Gotthold followed her through the entry and into the sitting-room on
the left, and would gladly have entered the adjoining chamber, from
which, as the girl opened and closed the door, the wailing of a child
and a woman's voice consoling it were distinctly audible. It was her
voice,--somewhat deeper and more gentle, it seemed to him, than in the
old days, but he had only distinguished a few tones above the moaning
of the child.
"Poor thing," he murmured, "poor child, if I could only help it."
His hand was extended towards the handle of the door, but instantly
fell again. If the girl had told her he was there, she would probably
come out for a moment; at any rate Carl must soon return.
He stationed himself at the open window and looked across the empty
courtyard towards the building Brandow had entered. How could he stay
so long! He again turned back into the room, which was already
beginning to grow dark, and his eyes wandered mechanically over the
furniture and pictures, many of which he thought he recognized, while
his ear was strained to catch the sounds from the next room. But
everything there had now become quiet, and in the stillness the old
Black Forest clock ticked so loudly--he had not noticed it before--the
evening breeze whispered in the linden before the window, and then once
more he heard nothing except the blood beating in his temples.
Had any misfortune happened? Was the child--he must have some
certainty.
But just as he took a step forward, the door opened and Cecilia
entered. The girl had told her nothing about the stranger; she came to
get a piece of linen from her work-basket, which stood in one of the
windows. The shadows fell heavily over Gotthold, and she did not see
him--her eyes were turned towards the window--until she had almost
reached him, when she suddenly paused, extending both hands in terror
towards the dark figure. The light of the setting sun streamed full
upon her pallid face, from which the large dark eyes stared with a
strange glassy look.
"It is I, Cecilia!"
"Gotthold!"
He did not know that he held out his arms; the next moment he would not
have been able to say whether she had really rested upon his breast.
When he was again conscious of what was passing around him, he was
standing beside her at the child's little bed.
"The girl was playing with Gretchen just before we came home--she fell
with her arm under her; I thought she had only bruised it; but it has
grown worse and worse, she cannot move it, and cries at the slightest
touch; I think she has broken it here above the wrist."
Gotthold had bent over the child, who gazed at him in surprise, but
without the least alarm. He thought he was looking into Cecilia's eyes.
"Are you the new doctor?" asked the little girl.
"No, Gretchen, I am not a doctor, but if you love your mamma you will
let me take hold of your arm."
"It hurts so," said Gretchen.
"I won't be long."
Gotthold took the little arm and moved it at the shoulder and
elbow--the child made no resistance; then he passed his hand carefully
down the lower arm to the joint and bent the wrist a little. The child
uttered a low cry. Gotthold laid the arm gently back on the coverlet
and stood erect.
"I think I can assure you that the arm is not broken; it is nothing
more than a severe sprain. I should like to put on a bandage, which
will relieve Gretchen's pain, because it will prevent her from moving
the joint. That will be sufficient until the doctor comes. May I?"
He had spoken in a low tone, but the child heard.
"Let him do it, mamma," she said; "I like the new doctor a great deal
better than the old one."
A few large tears ran down Cecilia's pale cheeks, and Gotthold's own
eyes grew hot. He asked whether she had a certain kind of bandage which
he described; one was brought, exactly what he needed. As he rolled it
he said:
"It is fortunate, that during the years I spent in study I visited, in
the interests of my art and also from real love of the profession,
various anatomical and other medical colleges. I have already been
able, on several occasions, to make my little knowledge useful, when no
other aid was at hand and the case was rather worse than this. I
repeat, there is not the least danger, and I would, if necessary,
undertake to effect a cure without the least hesitation."
"I have perfect confidence in you."
Gotthold's lips quivered. They had always addressed each other by the
familiar "thou," nor had he, either in dreams or waking visions, called
her by any other title during the last ten years.
The bandage was adjusted to Gotthold's satisfaction. Gretchen,
exhausted by weeping, and now entirely free from pain, had laid her
head on her pillow and seemed about to fall asleep. Gotthold left the
chamber and went back to the sitting-room. While groping about in the
dark for his hat, the most singular sensation overpowered him.
He had not forgotten that he wished to find Brandow and tell him of the
child's condition, but it seemed as if the intention was entirely
unnecessary; as if Carl Brandow cared as little about the child as he
did about Carl Brandow's horse; as if only he and Cecilia had anything
to do with it, and as though this had been not only during the last
quarter of an hour, but always, and could never be different.
Oppressed by this strange bewilderment, he stood motionless, and only
regained his senses when Cecilia entered quietly, but hastily, held out
both hands to him, and said in a low, rapid tone:
"I thank thee, Gotthold, and--I noticed that the formal 'you' wounded
thee, but the girl was looking at us in such astonishment; she repeats
everything, and besides, it must be, but once--for the last time--I
wanted to speak in the old way, as thou wert here once more."
"That sounds, Cecilia, as if you[2] had not wished me to come."
She had now released her hands, which he had clasped firmly in his own,
and thrown herself into a chair by the window, supporting her head on
her hand. He went up to her.
"Cecilia, did you not wish me to come?"
"Yes, yes," she murmured, "I have longed to see you again--for
years--always; but you ought not to have come; no, you ought not to
have come!"
"Then I will go, Cecilia."
"No, no," she exclaimed, hastily raising her head, "I do not mean that.
You are here--the mischief is done. And now you can stay--you must stay
until--"
She paused suddenly. Gotthold, who was following the direction of
her eyes, glanced through the open window and saw at the end of the
court-yard Carl Brandow talking with Hinrich Scheel, whom he now left
and came hurriedly towards the house.
"He has returned already," she murmured; "what will you say to him?"
"I don't understand you, Cecilia,"
"He hates you."
