When, after a night of torturing restlessness, Gotthold suddenly awoke from his heavy morning sleep, the sun had already been shining through the white lace curtains of his chamber for several hours. "Thank God," he said aloud, "morning has come, and with the morning everything will doubtless look brighter."
He was soon dressed, and standing at the open window. How familiar the scene was to him. There was the circular space, with its grass-grown walks, and the little obelisk in the centre, surrounded by pleasant white houses with pretty gardens; yonder the stately schoolhouse, from whose open windows the singing of the boys rang out so distinctly upon the quiet of the Sabbath morning, that he fancied he could distinguish the words of the hymn. On the right hand, peering between the houses, and rising above their roofs, appeared the dark green foliage of the huge trees in the royal park, and far away on the left, between other dwellings, gleamed a portion of the lake, and the tiny islet--just at this moment sparkling in the sunlight--which lies before the large island. He had seen the beautiful picture hundreds and hundreds of times just as he saw it now, when, after the morning service was over, he stood at the window of the school-house with Curt, his eyes wandering towards the region where beloved Dollan lay; and even as now it allured him from the narrow walls of the room out into the sunny fields, the shady woods, and by the blue lake. These lights, these shadow, this brilliant azure hue had kindled in the boy a pure desire to reproduce, to counterfeit what lay so clearly, though in such complicated lines before him, and so deeply stirred his heart with strange forebodings. They had been his first teachers in the wonderful language of lines and colors; and fluently as he had since learned to speak it, he was still indebted to them for all that he had attained. Had he not felt yesterday, when he drove through the familiar scenes, heavy as was his heart, that all his toil and labor in beautiful Italy had been more or less vain, and he had always painted only with his eyes and hand, never with his heart; spoken a beautiful, musical, but foreign tongue with difficulty, instead of his native language; and that here, and here only, in his native country, and beneath his native sky, could he become a true artist, who does not utter what others can say as well or better, but what he alone can express, because he is himself what he says.
But could home really still be home to him after all that had happened, all he had experienced and suffered here? Why not, if he only saw it with the eyes with which he endeavored to see the rest of the world; if he wished to be nothing more than what, in his good hours, he believed himself to be--a true artist, living only in his ideal creations, behind whom everything that fetters other men lies like an unsubstantial vision, and for whom, when in evil plight, there is a God to whom he can tell what he suffers. Yes, his art, chaste and severe, had been his guiding-star in the labyrinth of his early days, his talisman in the misery and poverty of the years he had spent in Munich, his refuge at all times; and she should and would continue to be so--would cling loyally to him if he was faithful to her, and ever throned her reverently on high as his protectress, his adored goddess.
The boys' song died away. Gotthold passed his hand over his eyes, and turned back into the room just as there was a loud knock at the door.
"What, is it you, Jochen?"
"Yes, Herr Gotthold, it is I," replied Jochen Prebrow, after putting the coffee-tray he had brought in as carefully on the table as if it had been a soap-bubble, which would break at the slightest touch. "Clas Classen, from Neuenkirchen, or, as they call him here, Louis, had just gone down cellar when you rang, and I thought the coffee would taste none the worse for my bringing it."
"Certainly not; I am very much obliged to you."
"And besides, I wanted to ask when I should harness the horses."
"I shall remain here a few days," replied Gotthold.
At these words a smile began to overspread Jochen's broad face, but it instantly vanished again as Gotthold continued: "So you must drive on alone, old friend."
"I should like to stay here a few days too," said Jochen.
"And you cannot unless I keep the carriage? Then I will, and, what is of more value to me, you; and we will go on at once to Dollan, which I suppose is what you want. Or do you think the horses ought not to be left so long?"
Jochen had no anxiety on that score. His good friend, Clas Classen, whom the people here had the strange custom of calling Louis, would willingly undertake the care of them and see that they had all they needed, but why did Herr Gotthold walk when they had horses and carriage on the spot?
"But I should prefer to walk," said Gotthold.
"Well, what's one man's meat is another man's poison," said Jochen rubbing his thick hair. "But there's still another difficulty in the way: you will find the nest empty."
"What do you mean?"
"They passed through here an hour ago, both the gentleman and lady," replied Jochen. "I was sitting in the coffee-room and they stopped at the door."
Gotthold stared steadily at Jochen. She had been there, so near him, under the window at which he had just been standing, and he might have seen the pure face again as Jochen saw it, who spoke of it as coolly as if it were a thing that might happen every day.
"And did you speak to her, Jochen?" he said at last hesitatingly.
