The next day Mauer was still so entirely unnerved and overcome by the
events of the day before that it was with the greatest difficulty he
rose from the bed; and yet it was intolerable misery to remain there.
All Carmen's persuasions were of no avail; he insisted on getting up
and dressing; but was quite unable to leave the house, and required the
most perfect quietness. She tried to divert his mind, by gentle,
cheerful conversation, from the sad, gloomy thoughts which seemed to
oppress him. It made the girl's tender heart ache, as she looked into
his unutterably sad face, which only yesterday was beaming with such
great joy.
At ten o'clock Jonathan came to pay a friendly visit. Fortunately
Carmen, who was standing at the window, saw him coming across the
street towards the house, and warning her father of the approaching
visit, she could see how he started with terror at the information.
But he soon controlled himself, and said in a resigned tone: "Let him
come in. The sooner I get through all the meetings and greetings, the
sooner I will have some rest. I must grow accustomed to seeing him,
and I feel stronger to-day than yesterday. I have not seen him before,
since your dear mother died, Carmen, and life has been one long
unbroken sorrow since then." She made a movement to leave the room, so
that the meeting between the friends should be private, but Mauer held
her back and pleaded: "Stay with me, my child," as if he could not bear
to have her out of his sight.
When Jonathan entered, he stood for a moment near the door, and his
eyes sought to read the expression of the sick man's face. The latter
sat with his head resting against the sofa-cushion, and his deep-sunken
eyes fixed beseechingly on the visitor, as if saying, "Spare me!"
"Good-morning Brother Mauer!" cried Jonathan. "Are you feeling better
to-day?" He held out his hand, into which the other placed his
hesitatingly, and would have quickly withdrawn it had not Jonathan held
it fast as he said:
"Let me feel your pulse. You are still very much fatigued, and your
hand is as cold as ice."
"Thank you, Brother Jonathan," said the invalid; "I think perfect rest
is the best remedy. I have borne many heavy burdens, dear Brother,
which have weighed me down intolerably; and now that the Lord has led
me home again, let your pity and sympathy be with me on account of all
I have suffered."
"Certainly, Brother Michael; it cannot be otherwise. Your return has
been a matter of great rejoicing with us all," replied Jonathan. "But
I must give you a prescription, that you may gain your strength more
quickly. Do not talk too much to-day; some time, later on, you must
give us an account of your travels." With these words, he turned to
Carmen with a searching look, as if to divine how far he might trust to
her silence. She purposely avoided his eye, and remained standing at
the window.
"I will make your father well again, if you will be kind to me in
return," he said with emphasis.
Then she was compelled to turn and speak. This man ruled her, in spite
of her dislike.
"If you can do anything for my father, Brother Jonathan, you will
please not consider me in the matter, but do it for God's sake and your
own," she replied calmly.
He drew a chair up to the table, and, seating himself, wrote a
prescription which he handed to Carmen.
"Have that prepared at once, dear Sister," he said, "and give it to
your father according to the directions; it will benefit him very much.
You know, Brother Michael, my remedies are very powerful." A peculiar,
sarcastic expression played around his mouth as he spoke, and Carmen,
whose quick eye perceived it, wondered what he was ridiculing. Was it
her anxiety about her father, or was it the old man's weakness? But it
came and went like a flash, and he resumed his usual manner as he rose
to leave, saying to Mauer: "Adieu, Brother. May the Lord keep you and
give you a speedy recovery!"
"I will have the medicine prepared at once, father," said Carmen,
heaving a sigh of relief as the door closed behind the physician. But
when she looked at the old man, a chill of anguish struck through her
heart, for she saw how he had clasped his hands before his face, to
hide the big tears which were trickling between his fingers.
* * * * * *
Many days passed quietly away after Jonathan's visit. Carmen's
soothing, cheering influence seemed to have somewhat allayed her
father's nervousness, and a calmer, more equable mood seemed to have
come over him, as his state of health daily improved. But the nameless
shadow of a hidden grief seemed to hang over him. For his wants he
needed but little; self-denial and sacrifice had grown to be a second
nature to him, his one earthly wish seeming to be to have a house where
he and Carmen could live alone together; but as regards others, he was
open-handed and generous to help wherever it was needed. It was a very
difficult matter to find just the right dwelling to suit his taste, so
he finally concluded to build, renting in the meantime a comfortable
suite of apartments for himself, while Carmen continued to live as
heretofore in the Sisters' house; giving the smaller children a few
hour's instruction, and passing the rest of the day with her father.
She had regained all her vivacity of manner, for she considered her
dear father her protector and support; little guessing that it was, in
reality, quite the contrary, as he looked to her as his stay on which
to lean. When alone with him, she allowed her naturally gay humor to
have full sway, and he would smile contentedly when he heard her
exquisite voice warbling forth, now a hymn, now a Spanish love-song, or
when he saw her feet, as if inspired, try a half-forgotten Spanish
dance, which seemed like a greeting to him from that tropical world
where he had loved and suffered. Sometimes she would caress him with
pretty, fascinating ways, as if her heart longed to lavish on him all
the tenderness which had been gathering intensity during all the long
years of separation.
"You are so like Inez! Gay and merry, like her," he would say with
emotion, his eyes beaming with love. Thus she would succeed in
charming away, for a few moments at least, the shadow which rested ever
on his brow; and this success gave her a pure happiness she had never
known before.
