous with countesses need not despair.
To dodge those who might spy on his movements, he took a longish walk towards evening, from which he tried to return unobserved, for the churchyard was only a few steps distant from the parsonage.
On the stroke of six he emerged from the shadow of the church porch, and saw Hertha's figure darkly silhouetted in the late twilight as she sat waiting on a tombstone. His heart beat riotously in delighted anticipation. He approached her with his hat in his hand. "What a fascination and charm there must be about my person," he reflected, "if even this haughty highflyer succumbs to it!"
Hertha shot up at sight of him. She wore her old grey cloak, and had drawn the hood over her head and tied it under the chin. She was painfully excited. Her hands clasped the grave railings convulsively. Her eyes flashed in the darkness.
"You will think that this is a strange proceeding, Herr Kandidat," she said, in a trembling voice.
"Oh no, not at all," he assured her with a gallant bow.
"Ordinarily," she went on, "girls like me are not in the habit of appointing to meet people...."
She halted. There was something in her tone which made him feel a trifle less triumphant; it was almost as if she would have said, "people of your position."
"Wait a bit," he thought; "I'll soon bring her down."
"But your stupid conduct to my cousin," she continued, "compels me to speak very seriously to you."
Kurt felt very much as if a bucket of cold water had been hurled at him. It was evident what had happened. Elly had told tales, and Hertha, whether jealous or not, had made up her mind to put obstacles in his way.
"I beg pardon, countess," he said, raising his hand in dignified protest. "This is a matter of a very private nature. I don't know how far and by what means you have gained the confidence of your cousin Fräulein Elly, and I, for my part, cannot flatter myself that I have your confidence; therefore, if you will allow me----"
He raised his hat as a sign that he desired to end the conversation.
"Listen to me, if you please, Herr Kandidat," said Hertha, and her eyes flashed wrathfully. "If you adopt this tone towards me, it will be the worse for you."
"You talk in riddles," he replied, with a smirk.
"I am ready to express myself as plainly as you like," said Hertha. "I have run over here secretly, and at great risk, and you thought of going away and leaving me in the lurch like a naughty schoolboy."
In his most cavalier style he begged her pardon, and submitted to hear what was coming.
"Why don't you leave my cousin alone?" asked Hertha, measuring him with a scornful eye from head to toe.
"I love Fräulein Elly," he replied, "and I will annihilate all who thwart my love."
"Don't be so impertinent, Herr Kandidat. No one will believe you."
"They shall be made to believe," he said; "when two young hearts love, who shall come between them?"
Hertha shrugged her shoulders. "Elly does not love you, Herr Kandidat," she said.
"I happen to possess proofs to the contrary," he replied, with another polite bow.
"Ah! You mean the silly letters?" asked Hertha. "If she hadn't begun to write them behind my back, I should long ago have put a stop to it. Yesterday she came to me and implored me to save her, and I mean to save her, Herr Kandidat, even if it should cost me my life."
"Save her from what, if I may venture to ask, countess?"
"From you, Herr Kandidat. She has begged you more than once to leave her in peace, and told you that you frightened her. But you have continued, in spite of that, to bombard her with your crazy letters, verses, and stuff. The verses aren't even original, and the rest is all lies. So now you know what I think, Herr Kandidat."
Kurt gnawed his moustache. It seemed as if the prospect of a double defeat lay before him. But he would not lose the battle without a last struggle.
"My good breeding prevents my answering a lady in the tone which you have chosen to adopt towards me. But I should be glad to know why, if your cousin Fräulein Elly holds me in such detestation, and finds my letters so senseless, has she demeaned herself to invite me to enter into a correspondence with her? And why, up to the present, has she not disdained to answer my letters?"
Hertha bit her lips. It was no easy task to defend Elly's folly.
A silence ensued. The autumn wind moaned in the larches, and brought down with every gust a shower of fine prickly rain.
Hertha appeared to herself unspeakably stupid and silly. If she had had her riding-whip, she would have loved to bring it about the ears of the youth, who maintained his dandified air, and was straining every muscle to impress her as a model of gentlemanly forbearance. But it would not have helped matters.
"You don't answer me!" exclaimed Kurt Brenckenberg at last, triumphantly. "Then, naturally, I draw my own conclusions."
