Edward, on his part, was in a very different temper. So little he
thought of sleeping that it did not once occur to him even to undress
himself. A thousand times he kissed the transcript of the document, but
it was the beginning of it, in Ottilie's childish, timid hand; the end
he scarcely dared to kiss, for he thought it was his own hand which he
saw. Oh, that it were another document! he whispered to himself; and, as
it was, he felt it was the sweetest assurance that his highest wish
would be fulfilled. Thus it remained in his hands, thus he continued to
press it to his heart, although disfigured by a third name subscribed to
it. The waning moon rose up over the wood. The warmth of the night drew
Edward out into the free air. He wandered this way and that way; he was
at once the most restless and the happiest of mortals. He strayed
through the gardens--they seemed too narrow for him; he hurried out
into the park, and it was too wide. He was drawn back toward the castle;
he stood under Ottilie's window. He threw himself down on the steps of
the terrace below. "Walls and bolts," he said to himself, "may still
divide us, but our hearts are not divided. If she were here before me,
into my arms she would fall, and I into hers; and what can one desire
but that sweet certainty!" All was stillness round him; not a breath was
moving;--so still it was, that he could hear the unresting creatures
underground at their work, to whom day or night are alike. He abandoned
himself to his delicious dreams; at last he fell asleep, and did not
wake till the sun with his royal beams was mounting up in the sky and
scattering the early mists.
He found himself the first person awake on his domain. The laborers
seemed to be staying away too long: they came; he thought they were too
few, and the work set out for the day too slight for his desires. He
inquired for more workmen; they were promised, and in the course of the
day they came. But these, too, were not enough for him to carry his
plans out as rapidly as he wished. To do the work gave him no pleasure
any longer; it should all be done. And for whom? The paths should be
gravelled that Ottilie might walk presently upon them; seats should be
made at every spot and corner that Ottilie might rest on them. The new
park house was hurried forward. It should be finished for Ottilie's
birthday. In all he thought and all he did, there was no more
moderation. The sense of loving and of being loved, urged him out into
the unlimited. How changed was now to him the look of all the rooms,
their furniture, and their decorations! He did not feel as if he was in
his own house any more. Ottilie's presence absorbed everything. He was
utterly lost in her; no other thought ever rose before him; no
conscience disturbed him; every restraint which had been laid upon his
nature burst loose. His whole being centered upon Ottilie. This
impetuosity of passion did not escape the Captain, who longed, if he
could, to prevent its evil consequences. All those plans which were now
being hurried on with this immoderate speed, had been drawn out and
calculated for a long, quiet, easy execution. The sale of the farm had
been completed; the first instalment had been paid. Charlotte, according
to the arrangement, had taken possession of it. But the very first week
after, she found it more than usually necessary to exercise patience and
resolution, and to keep her eye on what was being done. In the present
hasty style of proceeding, the money which had been set apart for the
purpose would not go far.
Much had been begun, and much yet remained to be done. How could the
Captain leave Charlotte in such a situation? They consulted together,
and agreed that it would be better that they themselves should hurry on
the works, and for this purpose employ money which could be made good
again at the period fixed for the discharge of the second instalment of
what was to be paid for the farm. It could be done almost without loss.
They would have a freer hand. Everything would progress simultaneously.
There were laborers enough at hand, and they could get more accomplished
at once, and arrive swiftly and surely at their aim. Edward gladly gave
his consent to a plan which so entirely coincided with his own views.
During this time Charlotte persisted with all her heart in what she had
determined for herself, and her friend stood by her with a like purpose,
manfully. This very circumstance, however, produced a greater intimacy
between them. They spoke openly to each other of Edward's passion, and
consulted what had better be done. Charlotte kept Ottilie more about
herself, watching her narrowly; and the more she understood her own
heart, the deeper she was able to penetrate into the heart of the poor
girl. She saw no help for it, except in sending her away.
It now appeared a happy thing to her that Luciana had gained such high
honors at the school; for her great aunt, as soon as she heard of it,
desired to take her entirely to herself, to keep her with her, and
bring her out into the world. Ottilie could, therefore, return thither.
The Captain would leave them well provided for, and everything would be
as it had been a few months before; indeed, in many respects better. Her
own position in Edward's affection, Charlotte thought, she could soon
recover; and she settled it all, and laid it all out before herself so
sensibly that she only strengthened herself more completely in her
delusion, as if it were possible for them to return within their old
limits--as if a bond which had been violently broken could again be
joined together as before.
In the meantime Edward felt very deeply the hindrances which were thrown
in his way. He soon observed that they were keeping him and Ottilie
separate; that they made it difficult for him to speak with her alone,
or even to approach her, except in the presence of others. And while he
was angry about this, he was angry at many things besides. If he caught
an opportunity for a few hasty words with Ottilie, it was not only to
assure her of his love, but to complain of his wife and of the Captain.
