"I must speak with you this evening in the park, under the weeping ash," Eric had said to Bella as they were getting out of the boat.
"This evening?" she asked.
"Yes."
"And in the park, under the weeping ash?"
"Yes."
She had of her own accord placed her arm in his, and they walked together in silence to the villa; then she relinquished his arm, and went straight to Clodwig and the Mother.
She knew not what she desired here, but she was happy, or rather soothed, when she saw them sitting so confidentially together. Yes, she thought, every one who gives an ear to him, and returns a stimulating reply occasionally, is as much to him as I.
She rose and went into the park; she walked about restlessly, knowing that Eric must get released from Roland, in order to keep the appointment with her. But she had no idea how hard it was for him to effect this; not so much because Roland was not obedient, and mindful every hour of the task set him, but because Eric was inwardly disturbed that he was obliged to assign to his pupil as a duty and a theme some noble thought, some lesson, some subject of study, merely to become temporarily freed from his presence. The book he gave him, the place he selected for him to read until his return, appeared to him perverted to a wrong use, dishonored and profaned; yet nothing else could be done. It was a bitter experience, but it was the last time; he would come out from this final interview pure and strong; and have a plain and straight path before him.
He became composed with this thought, and entered the park. He found Bella on the seat upon the height; she had evidently been weeping freely.
Hearing his step, she removed the handkerchief from her eyes. "You have been weeping?"
"Yes, for your mother, for myself, for us all! O, how often have I heard your mother ridiculed, blamed, pitied, and despised, for following the impulse of her heart and the man of her choice. For some time the saying was, To live on love and eight hundred thalers. She is now more highly favored than any of us. With blessed satisfaction she surveys now the past, and looks forward to the future in her son, and what are her deriders? Puppets, dolls,—gossipping, music-making, dancing, chattering, scandal-making dolls! They turn up their noses at the man who has become so rich on the labor of slaves, and our aristocratic fathers sell their children, and the children sell themselves, for a high rank in society, for horses and carriages, for finery and villas. The nobility, the poor nobility, is the inherited curse from ancestral pride, from slavery to the ancestral idea! A peasant woman, who gleans barefooted in the stubble-field, is happier and freer than the lady who is driven through the streets in her carriage, leaning back and cooling herself with her fan."
"I have one request," began Eric in a constrained voice; "will you bestow upon me one hour of your life?"
"One hour?"
"Yes. Will you listen to me?"
"I am attentive." As she gazed at him, her eye-brows seemed to grow larger and larger, the corners of her mouth to be drawn slowly down, and her lips to open as if parched with a feverish heat; nothing was wanting but the wings upon her head, and the snaky heads knotted under her chin, to give the perfect Medusa-look.
Eric was for an instant petrified; then collecting himself, he continued:—
"Two questions now rend my heart; one is, Has the violence of love taken from me life, study, and the power of abstract thought? The other is, Must a child of humanity, because destiny has once decided for him, become a lifelong victim to this determination? And these two questions resolve themselves into one, just as those snaky heads form one knot under the chin of the Medusa."
"Go on!" urged Bella.
"Well, then, there was one hour when I would like to have said to the beautiful wife sitting before me, 'I love thee!' and I would have embraced and kissed her, but then,"—Eric pressed his hand upon his heart, and gnashed his teeth,—"but that hour over, I should have put a bullet through my brain!"
Bella let her eyes fall, and Eric went on: "One hour, and then my peace was gone; I had nothing left. I could not sleep. I could not think. This could not last. I lost myself, and what did I gain? I saw all that this love devastated, and could it be love? No. Could I take it lightly like others, it would be light. But why is this the only thing to be made light of? Why is not the ideal of life also to be made light of, and why is not all feeling only a plausible lie?"
In a hoarse voice he added:—
"But I do not believe that love has the right to lay everything in ruins; but then perhaps it may be said, it is not real love. Pluck up heart, look at the world for yourself, see how pleasantly, respectably, and shrewdly it lies, the women tricked out with artificial beauty, and the men with superficial knowledge. Do you see the abyss on whose brink I stood? And here I said to myself. We are placed in the world in order to live, and knowledge and culture have been given us that we may get from them life and not death. And how could I look a noble man in the face, how could I look up to the sun in heaven, how was I to educate a human being, to stand erect in the world, to abhor crime, to discern the holy; how was I to take the word mother upon my lips, with the consciousness that I was myself the vilest of all, and that there was no moment in which I, and another also, must not tremble, and be filled with cowardly fear and despair."
Eric paused and placed his hand on his forehead; his voice choked, tears stood in his eyes.
"Go on!" cried Bella, "I am listening."