"The lady remained in the carriage," said Jochen; "but he came in to drink a little rum, and as there was nobody else in the room, and I had just got some out of the cupboard for myself, I helped him to it; and then he asked where I came from, and I told him I was here with a gentleman, but I thought we should go on to-day as soon as he was up. He asked if I knew the gentleman; but of course I didn't; for, thought I, the friendship between those two was never very great, and the less one has to do with Herr Brandow the better. Wasn't I right? Well, and so one word led to another, and he took out his watch and said he was going to Plüggenhof and should probably stay there till to-morrow evening, and then he drank his rum, which he will perhaps pay for when he comes back, and away he went; he had a pair of splendid bays, thorough-breds, especially the saddle-horse. You would have been delighted with them, for you are a judge of horses; I saw that yesterday."
Gotthold's eyes were still fixed steadily upon the floor. She would not even know that he had been here.
Be it so! He had not intended, even for a moment, to cross her path; and now the way was open, perfectly open; he could carry out unhindered, and without any pain, the plan he had formed yesterday when he returned from the Wollnows' through the park to the inn.
An hour afterwards the two men were walking along the road to Dollan, at first upon the highway, then by side paths and short cuts, every foot of which Gotthold knew.
He walked on, lost in dreams of the days that had fled and could never return, while far above his head the larks sang unceasingly, the black crows stalked over the quiet fields abandoned to Sabbath solitude, the bright-plumaged jays fluttered over the moors, and above the border of the distant woods an eagle wheeled in majestic circles. Jochen, who had taken nothing except Gotthold's dressing-case and paint-box tied up with his own little bundle in a gay cotton handkerchief, generally loitered a little behind and did not disturb his silent companion by any undue loquacity. Jochen had his own thoughts, which to be sure did not dwell upon the past but the future, thoughts he would gladly have uttered, only that he knew not how to guide the conversation in that direction. But they were approaching nearer and nearer to the corner of the woods, where he must part from Gotthold for the day, and if he wished to hear his opinion at all, now was the time. So he took heart, overtook his companion with a few long strides, walked on a few minutes by his side in silence, and was not a little startled himself when he suddenly uttered aloud the question he had mutely repeated a hundred times: "What do you think about marrying, Herr Gotthold?"
Gotthold paused and looked in astonishment at the worthy Jochen, who also stood still, and whose broad face, with its staring eyes and half-open mouth, wore so singular an expression that he could not help smiling.
"What put that into your head?"
"Because I want to get married."
"Then you must know about it far better than I, who do not."
Jochen closed his lips and swallowed several times, as if he had taken too large a mouthful. Gotthold was now forced to laugh outright.
"Why, Jochen," he exclaimed, "why are you so mysterious to an old friend? I will gladly give you my best advice, and if I can, and you care about it, my blessing also, but I must first know what the matter is really about. So you want to be married?"
"Yes, Herr Gotthold," said Jochen, taking off his cap and wiping the drops of perspiration from his brown forehead; "at least I don't exactly, but she says she has always wanted me."
"That is something, and who is she?"
"Stine Lachmund."
"But, Jochen, she is at least fifteen years older than you."
"She can't help that."
"No, certainly not."
"And then she is a capable woman, who has a good stout frame and strong bones, only it is a little hard for her to move about because she has rather too much flesh now, but she says that would probably go off if she had more work to do than she has at the Wollnows', where life is altogether too easy."
"Well, if she thinks so herself."
"Yes, and then she has put by a pretty sum of money at the Wollnows', and her old father and mother at Thiessow,--you know, Herr Gotthold, we sailed over there once with the young master, and there was a terribly high sea outside, so that we got there as wet as cats, and old Lachmund thought we must really have had a ducking."
"And then he made us a stiff glass of grog," said Gotthold.
"And our young master drank a little too much, and played all sorts of pranks in the old man's long jacket, with his sou'wester on his head--that was a jolly time, Herr Gotthold." Jochen had lost the thread of his story, but Gotthold kindly prompted him, and he now went on to relate that the old couple, rich people for their station in life, who had kept a sort of inn in the large fishing village, at last wished to resign the sceptre they had so long and obstinately held to their only daughter, and give themselves up to repose for the rest of their days, on condition that she should instantly marry some good man.
So Stine Lachmund, whom Jochen had visited in the kitchen at the same time that Gotthold had been calling upon her master and mistress, had reported, and asked Jochen whether he would be her husband.
"For you see, Herr Gotthold," continued Jochen, "she don't take to everybody, and she has known me, as one might say, all my life, and knows I am an orderly, sober man, who understands how to take care of horses, knows enough about farming, and can even manage a boat, if it doesn't blow too hard."
"Then so far everything would be perfectly suitable," said Gotthold, "but now we come to the principal thing: do you really love her?"
"Yes, that's just it," replied Jochen thoughtfully. "She asked me herself last night, and what was I to say?"
"The truth, Jochen, nothing but the truth."
"I did, Herr Gotthold, I did tell the truth. 'Not yet,' I said, and then she laughed and said that would do no harm, all that would come right if the woman and the man were well-behaved. I must ask you, you would give me the right advice."
"I?"
"Yes, you would know about it; you had always been a good man, and--and--"
"And?"
