The Children of the World Part 30

"So you really think--" Reginchen began; but she did not finish the sentence.

"I'm as sure of his love as of my own," Franzelius faltered. "If I could have cherished any doubt, everything would have been proved and made plain half an hour ago. I have no right to persuade you to anything against which your heart rebels. But I'm sure that now you know his secret, it will be impossible for you not to become attached to him; he is far more lovable than I, whom only your heavenly goodness--perhaps through mistake or accident--"

"No," she eagerly exclaimed, almost ready to cry, "now I must speak frankly; there was no special goodness about it except your own, and as to Herr Walter's being more lovable--dear me it's possible, but I can't help it--I'd rather have _you_; didn't you notice it when you tried on the boots, spoke of the stockings--wait, I'll get them right away, they've been finished a long time, I hurried so because I thought you'd have to go away, though not forever! Dear me, to think I must help you now, besides making the stockings."

"Girl!" he exclaimed, "you would really--It's too much--oh! now I see for the first time how happy we might have been."

"Who knows what may happen yet," she said, consoling herself as she wiped her eyes with her ap.r.o.n; "but wait here five minutes; I've got them in my work table. I'll be back again directly. They will certainly fit you and keep you warm."

As she pa.s.sed close by him and went out of the door, he was strongly tempted to hurry after her, clasp the beloved form in his arms, and imprint his thanks for her gift on her fresh lips. But he was so sincere in his purpose of resigning her to his friend, that he did not trust himself even to touch her, precisely because he felt that she would not have resisted. When she had gone, he sank down on a bench like a heavily burdened man and pressed his hands to his eyes. Amid all his sorrow, he revelled in the bliss of knowing that she loved him, and each word which had a.s.sured him of the fact still echoed in his soul.

He was suddenly roused from this happy reverie by a loud cry in the courtyard, close to the door that opened into the back building. He recognized Reginchen's voice, and in mortal terror started up, tore open the door, and was about to rush across the entry into the courtyard. But a terrible sight checked him.

On the threshold of the back building, which was reached by two steps, lay Balder, wrapped in his dark cloak and completely insensible. The unfortunate youth must have overheard the whole conversation, since he had not dared to move lest he should betray his presence. Who would undertake to describe the storm that raged in his soul, as silently leaning against the wall, he saw all his dearest illusions shattered!

His still delicate chest heaved and labored till he thought he was suffocating, and the idea that the two happy lovers might come out and find him there pierced his heart like glowing iron. He had already risen to rush out into the street, when her proposal to bring the present from the front of the house again bound him to his dark corner.

But he thought he would take advantage of the few minutes before her return. As soon as she had disappeared in the pa.s.sage, he hastily dragged himself to the door--clinging to the wall as his limbs refused to support him, in order to reach the staircase that led to his room.

But just as he had gained the second step, his strength failed, a stream of blood gushed from his lips, and he fell fainting on the threshold.

When Reginchen returned with the little package, she started at the sight of the dark ma.s.s that barred her way, but when she recognized the fair hair and saw the dark stains on the stones close by, she lost all composure and screamed for help as piteously as if she herself had been stabbed to the heart. She did not exchange a word or glance with the friend who came hurrying out. In the twinkling of an eye everything became clear to her, and she shrank like a criminal from the eyes of her fellow culprit. They carried the unconscious sufferer, who only uttered low moans, up the stairs and laid him carefully on his bed. In the midst of their efforts to restore him to consciousness, while still fearing that he might open his eyes and see them both at his side, Edwin returned and entered the room in the highest spirits.

With what anguish the sight that met his gaze overwhelmed him, they only can understand, who have lived long enough to experience the cruel mockery with which fate delights in suddenly hurling mortals from the greatest happiness into the deepest misery.

CHAPTER VI.

After Christiane had seen the couple in the carriage and fled from the wide avenue into the more densely wooded portions of the park, she had wandered about for hours without aim or object, at times pausing breathless to rest upon some bench.

The fog had become so impenetrable that the crescent of the moon hung a pale line of light in the grey sky and total darkness brooded over the intricate paths of the Thiergarten. It was no night for a solitary pedestrian, but she met no one, and she felt no fear. What indeed could happen to her? To be sure she might be attacked, robbed, or even killed by some drunken vagabond. But she was quite willing to run the risk of this, and the thought of other dangers to which a woman might be exposed in such a nocturnal ramble did not alarm her. When Adele had once asked how she dared to go out so boldly at all hours of the evening, she replied: "I always go about with my face unveiled, I need no better protection." To-night in particular, with all the tortures of a hopeless love in her heart, she had become more firmly convinced than ever that she was a discarded step-child of Mother Nature condemned to perpetuate self-sacrifice; she felt a sort of bitter pleasure in the thought that she had nothing in common with the rest of mankind, either in love or hatred, but was as it were a peculiar being, allied to unknown creatures of darkness, who were as ugly as she, and therefore wise enough to avoid the daylight. In this wild mood which gradually obtained more and more the mastery over her, she would scarcely have been alarmed, if at some crossing in the paths she had chanced upon a crowd of spectres and been bidden to make one of their company.

