  There is not much to be said of the period which now ensued. Outwardly everything went on as usual. The void made by the flight of the insubordinate member of the family seemed to be felt by no one except myself and the silent Uncle Joachim; at least, her name was never mentioned. True, pauses in the conversation at table were more frequent, and were usually broken--not always with much taste--by a remark from my little pupil. There had been no gayety before in this strangely constituted circle, and I don't remember ever having heard a really hearty laugh. But, since the event, the master of the house seemed to desire to keep his family under still more rigid spiritual control. The blessing invoked upon the food often extended into a short homily, and on Sunday afternoons he held services of his own, by the aid of some Lutheran tracts, from which he extracted so confused a theology that I was often compelled to exercise great self-control in order not to give the rein to my old love for debate. On such occasions he indulged in rancorous allusions to stray sheep and lost souls, spite of the presence of the servants, who nudged one another, and afterward let their tongues wag freely in the servants' hall. I wished myself a hundred miles away, for it seemed to me as if the veil, which hitherto had only allowed me to see the vague outlines of persons and things in the household, was suddenly torn away, and I experienced a sense of almost physical discomfort, which increased with every passing week. The most puzzling thing was that, spite of the promise I had given my worshiped idol at our last meeting, I had become suspicious even of her. When I imagined her in the society of the strange actor, my hand involuntarily clinched, and I was strongly inclined to pronounce the whole female sex, which had seemed to me so supernatural and adorable in this individual, nothing better than the body-guard of the enemy of mankind. I was by no means reconciled to her, but on the contrary still more deeply wounded, when, a fortnight after her disappearance, I received the printed announcement of her marriage to Herr Konstantin Spielberg, theatrical manager. I had still cherished a secret hope that she would repent the false step into which her exaggerated sense of justice had led her, and withdraw from the turbid, bottomless swamp she had entered, pure as a swan that needs only to shake its wings to cast off everything that could besmirch it. True, with my knowledge of her, I ought not to have been surprised that she should take upon herself all the consequences of her hasty step, yet it roused a feeling of such intense bitterness that it made me fairly ill, and for twenty-four hours I would see no one, as if the sight of any human face must awaken a sense of shame. I knew that she had written long letters to her aunt and Uncle Joachim, letters in which she had probably attempted to justify her conduct. But I did not venture to make any inquiries about them. More than once, when I met her beloved uncle, my tongue was on the point of asking the question what threat he had used to deter his brother from pursuing the fugitive. I vaguely suspected that I should learn things in her favor. But, as the old gentleman did not commence the subject, I was forced to say to myself that, little friendship as he felt for his brother, he probably considered it unseemly to afford a stranger a glimpse of the circumstances that did no honor to the name they both bore. Not until long after did I obtain a clear understanding of the matter. Even from the poor, timid baroness, I could obtain no information, though, since the loss of her affectionate young confidante, she had shown me even greater kindness than before. Nay, since I had offered to supply FrÄulein Luise's place at the evening games of cards, I was regularly assured of her friendly feeling by a warm clasp from her little wrinkled hand on my arrival and departure. Very soon she bestowed upon me another office which her niece had formerly filled--that of her High Almoner. I now perceived, with reverent emotion, how from her invalid chair she was the guardian angel of all the poor and wretched in the village; and the wan little face, with its bony nose and low forehead, really gained a gleam of youthful grace when I informed her of the recovery of some sick person, or the gratitude of a poor woman to whom her help in some desperate strait had restored the courage to live. Besides the quiet satisfaction I felt in my own modest share in these deeds of charity, I had one great pleasure--my little pupil was becoming more and more fond of me. Through all his ungovernableness he had retained a dim consciousness of right and wrong, and when he perceived the patient love I gave him he felt the obligation not to be indebted to me, and therefore vented his instinctive rudenesses on others. His progress in study continued to be extremely slow. But he disarmed my displeasure by a frank confession of his faults and laziness, and the entreaty that I would not attribute to ill-will what was a part of his nature. I hoped to gradually obtain an influence over this perverse disposition, but I was not allowed time to do so. With this fact there was a strange story connected. The day after the flight of the Canoness, as FrÄulein Leopoldine needed a companion, Mademoiselle Suzon had moved into the vacant tower-room below me. From this time, also, the Frenchwoman was present at the history lessons, during which she made herself very troublesome by asking foolish questions and coquettishly endeavoring to turn the tiresome teaching into empty conversation. But I said nothing about it, knowing that a complaint to the baron would have been futile. Neither did I trouble myself about the extraordinary marks of favor with which the cunning creature began to annoy me. One of the least of these was, that I rarely returned home from a walk without finding in my room a bouquet of flowers or a few choice fruits, filched from the garden or the green-house. Even at table she did not restrain herself in the least from making all sorts of advances to me, praising my lessons, repeating admirable remarks of which I had no recollection, and keeping up a fusillade of glances, which greatly incensed me, because it seemed to show distinctly that we were on the best possible terms with each other. In my innocence, I was mainly disturbed lest it should place me in a false light before the eyes of my employer and his wife. To Uncle Joachim I had made no secret of my dislike. The baroness's confidence in my honor and virtue, however, seemed immovable, and the baron appeared to be merely amused by this shadow of flirtation between his awkward tutor and the family friend, without seeing any cause for suspicion in it. The affair pursued its course in this way for several weeks. Sometimes, from the open window beneath mine, I heard, instead of the dear "Orpheus" melody, most unmusical sighs and incoherent French verses, declaimed to moon and stars, but whose real object I knew only too well. Then I shut my own casement with an intentionally loud slam, and preferred to dispense with the delicious coolness of the autumn night rather than seem to listen to the tender soliloquies of this detestable hypocrite. She perceived that she made no progress in this way, and resolved to risk a bold stroke. It had already happened several times--accidentally, as I, unsuspicious novice, supposed--that, when going up to my room, I passed the FrÄulein's door just at the moment she was putting her shoes outside. I had then forced myself to exchange a few courteous words with her, but escaped her efforts to carry on a more familiar conversation in the dimly-lighted corridor as quickly as possible by a hasty "Bonne nuit, mademoiselle!" How different would have been my demeanor if my former neighbor in the tower, whose shoes and speech were both less ornate, had met me here even once to say good-night! One evening my game with the old lady had been unusually prolonged. Mademoiselle Suzon, after her victory at chess over the baron, and obligatory courtesy to the baroness, had glided out of the room; the master of the house, making no concealment of his impatience, paced up and down the spacious apartment, frowning angrily; the servants occasionally glanced sleepily through the glass doors, to see if it were not bed-time. At last we finished, and I could take leave of my employers. My old patroness pressed my hand with a friendly glance, the baron nodded silently, but, as it seemed to me, with a sarcastic smile. I took the candle from the servant who was waiting outside, and, in a mood of dull ill-temper which was now almost always dominant, mounted the stairs to my lofty lodging. I thought the delay would at least insure safety from my tormentor. But as, walking on tip-toe, I reached the story where her room was situated, the door gently opened, and an arm in a white night-dress noiselessly placed the well-known pair of dainty shoes on the floor. I stopped, holding my breath and shading the candle with my hand. But, as the door showed no sign of closing, I resolved to rush straight on and pretend to be deaf and blind. But I had reckoned without my host. The door was suddenly thrown wide open, and the French spook, in a most bewitching nÉgligÉe costume, stood directly before me. "Bonsoir, Monsieur le Candidat!" I heard her whisper, and then followed a long, half tender, half reproachful speech in her Franco-German jargon, of which I only understood that she was angry with me--yes, seriously offended, because I so openly shunned her. She could bear it no longer, and desired at last to know what grudge I had against her, why I treated her like an enemy. She knew, of course, that she could bear no comparison with FrÄulein Luise, to whom I had been so completely devoted. She was only a simple French girl, and had no other qualitÉs than her good heart and her virtue. But, since I was such a chivalrous young man, and treated everybody else so kindly and politely, she must suppose that she had given me some special offense; and, if this were the case, she would gladly apologize for her fault if she could thereby put an end to the icy coldness with which I treated her. As she spoke, the wretch gazed at me with such an humble, childlike expression in her crafty black eyes, that I, poor simpleton, completely lost countenance. I stammered a few French phrases--I should have found it more difficult to lie in German--assured her of my profound estime, and that she had made a deplorable erreur, and, with a low bow, was hurrying away, when I felt the arm that carried the candle seized in a firm clasp. "I thank you for those noble words," said the smooth serpent, fixing her glittering eyes so intently on my face that I could not help lowering my own like a detected criminal. "If you knew, Monsieur Jean, how happy your sympathie, your cordial warmth makes me! Ah, mon ami, I am not what I perhaps seem to you, a superficial, selfish creature, who avails herself of her position in this house to gain some advantage. If you knew how this dependence, this forbearance humiliates me! My youth was so brilliant, so happy! If any one had told me then that I should ever enter a foreign German household--" And she now began to relate to me in French, with incredible fluency, the romance of her life, not more than half of which could I understand. But as, spite of my inexperience, I retained a sufficient degree of calmness to believe that even this half contained far more fiction than fact, I at last, relapsing into my former incivility, showed evident signs of impatience, and was just in the act of gently shaking off the hand that still held my arm, when her eyes filled with tears as she talked of her worshiped mother, and that honorable man, her father. "You are exciting yourself too much, mademoiselle," I said. "It is late--you must go to rest--to-morrow, if you wish--" Meantime I glanced into her room, which looked very untidy. The bed was already opened, and on the little night-table stood a candle which illumined the picture of the Madonna on the wall and a small black crucifix beneath it. "Oh, mon ami!" she sobbed, pressing my arm as if she needed some support in her grief, "si vous saviez! Mon coeur est si sensible--tous les malheurs de ma vie--" and then came a fresh torrent of revelations of her most private affairs, till terror brought cold drops of perspiration to my forehead and, in my helplessness, I could finally think of no other expedient than to whisper: "Calm yourself, Mademoiselle Suzon! Somebody is coming--if we should be found here--!" Her features suddenly changed their expression, she half closed her eyes, as if fainting, and murmuring with a gesture of horror: "Mon Dieu--je suis perdue!" tottered backward and would have fallen, had I not sprung forward and caught her with my free arm. Instantly I felt her throw her arm over my shoulder, clinging to me as if unconscious, and while we stood in this attitude and undoubtedly formed a very striking group, which I myself lighted effectively with the candle I held aloft, hasty footsteps, which I had only pretended to hear, actually did come up the staircase, and at the end of the corridor appeared the tall figure of one of the footmen, who served as the baron's valet. I was wild with rage and shame at having allowed myself to be caught in this suspicious position, and the thought darted like lightning through my brain that the whole scene had been merely a prearranged farce, to which in my good-natured simplicity I had fallen a victim! The fellow's manner strengthened this belief, as he grinned at me with insolent cunning. Besides, he had no reason to come here at this hour. Yet I retained sufficient composure to say quietly: "Mademoiselle has been taken ill. Wake the housekeeper, Christoph, and see that she is put to bed. I wish her a speedy recovery." With these words I unceremoniously laid her on the floor, and walked off as calmly as if entirely indifferent to what was happening behind my back. Yet every one will understand that I could not fall asleep very quickly that night. Again and again I called myself an ass for having entered this clumsy trap, and for the first time in my life learned that a good conscience is not always a soft pillow. True, when I asked myself how a trained man of the world would have acted in this situation, I could find no reply. But my contempt for the female sex increased that night to such a degree, and gained so large an access of dread and horror, that for the first time I envied the anchorites who, to escape from the sight of these fiends, retreated to some wilderness, where if any appeared to them and might perchance lure to sin, though they did not come straight from Hades, at least the hermits could not be surprised by inquisitive lackeys. The next morning, just after I had risen with so disagreeable a tang on my tongue from the scene of the previous night that I could not make up my mind to touch any breakfast, I suddenly heard a heavy step in the corridor outside, which I recognized with terror as the baron's. I did not doubt for an instant that the hour of judgment had struck, and the whole affair had been planned to obtain a sufficient excuse for my dismissal--I was perfectly aware how little I had concealed my feelings toward the outlawed member of the family, the lost soul of this household. After the first shock of surprise, I really felt glad that the climax had been reached without any volition of mine, and armed myself with all the pride and defiance of a pure conscience. What was my amazement when my employer, after knocking courteously, entered my room with his most cordial smile, which I had not seen for a long time, and sat down on my hard sofa with the utmost affability. He began by requesting me to give my pupil a holiday, as the family intended to drive to a neighboring estate. Then he launched into praises of the good influences I had exerted over Achatz, and expressed the hope that I might still long devote myself to his education, even if the other duties of my office claimed my attention--for the old pastor could not remain longer; his sermons showed that he was falling more and more into the childishness of old age. He had determined to pension him very shortly, even if it were against his wish, and give the office to me, though I could not move into the parsonage till after Christmas, as a suitable residence must first be found for the old couple. I was so surprised by this offer--after having prepared myself for the most furious rage--that I could only thank my kind patron with a few clumsy words. "Oh, my dear Weissbrod," he replied, gazing out of the window with his handsome bright eyes, like an aristocrat who is accustomed to dispense favors, "you need not give me any special thanks. I know what I possess in you, and hope that we shall understand each other better in future. Of course, I should have wished you to treat me with more frankness, but I understand and pardon your reticence. You thought me a rigid judge of the conscience, from whom it would be best to conceal all human weaknesses. You ought to have believed me a better Christian, one who is mindful of the words relating to the forgiveness of his erring brother: 'I say not unto thee, until seven times; but until seventy times seven.' Besides, youth has no virtue, and a future pastor is not to blame if he remembers the proverb: 'The pastor when settling for life wants a wife.'" He smiled with patronizing significance, rose, went to my bookcase, and, while gazing thoughtfully for the tenth time at the names of Neander and Marheineke on the backs of the volumes, remarked with apparent calmness: "When do you expect to be married?" I felt as if I had dropped from the clouds. "Herr Baron," I replied, "I am very grateful for your kindness, but I have never had any idea of entering the estate of matrimony." The baron took out a book, turned the leaves, and then said, still in the same tone of gracious familiarity: "That I can easily believe, my dear Weissbrod. Young people do not always think of the consequences of their acts. But an honest man, and especially a servant of the gospel, will not hesitate to recognize the obligations he has undertaken. As I said, I do not reproach you for having permitted the matter to go so far. But, after the scene of yesterday evening, which could not remain secret, you will perceive that it is your duty to protect the honor of the lady you have compromised, and this can only be done by a speedy marriage." He shut the volume and restored it to its place. Then, turning quickly and gazing at me with an inquisitorial expression, as if I were a convicted criminal, he smoothed his beard with his white hands. But, thanks to the indignation which took possession of me at the perception of this base farce, I maintained sufficient composure to look him squarely in the face and answer coldly: "I do not know what has been told you, Herr Baron. But, for the sake of truth, I must declare that it never entered my mind to carry on any love affair beneath your roof, and that my conscience absolves me from any obligation." I saw that he turned pale, and with difficulty repressed a violent outburst of rage. At last he said: "How you are to justify yourself to your conscience is your own affair. Mademoiselle has told me, with tears, that yesterday evening you took advantage of a moment's physical weakness, by which she was attacked, to embrace her, an act that did not occur without witnesses. I am disposed to judge such an impulse of gallantry leniently, on account of your youth and the attractiveness of the lady. But, as she is alone and defenseless in the world, it is my duty to protect her reputation, and I therefore give you the choice between proposing for her hand within twenty-four hours or resigning your position in my house, and with it all your prospects for the future. You must not make your decision in your first embarrassment. When we return this evening from our drive, there must either be a note from you in the young lady's room containing your proposal, or in mine your request for a vacation, as family affairs summon you as quickly as possible to Berlin. This request--unless you should change your mind while away--you must follow after a time with a petition for your final dismissal. You see that, even though you have forfeited my esteem, I treat you with Christian forbearance, but at the same time, as I am a foe to scandal and have confidence in you, I trust you will avoid any cause of vexation. I will now leave you to consider your own future, and wish you good-morning." He nodded with affable condescension and, without waiting for an answer, left the room. I was scarcely alone ere the repressed indignation that had been seething within me found vent in a convulsive laugh, and I felt tempted to rush after my noble patron and loudly inform him, outside the door of his clever accomplice, that I was not the dull simpleton they believed me, but saw through their preconcerted manoeuver, and was not at all disposed to let a bridle be thrown over my head. Fortunately I remembered that I did not possess a particle of proof, and should only make my cause worse by uncorroborated assertions. So I strove to calm myself, showed my pupil, who came bounding joyously in to bid me good-by, a