down the precipitous path, and reached the house greatly exhausted, and
his knees knocking under him. He remarked a travelling carriage which
stood beside the shed, and in the stables in which a cow was kept
during the winter, two horses were tied to the manger. Without heeding
the landlady who was dying to tell him the news, he walked straight
into the room where the child sat at the table playing with a new doll.
"Uncle Max is here," she cried out to him, her face beaming with joy.
"He has brought me a doll that can move its eyes; then he dined with
Mamma, and now they are both on the island. They will soon return
however, as Uncle Max means to take us away in his large travelling
carriage, but Mamma said that she would not move a step without your
special consent."
"Fanny," he said, and took the child's curly head between his hands,
"you won't forget me, though I cannot offer you a beautiful doll, but
only a simple bunch of flowers?"
The child looked up surprised; "Mamma said that after the good God, I
should love you best, because you have saved my life. I love you better
than all other people; but Mamma I love best of all."
He stooped over the fair face, and kissed the child's truthful loving
eyes, and her pale lips.
"You are right, little Fan," said he, speaking with difficulty, "she
deserves your love. Here is my bouquet, and give her my compliments."
He turned towards the door.
"What are you going away! the child called after him; won't you come,
and tell me some nice story."
"Another time," was all he could say. The nurse who just then came in,
tried to detain him, and wondered at his disturbed appearance, but he
passed her by, and hastening to his own room locked the door behind
him.
Once more alone, he was so overcome by the agony of his feelings that
he dropped into a chair and his strong frame shook with convulsive
though tearless sobs. But he promptly recovered himself, pressed his
hand to his heart as if to still its throbbings and proceeded to stuff
his few possessions into his travelling bag. Only his portfolio he kept
back; then he sat down at the table, and mechanically took out the
letter to his friend as if to add another postscript, but he vainly
sought for words and he finally laid it down, took up another sheet and
began to write a short account of the child's illness, with the
intention of leaving it to Lucille in case she should find another
consultation necessary.
He found a certain satisfaction in clearly wording his statement, and
in perceiving how steadily his hand wielded the pen. "At least I have
not yet lost my senses," he said aloud.
He had just finished this writing when a man's quick step was heard
approaching his room, and then came a knock at the door. He rose with
an angry feeling. He could not deny his presence, and yet this meeting
was intensely distasteful to him. He unlocked the door with a
countenance which was anything but inviting. The moustachied stranger
however entered with the most amiable air. Apparently he did not expect
a very gracious reception, but seemed fully determined not to let
himself be put out by anything.
"My dear doctor," he exclaimed in an engaging manner, and with a
friendly shake of the hand. "Pray excuse my intruding on you; Lucille
has told me that you refuse to listen to any thanks, but I am not to be
daunted; I am a soldier and would think it dishonourable to be afraid
of anything; even of the glum face of a benefactor; and so I boldly
express my thanks, at the risk of being challenged by you afterwards,
and tell you that I shall always feel indebted to you, and that you can
command my services at any time as you would those of your oldest
friend.--You have worked wonders, you best of doctors! Not only with
the little one, whose welfare I have at heart as though it were my own
child, but above all with the mother--I can assure you that I hardly
recognized her. From the time when her husband my dear brother was
buried with his comrades in one common grave on the field of battle,
her widowed grief, up to a few weeks ago, had always remained the same.
All the efforts of her friends to restore her to her former
cheerfulness were vain. Seven years! In truth, I should say that the
most legitimate grief might be overcome in that time. Between
ourselves, be it said, though I sincerely loved my brother, yet I have
found these seven years unconscionably long. Lucille was my lady love
as well as my brother's, but then I was only a good for nothing
lieutenant, and so I had to yield the precedence to my brother Victor.