Anything would be better than to return to mankind, the best and n.o.blest of whom had always made her the most miserable without even suspecting the fact. She shed no tears; all personal feelings--love for Edwin, jealousy of the beautiful girl--receded farther and farther into the background of her thoughts; only her own destiny, the world in which her fervid heart was languis.h.i.+ng, the tortures of a lost youth, the dread of a lonely and loveless old age,--these rose in ghostly, exaggerated outlines before her soul, and from time to time extorted from her a cry, that in the deep silence startled even herself.

When she came to the fish ponds, above which floated still denser fogs, she involuntarily paused. For a long time she stood and gazed at the dense whiteness which never s.h.i.+fted and which seemed to be waiting for some wearied, hunted human life to find rest in its depths. But her seething blood, inflamed by the unusual indulgence in wine, recoiled from the thought of such an end. Mechanically and without thinking of what she was doing, she picked up a stone from the roadside and threw it into the mist-veiled water. The sullen plash of its fall recalled her to herself. She drew a long breath, trembled, wrapped her cloak closer around her, and then walked away more slowly than before, but taking a direct lane toward the city, which she reached in half an hour.

In the wild chaos of thoughts that filled her mind as she went, there was one fixed resolution, to which she constantly returned: to-morrow she would leave the house where she lodged, engage other rooms, and then consider whether it would not be better to turn her back upon the city altogether and seek some corner of the world where life would be quite dest.i.tute of charm, nature most barren, and men utterly wretched.

Invalids often go to springs merely to find companions in suffering and thus make their condition more endurable. Why should not the miserable avoid the neighborhood of the happy, in order to bear their burdens more easily among those who are wretched likewise?

As she entered the little courtyard of the house in the Dorotheenstra.s.se, she noticed that there was a light in her room; but thought the maid servant, who waited upon her and had a second key, was probably doing something there and unsuspiciously ascended the stairs.

She had been unable to make up her mind to look at Edwin's windows.

On reaching her door, however, she did not find the key in the lock.

"Perhaps the girl has only lighted the lamp and gone out again," she thought, as she hastily opened it. The little ante-room was dark and nothing was moving there, so she hastily opened the door of her sitting and sleeping room, but paused on the threshold in astonishment when she saw Lorinser sitting in a corner of the sofa, holding on his knees a book, from which he did not even raise his eyes at her entrance.

The little lamp with the green shade was burning on the table beside him and illumined the strongly marked countenance with its high, smooth forehead and firm mouth. No expression betrayed any special agitation of mind, and when he at last raised his eyes and fixed them on the dark figure of the woman who stood on the threshold in silence, gazing at him as if she could not believe her own eyes, no stranger would have suspected that he was a guest playing master of the house in the presence of the real occupant, so perfectly unembarra.s.sed was the smile with which he greeted the newcomer.

"Good evening," said he, "you are late. Excuse me for having made myself comfortable here during your absence; I provided for plenty of light and warmth, and have whiled away the long hours--But my G.o.d!" he exclaimed, suddenly interrupting himself, "how you look, Christiane!

You're deadly pale and trembling from head to foot--take off your damp cloak--come--here's a warm place in the sofa corner--will you tell me where your tea pot is? You must get warm again--"

"Leave me!" she hoa.r.s.ely exclaimed, repelling the hands that tried to clasp her cold fingers. "I need no one--I'm perfectly well--it's only surprise, indignation, at finding you here after I've plainly told you that I did not desire your visits, that I would never receive you again."

"That's the very reason I've come," he replied in the calmest tone, while his eyes wandered toward the ceiling. "You've expelled me as we only expel one whom we deeply hate or--love a little, and therefore fear. Do you suppose a man will endure this, without at least making an endeavor to discover in which of the two situations he stands? I at least, even if you were not what you are to me, am not the man to obey blindly. I've had no rest, Christiane, that's why you see me here with but one question on my lips; when I have the answer, I'll go. But we must understand each other."