cheerful face, and embraced him, a caress he received with innocent surprise, not suspecting that I was taking leave of him forever, and then watched from my window the departure of the family, which took place with the usual ceremony. In the servants' presence the baron always treated his wife with chivalrous courtesy, lifted her into the carriage himself, saw that she had the pillows for her back and the rug for her feeble knees, and always asked if she was comfortable, and whether she would not prefer to have the carriage open. Mademoiselle Suzon helped him with kittenish suppleness. Spite of the nocturnal attack of faintness, her usual smile rested on her lips, and not a single upward glance at me intimated that above her lodged the robber of her honor, the man on whom depended the weal or woe of her future life. As soon as the carriage had disappeared in the elm-avenue, I prepared to pack my effects, except my books, which I could not take with me without revealing my determination never to return. I do not know what impulse of prudence induced me to enter into the cunning farce my shrewd employer had marked out for me. Perhaps it was consideration for the kind mistress of the house or for my little pupil. The others certainly had not deserved to have me conceal the truth. After locking my trunk, I sat down and wrote the note to the baron, which was disagreeable enough for me. With great difficulty I resisted the temptation to inform him, on another sheet, that his hypocritical words had not blinded me in the least to the real motive of his conduct. But I deemed it more dignified to leave him to his own conscience, and, if the matter was as I firmly believed, he would be sufficiently punished. Several other farewells were before me--my worthy pastor, old Mother Lieschen, with whom since the Canoness's departure I had chatted a short time on many evenings, and finally my honored patron, Uncle Joachim. I made the leave-taking with the first two as brief as possible. I felt reluctant to use deception toward the good old pastor, and yet I could not tell him the whole truth. But, spite of his eighty years, his eyes were still keen enough to perceive the real state of affairs, so that a shake of the hand was sufficient to make us understand each other. Mother Lieschen was not in her hut. I could only leave a farewell message, in which I wrapped a small gift of money. Uncle Joachim I found in the fields, where he was overlooking the laborers in place of the steward, who was ill. I thought it needless to maintain any secrecy toward him. He listened quietly, and his sharp, expressive features showed no signs of surprise. "I have seen it coming," he said at last, sending forth vehement puffs of smoke from his short pipe. "The farce is excellent, though no longer perfectly new; such things have frequently occurred before, though the exit is usually different. Well, I'm not anxious about you, Sir Tutor, and I shall at least have the advantage of no longer seeing that intriguing woman's face opposite. Believe me, my dear friend, I, too, would gladly take to my heels and try to earn my bit of daily bread elsewhere, even if it should be as head-groom or steward on the estate of one of my former equals and boon companions. But there is my sister-in-law, poor thing. Who knows what her pious husband might do, if the last person in whose presence he is obliged to control himself should go away? You know the proverb about us natives of the Mark--that, though we never burned a heretic, we never produced a saint. Well, if there were a Protestant Pope, he should canonize that poor martyr for me on the spot." Then, after we had shaken hands, he called me back again. "You must do me the favor to keep this whole abominable story a secret, Sir Tutor," he said. "I could not blame you if you blazoned it abroad, for, after all, you are the one who is injured, and, if we can get no other satisfaction, to rage and call things by their right names relieves the bile. Still, remember that the honorable man who has thus injured you bears the same name as our Luise, to say nothing of myself. True, the girl has made haste to lay it aside. If you should ever meet her in the outside world, give her a tender greeting from Uncle Joachim, and tell her to bestow a sheet of letter-paper on him. Well, may God be with you, my dear friend! Heads up always, then we see the sun, moon, and stars, and not the wretched worms that crawl on this foul earth." As he uttered these words, he clasped me affectionately in his arms, and kissed me on both cheeks. Then, turning abruptly away, he went back to his work. In the afternoon I sat in the self-same butcher's cart in which I had made the journey to the castle. Krischan maintained a diplomatic silence, though I could not doubt that, like the other servants, he was perfectly aware of the nocturnal incident and its unpleasant consequences. Yet I perceived that the popular voice was not against me, for several times on the way I was obliged to refuse a drink from the worthy fellow's bottle. In the village, too, many tokens of a friendly and respectful disposition fell to my lot. Yet, though this time the bays did not have the heavy box of books to drag through the sand, and my conscience was no weightier burden than it had been six months before, the drive, spite of the bright October weather, was a dismal one, and my heart was far from singing hymns as it had longed to do on the former occasion. I could not help constantly reflecting that a few weeks before the one woman who attracted all my thoughts had passed over this very road to a future which I could paint only in the blackest hues. I can not shake off the fear that in the preceding pages, which concerned my insignificant self, I may have been too verbose. Should this really be the case, I may confidently assert that the error is not due to the garrulity, or even the self-love, of a lonely man, but the desire of a conscientious biographer to omit nothing that could throw more light upon the acts of his heroine. During the time immediately following her marriage, she disappeared entirely from the horizon of my own pitiful existence. I will therefore make my account of the succeeding years until she reappears as brief as possible. My good old aunt in Berlin received me with her former love and kindness, though somewhat surprised that she must once more shelter in her little back-room the clerical nephew whom she had expected to speedily see shining as a brilliant light of the church in the glittering candlestick of a parish, while he now again seemed to be a dim little flame with a big "thief" in it. True, she did not suspect the real state of the case concerning this "thief"--the hapless love for a woman who had utterly vanished that was secretly consuming me. I did not deny it to myself for a moment. I knew too well that all the joyousness of youth was irretrievably lost to me; and, as I perceived that the consolations of religion were powerless in my condition, I fell away more and more from my theological vocation, and during the first months gave myself up to a very God-forsaken, brooding idleness. I carefully remained aloof from the circle of my former companions. I felt that the experiences of the past six months had separated me from them forever. Even in my outward man I had changed so much that two of my former most intimate friends passed close by me in the street without recognizing in the tall fellow with closely cropped hair, clad in a light summer suit and a straw hat, the apostle of yore, with his long locks parted in the middle, and clerical black coat. On receiving my definite request for a dismissal, the baron, closely as he usually calculated, had sent me six months' extra pay as tutor, which I did not return, though I could not help regarding the modest sum as a sort of hush-money. Having been turned out of the house without any fault of my own, I thought myself entitled to some compensation. This money, which I was not compelled to use for my own support, since my kind aunt feasted me as though I were the prodigal son, I devoted to one exclusive purpose, for which probably no theological candidate waiting for his parish ever used his savings--I went to the theater every evening. True, my longing to hear the great Milder was not fulfilled. I do not know whether she was dead or had merely retired from the stage. But I heard other admirable singers, among whom Sophie LÖwe and the fair-haired Fassmann made the deepest impression upon me, and in the drama I was just in time to admire the famous Seydelmann, and afterward, perhaps wrongly, rave over Hendrichs, though I never saw the latter enter without a feeling of aversion, which did not vanish until he had acted for some time. He reminded me, both in personal appearance and in many gestures, of another actor, whom I hated from my inmost soul because I believed that he was to blame for the darkening of the star of my life. But the world represented on the stage, the creations of the authors themselves, captivated me far more than any individual artist--so bewitched me, indeed, that I do not remember having opened a theological work or even visited a church during the year and a half I spent in the capital. The hypocrisy whose bitter fruits I had tasted had disgusted me with the delicious wine pressed in the Lord's vineyard, till, with a sort of defiant rebellion, I fled to the world of illusion irradiated by the foot-lights. No one will marvel that, in this mood, I even essayed my own powers as a dramatic author. Of course, it was no less a personage than Julian the Apostate whom, during five acts, I made atone in iambics for having desired to restore to honor the ancient Pagan gods. I still retained enough of the theologian to place Venus lower than the mother of the Saviour. Yet between the lines glimmered so skeptical a view of the world that this exercitium in ecclesiastical history certainly would not have been reviewed cum laude at my old college. I had just finished the shapeless opus, and was considering whether I should offer it to a "rational artist," like Eduard Devrient, for his opinion, when a sorrowful event suddenly stopped my dramatic career. My loving nurse and supporter fell ill, and at the end of a few days I was obliged to accompany her to her last resting-place. As she had lived upon a small annuity, her whole property consisted of old furniture and a modest wardrobe. I myself had spent all my money except a few thalers. Therefore, it was necessary to again obtain a firmer foothold than the boards of the theatre, which could not be my world. A few private pupils whom I secured helped me out of my most pressing need. Meanwhile, I industriously watched the papers for advertisements for tutors, and almost every week sent to the addresses mentioned a letter containing copies of my testimonials and references, including the name of my first employer, but to my grief and anger I invariably received a refusal. Knowing myself to be so well recommended, it was a long time ere I could understand these persistent failures, till at last, one sleepless night, when anxiety about my immediate future sharpened my wits, I hit upon the most natural solution of the enigma--my former employer, in reply to inquiries about me, of course gave the most unfavorable information, thereby refuting his written testimony, partly to prevent my relating in a new position the true cause of my dismissal. Therefore, when a tutor--who must also be musical--was wanted for two boys seven and eight years old on a country estate near the frontier of Pomerania, I quickly formed my resolution, borrowed from an actor, whose acquaintance I had made, the money to pay my traveling expenses, and hastened to wait upon my future employer in person. I found the position to be everything I could desire. The owner of the estate was a vigorous, thoroughly aristocratic, that is, noble-minded, man of middle age, who was deeply interested in agriculture, and had therefore left the education of his two sons exclusively to his admirable wife, until they had outgrown her feminine care and teaching. When I had explained my situation, and told him enough of the cause of my short stay with the baron to enable the shrewd man to perceive my innocence, without suspecting the whole truth, we soon agreed that I should come on trial for a quarter. These three months became three years, and, as neither found any reason to complain of the other, I should probably have grown old and gray in this beautiful part of my native land, had not the strange wandering star of my life suddenly appeared again in the firmament and lured me into new paths. I had entered upon my office of tutor without any thought of ever moving into the neighboring parsonage. This was partly because I had become doubtful of my vocation as a preacher, and partly because I did not grudge the excellent man who now filled the place the longest possible life, which indeed he needed in order to leave his six young daughters--who had early lost their mother--alone in this dreary world without anxiety. The oldest, Marie, was just sixteen when I entered upon my duties in the family of Herr von N----. Never have I known a more exemplary girl than this pure and lovely young creature, who, spite of her extreme youth, took the whole burden of the housekeeping and the education of her younger sisters on her slender shoulders, without even seeming to feel its weight. Her violet eyes and waving light-brown locks gave her a claim to beauty, especially when she smiled and her teeth glittered bewitchingly between her pouting lips. Had I not been afflicted with so obstinate a heart, I should undoubtedly have lost it to this charming child of God, and now be settled as a worthy pastor and father of a family in some village in the Mark. But my thoughts, spite of my utter hopelessness, clung so steadfastly to one image that for a long time I went in and out of the worthy pastor's house, and ate many a piece of cake Marie had baked, without seeing the merry little housekeeper in any other light than as the well-educated daughter of a man to whom I became more and more indebted for my own development. For, while a country pastor who enters his pulpit every Sunday for twenty years usually lets his spiritual armor grow tolerably rusty with the flight of time, this admirable man, in his quiet gable-room, had taken the most eager interest in all the struggles which in those days agitated the theological world, had entered deeply into the historical investigations of the TÜbingen School, and instantly fanned to a bright blaze the scientific interest which, during my rage for the theater in Berlin, had become completely extinguished--a blaze, it is true, that consumed to a sorry little heap the last scraps of orthodoxy with which I had covered my nakedness. This is not the place to enter more fully into this spiritual question now struggling in the pangs of its birth. Only I must say that I looked up with actual reverence to this man who, from the depths of his warm, thoroughly evangelical nature, drew the strength--spite of casting aside the dogmatic traditions, whose foundations had been shaken in his soul--to beneficently fulfill his duties as pastor and proclaim the Word, without being faithless to its spirit. I was not granted this gift, rooted in the purest philanthropy, and therefore capable of helping each individual to salvation in his own way. I was exclusively occupied with my own redemption, and, as I had entirely relinquished the idea of a parish, and for the present gave myself no anxiety about any other profession, I spent these three years, so far as my secret yearnings for my lost love permitted, very happily, and daily passed several hours with my teacher and friend, who treated me like a younger brother, and let me share without reserve everything that occupied his mind. It was inevitable that I should be on the most familiar terms with his children also. From the first I had placed myself on a footing of merry banter, and asked the little girls to call me Uncle Hans. Marie persisted in addressing me as Herr Johannes. Yet an innocent familiarity, like that of blood relations, existed between us, and seemed to continue undisturbed when the child had matured into a maiden, and the eyes of the girl of nineteen gazed into the world with a dreamy earnestness that would have given a person better versed than I in reading the human heart much food for thought. I noticed that she had lost some of her former vivacity, but was so unsuspicious that I jested with her about it, and drew no inference from her silence and blushes. True, the idea occurred to me that the young bird was fledged and longed to quit the overcrowded nest. But, as I knew with whom she associated, and that none of my employer's guests, who sometimes visited her father, had made the slightest impression upon her, I ascribed her changed demeanor to some anxiety of conscience--she often rummaged among her father's books--rather than any affair of the heart. That I myself might be the cause never entered my dreams. All vanity had been shorn away with my beautiful fair locks, for with cropped hair I seemed to myself anything but attractive, and, since I had been obliged to atone for the bold hope of making an impression on the heart of the sole object of my adoration, by the keen disappointment of her marriage, I did not consider myself created to be dangerous to any woman. So, one morning, when I had vainly sought my pastor in his study to return him a volume by David Friedrich Strauss, and on entering the little garden saw Marie sitting on a bench, holding in her lap a dish of green beans which she was preparing for the kitchen, I greeted her with a jest, though I noticed her tearful eyes, and asked if I could sit beside her a moment. She nodded silently, and moved to make room for me. I commenced an indifferent conversation, but secretly resolved to question her, like a true uncle, about the cause of her melancholy. Her only friend, the daughter of a neighboring pastor, had just become engaged to a young agriculturist. I began with that, and asked if there was genuine love on the part of the girl, to whom I also had become attached. Marie, without looking up from her work, replied that this was a matter of course. How could people stand before the altar, and form the sacred tie, if there was no real love? Why, I answered, many a girl hopes that love will come after marriage, and only weds for the sake of having a home of her own, a husband, and children. True, I did not believe Marie capable of such conduct. She would never put this little hand--and as I spoke I patted the delicate little fingers resting on the beans--into that of a man whom she did not love with her whole heart. Again I felt a violent tremor run through her slender figure; she made a visible effort to calm herself, but suddenly let the dish fall from her lap, tears streamed from her eyes, and, stammering almost inaudibly, "Excuse me, I don't feel well!" she rushed into the house as if flying from Satan himself. I remained sitting on the bench as if a thunderbolt had struck me. It was long ere I could calm myself sufficiently to pick up the dish and carefully collect the scattered green pods. What would I have given to be able, with a clear conscience, to follow the dear child, take her little cold hands in mine, and utter words which would have had the power to dry her tears. But, deeply as my heart glowed with tender sympathy for this youthful sorrow, I did not doubt an instant that I should be doing her a far heavier wrong if I tried to console her without the "real love" than if I left her uncomforted. At last, after vainly waiting in the hope that she would come back and turn the affair into a jest, I rose in great perplexity and went thoughtfully back to my employer's house, here also called the "castle," though it had no feudal aspect. As soon as I was alone in my little room--my pupils were waiting for their lessons in the school-room--I went to the mirror and carefully scrutinized my face. Even now I could find in it nothing that seemed calculated to disturb the peace of a young girl's heart. The conversations with the dear child, which I could remember also contained nothing captivating, and, as I had again and again said that I should probably remain a bachelor all my life, I could not help acquitting myself of all blame in the sweet girl's unfortunate passion. Yet the sudden discovery so agitated me that I felt unable to give my Latin lesson. I dictated a written exercise to the lads, and, while they were at work upon it, sat down by the window with the last newspaper, which had just been brought in, not to read, but to have some pretext for pursuing my idle and fruitless thoughts. But, as my eyes wandered absently over the columns of the paper, they were abruptly arrested by a name which glared in large letters amid the small type of the advertisement. Konstantin Spielberg. How long a time had passed since I had either heard or read that name! In Berlin, where ever and anon--always blushing as if I were betraying my secret--I had inquired about this object of my silent hate, no one seemed to know whether he was alive or dead. He appeared to have won no special repute as an artist, and, since his withdrawal to the provinces, his former