"Then I don't know why he sought me out and gave me such a pressing
invitation to his home, which I certainly had never intended to enter."
"He sought you out--invited you--that is impossible."
"Then he meant to make me--us--but that is no less impossible."
She looked at him in astonishment.
"Impossible!" she said, "impossible!"
A strange, sad smile flitted over her pale face.
"Then everything can remain as it was," she said, "it is all right."
"Holloa!" cried Brandow, who had seen them both at the window, and now
quickened his already hasty steps and eagerly waved his hand.
He entered the room immediately, after calling from the door: "Ah! so
you have found her already! Isn't this a surprise, eh? What am I to get
for it? Ah! a man must be cunning. Not a word to the wife, who would
make all sorts of well-meant objections about old enmity and other
long-forgotten follies; and then tell the friend she will be on
tenter-hooks till I bring him home. That's the way to catch one's
birds!"
He laughed loudly.
"You will wake Gretchen," said Cecilia.
"Yes, what is the matter with her?" asked Brandow, lowering his voice.
"I hope it is nothing serious, a false alarm, as it was with Brownlock,
or--where are you going, Cecilia?"
She had risen and entered the next room, closing the door behind her.
Gotthold informed Carl how he had found the child, and what he had done
for the present.
"But shall we need to send for the doctor at once?" said Brandow.
"I do not think it absolutely necessary," replied Gotthold, "but if you
are at all anxious--"
"I anxious? God forbid! It would be the first time in my life. I leave
all that to my wife, who, if the child is in question--oh! here you
are! Gotthold says we need not send for Lauterbach immediately, and
besides it would be of very little use; he is never to be found on
Sundays. I shall be obliged to drive over early to-morrow morning and
then I can bring him back with me. Don't you think that will do?"
"Will you look at Gretchen again?" said Cecilia. She did not glance at
her husband, but addressed Gotthold, who followed her, leaving the door
open behind him, in the expectation that Brandow would go with them;
but he had paused half way. Gnawing his under lip, he looked through
the open door at the pair, who were now standing one on each side of
the child's little bed, bending over it, so that in the dusk their
faces seemed to touch. Were they not whispering: "he has deceived us,"
or something of the kind? No, it was Rieke who had spoken. "The girl
shall keep a sharp watch for me. So far everything has gone better than
I could expect."
He went slowly into the room; involuntarily pausing a moment upon the
threshold, which he had not crossed for a long time, and shrinking from
a bluish light that suddenly filled the apartment, now almost dark. But
it was nothing--only the first flash of lightning from a thunder-storm
which had risen at the close of the sultry day. Thunder rolled in the
distance, the trees in the garden swayed to and fro, and a few heavy
drops of rain plashed against the window-panes.
The storm had long subsided and the night was far advanced when
Gotthold, treading softly and carefully, shielding his light with his
hand, crossed the wide garretlike entry, lumbered with all sorts of
articles, towards the gable-room, which had been assigned him as his
sleeping apartment. Brandow, with whom he had been sitting until this
time over a bottle of wine in the room on the right-hand side of the
entry, which had always been appropriated by the master of the house,
had wished to accompany him, but Gotthold declined: he could find the
way; two pairs of boots made more noise than one, and he remembered
that footsteps on the upper floor sounded remarkably loud at night.
"Well then, go alone, you stickler for everybody's comfort," said
Brandow laughing, "and remember, sleep off all thoughts of going away
to-morrow; I tell you once for all I won't hear of it. I'll stop for
Jochen Prebrow as I pass the smithy to-morrow; he can sit on the box
with my Fritz, and I'll bring your luggage out to you. I shan't let you
leave under a week, and if I had my way you should stay here always.
But you'll take good care not to do that; such a life would be
unendurable to a man of the world. Well, I have complained of my fate
more than is seemly; but in the presence of a man of your stamp, one is
too painfully reminded of what he might perhaps have made himself, and
what he has finally become. Good night, old fellow, and pleasant
dreams!"
And now Gotthold stood at the open window in the cosy old gable-room.
But eagerly as he inhaled the night breeze, which blew fresh and cool
through the trees, still dripping with rain-drops, it did not lighten
his heart, which throbbed heavily and painfully in his panting breast,
like a sleeper whose brain is oppressed by some painful dream. Was it
not all a mad dream that he was standing in Dollan in the gable-room,
gazing at the dim light which fell upon the dark shrubbery from the
window below him, the window of the room where she had slept when a
girl, and in which she now watched beside the bed of her child, her
child and his--
Gotthold sank into a chair beside the window, and pressed his hands
upon his burning brow.
A gust of wind which sighed through the rustling trees roused him
from his painful reverie. He started up with a shiver. His limbs
trembled as if in a fever. He shut the window, and threw himself in
the darkness--the light he had brought with him had gone out long
before--upon the bed. It was the very same one in which he had so often
slept when a boy and a youth, and it stood in the same place. He had
noticed that when he entered the room. Now he thought of it again, and
remembered the last time he had lain here--ten years ago, in the early
morning after the night, the first part of which he had spent in the
beach-house with Cousin Boslaf, and a few hours after, when they were
awake below, he was to go down and bid them farewell forever--then too
he; had turned his burning head first on one side and then the other
upon the pillows, and had been unable to find rest anywhere.
"After wandering through the wide world so long to be whirled back to
this little room, the same as I was then! No, not the same! Poorer,
much poorer!
When I wandered away, away, away,
Coffers and chests were heavy;
As homeward I turn my steps to-day,
Everything is empty.
"Empty, empty!" he murmured, as if his burning, wakeful eyes could read
the cheerless words from the white wall opposite to him, on whose bare
surface the first gray light of dawn was struggling with the darkness
of night.