"It is well. This once do I speak thus to you, and only this once. You have courage to hear the truth. Our relation is not love, must not be love; for love cannot thrive on murder, hypocrisy, and treachery. I clasp your hand—no, I clasp it not, for I know I could not let it go, if I did. Here I stand—I speak to you, you listen to me—I speak to you, as if I were miles away, as if I were dead; there must be distance, there must be death, before there is any life."
"What do you mean?" interposed Bella.
She looked at Eric's hand as if he were about to draw a weapon from his bosom.
Breathing deep, he went on: "It must be possible for human beings who have been made conscious of where they are, to find again the right path from which they have wandered. My friend! you are happy if you understand the happiness, and you can and must learn to appreciate it; and I am happy. Howsoever my heart may be shattered, I know I shall come to understand my duty and my happiness. I have been, heretofore, so proud, I thought I had mastered the world and brought it under my feet, and so did you; and that we have met, is to be not for our destruction, but rather for our awakening into a new life.
"I foresee that the days will come when we shall coldly extend to each other our hands, and say, or even not say, though we feel and know it, that there was one pure hour, an hour won by a severe struggle, when we were exalted in our own souls, and because we held each other so highly, we did not debase nor degrade ourselves. This hour is hard, is overwhelming; but what is hard and overwhelming now, will be, in the future, tender and full of restoring strength.
"We would hold each other high, that we may not destroy the laws of righteous living. And here is life's duty. My friend, it was a saying of my father, The man of understanding must be able to obey the command of duty, with the same glow of zeal that others obey the command of passion. So must it be. The stars shine over our heads, I look upon you as upon a star that shines in its purity and in its ordained orbit. Ah! I do not know what I am saying. Enough! Let me now bid you farewell; when we meet again—"
"No, stay here!" Bella cried, grasping his arm, which she let go immediately, as if she had touched a snake.
She withdrew two steps, and threw back her head, saying:—
"I thank you."
Eric wanted to reply, but it was better that he should say nothing; he was about to go away in silence, when Bella cried:—
"One question! Is it true that you saw Manna Sonnenkamp, before you came here?"
"Yes."
"And you love her, and are here on her account?"
"No."
"I believe you, and I thank you."
There seemed to be in this utterance something consolatory to her, that she had not been sacrificed to love for another. She looked wildly around, moved her head right and left, and when she had become calm again, she said:
"You are right. It is well."
She seemed to be looking for something to give to Eric, without being able to find it; and now, as if she were giving utterance to a thought that had long lain upon her mind, and which anxiety for his welfare forced from her, she cried,—
"Be warned! Be on your guard against my brother; he can be terrible."
Eric went away; it was a hard matter to return to Roland, but he must.
He sat still by Roland's side for a short time, with his hands over his eyes; the light pained them, and he did not venture to look at Roland.
Then a servant, came with the message that the Count and the Countess were going to take their departure at once; Eric and Roland could bid them good-bye in the court-yard.
They went down, and heard that, contrary to the original plan, they were to set out immediately, and send the next day a carriage for Aunt Claudine.
Bella extended her gloved right hand to Eric, saying in a low tone:—
"Good-night, Herr Captain."
The carriage drove off.
Bella sat quietly as she rode homewards with her husband. After a long silence. Count Clodwig said,—
"My heart is full of happiness and joy; it is a real blessedness to see a woman who is sixty years old, and who has never had a thought that she needed to repent of."
Bella looked up quickly. "What does this mean? Has he any idea of what has transpired?
"That cannot be; he would not, in that case, have referred to it. But perhaps it is his lofty manner of giving a hint towards a life of purity."
She was fearful of betraying herself if she made no answer, and yet she was at a loss what to say. Making a violent effort of self-restraint, she said at last,—
"This lady is very happy in her poverty; she has a noble, highly-cultivated son."
Clodwig now looked round as if some one had pulled upon him. Could Bella have had any notion that the thought had crossed his mind,—What if this wife—and then Eric be thy son?
He was better off than Bella, for there was no necessity of his making any reply; but he inwardly reproached himself for having had the faintest impression of such a thought.
They drove along in silence; there was oneness of feeling, and yet each had saddening thoughts; for the rest of the way not a word was spoken. It seemed to Bella as if some mighty force must come and bear her away into chaos, into annihilation. The carriage rattled so strangely, the wheels grated, and the maid and the coachman looked to her like goblins, and the flitting shadows of the moon like pictures in a dream, and the carriage with its inmates like a monster; anger, shame, pride, humiliation, were stormily coursing through her heart, that had not yet been calmed.
She was enraged with herself that she, who was mature in worldly experience, had allowed herself to be carried away by such a girlish infatuation, for that was the name she still gave it. And had not her self-love been wounded? Was not this the first time that she had ever stretched out her hand without its being grasped?
