Absolution Part 34

At first Rosa was somewhat reserved. There was something shy and strange in her behaviour towards her mother, but the latter did not notice anything; all she wanted was a soul, a friend to share her anxiety.

"I don't know where Becker is," she began. "It's already dark and he hasn't returned yet. He has never gone away like this before, never stopped away so long without saying a word. O G.o.d, surely nothing can have happened to him?" she cried, pressing her [Pg 291] hands to her temples with an expression of dread. "Oh, this fear, this fear!"

The woman no longer thought of hiding her feelings; there was a look of wild terror in her eyes, and her agitated voice was full of despair.

Rosa's face had flamed when her mother came into the room, but she turned deadly pale now. She did not answer, but she gazed at her mother as though she were trying to read her soul.

A shot was heard in the Przykop. Mrs. Tiralla gave a shrill scream.

"A gamekeeper is shooting," said Rosa.

"They surely can't have hit him? Oh, if he were in the Przykop and they had wounded him? But that"--Mrs. Tiralla gave an excited laugh--"would not be the worst. If only he comes back, if only he comes back! Do you think he could go away without saying good-bye?" she asked her daughter eagerly, casting an imploring glance at her. If only the girl would say, "He'll come back, mother, don't grieve, he'll come back to you."

If only Rosa with her innocent lips would beseech the Almighty to give him back to her.

"Pray, my child," stammered Mrs. Tiralla, as she pressed her daughter's folded hands between her own. "Pray. Let us pray together."

A convulsive movement pa.s.sed over Rosa's pure face. It looked as though she were going to thrust her mother away. But the struggle only lasted a moment. Fixing her eyes on a crucifix that she had hung over her bed, she said with s.h.i.+ning eyes, "What shall I say?" just as she had spoken as a child, when her mother, tortured and full of hate, had knelt in the evenings at her bedside and wakened her with her tears and sighs.

[Pg 292]

"Pray, pray."

But Rosa's voice had lost its childish cadence; the clear, silvery ring had gone, and there was something austere and coolly calm in it now.

"What do you wish me to say?"

"Oh, you know," groaned her mother. "Pray for him--oh, my fear, my fear. Pray that he may return to me. Child, my child, pray for me."

Freeing herself from her mother's clinging hands Rosa began to repeat the _Salve Regina_. "Hail, Queen, Mother of mercy. Thou our life, our sweetness, our hope, hail!" Her voice gradually rose and lost more and more of its cool austerity, as though she were intoxicating herself with the sweet beauty of the words, until it became warm and soft and melting as she said, "To Thee we call, to Thee we sigh, as we grieve and weep in this vale of tears." And then pa.s.sing from the Salve to another prayer, she raised her voice in fervent supplication until it almost became a cry, "Be gracious to him! Spare him! Deliver him from all evil, from all sin!"

"Be gracious to him--spare him--deliver him!" repeated her mother mechanically. She did not know what she was praying, she did not understand that the words her daughter had been repeating were from the litany for a departing soul.

"We, poor sinners, pray Thee to hear us." The mother and daughter mingled their voices in fervent prayer, whilst the words, "Martin, Martin, what has become of you?" echoed in their hearts and rose like a twofold cry from the narrow little room that was gradually growing darker and darker.

"Stop, stop!" The woman sobbed aloud, she could not pray any longer.

She threw her arms round her daughter's neck and wept. "Rosa, Rosa, he's [Pg 293] not coming back. Rosa, darling,"--she pressed wild kisses on her daughter's face that was uplifted so piously--"pray, pray--how am I to thank you? No, don't pray any more, rather tell me--hark, there he is!"

In a second she was on her feet, and had rushed to the door, which closed with a bang behind her.

Rosa remained alone in the darkness.

She heard Martin's voice downstairs, and then Mikolai--and then her mother's happy laugh.

But Rosa continued to pray fervently; it was as though she were holding fast to the words of her prayer. The stars had long ago come out above the farm, the new moon was just over the gable, but she still lay on her knees praying. But now it was a soft whisper to the Lord, a blissful communing with the Bridegroom of her soul.

It was night at Starydwor. The moon had disappeared, and black clouds, driven along by the boisterous wind, were chasing each other over the house-top and hiding the stars.

Mr. Tiralla was sitting alone in his room. It was really time for him to go to bed, but there was n.o.body to a.s.sist him; Marianna had not come, and he was unable to go to bed alone. At first he had moaned and growled, but now he was calm. The few thoughts he had left were creeping after the servant. Ha, ha! how she was racing; she was running to meet a sweetheart. It amused him to picture her to himself.

What a good thing it was that his thoughts were his own, that they had not taken them from him as well as everything, everything else. He made a grimace as he clenched his fists. "That woman!" [Pg 294] There she had stood--there at the writing-desk, and had wanted to steal his money--no, not his money, the powders, his powders. They were worth more than money. She had wanted to get him out of the way by the help of them. Ha, ha!--he chuckled to himself--but he had hidden them well, she would not be able to find them now.

Next time little Bohnke came he would show him where he had hidden those dear, precious things--no, he would not even show little Bohnke, for who knows, perhaps they would make his mouth water, and he would kill him so as to get them, and then eat them all up himself.

"Now, now, little Bohnke," said the man, shaking his finger at an imaginary person in the corner of the room. Then he added, "No, I'm not angry with you, in spite of your not having been to see me for so long.

Take a seat, brother, there, sit down." He dragged a chair nearer with his heavy foot, and smiled at the schoolmaster, who was sitting near him with such a pale face and such hollow eyes.