colleagues, several of whom I knew, had heard nothing about him. As such wandering stars only diffuse their light in their immediate vicinity, the small local sheets that came to us made as little mention of him as the large journals of the capital. Now, in his erratic course, he had come so near us that I could not avoid suddenly discerning him with the naked eye. There stood the notice. "Konstantin Spielberg, with his renowned dramatic company, has arrived in St. ----," the nearest Pomeranian capital to us, "and intends, during the next six weeks, to give performances to which respected citizens, the nobility, and the art-loving public are invited." At any other time this intelligence would undoubtedly have agitated me, but without stimulating me to any decision. In the strange situation in which I found myself since my last interview with my friend's daughter, this shadow from former days seemed to me like a sign from Heaven. I instantly resolved to repress all the emotions contending in my soul and convince myself, with my own eyes, how this man's wife fared, and whether she needed any assistance from the friend whose confidence she had certainly sorely betrayed. I went at once to my employer and requested him to give me a week's vacation. Both physically and mentally I was in a strangely upset condition, which perhaps was only due to stagnation of the blood, and would be relieved by a short pedestrian excursion. My request was granted without hesitation, and that very afternoon I found myself, with a light knapsack on my back, but my heart doubly burdened by two hopeless love-affairs, on the sunny highway that led to the Pomeranian frontier. I might have reached my destination that night. But, swiftly as I had commenced my walk, after the first hour it became difficult for me to put one foot before the other. I constantly repeated to myself: "How will you find her? And how will she look when you suddenly take her by surprise without having previously inquired whether your visit would be agreeable or not? Quite probably she will shrink from you, as if you were a ghost recalling a time she would prefer to have buried, and you can be off home again. "What then? And what is to be done about the other, whom you really never ought to see again, if you desire to be an honest man." Under the influence of such thoughts I stopped, at the end of a few hours, at a respectable village tavern, the last in the territory of the Mark, and spent the sultry night uncomfortably enough in the thick feather-bed. The next morning I continued my snail's pace. Never in my life had I felt more plainly, and with deeper shame, how pitiful a thing is our much-lauded free-will. For in fact I was nothing more than a puppet which a child pulls by a string, and it made the matter none the better because the boy whose plaything I was had gay wings on his shoulders and wrote his name Cupid. It was about ten o'clock when I reached the little city--a place as ugly, dreary, and lifeless as any other Pomeranian town on an August morning. But, as I walked over the rough pavement of the main street, my heart throbbed as if I were entering some enchanted city, where in a crystal castle I should find the princess in a giant's power, and, after perilous adventures, secure her release. I first inquired at the hotel, fully expecting that I should find the "renowned" traveling company had lodgings there. But, when I had thrown my knapsack into one chair in the public-room of the "Black Eagle" and myself into another, and the waiter had brought me half a bottle of Moselle, I was better informed at once. The actors had spent only one night with them, and the very next day hired the back of the commandant's house for a month. Until six years ago a regiment of infantry had been stationed here, and the colonel had occupied Count X----'s old house facing the Goose-Market. When the regiment was ordered to another garrison, the house was not rented again. Now the manager had hired the back building, formerly used for the offices and adjutant's residence, at a very low price. The performances were given at the SchÜtzenhaus near the Stettin Gate. The actors were splendid and drew large crowds. "Does the manager's wife play too?" I asked, and, as I spoke, my hand trembled so violently that part of the wine was spilled from my glass. No. The manager's wife never appeared. It was said that she was a lady of noble birth, who had run away with her present husband. But she was a very beautiful lady, and nobody could tell any evil of her. Did not I want something to eat? The table-d'hÔte, at which there was nobody now except one commercial traveler, would not be ready for two hours. I rose after hastily swallowing a single glass, let the officious youth brush my hat and clothes, and then requested him to direct me to the actor's residence. Perceiving my interest in him, he brought me the bill for that night's performance. The "Ancestress," a tragedy by Grillparger, with spectral apparitions: first row, six good groschens[3]; second row, five silver ones; pit, two good ones; children, half price; commencement at six o'clock. I read the names, of which I knew only the manager's: Jaromir--Manager Konstantin Spielberg. An uncomfortable feeling of mingled cowardice and repugnance again overpowered me. For a moment I actually hesitated whether I should not strap on my knapsack again and walk straight out through the opposite gate. But the puppet was fastened to its platform, and the naughty boy pulled till his toy was obliged to roll where he wanted it to go. The Goose-Market was a rectangular piece of ground, in which grew dusty acacia-trees. On one of the narrow sides stood the colonel's former residence, a by no means ugly two-story building, in the style of the reign of Old Fritz, with a flight of steps leading to the door, and a stone escutcheon on the cornice above. But all the windows were closed with shutters, and a cat lay asleep in the sentry-box beside the steps. My waiter led me to the side entrance, whose door was unlocked, and through the wide gateway into the shady court-yard, in whose center a large chestnut-tree spread its boughs in front of the windows of the rear building. "Please go up the stairs at the back," he said. "Somebody is always at home; but, if you want the manager, you'll find him now at the rehearsal. A very diligent artist, as the president of the district court says, and the rest of the company do well, too. But our little city deserves it, for everybody here raves about art. Well, you will see for yourself." He bowed affectedly and left me alone, which made me very happy. For the accursed throbbing of the heart grew madder than ever, and I was forced to lean against the trunk of the chestnut ere I was able to walk through the court-yard. The lower story of the back building seemed to be wholly occupied by stables and coach-houses. In the upper one, all the windows stood open, and their freshly washed panes glittered all the more brightly from the contrast to the thick dust on the doors and sills. At last I plucked up courage and mounted the dark stairs. I came to a long, tolerably wide corridor, and wandered helplessly past several closed doors. Behind one of them I heard the rattling of pans and dishes; that must be the kitchen. I did not wish to summon a servant, so I stole softly on. And now I paused before a door through which I heard the sound of a woman's well-known voice--only a few words, but I felt by the hot tide which coursed through my veins that it had not lost its power over me during the four or five years of separation. And now I summoned up my resolution like a hero and knocked. Some one called "Come in," and I suddenly stood inside the apartment, confronting my old, inevitable fate. She was sitting at the open window, and the sunbeams, piercing the foliage of the chestnut, flickered over her figure, leaving her head in shadow. At the first glance I saw that she had grown even more beautiful--a little stouter and more matronly, of course--but her face was still more instinct with intellect, and her nose had actually lengthened a trifle. She wore her hair in the same fashion as in her girlhood, only she had fastened over the coil behind a black-silk crocheted net, whose ends were knotted at her neck. No one would have perceived either her lineage or her present dignity as wife of the manager by her plain, dark-calico dress. But in her lap she held a red-velvet royal mantle--very threadbare, it is true--trimmed with gold-lace, in which she was mending a long rent, and a pile of knights' costumes, satin bodices, and plumed caps lay in a clothes basket beside her chair. "Good Heavens, Johannes!" I heard her suddenly exclaim. The royal mantle slipped from her hand, and she rose to her full-height, fixing her large brown eyes on me exactly as I had feared--as if a ghost had rudely startled her from her quiet thoughts. A little boy, about four years old, who had been playing with a Noah's ark on a piece of carpet at her feet, sprang up at the same time, seized her hand, and was now staring at me with mingled shyness and curiosity. At first I could say nothing. I was gazing steadily at the little fair head--her child, and her very image. She seemed to notice it, and, as if to disguise her first feeling of embarrassment, she bent over the little fellow, saying, "Go and shake hands prettily with the gentleman, Joachimchen. He is a dear uncle, and it is very kind in him to have sought out your mother again." But the child clung timidly to her arm, and would not approach me. "Yes, it is I, Frau Luise," I stammered at last, in some confusion. "I wanted, as my way brought me near you--. But you are looking so well, Frau Luise. How do you do? You are happy, I see--and the dear child--does Uncle Joachim know that he bears his name? He would surely be pleased." "Won't you sit down, Herr Johannes?" she replied. "The sofa over yonder is very uncomfortable. Bring a chair, and let us sit near the window. And now tell me whence you have come and what has brought you to us." I did as she requested, while she resumed her interrupted work and listened intently. The child had pushed his toys aside, and, when I held out my hand, shyly laid his soft little fingers in it. But I soon drew him close to my side, and, ere ten minutes had passed, he was sitting on my knee, patiently letting me stroke his hair while I described my life. True, I dared not make even the most distant allusion, to the one thought around which everything else had turned in the course of the years, and which had now brought me here. But women are sensitive, and have the gift of reading in our eyes and catching from broken tones the very thing we are most anxious to conceal. She, however, did not do this. "I am heartily glad to see you again at last, dear Herr Johannes," she replied, when I had paused. "I have always valued your friendship, and was very sorry that you had perhaps formed a false opinion of me when I disappeared so suddenly. If you stay with us a few days, you will see that I could not have done otherwise. My husband, too, will be glad to make your acquaintance. I have told him about you. True, you will not be able to judge correctly of his talent as an artist. His surroundings are not worthy of him, and he can not appear in his best parts in these little towns. But you will learn to value him as a man." I made no reply. I could not tell her that I greatly doubted the latter, and did not even desire it. My aversion to her husband was as much a part of my reverence for her as the thorn is a portion of the rose. "Put the boy down again," she said. "You will tire the gentleman, Joachimchen." The little fellow had begun to pull my whiskers with his slender fingers, which gave me great pleasure. "Let him stay, Frau Luise," I said. "Shall I tell you a story, little Joachim? Or, shall we play together?" "Play!" replied the dear child, and his earnest eyes sparkled. He slid quickly from my lap and again knelt on the carpet where the little menagerie lay, heaped in motley confusion. I sat down beside him and began to arrange the animals in pairs on the floor, asking my little playmate the name of each. He scarcely missed one. "He is remarkably far advanced for his age," I said to his mother, who sat at her work, looking down at us with a quiet smile. "He has associated entirely with grown persons," she replied. "I hope it will not always be so. I shall try to obtain some companions for him this winter. We shall then spend several months in the same place." Just at that moment the door opened and her husband entered. He paused as he saw the strange group at the window, but, when I rose, and his wife mentioned my name, came forward with outstretched hand, saying, in the beautiful baritone voice he used in personating his heroes: "How do you do, Herr Candidate? We are old acquaintances, for you were among the spectators at my disastrous appearance at the castle. It certainly was not one of my brilliant parts, and the only hand that moved to clap, wounded me. But, for the sake of the happy afterpiece, I still remember the day with joy and gratitude. Do I not, dear wife?" He had taken his wife's hand and raised it to his lips. I could not help owning that his chivalrous bearing suited him admirably. Though he had just passed his fortieth year, his appearance was still youthful and winning; there was not a gray hair in his locks À la Hendricks; the expression of the pale, finely-chiseled features was a trifle self-complacent and triumphant, but unmistakably kind. Even his conspicuous dress--a short, black-velvet coat trimmed with braid, yellow nankeen trousers, and a red-silk kerchief knotted loosely around his throat--was becoming. One thing, however, I did not like: he nodded to the child with sarcastic condescension, and, after a careless "How are you, lad?" took no further notice of him. The boy, too, quietly continued his play as if a total stranger had entered. The great artist instantly asked me familiarly if I felt inclined to change the pulpit for the stage, since it was well known that an actor can teach a pastor. Luise had told him that I was musical; as he meant in time to add operettas to his list of attractions, he could make me a sort of conductor, unless I should prefer to fit myself to be an actor. I would find it pleasant with him; his wife could bear witness that he did not make amends for the petticoat government he was under at home by tyranny behind the scenes. His jesting tone did not seem to be exactly agreeable to his wife. At least she did not enter into it, but gravely continued to mend the crimson robe. But he was evidently in the best possible humor. While pacing up and down the spacious room with the slow strides of a stage hero, he cast a proud, well-satisfied glance into the mirror that hung above the sofa every time he passed it, talked of the rehearsal from which he had just come, and trivial annoyances which he had smoothed according to his wishes. "You will make the acquaintance of the members of our company immediately," he said, turning to me; "and I hope you will find them by no means the worst sort of people. We must live and let live. My wise wife, who in the shortest possible time has transformed herself into a perfect mother to the company, has made the arrangement that we are all to dine together at noon, not at the hotel where food is dear and bad, but here under her wing. At first it was inconvenient to many of them. But they soon perceived it to be an advantage in every way. They obtain for a very small sum, which is deducted from their salaries in advance, good and abundant food, support themselves honestly, and contract no debts at the hotel. Besides, we have an opportunity of discussing at table many points concerning the evening performance which did not occur to us at the rehearsal." A square-built personage, with a white cap surrounding her flushed face, entered and announced that dinner was ready. "Here, my honored friend, you see the artist who provides for our physical support--FrÄulein Kunigunde--the mistress of the kitchen and larder, who in her leisure hours renders us priceless services as mistress of the wardrobe.--FrÄulein Kunigunde, I have the honor to present to you Herr Dr. Johannes, a distant relative of my wife, who would fain convince himself whether our car of Thespis merits the renown it enjoys in all the region where Low German is spoken. I hope you have some nice dish for us." The embarrassed creature courtesied silently and vanished, settling her cap. She evidently supposed me to be some distinguished stranger, before whom she would not willingly have appeared in her working-clothes. The artist, after a parting look in the mirror, passed his hand familiarly through my arm, saying: "You won't object to my suppressing your title of Candidate and promoting you to that of Doctor in presenting you to my colleagues. Among these frivolous folk, theology plays the part of Knecht Ruprecht,[4] or must encounter disrespectful badinage. Your surname, too, would give cause for witticisms. So let us keep to the Christian one. Then it will be thought that you consider it a duty to your aristocratic relatives to be known on the stage only as Johannes." I was about to protest against his taking possession of my person in this arbitrary fashion, but he had already opened the door of the adjoining room, and, as Frau Luise, who led the boy by the hand, cast a glance at me as she passed, which seemed to indicate that I need not be too rigorous, I entered without further scruple into the part thus forced upon me, and from which I fancied I could escape at any moment. The dining-room was a long apartment with three windows. Its walls were perfectly bare, and the old white-lace curtains made them seem still more cold and unhomelike. A narrow table, whose uneven width betrayed that it had been formed of several sets of boards, occupied the center; its cloth was not fine, but exquisitely clean. About fourteen rude wooden chairs were ranged around it, all as yet unoccupied, and the number of guests, who stood chatting together in the window-niches, seemed still incomplete. I was presented, as an old friend of the family and embryo student of the dramatic art, first to a married couple, Herr and Frau Selmar, who eyed me in unfriendly silence. These two oldest members of the company, as I afterward learned, were in a chronic state of dissatisfaction with everything and everybody except themselves. Probably there is no class of persons among whom the type of character embodying cureless, arrogant pride, may so frequently be found as amid the older dramatic artists, whose profession compels them to attach value to their personality, to long passionately for momentary triumphs, and to be on their guard against any rivalry. Herr Selmar, who took the parts of the stage fathers and blustering old men, considered himself still young enough for the lover's rÔles in which the manager shone, and his faded wife, who years before had bewitched all hearts by her personal charms as much as by her acting, could not now feel satisfied to fill the characters of old women and mothers. They had just been venting their irritation concerning some jealous grievance to each other, and I admired the good-natured cheerfulness with which the manager gradually soothed them. True, he was most ably assisted in doing so by the droll quips interposed by a tall, thin man of uncertain age, dressed in a greenish summer suit. The latter was presented to me as Herr Laban, comedian of the company, and as, spite of my uncomfortable mood, I could not help laughing heartily at his quaint jests, a sort of friendly familiarity instantly arose between us, and he took the seat next me at table. Frau Luise sat at the head, and on a high cushion in the chair at her right was the little boy, who managed his knife and fork very prettily from his miniature throne. Her husband occupied the seat at her left, then came the Selmar couple, I sat next the child, and with tender delight rendered him all sorts of little services. A few of the lesser lights of the company joined us, and, just as the soup was served, a dilatory pair appeared, in whom I recognized the young man and his companion who had attracted my attention while sitting on the bench in front of the village tavern. "Herr Daniel Kontzky--FrÄulein Victorine." With a silent bow to the manager's wife, they sat down opposite to me, and seemed to recognize my face. At least, they exchanged a few whispered words before beginning to eat, which they did with affected haste and indifference, entering into no conversation with any of their colleagues. They evidently desired to give the impression that they considered themselves far superior to their present associates, and had only strayed among them by chance. While the simple but very excellent food was handed around--FrÄulein Kunigunde brought in the dishes, placed them at the ends of the table, and left those who sat nearest to pass them farther--I had time enough to study the two youngest and most interesting members of the company. They had improved during the five years--at least, so far as their personal appearance was concerned. The young man, now probably about six and twenty, had a remarkably handsome face, whose swift play of expression instantly betrayed the actor. I afterward