It came across her that Eric might have overstated his love to her, in order to lessen the feeling of shame on her part. As she thought it over, it seemed to her that she detected something unnatural in his tone, something forced and constrained.
She thought again of Eric. Where is he now? Is he talking with any one? He certainly suffers deeply; he has saved himself and thee. Her thoughts were like a whirlwind. Now she scornfully exulted. It was only a trifling jest, an experiment, a bold play! She, Bella, the strong, had only tried to bring a young man to his knees before her, and she would have thrust him away with contempt if she had succeeded. She can say this—who can contradict her? Her whole past life was good evidence in her favor, and yet she felt ashamed of this lie.
But what is now to be done? she asked again. She is simply to be quiet; she will meet the man with indifference; her last word to him was to warn him against any attachment to Manna. There was the whole! That was the pivot on which, turned the whole bold game. She promised herself to root out of her soul every passionate feeling, every violent emotion. She was now grateful to the destiny that had aroused within her the strong forces of nature—her virtue had now been tried in the fire.
She took the veil from her face, and looked up at the stars. They should be witnesses that all immoderate, all childish allurements, that were unworthy of her, should be put far away. Now she silently thought of what Eric had said, "For this end are culture and knowledge bestowed upon us, that we should rule over ourselves."
As they were going up the hill on which Wolfsgarten was situated, there came over her a feeling of imprisonment; she thought her hands were tied, and she put them outside of her mantle. Clodwig thought she was seeking his hand; he took hers and held it with a gentle pressure.
They reached Wolfsgarten in silence, and Clodwig said, as they stood in the brightly lighted garden-saloon,—
"We can be silent in each other's company; and this is the fairest comradeship, when each one abides in himself and yet is with another."
Bella nodded, looking at the whole surroundings with a wondering glance. What is all this? To whom does all this belong? What power has brought her here? Where has she been? How would it be now, here alone with her husband, if-—-
It seemed to her that she must fall on her knees, grasp his hand, and beg for forgiveness.
But it is better, she thought, not for herself—she believed that she was ready to humble herself to the utmost,—but better for him not to know anything of what had transpired. It ought to be concealed from him. She bowed her head, and Clodwig kissed her brow, saying:—
"Your brow is hot."
Each retired to rest.
Bella sent her maid away and undressed without her aid to-night.
After Clodwig and Bella had driven off, the Mother went to the vine-embowered house with Eric. She led him by the hand like a little child; she felt his hand tremble, but she said nothing; when they had reached the steps, she said,—
"Eric, kiss me!"
Eric understood her meaning; she wanted to see if he could kiss her with pure lips. He kissed her. Mother and son uttered no word.
Every pain was removed from Eric's whirling brain. And truth requires it to be said, that the most painful thought was, that a feeling of regret had come over Eric, a short time previously. The tempter suggested that he had been too scrupulous, too conscientious. He had thrust from him a beautiful woman, who was ready to clasp him with loving arms. When he surprised himself in these thoughts, he was profoundly wretched. All pride, all self-congratulation, and all exalted feelings of purity, were extinguished; he was a sinner without the sin. He had believed himself raised upon a lofty eminence; he had even represented his love to Bella in stronger colors than the facts warranted. Now there was a recoil, and the whole power of the rejected and disdained love avenged itself upon his doubly sinful head.
For a long time he wandered about in the quiet night.
The soul has its feverish condition from wounds as well as the body, and equally requires a soothing treatment.
Eric had amputated a part of his soul in order to save the rest, and he suffered from the pain. But as the dew fell upon tree and grass, and upon the face of Eric, so fell a dew upon his spirit.
The self-exaltation of virtue was now taken out of him, washed away by his double repentance, and he was now again a child.
As he looked back to the vine-embowered house, he thought: I will, as a man, preserve within me the child; and still further he thought: Thou hast withdrawn thyself from temptation through the consciousness of duty; be tender towards the rich and great, to whom everything is offered, to whom so much is allowed; the consciousness of duty does not restrain them so absolutely as it does him who is in the world, him who must help and be helped by others, and who has lost everything when he has lost himself.
He returned home late in the evening; and at night he dreamed that he was struggling in the midst of the floods of the Rhine, and he, the strong swimmer, was not able to contend against the waves.
He shrieked, but a steam-tug drowned his cry, and the helmswoman of a boat looked down upon him with contempt—and all at once it was not the helmswoman, but a maiden form with wings and two brightly-gleaming eyes.
Early in the morning, a carriage from Wolfsgarten came for Aunt Claudine and the parrot.
For the thirty years since her marriage with the Professor, Frau Dournay had not passed a day without her sister-in-law; now, for the first time, she was letting her go from her. It seemed to both of them hardly conceivable that they could live apart from each other, but it had been decided upon, and must be.
