When, on the evening of the christening day, Lienhard accompanied his
aunt home, Kuni was nowhere to be found. Frau Sophia discovered in her
chamber every article of clothing which she had obtained for her, even
the beaver cap, the prayer-book, and the rosary which she had given.
The young burgomaster, at her request, went to the manager of the
rope-dancers, Loni, the next morning, but the latter asserted that
he knew nothing about the girl. The truth was that he had sent her to
Wurzburg with part of his company.
From that time she had remained with the ropedancers. At first the
master had watched her carefully, that she might not run away again.
But he soon perceived this to be unnecessary; for he had never found any
member of the company more zealous, or seen one make more progress in
the art. Now the only point was to keep her out of the way of other
rope-dancers, English proprietors of circus companies, as well as the
numerous knights and gentlemen who tried to take her from him. Her name
had become famous. When the crier proclaimed that the "flying maiden"
would ascend the rope to the steeple, Loni was sure of a great crowd of
spectators. Among her own profession she had obtained the nickname of
crazy Kuni.
Yet even at that time, and in the midst of the freest intercourse with
German, Spanish, and other officers in Flanders and Brabant, young
knights and light-hearted priests on the Rhine, the Main, the Danube,
the Weser, and the Elbe, whose purses the pretty, vivacious girl, with
the shining raven hair and bright blue eyes, the mistress of her art,
seemed to their owners worthy to empty, she had by no means forgotten
Lienhard. This wrought mischief to many a gay gentleman of aristocratic
lineage in the great imperial and commercial cities; for it afforded
Kuni special pleasure to try her power upon Lienhard's equals in rank.
When she went on with the company, more than one patrician had good
reason to remember her with regret; for she, who shared the lion's
portion of her earnings with her companions or flung it to the poor, was
insatiably avaricious toward these admirers.
The weaker she found many of them, the higher, in her opinion, rose the
image of him who had made her feel his manly strength of resistance so
cruelly. His stern, inexorable nature seemed to her worthy of hate, yet
for three whole years the longing for him scarcely left her heart at
peace an hour.
During this whole period she had not met him. Not until after she had
come to Augsburg, where Loni's company was to give several performances
before the assembled Reichstag, did she see him again. Once she even
succeeded in attracting his gaze, and this was done in a way which
afforded her great satisfaction. His beautiful wife, clad in costly
velvet robes, was walking by his side with eyes decorously downcast; but
he had surely recognised her--there was no doubt of that. Yet he omitted
to inform his wife, even by a look, whom he had met here. Kuni watched
the proud couple a long time, and, with the keen insight of a loving
heart, told herself that he would have pointed her out to Frau
Katharina, if he did not remember her in some way--either in kindness or
in anger.
This little discovery had sufficed to transfigure, as it were, the rest
of the day, and awaken a throng of new hopes and questions.
Even now she did not desire to win Frau Katharina's husband from her.
She freely acknowledged that the other's beauty was tenfold greater
than her own; but whether the gifts of love which the woman with the
cloudless, aristocratic composure could offer to her husband were not
like the beggar's pence, compared with the overflowing treasure of
ardent passion which she cherished for Lienhard, was a question to
which she believed there could be but a single answer. Was this lady,
restricted by a thousand petty scruples, as well as by her stiff, heavy
gala robes, a genuine woman at all? Ah! if he would only for once cast
aside the foolish considerations which prevented him also from being a
genuine man, clasp her, whom he knew was his own, in his arms, and hold
her as long as he desired, he should learn what a strong, free, fearless
woman, whose pliant limbs were as unfettered as her heart, could bestow
upon him to whom she gave all the love that she possessed! And he must
want something of her which was to be concealed from the wife. She could
not be mistaken. She had never been deceived in a presentiment that was
so positive. Ever since she reached Augsburg, an inner voice had told
her--and old Brigitta's cards confirmed it--that the destiny of her life
would be decided here, and he alone held her weal and woe in his hand.
Yet she had misinterpreted his conduct to his wife. In spite of the
finery which Kuni owed to the generosity of the Knight of Neckerfels,
who was then a suitor for her favour, Lienhard had recognised her.
The sight recalled their last meeting and its painful termination, and
therefore he had omitted to attract Frau Katharina's attention to her
immediately. But, ere Kuni disappeared, he had repaired the oversight,
and both desired to ascertain the fate of their former charge. True, the
wish could not be instantly fulfilled, for Lienhard's time and strength
were wholly claimed by the mission intrusted to him by the Emperor and
the Council.
