THE FREIHERR'S PRINCIPLES.
When the next morning Johanna went to her window, she could not repress
an exclamation of delight. Her room looked from a gable of the castle
out into the park. In front of it an aged oak stretched its gnarled
limbs above a little clearing; around it stood magnificent hemlocks,
their boughs drooping to the ground beneath a weight of snow; while on
the right the only vista through the trees afforded a view of the snowy
roofs and the little church of the village in the valley, of a row of
stunted willows, probably marking the course of a stream, and of the
wooded mountain-sides crowned by curiously-jagged rocks.
It was a peaceful landscape, such as she loved, and had the added charm
of the brilliant sunlight shining upon the glittering snow in the clear
wintry atmosphere. It attracted her irresistibly to go out into the open
air. The breakfast-hour was nine o'clock: she had half an hour to spare;
and she wrapped herself up and hurried out into the park.
She soon found a pathway, but walking on the dry snow was hard work, and
she had to return long before the limits of the park had been reached.
As she ascended the terrace steps in front of the castle, she saw her
grandfather standing at a window of the lower story. She called up a
'good-morning!' to him; he acknowledged her greeting, but his look and
air were so gloomy that she feared she had transgressed some rule of the
house, and betook herself to the dining-room with a certain timidity.
Her fears were groundless, however. When the customary morning
salutations had been exchanged and all had taken their seats at table,
the Freiherr said, "I am glad to see, Johanna, that you are not one of
these silly, new-fangled girls. Out in the open air before
breakfast,--that's right, child! But 'tis hard walking over the soft
snow. Can you ride?"
Johanna replied in the negative.
"Should you like to learn?" her grandfather asked, and when she said
'yes,' with sparkling eyes, he added, "Very well; be ready by half-past
twelve, and we will make our first trial. Christian will give orders to
have Elinor saddled for you; she's the gentlest creature in the world."
"She threw me," Magelone remarked.
"Your own fault!" the Freiherr exclaimed. "A horse is a noble creature;
those who would control it must keep a tight rein upon themselves. It
rebels against alternations between childish foolhardiness and childish
timidity. By the way, Magelone, when do you wish to begin riding again?"
"Not at all, grandpapa," Magelone replied, with gentle decision.
"Nonsense!" exclaimed the Freiherr. "A Doenninghausen and not ride on
horseback! Why, your cousins Hildegard and Hedwig are perfect Amazons."
"You will have to reconcile yourself to leaving me out of the family in
this respect as in several others," Magelone replied, as gently as
before, but with a flash in her eyes that betrayed her irritation.
"Probably you will find Johanna more truly of the race."
Aunt Thekla and Johann Leopold looked up startled; the Freiherr tossed
his head, and his eyes darted fire at Magelone, but his glance fell upon
Johanna, who, paler than usual, cast down her eyes, and he controlled
his displeasure. Magelone went on eating as if nothing had occurred; the
Freiherr turned with some question to Johann Leopold. The meal
concluded as monosyllabically as usual, and the members of the household
continued as silent after it was finished; and while the Freiherr smoked
his morning pipe, Johann Leopold and Magelone played chess, and Aunt
Thekla and Johanna busied themselves with some needlework.
Johanna was puzzled by Magelone; the more she reflected upon her words
the more she was convinced that they could not have been thoughtlessly
uttered, and yet was it possible that that careless air, that gentle
smile, those clear eyes, could conceal petty spite?
Her ride with her grandfather put an end to her reflections. Martin, the
groom, who, before her grandfather appeared, tried to initiate her
somewhat into the rudiments of his art, declared with a grin that the
"gracious Fraeulein was sure to be a good rider." The Freiherr, when he
saw her sitting gayly and confidently in her saddle, said, "Now hold
yourself upright, and don't be afraid." And away they went in the clear
winter morning, with Leo at their heels.
Johanna returned warmed and refreshed. Her grandfather had not talked
much, but the little that he had said, the few questions he had put, had
brought them nearer together.
Under the influence of this impression she sat down at her writing-table
to tell Ludwig, as she had promised, of her arrival; but she had
scarcely written two lines when there was a knock at her door, and
Magelone entered. "I am disturbing you," she said, with her sunniest
smile, "but I cannot help it. I must beg your pardon,--I said such a
horrid thing at the breakfast-table."
She approached Johanna and offered her her hand.
"Never mind," Johanna replied, clasping the delicate hand in both her
own. "I thought you spoke hastily."
Magelone shook her head. "No, it was not exactly that." And she seated
herself at the writing-table. "You have no idea how childish I am. It
vexed me to have grandpapa praise you at my expense, and I had to say
that,--_c'etait plus fort que moi_."
"'Confessions of a fair soul,'" said Johanna.
"You are laughing. Oh, you are good and kind!" Magelone declared. "I
never will be cross to you again. I will love you so dearly. Believe me,
Johanna, I have always wanted some one like you."
"You hardly know me," said Johanna.
"But I know that you have everything which I lack. The repose of your
manner,--how I envy and admire you for it! You can sit perfectly quiet
all the while grandpapa is reading the papers. It drives me about like a
will-o'-the-wisp."