Sonnenkamp was most politely attentive; he charged the Aunt to consider his house her home, and not to remain more than a few days as a guest at Wolfsgarten. He gave a basket full of carefully-covered grapes and bananas into the coachman's charge; the parrot's cage was on the seat near Aunt Claudine.
The parrot screamed and scolded as they drove off, and kept it up all the way, not liking, apparently, to leave Villa Sonnenkamp.
Herr Sonnenkamp proposed a drive to the Professorin, to help her forget the parting, but she answered, that not by diversion but by quiet reflection, can we compose and reconcile ourselves to the inevitable. Roland looked at her in surprise; these wore Eric's thoughts, almost his very words.
Several days passed quietly at the villa, which was hardly quitted even for visits to the vine-covered cottage. Bella's visit had brought a disquiet to the house, which still hung over them all, and they realized it afresh as they constantly missed the Aunt; Bella had taken something which seemed an essential part of their life. And besides, the house was again without any sound of music.
Eric and Roland were more industrious than ever, for the Mother had asked if she might not be with them in the study-hours, saying that she had never heard any of Eric's teaching. Eric knew that she wished to help him to keep a strict guard over himself; for though not a word had been said, she felt that something must have passed between him and Bella. And she not only wanted to watch over her son at every hour, but to inspire him by her presence to keep true to his duty to Roland.
So she sat with them from early morning through much of the day, breathing low, and not even allowing herself any needlework; and Eric and Roland felt a peculiar of a calm mind, of deep insight, and wide incitement in the presence of a third person, views. At first Roland often looked up at her, but she always shook her head, to remind him that he must give his whole mind to what he was about, and take no notice of her. Eric was completely free from the first hour, when he had caught himself giving such a turn to the lesson that his mother might learn something new, and had met her gaze, which said,—That's not the thing to be considered. He returned to his simple plan, without regard to his mother's presence. She was pleased with the methodical way in which Eric gave his instruction, and knew how to keep his pupil's attention. She listened with pleasure, one day, when he said that Indolence liked to say:—Nothing depends on me, a single individual; but, a nation and humanity consist of individuals; a scholar learns through single hours and days; a fruit ripens by single sunbeams; everything is individual, but the collected individuals make up the great whole. Eric had prepared himself, and read apposite passages from Cicero, and from Xenophon's Memorabilia. Roland must feel that he had the fellowship of the noblest spirits. But when they were alone, his mother said,—"I think that in illustrating everything and trying to give your pupil knowledge, you weaken and loosen his firm hold on fundamental principles."
Eric felt a shock of disappointment; he had hoped that his mother would express entire pleasure, and she was finding fault instead; but he controlled himself, and she continued, smiling:—
"I cannot help laughing, because my two points of criticism are really one and the same, looked at on two sides. The one view is this, that it seems to me dangerous to give your pupil, as you do, just what he desires: you follow the devious path of a young discursive mind, and just there lies the danger of private instruction. I mean, in this way it pampers the youthful mind by giving it only what it wishes for, not what it ought to have. The discipline of a definite course of study lies in the necessity of taking up and carrying forward what the connected plan requires, and not what may suit the fancy; this fits one for life too, for life does not always bring what we long for, but what we need and must have."
"And what is your second point?" asked Eric, as his mother paused.
"My second point is only a repetition of the first. I remember your father's saying once, that the first and only true support, or rather the very foundation of education, must be:—'Thou shalt, and thou shalt not; straight forward without comment, without explanation, without illustration.' Now ask yourself whether you are not weakening his character. When our Roland is brought into a conflict, I don't know whether knowledge will help him, rather than the ancient command: 'Thou shalt and thou shalt not.' I only say this to you that you may think it over; others may praise you, I must warn you. I can say, though, that you have attained one important point; the boy has a holy reverence for the spirit of the Past."
Eric grasped his mother's hand, and walked on sometime in silence. Then he explained to her how he wished to give Roland not only knowledge, but a firm foundation of self-reliance, on which his life might rest.
"My son," replied his mother, "you have set yourself a difficult task; you want to accomplish a three-fold work at once; that is not possible. Listen to me patiently. You want to complete and perfect a neglected education; you want to lead to higher aims, gaining at the same time a moral foothold and moral elevation, without using the means handed down to you; and, finally, you want to train a youth, who knows his own wealth, to be a useful, unselfish, even self-sacrificing man. Now why do you laugh, pray? I will stop, though I might add, that you want to make a boy without a family affectionate, and a boy without a country patriotic. Now tell me why you laugh."