The next afternoon Kuni ascended the rope to the steeple in the presence
of many princes and dignitaries. Firmly as ever she moved along the rope
stretched through the wooden stay behind her, holding the balancing pole
as she went. The clapping of hands and shouts of applause with which the
crowd greeted "the flying maiden" led her to kiss her hand to the
right and the left, and bow to the stand which had been erected for the
crowned heads, counts, nobles, and their wives. In doing so, she looked
down at the aristocratic spectators to ascertain whether the Emperor and
one other were among them. In spite of the height of the topmost
window of the steeple where she stood, her keen eyes showed her that
Maximilian's seat was still vacant. As it was hung with purple draperies
and richly garlanded, the monarch was evidently expected. This pleased
her, and her heart throbbed faster as she saw on the stand all the
nobles who were entitled to admittance to the lists of a tournament,
and, in the front row, the man whose presence she most desired. At
Lienhard's right sat his dazzlingly beautiful wife, adorned with
plumes and the most superb gold ornaments; at his left was a maiden of
extremely peculiar charm. According to years she was still a child, but
her delicate, mobile features had a mature expression, which sometimes
gave her a precocious air of superiority. The cut of her white robe and
the little laurel wreath on her brown curls reminded Kuni of the pagan
Genius on an ancient work of marble which she had seen in Verona.
Neither the girl's age nor her light, airy costume harmonized with her
surroundings; for the maids and matrons near her were all far beyond
childhood, and wore the richest holiday costumes of heavy brocades and
velvets. The huge puffs on the upper part of the sleeves touched the
cheeks of many of the wearers, and the lace ruffs on the stiff collars
rendered it easy, it is true, to maintain their aristocratic, haughty
dignity, but prevented any free, swift movement.
The young girl who, as Kuni afterward learned, was the daughter of
Conrad Peutinger, of Augsburg, whom she had again seen that day in The
Blue Pike, was then eleven years old. She was sometimes thought to
be fifteen or even sixteen; her mobile face did not retain the same
expression a single instant. When the smile which gave her a childlike
appearance vanished, and any earnest feeling stirred her soul, she
really resembled a mature maiden. What a brilliant, versatile intellect
must animate this remarkable creature! Lienhard, shrewd and highly
educated as he was, seemed to be completely absorbed in his neighbour;
nay, in his animated conversation with her he entirely forgot the
beautiful wife at his side; at least, while Kuni looked down at him,
he did not bestow a single glance upon her. Now he shook his finger
mischievously at the child, but he seemed to be seeking, in mingled
amusement and perplexity, to find a fitting answer. And how brightly
Lienhard's eyes sparkled as he fairly hung upon the sweet red lips
of the little marvel at his left--the heart side! A few minutes had
sufficed to show the ropedancer all this, and suggest the question
whether it was possible that the most faithful of husbands would thus
basely neglect, for the sake of a child, the young wife whom he had won
in spite of the hardest obstacles, on whose account he had so coldly and
cruelly rejected her, the object of so much wooing, and who, this very
day, was the fairest of all the beautiful ladies who surrounded her.
In an instant her active mind transported her to the soul of the
hitherto favoured wife of the man whom she loved, and her strangely
constituted woman's heart filled with resentment against the young
creature below, who had not even attained womanhood, and yet seemed to
gain, without effort, the prize for which she had vainly striven with
painful longing.
She, whose heart had remained free from jealousy of the woman who stood
between her and the man she loved, like a solid bulwark erected by Fate
itself, was now suddenly overmastered by this passion.
Yet she did not turn against the person to whom Lienhard belonged, as he
did to the city, or to his own family, and who was united to him by the
will of Heaven, but against the mysterious young creature at his side,
who changed with every passing moment.
This child--no, this maiden--must be a being of some special nature.
Like the sirens of whom she had heard, she possessed the mysterious,
enviable power of conquering the iron resistance of even the strongest
man.