"Good gracious! Herr Kandidat," said Hertha, elevating her shoulders contemptuously, "do you imagine I am going to dispute with you? Elly has not had my experience of life. She is still a silly young thing, and it was very wrong of you to take advantage of her silliness. She thought that she was bound to answer your letters. That is the long and short of it. And now I will give you a piece of advice. Don't dare come near her again, or write notes, or sing songs in the park, or carry on any more of that nonsense. For if you do, I will tell my brother the whole story, and he will point out to you clearly your duty in the matter. Good evening, Herr Kandidat!"
She drew her skirts together and passed by him, with the dead leaves fluttering around her.
For a long time Kurt stared blankly after her. The slender, upright, girlish figure was silhouetted in picturesque outline against the sulphur-coloured sky, and then vanished behind the churchyard wall.
"What a dog's life it is!" he murmured. "One begins to think one has a heart, and then it all comes to nothing."
He sat down on the edge of a grave and brooded. The wind howled, and the dry leaves came whirling down like autumnal spirits. He reflected on fame, heroism, the madness of love, and the perishableness of all earthly things.
"When a man has no money, he is nearly as good as dead," he quoted sadly, and then stood up, for supper-time was drawing near.
One afternoon Ulrich rode over to Halewitz with the news that a meeting of the Reichstag had been called for the third week in November.
Leo was alarmed, for it meant nothing less than being left ten days alone with Felicitas. In every limb he felt the shock which seemed to be propelling him several steps nearer the unknown fate that loomed in front of him.
He could have caught Ulrich's hands and cried in his ears, "If you value both our lives, stay here!"
And he was still in this frame of mind when his friend approached him with an extraordinary proposal.
"Felicitas has begged me," he said, with his quiet friendly smile in which pure goodness of heart put to flight all gravity, "to be spokesman for her in giving expression to a desire which she has long had very much at heart, a desire shared by your sister Johanna. Both wish that our respective families should partake together of the holy sacrament on the day before my departure."
Leo was filled with joy. It seemed to him as if a sustaining hand had been stretched out to him from the clouds, to afford him anchor and refuge in the whirlwind by which he had been threatened.
This ceremony would be a protection in the hours to be passed alone with her, it would be the highest consecration of his purer will.
"And what do you think about it, Uli?" he asked, looking inquiringly at his friend.
"I for my part seek and value every opportunity," he replied, smiling back at Leo, "which lifts me above the barren level of every-day thoughts. Were my breathing apparatus like other people's, I should love to climb to high places and get a wider outlook. Such an outlook over what has been and is to be is found in preparing for the sacrament. I have heavy work in prospect, this winter, and shall be obliged in my section to offer opposition to the tactics of my friends--it will do me good to travel to Golgotha beforehand, to prove whether I am fit for it."
"What worlds he is above me," thought Leo. "He lives in the heart of his ideals, and suspects nothing of the pack of impure thoughts some people have to drag about with them."
It now only remained to be decided which church should be chosen. Leo was certain that Felicitas would sooner die than stand with him before the revengeful countenance of Pastor Brenckenberg. And he, too, could not have endured the ordeal. Anxiety at the threats and antics of this "man who knew" would have dispelled all devotional feeling. Also the neighbouring parish, in which Uhlenfelde was included, must be avoided or Brenckenberg's jealous fury would be aroused.
There remained as neutral ground, Münsterberg, and it seemed advisable to drive over to the church of Superintendent Fürbringer, who was much beloved in the district for his mild Christian spirit and charitable disposition.
The rest was easily arranged. Grandmamma, who consented joyfully, undertook to inform Johanna of the plan, and the "chicks" were not even consulted.
When Leo entered the castle of Uhlenfelde the next day, his hand was seized in a woman's warm trembling clasp, and he heard a fervid whisper at his ear.
"Thank you. Oh, thank you."
He drew back astonished. A shadow glided away; a glass door rattled in the distance. Perplexed, stunned, as if he had encountered a vision, he groped his way on to Ulrich's study. Those hotly whispered words of thanks continued to ring in his ears. The week passed in nervous impatience. On Saturday morning they were to drive over to confession, and Johanna came to the castle to join the others. In the searching glance she directed to him, Leo recognised with horror her never-slumbering suspicions. He felt that it would be beyond his powers of endurance to take an hour's drive, with the police-sergeant gaze fixed on him, so he ordered round the small dog-cart for his own use.