Now it seems to me that I have every right to assert my claim
considering that it is of such long standing. Don't you think so,
doctor? But in spite of my perseverance through all these years, not
the slightest ray of hope was ever granted to me. I wished to accompany
her on this visit to the grave; but no, my request was mercilessly
refused. Wait till she has returned, I said to myself; who knows but
this visit may be the last stage of her conjugal grief. So I waited for
her return, or at least for a letter, but when three weeks had passed
without any tidings of her, fearing that some misfortune had happened,
I took leave of absence from my regiment, and traced her steps till I
found her here at the Dead Lake; not the cold and reserved Lucille of
old, but a totally changed being. The gratitude she feels for the
preservation of her child, seems to have reconciled her to life, and
consequently it will be to you alone that I shall owe my thanks, should
I one day be allowed to give her a far dearer name than that of sister.
She owns that it is you who have broken the ice, and talks of you with
so much enthusiasm that if I did not know that it overflowed from the
abundant thankfulness of her maternal heart, I should feel jealous of
you."
A short silence followed this artless avowal, during which the young
officer paced the room; then walked to the casement, and rapped his
fingers against the low ceiling.
"Well," he exclaimed, with his good-humoured laugh, "you doctors are
certainly not more fastidious than we soldiers! How did you manage to
hold out in this dismal hole? We will now try to make you as
comfortable as possible, for of course you are coming with us. Lucille
would never reconcile herself to the thought of losing her court
physician."
"I much regret," answered Everhard in a calm voice, "that Madam Lucille
is mistaken in this case. The child can travel without the least
danger; it is even necessary that she should leave this place, where
the food is not adapted to her delicate state of health. I had
determined to order a travelling carriage for tomorrow, when I
perceived your carriage. I could not place the ladies under better
protection than yours, so you must pardon me if I leave you to-day."
"Impossible!" cried the young officer in a tone of the most sincere
dismay. "What a desperate clamour the women would set up at your
leaving us so suddenly. Lucille, little Fan, even the nurse would cling
to your coat tails; I should have to arrest you by barring the way with
my sword."
"Possibly they may augment the difficulties of this inevitable and
necessary step," remarked the doctor with a grave face, "so the best
plan will be, not to mention my resolve and at nightfall I can easily
depart without any leave taking. Here is a report of the child's
illness, take the paper with you, but I trust it will not be required.
If you go only short day's journies, the drive at this season will
probably be beneficial to the health of the little patient. And so
permit me to bid you good-bye. I beg you to present my compliments to
your sister-in-law."
"Doctor, this cannot be your final decision; I hope you will yet change
your mind; meanwhile I will take this statement and leave you, for I
fear I have disturbed you whilst writing. Au revoir."
"Do not betray me." Everhard called after him. The young officer put
his finger to his lips, and hastened through the tap-room whistling a
merry tune.
Everhard had hardly been alone for ten minutes pacing his room like a
prisoner who is meditating how he can escape from his bare and narrow
cell, when he suddenly heard the outer door again open, and a step,
which sent the blood to his heart, approach his room.
"Is my cup of bitterness not yet full," he murmured to himself.
The door opened and Lucille stood before him with an expression in her
eyes which utterly disconcerted him and forced him to cast his down.
"Pardon me my friend," she said in an agitated voice, "if once more I
intrude on your solitude, though you so evidently avoid me. You even
intend to leave us without a word of farewell. My brother-in-law did
not admit this; but I was aware of it from his manner when he left your
room, and as I have long suspected this to be your intention, I was not
much astonished, though greatly grieved. I owe you so much that it
would be useless again to repeat my thanks before we part; but it is
not generous in you to deprive me of all opportunity of rendering you
any service, or of showing you the deep interest I feel in you. I am
persuaded that my friendship is not incapable of giving you relief if
you would but return the confidence with which I have always treated
you from the first hour we met. A secret grief consumes you. What would
I not give to be able to aid you in bearing the load which oppresses
you! Now could I leave you, perhaps never to meet you again, and have
to reproach myself with the thought, that although knowing, that you,
dearest and most devoted of friends, were suffering deeply, I yet
allowed a miserable fear of appearing curious and importunate to deter
me from making any attempt to assuage those sufferings or to learn
their cause!"
"No," she continued with heightened colour, "I know that you are not
selfish enough to burden me with this unbearable grief and remorse,
only because it humbles your pride to acknowledge your sufferings to a
woman."