"And if you had married our young lady, she would have been a great deal better off than she is now; yes, and, Herr Gotthold, I only saw her side face this morning through the window, as she sat alone in the carriage; but this I must say, she doesn't look over happy, and Stine says she has not much reason to. Do you think so too, Herr Gotthold?"
"I don't know, I hope"--replied Gotthold, "people talk so much,--but we were speaking about your offer."
"Yes, and what do you say now?"
"What is there to be said? If you feel inclined, marry Stine, who is certainly a worthy, honest girl, and may you both be as happy and prosperous as you deserve."
They had seated themselves in the shade at the edge of the wood, in order to carry on this important conversation quietly, but now Gotthold rose, hastily seized his travelling case and paint-box, which Jochen had laid on the grass beside him, warmly shook the hard brown hand of his companion, and entered the forest without casting another glance behind. Jochen looked after his retreating figure, then took his own little bundle on a stick over his shoulder, and began to ascend the moor, above whose topmost crest the roof of his father's smithy was just visible.
Gotthold hurried restlessly through the forest with hasty steps, as if he had not a moment to lose. But it was only the tumult of sore, sorrowful thoughts, that drove him on and would not leave him, any more than the swarm of flies which had entered the woods with him and hovered about his head, now rising, now falling, now lingering behind, now flitting on before.
"To think that I must always hear it, everywhere, and from all tongues," he murmured, "as if I were responsible for it; as if it were a reproach to me that she is not happy! Happy! Who is? Perhaps the infallible people who can recite, their moral multiplication table forward and backward like this Wollnow, the wise, self-righteous Pharisee; or like good Jochen, to whom fifteen years more or less in his Stine is of no consequence, provided a good maintenance is guaranteed him. But on the other hand--am I happy? Are thousands and thousands of others, who have scarcely a greater fault than that they are men, men with hearts that feel and sympathize, suffer and compassionate? A curse upon compassion and sympathy! They make us the pitiful creatures we are. What are you rustling, venerable beeches, which for centuries have strewn your withered leaves each Autumn over the soil of this forest, only to shine forth again in Spring in the full beauty of your green foliage? What are you murmuring, little brook, as you carry your clear brown water to the sea as busily to-day as when I played upon your bank, a merry boy, and thought it a heroic deed to leap across you from shore to shore? Alas! in the rustling, the murmur, I hear the same song that the swallow sang yesterday, the song of the eternal youth of Nature, which is ever the same, always equally strong, equally beautiful; and of the transitoriness, the frailty of men, who prolong a sorrowful, yet greedy existence by fear and hope, eat this shadowy food until death, and yet are happiest while their hearts can still hope and fear, their hearts which can never again be filled if once emptied, or if they fill and throb once more, fill with contempt, throb with indignation, that they could ever have been so foolish as to beat anxiously in blended hope and fear. Well, I no longer hope, so I need not fear even the view that awaits me yonder."
From the broader, but completely neglected road that had hitherto followed the course of the forest stream, and, turning to the right, still pursued its windings deeper into the woods to the sea, a foot-path branched off to the left and led upward, at first between the trunks of huge trees, but gradually through more and more stunted underbrush, which finally dwindled into heather and broom that covered the whole crest of the hill to its highest point, where the men of ancient times, in memory of one of their princes, had reared a huge monument of massive blocks of stone, now covered with thick moss, and partly buried in the earth. It was the spot from which Gotthold, with an unsteady hand, had made the colored sketch he afterwards used for the painting that hung in Frau Wollnow's room.
And now he stood there again, after ten long years--in, the shadow of one of the blocks of stone which protected him from the burning rays of the sun, while before him stretched the landscape with whose wondrous beauty the boy's eyes had never been satiated. Ah! Time had not obliterated a single charm; nay, it seemed as if the hour was expressly adapted to show him the Paradise of his youth in all its magic.
The hour of noon! The brilliant sunlight bathed the tops of the beeches, over which his eyes wandered to emerald meadows and golden cornfields--the meadows and fields of Dollan, which lay like a quiet sunny Eden among the shaded, wood-covered hills that enclosed it on all sides. Amid the meadows and fields, relieved against the darker foliage of the trees in the garden, appeared the straw thatched roofs of the farm buildings, and the tiled roof of the long, low mansion-house, in whose red gable he could distinctly perceive the tiny window of the little room he had occupied with Curt whenever he went to Dollan. What memories that little window evoked! It seemed as if his eyes were fixed upon it by some magic spell, and could scarcely turn away either to the right, where the hills opened and afforded a view of the blue sea upon which the distant white sails glittered like stars, or to the left, to glance over the wide brown moorland, upon which the lonely smithy stood under an ancient oak, the only tree in the shadeless waste, above whose verge towered other wood-crowned heights which closed the view on the land side.