Hertha, who sat by the window, in hat and cloak, heard him, and looked surprised as her eyes wandered out into the pouring rain, and Johanna, who seemed to understand his reasons, smiled sourly to herself. The family coach started with its freight of ladies, and Leo followed a quarter of an hour later. Wrapped in his mackintosh, with his Scotch cap pressed far back on his neck, chewing his extinguished cigar, he drove along the spongy roads. He had left his man behind, for he wished to be alone. He was approaching the religious business as an adventure--an adventure on the result of which the weal or woe of his whole future depended. The strength that he no longer found in himself should descend on him from Heaven in this mystery of incarnation. Either the grace of God would endue him with peace now and henceforth, or it would be lost to him for ever. He drove by the Wengern Parsonage with averted face, as if he were a thief slinking by. And in reality it was rather like it. Stealthily and by a back way he was going to creep into the circle of the divine forgiveness, and try and obtain by a miracle what others struggled for with clean hands and hearts, and by dint of strong effort. The wheels rattled down into the ferry ruts. Old Jürgens informed him respectfully, that the ladies had just been taken across.
"Ah! the one who will be the gnädiger Herr's young bride is an angel," he added, beaming, while he let the dripping rope glide through his horny fingers.
"Bride? Which do you mean?"
"Why, gnädiger Herr the young gracious countess, of course!" replied Jürgens, and winked slyly, as people are wont to do when talking of a well-matched pair.
"Is the fellow mad?" he thought. But fear disarmed his anger. What would happen to Hertha if this gossip was already afloat?
Since that last encounter, they had been as strangers to each other, and had scarcely exchanged a morning or evening salutation, and now there could be no further question between them of two souls seeking a common ground of agreement. That which their silence concealed meant an eternal estrangement. But what did it all matter, compared with that great daily-growing need of his, which swallowed all minor cares, losses and trials, as if they had never existed?
Peace, peace, at any price!
The Halewitz and Uhlenfelde carriages were drawn up tractably side by side at the Münsterberg church door, and a few peasant equipages modestly brought up the rear. He stepped into the grey bare church. The first thing his eye lighted on were the words in gigantic, gold letters, "Peace be with you," which shone above the altar in a half-circle. They seemed the solitary decorations which this bare God's house, stuffed with pitch-pine benches, contained.
But what more did it want? What they promised to the pious worshipper, as a matter of course, was the one essential for which he was striving.
The words affected him so powerfully that he felt his tears rising. He hid himself quickly behind a pillar, and laid his open hand across his eyes. He cursed his soft-heartedness, and conjured up some of his wildest memories in order to regain the mastery of himself.
At last he dared to venture forth and look around him. On the middle benches sat several groups of working people; women who had cried their noses red, and men who stared with vacant curiosity at the organ and choir.
His own people had not yet entered the church. Apparently they were still lingering in the vestry, which was always open to the high nobility.
Thither he betook himself. His footsteps echoed through the aisles. The praying women raised their noses a little; the men watched him idly. Felicitas was the first to meet him in the vestry.
He recoiled with an involuntary shudder; then quickly recovered himself, and gravely gave her his hand, feeling conscious that Johanna was keenly observing everynuanceof their meeting. And as he looked up he was aware that, from the dark background, a second pair of eyes rested on them with questioning anxiety.
Then Ulrich came to shake him by the hand, and to introduce him to the superintendent, a lean, gentle-eyed man with glasses and greyish whiskers, who welcomed him in a clear high tenor. His voice sounded in his ears like a peace-giving orison, compared with Brenckenberg's thunderous growl.
They now moved into the church, and took their places on the benches. Ulrich sat on Leo's right; Elly on his left. So everything was arranged as it should be. The service began. A chorale was sung, and the usual penitential prayer followed.
Leo strove to attend, but he could not succeed. He still stared, as if fascinated, at the golden words which shone down on him from the wall--like a magic formula. He tried to tear his eyes away from them, but they seemed almost to hypnotise him. Peace, peace, at any price!
And then suddenly words from the altar penetrated to his ear. "In virtue of my spiritual office I announce to thee, 'that thy sins are forgiven.'"
He started up in surprise; could it be so rapidly, so simply done? That for which he had struggled with the tension of despair, with the offering up of his whole nature, was here, after a few moments of uncomfortable meditation, tossed into his lap like a casual gift, with a stereotyped speech by a strange, be-spectacled man.
How could it, how dared it happen thus?
Close by him sat the man against whom he had sinned; not to mention that other who rotted in the earth. A little father away was the woman with whom he had sinned, flooding him with the horror of her presence--and behind her, she who knew all. Everything was just as it had been five minutes ago; yet in spite of that his guilt was to be instantly wiped out, because the quiet man up there, in "virtue of his office," chose to say so, forsooth. How was one to believe it? The organ passed into the arabesques of a florid voluntary. The confession was at an end.