learned he was the child of a Hebrew father and a Polish mother. From the latter he inherited the passionate fire of his eyes and the feminine delicacy of his complexion, as well as his small hands and feet. He wore a light summer suit of the latest fashion, and had a ruby ring on his little finger. But, notwithstanding his soft tenor voice, his laugh was sneering and disagreeable, and I noticed with surprise that he sometimes cast a side glance at Frau Luise which expressed open dislike, while her lip curled whenever their eyes chanced to meet. FrÄulein Victorine's face puzzled me still more. It revealed a two-fold nature, at once aspiring and sordid. Nothing could be more charming than her large, mournful gray eyes, under delicate black brows, and her little nose seemed to have been stolen from some Greek statue. But the mouth belied this refinement of nature. Spite of her youth, it was flabby and prematurely withered, and, even when it remained firmly closed, one expected nothing to issue from it save commonplace and repulsive words. Her little figure was the daintiest, and at the same time the most perfectly rounded that could be imagined, and she understood how to set off its charms in the best light. At first I was myself deluded as I watched her melting Madonna gaze wander so disconsolately over the company, and read in it a touching legend of lost youth and premature contempt for the world. But, as soon as she began to whisper with her neighbor, an expression of coldness and insolence rested on her face that was intensely repulsive to me. I will mention here the other members of the Round Table: A graybeard of fifty, vigorous and stoutly built, in the dress of a workman, who was introduced to me as stage-manager, machinist, and Inspector Gottlieb SchÖnicke--a queer fellow, who told me the very next day that he was a misunderstood genius, and, if he were only allowed to play King Lear once, the world would perceive what serious injustice had been done him for years; and his neighbor, a stout, plain, middle-aged woman, who filled the office of a prompter, but was often pressed into the service as an actress to play women of the people, Hannah in "Mary Stuart," nay, if necessity required, even the mother of Emilia Galotti. All these worthy actors and actresses behaved during the meal like mutes, and I thought I noticed that the presence of Frau Luise, whose kindness they regarded as condescension, embarrassed them. The only person whose manner displayed dignified ease was the manager himself, who did not let the conversation drop, first discussing all sorts of technical questions with the tall comedian, then turning to me and asking minute questions about the present condition of theatrical affairs in Berlin. I could not help secretly owning that he did not lack culture and sound judgment; and a certain enthusiasm for great models, whom he had studied on the stage, though it was expressed in a somewhat sentimental manner, and rather too abundantly garnished with classical quotations after the manner of actors, also did him honor. Besides, he ate very little and very gracefully, and always offered his wife the best pieces, which she declined with a blush. Frau Luise said little, devoted herself to the child, and thanked me with a half smile for my services to him. When the delicious plums and early pears, that formed the dessert, had been eaten, she rose from the table. A hasty "May the meal do you good!" was uttered on all sides without shaking hands, and in two minutes the whole company had dispersed. The manager, after again kissing his wife's hand, beckoned me to accompany him. "I must first of all take you into better company," he declaimed with his sonorous laugh. "I drink my coffee every day at the club-house, where all the rich dignitaries meet. You won't object to my taking your 'kinsman' away from you, Luise?" She silently shook her head and dismissed me with an absent "Farewell." I should have infinitely preferred to stay with her and the little boy, who had completely won my heart. But the actor had already passed his hand through my arm, and now led me out. Nothing was more painful to me than this familiar contact with a man whom I had cursed a thousand times in my heart, and who was now treating me so kindly and frankly that I could not even have stabbed him with Macbeth's imaginary dagger. We had scarcely reached the street, when he suddenly stopped, took off his straw hat, and passed his large, well-shaped hand across his brow. "I am extremely glad that you have come, Herr Doctor," he said in a subdued voice. "I don't grudge my wife a little agreeable refreshment, such as a visit from an old friend affords. 'She is a woman, take her all in all! But we will not conceal it from each other, she is not exactly in her sphere among us. Her eloping with me was a piece of magnanimous folly, which she does not repent, it is true, she is too proud for that, and--" here he straightened his shoulders and replaced his hat on his flowing locks--"and too happy in her marriage with me. Nevertheless, she is an aristocrat, and the best among us have a drop of gypsy blood in our veins. If she could have resolved to act--with her appearance, her superb voice--I am sure that she would now be completely absorbed by her new profession, and it would have been a great gain to me. But nothing would induce her to do this. Now she sits alone during the many hours that I am occupied, for the boy is a little aristocrat, too, and so quiet--I would rather have had a girl, you know. Girls can be used in the business much younger, and there is no such need of educating them. Well, as I said, it is only for her sake--she is really a pearl of her sex, and never complains. But I should like to see her shining in a suitable setting. Posterity weaves no garlands for the actor, and his contemporaries only too often twine for him a crown of thorns. That they wound her forehead, too, is painful to me. I am really a kind-hearted fellow. It is not true that genius makes people wicked and selfish. You will yet be convinced of it." I replied that I should not have much time to become acquainted with all his good qualities, as I intended to continue my journey the following day. In fact, all these disclosures made my heart so sore that I wished myself a hundred miles away. He instantly took my arm again and led me on. "We will discuss that subject further. I will not impose any restraint upon you, but, you know, temptation is really violence, and I think you will be able to endure our society for a few weeks at least. Come to the theatre tonight. It is not our worst performance. True, when I think of the difficulties with which a traveling company must contend, and how differently I might fill the office of a priest of art, had not envy and intrigues forced me away from the great theatres--" Here he launched forth into descriptions of his former triumphs, to which I listened with only half an ear. I remained only half an hour in the club-room, to which he conducted me mainly to show the distinction he enjoyed among these worthy citizens. His game of dominoes, at which I was merely a spectator, wearied me, and his drinking three small glasses of rum to one cup of coffee completely destroyed my dawning good opinion of him. I pleaded a headache, which would not allow me to endure the smoke-laden atmosphere of the room, and, as he was entirely absorbed in a conversation with several enthusiastic admirers, he dismissed me without opposition by one of his royal gestures of the hand. I sauntered in a very miserable mood through the little city and out of the gate. The day was beautiful, the air had been cooled by a light shower while we were drinking our coffee, and the neighborhood of the little town, with its fields and meadows dotted with fruit-trees, was well worth seeing. But my mind was closed against the perception of anything pleasant. I could not help constantly saying to myself: "So she lives here, with this man, among these people! And she has before her a long life, which can never again tend upward to the heights, but always downward, slowly paralyzing the mind and soul." For the unruffled cheerfulness of her manner at the table had not deceived me an instant. True, the life she had led in her uncle's house was by no means what she deserved. Yet, in those days, amid all the oppression, all the repugnance to so much that was base, her eyes had sparkled with joyous pride, and her head was held proudly erect on her strong shoulders. Now it drooped slightly as though under an unseen burden, and her large eyes often wandered to the floor as though seeking something that was lost. My grief for her was so intense that it even crowded the old passionate love into a corner of my heart, especially as I had taken a solemn vow to see in her only the wife of another. Nay, I believe, if I had found her perfectly happy, with head erect and laughing eyes, I would have uprooted the weeds of envy and jealousy from my poor soul forever. True, Uncle Joachim had said: "Whatever folly a woman like her may commit, she will not allow herself to succumb to it." He knew her well. But how much secret misery a human being may have to endure, even though he or she "bears the inevitable with dignity." Absorbed in these thoughts, I had walked a long distance, and was already considering whether I should not let the "Ancestress" go, and find some pretext for taking my departure that very evening, when I saw Frau Luise herself, with her little boy, approaching me by the shady path that led through a wood. The child was frisking merrily around his mother, but she walked slowly with bowed head, and seemed to answer his questions very absently. She had put on a small hat that had slipped back from her head, and a blue sunshade rested carelessly on her left shoulder. She came slowly forward without looking up, until the child noticed me, and with a sudden exclamation ran to her and seized her hand; then, with a friendly nod, she paused. At first we talked of indifferent matters, the weather, the pretty location of the city, and the superior fertility of the soil to that of her native region. This brought us to the persons we had both known there, and about whom she had been kept informed by Uncle Joachim. I learned that my former pupil had been placed in the cadet barracks, and that his sister was betrothed to Cousin Kasimir. Mademoiselle Suzon had quitted the castle a few weeks after my departure, to return no more. She passed quickly over this point, but a contemptuous curl of her lower lip betrayed that she had been informed of the whole affair. A young English lady had now taken the Frenchwoman's place; she did not know whether she could play chess, but she seemed to fill her predecessor's position satisfactorily in every other respect. Sometimes the new pastor--the old one had gently fallen asleep in death--came to the castle in the evening and held devotional exercises for an hour. Everything else remained unchanged. The veteran peacock had spread his tail for the last time the previous winter, and she was keeping some of his feathers as a relic. Then for a time we relapsed into silence. The dear child walked gravely along between us, holding a hand of each. When we came out of the wood, we saw a meadow thickly besprinkled with autumn flowers. "Run, Joachimchen, and pick a beautiful bouquet for Uncle Johannes," said the mother. The child obeyed, climbing merrily over the little slope by the road. "He is so bright," said Frau Luise, "he hears everything, and already understands more than is well, or at least has his little confused thoughts about all sorts of subjects. And I must tell you something that is to remain a secret between ourselves. I have never so thoroughly despised any one from the depths of my heart as Uncle Achatz, and it was a punishment to me even to breathe the same air. When I came to his house--only a few months after my mother's death--he had the effrontery to persecute me with offers of love. He wished to get a divorce and marry me. You can imagine that I longed to go out into the wide world then; but pity for my aunt, who is a saint-like sufferer, withheld me. During those sorrowful years I learned that man has no other source of strength and peace than his conscience, his love of truth, and the quiet communion with his God, who, it is true, answers us not when we chatter to him overmuch, but when we listen in the deepest silence. He commanded me to interfere when a good and innocent person was shamefully insulted in my presence. 'The measure is full!' cried a voice in my heart. 'You must no longer breathe the air of this house, where all human dignity is trampled under foot.' So I did what I could not help doing. I knew I was undertaking no easy task, and those who charged me with frivolity never knew me. Now, with God's assistance, I will perform it. And he has given me something that has helped me through many a trying hour and will aid me year after year." Her eyes wandered to the child, who had already gathered a handful of flowers, and with sparkling eyes was holding them up to show them to his mother. "The dear little fellow!" I said. "Yes, if I did not have him! He has never caused me a single sorrow. He constitutes my entire happiness." "Your entire happiness, Frau Luise?" The question had scarcely escaped my lips ere I regretted it. What right had I to tear the veil she had drawn over her fate? But she raised it herself. "No," she said, "you must not misunderstand me. The child is not the sole blessing I possess, but he is really my only entire happiness. You do not yet know my husband thoroughly. He is a noble-hearted man, and would do anything for my sake, so far as he could anticipate my wishes. But his profession makes him see the world in a different light, and think other objects desirable. That is usually the case between married people, and must be accepted. Have you ever or anywhere found entire happiness? We must strive to receive the patchwork with our whole souls, then the gaps will be filled, and, as the words run in Faust, 'the insufficient becomes an event.' Stay with us a few days. You will then judge many things differently." I did not know what to answer, but a cry of terror from the boy relieved me from my dilemma. We saw him suddenly spring aside, stumble over a clod of earth, and fall, still holding the flowers tightly in his little hand. I was at his side in an instant, lifted him, and saw that an ugly fat toad, which had jumped clumsily into the ditch, had frightened him. He was still trembling in every limb, but already smiled again and held out the bouquet to me. "His nerves are so sensitive," said his mother, as she smoothed the little bare head. "If he could only be more in the open air. But all my time is so occupied that I can scarcely manage to spend an hour out of doors with him every afternoon. And his father lives so entirely in his art that he does not see it." She became absorbed in her thoughts, while I walked by her side, carrying the boy in my arms. He soon climbed on my shoulders and pretended I was his horse, till his shouts and laughter even called a smile to his mother's grave face. Just before reaching the city, we again walked decorously side by side. I took my leave outside the house. Should I see her at the theatre? No, she always remained at home and her husband went with his colleagues to the club-room, so she could not receive me, but hoped to see me early in the morning, or at any rate at dinner. I dared not at once bid her farewell forever; nay, I no longer believed I should have the courage to set out on my return the next morning. The child had won my heart. Of course I spent the evening at the theatre. The hall of the SchÜtzenhaus had been hastily fitted up, and for the first time I admired Gottlieb SchÖnicke's skill in placing shabby and faded scenery and properties in the best light. My free ticket admitted me to the most desirable place, which consisted of three rows of rush-bottomed chairs, but I purposely took my seat on one of the back benches where the humbler folk, the tradesmen, and resident farmers of the little town, gave themselves up to the enjoyment of the play. The house was packed; the large receipts would have warranted a better illumination. But it was the rule not to light more than eight lamps in the proscenium and one on every other pilaster, and I must confess that the illusion was more perfect than in the broad glare of the gas in the theatres of the capital. I do not intend to deliver a discourse on the drama, and shall avoid adopting the style of the countless romances of theatrical life, especially as--apart from the external differences caused by the changed methods of travel--the lives of these strolling players have remained essentially the same since the days of Wilhelm Meister. Besides, they are perfectly familiar to the world in general and possess little interest. Only, for truth's sake, I must observe that the "renowned" Spielberg company did honor to their name. Spite of inadequate accessories and acting, the wonderful drama created by a classically poetic imagination, still under the influence of romance, exerted a fascination which even the lachrymose specter of Madame Selmar, and the hypochondriacal, sepulchral tones of her husband, who played Count Idenko von Borotin, could not destroy. Spielberg was a superb Jaromir, and I now understood that his fervent chest-voice might irresistibly charm the heart of a girl of twenty. In the scenes with Bertha particularly--whose character, as personated by FrÄulein Victorine, had a touch of witchery--his tones possessed a pathos that brought storms of applause from the audience which, however, on appearing before the foot-lights, he acknowledged--as became so great an artist--with merely a quiet bend of the head. During the performance his eye had discovered me in my dark corner, and ere he left the stage he made a significant gesture as if to say, "I expect to meet you again." But this was by no means agreeable to me. I only hated him the more because he had extorted from me some degree of admiration; besides, I longed to be alone in order to determine whether to go or stay. So I let the audience quit the hall, that I might not be accosted, with provincial courtesy, by any of the inhabitants who chanced to notice that I was a stranger, and was the last of all to emerge into the open air. It was a beautiful star-lit summer night, warm and still; the only sound was the patter of the heavy dew trickling from the branches of the trees in the SchÜtzen Park. I paused outside, enjoying the same sense of comfort we have while awake in bed between two dreams, in the consciousness that we are still enjoying our bodily existence. Only the day before yesterday I had been sitting on the bench in the parsonage garden, beside the dear sensitive girl from whom the sudden outburst of the flame of a hapless attachment had driven me, and to-day I was here amid these totally unfamiliar surroundings, with the old fire once more burning beneath the ashes, and must again save myself by flight if I were not to perish utterly. I saw the actors, who meantime had changed their clothes and washed off their rouge, emerging from a little back door, heard their loud conversation, and once even the call for "Doctor Johannes." Then the little group dispersed under the trees toward the city, and, after a sufficiently long interval separated us, I too set out on my way home. Suddenly I heard a light footstep behind me, and a low, musical voice said: "Are you in such a hurry, Herr Doctor, that you can't even look round at a defenseless lady, far less offer her your arm and your company?" At the same moment a hand was slipped through my arm, and by the uncertain starlight I looked into Victorine's big, mournful eyes. "I was belated," she said, "and now I am glad to still find a companion. Besides, I should like to become a little better acquainted with you, for at dinner, when the manager's wife is present, my mouth feels as though it were sewed up. Come, you needn't be afraid that anything will be thought of it, if we are seen taking this nocturnal promenade. We sha'n't meet even a cat, and you probably care no more what Mrs. Grundy thinks of you than I do." Her light tone, so strangely belied by her melancholy eyes, was extremely repulsive to me: So I answered very coldly and a trifle maliciously: "I only wonder that Herr Daniel leaves the knightly service to another." "He!" she replied, with a short laugh, which, spite of her beautiful voice, sounded very unmusical. "In the first place, he did not play to-night, and was not even at the hall. And then, though he usually pays me some little attention, we have had a quarrel to-day. You are mistaken if you fancy he is in love with me. It's only old custom that makes us keep together. His heart, such as it is, belongs to a very different person." "May I ask--?" "Why not? It is an open secret. He's infatuated with Frau Spielberg, though she's such a cold fish that it always makes me shiver merely to look at her. She behaves, too, as if he were not in existence, and when he gets into a rage about it he pours out his whole heart to me, and it does him good to have me laugh at him. That is our whole relation. Perhaps I ought not to speak to you so frankly about it. You are her relative, and of course revere her as though she were a saint. But I can't help it; she is insufferable to me, with her Canoness airs and woful face the instant the company begins to be a little merry, and one or another goes a shade too far. She ought to have kept away from the stage. But she felt her human nature once when she threw herself into Spielberg's arms. Why does she put on her governess manner now?" As I made no reply--feeling disgusted by these blasphemies--she chattered on, clinging still more closely to my arm. "You see, even you yourself can not defend her. She is a positive injury to the manager. He used to be such a pleasant, courteous man, a genuine artist. Now he, too, poses as a Philistine and tutor, all by the orders of his aristocratic wife. She would prefer to have the whole company live in the same house, like a great cloister, to be able to continually watch over them. And most of them are cowardly or obliging enough to submit to it. But Herr Daniel, Herr Laban, and my insignificant self don't care for such an institution for small children. We always lodge at the hotel, and so you have the honor of being only three doors away from me; your room is No. 6, mine No. 2. I hope we shall be good neighbors." I could not command my feelings sufficiently to enter into this light tone, so I began to speak of something entirely different, and praised--which I could do with a clear conscience--her acting that evening. "Nonsense!" she interrupted, "you can't be in earnest; for, between ourselves, I played abominably to-night, I was so vexed by the scene with Daniel, whom I had been lecturing because he confessed his jealousy of you. Besides, I hate such sentimental parts, which unfortunately I have to play most frequently. Before I joined Spielberg's company--I was still very young--I was very fond of acting the merry little coquettes, the gayer they were the better, and best of all were parts like those of Parisian grisettes. But the manager thought my face exactly suited the heroines of tragedy, so now I am continually obliged to moan and roll my beautiful eyes toward heaven, as, for instance, to-morrow in 'Cabal and Love.' I have finally become indifferent to it, and, after all, we learn to act best the characters most unlike our own." I did not feel at all tempted to enter into a conversation upon the art of acting and its higher demands with this girl. Meantime we had reached our hotel, at whose open door the waiter received us with a meaning face. I had evidently risen in his esteem, since I had the honor of escorting the youthful leading lady home the very first evening. On our way up-stairs she said: "I don't know whether I can venture to invite you to drink a cup of tea with me. I should be obliged to send you away in half an hour at any rate, for I must read over my part of Luise Miller once more before I sleep." I excused myself, on the plea that I had a letter to write. She quietly shrugged her shoulders. "As you please, Herr Doctor, or rather, as you must. I forgot that you are a kinsman of Frau Spielberg. So good-night, and no offense! 