The hour of noon, the hour of the great Pan! Not the faintest breath stirred the shining air; motionless were the dazzling white clouds upon the steel blue vault of the heavens; motionless the tops of the trees, the blossoming bushes, even the long blades of grass. Not a sound disturbed the profound stillness; even the locust, which had chirped among the stones of the giant's monument, was silent, perhaps terrified by the brown serpent, which, with its head upraised and its round glittering eyes fixed steadily upon Gotthold, lay motionless upon one of the masses of rock a few paces off, with the rest of its scaly body buried in a dense mass of heather. He had not noticed it before, and now perceived it with a sort of shudder. It seemed as if the torpor into which Nature had sunk had been embodied; as if the spirit of loneliness and desolation had assumed a material form. Woe betide you when the loneliness of yonder mansion with its neglected garden, the desolation of this remote valley, so far away from all human society, stares at you with those cold, cruel eyes; when you listen in the stillness for a beloved voice, and hear only the blood seething in your temples, and the heavy, anxious throbbing of your heart.
Avaunt, fiend, avaunt!
He raised his staff; the serpent disappeared; when he reached the rock upon which it must have been lying, he could see nothing but the swaying of the flowers through whose closely interwoven roots it was gliding away.
Or was it only an illusion of his excited fancy, and did the flowers bend to the soft breeze that now breathed through the hot air, growing constantly stronger and stronger, so that a rustling and murmuring arose in the forest behind him, the treetops at his feet began to whisper, and at last the cool fresh wind from the sea blew over the panting earth.
The spell was broken; Gotthold again looked at the landscape; but now with the eye of the artist, who is seeking to obtain the best view of his subject.
"I chose the morning light then, if one can call it choice; it was a mistake and I must arrange the atmospheric effect artistically, but the sun should be at a moderate height above the horizon, almost directly over the smithy; that will be about six o'clock, and I can have what I need until eight. I think it will prove a picture which might satisfy others as well as yonder talkative lady."
Gotthold collected his luggage; then it occurred to him that he might just as well leave his colors there. So he placed the box on the rock where the serpent had lain, in the dense shadow, and went down the hill, along the woodland path, to the long ravine through which the stream rippled to the sea, and at whose mouth, in the little inlet between two steep overhanging cliffs, stood Cousin Boslaf's lonely little house. In the old days at Dollan it had gone by the name of the beach-house, nor was the title used only there; the name was in all mouths, especially those of the ship-masters, to whom it was a welcome landmark on that dangerous coast even by day, and still more at night, when the warning light in Cousin Boslaf's window streamed through the yawning night over the dreary waste of waters to the helpless mariner. The brilliant glow extended a long distance, thanks to the huge arched tin dish which the old man had fastened behind the lamp, and whose spotless brightness rivalled polished silver. This light had now burned seventy years, to the joy of shipmasters and fishermen and the honor of the worthy man who kindled it night after night at no one's bidding, but in simple obedience to the dictates of his own kind heart.
Seventy years, and probably more rather than less; no one had counted them. Ever since the oldest man in that neighborhood could remember, Cousin Boslaf had lived in the beach-house--was it strange that he should be a half-mythical personage to the younger generations? He almost seemed so to his own relatives in Dollan, among whom he lived; in whose society, at least, he spent many hours; whose joys and sorrows he shared in his quiet way, and to whom his history was known; at least Curt's father had known and related it, Gotthold could not remember the occasion, and whether he had told the boys or--what was more probable--communicated it to some friends over a bottle of wine, and the boys had secretly listened in some corner.
It was long since Gotthold had thought of this story, which reminded him of a time when many a beech-tree that now reared its stately head far above the wanderer f did not exist. But now it once more came back to his memory, down to the smallest details, which he really knew not whether he had heard at that time, imagined since, or now first learned from the rustling of the forest giants, and the murmur of the brook that accompanied his steps.
"When we were under the Swedish rule," so all the stories of those days began, there lived on the island two cousins named Wenhof--Adolf and Bogislaf--both equally young, equally strong and handsome, and equally in love with a charming young lady, whom her father would give only to a rich man, for the simple reason that he had nothing but his noble blood and the great estate of Dahlitz, which was loaded with debts to an amount exceeding its value. The two cousins, it is true, did not belong to the nobility, but they had descended from a very good old family, and the Lord of Dahlitz would have made no objection to either, except the one he was unfortunately obliged to make to both, namely, that they were, if possible, poorer than himself. In fact, neither possessed anything except a good rifle with the hunting equipments belonging to it, and a pair of stout boots, whose thick soles crossed the thresholds of their many friends on the island, where they were everywhere welcome companions in the hunt or at the board. Of equal height, and almost similar cast of features, they also did everything alike, or so nearly alike that the hospitable, cheery land-owners saw one enter the courtyard no less gladly than the other, and were still better pleased when both appeared, which was almost always the case, for the two cousins loved each other much more warmly than most brothers, and as for their passion for the beautiful Ulrica of Dahlitz, their hopes of possessing her were so small that it was not worth while to quarrel about it.