She had sunk into a chair, which stood beside the window. The damp cloak still hung over her shoulders, but she had hastily removed her hat as if the strings choked her. As she now sat gazing into vacancy, he supposed that she was reflecting upon his words. But it was only because she heard Edwin's step overhead, and all her former emotions again awoke. She forgot that Lorinser had asked her a question, nay even that he was in the room.

"You delay your answer, Christiane," he began again. "I don't wonder at it and greatly as I desire to have a clear understanding between us, I have no wish to hasten this explanation. Perhaps the most favorable thing for which I can hope, is to have your soul hover in a sort of twilight, so strangely compounded of sullen hate and dawning affection, that neither can gain the victory. Such a condition may be singular and mysterious to your strong nature, which is usually so quick to decide; you think you can shake it off by ridding yourself of the man who causes the mood. You're mistaken, Christiane. You may deceive yourself: I know that I'm already too near to you to be crowded out of your life so easily. You must go on until you arrive at either hate or love. No one capable of a real emotion, has ever yet had a half feeling toward me." He had approached nearer and was standing beside her with folded arms, gazing at her face which in profile was distinctly relieved against the dark curtain. His vicinity, his low, quiet words, the firmness with which he a.s.serted his position, angered her more and more. With a quick indignant gesture, she threw her cloak over the back of the chair and rose.

"I must earnestly beg you to leave me," said she. "Only on condition that you respect my wishes now, will I consent to take no farther notice of the manner in which you've intruded here. If you were as well acquainted with human nature as you profess to be, you would give up the crazy idea that I could ever give you any power over me either for good or evil. Our characters are entirely unlike."

"You talk like a child," he answered quietly, "or you don't know what you're saying. If the difference between us were not as wide as heaven and h.e.l.l, we never could be anything to each other. Only opposite poles attract each other, simply because they seem to repel. Can there be a victory without a conflict? What you are to me, Christiane, I know only too well. What I am or shall be to you--you will soon learn, though you may now thrust the knowledge ever so far away. Or do you know another man," he continued gazing steadily into her face, "who in the hour when you are forsaken by all, when you feel more wretched than you have ever felt before, would come to you and offer you his hand to save you, who could again make desirable the life you would fain throw away as a worthless possession?" A lightning like glance from her gloomy eyes fell upon him. Contrary to his usual custom, he endured it and could not conceal his exultation; his bold shaft had struck the sore spot in her heart.

"Who has told you that I am miserable?" she pa.s.sionately exclaimed.

"And if it be true how do you know that I would not a thousand times rather remain unhappy than be rescued by you and your G.o.d? If you're right in supposing that all mankind has abandoned me, do you wish to rob me of what is yet left to me, my own individuality, my freedom, my solitude, in which I need answer to no one for my suffering? You've asked me the nature of the feeling that holds me aloof from you. It is this: I've a _horror_ of you! In the first hour of our acquaintance I detected in you the demon to whom nothing is sacred, not even the grief of a poor unhappy woman; who merely to gratify his selfishness, would fain obtain the mastery over everything, and therefore does not even think what others despise or overlook--a creature so dest.i.tute of all joys as I--too insignificant to be made useful. But you're mistaken, and neither your heaven nor your h.e.l.l will help you; this is the last time you'll ever see me, as truly--"

"Silence!" he imperiously exclaimed. "Do not forswear your own salvation, do not conjure up the fiends who are lying in wait for souls. And moreover no such vows are needed. Believe me, Christiane, I too have pride, and strength to suffer for its sake, and if I speak in vain to-day, it will be my turn to avoid you. But you must listen now.

You're too just to condemn me unheard." He drew a long breath, as if he were obliged to gather fresh courage for what he wanted to say. Then suddenly in his softest voice, into which when he chose he could throw an almost magical influence, he continued: "Sit down quietly; I will try to be brief. But you are greatly exhausted. You have just suffered bitterly again; do not deny it, Christiane, my longing jealous heart, makes my eyes keen; I could not tell you what or whom it was that caused you pain, but your soul is still trembling from the effects of this blow. Is not it so?" He relapsed into silence and watched her intently. She was gazing into vacancy but her lips quivered. "You're a fiend," she murmured. "But go on--go on--! let us get to the end."

"To the end?" said he. "Oh! Christiane, if you were only more gentle, if your grief had not made you insensible to the pain of others, you would spare me further words. Have I not already told you, that from the first moment I saw you I recognized the inevitable destiny that bound me to you, and have vainly striven with all the powers of the soul and mind to escape the thraldom? I have concealed from myself nothing that could help to stifle such a flame--your obstinacy, your atheism, your indifference to all that usually charms and misleads your s.e.x. I have told myself that I had no happiness to expect from this love, no future, no help for my own needs; the thirst for rule which you falsely impute to me--or no, let me confess it, which perhaps usually sways me--was never so ignominiously baffled as by you.