He never felt that with his own irrational haste he was on the way to
exhaust the cash-box. He found bitter fault with them, because in the
execution of the work they were not keeping to the first agreement, and
yet he had been himself a consenting party to the second; indeed, it was
he who had occasioned it and made it necessary.
Hatred is a partisan, but love is even more so. Ottilie also estranged
herself from Charlotte and the Captain. As Edward was complaining one
day to Ottilie of the latter, saying that he was not treating him like a
friend, or, under the circumstances, acting quite uprightly, she
answered unthinkingly, "I have once or twice had a painful feeling that
he was not quite honest with you. I heard him say once to Charlotte: 'If
Edward would but spare us that eternal flute of his! He can make nothing
of it, and it is too disagreeable to listen to him.' You may imagine how
it hurt me, when I like accompanying you so much."
She had scarcely uttered the words when her conscience whispered to her
that she had much better have been silent. However, the thing was said.
Edward's features worked violently. Never had anything stung him more.
He was touched on his tenderest point. It was his amusement; he followed
it like a child. He never made the slightest pretensions; what gave him
pleasure should be treated with forbearance by his friends. He never
thought how intolerable it is for a third person to have his ears
lacerated by an unsuccessful talent. He was indignant; he was hurt in a
way which he could not forgive. He felt himself discharged from all
obligations.
The necessity of being with Ottilie, of seeing her, whispering to her,
exchanging his confidence with her, increased with every day. He
determined to write to her, and ask her to carry on a secret
correspondence with him. The strip of paper on which he had, laconically
enough, made his request, lay on his writing-table, and was swept off by
a draught of wind as his valet entered to dress his hair. The latter was
in the habit of trying the heat of the iron by picking up any scraps of
paper which might be lying about. This time his hand fell on the billet;
he twisted it up hastily, and it was burnt. Edward observing the
mistake, snatched it out of his hand. After the man was gone, he sat
himself down to write it over again. The second time it would not run so
readily off his pen. It gave him a little uneasiness; he hesitated, but
he got over it. He squeezed the paper into Ottilie's hand the first
moment he was able to approach her. Ottilie answered him immediately. He
put the note unread in his waistcoat pocket, which, being made short in
the fashion of the time, was shallow, and did not hold it as it ought.
It worked out, and fell without his observing it on the ground.
Charlotte saw it, picked it up, and after giving a hasty glance at it,
reached it to him.
"Here is something in your handwriting," she said, "which you may be
sorry to lose."
He was confounded. Is she dissembling? he thought to himself. Does she
know what is in the note, or is she deceived by the resemblance of the
hand? He hoped, he believed the latter. He was warned--doubly warned;
but those strange accidents, through which a higher intelligence seems
to be speaking to us, his passion was not able to interpret. Rather, as
he went further and further on, he felt the restraint under which his
friend and his wife seemed to be holding him the more intolerable. His
pleasure in their society was gone. His heart was closed against them,
and though he was obliged to endure their society, he could not succeed
in re-discovering or in re-animating within his heart anything of his
old affection for them. The silent reproaches which he was forced to
make to himself about it were disagreeable to him. He tried to help
himself with a kind of humor which, however, being without love, was
also without its usual grace.
Over all such trials Charlotte found assistance to rise in her own
inward feelings. She knew her own determination. Her own affection, fair
and noble as it was, she would utterly renounce.
And sorely she longed to go to the assistance of the other two.
Separation, she knew well, would not alone suffice to heal so deep a
wound. She resolved that she would speak openly about it to Ottilie
herself. But she could not do it. The recollection of her own weakness
stood in her way. She thought she could talk generally to her about the
sort of thing. But general expressions about "the sort of thing," fitted
her own case equally well, and she could not bear to touch it. Every
hint which she would give Ottilie recoiled on her own heart. She would
warn, and she was obliged to feel that she might herself still be in
need of warning.
She contented herself, therefore, with silently keeping the lovers more
apart, and by this gained nothing. The slight hints which frequently
escaped her had no effect upon Ottilie; for Ottilie had been assured by
Edward that Charlotte was devoted to the Captain, that Charlotte
herself wished for a separation, and that he was at this moment
considering the readiest means by which it could be brought about.
Ottilie, led by the sense of her own innocence along the road to the
happiness for which she longed, lived only for Edward. Strengthened by
her love for him in all good, more light and happy in her work for his
sake, and more frank and open toward others, she found herself in a
heaven upon earth.
So all together, each in his or her own fashion, reflecting or
unreflecting, they continued on the routine of their lives. All seemed
to go its ordinary way, as, in monstrous cases, when everything is at
stake, men will still live on, as if it were all nothing.