'Thou'rt ill, ah, return, she declaimed from the rÔle of Bertha, then dropped me a mocking courtesy and glided into the door of No. 2. I ordered supper to be brought to No. 6, not because I was hungry, but to show the waiter that I had not availed myself of the favor of this envied neighbor. Then I stood a long while at the open window, gazing out into the narrow street and at the opposite houses, the homes of the worthy citizens who led their quiet lives so contentedly, without dreaming of tempests like those that raged in my heart and brain. One light after another disappeared, the footsteps of some belated pedestrian echoed less and less frequently from the pavement below; at last no sound arose save the hoarse voice of the night-watchman calling the tenth hour. The house, too, which was so slightly built that its walls told every secret, had become perfectly still. I was just unpacking my knapsack to make my toilet for the night, when I heard in the corridor a stealthy step which stopped a few doors away from mine, then a low knock, and after a short time a suppressed voice said, "Victorine. Open the door! I have something to tell you!" Of course, I could not hear the answer. The colloquy lasted some time, the request for admittance being several times repeated, sometimes in urgent, sometimes in coaxing tones, ere the closed door opened and was noiselessly shut again. The study of the rÔle of Luise Miller would scarcely be pursued in company. This incident had the effect of sending me to bed, firmly determined to turn my back as speedily as possible upon a world to which I did not belong. I woke in the morning with the same resolution, and only hesitated whether I should be expected to take a verbal farewell or might depart with merely a written one. But, while I was sitting at breakfast pondering over this weighty question, some one knocked at my door, and a personage of no less importance than Konstantin Spielberg himself entered. Though he had sat up till late in the night with several of the town dignitaries and some of his colleagues, and had drunk a great deal of liquor, he looked so fresh, so full of strength and cheerfulness, that again I could not help admiring him. He first kindly reproached me for having so slyly deserted him the evening before. It had been my own loss; he would have made me acquainted with some very intelligent people; and his colleague Laban's witticisms had been like a perfect shower of fireworks. But I should be forgiven if I would do him a great favor. "A favor?" I asked. "If only I have time to grant it. I shall leave in half an hour." That would be impossible in any case, he answered, arranging his locks before the mirror. I must see him that night as the President; it was one of his best parts, though he had resigned Ferdinand to Herr Daniel. But, if I really had any friendly feeling for him, I must help him out of a great difficulty. The prompter was to play Luise Miller's mother. Gottlieb SchÖnicke usually filled her place on such occasions, but owing to his carouse the night before he had become so hoarse that he could scarcely utter an audible word. So, if the performance was to take place, I must consent to fill this part and accompany him to the rehearsal at once. All reluctance and pleas of my unfitness for this responsible post were futile. And as, in the depths of my heart, I had sought some pretext for being compelled to stay, at least for one more day--ere I took my leave, never to return--I finally allowed myself to be dragged away, and half an hour later was standing behind the scenes with the prompter's book in my hand. Tall Herr Laban greeted me very cordially, and told me he yet hoped to see me appear in different parts. It was a pity to waste my gifts: figure, play of expression, voice, and taste for acting, all urged me toward the stage, and the company was in great need of new talent for the characters which he himself, now invita Minerva--he pronounced the words with a faultless accent--was compelled to fill, though Nature had originally intended him for a comedian. Victorine gave me a careless nod, and studiously held aloof. Her friend treated me with marked hostility, and was the only person who constantly found fault with my prompting, for which the manager quietly reproved him. Most of the members of the company performed their parts at the rehearsal indifferently enough. Frau Selmar, however, personated her Milford with a clear voice and through every shade of meaning, and Laban gave an extremely clever performance of his Hofmarschall Kalb. Gottlieb SchÖnicke remained invisible. Whether he was sleeping off his intoxication, or the story of his condition was merely a fiction to induce me to act with them, I have never been able to determine. After the rehearsal the actors unceremoniously dispersed; the manager had some arrangements to make in the dressing-room, and I was no little surprised when allowed a glimpse of this holy of holies to find only a single, tolerably large room, divided by a few screens and a sheet hung over a rope, into two dressing-rooms, one for the men, the other for the women. In the broad light of day all this disorderly collection of mirrors, rouge-pots, and clothes-presses looked uncanny enough, and I hastily beat a retreat. But, as I was passing through the empty auditorium of the theatre, I saw with astonishment Frau Luise sitting on one of the rear benches. "You here?" I exclaimed. "And absent yesterday evening? Do you attend such unattractive rehearsals?" "I never go to the theatre during the evening performances," she answered, rising. "I will not allow the suspicion that I do not consider the acting of the company worth looking at, so I sometimes come to the rehearsals, which also serves the purpose of enabling me to call my husband's attention to many points when we are alone. True, it is of little use," she added, with a resigned smile; "these second-rate people, among whom we are placed, are the very ones that have an exalted opinion of their own talent and knowledge of art. But I feel in a certain sense responsible for the acting of my husband, who is a genuine artist, and I know that my opinion is not a matter of indifference to him. "Besides, dear friend," she added, after a pause, "you can not imagine how lonely I am. So completely without society, except the company at the dinner-table, I sometimes feel the necessity of sharing some sphere of life, even though I might desire it to be a different one." Then she thanked me for having granted her husband's request, and we left the theatre together. On our way, while she frequently glanced back to see if her husband were not at last following us, I told her that I had determined to continue my journey to-day, and now positively intended to take my departure on the morrow. "You are right," she answered. "What should detain you here? You are not fitted for these surroundings." Then, after a pause, she added: "Write to me if you change your residence. I should always like to know where you are to be found, for I have one earnest desire, which I have long secretly counted on you to fulfill. When you have a parish, or a good wife, such as I desire for you, I should be glad to put my son in your charge." "Do you intend to part with the child?" "Yes, dear friend," she replied, her brows contracting with an expression of pain. "How I am to bear it I do not know. But my resolution is fixed. He must grow up in a perfectly pure atmosphere. While he is a child, I guard him myself. But how long will that be? Even now it is almost impossible for me to reconcile all my duties. When I go to the rehearsals I am compelled to trust him to Kunigunde, who is an excellent person, but does not always take the right course with him, and he shall not accompany me to the theatre. It would be worse than if I were to give him brandy to drink, instead of milk." Then we grew silent. "Poor woman!" a voice in my heart continually repeated; "you are indeed lonely." Meantime we had returned to the town, and then something happened, whose memory even now makes my heart throb faster. When we entered the courtyard of the commandant's residence, my companion's first glance sought the windows of her room. She suddenly grasped my arm as if to save herself from falling, and I asked in alarm if she were ill. But, as I looked up, a thrill of horror ran through my frame also. For at the open window I saw the child, who had climbed out on the sill, clinging with one little arm to the sash and stretching out the other toward a drooping chestnut bough, whose ripening nuts had probably roused his longing. As in his eagerness he held one little foot suspended in the air, he seemed fairly hovering aloft with but the feeblest support, and an icy chill crept down my back. Suddenly I heard the mother say in her gentlest voice: "Wouldn't it be better for me to get you the beautiful chestnuts, Joachimchen? You shall have a whole handful, if you are a good boy and climb down again at once. Do what your mother tells you, my darling. I am coming up directly. Then you shall show Uncle Johannes how to make a chain of chestnuts." The smiling boy looked down at us, nodded to his mother, cautiously drew first his foot and then his arm back from the giddy height, and quickly disappeared inside the dark frame of the window. My own heart had fairly stopped beating. When I could breathe again, I wanted to tell my companion how much I admired her for having had courage to repress any cry of terror that might have startled the little one and perhaps hurled him to destruction. But the words died on my lips, for the next instant she had thrown her arms around my neck, and, with her face hidden on my breast, burst into such convulsive sobs that I was forced to exert all my strength, to support the tall, noble figure in its helpless emotion. She did not regain her self-control until we heard steps in the gateway, then, still clinging to my arm, she hurried into the rear building and up the stairs. "Not a word about it to anybody!" she whispered. At the top she stood still, panting for breath, and passed her hand over her eyes. At last she rushed to her room, on whose threshold the child met her, and clasped her sole happiness in her arms with a cry of rapture in which all the pent-up excitement of the mother's heart found utterance. When, soon after, her husband entered, nothing but her unwonted pallor and a tremor, which still ever and anon ran through her limbs, could have betrayed to him that anything unusual had occurred. He, however, in his jovial self-satisfaction, was so exclusively absorbed in himself--having just purchased a new neck-tie which he meant to wear at dinner--that he noticed no change in her. And there was no one else at the table who took any special heed of her, except a young girl of fourteen--the daughter of the Selmar couple--who had been too ill to appear at dinner the day before. She went to Frau Luise, pressed her hand affectionately, and anxiously asked if she were well. "Oh! perfectly well," replied the happy mother, smiling, as she kissed the girl's cheek and inquired about her own doings. The dinner passed off very much like the one of the previous day, except that the manager regretted he could not drink my health in a glass of wine as a token of gratitude for my admirable prompting. But the rigid law of the household prohibited all spirituous drinks until the evening--and he cast a glance of comic terror at his wife. I saw that she found it difficult to maintain her assumed cheerfulness, and when we rose her knees trembled. So I suggested in a low tone that she should lie down for a time and trust the boy to me for the afternoon. She assented with a grateful glance and pressure of the hand. When, at the end of a few hours, I brought the child--with whom I had formed the closest friendship--back to his mother, I found her sitting by the very window at which she had gazed with so much horror. She was still quiet and pale, like a person just recovering from a dangerous illness, but I had never seen her look more beautiful and charming, and felt that the duty of self-defense required me to take leave of her now. I could not come to her room after the play, so we shook hands without uttering what was oppressing each heart; I kissed the child, for the last time as I supposed, and, in a mood well worthy of compassion, left these two beloved beings expecting never to see them again. When the evening performances ended, amid great applause--which most of the company had honestly deserved, even Victorine, whose Madonna eyes were obliged to make up for the deficiencies in her soul, while Daniel's acting, in its fervent sensual vehemence, if it did not depict the "German stripling," presented a very attractive young hothead--I attempted to again slip out unnoticed, but was detected by the manager's watchful eye, and, as tall Laban joined him, was helplessly carried off between them and dragged to the club-room. Protest as I might, Spielberg insisted upon treating me, and while doing so presented me to his acquaintances in the little town with great ceremony as a young dramatic student, whom he hoped to secure for his own stage. Meantime, one bottle of doubtful red wine followed another, and while I took a very moderate share I marveled at the celerity with which the great actor emptied one glass after another at a single draught, without the slightest flush appearing on his face. During all this time his stories of various events in his theatrical career seemed inexhaustible, and his frank delight in his own genius sparkled so innocently in his eyes, that it was impossible to feel vexed with him or avoid listening with a certain interest to his marvelous anecdotes, as one would to the tales of the "Arabian Nights." At last the regular guests had all dispersed, even Laban had departed, but the great actor still detained me and made a sign to the sleepy waiter, upon which he instantly set a bottle of champagne upon the table. "It's no-use, cousin," he said, in a sonorous bass voice, which, it is true, now sounded a little husky; "we have a solemn act to perform. I have vowed not to go to bed until I have drunk to a pledge of fraternity with you in foaming sack. Come and pledge me! You are a fine fellow, only you haven't yet found it out yourself. When you have been in my company a few weeks, you will strip off the chrysalis and wonder at yourself as your wings bear you from flower to flower. Even if you often fly too near a light and scorch yourself a little, that is better than your pastoral tepidity. Your health, my heart's brother! Let us drink eternal friendship!" Spite of my intense reluctance, I could not avoid his cordial embrace. Then he grew quieter, and, with apparent business-like gravity, began to discuss the capacity in which I was to enter his company. He spoke of new pieces its members were to study, the revision of older ones, for which he himself lacked time, and finally of his plan for including light operas in his repertory, for which he could not dispense with a conductor. I listened without protesting, save by interjections and shrugs of the shoulders. Meantime, he emptied the bottle almost alone and called for a second, but I rose and resolutely declared I was going home. "A plague on all cowardly poltroons!" he cried, staggering to his feet. "Virtue exists no more!" Then followed a torrent of classical quotations in a voice that made the windows rattle. Yet his gait was so unsteady that I hastily sprang forward to support him. When we were in the dark street, he passed his arm around my shoulders and tottered along the road like a blind man. "Say nothing to her about it, brother," he stammered, "nothing about the champagne. She hates champagne, though in other respects she's a good wife; it's pure jealousy, ha! ha! She thinks my heart belongs to the Widow Clicquot--a worthy dame, in truth, who never reads me a curtain-lecture, but her purse must be filled with gold if we want to win her favor, ha! ha!--and the father of a family, you know. Never get married, brother! 