Everything that can offend the vanity, the pride, even the honor of a man, or repel his affection, I have experienced at your hands. And now, Christiane, I ask you on your conscience: do you doubt the power of nature, or as I call it, the mystical force, which alone is capable, in spite of everything, of bringing me back to your feet? I was fully prepared to be misunderstood, reproached, abused. But that is the very miracle of love: it prefers to be trampled under foot by the beloved object, rather than caressed by an indifferent hand. Now have you still the heart to call me a fiend, only anxious to get your soul into his power? Your soul? oh G.o.d! I have given up the hope of winning it, spite of the pain it has cost me, I despair of initiating you into the depths of my life with G.o.d, making you a sharer in the bliss of my fears and longings. But believe me, Christiane, there is an earthly compensation for the highest divine ecstacies, of which all minds are not capable, a compensation which matures the soul and at the same time prepares it for higher degrees of knowledge: the blending of spiritual and sensual pa.s.sion, that thrills me with ardent yearning if I only touch your hand, meet your eyes, feel your breath on my face. No one, no matter how much he may have suffered, issues from this bath of the soul unrejuvenated and unrefreshed, and indeed, my friend, for your own sake I wish you had the courage to rush with closed eyes into the flames from which the poor mortal creature, purged from all the dross of earthly sorrow, emerges purified as a new, divinely consoled being.

"This is the mystery," he continued as she was still silent: "no one comes to the Father save by the Son, no one can understand heavenly love who closes the heart to earthly affection. You have not found your G.o.d, my friend, because you would not yield to the power of your G.o.d-_man_, your Saviour, who would have delivered you from yourself. Do you know for what sin Lucifer was expelled from the presence of the eternal one? He wished to remain in presumptuous innocence, disdained to submit to the power of love. Now he is freezing amid his flames, as you, Christiane, s.h.i.+ver with cold while your whole nature is on fire.

Oh! my friend, you are silent. Would that I had an angel's tongue to win from your soul some echo, thaw your frozen heart. You say you have a horror of me. Oh! it is not of me, the poor weak man, whom a single glance of yours can curb; you dread your own fall, which must precede your deliverance, the loss by which you are to gain, the death through which you must live. 'So a heart trembles at the approach of love, as if it were menaced by death.' But you have a strong soul, Christiane, you will shake off this cowardice and risk all to gain all, death for life, sin for mercy, hate for love--

"I knew it," he whispered, and his voice grew almost mournful, without losing its pa.s.sionate impetuosity, "when I first saw you and my heart instantly whispered your destiny: I knew this hour would come, resolutely as you might struggle, painful as were the thorns pride thrust into my soul. I have seen you from the beginning as I behold you now, and could not help secretly laughing at your foolish anguish, because you did not believe yourself formed to awaken love. You, whose looks and words and gestures have haunted me day and night, inflamed my blood as no woman ever had power to do! You, who hate me, _believe_ you hate me--for this horror is only the mother of longing--have poisoned my dreams with cruel tortures and made my waking hours miserable. If you knew all that from childish pride I have concealed from you--fool that I am, only to writhe the more helplessly at your feet waiting for mercy or sentence! And the omnipotent one knows that but one thought, one voice in my heart gave me courage to endure all this: the thought that the hour would come when you would suddenly melt, and swept away by the same storm, say to me: 'You have suffered enough, take me. Let us perish to live again in each other!'" He had bent nearer and nearer to her, his lips almost touched her hair, his gaze rested on her brow, which was damp as if from mortal agony, and she had closed her eyes as if fainting. As she still remained motionless, a sudden terror seized upon him. "Christiane!" he cried, clasping her impetuously in his arms and seeking her lips with his. But at this moment he was violently thrust back. She had sprung from her chair and retreated a step. In the dim light of the lamp he saw her eyes wide open and fixed with an indescribable expression upon vacancy.

"You're a fiend!" she exclaimed. "Leave me instantly! if you have the Satanic courage to utter another word, I will throw the window open and rouse the quiet night with shrieks of murder. Do you hear what I say?

If your own honor is not as indifferent to you as mine, go--go--GO!"

She uttered the last word in so loud a tone, and waved her hand so imperiously toward the door, that he remained silent. Yet he did not seem to be deeply agitated; nay even a smile hovered around his lips as he took his hat and overcoat from the sofa, bowed carelessly, and with a "good night" left the room. She heard him open the door that led into the entry and slam it violently after him, but could not distinguish his steps on the stairs. She was aware of his noiseless tread, however, and so at last believed herself alone. But the solitude only enabled her to collect her thoughts, and they made her still more wretched. She sank back into her chair, and the grief and anguish so painfully repressed found vent in pa.s.sionate tears.