Like a flash of lightning, Kuni, whose kind heart cherished resentment
against few and wished no one any evil, suddenly felt an ardent desire
to drive the little witch from Lienhard's side, even by force, if
necessary. Had she held a thunderbolt instead of a balance pole, she
would gladly have struck down the treacherous child from her height--not
only because this enchantress had so quickly won that for which she had
vainly yearned, alas! how long, but because it pierced her very heart
to see Frau Katharina's happiness clouded, nay, perhaps destroyed. A
bitterness usually alien to her light, gay nature had taken possession
of her, as, with the last glance she cast at Lienhard, she saw him
bend low over the child and, with fiery ardour, whisper something which
transformed the delicate pink flush in her cheeks to the hue of the
poppy.
Yes, the ropedancer was jealous of the laurel-crowned child. She,
who cared so little for law and duty, virtue and morality, now felt
offended, wounded, tortured by Lienhard's conduct. But there was no
time to ponder over the reason now. She had already delayed too long ere
moving forward.
Yet even calm reflection would not have revealed the right answer to the
problem. How could she have suspected that what stirred her passionate
soul so fiercely was grief at the sight of the man whom she had regarded
as the stronghold of integrity, the possessor of the firmest will, the
soul of inviolable fidelity, succumbing here, before the eyes of all,
like a dissolute weakling, to the seductive arts of an immature
kobold? These two, who gave to her, the orphaned vagrant, surrounded by
unbridled recklessness, physical and mental misery, a proof that there
was still in marriage real love and a happiness secure from every
assault, were now, before her eyes, placing themselves on the same plane
with the miserable couples whom she met everywhere. She could not have
expressed her emotions in words, but she vaguely felt that the world
had become poorer, and that henceforth she must think of something more
trivial when she tried to imagine the pure happiness which mortals are
permitted to enjoy. She had seen the blossoms stripped from the scanty
remnant of her faith in truth and goodness, which had begun to bloom
afresh in her heart through the characters of this pair whose marriage
procession she had watched.
Loni had been beckoning a long time; now he waved his gay handkerchief
still more impatiently, and she moved on.
Her lips forced themselves into the customary smile with difficulty.
Tripping forward was an easy matter for one so free from dizziness. She
only carried the pole because it was customary to begin with the least
difficult feats. Yet, while gracefully placing one foot before the
other, she said to herself--safe as she felt--that, while so much
agitated, she would be wiser not to look down again into the depths
below. She did avoid it, and with a swift run gained the end of the rope
without effort, and went up and down it a second time.
While, on reaching the end of her walk, she was chalking her soles
again, the applause which had accompanied her during her dangerous
pilgrimage still rose to her ears, and came-most loudly of all from the
stand where Lienhard sat among the distinguished spectators. He, too,
had clapped his hands lustily, and shouted, "Bravo!" Never had he beheld
any ropedancer display so much grace, strength, and daring. His modest
protegee had become a magnificently developed woman. How could he have
imagined that the unfortunate young creature whom he had saved from
disgrace would show such courage, such rare skill?
He confided his feelings, and the fact that he knew the artist, to his
young neighbour, but she had turned deadly pale and lowered her eyes.
While looking on she had felt as though she herself was in danger of
falling into the depths. Giddiness had seized her, and her heart,
whose tendency to disease had long awakened the apprehension of the
physicians, contracted convulsively. The sight of a fellow-being
hovering in mortal peril above her head seemed unendurable. Not until
she followed Lienhard's advice and avoided looking up, did she regain
her calmness. Her changeful temperament soon recovered its former
cheerfulness, and the friend at her side to whom the lovely child, with
her precocious mental development, appeared like the fairest marvel,
took care, often as he himself looked upward, that she should be guarded
from a second attack of weakness.
The storm of applause from below, in which Lienhard also joined, fanned
the flames of desire for admiration in Kuni's breast to a fiery glow.
She would show him, too, what she could do--compel him to applaud her.
She would force him away from the little temptress, and oblige him to
gaze up at her whose art--she learned this daily--possessed the power to
fix the attention of spectators like the thrall of the basilisk's eye.
When on the rope she was no insignificant personage. He should tremble
for her as did the gray-haired, scarred captain of the foot soldiers,
Mannsbach, the day before yesterday. He had told her that his heart had
throbbed more anxiously during her daring feats than on the bloodiest
field of battle.
She moved forward more swiftly to the time of the lively dancing tune
which the city pipers were playing. Midway along the rope she turned,
ran back to the cross-shaped trestle at the steeple window, handed the
balancing pole to Loni, and received a cage filled with doves. Each one
bore around its neck a note containing an expression of homage to the
Emperor Maximilian, and they were all trained to alight near the richly
decorated throne which was now occupied by the chivalrous monarch. The
clown who, with a comical show of respect, offered her what she needed
for her next feat, told her this.