He did not once interrupt her, but stood with his eyes fixed on the
ground. When she had ceased speaking, he made an effort to answer her
but he did not look up. "Thank you," he said, "I know that your
questions proceed from the kindness and benevolence of your heart; and
be assured that if the weight which oppresses me could be lightened by
human means, I would apply to you for help--I was enabled to come to
your aid, why therefore should I not accept succour from you? But there
are certain circumstances in life which cannot be altered, and in such
cases, I think it is foolish weakness, and even culpable to give vent
to useless complaints, and to importune one's friends with them. Let us
part. When the health of your child is completely restored to its
former bloom, the sad impressions connected with the remembrance of the
Dead Lake will vanish from your mind, and with them the image of a man
who"--....
Feeling that emotion was overpowering him, he suddenly stopped, and
walked to the window to regain his composure. When after a moment he
again turned towards Lucille, he saw her leaning against the door post,
pale as death and with the same pained expression on her countenance
that he had noticed the first day of her arrival.
"Good heavens, what ails you?" exclaimed he; "Know then, if you cannot
bear the feeling of being indebted to me, that we are quits. If I have
succeeded in saving the life of your child, you have fully acquitted
this debt by preserving my own life."
She looked up with surprise.
"Yes," he continued; "on that very table, on the night I first met you,
I wrote a farewell letter to life. The letter still lies there, so you
see that I have changed my resolution. I do not say that I feel
grateful to you for it. Possibly non existence has its dark side too,
but it cannot be worse than remaining between life and death neither
suited to the one, nor prepared for the other--enough of this! Is it
your fault if the life which you saved was not worth the trouble? Do
not let us prolong so painful a meeting. Our paths now diverge--You
return to your home, I go where fate leads me. I am driven on by my
destiny like a stone which a boy rolls before him. I thank you for the
happy days I have spent in this wilderness; they have been the first,
for a long time, in which I felt that I lived. It is a pity that they
must pass away like every thing else in this perishable world."
"And why must they pass, away?" she asked looking up with anxious and
imploring eyes. "Why will you not accompany us?"
"Why? because"--he suddenly stopped. His eyes whilst wandering round
the room had fastened on the letter to his friend which lay on the
table, beside the travelling bag. A sudden thought flashed through his
mind. "You wish to test the value I set on your friendship, and that it
is not pride which prevents me from availing myself of your kindness;
well then take this letter, but promise not to read it before
to-morrow. Will you promise this?"
She only bowed without looking at him.
"This letter contains every explanation which I could not bring myself
to utter. When you have read it, you will understand that I can no
longer remain here, and that you ought not to detain me. And now give
me your hand once more. Let me also thank you again for the happiness
of knowing you! He pressed her hand to his lips with much emotion.
Embrace your child to-morrow when you have read the letter, and
then--but I need not ask you for this; then in spite of all, think
kindly of me. I know that you will do so, have you not the heart and
soul of an angel!"
He hastened from the room and passed through the empty passage. He
heard Fanny's voice in the sitting-room. She talked with the nurse and
mentioned his name. This accelerated his steps. He had just presence of
mind enough left him to throw a handful of money to the landlady, and
to bid her good-bye, then he followed the cart track which led into the
valley, and hastily turned round the first corner without looking back.
After he had walked for a quarter of an hour unconscious of all around
him, only blindly driven on by the dim feeling that if he once looked
back his strength would fail him; it suddenly occurred to him that he
was walking northward in the direction of Germany, instead of turning
towards the lakes of Lombardy as he had at first intended. "What does
it matter," he said to himself; "what is home to me, am I not
everywhere a stranger?" He descended to the bed of the mountain stream
which flowed by the roadside. There he rested for a while, bathed his
feverish brow with the cold water, and listened to its gurggle as it
flowed over the pebbly bed. The sound reminded him of Fanny's clear
voice when she laughed for the first time after her illness. This
recollection so overpowered him that the tears streamed from his eyes,
and he let his grief take its course without trying to check it.
A cart which passed him in its slow progress up the hill, roused him
from his painful thoughts. It occurred to him, that the carter would
stop at the inn and there probably see Lucille and her child. That
happiness would never be his again! However he remained firm to his
resolve, and wandered on till he felt, in his trembling knees and
exhausted frame, how deeply the last few hours had affected him.
