Withered Leaves Volume Ii Part 25

"The paper--the paper," cried Blanden impatiently.

"I have carried it about with me, always upon my heart, have squeezed the lines into this locket. I was searched before the authorities at the inst.i.tution--nothing was found! Ha, ha, it was too well taken care of."

And at the same time she commenced to dance about like a wild woman, holding the locket high in the air. She appeared like one of the Nikobar island girls, who once, when upon his voyage round the world he had been cast upon their sh.o.r.e, surrounded him in such dizzy tumult.

He was fain to confess that Ktchen was no longer the half-witted seal of former days, that a remarkable transformation had taken place, but that her mind, far from having found its proper balance, had now pa.s.sed from moody absorption into a wandering will-o'-the-wisp-like frenzy.

"And why did you not show this paper to the judges? Its contents are still unknown to me, but I surmise that it might have spared you the long confinement and detention in the inst.i.tution."

"To be sure; oh, to be sure! I should have been free as the sea-gull in the air; I only needed to press this. Snap! the case would fly open, and they would all have known what they wished. They pressed all around it, too, but the good spring did not move; they believed at last that it was merely a senseless amber ornament and gave it back to me."

"And you preferred to be tortured and locked up?"

"Of course; it was not intended for the judges. Oh, the clever people--judges and doctors! How they exerted themselves; how they thought, and consulted and questioned! And what faces they made over it--it was enough to kill one with laughing! Ha-ha! half-witted Ktchen outwitted them all."

"And who gave you this locket?"

"The man down below, who was so liberal to-day; he dispenses good and evil. Once I brought him safely to sh.o.r.e through a storm that had suddenly arisen, and he rewarded me with this."

"And for whom are these lines destined!"

"You still ask! Any other man would have guessed long since; for you, for you! She wrote them out at sea, before she sprang into the water."

"Then it is the truth! I was convinced of it long since," said he to himself; "but yet moments came in which I was glad to doubt again--what is not possible upon the lonely waves between heaven and earth, with a half-witted--or evil-minded girl?" and then suddenly starting, he cried, as he held Ktchen firmly with his strong arms--

"And yet you are her murderess--why did you not save her?"

"It was not possible," said she, stuttering and shaking; "a wave washed her away from my side--she was buried."

"And the paper--unhappy girl, when were you to give me the paper?"

"She did not say--I could do it at once."

"And you did not do it?"

"I would not."

"Out with the paper!" cried Blanden, enraged.

"I have kept it securely in my bosom for so long, I want my reward for it."

"Your reward for having kept it from me for years! It is my property--I shall obtain it by force."

He began to struggle with Ktchen, who held the locket convulsively in her hand, and uttered a piercing shriek, followed by a wild laugh.

"Ha-ha, and if you have it in the net, it will escape again through the meshes! It will avail you nothing, absolutely nothing--without the secret."

"Give it me, then."

"I love you--love me in return!" cried she, stretching out her arms towards him.

"Lunatic," cried Blanden, retreating, as though a sea polypus would Lave encircled him with its arms.

She caught at the empty s.p.a.ce, then knelt down, crying and sobbing.

"Poor Ktchen has n.o.body in the world; her father is dead--he was always hard and stern. Ah, the sea is so wide, so wide--and the boat drifts farther and farther out--and who cares for me? You were good to me--you gave me the boat--oh, it does not lie on the sh.o.r.e by the post! Here--that is your boat! I had it made into my bed, my sole possession--and there I dream of you."

Blanden was moved; he drew nearer, he stroked her wet hair and said kindly--

"Poor child."

Thereupon she gave him the locket, after having opened it with a quick pressure and sobbing aloud, hid her face.

Blanden went up to the light that was burning low into its socket, and cast a gloomy flickering dense shadow upon the half-effaced letters.

Already he doubted whether he should be able to decipher them here, but Ktchen came to his a.s.sistance, saying in a hollow voice--

"I will be your light; I know what stands there, I have read it many thousand times--

"'I do not desire to live any longer--love my mother!

"'Eva.'"

Blanden was struck to his heart; he had imagined this connection, but now that he saw it in black and white, written with the trembling hand of death, so that all soothing doubt had become impossible for evermore; that these half-faded characters, as did the _Mene Tekel_ of Belshazzar, announced to him in fire how Eva had merely sought death because he had loved her mother, he was terribly shaken, as with a new unexpected blow. He felt as though a hurricane whirled up all the withered leaves of his life and dashed them into his face.

He struggled for composure, one hand propped upon the window-ledge in the wet snow, the other covering his eyes.

There was a long pause. Ktchen still lay upon her knees; in her face an expression of silent beat.i.tude--he had spoken kindly and lovingly to her. All the more was she alarmed when Blanden suddenly sprang upon her in violent anger and dragged her up roughly.

"And this message from the dead you have withheld from me for years, not from idiotcy, not from mental stupidity--I see through you now. It was all pretence or deceit, who can tell; or else such G.o.d-forsaken creatures have a cursed instinct that is as cunning as much vaunted reason. You would not save Eva, merely because I loved her. You did not give me her words of farewell, because they urged me to love her mother; you only gave me these lines now when her mother is also dead!

I was to love nothing in the world excepting yourself! Rather would I tarry at the North Pole with senseless seals than with such a creature as you! Certainly, they, too, possess the power to kill men! Away, out of my sight, you horror!"

And he dashed her from him, so that she fell upon her straw couch.

A short pause ensued; the light faded into smoke. Blanden groped for the door. Then he heard Ktchen's voice from the bed; it sounded quite changed--ghostly and hollow--

"Yes, none of them shall have you; none, none--only I alone! Ha-ha, I save no one--whosoever seeks death may have it--there will be room, there will be room. May they all die, all-- Hark! the sea rises--come into my boat, come, come!"

Blanden had reached the door; he had begun to feel it gruesome with the love-mad girl.

In his haste to escape he had not thought of the obstacles which would impede him; now here, now there, knocking against them he felt for the stairs, down which he stumbled in the dark without caring that he had hurt his foot by frequent false steps.

Below in the witches' kitchen the kettle was simmering as before; but Mother Hecht, her elbows planted on her hips, stood surrounded once more with her unoccupied subordinate witches and a new troop of students who had arrived, gazing at the spectacle which was afforded them, the hero being once again none other than the Italian, only that this time he could not display himself to the crowd in the elevated consciousness of having performed a daring deed.

On the contrary, he appeared very dejected and disconsolate before the officer of justice, who, in all the pride of his position, laid his hand upon the man's shoulder.

"At last I have you, my Herr! It has cost me trouble enough, and my night's rest also. Bller and Co. knew that the time for the bill had run out; why did you make our task harder and let yourself be sought for everywhere!"