"Forgive me, mother; there's reason in your being called Professorin; you have discoursed like a Professor from his desk. But let me tell you that the two-fold or the five-fold task is only a simple one in the end. I confess I have often said to myself that I might make it easier, but then I would ask myself whether this was not an attempt to excuse my own desire of comfort. I must make the experiment of placing a youth upon the platform of acting freely from-—-"
"Reason?" responded the mother. "Reason may give composure, but not happiness nor blessedness; reason may not be the nourishment which suits the young spirit. Remember, my son, that meat is good food, but we do not feed a new-born child on meat instead of milk. Do you understand what I mean?"
"Yes; you mean that religion is the mother's milk of the spirit."
"Exactly," said the Mother, in triumph. "Your father always said that no man had ever produced any great work, or accomplished any great deed, who did not believe in God; God is the highest object of imaginative thought. So long as philosophy cannot show a moral law which can be written, concisely and with perfect clearness, upon two tables of stone, education must make its progress through religion."
"Mother," answered Eric, "we believe in God more truly than those who would confine him within the limits of a book, of a church, or of a special form of worship."
"Ah," said his mother, "let us drop the subject. Do you see that butterfly, flitting in great circles against the window pane? The butterfly takes the glass, from its transparency, to be the open air, and thinks that he can pass through it, but dashes his head at last against the glass wall that seemed to be nothing but air. But enough, I am not strong enough for you. If your father still lived, he could help you as no one else can."
The conversation, now turning on the father's death, wandered away from the previous subject.
Frau Ceres was jealous because the Professorin devoted less time to her, and surprised them by suddenly expressing the desire to be present at the lessons, saying that she had more need of instruction than the rest. And Sonnenkamp also betook himself to Roland's room. He could never be idle, and so, when he did not smoke, he had the habit of whittling all sorts of figures out of a small piece of wood; and he was especially fond of cutting into grotesque shapes fragments of grape-vine roots. This was the only way he could sit and listen.
Eric saw that his instruction was interfered with by this heterogeneous assemblage. The Mother understood his disquiet, without a word being said, and staid away from the lessons. Frau Ceres and Herr Sonnenkamp soon did the same.
While Eric was enabled to banish, by a strict fulfilment of his duties, every trace of the disturbing element introduced by Bella, the Mother was full of restlessness. She had attained what had been the object of her strongest wishes, access to a large garden of plants and unlimited sway therein, and yet she was not quite content.
One morning, as she was walking early in the park with her son, she said:—
"I have discovered something new in myself: I have no talent for being a guest."
Eric interposed no questions, for he knew that she would reach the goal, even if she took a roundabout way. The Mother continued:—
"I have the feeling that I must bring something to pass; I cannot be forever a passive recipient; and here is the special danger of riches. The rich look upon themselves as guests in this world; they themselves have nothing to do, and others must do everything for them. I tell thee; my dear son, that I cannot stand it, I must do something. You men, you can work, create, influence, and renew your life by what you do, while we women can only recreate and restore our life by loving."
Eric suggested that she accomplished her part by simply being, but the Mother very energetically responded:—
"I am always vexed with Schiller for this: he should not have said, it isn't like him to write, 'Ordinary natures pay with what they do; noble ones with what they are.' That sounds like a carte blanche for all do-nothings, with or without coronets upon their seals."
Eric held up to her the satisfaction arising from her influence upon Frau Ceres; but the Mother shook her head without any remark.
She had placed great hopes in that, but such an enigmatical and incomprehensible person was presented to her view, that she seemed to herself wholly useless. She would not acknowledge to her son that the house had something oppressive to her; that the family had all its glory and pride in external possessions, so that everything here appeared external, directed by alien hands, and altogether destitute of any strength developed from within.
Fräulein Perini spoke always of Frau Ceres as "the dear sufferer." From what was Frau Ceres suffering?
The Professorin had once lightly touched upon the thought how greatly Frau Ceres must miss her daughter; when, with eyes sparkling like those of a snake as it suddenly darts up its head, she sent Fräulein Perini, who was at hand, into the garden; she then said to the Professorin, looking timidly round:—
"He is not to blame; I, only I. I wished to punish him when I said that to my child; but I did not mean she should go away."
The Professorin begged that she would confide the whole to her, but Frau Ceres laughed like a person wholly beside herself.
"No, no, I shall not say it again, and certainly not to you."
The distress which the Professorin had experienced at the first interview with Frau Ceres was felt anew. She believed now that she knew the suffering of the dark-eyed woman, who, sometimes listless, and sometimes restless as a lizard, was troubled by a thought which she could not reveal, and could not wholly keep back.
Like a child to whom a story is told, she was urged by Frau Ceres to tell her over and over again about the court fêtes, which alone seemed to awaken any interest. Frau Ceres was delighted to hear the same things repeated.