He had now reached a more expanded part of the valley; he sat down
beside a small shed which had formerly served as shelter to the workmen
of a quarry. His head sank on his chest, and he was soon absorbed in
gloomy thoughts and reveries.
An hour passed and found him still sitting there half stupified;
neither feeling pain nor wishing for any thing. He only heard the
rushing of the water and stared vacantly at the stones and mosses at
his feet. Suddenly he started up, the tread of horses was heard, and
the grating sound of the heavy drag as a carriage proceeded slowly down
the hill. A secret presentiment thrilled through him, he looked up with
a feeling of terror, and to his dismay recognized the carriage of the
young officer.
On the box beside the coachman was seated the nurse, her fat
good-humoured face shaded by a large straw hat and a blue veil, though
the sun had now sunk low, and only a few slanting rays reached the deep
glen. His first thought was to spring up, and fly before them. But even
if he could have got in advance of them here on this steep road, once
in the plain they would speedily overtake him; so he had no chance of
escaping. He stealthily rose and approached the door of the hut. "They
have not yet seen me," he murmured; "they will drive past, and then
this last pain will have been overcome; but why could they not have
spared me this?"
He entered the shed half ashamed of slinking away, and hiding like an
outlaw.
Through all those days of inward strife he had never felt so thoroughly
wretched and unhappy as he did at that moment. Now when his last
strength was exhausted, he had to witness the triumphant progress of
one to whom he bitterly grudged the prize that was denied him.
Cautiously he pressed against the wooden partition of the hut he could
not refrain from looking through the small aperture which stood in lieu
of a window, and once more gaze on those dear faces.
They were now so close to him that he could examine the inside of the
carriage. On the further side lay the child asleep, wrapped up in
blankets, and cloaks. Lucille sat beside her, and held her hand, but
her eyes searchingly scanned the road. Where was her young protector?
"He will follow on foot," thought Everhard. "Thank heaven they have
passed; now all is over!"
Suddenly the carriage stopped. The coachman jumped off his seat, and
opened the door. Lucille hastily descended and walked towards the hut.
A few moments later and she stood with a bright flush on her cheek
before the bewildered young man.
"You see that all your resistance is vain my dear friend," she said in
a trembling voice. "You wished to escape, but we follow you; we
discover your hiding-place, and now hold you fast in spite of your
resistance. We cannot do without you, you must...."
"For heaven's sake," he cried, greatly agitated, "what has happened.
Has the child had another attack?"
"Our child sleeps," said the charming woman, and her voice sank low;
"but still we want you my dear friend. This time ... this time, it is
the mother who entrusts her life to you."
"Lucille!" he exclaimed, well-nigh distracted, and seizing the
hand which she offered him, drew her into the hut. "Can I?--may I
hope?--Will you indeed ..."
"I must ask you to pardon me," she replied blushing still more deeply:
"I could not wait till to-morrow, but read your letter the moment you
were gone. Then, I may as well confess all,--I had to sustain a severe
conflict within me, but I soon felt that I never could again arrive at
a clear understanding of my own heart, if I let you depart. You have
broken your vow, and have resolved to bear life for my sake, I can only
return this by surrendering myself to you. He to whom I pledged my
faith, never had another wish during his life than to see me happy. I
am convinced that if I could now explain to him how all this has
happened, he would release me from my word. When I had clearly
perceived this, I could find no rest. I have confided everything to my
brother-in-law. He has remained behind with a heavy heart; but he told
me to shake hands with you in his name. 'If he can make you happy
Lucille,' these were his last words, 'I will try not to hate him.' Will
you make the trial my dear friend?"
Unable to contain himself any longer he fell on his knees at her feet,
clung to her hands, and buried his face in the folds of her dress. He
could not utter a word except her name, which he stammered out
repeatedly in faltering accents.
"How is this?" she whispered. "Overcome this emotion, and be a man. You
ought to be my support; I must look up to you. Have I not done so,
during all these days?"