Loni, sure of being heard by no unbidden ear, called to her from the
window:
"Art is honoured to-day, my girl."
The clown added jocosely:
"Who else was ever permitted to walk over the anointed head of our lord
the Emperor?"
But Kuni would not have needed such encouragement. Doubtless she felt
flattered by the consciousness of attracting even the sovereign's
glance, but what she intended to do immediately was for the purpose of
compelling another person to watch her steps with fear and admiration.
Crossing her feet, she threw back her garlanded head and drew a long
breath. Then she hastily straightened herself, and with the bird cage in
one hand and the winged staff of Mercury, which the clown had handed
to her, in the other, she advanced to the centre of the rope. There she
opened the cage as steadily as if she had been standing on the floor of
her own room. The birds fluttered through the little door and went, with
a swift flight, directly to their goal. Then, below and beside her, from
every place occupied by spectators, and from hundreds of windows, rose
thunders of applause; but it seemed to her as if the roaring of the
surging sea was in her ears. Her heart throbbed under her pink silk
bodice like an iron hammer, and in the proud consciousness of having
probably attained already what she desired, and, besides thousands of
other eyes, fixed Lienhard's upon her as if with chains and bonds, she
was seized with the ambitious desire to accomplish something still more
amazing. The man to whom her heart clung, the Emperor, the countless
multitude below, were all at this time subject to her in heart and mind.
They could think and feel nothing except what concerned her, her art,
and her fate. She could and would show to Lienhard, to the Emperor,
to all, what they had never witnessed. They should turn faint with
sympathizing anxiety. She would make then realize what genuine art,
skill, and daring could accomplish. Everything else, even the desire for
applause, was forgotten. Though her performance might be called only a
perilous feat, she felt it to be true, genuine art. Her whole soul was
merged in the desire to execute, boldly and yet gracefully, the greatest
and most perfect performance attainable by a ropedancer. With beads of
perspiration on her brow, and eyes uplifted, she threw the cage aside,
swung her Mercury staff aloft, and danced along the rope in waltz time,
as though borne by the gods of the wind. Whirling swiftly around, her
slender figure darted in graceful curves from one end of the narrow
path to the other. Then the applause reached the degree of enthusiastic
madness which she desired; even Loni clapped his hands from the steeple
window. She had never seen him do this to any of the company. Yes, she
must have accomplished her purpose well; but she would show him and
the others something still more wonderful. What she had just done was
capable of many additional feats; she had tried it.
With fluttering hands and pulses she instantly loosed from her panting
bosom and her hips the garland of roses and leaves twined about the
upper portion of her body, and swung it around her in graceful curves as
she knelt and rose on the rope.
She had often jumped rope on the low rope, turning completely around
so that she faced the other way. To repeat this performance on the one
stretched to the steeple would certainly not be expected from her or
from any other. Suppose she should use the garland as a rope and venture
to leap over it on this giddy height? Suppose she should even succeed in
turning around? The rope was firm. If her plan was successful, she would
have accomplished something unprecedented; if she failed--if, while
turning, she lost her balance--her scanty stock of pleasure here below
would be over, and also her great grief and insatiable yearning. One
thing was certain: Lienhard would watch her breathlessly, nay, tremble
for her. Perhaps it was too much to hope that he would mourn her
sincerely, should the leap cost her life; but he would surely pity her,
and he could never forget the moment of the fall, and therefore herself.
Loni would tear the gold circlet from his dyed black locks and, in
his exaggerated manner, call himself a son of misfortune, and her the
greatest artist who had ever trodden the rope. All Augsburg, all the
dignitaries of the realm, even the Emperor, would pity her, and the end
of her life would be as proud and as renowned as that of the chivalrous
hero who dies victor on the stricken field. If the early part of her
life had been insignificant and wretched, its close should be grand and
beautiful.
Long consideration was foreign to Kuni's nature. While these thoughts
were darting with the speed of lightning through her excited brain, she
stripped from the garland, with the presence of mind which her calling
teaches even in serious peril, the roses which might have caught her
feet, and swung it in a wide circle above her. Then nimbly, yet careful
to maintain in every movement the grace without which the most difficult
feat would have seemed to her valueless, she summoned all the strength
and caution she possessed, went forward at a run, and--she did not know
herself just how it was done--dared the leap over the rope once, twice,
and the third and fourth time even accomplished the turn successfully.
