The summer had come; the yellowing grain waved in the soft breezes, and
the cherry-trees in the orchards and along the high roads had all been
robbed of their fruit. The sky was cloudless and the first grain had
been harvested in Niendorf.
From the cities every one had fled to the watering-places or into the
mountains. The corner-house in the market-place was shut up from top to
bottom. Mrs. Baumhagen was in Switzerland, Mr. and Mrs. Fredericks in
Baden-Baden. Uncle Henry had gone to Heligoland, because nowhere can
one get such good breakfasts as on the dunes of that rocky island.
Only the two sat still in their nests; separated by a small extent of
wood and meadow, they could not have been further apart if the ocean
had rolled between. There was no crossing the gulf between them.
In Niendorf everything was irregular and in disorder. How should the
little Adelaide know anything about the management of a farm? She was
on her feet all day, she took a hundred unnecessary steps, and in the
evening she complained that the two dainty little feet in the pointed
high-heeled shoes hurt her so, and that the servants had no respect for
her. Aunt Rosa was in a bad temper, for she found herself in her old
age condemned to the life of a lady-in-waiting. Adelaide could not
possibly dine alone with Linden, and she must always be there. So at
twelve o'clock every day, the old lady put on her best cap, and sat,
the picture of misery, opposite Linden, in Gertrude's vacant place. The
meals were desperately melancholy. After awhile Adelaide also became
silent, since she very rarely got any reply to her remarks. So they ate
their dinner in silence and separated as soon as possible afterwards.
Frank, however, had work to do at least, he could not _always_ think
and brood and look at the locked door which led into Gertrude's room.
That happened in the evening in his quiet room when little Adelaide was
singing all manner of melancholy songs about love and longing
down-stairs. And at midnight when it was quite quiet, when every one
was asleep in the house and only some faint barking of a dog sounded
from the tillage, he wandered up and down the room till the lamp grew
dim and went out, and even then he did not stop.
He no longer expected her to come, though he had done so for days and
weeks. At first he had gone to the very walls of her garden with a
gnawing desire to see her; he would be there when she came out of the
gate, and he would go to meet her at the very first step. In vain, she
did not come.
Once the servants had seen him when his eyes were strangely red. "The
master is crying for the mistress," was the report in the kitchen.
"Why doesn't he go and get her?" said the coachman, "I wouldn't cry a
drop; I should know very well how to get back an obstinate wife,"
making an unmistakable gesture. "Brute!" cried the maids, and thereupon
all the women turned their backs on him.
It was long since there had been such a harvest; the barns could
scarcely contain all the grain. The fragrance of the hay came over from
the meadows and mingled with that of the thousand roses in the garden;
the great linden bloomed in the court-yard and a happy hen-mother led
out to walk a legion of yellow little chickens.
In the stork's nest on the barn the young ones were growing apace; the
homely old house lay almost buried in luxuriant greenery; the clematis
climbed up to the windows and peeped in at the empty rooms, and the
swallows which were building under the roof, went crying through the
country and the city, "She has gone away from him! She has gone away
from him!"
Yes, everybody knew the sad story by this time. Gertrude Baumhagen was
separated from her husband. In the coffee parties one whispered to
the other, people spoke of it at the cafes and at dinner-parties,
and at the table d'hote in the hotel it was the standing topic of
conversation. No one knew exactly why this had happened. There were a
thousand reports of a most wonderful nature.
"He did something disagreeable about his wife's dowry--"
"She went away because he lifted his hand to strike her--"
"The mother-in-law made mischief between them--"
"Nonsense! She was jealous--there is a little brown cousin in the
house--"
"No, it was not that--she heard that before they were engaged he
consulted an agent about her fortune. It is not so very unusual
now-a-days."
"Ah, bah, no woman would run away for that!"
"That shows that you don't know Gertrude Baumhagen very well. It is a
fact that she has gone away."
Yes, it was a fact, and Gertrude sat in her lonely house like one
buried alive in that ever gloomy room. She could no longer read; it
seemed as if she slept with open eyes. Sometimes Johanna brought her
her child, and the young wife's eyes mechanically followed the little
creature as it crept awkwardly over the floor or tried to raise
itself by a chair, but she would not touch it even when it fell and
cried.--Towards evening, however, the same unaccountable restlessness
always came over her; then she walked hurriedly up and down the garden
for a long time till she reached the top of the little hill; there she
would remain for hours, gazing at the Thurmberg till her hair and dress
were wet with dew.
"Believe me," she said to Johanna, "I shall be ill--here," and she
pointed to her head.
"I do believe it," assented the other, "it is easy to make one's self
ill--"
It was a day at the end of July; a frightful sultry heat brooded over
the earth, and the young wife suffered greatly from it even in her cool
room. After dinner she lay motionless in her chair by the window; a
severe headache tortured her as was so often the case lately.