But the mother took care to show that a princess has a special employment for every hour, and that a regular performance of duty was of great importance. She spoke earnestly, and came back often to the consideration, that a woman like Frau Ceres, born in a Republic, could have not the remotest conception of all this, and that it was like being suddenly removed into another century.
"I understand everything that you and your son say," Frau Ceres stated, "but what other people say, except the Major, I hear it indeed, but I don't know where I am. Just think, I was afraid of you at first."
"Of me? No one was ever afraid of me before."
"I will tell you about it some other time. Ah, I am sick, I am always sick."
The Mother did not succeed in arousing Frau Ceres out of her life of mere alternate sleeping and waking.
Sonnenkamp met the Mother with demonstrations of deepest respect, and seemed to practise upon her his airs and attitudes of genteel behavior. He delicately hinted that he had faithfully kept the agreement, and had never asked her what his wife said and desired; and now he would only beg to be permitted to make one inquiry, whether Frau Ceres had never spoken of Manna.
"Certainly, but very briefly."
"And may I not be allowed to know what this brief communication was?"
"I don't know myself; it is still a riddle. But, I beseech you, do not lead me to disloyalty and breach of trust."
"Breach of trust." cried Sonnenkamp with trembling lips.
"Ah, it was not the right word. Your wife has confided nothing to me, but I believe,—I pray you not to mistake me,—I suspect, she is secretly afraid of Fräulein Perini, or is vexed or angry with her. As I said before, I am very far from meaning to blame Fräulein Perini, and I almost repent of having said as much as I have."
"You can be at rest on that point. My wife would like to send Fräulein Perini out of the house ten times every day, and ten times every day to call her back again. There is no person, not even yourself, who is more needful to her and more useful than Fräulein Perini." The Professorin longed to be out of the house, and she could find no adequate reason for the deep hold which the desire had taken upon her. She had no desire to be made the depositary of secrets, nor to solve riddles, and yet she was incessantly occupied with the thought of the daughter of the house. A child, a grownup girl, whom such a family abandoned, perhaps this maiden was a charge for her; but how it was to be, she could not perceive, and yet the thought would not leave her.
She wanted to question the Major, Clodwig, and Bella; and she would even have liked to have recourse to Pranken, but Pranken had not been visible for several weeks. She got Joseph to show her Manna's room one day; and while there, it seemed to her as if the dear child were calling her, and as if it were her duty to lend her a helping hand.
She wrote a letter to the Superior, informing her that she would pay her a visit at the first opportunity.
When Sonnenkamp was alone in the garden, in the hot-houses, in the work-room, or his seed-room, he wore perpetually a complacent, triumphant smile, often congratulating himself upon his success in making persons and circumstances play into his hands, ruling, bending, and directing them, just as he did the fruit in the garden.
The refractoriness and the indolence of Frau Ceres were very serviceable, at first, in lending to the whole establishment an air of respectability. It gave the appearance of self-containedness, as if there was no need of other people; as if there was everything in their own circle, and what should be superadded to this would be received graciously, but was not an absolute necessity. But this appearance of seclusion soon became a sort of mysterious riddle, and excited curiosity and scandal.
Sonnenkamp had foreseen this, but had not anticipated that this state of feeling would last so long. The shyness and reserve of the dwellers in the vicinity in forming any intimate relations with him, and their failure to visit him on familiar terms, gradually disturbed him. This distance must not be allowed to have too much weight, it had better not be noticed; and complaisance must be shown towards these who hold themselves thus distantly, and it must not be seen that their bearing is remarked at all.
The relation to Otto von Pranken had begun with the stable, but proceeding farther, by the connection of the families promised now a firm basis in the future. Until now, Sonnenkamp's house, park, and garden, considered as a whole, seemed like some isolated, alien, and extraneous plant within a flower-pot. Through Eric and his family the roots had begun to spread, and the plant to grow independently in the open ground.
The intimate relation with Clodwig and Bella, which Pranken had not been able to bring about, had been effected through Eric; and now the Professor's widow was to carry that still farther, by giving and receiving visits which would naturally unite the families.
Sonnenkamp very cautiously expressed to the Mother his regret, that his wife did not incline to keep up a neighborly acquaintance with the respectable families around. The Mother had a desire to get a look into the life of this part of the country, and to express thanks to those who had manifested so much friendliness towards her son. She wanted first to visit the house of the Doctor. Sonnenkamp suggested that she should then call upon the Justice's family. He placed his whole house at her disposal if she wished to make invitations.
One beautiful Sunday in the latter part of summer was fixed upon for visiting the neighborhood.