"Drink, friend, drink," said Mr. Tiralla, as he seized his gla.s.s and finished it in one gulp. "Pooh!" He made a gesture of distaste. It did not taste at all nice--or did it taste nice? "No, no!" He raised his fist and struck the gla.s.s so hard that it broke into pieces. There, that did him good. Now _that_ enemy could not harm him again.

"Ha, ha!" He chuckled to himself again, and did not notice that the blood was trickling down his finger. "Why are you so quiet, little Bohnke?"

No answer. But the wind moaned round the house and rushed down the chimney screeching, "Oo-hoo, oo-hoo," like an owl.

The man had been accustomed all his life to this [Pg 295] wintry music round Starydwor, but now it terrified him. He attempted to make the sign of the cross and glanced round timidly. The schoolmaster had gone, he was alone, quite, quite alone.

"Who's there?" He started up in terror; he wanted to scream, but he could only utter a few inarticulate sounds. Somebody had opened the door. He blinked and tried to discover who the intruder was, but his eyes had grown very dim. Somebody was coming in, but it was not little Bohnke. Who else could be coming to see him? A man--a woman?

"You?" he shouted, seizing hold of the bottle so as to defend himself with it. What did Sophia want? Was she coming to kill him now in the night? He hurled the bottle and it broke into bits on the floor.

"It's I, father," said Rosa, and she knelt down and collected the broken pieces of gla.s.s.

"Oh, it's you." He drew a long breath. Yes, now he could see it, it might be Rosa. The lamplight fell on her curly, reddish hair, and he bent a little forward as she knelt before him and took hold of it. "No, it's not Sophia," he said with a sigh of relief. But he was still suspicious. "What--what do you want?" he stammered.

She was glad to think that he at least recognized her. How unutterably heavy her heart felt. She had knelt in her room until her knees had ached, and had prayed and prayed. There had been no Marianna to groan on account of her everlasting whispering and sighing, for the girl had gone out. And when she had at last finished her prayers, she had sat down on her bed with her hands folded and waited patiently until there was not a sound downstairs. She wished to speak to her father quite alone, without being disturbed by any one. And if he had already gone to bed, she [Pg 296] would sit down on his bed. How often she had had to do that as a child, and he had always been so affectionate to her in those days. Then she would say "Daddy," and stroke his hair as she used to do. Oh, she was quite sure it would be all right, for she had been praying for it so fervently.

But when her father stared at her with his dull, yet fierce eyes, she lost her a.s.surance. "I wanted--I----" she stammered. She would have liked to cry aloud, he looked so awful. No, that was not her daddy, whose hair she had smoothed, on whose cheeks she had imprinted kisses--first on the right cheek and then on the left--her daddy who had called her, "My star, my little red-haired girl, my wee birdie, my sun, the key which is to open the door of heaven for me, my consolation."

She did not know how to begin, so she sat on the other chair near the table and gazed at him intently with her sad eyes. She had thrown the pieces of gla.s.s, which she had collected in her ap.r.o.n, into the peat basket near the stove, and now she wrapped her ap.r.o.n round her hands, for she s.h.i.+vered with cold, although the room was so stifling. What she had undertaken to do was too difficult after all; oh, it was her dread of him that made her feel so cold. She had never, never seen anything so horrible as this man who was her father. He used to be big, but now he seemed to have grown small; his coat was much too large for him across the shoulders and hung round him. A horrid grin made his lips droop, and his purple nose positively shone in his pale face, that was of a dirty yellow colour. The rims of his eyelids were puffy and turned outwards. But the worst of all was his eyes. Oh, those eyes!

Rosa felt as though she must protect herself from [Pg 297] that well-nigh lifeless glance, which at that moment, however, had something glittering, even brutish, in it.

What was her father thinking of? Whom did he take her for? She gave a start. "Ha, ha! Marianna," he chuckled, stretching out a shaking finger towards her.

He touched her. "Ha, ha!--hope you're enjoying yourself--ha, ha!"

She had to keep a firm hold of herself so as not to scream aloud, and her hands closed over each other tightly under her ap.r.o.n. The mere fact of folding her hands calmed her. She had so often prayed for strength, and she was sure that He would not forsake her now. She felt as though she were the maiden whom she had been so fond of reading about in the book of holy legends, who had entered the fierce lion's cage undismayed, and had gladly given her blood for the sake of her Heavenly Bridegroom.

"Lord Jesus," she cried loudly and fervently, then, pressing her folded hands to her heart, she smiled at her father. "Daddy, my daddy."

For a few seconds the old man's grin grew even broader, but then his face became calm. Daddy? He looked at his daughter in astonishment and stammered, "Little Bohnke has gone--who's speaking--so kindly?"

"I, Rosa."

He shook his head peevishly. "Don't want her."

A happy thought struck her. Laying her trembling hand on his, she said in a low, persuasive voice, "It's I, Roschen, your little star, your red-haired girl, your wee birdie, your----" the tears welled into her eyes; she gulped them down bravely, but her voice choked.

Then he continued, "My sun, the key which is to [Pg 298] open heaven's door for me--ah!"--he smirked as though he remembered something, and then added as tenderly as he could in his husky, faltering voice, "my consolation." He looked at her, felt her hair as he had done before, and pa.s.sed his hands over her as she stood before him tall and slender, for she had jumped up from her knees in her bitter, painful emotion. "Too big--too big--you're not my wee one, not my little daughter--Roschen--my sun--my consolation." And he looked down at the floor and smiled, as if a tiny little girl were standing there, who was not yet big enough to reach up to the table.