Johanna placed her cupful of strong black coffee on the table and put
the book beside it which had been opened at the same page for the last
three days.
"Here is a letter too," she added.
Gertrude had acquired a great dread of letters lately. She overcame her
aversion however and opened it. It was in Jenny's pointed handwriting,
and Jenny only wrote surface gossip; one glance at the letter would
suffice. Two sheets fell out.
"It is a long time since we heard anything from you," she read, "so
that we are very anxious about you--are you still in 'Waldruhe?'"
"I met Judge K. yesterday at a reception, the same who, in the
celebrated divorce case of the Duke of P. with Countess Y., was the
counsel of the latter. I asked him playfully if a woman could separate
from her lord and master if she found that he had had more thought of
her worldly goods than of herself, described the situation pretty
plainly and spoke of a friend of mine who was in such a position. He
replied, 'Tell your friend she had better go quietly back to her
husband, for she is sure to get the worst of it.' His real expression
was a much rougher one, for he is well known as a brute.
"Well, there you have the opinion of an authority in such matters. Make
an end of the matter, for you may have so bitterly to repent a longer
delay as you are quite unable to realize in your present magnificent
scorn. If I am not much mistaken you really love him. Well, there are
things--but it is hard to write about such things. Read the enclosed
letter, which mamma sent me a few days ago. Perhaps you will guess what
I wanted to say.
"I wish you had been with me in Paris or were here now in Baden-Baden.
You would see how we German women, with our thick-skinned housewifely
virtues and our cobwebby romance, make our lives unnecessarily hard. I
am convinced a French woman would hold her sides for laughing if she
should hear the cause of your conjugal strife.
"Arthur is very amiable, and obeys at a word. He surprised me with a
Paris dress for the reception yesterday. As soon as he gets out of our
little nest he is like another man. Good-bye, don't take this affair
too tragically.
"YOUR SISTER."
Slowly the young wife took up the other letter; it was in Aunt
Pauline's pointed handwriting and was addressed to Mrs. Baumhagen.
"DEAREST OTTILIE:
"Everything here goes on as usual. I was at your house yesterday;
Sophie is there and had a great moth-hunt yesterday. Your parrot had a
bad eye but it is all right again now. I have heard nothing of
Gertrude; she will let nobody in. I suppose you have heard from her.
There are all sorts of reports about Niendorf going about. Last
evening my husband came home from the club--they say there is a cousin
there who manages the house. Mr. Hanke has seen her in Linden's
carriage--very dark, rather original, and very much dressed. Well, of
course, you know how people will talk, but I will not pour oil on the
fire. I saw Linden too, once, and I hardly knew him; he was coming from
the bank. The man's hair is growing gray about the temples; he looked
like another person, so--how shall I describe it--so run down."
Gertrude dropped the letter and then she sprang up--she shook and
trembled in every limb.
With a powerful effort she forced herself to be calm and to be
reasonable. What did she wish? She had separated from him forever. But
her heart! her heart hurt her so all at once, and it beat so loudly in
the deathly stillness which surrounded her that she thought she could
hear it.
"Johanna!" she shrieked, but no one replied; she was probably out in
the garden or in the kitchen at work.
And what good could she do her? "No, not that, only not that!"
She sat down again in her chair by the window and looked out among the
trees. What would she not give if the woods and the hills would
disappear so that she could look across into that house--into that
room! "A gay little thing is that brown little girl," Johanna had said
the other day. And Gertrude saw her in her mind's eye tripping about
the house, now in the garden-hall, now up the steps, those dear old
worn-out steps. Tap, tap, now in the corridor, the high-heeled shoes
tapped so firmly and daintily on the hard floor; and now at a brown
door--his door.
Might she enter? Ah, his room, that dear old room! And Gertrude wrung
her hands in bitter envy. "Go!" she cried, half-aloud, "go! That
threshold is sacred--I--I crossed it on the happiest day of my life--on
his arm!"
And she could see him sitting at his writing-table in his gray jacket
and his high boots just as he had come in from the fields; his white
forehead stood out in sharp contrast to his brown face. She had always
liked that.
And gray hair on his temples? Ah, he had none a few weeks ago! And
again a dainty little figure fluttered before her eyes going towards
him. Ah, she would like to know that one thing--if he could ever forget
her for another--for this girl perhaps? But of what use was all this?
She got up and went out of the room across the corridor to her father's
room. What her father had done thousands had done before him, and
thousands would do it--a man need not live!
