TELLING ERNESTINE
He had thought to tell her on Tuesday, but after their talk, when he took
his last look at her pictures--it had tortured both eyes and heart to do
that, but he knew in the days ahead that he would be unsatisfied with
having passed it by--he could not bring himself then to do it. He could
not keep it from her long now, but she was so happy that day in her
triumph about the picture. He was going to darken all of her days to
come; he would leave her this one more unclouded. But it was hard for him
to go through with it. He longed for her so! He must have her help. He
had asked for the pictures before telling her just because he knew it
would be unbearable for them both, if she did know. It would need to be
done in that casual way or not at all. It was strange how he felt he must
see them. It was his longing to keep close to her. He could not bear the
thought that his blindness might make him to her as something apart from
life, even though the dearest thing of all. He must enter into every
channel of her life.
It was Wednesday now, and he had told her. All the night before he had
lain awake trying to think of words which would hurt her the least. He
would put it very tenderly to his poor Ernestine. He would even pretend
he saw some way ahead, something to do. Ernestine could not bear it
unless he did that. It was the one thing which remained for him now--to
make it easy for her.
This was firmly fixed in his mind when he told her that morning he wanted
to talk to her about something and asked her to come into the library. He
was sure he had himself well in hand; the words were upon his lips.
And then when he said: "I want to tell you something, dear--something
that will hurt you very much. I never wanted to hurt you; I can not help
it now,"--when he had said that, and she, with quick response to the
sorrow in his voice, had knelt beside him, her arms about his neck,
something,--the feel of her arms, the knowing there was some one now to
help him--swept away the words and his broken-hearted cry had been: "Oh,
sweetheart--help me! I'm going blind!"
Those first moments took from her something of youth and gladness she
would never regain. First frozen with horror, then clinging to him
wildly, sobbing that it could not be so--that Dr. Parkman, some one,
would do something about it; protesting in a fierce outburst of the love
which rose within her that it did not matter, that she would make it all
up to him--their love make it right--in one moment stricken dumb as
comprehension of it grew upon her, in another wildly defying fate, but
always clinging to him, holding him so close, trying, though frightened
and broken, to stand between him and the awful thing as the mother would
stand between the child and its destroyer, Ernestine left with that
hour things never to be claimed again. And when at last she began to
sob--sobbing as he had never heard any one sob before--all his heart was
roused for her, and he patted her head, kissed her hair, whispering:
"Little one, little one, don't. We'll bear it together--some way."
During that hour she never loosened her arms about his neck. Deep in his
despairing heart there glowed one warm spark. Ernestine would cling to
him as she had never done before. God had not gone out of the world then.
He had let fate strike a fearful blow, but He had left to the wounded
heart such love as this.
"Dear," she said at last, her cheek against his, her dear, quivering
voice trying so hard to be brave, "if you feel like telling me
everything, I would like to know. I will be quiet. I will be good. But I
want to bear every bit of it with you. Every bit of it, darling--now, and
always. That is all I ask--that you let me bear it with you."
The love, the understanding, the longing to help, which were in her voice
opened that innermost chamber of his heart to her. If she had not won
this victory now, she could never have done so in the days ahead. This
hour made possible the other hours of pouring out his heart to her,
taking her into it all. He told her the story of how it happened, the
long, hard story which only covered days, but seemed to extend through
years. He told of those hours of the day and night on the rack of
uncertainty, of trying with the force of mind and soul to banish that
thing which had not claimed him then, but stood there beside him, not
retreating,--waiting. He told her of that lecture hour Monday morning
when he literally divided himself into two parts, one part of him giving
the lecture, giving it just as well as he had ever done, the other part
battling with the phantom which he would vanquish or surrender to within
an hour. And her only cry was: "You should have told me! You should have
told me from the first!" And once he answered: "No, dear--no; before I
knew I did not want to frighten you, and after--oh, Ernestine, believe
me, sweetheart, I would have shielded you forever, no matter at what cost
to myself--if only I could have done it!"
At last he had finished the story. He had told it all; of sitting there
afraid to look, of looking and seeing and comprehending. Oh how he had
comprehended! It was as if his mind too, his mind trained to grasp
things, had turned against him, was stabbing him with its relentless
clearness of vision. He told her of the merciless comprehension with
which he saw the giving up of his work, the changing of his life, the
giving up--the eternal giving up. He told her of how it had seemed to
mean the making over of his soul. For his soul had always cried for
conquest, for victory, for doing things. How would he turn it now to
submission, to surrender, to relinquishment? Everything had been tumbling
about him, he said, when that knock came at the door as the call from
life, the intrusion of those everyday things which would not let him
alone, even in an hour like that. And then of the boy with his paltry
trouble which seemed great--the hurts--the final rising up of the
instinct to help, despite it all. Then of sitting there alone and seeing
a faint light in the distance, wondering if, in all new and different
ways, he could not keep his place in the world.
"Oh help me to do that, sweetheart! Help me to keep right! Don't let me
lose out with those other things of life!"
Her arms about his neck! He would never forget how she clung to him.
There was a long silence when their souls reached one another as they
had never done before. The quivering of her body, her breath upon his
cheek--they told him all. But after that, the words did come to her;
broken words struggling to tell of what her love would do to make it
right; how she would be with him, so close, so unfailing, that the
darkness would never find him alone.
His arms about her tightened. Thank God--oh yes, a million times thank
God for Ernestine!
Then he felt her start; there came a sound as though she would say
something, but choked it back.
"Yes, dear?" he said gently.
"Oh, Karl, I shouldn't ask it. It will hurt you. I shouldn't ask."
"I would rather you did, dear. Ask anything. We are holding nothing from
one another now."
"I just happened to think--I wanted to know--oh Karl, it wasn't in your
eye on my birthday, was it? It hadn't happened--wasn't happening--when we
sat there by the fire, happier than we had ever been before?"
His impulse was to hold that back. Why should he put that upon her, too,
to hurt her as it had him, shake her faith as it had tried to shake his?
But his moment of silence could not be redeemed. "Karl,"--her voice was
strangely quiet--"it wasn't, was it?"
He groaned, and she had her answer.
She sprang away from him, standing straight. "Then," she cried--he would
never have dreamed Ernestine's voice could have sounded like that--"I
hate the world! I despise it! I will not have anything to do with it! It
fooled us--cheated us--_made fun of us_! I'll despise it--fight it"--the
words became incoherent, the sobs grew very wild, she sank to the floor,
crouching there, her hands clenched, sobbing: "I hate it! Oh how I want
to pay it back!"
He was long in quieting her, but at last she would listen to him.
"Ernestine," he said, his voice almost stern, "if you start out like that
you cannot help me. It is to you I look. If you love me, Ernestine, help
me not to hate the world. If we hate the world, we have given up.
Sweetheart,"--the voice changed on that word--"even yet--even yet in a
different way, I want to win. I cannot do it alone. I cannot do it at
all, if you hate the world. You are to be my eyes, Ernestine. You are to
see the beautiful things for me. You are to make me love them more than I
ever did before. You are to be the light--don't you see, sweetheart? And
you cannot do it, don't you see you cannot, if your own heart is not
right with the world?"
She did not answer, but she came back to his arms. Her quick breath told
him how hard she was trying.
"See your statue up there, liebchen? Remember how you always liked it?
What you said about it that night? Oh, Ernestine"--crushing her to
him--"help me to grip tight to my broken sword!"