'Long hair, short wits,'" and he began to sing the champagne aria in the midst of the death-like silence of the Goose-Market. When, with some difficulty, I at last succeeded in getting him up the stairs to his lodgings, he became as still as a mouse, and trembled from head to foot. "Don't tell her!" were the last words he whispered. Then, forcing himself to stand erect, he gently opened the door. "Good-evening, my angel," he stammered, and was going up to her to embrace her. She silently rose and looked at him with a sorrowful gaze, which suddenly seemed to sober him. "Well, well," he said, "it's hardly one o'clock--we don't act to-morrow--I've done a good business, too, haven't I, cousin? He'll stay with us, sweetheart; I've engaged him as dramatist and conductor, at a monthly salary of twelve thalers for the present--that will please you, I think. But now good-night, cousin! I'm perfectly sober, only I couldn't tell the town how one becomes President. So I'm going to take a long sleep, for the torture of the day was great." Amid all the confusion of his brain, he still retained sufficient chivalrous courtesy to take his wife's hand and kiss it. Then he staggered through the side door into the sleeping-room, and we could hear him fall on the bed without undressing. I cast a hasty glance at his wife, who stood gazing into vacancy. "Good-night, Frau Luise," I said. "You will see me again to-morrow." "To-morrow?" "Certainly. To-morrow, and every day until you yourself send me away. Perhaps I may yet make myself useful here--though not as conductor." After that night I no longer led my own life. My existence seemed only valuable when I made myself a slave, soul and body, in Frau Luise's service, coming to her aid wherever her own grand and lofty strength failed. In reality I was making no sacrifice by this self-abnegation. For, as I have already confessed, my own aims and purposes had vanished, as a light on which a nocturnal traveler depends suddenly proves a will-o'-the-wisp, and flickers into a marsh mist. I felt averse rather than inclined to enter a pulpit, and I had not sufficient love or talent for any art or science to induce me to devote my life to it. Clearly, as though written on the wall by some spectral hand, the sentence stood before me: "You are a mediocre man from whom the world has nothing to hope in the way of happiness or enlightenment. Rejoice if some good human being can warm his hands by your little flame." I also perceived the correctness of my opinion by the fact that this discovery, instead of wounding me, created a sense of peace I had hitherto lacked. Rarely have I awaked in a mood so joyous, feeling as it were new-born, as on the morning after I had placed myself at the service of this noble woman. And the difficulties in regard to my former occupation which still embarrassed me were to be dispelled in the simplest way. With my breakfast a letter was brought in, which had been forwarded from the estate I had left, as I had said I should remain in this place for several days. A former fellow-student, a very admirable and intelligent man, wrote that some weakness of the throat compelled him to give up his profession as a preacher. Until he could determine how to shape his future life, he desired to seek a position as tutor in a family, and begged me to aid him as far as possible. I instantly wrote to my employer, informing him that I could not return to his house for reasons which at present I could disclose to no one, but which he would certainly approve if I could ever confide the whole truth to him. At the same time I proposed in my place the college friend, for whose character and education I could amply vouch. I took leave of him and his whole family, who had become so dear to me, and requested him to send my property to me except the books, which I would leave for the present in my successor's care. Then I wrote a few cordial lines to my friend the pastor. As I added the farewell message to his dear daughters, the sorrowful face of the eldest again appeared before me in the most vivid hues, and her earnest eyes seemed to say: "You do not know what happiness you are losing." But I was proof against any temptation to return. Early that very morning I hurried to Herr Spielberg's rooms. He received me in a Turkish dressing-gown, with his brightest face, and, when I inquired how he had slept, answered, laughing: "You probably expected to find me a quiet fellow, cousin. But you must know that champagne and I are on the best of terms. When we do fall out, however, champagne always gets the worst of it; or to quote Julius CÆsar: 'We were two lions litter'd in one day, "But, good-morning. I hope you haven't slept off overnight what we arranged yesterday. How much salary did I promise you? I don't remember. But I won't play the rogue to you at any rate." I told him that I would remain only on two conditions: first, that I should have entire liberty to do nothing except what I felt competent to accomplish; and secondly, that there should never be any question of wages. I had saved enough, during my three years as a tutor, to live without earning anything for a time. He made no reply, only shook his ambrosial locks thoughtfully and struck my shoulder with his hand, like a prince accepting the homage and service of a vassal. Then he called his wife, who was in the adjoining room, dressing the boy. She entered with her usual calm expression and, avoiding my eyes, held out her hand. The boy ran to me and threw his arms around my neck. "What do you say, dear," cried the artist, "he has really determined to stay. Of course, it is solely on your account, for he would not throw up his profession for my sake. Well, I hope you will treat him kindly. 'This lad--no angel is from sin more free, With these words he rose, smiling, leaving me to decide whether the quotation referred to my character of Fridolin, or to Joachimchen, who expressed great delight on hearing that Uncle Johannes would take him to walk immediately. After her husband had left the room, Luise came to me and said in a low tone: "I can not approve your decision, Johannes. But I am so weary that I have not the strength to combat it." I shall avoid giving a minute description of the time that now followed. No one can feel disposed to pursue the destinies of such a strolling company, the alternations of good and evil fortune, or the coming and going of its members, in greater detail--nay, even for theatrical history the list of its plays would have no value, as it was not at all regulated by the spirit of the time, nor even by the fashion, but patched together from new stock and shabby rubbish, as chance and the difficulties of stage-setting permitted. During the first few months the enterprise remained in about the same stage of prosperity as I had found it. Then, by the withdrawal of the Selmars and their charming daughter, it fell several degrees, soon rose again by advantageous engagements, and then declined in consequence of our worthy stage-manager's being made helpless for months by a fall from a high scaffold. These fluctuations corresponded with the ebb and flow in the cash-box, and, but for the wise economy of the manager's wife, there would often have been a failure in the payment of salaries. But the name of Spielberg always possessed sufficient attraction to fill the house tolerably well, and make amends for the recreant members. The most faithful were those from whom I should have least expected loyalty--Laban, who, with all his apparent frivolity and jesting, felt a sincere and warm reverence for Frau Luise, and the young couple, whose stay, it is true, was due to less honorable traits of character. How they were to regard me, and in what manner my position as dramatic "maid of all-work" was to be interpreted, at first caused them much perplexity. They soon learned that I was not working for money. My sole pecuniary profit consisted in my paying no board, as Frau Luise would not permit any other arrangement, and occasionally, when lodgings for all could be hired, I was not allowed to pay for my sleeping-room. In return, I made myself as useful as I could, coached green beginners in their parts, sometimes stood at the side-scenes or crouched in a subterranean box with the prompter's book in my hand, copied parts, arranged plays so that ten characters could be compressed into six, and only drew the line of my services at the one point of obstinately refusing to undertake to act any part, no matter how trivial. At first they attributed this to arrogance, of which, spite of his unassuming helpfulness, they credited the "doctor" with a large share. But, after I had once told them that I cherished too lofty an idea of art to sin against it by bungling work, I rose no little in their esteem, and even Spielberg, who never ceased saying that I was a genius in disguise, let me alone. The suspicion that I was following the company as a secretly favored admirer of the manager's unpopular wife had of course at first suggested itself, even to the better natures among them. But the calm irony with which the great artist crushed all allusions to such a relation did not fail to produce its effect, as well as the perfectly unembarrassed demeanor of the suspected woman herself, and my own Fridolin countenance, which expressed anything rather than the secret triumph of a favored lover. And, indeed, I was not on a bed of roses. Not to mention that I was forced to purchase the happiness of being daily in her society, and making myself indispensable to her by a hundred little services, at the cost of witnessing her suffering, which, it is true, she bore like a heroine, but which nevertheless constantly consumed her strength and youth--it was a most painful thing to be compelled to witness her husband's steady progress toward the ruin to which the unfortunate man opposed less and less resistance. At first I had endeavored not to lose sight of him after the play was over, striving--in the outset with mild, afterwards with the most earnest remonstrances--to recall him from his fatal passion. As he had a gentle, yielding nature, I succeeded several times in doing so. But Daniel, who with fiendish cold-bloodedness played the part of his evil genius, soon made him disloyal to his best resolves and vows, so, at the end of a few weeks, I was forced to let the evil pursue its course. For a time the leonine constitution of which he boasted resisted the effects of his nocturnal debauches, at least so far that no traces of them were visible the following morning. Then, in the consciousness that he stood in need of forgiveness, he was courteous and affectionate throughout the day, like a little boy who fears punishment, and paid his wife all sorts of charming little attentions. But as his weakness gained more and more control, and his nervous strength began to fail, he no longer took any trouble to deceive us about his condition, and instead of showing repentance and embarrassment, after spending half the day in bed suffering from the effects of his intoxication, he tried to conceal his evil conscience under an air of boastful defiance, and bluntly declared that genius required great stimulants, and need not be restrained by Philistine rules. Of course, with such irregularities, which soon became the rule, no firm, careful management of the company was possible. By degrees all business cares and responsibilities were shifted to my insignificant self. It was enough if the sick lion crawled out of his den an hour before the performance, rolled his bloodshot eyes in front of the mirror, and then made his somewhat husky but all the more tragic voice resound through the theater till the puzzled spectators left the house with the acknowledgment that he had "roared well" again, and no one could easily outdo him in shaking his mane. Nevertheless, in this disorder, the company lost its power of attraction more and more, and were obliged to change from place to place more frequently, and these numerous journeys increased the expenses and demoralized the members. I did what I could to stay the ruin, and, besides a silent clasp of the hand from the woman I loved, I was rewarded by the confidence and devotion of most of my colleagues. Only two, who watched the mischief with quiet malice, showed me their aversion more openly, the more honestly I tried to save the tottering car of Thespis from breaking down. These two, of course, were Daniel and Victorine. For a long time the cause of their evident dislike was a mystery to me. For the insolent young fiend could not long suppose that he had been supplanted in the favor of the object of his secret worship by the faithful squire, and his publicly-acknowledged sweetheart, disagreeable as she was to me, I treated with the utmost courtesy. The real purpose of both, and the reason I stood in their way, did not dawn on me until afterward. Daniel's passion for the pure and proud woman was of the nature of those feelings with which fallen angels survey their former heavenly companions. He could not forgive her being so unapproachably far above him. To drag her down, gloat over her humiliation, take vengeance for the coldness with which she passed his hellish ardor by--this was the diabolical idea that haunted him day and night. He well knew it was madness to hope for its attainment so long as our wandering life pursued its usual course. But, if everything were thrown into confusion, the husband utterly ruined, the wife overwhelmed by poverty and despair, he relied on conquering the helpless woman, and, with Satanic energy, grasping her when mentally broken down as his sure prey. Whoever strove to check this development of the tragedy he could not fail to hate. He had such power over Victorine that she shared this mood--though the infernal plot affected her too. Besides, I had made her forever my foe by remaining wholly indifferent to her charms. I will pass over the proofs I might bring forward, not because I am ashamed of my rÔle of Joseph, but, even without this, I shall have occasion to speak of myself more than is agreeable to me. I should have led no enviable existence, had not Heaven itself provided some consolation and strengthened my heart. Whenever we settled for a few months in one of the larger cities, I always obtained a piano, which was placed in Frau Luise's room, or, if there was no space there, in the dining-room--she still maintained the rule of having the meals in common, though the Round Table constantly dwindled--and here we passed our only hours of pure, unshadowed happiness. For, when she sang and I accompanied her, the narrow walls seemed to expand, the earth, with everything base and unlovely it contained, to sink beneath us, while we ourselves floated in a sunny atmosphere where everything was harmony and peace, love and hope, and every wound that bled secretly healed at once as though touched by the hand of some enchanter. We did not permit ourselves this delight daily, only on Sundays and when, for some reason, there was no acting. The boy, meantime, sat in a little chair and never turned his eyes from his mother while she sang; or I took him on my knee while I played the accompaniment, and he gazed wonderingly at the keys. At last I began to give him a few lessons on the piano, and was amazed to see how easily he understood everything. Oh, that child! He became more and more the one unalloyed delight of my life, for unmixed happiness in the society of his mother was impossible for me. Afterward, during my long life as a teacher, I had an opportunity to observe many hundred boys, and to this companionship I owe a thousand pleasures. But neither before nor after did I ever meet a child like Joachimchen. He was no prodigy in the usual acceptance of the word. No technical talent, no intellectual gift developed with extraordinary power or precocity, and, even in music--the only instruction I began in his sixth year to give him regularly--he made no remarkable progress. But the quality this young creature possessed to a far greater degree than other children of his age, was the subtlety and accuracy of his mental perceptions, by which he infallibly distinguished truth from semblance--a, if I may so express it, moral clairvoyance which enabled him to give the most striking opinions of persons and things without any precocious conceit. No trace of child-like vanity, no desire for praise, marred this innocent faculty of his soul. He was like a clear mirror, which reflected in their real outlines the images of everything that surrounded him. Any one whom he loved was sure to be pure and good; for everything base and sordid, though it approached him under the most flattering guise, instantly repelled him. Yes; there was a well-spring of cheerfulness in this little human being which, in proportion to the delicacy of his physical condition, became the more refreshing to him and those who best loved him. His thoughtful views of the world, and the luster of the large eyes in the little palid face, would have roused our anxiety, had not shouts of mirth often issued from the narrow chest, while even in his quieter moments there was no trace of sickly peevishness or weariness. The little naughtinesses, almost invariably seen in an only child who is deeply loved and spoiled, were foreign to his nature. A sign, a word would guide him. It was only in the society of other children that I frequently perceived a shade of reserve and fretfulness in his manner, so I persuaded his mother not to force him into their companionship. On the other hand, he was all the more vivacious, even to the verge of ungovernable delight, when we took him out to walk. He chased all the butterflies, made friends with all the little dogs he met, and, mounted on a hobby-horse, galloped along, swinging his little riding-whip. Everybody loved him, though he was very chary of his caresses. He was shy only with his own father. Often at dinner--the only time he spent a whole hour with him--I saw him fix a watchful gaze upon Spielberg, just when the latter in his most radiant mood was pouring forth high-sounding speeches about art and artists. The boy never uttered a word, though often, to the delight of the others, he made one of his quaint, penetrating remarks to some member of the company. Never, either to me or his mother, did he mention his father's name. But the latter, whose face always beamed with the consciousness that he was impressing every one, evidently avoided meeting the child's eyes, and, when he felt their gaze on him, became so confused that he often hesitated in the middle of a sentence and lapsed into silence. I do not remember, during all the time that we lived together, a single instance when he showed the boy any tenderness, or troubled himself in the least about him. I had agreed with Frau Luise that, on account of the child's delicate constitution and sensitive nerves, he ought to be guarded from all mental excitement, though he was now six years old, an age when children usually begin to Study the alphabet and primers. To train him in the use of his hands, I gave him easy lessons in drawing, which he greatly enjoyed, let him practice daily half an hour on the piano, and sing with his clear little voice intervals and simple songs. During our walks I told him Bible stories, which, whatever may be thought of their historical value, ought--as the most venerable traditions from the earliest days of the Christian world--to be given every child for his journey through life, as well as the fairy lore of our nation. Yet I was obliged to limit even this elementary instruction, because the boy's unusually vivid imagination transformed everything which was intended merely to serve for amusement into solid food for his mind. For instance, he became as much excited over the history of Joseph and his brothers as a grown person would have been by a novel. I directed his thirst for knowledge exclusively to natural objects, so far as my defective education in this department permitted, and everything seemed to be going on admirably when a slight attack of fever roused our anxiety. The company had settled in one of the larger cities on the shore of the Baltic, where they were doing an excellent business. So the plan of instantly departing, and perhaps breaking up the threatening disease by a change of climate, could not be entertained. Besides, the physician, whom the mother questioned, did not consider the case serious, attributed all the symptoms to the child's rapid growth, and prescribed a different diet and certain strengthening measures which seemed to have a good effect. We had formerly divided the care and training of the boy in such a way that he was never left a moment without his mother or myself. Now she would not allow me to take her place except for an occasional half-hour, and even at dinner remained in her room, while we were served by Kunigunde. For a long time she had given up the sleeping-room to her husband's sole use, and contented herself with an uncomfortable couch made up every night on the sofa, while the child's little bed stood close by her side. He could not be allowed to see the condition in which his father usually returned at midnight. One morning she received me with an anxious face. Joachimchen was reluctant to leave his bed, complained of headache, and did not want his breakfast. The doctor, whom I instantly summoned, soothed her as much as he was able. The fever had not increased, perhaps some childish disease was coming on, which would produce a favorable change in his whole physical condition. He prescribed some simple remedy, and we felt a little relieved. He became no worse in the evening. But I had told Spielberg that I could not perform my duties that night, and, as the play had been acted hundreds of times, I really was not needed behind the scenes. When at ten o'clock I felt the pulse of the child, who was lying in an uneasy slumber, I thought there was no occasion to fear a bad night, and persuaded his mother to lie down in order to save her strength. I would sit up a few hours longer, as I had some alterations to make in a new play, which was then creating a sensation--I believe it was the "Son of the Wilderness"--in order to adapt it to the scanty strength of our company. My room in the private house where we had taken lodgings was on the same floor as the manager's, and I could be summoned by the faintest call. But for several hours everything remained quiet, and I was just thinking that I might venture to go to bed when I heard the drunkard's heavy footstep on the stairs. He had wished the sick child a good night's rest, with evident sympathy, and even now seemed to remember that he must enter softly. Nor did it surprise me that he did not go directly to his own sleeping-room as usual, but gently raised the latch of his wife's door. He wants to inquire how the boy has rested, I thought. I had just closed my book and was preparing to retire for the night when I heard the door of Frau Luise's room thrown open, Spielberg's voice faltering unintelligible words, and shrill moans and cries for help from the boy which sent a thrill of terror through every nerve. But I had no time to reach my door, for at the same instant it was flung wide open, and the unfortunate mother, clad only in the white dressing-gown in which she was in the habit of lying down when Joachimchen needed any special care, darted in, her face death-like in its pallor, holding the wailing child in her arms. "Protect us! Save the child!" she cried, with a terrified gesture, and as she rushed to my bed, drew back the