Just at that time something happened which at one blow completely altered their situation, or at least the situation of one of them.
A very wealthy and eccentric uncle in Sweden died, who, besides his property in that country, had an estate on the island to bequeath, namely, beautiful Dollan, which at that time included the forest down to the sea-coast, and all the land across the wide moor to the Schanzenberge. This estate he now left to the two cousins, or rather to one of them, for according to the singular wording of the will it was to go to the one whom a jury of six of his acquaintances should pronounce the "best man." Everybody laughed when this strange condition was made known, and the cousins laughed too. But they soon became very serious when they considered that not only Dollan was at stake, but Ulrica von Dahlitz, whom her father would joyfully give in marriage to the owner of Dollan. It was strange to see the two cousins, who had hitherto been inseparable, now begin to take separate paths, and, when they could not avoid each other, measure each other with grave, questioning, almost hostile looks, which seemed to say: I am the better man.
In the bottom of his heart each was obliged to confess, and did acknowledge, that the matter was at least very doubtful; and so thought and said the six judges whom the two cousins had chosen, and whose decision they had promised to obey. But all six were blameless young men, who set about their difficult task very gravely and solemnly, and held long, very long consultations, during which immense quantities of good old red wine were drunk, and a vast number of pipes was smoked, until they at last came to the following conclusion, which was universally praised as a wise and perfectly suitable one.
The cousin who should best perform six tasks to be given by the judges, should be considered by them and the world the best man.
The cousins would now have been in a very unfortunate situation, if the judges had obtained their wisdom from any philosophical or learned book; but no one of them had even thought of such a thing. The best man, according to their standard, would be he who, in the first place, should be able in the presence of the judges, within forty-eight hours, to put a three-years-old stallion, which had never been mounted, through the four principal paces--the walk, the trot, the gallop, and the run; secondly, cross the moor of Dollan, from the manor-house to the old smithy, with a team of four fiery young horses, going at full gallop, on a certain line; thirdly, swim from the shore to a ship anchored a German mile away in the offing; fourthly, from sunset to sunrise--it was in June, and the nights were short--drink a dozen bottles of wine; and fifthly, during that time play Boston with three of the judges without making any great mistakes. But if, as was almost expected, the judges even then could not decide, the cousins were to have twelve shots with a rifle at a target placed at a distance of two hundred and fifty paces, and the one who could hit the centre most frequently should be "the best man," and the owner of Dollan.
This sixth and last trial was really a last resource, upon which the judges had decided very unwillingly; for every child knew that Bogislaf was not only the better shot of the two, but the best on the whole island; still the matter must be settled in some way, and as Adolf, perhaps hoping that he should win the prize before that test was reached, made no objection to number six, everything was decided and the contest could begin.
It began and continued as had been universally expected. The two young sons of Anak rode their horses, guided their carriages, swam their mile, drank their twelve bottles of wine, and played their Boston with such equal skill and faultlessness, that the most scrupulous eye could detect no difference in the merit of the performance, and with heavy hearts the judges were obliged to proceed to the last trial, whose result was not doubtful.
And heavy, heavy as a hundred-pound weight poor Adolf's heart might well have felt in his brave breast, when he appeared on the ground on the momentous day. He was very much depressed, and the secret encouragement of the judges, who wished him well, did not cheer him. "It is all useless now," he murmured.
But, strangely enough, Bogislaf seemed no less moved, nay, even more agitated than his cousin. He was pale, his large blue eyes looked dim and sunken, and his particular friends noticed, to their horror, that when the cousins shook hands, as they always did before every contest, his hand--his strong brown hand--trembled like that of a timid girl.
The cousins, who were to fire alternately, drew lots; Adolf had the first shot. He was a long time in taking aim, raised and lowered his gun several times, and finally hit the last ring but one.
"I knew it beforehand," he said, covering his eyes, and would have liked to stop his ears; but he listened intently, and drew a long breath, when instead of the "centre" he expected, the number of the last ring on the target was mentioned, and repeated in a loud tone by one of the judges.
Was it possible? Well then, there was still hope. Adolf collected all his powers; he shot better and better, three, four, six, nine, and ten, and again six and ten; and Bogislaf always remained one ring behind him, neither more nor less--always one ring.
"He is playing with him, as a cat plays with a mouse," the judges said to each other after the first three shots had been fired.
But Bogislaf grew paler, and his hand trembled more and more violently at every trial, and only grew steady at the moment when he discharged the gun; but he was always one ring behind Adolf, and now came the last shot, the worst Adolf had made. In his terrible excitement he had just grazed the outer edge of the target; if Bogislaf now hit the centre, he would be the victor: the result of the long struggle, the magnificent estate, the beautiful bride--all, all depended upon that one shot.
