HOW THEY FOUND UNDINE AGAIN.
The longer Huldbrand sought Undine beneath the shades of night, and
failed to find her, the more anxious and confused did he become.
The idea that Undine had been only a mere apparition of the forest,
again gained ascendancy over him; indeed, amid the howling of the
waves and the tempest, the cracking of the trees, and the complete
transformation of a scene lately so calmly beautiful, he could
almost have considered the whole peninsula with its cottage and its
inhabitants as a mocking illusive vision; but from afar he still
ever heard through the tumult the fisherman's anxious call for
Undine, and the loud praying and singing of his aged wife. At length
he came close to the brink of the swollen stream, and saw in the
moonlight how it had taken its wild course directly in front of the
haunted forest, so as to change the peninsula into an island. "Oh
God!" he thought to himself, "if Undine has ventured a step into
that fearful forest, perhaps in her charming wilfulness, just
because I was not allowed to tell her about it; and now the stream
may be rolling between us, and she may be weeping on the other side
alone, among phantoms and spectres!"
A cry of horror escaped him, and he clambered down some rocks and
overthrown pine-stems, in order to reach the rushing stream and by
wading or swimming to seek the fugitive on the other side. He
remembered all the awful and wonderful things which he had
encountered, even by day, under the now rustling and roaring
branches of the forest. Above all it seemed to him as if a tall man
in white, whom he knew but too well, was grinning and nodding on the
opposite shore; but it was just these monstrous forms which forcibly
impelled him to cross the flood, as the thought seized him that
Undine might be among them in the agonies of death and alone.
He had already grasped the strong branch of a pine, and was standing
supported by it, in the whirling current, against which he could
with difficulty maintain himself; though with a courageous spirit he
advanced deeper into it. Just then a gentle voice exclaimed near
him: "Venture not, venture not, the old man, the stream, is full of
tricks!" He knew the sweet tones; he stood as if entranced beneath
the shadows that duskily shrouded the moon, and his head swam with
the swelling of the waves, which he now saw rapidly rising to his
waist. Still he would not desist.
"If thou art not really there, if thou art only floating about me
like a mist, then may I too cease to live and become a shadow like
thee, dear, dear Undine!" Thus exclaiming aloud, he again stepped
deeper into the stream. "Look round thee, oh! look round thee,
beautiful but infatuated youth!" cried a voice again close beside
him, and looking aside, he saw by the momentarily unveiled moon, a
little island formed by the flood, on which he perceived under the
interweaved branches of the overhanging trees, Undine smiling and
happy, nestling in the flowery grass.
Oh! how much more gladly than before did the young man now use the
aid of his pine-branch!
With a few steps he had crossed the flood which was rushing between
him and the maiden, and he was standing beside her on a little spot
of turf, safely guarded and screened by the good old trees. Undine
had half-raised herself, and now under the green leafy tent she
threw her arms round his neck, and drew him down beside her on her
soft seat.
"You shall tell me your story here, beautiful friend," said she, in
a low whisper; "the cross old people cannot hear us here: and our
roof of leaves is just as good a shelter as their poor cottage."
"It is heaven itself!" said Huldbrand, embracing the beautiful girl
and kissing her fervently.
The old fisherman meanwhile had come to the edge of the stream, and
shouted across to the two young people; "Why, sir knight, I have
received you as one honest-hearted man is wont to receive another,
and now here you are caressing my foster-child in secret, and
letting me run hither and thither through the night in anxious
search of her."
"I have only just found her myself, old father," returned the
knight.
"So much the better," said the fisherman; "but now bring her across
to me without delay upon firm ground."
Undine, however, would not hear of this; she declared she would
rather go with the beautiful stranger, into the wild forest itself,
than return to the cottage, where no one did as she wished, and from
which the beautiful knight would himself depart sooner or later.
Then, throwing her arms round Huldbrand, she sang with indescribable
grace:--
"A stream ran out of the misty vale
Its fortunes to obtain,
the ocean's depths it found a home
And ne'er returned again."
The old fisherman wept bitterly at her song, but this did not seem
to affect her particularly. She kissed and caressed her new friend,
who at last said to her: "Undine, if the old man's distress does not
touch your heart, it touches mine--let us go back to him."
She opened her large blue eyes in amazement at him, and spoke at
last, slowly and hesitatingly: "If you think so--well, whatever you
think is right to me. But the old man yonder must first promise me
that he will let you, without objection, relate to me what you saw
in the wood, and--well, other things will settle themselves."
"Come, only come," cried the fisherman to her, unable to utter
another word: and at the same time he stretched out his arms far
over the rushing stream toward her, and nodded his head as if to
promise the fulfilment of her request, and as he did this, his white
hair fell strangely over his face, and reminded Huldbrand of the
nodding white man in the forest. Without allowing himself, however,
to grow confused by such an idea the young knight took the beautiful
girl in his arms, and bore her over the narrow passage which the
stream had forced between her little island and the shore.
The old man fell upon Undine's neck and could not satisfy the
exuberance of his joy; his good wife also came up and caressed the
newly-found in the heartiest manner. Not a word of reproach passed
their lips; nor was it thought of, for Undine, forgetting all her
waywardness, almost overwhelmed her foster-parents with affection
and fond expressions.
When at last they had recovered from the excess of their joy, day
had already dawned, and had shed its purple hue over the lake;
stillness had followed the storm, and the little birds were singing
merrily on the wet branches. As Undine now insisted upon hearing the
knight's promised story, the aged couple smilingly and readily
acceded to her desire. Breakfast was brought out under the trees
which screened the cottage from the lake, and they sat down to it
with contented hearts--Undine on the grass at the knight's feet, the
place chosen by herself.
Huldbrand then proceeded with his story.