curtains and hastily laid the boy, whose slender frame was convulsed with sobs, on it, she whispered, with a glance of intense fear: "He will follow us! Bolt the door! O, God, this too!" She had thrown herself on her knees beside the bed, clasping her darling's quivering form closely in her arms, pressing her lips to the little pale face, and murmuring in confused words that he must be quiet, nobody would hurt him or his mother, he had only been dreaming, now he must go to sleep again, and his mother and Uncle Johannes would stay with him all night. The child did not cease moaning, struggled into a sitting posture in her arms, and cast an anxious glance around the room as if he feared a pursuer. And in fact some one knocked at the door, but very timidly, and, as none of us answered the request to open it, silence followed, and we heard the steps retire and the door of Spielberg's room open and close. But there was no improvement in the child's condition. He tossed convulsively to and fro, his eyes rolled without any sign of intelligence, and his face burned with fever. "I will get the doctor, Frau Luise," I said. "I hope it is only a crisis." She made no reply, but gazed fixedly at the little one's distorted features, and endeavored by her embrace to control the convulsions that shook the slight frame. We found them still in the same state when I at last brought the physician. The worthy man, who felt the most sincere reverence for the poor mother, made every effort to conceal his alarm. When, after a few hours, during which he had watched the very trivial success of his remedies, he took his leave, promising to return early in the morning, and I lighted him down the stairs, he pressed my hand with a heavy sigh. "Poor woman!" he said. "The child does not suffer at all; it is not conscious. But how the mother is to bear--" "So you have no hope--" "There is inflammation of the brain, more severe than I have often witnessed. But nature is incalculable. Do you know how it happened that his condition changed for the worse so suddenly?" I answered in the negative. It was not until long afterward that I learned what had occurred in the brief interval between the father's entrance and the mother's flight. Spielberg had returned home with a clearer head than usual. When he entered his wife's room, she half arose from the sofa and laid her finger on her lips. By the light of the dim night-lamp he approached the child's bed, softly touched the little sleeping face, gazed at it a short time, and then turned to his wife, whispering: "He is doing admirably." She merely nodded, and when, in an impulse of his old tenderness and sympathy with her anxiety, he held out his hand, she kindly returned the clasp. He sat down on the edge of the bed and told her in a low tone that the play had been much applauded and the receipts large. When she asked him to go to rest, as talking might disturb the child, he answered that he was not tired, but felt inclined to have a short chat with his beloved wife. When she shook her head, he moved nearer, and, putting his arm around her, begged her to go into the next room with him for a little while. It was so long since they had had a confidential talk, and there was rarely time for one during the day. The more he urged, the more firmly she declined, till he finally threw both arms around her and whispered: "If you don't come voluntarily, I will use force! You are my wife!" Then, as she resisted with desperate strength, he fairly lifted her up and was carrying her away, when a shriek from the child's bed suddenly made him loose his hold. The boy was sitting up, staring with dilated eyes at the nocturnal scene, and stretching out his little arms as if to aid his defenseless mother. The next instant he had sprung from the bed, climbed on the sofa by his mother's side, and, thrusting his father away with his little clinched hands, screamed: "You sha'n't kill my mother! Go away! You sha'n't hurt her!--" till, exhausted by terror, the chivalrous child succumbed to a severe attack of fever. The boy lay in the same condition all night, without a single interval of consciousness. We had not removed him to his own little bed; my room, situated at the end of the corridor, was quieter than his mother's. Neither of us left him. His father had come in early in the morning, but, as he found the child apparently calm and received only curt answers from his wife, who did not vouchsafe him a single glance, he soon went away again. For the first time his unshadowed self-complacency had deserted him. He hung his head like an unjustly accused criminal before the judge, whom he can not hope to convince of his innocence. The physician had returned very early. He uttered no word of discouragement, but his troubled face, after he had examined the child, so oppressed my heart that I could not even venture to ask a question. But when I went out with him he pressed my hand, whispering: "If he survives the night--but we must be prepared for everything." The actors, who were all very fond of the little fellow, stole to the door, tapped gently, and asked me for news of him. The only one who entered the room was Daniel. He bowed silently to Frau Luise, and then stood a long time at the foot of the bed; but, after a hasty glance at the little invalid, he fixed his glowing dark eyes on the mother, who, still robed just as she had fled to me yesterday, sat beside the child, now hovering between life and death. At first she took no more notice of the intruder than of anything else that was passing around her. Suddenly she seemed to feel his scorching gaze, and looked up; the blood crimsoned her pale cheeks, and she flashed a single glance at the man she so detested. His head sank, as if he had been struck by an arrow, and he glided on tiptoe out of the room. Victorine alone did not appear. She had never showed any affection for the child, and, besides, was to have a benefit that night, for which she wished to freshen her costume by many little devices. No one thought of dinner. Kunigunde brought Frau Luise some food, which she did not touch. I myself hastily swallowed a few mouthfuls in the kitchen. Spielberg, who after the rehearsal had again inquired for the child, went to the hotel with the others. So the evening approached. The boy's condition remained unchanged, except that the fever increased, and every remedy used seemed powerless. After a bath, however, which the doctor himself helped to give, he seemed somewhat quieter, and lay still and pale in my large bed, the dear little face only occasionally distorted by a slight convulsive quiver. The father entered in street dress. For the first time his wife looked at him, and her lips parted in a question--her voice sounded hoarse and hollow after her long silence. "Are you going to act to-night, Konstantin?" He went up to the child and touched its pale forehead. "He is better. His forehead is perfectly cool. I will come back as soon as the play is over." "He is not better. If, meanwhile--" She could not finish the sentence. He looked at me. I shrugged my shoulders and turned away to hide the tears the unhappy mother's voice brought into my eyes. "If I could be of any assistance here," he said, hesitatingly; "it costs me a hard struggle to leave you, but you will find that the night will pass quietly, and to-morrow we shall be relieved of all anxiety." "To-morrow!" she repeated, dully. "You are right; to-morrow we shall be relieved of all anxiety." Turning abruptly away, she bowed her face on the pillow of the little boy, whose chest was beginning to heave painfully. The artist had already gone to the door, but stopped, saying: "Since you prefer it, I will give up the performance. I am so agitated that it would be a poor piece of acting; and then--if he is really--no, it is better so. They must do as well as they can. Farewell!" I felt how deeply each one of these careless words wounded her. But no sound or look betrayed that she was conscious of anything save her maternal anxiety. Yet--when, half an hour later, a boy brought a note in which was scrawled in pencil, "I had entirely forgotten that it is Victorine's benefit. Unfortunately, it has been impossible for me to induce her to give me up, and, besides, we have a very crowded house. Let us bear the inevitable with dignity. Konstantin"--I saw by the gesture of loathing with which she crushed the sheet and flung it into the corner, that the wife possessed a vulnerable spot as well as the mother. Still she uttered no word of comment, and the next moment seemed to have entirely forgotten it. For the brief armistice produced by the bath had expired. The last struggle began. It lasted only a few hours, then all was over. The brave little heart had ceased to beat. The mother sat like a statue of despair beside the bed, holding the little white hand, which no current of blood would ever again warm, and gazing fixedly at the closed eyelids and livid mouth distorted by pain that would never more utter any merry words. It was as still around us as though the night was holding its breath, in order not to rouse the mother's agonized heart from its beneficent stupor. I had thrown myself into a chair in a dark corner, and felt as though I were sinking deeper and deeper into the bottomless abyss of the vast enigma of the world. From time to time I was forced to struggle with the temptation to rise, go to the poor woman, fall on my knees before her, and plead: "Keep your heart firm that it may not break. If you follow him into the grave, I shall perish too." But I conquered this selfish impulse. What mattered what happened to me! What mattered anything, since this child no longer breathed! The window stood open, the still night air--it was early in June--stole into the room, but, as the house stood in a quiet side street, rarely bore with it the sound of a human voice or a passing footstep. The play must be over, and, with silent indignation, I expected to see the artist return home to-night in the same condition as yesterday. But I had done him injustice. His footstep echoed from the street below as firm and full of stately majesty as when he trod the boards in his most exalted characters. Beside it was another, which I should instantly have recognized as Daniel's elastic tread, even had not his voice been audible also. The words were unintelligible. But he must have been telling some amusing story, for his companion's resonant laugh interrupted him several times. They did not cease talking till they reached the door of the house. His wife started at the sound of the laugh, and rose. The little lifeless hand slipped from her clasp. She passed her other hand over her brow and her lips moved, but I did not understand what she was saying, and I only saw that her eyes were sullenly fixed on the floor. Her husband entered softly. "O, God!" he exclaimed, as he glanced at the bed. "It is over!" He pondered a moment to find something to say to his wife, then with a deep groan went to the boy and was about to bend over him. But he started back as the mother suddenly stood before him, with her tall figure drawn up to its full height. "You shall not touch him," she said, in a harsh, hollow tone. "Go, at once--we have nothing more in common with each other. May God forgive you for what you have done! Go, go!" she repeated, in a louder tone, as he made a gesture of entreaty--"I will not bear one word from you--here--by this bed--in this hour--" "Luise!" he exclaimed wildly. "Hush!" she replied sharply, "I pity us both, you as well as myself. I know you do what you cannot avoid. But go, go! Something is rising in my soul--something terrible. If I should see you before me longer, poor--comedian, I might utter words I should repent to-morrow." Spielberg tottered out of the room. But, as soon as he had closed the door behind him, his wife sank down beside the couch of her dead child, and a convulsive sob burst from her sorrow-laden heart. (Here in the manuscript follow several pages, in which a detailed account is given of everything that happened during the next few days. After so many years, every little circumstance was still present to the narrator, and his grief for the boy, his sympathetic insight into the soul of the hapless mother, burst forth with such renewed strength that he felt a sorrowful relief in again conjuring up, incident by incident, these melancholy recollections. But we will not take up the thread again until after the earth has closed over the little coffin, which was wholly concealed under the garlands bestowed by the actors and some kind people among the inhabitants of the little town. The mother, who could not be prevented from walking in the funeral procession, had watched with tearless eyes, as if they were "burned out," her "entire happiness" placed in the grave--the father had displayed a pathetic emotion, whose extravagance touched no one. The next evening a comedy was again played, and the great artist did not miss a word of his part.) The fortunate star of the renowned company of artists seemed to have vanished when the child's eyes closed. The audiences at the theater daily diminished, two of the most useful and indispensable members broke their contract and left the manager in great embarrassment, he himself, after having exerted some little self-control during the first period of mourning, plunged still more madly into his nocturnal carouses, and, when I earnestly remonstrated, asserted with tragic affectation that he had no other means of drowning his grief. Recently he had even smuggled a bottle of strong liquor into the dressing-room, contrary to his own rule, prohibiting the use of wine or spirituous drinks of any kind during the performances. So it happened that he sometimes declaimed his lines with a stammering tongue, and lost the last remnant of his authority over his company and effect upon the public. I watched the increasing trouble with deep anxiety; but the mute abstraction in which the unhappy wife passed her days tortured me still more. At last I ventured to speak to her on the subject, and it seemed as though she had only been in an apparent death-trance, which was broken by the first tender word, the first touch of a friend's hand. "I thank you, Johannes," she said, and for the first time her dull eyes grew wet with tears. "You are right, I must try to control my grief. It is not death which has clutched me in his bony arms and stifled every breath. Life, dear friend, is far more cruel; I cannot break the chains and bonds in which it has fettered me. But even a convict who drags an iron ball by a chain must perform his task. It was cowardly and childish to neglect my daily duties. Only have a little patience with me; I will hold up my head again." From that moment she resumed all her duties to the company, managed the money matters, kept an eye, with Kunigunde's assistance, on the wardrobe, sent the members word that she would again provide the dinner, and only shrank from one thing--occasionally attending a rehearsal as usual. She again treated every one pleasantly, but never spoke a word to her husband except when he addressed her. Her misfortune had drawn the members of the company nearer to her; the women, especially, showed her many little attentions, except Victorine, who held aloof as before, and no longer even appeared at the Round Table. But, when darkness came, she always went to the graveyard and remained there an hour alone, declining even my companionship with a silent shake of the head. But we met each other several other times when she was returning home, and walked silently side by side, absorbed in the same thoughts, which needed no utterance. I only remember that I once asked her how she could reconcile this pitiless blow with God's fatherly kindness. She stopped and, raising her tearful eyes to heaven, answered: "Never for one moment have I doubted him. Spite of all the burdens that weighed upon me, I was the most blessed among women, and God is wise and just. He lets the tree of no earthly happiness grow into heaven. But, for the very reason that he took the child from me, I know that he has not deserted me. If he had left him to me, and he had some day seen with his innocent eyes the ugly world around us as it really is, and been permitted only the choice between scorning it or becoming akin to it, who knows what he would have decided, and either course would have made both him and me wretched. Now I have buried him here in my heart, in all his purity and loveliness, and may love him forever, far better and more fervently than when I still clasped him in my arms. And, though this love is full of sorrow, neither time nor fate has any power over it, and for this I thank God, whom I always know near to me when I go down into the depths of my own heart and feel the dear child living on there." What answer could I have made? My whole philosophy became pitiful and humble before the pious trust of this strong soul. She received the news calmly, when one day at table her husband said that they would be obliged to change their residence. The receipts were miserably poor, and he had had an invitation from the magistrates of the next town on the coast to give a series of plays, lasting several weeks. As he spoke, he cast a side-glance at his wife, as though fearing she would object to leave the place where her child lay buried. He had long since fallen into the habit of discussing no subjects, when alone with her, except those required by absolute necessity. To his surprise she simply assented. Even, when, three days after, we departed and I drove through the gate in the same carriage with her and the worthy lady whose young daughter played the ingÉnues, while Spielberg, with Daniel and Victorine, formed the rear-guard, she had strength enough to give no sign of the emotions which must have assailed her in parting from the little grave. But the hopes with which we had struck our tents were not to be realized. Just at that time a panic occurred in commercial circles that made itself felt in the seaport no less than in the large North German commercial towns. People kept their pockets buttoned, and even the renowned artist could not open them. He became so irritated by this state of affairs that, to punish the ingratitude of the age, he intentionally hid the light of his art under a bushel, and played his parts with such haughty negligence that even the few patrons of the theater, who had known his reputation, shook their heads, and transferred their favor to the less famous members of the company. Victorine was the admiration of the young merchants; the ingÉnue previously mentioned turned the heads of the older school-boys; Daniel, whose acting, even when most negligent, always had its interesting moments, found favor with the critics in the two local papers--yet, nevertheless, the receipts were so small that the company would have been compelled to disband had not Frau Luise's wise economy provided a reserve fund for such contingencies. She paid the salaries as regularly as ever, and kept the wardrobes and other requisites in decent order, without receiving any special thanks from any one. I myself was entirely out of funds. Two and a half years of this wandering life had devoured my savings, I could scarcely be seen in my shabby clothes, and, though protected from any anxiety about food, had not even the small amount of pocket money required for trifling wants, so that I was sometimes seized by a mood of despairing melancholy, and should undoubtedly have been up and away some day had I not known how indispensable I had become. If I left the company, everything must go to ruin. I could tell myself, without vanity, that the breach of my--unwritten--contract would be equivalent to fracturing an axle in the car of Thespis. Moreover, was I not bound body and soul to this woman, considering myself transcendently rewarded if she held out her large, firm hand to me in the evening and said, "Good-night, dear friend!" Still, these miserable circumstances oppressed me more and more, and one day, when I met in the street a college friend who meanwhile had had a prosperous career, and while on a business journey had come to our Pomeranian coast, I bore his look of compassionate surprise with a bitter laugh, and willingly accepted his invitation to share a bottle of wine with him that evening at his hotel and make a general confession. I had made no confession for years, and it was months since a drop of wine had moistened my lips. So only a single glass was needed to lure from me an unreserved acknowledgment of my wretched plight. There was but one thing I carefully concealed--the strongest chain that bound me to this miserable existence, my mad, hopeless love for this woman. Yet, had the hand of a god suddenly aided me to tear myself free, what could I have done with my liberty? To what occupation in civil life should I have found the door open, I, a runaway Candidate of theology, who had not disdained to play the part of factotum to a company of traveling actors for two years and a half. So when, toward eleven o'clock, I took leave of my former comrade, we were no wiser concerning my future, and what I had to hope and fear from it, than in the beginning. He had told me, with a shake of the head, that there must be some love affair in the matter, and correctly understood my shrug of the shoulders. But, as