Pale as death, Bogislaf stepped forward, but his hand no longer trembled; firmly, as if his arm and the gun were one, he took aim, the glittering barrel did not swerve a hair's breadth, and now the report crashed upon the stillness. "It has hit the mark," said the judges.
The markers went forward and sought again and again, they could not find the bullet; the judges also went to the spot and searched and searched, but they could not find it either. The unprecedented, almost incredible thing had happened--Bogislaf had not even hit the target.
The judges looked at each other in perplexity, and for poor Bogislaf's sake scarcely ventured to utter what must be said. But Bogislaf went up to his cousin, who stood with downcast eyes, as if ashamed of his victory, seized his hand, and evidently wished to say something which did not escape his pale, quivering lips. But it could not have been a curse, for he fell sobbing on Adolf's neck, pressed him to his heart, then released him, and without uttering a word, strode away and disappeared.
He remained absent. Many supposed he had killed himself; others declared that he had buried himself in the northern part of Norway amid the ice and snow to hunt bears and wolves; and they were perhaps right.
At all events, he was not dead, but after an absence of several years suddenly appeared on the estate of a friend who had been one of the judges, and here his cousin Adolf and his young wife Ulrica met him--quite accidentally, for they had not heard of his return, and the young wife was so startled that she fell fainting on the floor, and was restored to consciousness with great difficulty. To be sure, she had always been one of those who believed Bogislaf dead, and had already had several discussions on the subject with her husband, who always asserted the contrary. It was said that this was by no means the only point of difference between the husband and wife, and there were in truth many things which did not increase the happiness of the young pair. True, the extravagant old Lord of Dahlitz, who had sold his property to a Herr Brandow--Carl Brandow's great-grandfather--and then lived very contentedly on his son-in-law for several years, was now dead, but the daughter had inherited her father's expensive tastes, and Adolf was anything but a good economist.
This last quality certainly did not prevent him from doing what the simplest gratitude required;--and therefore--in spite of his wife's opposition--he invited poor Bogislaf to visit him at Dollan and remain as long as possible. At first Bogislaf positively refused, and with good reason. The cause of the result of the shooting match had now transpired! It was known that the evening before the contest Ulrica had sent her cousin and most intimate friend, Emma von Dahlitz, a poor orphan who lived with her wealthy relatives, to Bogislaf with the message: she would never, never, though everybody should declare him to be the best man, accept him for her husband, but Adolf, whom she always had loved, and always should. Then Bogislaf, as he no longer had any hope of winning the girl he loved, generously resigned to his cousin a property which no longer had any charm for him.
He long refused to accept his fortunate cousin's invitation, but finally came--for only a week. But the days had become weeks, the weeks months, and the months years, so that this was now the fourth generation which had known old Bogislaf Wenhof, or, as he was commonly called, Cousin Boslaf, in the beach-house of Dollan. He had removed there at the end of the first week, after purchasing it, together with the few fields and meadows belonging to it, for a very small sum from the government, which had originally built it for a watch-house; but though the beach-house did not really belong to Dollan, but was Cousin Boslaf's own property, Cousin Boslaf clung to Dollan all the more closely, so closely that the constant intercourse had filled the heads of the people with all sorts of superstitious fancies, in which the old man sometimes figured as the good, and sometimes the evil genius of Dollan, and especially the Wenhof family. Alas! even if he were the good genius, he had been unable to prevent the ruin of the house, or withhold the son of Adolf and Ulrica, who had many of the Dahlitz traits of character, from selling Dollan to the convent of St. Jürgen at the close of the preceding century, after which he was glad to remain as a tenant where he had once been master. Cousin Boslaf had not been able to prevent that, or any of the other things which had happened from that time to the present day.
"But what does this mean?" said Gotthold to himself. "How can one let his healthy brain become so bewildered by the rustling of the forest, the murmur of the stream, and these old tales! I believe the serpent has bewitched me with its cold glittering eyes, and I am still under its spell. But its reign is over now. There is the sea gleaming through the boughs, my own beloved, beautiful sea! Its fresh breath will cool my hot brow. And he, the old man who lives yonder, and who learned so early the meaning of the harsh word sacrifice; who renounced power, wealth, and woman's favor that he might not lose his own manhood, was probably the better and wiser man."
