Before one could realise it, winter had come, and the Place with the
Church was covered with snow.
Eleanore had gone skating; when she returned she sat down in the living
room to wait for Daniel. There she sat with her fur cap on her head,
holding her skates in her hand by the cord: she was tired--and she was
thinking.
Daniel entered the room and greeted her; she looked up, and said with a
gentle voice: "I am with child, Daniel; I found it out to-day."
He fell on his knees, and kissed the tips of her fingers. Eleanore drew
a deep breath; a smile of dream-like cheerfulness spread over her face.
The following day Daniel went to the Town Hall, and made arrangements to
have the banns posted.
Hardly had Philippina heard that Daniel and Eleanore were to get married
in February when she disappeared; she did not leave a trace of her
whereabouts behind her. Little Agnes cried in vain for her "Pina." Six
days after Philippina had left, she came back just as mysteriously as
she had gone away. She was desperately gloomy; her hair was towsled, her
clothes were wrinkled, there were no soles on her shoes; she was as
speechless as a clod, and remained so for weeks.
No one knew, nor has any one ever found out, what she did during those
six days or where she had been.
Eleanore insisted on a church wedding; this caused Daniel a great deal
of worry; it made him run many a vexatious errand. But he consented to
do as Eleanore had asked; for he did not wish to deprive her of any
pleasure she might imagine such a ceremony would give her. Eleanore made
her own white dress and her veil. Gisela Degen, a younger sister of
Martha Ruebsam, and Elsa Schneider, the daughter of the rector of the
Church of St. AEgydius, were to be her bridesmaids. Marian Nothafft and
Eva were also to come over from Eschenbach; Eleanore had already sent
them the money for the tickets.
"Help me with my sewing, Philippina," said Eleanore one evening, and
handed her silent house companion the veil, the border of which had to
be made.
Philippina took her seat opposite Eleanore, and began to sew; she was
silent. In the meanwhile, little Agnes, tottering about on the floor,
fell and began to cry in a most pitiable fashion. Eleanore hastened over
and picked the child up. Just then she heard a sound as if cloth were
being torn. She looked around, and saw that the veil had an ugly rip in
it: "You wicked thing! What do you mean, Philippina?" she exclaimed.
"I didn't do it; it tore itself," growled Philippina, taking every
precaution to see that Eleanore might not catch her cowardly eye.
"You just leave that alone! Keep your hands off of it! You will sew evil
thoughts into my veil," replied Eleanore, filled with forebodings.
Philippina got up. "Well, it's torn anyway, the veil," she said in a
defiant tone; "if harm is to come it will come; you can't keep it off by
sending me away." Philippina left the room.
The injury to the veil was not as great as Eleanore had feared. It was a
relatively easy matter to cut off the torn piece entirely, and still use
the remainder.
But from that hour Eleanore was filled with sadness: her face might be
compared to a beautiful landscape on which the first fog of autumn has
settled. It is probable that the tearing of her veil had nothing to do
with her depression: there was not a shimmer of superstition in her.
Perhaps it was merely happiness and fulfilment: it may be that she felt
the end had come, that happiness and fulfilment leave nothing more to be
desired, that life from then on would be nothing but a hum-drum
existence which does not give but only takes.
Perhaps her mind was darkened and weighed down with grief because of the
life within her body; for that which is to come sends out its rays of
melancholy just as well as that which has come and gone. What was there
to hinder a pure soul from having an inner premonition of the fate that
was in store for it? Why should this soul not learn in its dreams of the
inevitable that was not so far ahead?
It was impossible to notice any change in Eleanore; her eyes were
bright; she seemed peaceful. She would often sit before the mask of
Zingarella; she hung it with fresh flowers every day: to her the mask
was a mysterious picture of all that her own being, her own life,
embraced.
Marian Nothafft came to the wedding alone. Just as in the case of
Daniel's wedding to Gertrude, she had left the child with a neighbour.
She told Daniel and Eleanore that she could not think of taking the
child out on such a journey in the dead of winter. She mentioned Eva's
name or talked about her only in a half audible, subdued voice, a tender
smile playing gently about her lips.
Among those present at the wedding in the AEgydius Church were Judge and
Frau Ruebsam, Councillor Bock, Impresario Doermaul, Philippina
Schimmelweis, Marian Nothafft, and Inspector Jordan. On the very last
bench sat Herr Carovius; underneath one of the pillars, unseen by most
of the people in the church, stood Baron Eberhard von Auffenberg.
Philippina walked along in an ugly, crouched, cowering fashion by the
side of Jordan; had it not been that she was constantly chewing her
finger nails, one would have thought she was asleep.
As the bridal couple was marching up to the altar, the sun broke out,
and shone through the windows of the old church. The effect was
touching; for just then Eleanore raised her head, stroked her veil back
from her forehead, and caught the full light of the sun in her radiant
face.
Old Jordan had laid his forehead on the prayer-desk; his back was
quivering.