As Leo gave the superintendent his hand at parting, he met a friendly, well-meaning glance from behind the eye-glasses, which seemed to say, "Taken altogether, you must be a fine fellow."
"I was once," thought Leo, responding mutely to the mute speech, and he resolved on the spot to seek counsel and rest for his soul from this man of peace.
Pleading business in the town, he left his party to drive home without him. He promised Ulrich to look in at night, and avoiding a last significant look of Lizzie's, he went to lounge away two unprofitable hours on the tobacco-saturated horsehair cushions of the Prussian Crown, pawing, without appetite, the food which the officious landlord set before him.
Then he found his way to the superintendent's house, while the rain still poured from the heavens. The deal floor of the entrance-hall, as he came into it, gleamed silver in its polished cleanliness, as if it had just come from the carpenter's. The same aggressive polish radiated from the steps of the wooden staircase which led to the first floor. Every rib and vein in the boards was visible, though they might have lain there for many years. Biblical pictures in mahogany frames, crowned with wreaths of immortelles, hung on the snow-white chalk of the walls. A distinct odour of freshly roasted coffee permeated the atmosphere; an odour which has a habit of clinging to dwellings in which painful neatness is combined with modest cheer, and thus counts as a guarantee of bourgeois domestic bliss.
The door was opened noiselessly by a girl of twelve, who appeared on the threshold in a stiffly starched apron, with lappets which spread over her shoulders like the collar of a mandarin. She giggled artlessly, and then waited silently to hear what he wanted. Her flaxen hair differed so little from the colour of her skin, and was strained back so smoothly and flat over her head, that without the plaits, which formed a nest on her neck, it would have been difficult to see that she was not bald.
When Leo had expressed his wishes, she rubbed her nose a moment, and then vanished through another door. Not a sound was now audible.
"So this is what peace looks like," thought Leo, glancing round him. He felt as if he were standing at the entrance of the promised land.
"Papa says, will you come in, please?" said the little girl, with another spasmodic giggle.
He walked in.
The superintendent, in his long alpaca house-coat, with the pattern of the cushion against which he had been reclining imprinted in red lines on his right cheek, stood at the door. He was wiping his glasses, and blinked sleepily with his shortsighted eyes.
"Pardon," he said, in a friendly tone, "I have just been taking my middaysiesta, and have been lying on my glasses. Without them I am not quite sure with whom I have the pleasure----"
When Leo gave his name the expression of the thin mild face became a shade friendlier without losing its composure.
"This is a real honour for me, Herr von Sellenthin," he said, and invited him to sit down on the sofa covered with red flowery cretonne, which, as Leo dropped on to it, uttered a squeaking sound, and the springs of which made themselves disagreeably felt. "There are many roads which lead men to men," continued the shepherd of souls; "may I hope that the one you have come by is blessed?"
He stretched out both his hands to Leo, who seized them with grateful warmth.
"It may surprise you, Herr Superintendent----" he began.
"Pardon, dear Herr von Sellenthin, on the contrary, I might almost say, with truth, that I expected you."
"How? Expected me!" echoed Leo, astonished.
"Could there be anything more natural than that the penitent who is confiding his conscience to an unknown man, who promises him something so infinitely great, should wish to enter into closer human relations with him? Although we, as Protestants, do not recognise the institution of a father confessor, we don't desire to administer our healing in the lump. Each of us has his peculiarity, his prejudices, and, to come to the worst, his doubts, and it is to discuss one or other of these points, if I am not mistaken, that you have honoured me by coming here."
"You are right, Herr Superintendent," Leo replied, his confidence growing.
"And there is one more thing that I would say, my worthy friend. I do not intrude into the secrets of my brother penitents, and have no wish that they shall specify categorically the causes of their heaviness of heart, for that is difficult and awkward for both sides."
"It was not my intention to do so," said Leo.
"Capital! All the easier will it be to gain our object." And with a motion of his hand, he invited Leo to explain how his affairs stood.
"You may have heard, Herr Superintendent, that I for a long time shunned my birthplace," Leo began, involuntarily adopting, somewhat, in spite of his natural bluntness, the form of speech of the pulpit orator.
"I have certainly heard something to that effect," replied the latter, cautiously.