Frau Ceres had promised to go with them, but when the morning came for them to start, she declared that it was impossible. The Professorin now observed, for the first time, a spice of artfulness in her; she had consented, evidently, to avoid being urged; and now she planted herself upon her own will, without making any plea of ill health.
Fräulein Perini remained at home with her.
They drove first to Herr von Endlich's, although they might have known that the family were absent; they wanted only to leave their cards.
From Herr von Endlich's Sonnenkamp returned to the villa, and left Roland, Eric, and the Mother, to proceed to the town. He called out to them at parting, that they must take care not to drink all the wine that should be offered them.
And when the Mother was now driving with Eric and Roland, the thought occurred to her that she was not making these visits on her own account; but she was just as happy in making them as the representative of her friendly host.
Roland wished them to stop as they were going along, for they met Claus, the field-guard. Roland introduced him to Eric's mother; she extended her hand, and said she would soon give him a call.
Claus, looking very much gratified, and pointing to Roland, replied:—
"Yes, yes, if I had to turn out a grandmother for him, it would be nobody else but you."
They laughed, and drove on. When they reached the town, the bells of the newly-erected Protestant church were just ringing. It stood upon a hill, from which there was a wide view of the country around.
The Mother stopped, and went with Eric and Roland into the church.
Roland had never been in a Protestant church while service was going on. The Mother requested him not to go in now, when she heard him say this, but to proceed directly with Eric to the town; he was bent, however, upon remaining with her.
They entered the simple, plain building just as the congregation was finishing the hymn. The Mother was pained to hear a discourse on eternal punishment, delivered in a high-pitched voice, and regretted in her own mind that she had yielded to Roland.
After they had taken a survey of the cheering landscape on coming out, the Mother took Roland's hand, saying:—
"When you are prepared for it, I shall make you acquainted with one of your countrymen, from whom you can get higher views."
"Is it Benjamin Franklin? I know him."
"No; the man I speak of is a preacher who died only a few years ago; a man of the deepest religious nature. I am glad to have known him personally; he has been a guest at our house, and I have taken him by the hand. He and your father, Eric, became intimate friends at once."
"Do you mean Theodore Parker?" inquired Eric.
"I mean him, and I feel elevated to have had such a man live with us."
"Why have you never spoken of this man?" said Roland, turning to Eric.
"Because I did not wish to interfere with the faith in which you were brought up."
Eric said this without meaning to reprove his mother, and yet she was alarmed when she heard his reply; she repeated, that Roland would learn about the man after his judgment had become more mature.
The mischief, however, had been done, of pointing out to the youth something which was now withheld from him; and as he had never been accustomed to being denied, anything, he would now, as usual, be eager after what was forbidden, and if it was not given him, he would take secret measures to get it himself.
Eric and Roland received the salutation of many coming out of church. Eric introduced his mother to the School-director, the Forester, his wife and sister-in-law, who all accompanied the friends into the town. The walk along the public highway was pleasant; there is nothing, on the whole, like this pleasant mood with which a large number of persons of various condition and character return from church.
"Wasn't the Doctor's wife at church?" asked the Mother.
They told her that she never went on Sunday morning, but staid at home to comfort the country people who came early on Sunday; she often gave them simple household remedies, and arranged the order in which they should be admitted to the Doctor on his return.
Eric now heard, for the first time, that they called the Doctor's wife Frau Petra. She had something of St. Peter's office, the keeping of the door into the heavenly kingdom of healing.
They entered the Doctor's house. The cleanliness of the entry floor and steps was notable as usual, and on the walls good pictures were hanging, no one of which seemed to owe its position to chance. Green climbing-plants were standing upon pier-tables, and sending out their tendrils in all directions. In the sitting-room the work-table was placed under the window, before which was a street-mirror; and on the table itself stood a camelia in full bloom. They heard the Doctor's wife saying in the next room,—
"Yes, good Nanny, you are talking the whole time about religion and conformity to the will of God, and now you are clear down in the depths of despair, and out of patience, and unwilling to take kindly advice. My husband can give medicine, but you must give yourself love and patience. And you, Anna, you give your child too much to eat and then you have to keep coming for help. One can't get understanding at the apothecary's. And you, Peter, you go home and apply a bandage wet with warm vinegar."
Nothing further was heard. Apparently the servant had come in and announced the arrival of the visitors.
The door opened, and the Doctor's wife entered. She gave a hearty greeting to the Mother, and ordered the servant to bring a bottle of wine and three glasses. In spite of the Mother's refusal, the gentlemen must drink.
When the Professorin lauded the beneficent influence of the Doctor's wife, the latter at once accepted the praise saying,—
"One can learn something in more than forty years' experience, such as I have had. At first I shuddered, but I was always angry with myself for it; now I have learned from my husband what stands me in the best stead."
"What is that?"