Still following the course of the stream, which, now that it was so near its mouth, grew more noisy and impatient, falling in many a miniature cascade as it hurried plashing and murmuring down the ravine, overgrown with huge clumps of ferns and the most luxuriant grass, Gotthold, a few moments after, reached the shore. On the right hand, almost at the extreme point of the promontory, which, covered with large and small stones like the rest of the coast, ran out several hundred paces into the sea, stood Cousin Boslaf's house. The old flag, which Gotthold had remembered from his boyhood, still fluttered from the tall staff on the gable roof. It had originally been a Swedish banner, but in the course of years the wind and weather had so dimmed its colors, and made so many repairs necessary, that the authorities could not have taken umbrage at this relic of foreign rule, even if they had troubled themselves particularly about Cousin Boslaf's actions. This, however, they had never done, so the old flag fluttered and rustled and flapped merrily in the fresh breeze, which blew still stronger as Gotthold now stood before the low dwelling, built partly of unhewn stone from the shore, whose only door was on the side towards the land. The door was locked; he could not look into the little iron-barred windows on the right and left, which lighted the kitchen and store-room, for they were considerably above a man's height, close under the roof; and the strong iron shutters were put over the two larger windows in the front of the house, which faced the sea. Evidently Cousin Boslaf was not at home.
"To be sure," said Gotthold, "after an absence of ten years we can't be surprised not to find a man who was eighty years old at the time we left him."
And yet he could not believe that the old man was dead. He had just been thinking of him so eagerly, seen him so distinctly in his mind's eye--the tall, slender figure, walking with long, regular strides, as he had so often beheld him. No, no, the old man belonged to the race of giants; he had surely outlived this little space of time.
And then the house and its surroundings--the little front yard enclosed by a walk, the tiny garden bordered with shells--did not look as if they had been left for any length of time. Everything was in order and painfully neat, as the old man used to keep it; the little bridge in the creek to which he fastened his boat had even been lately mended with new pieces of wood, carefully dovetailed together. But the boat had gone; undoubtedly cousin Boslaf had rowed out to sea in her. To be sure, it was not his custom, but the old man's habits might have altered during the last few years.
The afternoon was already far advanced; the walk through the ravine to the beach-house had occupied more time than Gotthold expected. He would wait for Cousin Boslaf an hour longer, and then return to the giant's grave, paint until sunset, claim the hospitality of the smithy for the night, and early the next morning--it was to be hoped with better success--seek out his old friend once more. Then he could reach Prora at noon, and after taking leave of the Wollnows, drive on with Jochen without delay. He had thought yesterday of finishing the picture in Prora; but they would pass through the place to-morrow evening on their return from Plüggenhof, so Jochen had informed him, and he would not trust a second time to the chance which had saved him from meeting Carl Brandow that very morning.
The young man had thrown himself down upon the shore under the shadow of the beeches, which here extended to the very brink of the steep cliff. Accustomed as he had been on his sketching excursions to satisfy himself for a whole day with a piece of bread and a drink from his flask, he now felt no hunger; but he experienced far more fatigue than he had usually done after longer walks. As he lay there with the beeches rustling over his head, and the waves breaking on the stony shore beneath with their monotonous cadence, his lids gradually fell over eyes wearied by long gazing over the boundless waste of waters.
A few hours later, Carl Brandow and Hinrich Scheel were riding over the moor from the smithy to Dollan, the same road which they had passed over in the opposite direction not ten minutes before. They rode at a quick trot, the groom a few dozen paces behind his master, though not from any feeling of respect, and certainly not because he was worse mounted. On the contrary, his horse was a magnificent brown animal of the purest blood, far more valuable than his master's half-breed, so valuable in fact, that any passer-by would have wondered how such a noble animal could be ridden upon such an ordinary occasion. But Hinrich Scheel was no ordinary rider; he noticed every movement of the horse upon the rough road as carefully as if he were training it upon a smooth race-course; not the smallest awkwardness was suffered to pass unnoticed; it had just been guilty of a trick for which it must be punished; and that was the reason why he had remained a little behind.
Suddenly Carl Brandow drew his rein, and half turning said, over his shoulder, "Are you perfectly sure you saw him?"
"I told you I passed within a hundred paces of him," answered Hinrich Scheel sulkily; "and I had plenty of time to look at him too; I believe he stood up there an hour, as if he had taken root."
"But why did that scoundrel of a Jochen say just now that he didn't know where he was?"
"Perhaps he doesn't."
"Stuff and nonsense!"
They rode on a short distance side by side; the master staring gloomily straight before him, and the groom from time to time casting a sly glance at him from his squinting eyes. Then he urged his horse still nearer and said:
"Why should he know? I don't know why you are running after him as a cat chases a mouse."
"Bah!"
"Nor why you came back from Plüggenhof so soon, have ridden the horses half to death, and gave me a louis-d'or when I told you I had seen him."
"I'll give you six if you'll tell me where I can find him," cried Carl Brandow, turning eagerly in his saddle.
"Where you can find him? Why that's easy enough; with the old man in the beach-house yonder."
"Where I cannot seek him."
"Without having the old man send a bullet through your body. Six louis-d'or! I think I should wait a long time for the money. But I will tell you where you can find him without the gold, if you'll let me ride Brownlock across the bog."
"Are you crazy?"
"I will cross it faster than you can cross the hill. Can I go?"