What had she been forced to hear! Although indignant at the art with which the gloomy fanatic blended the highest with the basest things, the divinest impulses with the maddest desires, striving with subtle boldness to lull to sleep the pure voice of the soul: was it not pa.s.sion, she asked herself, that blazed within him, the language of unbridled love, which risks all to attain its object, and summons h.e.l.l as well as heaven to its aid? Then she was not too repulsive to kindle such a fire, there was one man who would dare all for her, whom neither her hatred nor abhorrence could restrain from persecuting her with his ardent longings! From the chill in which she had s.h.i.+vered during her long walk through the misty night, into what a fiery gulf was she now hurled! or no, not yet into the blazing abyss, but the flames that rose from it were near enough to make her gasp for breath. She could not sit still in her chair, the air was so oppressively sultry; she opened the window, but instantly closed it again, as the fog, cold and damp as the atmosphere of a tomb, floated into the room making her s.h.i.+ver. Long before this the little fire in the stove had gone out, now the lamp failed also. She was in darkness, but she did not heed it. Pacing to and fro, absorbed in a chaos of thoughts, she mechanically loosened one article of clothing after another, letting each lie, where it fell.

While thus groping about, she found herself beside her bed and sank down upon it. "To sleep!" she said aloud, and started at the sound of her own voice, then hastily cowered under the quilt as if for concealment. But she could not close her eyes; they burned too painfully after the long walk through the foggy night. She could not banish from her thoughts the eyes of the dangerous man she had just driven away; nothing availed her; they flashed upon her everywhere, even from the darkness and through her closed lids. In her terror she tried to banish the spectre by a spell which had never yet failed her, by conjuring up Edwin's form before her mind. Now even this was useless: with all her efforts, she could not recall the features that were usually so distinct; but Toinette's lovely face suddenly came uppermost in her mind, so bright and smiling that she felt a sharp pang, and drew the coverlid over her eyes to shut out the memory. The next instant she again threw it back, raised her head from the pillow and sat up, as if suffocating. A weary moan escaped her lips, she threw her bare arm over her face and buried her teeth in her own flesh until the keen agony recalled her to consciousness.

"He was right," she said to herself, "there is but one magic, the magic of sin. A G.o.d now, to whom one could pray: Deliver us from evil--but a G.o.d, who must first be implored--!"

She sat erect bewildered with anguish, her heart throbbing stormily; then gradually she sank back, into a rec.u.mbent posture, and at last fell into a half slumber. The night seemed yet more silent, the world seemed dead, and only she with her unappeased longing for happiness, could not perish. Suddenly she fancied that she heard a strange crackling sound, as if a bat were fluttering over the floor. A shudder ran through her frame; she could not move, her limbs seemed paralyzed by approaching death.

"Who is there?" she cried. No answer.

"Is there any one in the room?" All was still as death.

"I am delirious," she said to herself. "Oh! this long night! If morning would only come. Oh! for sleep--for one hour's sleep!"

She buried her head in the pillows and at last really fell asleep. In her dreams she met Edwin, and his manner toward her was different from what it had ever been. He smiled at her with his happiest look, and then grew grave again exactly as he had done when she had watched his reflection in the mirror, while he sat opposite to the beautiful girl.

But now all his whispers and fond glances were directed toward her. Her heart would not believe it, it must be a dream, a voice ever repeated in her ear; but he talked so persistently and entreatingly, with looks and tones of such ardent pa.s.sion, only, strange to say, in the exact words she had just heard from Lorinser, that intoxicated with delight, she could no longer strive against the miracle. Beloved by him! A thrill of joy made her tremble. She saw him bend over her, felt his breath on her face, her burning lips half parted in the empty gloom and murmured wild words----

A piercing shriek suddenly rang through the silent house, a shriek which in its terrible shrillness sounded so little like the accents of a human voice, that the sleepers whose ears it reached only started a moment, and then as all remained still, quietly relapsed into slumber again, believing it to be some dream or illusion of the senses. Up in the "tun" Balder moved in his restless sleep, and asked if he had screamed so himself. Mohr had sprung from his chair and was trembling from head to foot. He thought he had distinctly heard the terrible cry proceed from the room beneath. "Let me go down," he whispered to Edwin.

"It sounded as if some one were shrieking for help against an a.s.sa.s.sin." Edwin stopped him. "Where do you want to go?" he whispered.