"Rude bluntness, the only effectual thing. Each one is thinking about himself, but why talk about myself?"
She expressed her satisfaction at becoming acquainted with the Mother. The two ladies smiled when Roland said:—
"We went to the church, and from there we came to you, and we think we are much better off here."
The wine came, and Eric and Roland drank the health of the Doctor's substitute. Then they went to the study of the Physician, and Eric explained the anatomical charts to Roland.
The Mother urged the Doctor's wife, with whom she was visiting, to return her visit soon, and expressed the hope of great good to result to Frau Ceres from her resolute nature.
"I should be afraid of being too blunt," answered the Doctor's wife, whose nature was in reality exceedingly gentle and considerate.
"I trust you will pardon my boldness; is it true that Manna is to be taken from the convent, and have her education completed by you?"
The Mother was amazed. What was to her only a vague thought, was the gossip of the neighborhood. She could not imagine what had given rise to it, and the Doctor's wife could not tell where she had heard it.
When the Mother now made particular inquiries about Manna, the Doctor's wife said that Roland was the only one of Sonnenkamp's family whom she knew. She knew nothing at all about Manna; but Lina, the Justice's daughter, had been her friend, and from her something definite might be learned.
The Physician joined them, but did not stay long. He waited only to get, as soon as he could, the report from his wife.
The Mother took leave, and Frau Petra did not urge her to remain, saying that she had still to speak with several of the patients before they went.
In lively spirits they left the house.
They had to wait longer at the Justice's, for wife and daughter must first make their toilet. When they finally appeared, they had many apologies to make for the disorderly appearance of the room, and for their own hurried toilet; yet dress and room were as neat and pretty as one could wish.
The messenger was sent after the Justice, who was taking his Sunday's glass; and when at last the Professorin had taken a seat in the corner of the sofa, where one could hardly find room among the embroidered cushions, a pleasant conversation ensued. The Justice's wife had adroitly made mention of her father, whom the Mother knew, and they gradually established an agreeable intercourse, after the first awkward preliminaries were all over. The Professorin knew how to draw Lina out, and was greatly pleased with her bright description of the convent-life. Lina was encouraged by this, so that she became more and more animated and communicative, to her mother's great astonishment.
The Justice made his appearance. He had evidently swallowed down his glass hastily, for nothing ought to be left unfinished. He shook the hand of the Professorin longer and harder than was at all necessary, and assured her humorously—humor seemed very odd on the little man's grave face—of his magisterial protection. He then gave an account to Eric and Roland of the Pole's having broken out of the House of Correction, and of their having put up an advertisement for his apprehension, but they would be glad never to see him again.
The Justice's wife and Lina put on their hats, and went with their guests by a circuitous path along the Rhine to the house of the School-director, not without some consciousness, perhaps, of the good appearance they were making. Eric walked with the Justice's wife, the Justice joined Roland, and Lina went with the Professorin.
Lina began of her own accord to talk of Manna, of her present melancholy, and of her former liveliness; she had cherished the most enthusiastic love towards her father, so that it seemed as if she could not leave him for a single day; and Lina begged the Mother to use her influence to have Manna return once more.
The Mother carefully refrained from making any inquiries, but it struck her strangely that from these visits, made only out of politeness, a new duty seemed to be unfolding before her.
If she had been able to imagine that she was only used by Sonnenkamp to play into his own hands, she would have been still more astonished at the various phases which one simple occurrence may assume.
They did not find the family of the School-director or of the Forester at home; as they were returning in the carriage and driving by the Doctor's house, his wife was standing in the doorway; she called to them to stop.
She came out to them, and said that she had forgotten to remind the Mother to call upon the Major and Fräulein Milch to-day; the Major was very good-natured, but he was very sensitive in regard to the respect shown him, and he never forgave any one for neglecting to pay the proper attention to Fräulein Milch. Fräulein Milch was a very excellent, respectable person, if they could overlook one thing.
They returned to the villa in good spirits.
The first person they met in the courtyard was the Major. He looked somewhat out of humor, but his countenance lighted up when the Professorin said that she had intended to call upon him and Fräulein Milch to-day, and to get a cup of coffee, as she unfortunately could not fall into the ways of this part of the country, and drink wine every day.
The Major nodded; but he soon went off to send a child of the porter's to Fräulein Milch with the welcome message.
The Mother was very animated, and Eric expressed his joy that his mother experienced something of that exhilaration produced by a sight of the life of the people and the life of nature along the Rhine.
When Roland came to dinner, he said in a low tone to the Professorin:—
"I have looked into the Conversations-Lexicon, and to-day is Theodore Parker's birthday; to-day is the twenty-fourth of August."
The Mother whispered that it would be well for him to speak of it to no one but her.