HOW IT FARED FURTHER WITH HULDBRAND.
Shall we say it is well or ill, that our sorrow is of such short
duration? I mean that deep sorrow which affects the very well-spring
of our life, which becomes so one with the lost objects of our love
that they are no longer lost, and which enshrines their image as a
sacred treasure, until that final goal is reached which they have
reached before us! It is true that many men really maintain these
sacred memories, but their feeling is no longer that of the first
deep grief. Other and new images have thronged between; we learn at
length the transitoriness of all earthly things, even to our grief,
and, therefore. I must say "Alas, that our sorrow should be of such
short duration?"
The lord of Ringstetten experienced this whether for his good, we
shall hear in the sequel to this history. At first he could do
nothing but weep, and that as bitterly as the poor gentle Undine had
wept when he had torn from her hand that brilliant ornament with
which she had wished to set everything to rights. And then he would
stretch out his hand, as she had done, and would weep again, like
her. He cherished the secret hope that he might at length dissolve
in tears; and has not a similar hope passed before the mind of many
a one of us, with painful pleasure, in moments of great affliction?
Bertalda wept also, and they lived a long while quietly together at
Castle Ringstetten, cherishing Undine's memory, and almost wholly
forgetful of their former attachment to each other. And, therefore,
the good Undine often visited Huldbrand in his dreams; caressing him
tenderly and kindly, and then going away, weeping silently, so that
when he awoke he often scarcely knew why his cheeks were so wet;
whether they had been bathed with her tears, or merely with his own?
These dream-visions became, however, less frequent as time passed
on, and the grief of the knight was less acute; still he would
probably have cherished no other wish than thus to think calmly of
Undine and to talk of her, had not the old fisherman appeared one
day unexpectedly at the castle, and sternly insisted on Bertalda's
returning with him as his child. The news of Undine's disappearance
had reached him, and he had determined on no longer allowing
Bertalda to reside at the castle with the widowed knight.
"For," said he, "whether my daughter love me or no, I do not care to
know, but her honor is at stake, and where that is concerned,
nothing else is to be thought of."
This idea of the old fisherman's, and the solitude which threatened
to overwhelm the knight in all the halls and galleries of the
desolate castle, after Bertalda's departure, brought out the
feelings that had slumbered till now and which had been wholly
forgotten in his sorrow for Undine; namely, Huldbrand's affection
for the beautiful Bertalda. The fisherman had many objections to
raise against the proposed marriage. Undine had been very dear to
the old fisherman, and he felt that no one really knew for certain
whether the dear lost one were actually dead. And if her body were
truly lying cold and stiff at the bottom of the Danube, or had
floated away with the current into the ocean, even then Bertalda was
in some measure to blame for her death, and it was unfitting for her
to step into the place of the poor supplanted one. Yet the fisherman
had a strong regard for the knight also; and the entreaties of his
daughter, who had become much more gentle and submissive, and her
tears for Undine, turned the scale, and he must at length have given
his consent, for he remained at the castle without objection, and a
messenger was despatched to Father Heilmann, who had united Undine
and Huldbrand in happy days gone by, to bring him to the castle for
the second nuptials of the knight.
The holy man, however, had scarcely read the letter from the knight
of Ringstetten, than he set out on his journey to the castle, with
far greater expedition than even the messenger had used in going to
him. Whenever his breath failed in his rapid progress, or his aged
limbs ached with weariness, he would say to himself: "Perhaps the
evil may yet be prevented; fail not, my tottering frame, till you
have reached the goal!" And with renewed power he would then press
forward, and go on and on without rest or repose, until late one
evening he entered the shady court-yard of castle Ringstetten.
The betrothed pair were sitting side by side under the trees, and
the old fisherman was near them, absorbed in thought. The moment
they recognized Father Heilmann, they sprang up, and pressed round
him with warm welcome. But he, without making much reply, begged
Huldbrand to go with him into the castle; and when the latter looked
astonished, and hesitated to obey the grave summons, the reverend
father said to him:--
"Why should I make any delay in wishing to speak to you in private,
Herr von Ringstetten? What I have to say concerns Bertalda and the
fisherman as much as yourself, and what a man has to hear, he may
prefer to hear as soon as possible. Are you then so perfectly
certain, Knight Huldbrand, that your first wife is really dead? It
scarcely seems so to me. I will not indeed say anything of the
mysterious condition in which she may be existing, and I know, too,
nothing of it with certainty. But she was a pious and faithful wife,
that is beyond all doubt; and for a fortnight past she has stood at
my bedside at night in my dreams, wringing her tender hands in
anguish and sighing out: 'Oh, prevent him, good father! I am still
living! oh, save his life! save his soul!' I did not understand what
this nightly vision signified; when presently your messenger came,
and I hurried thither, not to unite, but to separate, what ought not
to be joined together. Leave her, Huldbrand! Leave him, Bertalda! He
yet belongs to another; and do you not see grief for his lost wife
still written on his pale cheek? No bridegroom looks thus, and a
voice tells me that if you do not leave him, you will never be
happy."
The three listeners felt in their innermost heart that Father
Heilmann spoke the truth, but they would not believe it. Even the
old fisherman was now so infatuated that he thought it could not be
otherwise than they had settled it in their discussions during the
last few days. They therefore all opposed the warnings of the priest
with a wild and gloomy rashness, until at length the holy father
quitted the castle with a sad heart, refusing to accept even for a
single night the shelter offered, or to enjoy the refreshments
brought him. Huldbrand, however, persuaded himself that the priest
was full of whims and fancies, and with dawn of day he sent for a
father from the nearest monastery, who, without hesitation, promised
to perform the ceremony in a few days.