he had been to the theater the night before, he seemed undecided between Victorine and the young ingÉnue. "Let me sleep over the affair," he said at last, as he went out into the hall with me--we had had our wine in his chamber, as there was much noise and confusion in the public room below--"I sha'n't see you to-morrow, because I must leave very early, but I will write as soon as a good idea occurs to me." I pressed his hand and thoughtfully descended the stairs. In going up, two hours before, I had seen in the public room below Luise's husband and several actors, among them Daniel, who was inseparable from the manager. Meantime, eleven o'clock had come, but they had not yet separated, and I wished at any cost to avoid meeting them. But, just as I was stealing softly past the door, it was thrown open, and my friend, tall Herr Laban, staggered out, supported by one of the younger actors. Both were in the gayest humor. "Look there, look there, Timotheus!" he shouted, laughing. "Where the deuce hast thou been hiding"--he always used 'thou' to me--"while we have been seeing the most capital farce played here? You have missed a great deal, I can tell you, Doctor; and, in not saying good-night to your traveling friend over our heads, you have stood very much in your own light. Isn't that so, Juvenil?" The young man laughingly agreed that it had been a splendid joke--no comedy of errors had ever amused him so much. I tried to pass on with some careless remark, but Laban seized my arm and, while we helped him down the last steps, began to tell me the story in his comical way. They had drunk several glasses when Daniel began to boast of his talent for imitating living persons, and instantly gave several proofs of this ability by copying the voice and gestures of the landlord and some of the regular guests, to the delight of the whole company. Spielberg alone had sat in his heroic grandeur, looking on with an air of contemptuous dignity, and finally remarked that such monkey tricks, which dazzled the public, were easy, and besides found their limits in certain figures whose majesty rendered them, as it were, unapproachable for mimicry. Did he include himself among them? the insolent fellow asked, and, when the great man nodded silently, he laid a wager that he would personate him so exactly that he would hardly know whether it was himself or his double. They ordered a bottle of champagne, and then Daniel led the manager into the next room. After a short time the door opened again, and Spielberg strode in. Everybody asked whether Daniel was not ready or had given up his wager. "That young man promises much, and does nothing save to make fools of honest Thebans," was the reply, after which he approached the table with his stately walk, shook the bottle in the ice and exclaimed: "A plague on all cowardly poltroons!" Then they first discovered that it was Daniel, and not the great actor himself, and even then it was only the little hand he owes to his Polish blood that betrayed him. But, just as there was a general burst of applause and laughter, the door again opened and a second Daniel appeared, in a gray summer suit and Polish cap, with his cat-like tread and feminine movement of the hips, so that the uproar and clapping of hands grew louder than ever--for nobody had ever imagined the manager possessed such a talent. This, however, was merely the beginning of the farce. Each continued to play the character of the other: Daniel in the belaced velvet coat, with straw hat pulled over his forehead, toasted his image, amid constant quotations uttered in his resonant voice, and Spielberg, with all the Harlequin tricks the other was in the habit of using on the stage, never let the laughers stop to take breath, so that each of the two had won and lost the wager. But, when they had broken the neck of the second bottle, Daniel suddenly became silent, went to Spielberg, and whispered something which made the manager look puzzled. But his double seized his arm and led him out. When after a long time they did not return, we asked for them, and the waiter said that after whispering together for some time the two gentlemen had left the hotel arm in arm. I do not know why I could not laugh at this amusing trick. But I hastily took leave of the two actors, whose room was on the top floor of the hotel, and, in a most uncomfortable mood, passed out into the street just as the clock in the nearest church-steeple struck eleven. Though I felt no inclination to sleep, a strange anxiety urged me homeward, as if I were expected there. My way led through the street in which the other hotel stood. Here Victorine and Daniel lodged. And just as I glanced at the door of the house I saw the fellow--whom I easily recognized by his dress--ring the bell and, directly after, with a greeting from the porter, cross the threshold. But what thought occurred to me? Was that really Daniel--or was it his double in his clothes? And, if it were the latter, what was he doing in that house, where Victorine was now probably waiting for the other? However, I had no time to ponder over this idea, for the question suddenly darted through my brain: What has become of that other, the false Spielberg? Suspecting some deviltry, some base trick, I rushed through the deserted streets to the house where Frau Luise lived, and I, too, had my modest room in the upper story. She was in the habit of sitting up late with some piece of sewing or a book, usually alone, for faithful Kunigunde closed her eyes at nine o'clock. As I hastily drew out my night-key I noticed that the door, contrary to custom, stood half open. I did not take time to shut it again, but, with trembling hands, lighted the little pocket-lantern, which must illumine my way up the dark stairs, and rushed on. But I had not yet reached the landing on the first story when I heard Frau Luise's deep tones, and then saw her facing her husband--no, his double, who, with his straw hat on his head and his coat flung open, slowly retreated before her, his ardent dark eyes fixed with an indescribable expression on her face. Frau Luise was holding a little lamp in her left hand, and had raised her right threateningly against the scoundrel, her face, whose waxen pallor usually formed a striking contrast to her mourning dress, was flushed with the crimson hue of wrath, and her eyes shone with a strange, supernatural luster. "You will leave this house at once and the city tomorrow," I heard her say. "You are the most contemptible of human beings, and what you have presumed to do merits a bloody chastisement. I am a woman, and must leave it to my husband to avenge this insult as he deems best. But, if you should ever have the effrontery to appear before my eyes again--" "Pardon me, madame," he interrupted--and, though he endeavored to appear entirely nonchalant, I detected in his tremulous voice that he did not feel entirely at ease while confronting this haughty figure--"I beg a thousand pardons; I did not imagine you would take an innocent jest so tragically, especially as your husband saw no offense in it. We had laid a wager that I could personate him exactly. The final and hardest test, of course, was whether his own wife would recognize me. Well, at first you certainly believed me to be Herr Spielberg, and were not undeceived until I took the liberty of embracing you--doubtless a husband's kisses are less ardent than those of a lover, who for two years has yearned to even once press his lips upon a mouth which never had aught for him save contemptuous silence. Though I have lost my wager, the kiss that betrayed me is abundant compensation, and so, fairest of women, I have the honor--" He was not to have breath to finish the sentence. For, in a fury I had never experienced before, I rushed upon the miscreant, seized him by the chest, and, tearing off his hat with the other hand, shook him by the hair till his sneering face wore an expression of mortal terror, as I dragged him to the stairs and would have flung him down heels over head, had he not by a sudden movement, lithe as a young panther, escaped from my grasp, and, thrusting me aside, glided down the dark stair-case, muttering an imprecation between his set teeth. We heard him shut the door of the house and, in the fear of pursuit, hurriedly lock it. Then, in the death-like stillness that again prevailed, we looked into each other's eyes to see if it were possible that we had actually experienced this, or whether some dream had conjured up the same vision before both. I saw her tremble as if some unclean beast had clutched her in its claws. A quiver of wrath and loathing contracted her brow and lips. "I thank you, Johannes," she said. "But excuse me, I must go in now and wash myself. O, Heaven! all the perfumes of Arabia--but no, we can only be sullied by our own evil thoughts. Do not you think so, too?" She turned away and carried the lamp back to her room again. I followed her to the threshold. "Frau Luise," I asked, "will you let me shoot the rascal down like a mad dog? Or do you consider him worthy to receive his punishment in an honest duel?" "You must do nothing to him," she answered in a hollow tone. "If, as I still hope, it is false that another person knew of this knavish trick, it is that other's business to avenge the insult that was offered to him even more than to me. To-morrow will decide this. It is late now--you must leave me--I must wash my face and the hands that touched the scoundrel, even to push him away." I shut the door, and sadly mounted the stairs to my room. It was useless to think of sleeping. Not only because the detestable scene I had just witnessed still hovered before my eyes, but because I expected every moment that the other would return home, and wished to be ready in case his wife should need my assistance. True, she was strong and brave enough to defend herself against any insult or injury. But who could tell in what state of recklessness, stung by his evil conscience, that "other" would confront her. At any rate he delayed long enough. The rÔle of double, which he played so admirably, seemed to have found an appreciative audience in the depraved girl for whom he was enacting it, or perhaps she had entered into the deception with malicious satisfaction in order to wound the noble woman she hated. I heard the clock strike the hours--midnight, one, two. Then, without undressing, I threw myself on the bed and shut my burning eyes, but my ears remained open and watchful. Scarcely half an hour had passed when I heard a lagging step approach along the pavement below, and in an instant again stood at my window. Yes, it was he. By the gray light of the summer sky, I could distinguish the Polish cap, the loose coat, and the white hands which hastily rummaged his pockets for the key of the house door. But it was in the other suit of clothes, now worn by the double. The criminal who had shut himself out of the peace of his own home stood for a time gazing up at the windows, behind which he doubtless saw the glimmer of the night-lamp. Ought you to go down, open the door for him, and pour forth to his face all you think of him, all the wrath you have so long pent up concerning his sins against this woman, the tip of whose little finger he is unworthy to kiss? No, I thought. Let him suffer for his sin. It is only a pity that this isn't a winter night, and he is not obliged to stand barefoot in the snow until broad daylight. He? He would have been likely to undertake such a penance! After twice calling, in a tone of assumed piteousness, "Luise!" he took off his cap, passed his hand over his waving locks, then pressed the little fur cap low over his forehead, and turned defiantly to seek the place from which some pitiful remnant of remorse had driven him. I uttered a sigh of relief, opened the window, and cooled my heated face. At last I sought my couch, and toward morning really fell asleep. My slumber was so sound that I was first roused by a very loud knocking at my door. When I opened it, Kunigunde was standing outside, and requested me to come down to Frau Luise. "Has your master returned?" I asked the faithful creature. "Of course. But not until nearly nine o'clock, when my mistress had gone out to make some purchases. He seemed to know that she was not at home, for he did not even ask for her, but shut himself up in her room for a while, and then went away without leaving any message. But I saw a letter lying on the table, which the mistress read as soon as she came in, and then sent me up to you." The good old woman was evidently troubled, and, in spite of having gone to rest so early, seemed to have heard enough of the nocturnal scene to pity her honored mistress. When, following close at her heels, I entered Frau Luise's room, I found her sitting on the sofa beside a table, with the letter lying open before her. She nodded to me with an absent look, and said in an expressionless tone: "Sit down and read this, Johannes; the end has come." I took the sheet and hastily glanced over it. The letter was not short, and was written precisely in Spielberg's usual style, lofty, adorned with rhetorical ornaments, interspersed here and there with a quotation from Schiller. He saw that by yesterday's occurrence--of which, though without any evil intent, he had been the cause--he had forfeited even the last remnant of her love. So it would be better for him to go voluntarily into exile, and not return until he could meet her with new renown and in an assured position. True, what are the hopes, the wishes on which man relies? But he trusted to his star. She would lose all trace of him for a time, but he hoped he should afterward be able to repay her for what she had suffered through him. He closed by thanking her for her generous tolerance of his weaknesses. Genius was no easy companion for a life-pilgrimage--and similar high-sounding words. In a postscript, he begged her to pardon him for having appropriated, in order to execute his plan, the reserve fund she had so carefully saved. He left in exchange, at her free disposal, the whole fundus instructus, scenes, costumes, requisites, and theatrical library; she might either sell them or continue the business. In the latter case, Cousin Johannes would assist her. Then followed a pathetic farewell, another quotation, and the signature, with an elaborate flourish: "Ever your own Konstantin." I probably looked like a person who, while eating raspberries, suddenly bites a wasp. For, as I silently laid down the letter, she said soothingly: "It has moved me very little. This must have happened sooner or later, and it is fortunate that it came now. Believe me, I feel perfectly calm, and am sincerely grateful to him for not having sought a personal interview. I am like a person recovering from a severe, insidious disease, a little weak, it is true, but I shall no longer be terrified by the hideous visions with which the fever tortured my brain." "What do you intend to do?" I asked at last. "My duty, so far as I can. True, I am as poor as a church-mouse. But the others must not suffer." "Frau Luise," I said, "I know that you were formerly too proud to summon your guardian to give an account of his management of your property. But now, in such necessity--" She smiled bitterly. "Too proud? My dear friend, I should not have been too proud even at that time to claim my rights. But, as you know, where there is nothing, even the Emperor cannot assert his rights, far less a poor Canoness who eloped with an actor. My uncle squandered the last shilling of my mother's property. Would you have me turn him out of house and home by appealing to the law? But let us say no more about these detestable things. Fortunately I paid the members of the company their monthly salary only a few days ago. As the business is now broken up, they are in a pitiable plight, for where can they obtain a new engagement in midsummer? So the fundus instructus must be sold as quickly and as profitably as possible, and meantime be pawned. You will do me this one last favor, dear Johannes. I have another little plan, too. Why do you look at me so wonderingly? Surely you did not suppose that all this would find me unprepared. I have long expected something of the sort. Weak as he is--but we will not speak of him." She now explained her intention of obtaining, by means of a concert in the theater, a considerable sum for the benefit of the orphaned company, which, bereft of the manager and "the others," could give no more performances. By these "others" she meant Daniel and Victorine. While out of doors she had met an actor, who excitedly asked whether she knew that the couple had just gone on board an English merchant vessel lying in the harbor. He did not say that the manager was with them, but the wife did not doubt it for an instant, and therefore knew what she should find when she returned to the house again. She would herself appear and sing at the concert, she continued. She knew that there would be a full house, for her misfortune, of course, was now in everybody's mouth, and, as she had always kept out of sight, curiosity and perhaps a better feeling would urge many to see and hear the woman who had led so strange a life, and must now reap what she had sown. She did not fear the eyes of strangers. It was a misfortune that her heart had prompted her to entrust her life to the keeping of one who was unworthy, but neither a disgrace nor a crime. So she would appear, with head erect, before a cold, malicious world, and not a note would falter in her throat. She had not expected too much of her own powers. When she appeared on the stage, in a plain black dress, with a little black veil wound around her golden braids, and every eye in the densely-crowded house was fixed upon her, I saw--I was sitting at the piano to play her accompaniments--her face flush for a moment. But its natural hue instantly returned, and she sang her aria from Orpheus, several melodies from Iphigenia in Tauris, and Mignon's song composed by Beethoven, with such power and simple beauty that it seemed as if the tempests of life which had stirred the inmost depths of her soul had only served to bring the flower of her art to still more superb development. The effect was so profound and overwhelming that a storm of applause, such as had never greeted even the finest scenes of the great actor, shook the theater. She bowed modestly, with a sad smile that won every heart. When, in the waiting-room, I congratulated her, her face clouded. "Hush," she whispered hurriedly. "Would you tell the victim, about to be offered as a sacrifice, that the garlands are becoming?" The other parts of the programme, two comic soliloquies by Laban, and some of Schiller's ballads recited by our ingÉnue, were well received. When I accompanied Frau Luise home, I held in the box under my arm a very large sum received from the evening's entertainment. When we reached her room, I wished to give her the money. "No," she replied, "henceforth you must be the treasurer. I shall make but one stipulation--that you do not entirely forget yourself, but share equally with the rest. With foolish generosity you have spent all your savings in order to retain a laborious situation here, for which you received neither thanks nor payment. What do you intend to do now?" "That will depend upon you, Frau Luise." Her eyes sought the floor, then, raising them to mine with an indescribably tender glance, she said: "No, my friend, we part this very day, this very hour. You need have no anxiety about me. I shall not pine away and die. You know that I am very strong, or how could I have endured everything?--and, as I am no longer a Canoness, I must not shrink from a little labor. But you must try to return to the life from which your friendship for me has torn you. Promise me that, after you have attended to the last details of business here, you will go back to your old profession, if not as a clergyman, as a teacher, or in some scholarly occupation. I will watch your course from a distance. You will promise, will you not?" "Frau Luise," I stammered, "do you wish to banish me? Do you not know--" "I know all, my friend; you need not add another word. And I also know that I love you with all my heart, and therefore it is better for us to part. A woman whose husband has vanished is not free to choose--surely you understand that. And I will suffer no stain upon my name. You will remain my friend, as I am yours. And to seal this, I will now, in bidding you farewell, affectionately embrace you and give you a sister's kiss. Your lips, my faithful friend, shall restore the purity of mine, which yesterday were desecrated by a scoundrel." With these words, she embraced me, and for one brief, blissful moment her warm lips pressed mine in a pure and tender caress. Then, with a low "Farewell, my friend," she gently pushed me out of the door. The next morning, when I woke from sorrowful dreams, and was hurriedly dressing, some one knocked at my door. Kunigunde entered and, with many tears, told me that her mistress had driven away at dawn in a hired carriage, telling nobody her destination, and leaving for me a farewell and a little package. It was a sealed paper. When I opened it, out fell the gold chain on which she used to wear around her neck the locket containing her mother's picture. |
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