"That is your nature," Johanna rejoined. "There is always something
about you, not like a will-o'-the-wisp, but like a rippling wave."
Magelone shook her head. "Far more like a will-o'-the-wisp. The wave has
its goal, flows in a destined course; I go I know not whither."
"But you are gay and happy; what more would you have?" exclaimed
Johanna.
Magelone replied, "Not always. Latterly I have been rather gloomy than
gay. What do you think of Johann Leopold?" she added, after a pause.
"I cannot judge yet," Johanna replied. "I have hardly talked with him."
"He does not talk," Magelone interrupted her. "He is just what you have
seen him day out and day in. It is the same with every one. Grandpapa is
always dictatorial, Aunt Thekla always good and tiresome, Johann Leopold
always odd. Doesn't he look like the marble guest?"
"He looks melancholy and ill."
"And yet he has no positive complaint that I know of," said Magelone.
"His hobby is chemistry. Whenever he is not on duty with grandpapa he is
shut up in his laboratory in the garden, with all sorts of sounds and
smells. It is a perfect witch's kitchen there. Can you imagine an odder
match than he and myself?"
"Magelone!" cried Johanna. "You do not mean to say----"
"Yes, yes; we wish--or rather we ought to marry," Magelone interposed.
"Grandpapa devised the match, and of course it must be. I am a widow;
Johann Leopold's betrothed died; I have lost my property; he is the
heir. We are equals in rank; he is thirty years old, I am twenty-one. In
short, the match is the most suitable that can be imagined."
"But you will not consent?"
"What am I to do?" Magelone asked, shrugging her shoulders. "I am
spoiled. Poor Willfried ran through all my money to the last farthing. I
have no chance of making conquests in this wilderness; and, besides, who
would marry a widow with no money?"
"Whoever loved her."
"Do you believe in love?" asked Magelone. "I don't. All I have seen of
what is called love was mere play. People flirt, and try to befool one
another, to outdo a rival, but love, which might induce one to contract
a disadvantageous marriage, never. Marriage is a business transaction."
"Yours does not seem to have been such," Johanna said.
"Do you suppose I was enamoured of my stout captain?" asked Magelone.
"Not in the least! It suited me to marry before I was quite eighteen an
officer of the Garde du Corps; it suited me to go to Berlin, and to
court; but I never imagined for a moment that Willfried would forego his
ballet-girls and his cards for longer than the honeymoon. My folly lay
in never reflecting upon how quickly a fortune may be gambled away. My
good father ought to have thought of that; but he was ill, and wanted
to see me established, as they say, before his death, and so it all
happened."
"Poor child!" said Johanna, taking her hand. "It was the fault of
circumstances. You will learn to look upon life differently. Only have
courage, and hope."
"If I could!" Magelone said, her melancholy smile contrasting oddly with
her sparkling eyes. "Do you know I sometimes fancy that I have no heart?
It has something to do with my name. The water-witch Magelone, after
whom I am called, bequeathed to me her own uncanny nature."
"No, no; you will learn to love," Johanna interrupted. She thought of
Otto, and of the way in which he had spoken of Magelone. "You are not
actually betrothed yet?" she added.
"Not yet," Magelone replied. "Thus far grandpapa has only informed us
both, Johann Leopold and myself, of his desire. He called us into his
study and addressed us very solemnly."
"And you?" Johanna asked.
"Johann Leopold bowed, as he always does, like an automaton,--_cela
n'engage a rien_,--and I suppose I smiled. But what does it matter what
we say? You may be sure that if we employed all the eloquence in the
world to combat grandpapa's arrangements it would avail nothing. At
Christmas, when all the noble family are assembled here, the betrothal
will take place, and at the hour that grandpapa shall appoint we shall
stand before the altar and exchange rings whether we will or not."
"That I cannot understand," said Johanna.
"You will understand it when you have once seen how terrible grandpapa's
anger is," Magelone rejoined,--"when he frowns, and his eyes flash from
beneath his bushy white eyebrows, and his voice thunders and roars. It
occurs but rarely, but the terror of it is in our very blood, or has
been taught us from childhood, I cannot tell which."
"Did you ever see grandpapa so?" asked Johanna.
"Only once, when Otto, who is very hasty, had boxed the forester's ears.
Grandpapa roared out that so to treat an honest man, who could not
demand satisfaction for the insult, was the act of a blackguard; Otto
was not worthy to bear the name of Doenninghausen. As I tell it it seems
nothing, but when grandpapa flew out at the poor boy I really thought he
would have felled him to the earth, and every one present--it happened
during the charmingly social hour after breakfast--was petrified with
horror."
"But grandpapa was right!" exclaimed Johanna. "Cousin Otto must have
acknowledged that, for he speaks of him with the greatest reverence, and
calls him a nobleman in the fullest sense of the word."