"For years I was knocking about in foreign countries, and gave very little thought to the salvation of my soul. I lived according to the morals and customs of my half-civilised surroundings, and saw nothing wrong in so doing."
"That can be taken for granted," the superintendent put in.
"But, now that I find myself back, and in normal circumstances, I see, with horror, the nature of the crime I am guilty of."
The superintendent made a slight inclination of the head, and stroked his shaven chin.
"That, too, is easily understood."
"Put yourself in my place. What once had seemed perfectly legitimate, and in accordance with my sense of honour, began to disturb my conscience, to torment me at night, to hunt me about by day, to render me slack in body and intellect; in fact, it has so transformed my character, that I am but the shadow of my former self."
The parson nodded contentedly, like a doctor does when the patient enumerates one after the other, symptoms of the disease which he has diagnosed beforehand.
"And for this evil you seek a remedy?" he asked.
"Yes."
"My dear friend, even in the very evil itself lies the remedy."
Leo felt the blind anger rise within him, which now so frequently overwhelmed him. This, after all, came to very much the same as Brenckenberg's doctrine.
"Don't frown, my dear friend, nor argue with God; but fold your hands, and praise His Holy Name for the grace which has brought you even to this condition of mind, and laid this leaven in your heart to prepare it for the blessings He will rain on you."
"What blessings?"
"The blessings of His infinite mercy. How can you even ask when you already stand on the threshold of Salvation? Like the blind man led by God's angel, you have been wandering, you knew not whither, and while you have been thinking yourself lost you suddenly find yourself even at the door of Heaven. A hidden voice has been bidding you to the Lord's Table, and this voice was even the voice of Divine Grace."
Defiance and suspicion fought for the mastery in Leo's soul. The little word "even," which the man interpolated so repeatedly into his sentences, irritated him. After using it he had a habit of pausing, while he smacked his lips, so that however dulcet and consoling his words might be, it gave his delivery an air of dryness. But never for a moment did he abandon the quiet, modest, warmhearted tone with which he had wooed Leo's confidence from the first.
"And, therefore, my dear friend, I may even promise you that to-morrow you will experience a divine miracle. The moment that the sacred chalice touches your lips the trouble you suffer from will be charmed away, and at the same time, the sin which you so earnestly repent will cease to distress you. If you had not intimated this penitence to me I could not speak with such assurance, but now I may bid you welcome as a worthy guest, whose soul is clad in white garments, to God's table."
Leo suppressed a scoffing smile. How unsuspecting and innocent it all sounded!
This worthy man, with his feet on the spotless, scrubbed boards of his house, breathing in the soothing fumes of roasted coffee-berries, tattooing his cheek every afternoon with the impress of the bead-embroidered cushion, what did he know of the depths and tortures of the hell in which he wrestled?
And, notwithstanding, how full of promises and evangelical consolation were his pronouncements! To hear him was like listening to a lullaby one sings to a crying infant.
A miracle was to happen! In truth, a miracle must come to pass, for in it his only chance of redemption lay. He had been on the watch for a miracle, and now one was prophesied. What more could he desire?
Meanwhile the little flaxen-haired daughter had come in from the next room, and now leaning against her father's knee she whispered something in his ear.
He looked at the clock, smacked his dry lips, as if he were on the point of saying "even," and shook his head smiling. Then a bright idea seemed to strike him. He turned to Leo.
"It would be doing us a great honour if you would drink a cup of coffee with us quietly?"
It might have been interpreted as a slight if he had declined the invitation, and two minutes later the small daughter, biting her lips in anxiety lest she should spill anything, carried in a china tea-tray, from which the fragrance of coffee, which had hitherto faintly filled the air, streamed in full strength. A woman's hand, with a polished wedding-ring on it, was visible for a moment at the latch of the door, but, having done its duty, was about to be withdrawn, when the superintendent said--
"Come in, dear wife, and let me present you to our distinguished guest."
A female figure, clad in black, appeared on the threshold. Spare, yet dignified; serious, yet friendly; severe, and yet kindhearted, this lady seemed admirably adapted to preside unostentatiously at Women's Unions and Mother's Meetings, and to take the place of honour with quiet self-possession beside the wives of the landed gentry. On her head she wore a black cap, scarcely larger than half a crown. Two wide ribbons floated over her ears to her shoulders, heightening the impression her personality made, of unassuming solemnity.
The superintendent introduced her to Leo. The hand she offered him was grey and bony, as a labouring woman's, and the fingers ploughed with needle-pricks. It was reported that this hand had scattered blessings for miles round.