It had not once cost her an effort to maintain her balance.
Again she saw Loni clapping his hands at the window, and the
acclamations of the crowd, which echoed like peals of thunder from
the lofty, gable-roofed houses, informed her that the boldness of the
venture and the skill with which she had performed it were appreciated
by these spectators. True, she could not distinguish the voice of any
individual, but she thought she knew that Lienhard was one of those who
shouted "Bravo!" and clapped most loudly. He must have perceived now
that she was something more than a poor thief of a rosary, a useless
bread-eater in the Schurstab household.
She straightened the garland again and, while preparing to take another
run, repeat the feat, and, if her buoyancy held out, try to whirl around
twice, which she had never failed to accomplish on the low rope, she
could not resist the temptation of casting a hasty glance at Lienhard;
she had never ascended to the steeple without looking at him.
Secure of herself, in the glad conciousness of success, she gazed down.
There sat the illustrious Maximilian, still clapping his hands.
Gratefully, yet with a passionate desire for fresh applause, the resolve
to show him the very best which she could accomplish was strengthened.
But the next moment the blood faded from her slightly rouged cheeks, for
Lienhard--was it possible, was it imaginable?--Lienhard Groland was not
looking up at her! Without moving his hands or vouchsafing her a single
glance, he was gazing into the face of the little wearer of the laurel
wreath, with whom he was eagerly talking. He was under her thrall, body
and soul. Yet it could not be, she could not have seen distinctly.
She must look down once more, to correct the error. She did so, and a
torturing anguish seized her heart. He was chatting with the child as
before; nay, with still more warmth. As he now saw nothing which was
happening upon the rope, he had probably also failed to heed what she
had performed, dared, accomplished, mainly for his sake, at the peril of
her life, on the dizzy height. His wife was still clapping her hands at
his side, but Lienhard, as though deaf and blind to everything else, was
gazing at the page which the miserable little elf was just giving him.
There was certainly writing on it--perhaps a charm which rendered him
subject to her. How else could he have brought himself to overlook so
unkindly herself and her art--the best she had to bestow--for the sake
of this child?
Then, besides the keenest sorrow, a fierce, burning hate took possession
of her soul.
She had not appealed to her saint for years; but now, in a brief,
ejaculatory prayer, she besought her to drive this child from Lienhard,
punish her with misery, suffering, and destruction. A sharp pang which
she had never before experienced pierced her to the heart. The pure,
sunny air which she inhaled on her lofty height seemed like acrid smoke,
and forced tears into the eyes which had not wept for many a long day.
As, not knowing exactly what she was doing, with her ears deafened by
the shouts of the crowd, among whom Lienhard now, with anxious suspense,
watched her every movement, she again raised the rope and prepared to
spring, she fancied that her narrow path rose higher and higher. One
more step, and suddenly, with Loui's shriek of horror and the clown's
terrified "Jesus and Mary, she is falling!" ringing on the air, she felt
as if the rope had parted directly in front of her. Then a hurricane
appeared to howl around her, bearing her away she knew not whither. It
seemed as though the tempest had seized the ends of the rope, and was
dealing terrible blows with them upon her shoulders, her back, and her
feet. Meanwhile the little wearer of the wreath was lying on a black
cloud opposite to her at Lienhard's feet.
She still held the sheet in her hand, and was shouting to the angry
elements the magic formulas which it contained. Their power Kuni knew
it--had unchained them. Lienhard's deep voice mingled with her furious
cries until the roar of the sea, on whose rocky shore the hurricane
must have dashed her, drowned every other sound, and rolled over her,
sometimes in scorching crimson, sometimes in icy crystal waves. Then,
for a long time, she saw and heard nothing more.
When her deadened imagination again began to stir, she fancied that she
was struggling with a huge crab, which was cutting her foot with shears.
The little elf was urging it on, as the huntsmen cheer the hounds. The
pain and hate she felt would have been intolerable if Lienhard had made
common cause with the terrible child. But he reproved her conduct, and
even struggled with the kobold who tried to prevent his releasing her
from the crab. The elf proved stronger than he. The terrible shears
continued to torture her. The more she suffered, the more eagerly
Lienhard seemed trying to help her, and this soothed her and blended a
sweet sense of comfort with the burning pain.