He rose slowly. "Pardon me darling," he said, pressing her to his
heart, and ratifying on her lips a mute vow. "My knees could no longer
support me. This day has brought me too much misery and bliss. Now I am
strong again, now my heart can once more sustain hope and happiness.
Let us walk to the carriage, I am impatient to embrace our child."
DOOMED.
DOOMED.
Meran, 5th October 1860.
A week has passed since my arrival and I have not written a line! I was
too much exhausted and agitated by the long journey. When I sat down to
write, gazing on the white blank pages, it seemed to me as if I were
looking into a camera obscura. All the scenes which had greeted me on
my journey appeared so clearly and vividly before me and chased each
other as in a feverish dream till my eyes filled with tears.
More than once during the journey I had felt the tears ready to start,
but I was not alone, and I had no desire to be pitied, and questioned
by the strangers who occupied the carriage with me.
Here it is different--I am alone and free. Already I have learnt by
experience that solitude only can bring freedom. Why am I, even now,
ashamed to weep? have I not a full right to do so? Is it not sad that
my first glimpse of the beauties of this world should also be my last?
Truly it were better that I closed this book, and left the blank pages
as they are. With what can I fill them but with useless complaints. I
had imagined that it would be pleasant and consoling to write down
every thought that crossed my mind, every event in this my last winter.
I wished to bequeath this book to my dear brother, my little Ernest,
who is as yet too young to understand life and death; but some day or
other he would prize it, when, asking about his sister, he found no one
to answer him. Now, however, I see it was a foolish thought. How could
I wish to live in the memory of those dear to me, in the image of my
last illness. Better that he should forget me, than have impressed on
his mind these pale features which frighten even me when I look at them
in the mirror.
Evening.--
--The atmosphere heavy and lowering.--
For several hours I have been sitting at the open casement. From thence
one can overlook the beautiful country of the Adige. And far beyond the
walls of the town and the wide-spreading[2] poplars which border the
stone-dike beside the rushing Passer, the view extends over the lower
pasture-lands, intersected with a hundred rivulets, where the cattle
feed, to the distant chain of mountains which bounds the horizon. The
air was so still that I could hear the voices of the promenaders on the
_Wassermauer_[3]--or was it a fancy of mine?
The children of my landlord, a tailor, peeped in curiously through the
door till I at last gave them the remainder of the chocolate in my
travelling bag. How joyfully they ran down with it to their mother!
Soon I became more calm and cheerful. I found that I had been wrong in
dreading my own soliloquies. Why, even considering these leaves as a
legacy, should they only contain sorrow? Did I not leave home, where I
was tied down by a hundred fetters with the full determination for
once, to enjoy life and liberty? And shall I now bear witness against
myself that I am unworthy of that freedom?
Certainly it will be but a brief enjoyment, but all the more firmly
will I grasp it and not embitter it by weakness and absorbing
self-pity.
The landlady told me that this morning a burgher of Meran, who had
never suffered from illness in his life, had died suddenly in his
prime. They had all expected that he would attain to a good old age,
and, probably, he had thought so himself. Comparing my fate with his,
is not mine preferable? Probably, like the generality of men, he had
spent his days in toil and labour, looking forward to a time when
having earned a sufficiency, he would be able to rest, and enjoy the
remainder of his life. His end was unexpected, whilst I know mine. And
is not this difference all in my favour? Is not spring yet distant, and
should I so fully enjoy this reprieve, were its short duration
concealed from me? Oh, truly it is a blessing not to be overtaken, and
surprised by death; to watch his slow approach, and only then, face to
face with him, learn to live. I can never sufficiently express my
thanks to our doctor, my dear fatherly friend, for not keeping the
truth from me--thus has he fully redeemed the promise he gave to my
dying mother, always to stand by me as a friend.
The night has now set in. I can hardly see what I write. In my whole
life, I have never felt so thoroughly at peace as here, in this
beautiful forecourt to the grave.--Father! that I could but waft one
breath of it to your depressed and sorrowful soul. Good night! Good
night, my little Ernest. Who has put you to bed to-night? Who shall now
tell you fairy tales to send you to sleep?
The 6th Afternoon.