On the table by the bed stood the glass with his monogram, out of which
he had drunk that dreadful potion. The servants had washed it and put
it back there. She walked a few steps toward the window and started
suddenly. Ah yes, it was only her image in the glass. She walked
quickly up to the shining glass and looked in--there was a wonderful
bluish shimmer in it and her face, pale as death, looked out at her
from it. The deep shadows under the eyes spread far down on her cheeks.
Shuddering, she turned away; there was something ghostly about her own
face.
And again she stood still and thought. What was left for her in life?
Everything was gone with him, everything!
"Mrs. Linden," said a voice behind her, "Judge Schmidt."
She nodded.
"In my room."
Ah, yes, she had forgotten that she had sent for him. He came to-day,
and she had only written yesterday. But it was just as well, she must
make a beginning.
She turned back again; let him wait, she could not go just yet. She
went to the window and saw how the heavy leaden clouds were spreading
over the sky; a storm was brewing in the west. Courage, now, courage!
When it was past the sun would shine again; sometimes a broken branch
could not lift itself again. So much the better! There would be no more
of this quiet, this deadly calm.
Only something to do--even if--
"Ma'am!" called the voice once more, and then she composed herself and
went.
She knew him very well, the old gentleman who came towards her with a
kind smile, but she could not speak a word to him. She could only wave
her hand silently towards the nearest chair. He knew what the matter
was, let him begin the dreadful conversation.
"You wish for my advice, Mrs. Linden, in this difficult matter?"
"Yes, I wish you to act for me," she said, looking past him into the
corner of the room, "and I wish above all that Mr. Linden should be
informed of the decision I have come to. I will leave him in possession
of my whole fortune with the exception of this house, and the capital
that is invested in my brother-in-law's factory."
She said the words hurriedly, as if she had learned them by heart.
"Are you quite in earnest about it then?" asked the old man.
Her eyes blazed out at him.
"Do you think I would jest on such a sorrowful subject?"
"And you think your husband will agree?"
"It is _your_ affair, Mr. Schmidt, to arrange this."
He bowed without speaking. She too was silent. An oppressive stillness
reigned in the room, in the whole house. It seemed to Gertrude as if
she had just heard her sentence of death.
"There will be a bad storm to-day," said the judge after awhile. "I
must leave you now, madam, and as I am half-way to Niendorf now, I will
just drive over, to arrange the matter with your husband in person."
"To-day?" She was startled into saying it.
He hesitated and looked at her.
"You are right, to-morrow will suit me better too--let us say the day
after to-morrow."
"No," she replied, hastily, "go at once, it will be better, much
better."
She got up in some confusion; her headache, the consciousness that she
had now set the ball rolling nearly overwhelmed her. She accompanied
the lawyer mechanically to the head of the stairs; then she remained
standing in the corridor, her hand pressing her throbbing temples, half
unconscious.
She could hear Johanna in the kitchen, and as if she could bear the
loneliness no longer she went in and sat down on a chair beside the
white scoured table. Johanna was standing before it, choosing between
ivy-leaves and cypress-twigs. Her eyes were red with crying, and large
drops fell now and then on the hands which were making a wreath. The
whole kitchen smelled of death and funerals.
"What are you doing there?" asked Gertrude.
Johanna looked away and suppressed a sob.
"It will be a year to-morrow," she replied in a choked voice, "since
they brought him home to me dead."
"Ah, true."
The two women looked deep into each other's sorrowful eyes, each with
the thought that she was the most unhappy. Ah, but there stood the
little carriage with the sleeping child, and that belonged to Johanna,
and Johanna could think of _him_ without other sorrow and heartache
than that for his loss. To lose a loved one by death, is not half so
hard as to lose him in life. Gertrude could find no word of sympathy.
"Oh, how could I live through it!" sobbed the young widow. "So fresh
and strong as he went across the threshold, I think I can see him now
striding up the street. And the very night before, we had a little
quarrel for the first time and I thought, 'Just you wait, you will have
to beg for a pleasant word from me.' And I went to bed without saying
good night, and the next morning I wouldn't make his coffee.
"I heard him moving about in the room and I was glad to think that he
would have to go without his breakfast. He came to my bed once and
looked in my face and I pretended to be asleep. But as soon as he had
shut the outside door behind him, I jumped up and ran to the window and
looked after him--I was so proud of him. It was the last time; it
wasn't two hours later when they brought him home, and day and night I
was on my knees before him, shrieking, and asking if he was angry with
me still. And I prayed to God that He would let him open his eyes just
once, only once, so I could say, 'Good-bye, Fritz, come home safe,
Fritz.' But it was all of no use; he never heard me any more."
Gertrude sprang up suddenly and left the kitchen. O God! She felt sick
unto death. Everything seemed to whirl round and round in her brain, as
if her mind were unsettled. She could no longer follow out a train of
thought to its end, and an idea which had seized upon her five minutes
ago in the most horrible clearness, she was now unable to recall; try
as hard as she might, nothing remained to her but a dull dread of
something dreadful hanging over her.
It was no doubt the heavy air, the oppressive stillness of nature
before a storm that had so excited her nerves.
She rang for ice-water. When Johanna set the glass before her she
turned her head away.
"Johanna, do you happen to know how long the--young lady is going to
stay at Niendorf?"
"I think the whole summer, ma'am," was the reply. "A good thing, too.
What could they do without her over there?"
Gertrude bit her lip; she felt ashamed. What right had _she_ to ask
about it?
"Did you want anything more, ma'am?"
"Nothing, thanks."
And she remained alone in her room as she had been so many days before.
She could hear the gnawing of the moths in the old wood-work, and now
and then the steps of the servant in the corridor. With burning eyes
she gazed at the ever-darkening sky; her hands grasped the slender arm
of her chair as if they must have an outward support at least.
Gradually it began to grow dark; the approaching evening and the black
storm-clouds together soon made it quite dusk, while now and then sharp
flashes of lightning brought the dark trees into full relief. Close by
Johanna was closing the windows of the sleeping-room.
"Shall I bring a lamp?" she asked, looking through the half-opened
door.
"No, thanks."
"But you oughtn't to sit so near the window, ma'am, it looks so
dreadful out there."
Gertrude did not move and the tear-stained face disappeared. A sudden
gust of wind swept through the trees, the branches were tossed wildly
about as if in a fierce struggle with brute force; the slender branches
were bent down to the ground only to rise again as quickly, and a
fierce blast whirling about gravel, leaves and small stones dashed them
against the rattling panes. Then followed a dazzling flash of
lightning, thunder that made the house shake, and at the same time a
sudden deluge of rain mingled with the peculiar pattering of large
hail-stones.
Johanna, with her child in her arms, came anxiously into her mistress'
room.
"Oh, mercy!" she shrieked, falling on her knees before the nearest
chair. Another flash filled the room for a moment with a dazzling red
light, and the thunder crashed after it like a thousand cannon.
"That struck, Mrs. Linden, that struck!" cried she in terror.
Gertrude had stepped back from the window; she was standing in the
middle of the room. By the light of the constant flashes the servant
could see her pale, rigid face with perfect distinctness. She rested
her hands on the table and looked towards the window as if it did not
concern her in the least. And still the storm raged more fiercely,
while the world seemed to be standing in a perfect sea of fire. It
seemed to have endured for hours. But gradually the flashes grew less
frequent, the crashes of thunder grew more distant, and at last only a
light rain dripped on the trees and the storm died away in a distant
low grumbling.
Gertrude opened the window and bent far out; a wonderfully sweet air
blew upon her face, soft and aromatic, refreshing and invigorating, and
above in the sky the clouds had parted and a brilliant star sparkled
down upon her. Then she started back. From the high-road there came a
sound of hurried movements; a sound of wheels, the cracking of whips,
the cries of men--what did it mean? It was usually as quiet as the
grave here at this hour.
"Fire!" Had she heard aright? She could not see the street but she
leaned far out and listened to the uproar. Her heart beat loud and
fast. The gardener's wife ran hastily up in her clattering wooden
shoes, and her shrill voice came up to Gertrude's ears.
"David, hurry, hurry, hurry, it has been burning in Niendorf for the
last half-hour--the engine has just gone by--hurry!"
"Clang, clang, clang!" clashed out the church bell now. In Gertrude's
ears it sounded like a death-knell. Clang, clang, clang! Why did she
stand still there, her hands clasping the window-sill as if they were
nailed there? She heard doors banging, and voices and shouts, she heard
the gardener rushing out of his house--and still she stood there as if
there was a spell upon her.
Again clashed out the warning notes of the bell! And at length she
roused herself as if from a heavy dream, and now she was quite alive
once more. She flew like an arrow out of the room, snatched a shawl
from the wall of the corridor and rushed past Johanna, who was standing
at the gate with the gardener's wife and children,--away out over the
half-flooded high-road.
"Mrs. Linden! For the love of Heaven!" screamed Johanna behind her. But
she paid no heed to the cry. Like a murmured prayer came from her
lips--"On! on!"
The road before her was dark and lonely; the men who had hastened to
the rescue, were out of sight long ago.
She actually flew; she felt no fear in the gloomy wood; she saw nothing
but the dear old burning house, and a pair of manly eyes--once, ah,
once so inexpressibly dear. Something came pattering behind her. Ah,
yes--the dog.
"Come," she murmured, and hurried on, the sagacious animal close behind
her.