"You are welcome, Herr von Sellenthin," she said, with a stiff bow, and then turning to her husband she added, in a low voice, "Shall I send in the honey-slabs?"
"Yes, by all means send them in," he replied, after a moment's reflection, with the same air of friendly composure with which he had been dealing with the salvation of Leo's soul.
The two men were again alone. The clergyman offered Leo cigars, pale yellow cigars, which smouldered slightly, and he himself lit a long pipe.
They discussed the affairs of the neighbourhood and topics of the hour in a calm, matter-of-fact way; the harvest, the increase of pauperism, and the strike in Saxony, which threatened even here to become a social evil. And thus they came to speak of the parish of Wengern.
The superintendent smiled. "Your deceased father," he said, "filled the cure there with a queer sort of fellow. To-day it wouldn't be possible, for the law of sanction is exercised much more rigidly than it used to be. I will confess to you that more than once I have prevented a storm bursting over his head, for the consistory would be glad to have done with him. He is only saved by his orthodoxy and the strict morality he preaches. If half of his goings-on were known, he would long ago have got his dismissal."
"And you, as his superior, tolerate him?" asked Leo.
"Yes, dear Herr von Sellenthin. How shall I express it? It lies in the weakness of the human heart that a man sometimes can't do what he ought. I believe that the pastor has eight children. I have only five. Peter is the rock on which the Church stands, but it also has its John. Why should one not take John for a model, so long as one isn't a member of the consistory?"
Leo pressed the simple man's hand in gratitude.
"And then, you know, Herr von Sellenthin, that in conference, Pastor Brenckenberg is the only man who has what, at the university, we called 'ideas.' It's a funny thing what becomes of those so-called ideas. When we were young we all had them in abundance, but they diminished as we grew older, and now one hardly knows what they are like. When one comes across them in another, they are apt to irritate at first, but finally one feels that they do good. Therefore I suffer Brenckenberg gladly in our midst. And besides that, Herr von Sellenthin, there is a homely saying which I have often found true, and which may apply even to your case. It is, that the majority of things are not so bad as they seem. You will ask, what about the deadly sins? God knows they exist in plenty. Seven of them, the Scripture says. But the main point is this. Why did the Saviour die on the Cross if we were to despair in our sins? Either that death seems to us an act of folly, which God forbid, or we believe in it even as a miracle, which every day of our lives is worked anew, and which to-morrow will be worked especially for you, my dear friend."
Filled with his harmonious views of life, he waved his cup to and fro complacently, to stir up the sugar in the dregs of his milk-coffee.
Leo rose to take his leave. This man, so inoffensive that one couldn't help liking him, was not the priest that his soul needed. So he hurried away, as much without comfort as he had come. He felt as if he could have shaken the dust of that home of peace from his feet, only there was no dust there to shake. He drove through the rainy twilight towards Uhlenfelde. Night had fallen before he drew up at its closed gates. His horse splashed in a pool of water, and a shower-bath of raindrops trickled on him from the leafless branches which flanked the road. He would have got down to pull the bell, but a numbness which had overtaken him made him set still instead, and stare in front of him.
The gate-posts stood there like a pair of black hounds on their hind legs, glowering at each other. To right and left a piece of the wall crept out into the night; the rest was hidden by the darkness. Only from the castle came one pale path of light. It was the lamp burning in the bay where Ulrich's writing-table stood. It shimmered towards him along the damp undergrowth of the park, which stood out of the darkness here and there in mirrorlike patches, as if it wished to guide him to the place which he hesitated to approach. But the further it penetrated the fainter became the light, till at last it was powerless to withstand the night-shadows which swallowed it.
Leo felt an icy shiver pass through his drenched body. "There is the priest I want," he thought; "the only one on earth who can save me."
But of what avail were these weak longings? He would only stand before him to-day, as always, biting his lips, his frightened glance wandering along the walls, a martyr to nervous fears and yearning, his ears strained to hear if a gliding step was coming along the corridor, the step of one who would sweeten his distress, and destroy his hope. What object would there be in coming here to-day, if he did not confess and repent? His whip cracked. The horse stamped as he turned round in the spluttering water, through which the wheels ploughed with a creaking sound. He gave a last look, full of impotent rage and dull, painful longing at the peaceable stream of light which, like everything else in the world, served only to reproach him, and then he drove furiously back by the way he had come, still faintly hoping for what now was hopeless.