Magelone shrugged her shoulders. "My dear child, that is the
Doenninghausen craze. They all imagine that because they bear this name
they are superior to all other human beings; and since they are not
so,--I mean the younger generation,--they fall down and worship the old
gentleman, in whom the family craze has become flesh and blood. But what
have we to do with that?" she went on, jumping up and throwing her arms
around Johanna. "You are not weighted with the sacred name. I have, for
a while at least, thrown it aside, and I only wish we could really and
truly enjoy life. There it goes again!" she added, with an expression of
comic despair,--"that dreadful bell, for the second breakfast, and then
four vacant hours before it rings again to call us to dinner. Poor
Johanna! Day after day passes here, each the exact counterpart of these
last twenty-four hours, year out, year in, and there is nothing for it
but to lament with Heine's Proserpine,--
''Mid corpses pale,
While Lemurs wail,
To grieve away my youthful days.'"
Whilst Magelone was revealing this melancholy prospect to the new inmate
of the castle, the Freiherr had gone to his sister in the morning-room,
where, as he paced to and fro after his wonted fashion, with his hands
clasped behind him, he said, "I am surprised and delighted to find how
well Johanna suits us. Although she has been here so short a time, I
seem nearer to her than to Magelone."
"Yes, because she has more soul," said the old lady.
The Freiherr shrugged his shoulders. "My dear Thekla, what is her soul
to me? She is clever and--strange as it sounds, and much as the word
irritated me, coming from Magelone--she has race. More than any other of
my grandchildren is she flesh of my flesh and bone of my bone."
Aunt Thekla nodded assent, and the Freiherr went on:
"It makes me anxious, too. What is to become of the child? She does not
belong in our circle. She is too good to be married to one of these
new-fangled noblemen, who, in spite of their descent, are quite ready to
throw themselves away upon any peasant's or tradesman's daughter
provided she has money; and to allow her to fall back into a rank which
would separate her from us entirely,--a great pity, a great pity!"
"But must she of necessity be married?" asked Aunt Thekla.
"Of course!" said the Freiherr.
"I have not been----" the old lady began.
Her brother interrupted her. "But you were betrothed to one your equal
in rank. Since you vowed fidelity to your lover before his death, I
respected your vow, much as it went against the grain with me."
"Dear Johann, will you not likewise respect the desire of Johann
Leopold's heart?" asked Aunt Thekla.
The Freiherr turned short and stood before her. "Has the lad
complained,--taken refuge behind a petticoat----?"
"Not at all," his sister interposed. "He has not said a word; I heard it
from Magelone. And I know Johann Leopold's heart; I know that he has not
yet recovered Albertine's loss."
"Nonsense!" cried the Freiherr. "It is his duty, as the heir, to marry.
He knows it perfectly, and when a suitable _partie_ is offered him
without his looking for her or courting her, I promise you he'll say yes
and amen without a word."
Aunt Thekla shook her head dubiously.
"Do you call it a suitable _partie_?" she said. "I fear that Magelone,
with her love of amusement and her superficiality, will make Johann
Leopold unhappy, or that he will make her so."
"I do not think so," said the Freiherr. "On the contrary, she will
spirit him up, and he will tone her down; a very good thing for both.
The stronger will get the upper hand, I don't care which it is. My duty
is to look out for the continuance of the family intrusted to my care."
"Dear Johann, do not take it amiss, but it strikes me that you look out
for it rather too much," the old lady said, timidly.
"Too much!" the Freiherr repeated, pausing again before his sister, and
his eyes flashed. "Do you really think that too much can be done in this
age of indifference and degeneracy? I can understand such a thought in
the younger generation, which is for the most part senseless and
objectless, and finds it easiest to swim with the current. But I--I
hoped you knew this without needing my assertion--I have sworn to stand
fast as long as I can, and to hold fast as much as I may. We have been
taught, and we have believed, that, like everything else on earth, the
differences of rank are instituted and decreed by the Almighty. Since
when has this not been so?"
He paused, and seemed to expect a reply, but the increasing violence of
his tone and manner had intimidated his sister. She sat mute, with
downcast eyes; and after a pause he went on:
"I do not wish to find fault with those who think otherwise. 1848
thinned our ranks. But for those who believe as I do it is all the more
an imperative duty to assert themselves. I have done so. I have made
great sacrifices to my convictions, and I feel that I have thereby
purchased the right, so long as my eyes are open to the light, to
provide for Doenninghausen according to the dictates of my reason and my
conscience. If you think I do too much--well, I must endure that
reproach."
The old lady went up to her brother. "Dear Johann," she said, laying her
hand upon his arm, "how can you suppose that any one of us would
reproach you? We know that you always do what is best, and we thank you
from our hearts."
"That I don't believe, neither is it necessary," the Freiherr interrupted
her. "I do my confounded duty, fulfil my obligations,--_basta!_ Has
not the lad, Johann Leopold, had his own way hitherto in everything? He
has studied what he chose, where he chose; he has travelled for years;
has been betrothed to the girl whom he loved, and what is the result? He
has come to be a mollycoddle and a bookworm. My successor, the Lord of
Doenninghausen, must be none of that. At all events, an attempt must be
made to spirit him up by a marriage with Magelone, and so the betrothal
is fixed for Christmas, the marriage for Easter. But come, Thekla, the
bell rang some time ago."