As the invalid grew stronger, every one hastened to visit him. The
elders wanted a full account of his missionary work in Mongolia, and of
the religious condition of the heathen in Bengal and the Himalayas; so
Mauer was at last obliged to consent to give a public narration of his
experiences. This could not fail to give him a certain degree of
importance in the settlement, and it was suggested that he be elected
to some public office. But he divested their minds of any such
thought, and desired to be allowed a quiet and retired life; he was too
modest and reserved to put himself forward at any time, and now
anything like publicity was positively painful to him. Even when
chatting socially with old friends, he displayed more or less shyness,
and especially when Jonathan was present.
"A strange sort of friendship!" thought Carmen, as she noticed how her
father never sought the doctor's society, but, on the contrary, seemed
to tolerate his company with a kind of bitter endurance, as if he were
in some secret way the master and Mauer the slave. Often, when
Jonathan addressed him, he would suddenly change color and an
involuntary expression of terror pass over his countenance; then the
physician's words would assume a slightly scornful tone, and Mauer
would humbly lower his eyes.
A few days after Jonathan's visit, he inquired how the prescribed
medicine had affected him.
"Most beneficially," replied Mauer. "I feel stronger in every way."
"Just as I thought," said the other, smiling kindly. "I ordered
fifteen drops, but now you can begin to take twenty; that will not be
too strong--but positively not more, dear Brother."
Mauer looked up at him with an expression of keenest anguish, and
gasped for breath; while Jonathan continued to smile at him.
No wonder Carmen thought, "What a strange sort of friendship!"
"It must be with my dear father as it is with me," she said to herself
by way of explanation. "He recognizes the snake-like nature in Brother
Jonathan, but dares not show it; and having been friends in early
youth, he still loves him in spite of everything."
Weeks and months passed away. Mauer's house was in process of being
completed, and he was constantly urging the workmen to have it ready
for him as soon as possible, as he longed to be settled.
The plan had evidently been drawn on the same simple and spacious style
of the hacienda in Jamaica, where Carmen's mother had lived. A wide,
shady veranda was to extend all around, and a broad flight of steps to
lead from it to the spacious grounds. Deep-seated windows were to open
out on the garden, and elms instead of magnolias must shade them. But
the veranda had to be given up, for, when the plan came under the
observation of the elders, a committee called on Mauer and represented
to him that such a thing would be a gross violation of the severe laws
respecting the simple style of building used in the settlement, and
would give cause for great offence. The inhabitants of the town must
be content to live without ostentation and show, abiding by the general
customs, and conducting themselves as humble members of the faith.
"Just to think: I, an old man, was going to set such a bad example and
encourage foolish ideas!" said Mauer to his daughter, deeply mortified.
"When one has been abroad, in different lands, as I have, much that
belongs to the outside world clings to him when he gets home, and is
never so noticeable as when he mingles once more with his brethren.
The renouncing of our own will, and compliance with the wishes of
others, has all to be learned over again."
"But," cried Carmen, impatiently, "they find impropriety in so many
things here that one must needs give up thinking, in order to please
them. The free spirit within us is so cramped and restricted that we
cease to be individuals. It is surely not necessary to make automatons
of ourselves if we wish to be good. No; we should choose the right of
our own free will, because it is right; then we will not fail to do
what is pleasing in the sight of God."
"Free spirit within us! What do you mean by that? We are so often the
slaves of our own desires that our ideas of right and wrong get
confused, and we lose our own souls thereby," returned her father, much
agitated. "We should, therefore, never reject the path which our
religion requires us to choose, but rather submit patiently, without
arguing or any wish to rebel."
Thus the building which had been so beautifully planned, and with so
much pleasure, turned out to be, when finished, just like all the
others. But Carmen did not bear the frustration of their cherished
hopes as calmly as the old man. Her visit to Wollmershain, although it
had not given rise to any new tastes or dislikes regarding the home
customs, had strengthened the long-buried desires which lay within her
breast, and quickened her natural spirit of resistance to the existing
state of things. Frau von Trautenau, as well as the style and manner
of life at Wollmershain, was peculiarly congenial to her taste.
Therefore, although the visit had never been repeated, she often lived
it over again in her thoughts, and in speaking with her father always
referred enthusiastically to persons and things there. One day, while
describing the unrestrained and harmonious life of her new friends, the
sound of trumpets playing a hymn came wafted in through the open door.
"Who is dead, Carmen?" asked Mauer, listening intently as he sat by the
window. "Is that not the dirge of a bachelor Brother? I remember the
air, as I do that of all our funeral hymns. How often, when suffering
under my bondage as a slave, I have thought that at my death no music
would be heard. But now I know that some day the trumpets will tell to
the other brothers when the heart of old Mauer has ceased to beat."
"Oh, my father, you must not speak thus!" said Carmen, anxiously. "The
person for whom the music is sounding is the bachelor Brother
Christopher Yager, who died yesterday evening. He was the one who
spoke in defence of our unmarried sisters in the general council; and
now some one will have to be elected in his place."
This election followed immediately after the funeral, the elders
casting votes for those they deemed most suitable for the position.
The majority were in favor of Jonathan Fricke, who was received with
universal satisfaction. No one was more pleased with the result than
Sister Agatha, who always depended so much on him for advice. She felt
that now, being able to entrust the affairs of her department to his
wisdom and circumspection, his piety and brotherly love, was as if she
handed her ship over to the guidance of a skilful and able captain. He
received the honor with great humility, as a duty laid upon him from
which he must not shrink, however unworthy he felt to bear the heavy
responsibility. Yet in spite of all his apparent absence of pride,
there was something about him which elicited the homage of the Sisters
as they gave their promise to be willing to trust him with their
confidence and follow his instructions.