Before them the road ran in a tolerably steep ascent over a hill, an outlying spur of the Schanzenberge on the left, which stretched some distance into the moor. On the right of this hill a broad tract of marshy land extended across the moor to the forest, where it found an outlet in the stream whose course to the sea Gotthold had followed that afternoon. The summit of the hill had undoubtedly sunk into the marsh years before, for the long mound of earth divided it like a wall, which at the time it was engulfed had doubtless been very steep, but in the course of years had been so much washed away by the trickling of water down the hillside that, it now formed an irregular slope, along whose upper edge ran the old carriage road, while farther up the acclivity large stones made the way impassable for vehicles, although horsemen and pedestrians might wind through. The condition of affairs had probably not been so bad when Bogislaf and Adolf Wenhof were obliged to drive their horses along here at full gallop, for now no man in his senses would pass the spot in a carriage except at a walk, and Jochen Prebrow was perfectly right when he said that it would have been easy for him--or any one else--to execute Curt's wild order, and hurl the young pair down the slope into the bog on their wedding day.
The riders had stopped their horses; Carl Brandow looked up the hill and over the marsh.
"You are crazy," he said again.
"Crazy or not," exclaimed Hinrich Scheel impatiently, "it must be done. I went to Salchow this morning to hear what Mr. Thompson had to say. The fellow always knows everything, and declares that they have enclosed a piece of marshy ground in the race-course for Brownlock's special benefit, because they think he is too heavy to cross it, and you'll be obliged to take a wide sweep around. Well, sir, if you make the victory so easy for Bessy, Count Grieben and the other gentlemen will be very well satisfied, and I can be satisfied too."
"You would be no better, suited than I," said Brandow, and then muttered between his teeth: "everything is all of a piece now."
"Shall I?" said Hinrich Scheel, who probably perceived his master's irresolution.
"For aught I care."
A ray of joy flitted over Hinrich's ugly face. He turned the horse, which had long been champing his bit impatiently, and galloped a hundred paces to the left, to the edge of the marsh, then paused and shouted:
"Ready?"
"Yes!"
"Now!"
Brownlock sprang forward with a mighty leap, and then flew over the marshy ground. Again and again his light hoofs broke through the thin covering of turf, so that the water dashed high into the air, but his wild speed did not lessen, on the contrary it seemed to increase, as if the noble animal knew a bottomless gulf was yawning under him, and that he was running for his own life and that of his daring rider. And now the quaking soil grew visibly firmer. The deed scarcely believed possible had been accomplished, Brownlock had crossed the marsh, and would cross any other. "There is no doubt now," muttered Brandow, "I can accept every bet; and am I to let Plüggen have the animal for the paltry sum of five thousand thalers! I should be a fool! Besides, he probably was not in earnest; but the money must be forthcoming, even if I should have to steal or commit a murder for it. Holloa!"
He had not turned his eyes from Brownlock, as he rode across the hill at a gallop without noticing where he was going, until his chestnut, accustomed to pass this place at a walk, recoiled from the edge so suddenly that the gravel and pebbles rolled down the slope.
"Holloa!" cried Brandow again, as he soothed the frightened animal, "I came very near committing the murder on myself."
He rode down the other side of the hill more cautiously, and then dashed up to Hinrich, who was galloping up and down the edge of the bog, trying to soothe the snorting racer.
"What do you say to that, sir?"
"That you are a capital fellow; and now, since you have had your own way, where do you think I shall find him?"
"On the giant's grave," said Hinrich; "I went up there after he had gone away, and found a thing like a box. There was a little key sticking in it, and it held his painting tools, as I saw. The box had been put carefully in the shade; but about six o'clock the sunlight will fall where the shadow rested this morning, and I think he will be on the spot at that time."
"And why didn't you tell me so at once?"
"You may be satisfied that I didn't tell you," answered Hinrich, tenderly patting Brownlock's slender neck. "You wouldn't have known that you are, I don't know how many thousand thalers richer than you supposed."
"It is six o'clock," said Brandow, looking at his watch.
"Then ride on and find him. I must take Brownlock home. Shall I tell Frau Brandow that we shall have a visitor this evening?"
"I don't know that yet myself."
"She would be so delighted."
"Be off, and hold your tongue."
A repulsive grin overspread Hinrich's grotesque face, and he cast a piercing glance at his master, but made no reply, turned Brownlock, and rode slowly away.
"I might just as well tell him everything," said Carl Brandow to himself, as he turned his horse's head and rode over the moor towards the forest. "I believe the damned fellow sees through me as if I were glass. No matter; everybody must have some one on whom he can depend, and certainly I could not have done without him this time. I've no desire to invite the stupid fellow, but it is one chance more, and I should be a fool to hesitate long in my present situation."
Carl Brandow dropped the reins on his horse's neck as he rode slowly up the rough forest path at a walk, and drew from his pocket a letter which he had found on his return home, half an hour before: