IT was Christmas Eve. The snow was whirling in dense masses outside, and the wind was so strong that it swept one side of the street quite clean, and piled up whole mountains of snow across the way. Through all the windows there gleamed the bright light of the merry Christmas trees, and the voices of hundreds of happy children were heard. Alone and softly Sorrow crept along in the snowstorm. She turned her eyes neither to right nor left, that she might throw no shadow over these Christmas gayeties; she was making for a house where there was no joy to destroy. She passed two children—a girl in thin outgrown clothes, and a little boy who wanted to see all the lovely things that were inside the houses. His sister raised him up with all her strength, so that he could grapple hold of the window-sill, and with enchantment he looked at all the wonders within. But lifting her arms had made her poor old dress crack, and a sleeve came out of its seam. A tear ran down her face; it froze on her cheek. Sorrow stroked her head with her hand.

"I was coming to you," she said; "how go things at home?"

The girl shrugged her shoulders.

The little one coughs and can barely breathe, and the older sister says the pains in her legs are so bad with this wind.

"Won't you come home with me?"

"Oh no," said the boy, "it is so beautiful in there, so bright. Do you hear how they laugh?"

Sorrow did not look up but went further, and did not notice that Envy was creeping behind her, with his thin lips and sharp nose and squinting eyes. He came up to the children and whispered to them—

"Yes, it is beautiful in the homes of the rich, is it not? What have you got, you poor things? Is it not Christmas too for you?"

"Hu, how cold it is!" the boy said suddenly. "Come, it is no longer pretty here."

And they ran home.

As they opened the door a haggard woman called out sharp and impatiently—

"Quick, shut the door, or all the snow will come in."

They cowered into a corner behind the hearth; the woman walked up and down, carrying a child in her arms that coughed and choked and gasped for air. In the only bed lay a feverish girl, emaciated, with unkempt hair and large restless eyes. Sorrow sat on the edge of the couch and held her hand; the girl talked incessantly, softly and quickly—

"You see it is Christmas, once that was so beautiful, when things still went well with us. Then we always had a tree and apples and gingerbread, and I had a doll that had clothes like a princess. I liked sewing them for my dolly; I don't like it now for other people."

She smiled.

"What a pity you can't see the little dress I made for this evening, white and red, with cords and pink bows."

Then the crack of the door opened and Envy pushed himself in softly, invisibly. It grew markedly colder in the room. The mother's face became gloomy, the feverish girl more restless.

"Oh," she cried, impatiently, "always sewing, always sewing. Why do the others, who were poor, drive about in fine carriages, and wear soft clothes and laugh so merrily! If they are wicked, well, then it must be nice to be wicked. What does my labor bring me?—hunger and pain!"

The mother did not hear her daughter's rapid words, for the child in her arms was wrestling with death. Outside the wind howled. The two other children had fallen asleep in their corner, hungry and exhausted, and in their dreams Envy had no more power over them, and they only saw the beautiful Christmas tree shimmering. It was a long night in which the lamp of life flickered up and down in that little house, and a young soul fought at the hand of Sorrow the fight for life and death.

Towards morning the wrestling of both was ended. The child lay dead in its mother's lap, the young girl slumbered restlessly. The storm was over. The glittering snow lay piled up high, looking blue in the shadows of the houses, and softly tinted with red where the rising sun met it. Then the bells began to peal for merry Christmas. That woke the two children, who stared aghast at the little corpse. The young girl raised herself, and saw that her mother wept, but from her eyes there came no tears—she envied the dead child its rest.

A merry sound of sledge bells sounded, and like a lovely dream two beautiful young girls flew past in a sledge, wrapped snugly in rich furs. Their cheeks and eyes sparkled with joy in the beautiful sunshine. It passed like lightning, this vision, but all in the little house were dazzled by it. The sick girl drew her thin hands through her black hair, the poor woman bit her teeth together, and the two children said—

"Mother, were those angels?"

"No," she uttered harshly; "they were human beings like ourselves, only rich and happy, who are not hungry, and have warm clothes."

Sorrow touched her arm—

"If you desire it, I will bring them here, into your home; but at one price—they will suffer pain and misery, and their joy will vanish. Do you want that?"

"Yes," said the woman, "I do. Why should not they watch and weep as we do?"

Sorrow sighed.

"Shall I fetch them?" she asked once again.

"Go, go; do you not see that my children starve? What do other people's children concern me?"

Sorrow neared the young girl's bed.

"Farewell for the present," she said; "be brave and reasonable, and take care of yourself, that I may not have to come to you again to punish."

She kissed the children. "I send you the angels and a good Christmas, have patience."

Then she softly lifted the door latch and was gone. Envy slid after her; and in her place, on the first sunbeam that smote the rows of houses, Hope floated into the room and made it light. Mother and children looked out expectantly. The girl pushed back her hair from her brow, and the bad thoughts retreated.

Sorrow paced so lightly across the snow that she scarcely left a trace, as though she were borne by the sharp east wind, whose pungent tongue mocked the fine winter morning. She went through the most aristocratic streets, and vanished into one of the stateliest houses; entering so softly that no one noticed her, not even the servants, who were stretching themselves on red cushioned divans in the entrance hall; not even the parrot that always cried, "Canaille! Canaille!" and made a wise face. She went up the broad stairs, where everything was perfumed of fir-trees, straight towards a high door, whence the laughter of youthful voices resounded. Unnoticed she stood in the high large room through whose many windows the sun streamed, touching the white-covered, long tables, on which still lay all the presents given the night before. At one end of the room stood three tall fir-trees, their branches bent under a gay weight, and round about the room some thirty smaller ones. The six huge chandeliers were encircled with garlands of fir and chains of glass balls, and from one to the other hung rows of colored paper lamps. It must have looked quite fairy-like in the evening with all the candles alight. Amidst this glory two tall slim, supple figures, in dark, close-fitting, cloth dresses, were playing battledore and shuttlecock. Every movement was of rare grace, and the delicate profiles with the dark arched eyebrows, stood out well against the somber firs. The gold brown hair of the one hung in voluptuous waves over her shoulders, only held together by a ribbon; a weight of fair plaits hung down the neck of the other. Their heads thrown backwards revealed faultlessly set necks and laughing rows of pearly teeth. It was a sight for gods, and the young man who looked on thought so, as he sat in Olympian calm carelessly reading in an armchair, dressed in an elegant morning suit, a cigarette in his ring-covered hand. From time to time, in a powerful baritone, he hummed some rather frivolous songs that each time drew down on him a storm of laughing reproaches.

"I beg my stern cousins to remark," he said, "that the ball has now fallen fourteen times to the ground, and that I consequently regret that my proposal was negatived that each such miss should be punished with a kiss."

The girls laughed, but suddenly they noticed Sorrow, who looked on seriously at their merriment, like a distant hail-cloud at a harvest home.

"Who are you?" both girls asked at once, approaching their strange guest.

Sorrow would fain have cast down her eyes that she might not look at the three young heads in that room; but she saw them, and felt herself spell-bound. She looked at all three, and then said in her soft, deep tones—

"I have just come from a house where since yesterday no one has eaten, where this night a child has died, and a girl lies sick in bed; two other children I found out in the snowstorm as they were admiring a Christmas tree. Can you not help?"

"Yes, yes, at once," cried the one with the gold brown locks. "Albert, be so good as to order the sledge. Cara, do you run to mother and ask her for money. I will get food and clothes."

With all imaginable speed every thing was got ready. After a brief half-hour the sledge stood before the door laden with wood and baskets, and one of the Christmas trees. There was barely room for the three young people to squeeze in. The mother, a stately, elegant woman, with wise eyes, restrained the eldest girl, Doris, for a second, to say something to her very earnestly, upon which she kissed both her hands. Then she, too, flew downstairs after the others, and as fast as the wind they trotted to the house of the poor people.

"Mother, the angels have come," cried the children.

They got out and brought in the tree. Cara knelt down by the hearth and made a fire, and Doris placed the tree by the bedside of the sufferer, darkened the room and lighted it. She gave the children bread and cake, and then the two lovely girls stood by the sick girl's bedside and sang a Christmas carol. The little boy, with folded hands, looked now at the lights, now at the angels, and large tears rolled over his pale face. Albert did not quite know what to do with himself; but now that the two girls helped the mother to warm some soup and cut up meat for the children, he neared the bed, and looked with scrutiny into the black eyes that glowed and reflected with uncanny fire the lights of the Christmas tree.

"What is your name?" he asked kindly with his pleasant voice.

The girl looked at him long and earnestly; she felt the gaze of his beautiful blue eyes burn into her heart. Then she grew red, cast down her eyes, and said: "Lotty."

Soon an animated conversation sprang up between the two. Albert took out his pocket-book, wrote a few lines, and sent off the servant with orders to bring the doctor back in the sledge. They would wait till he came. Doris's eyes rested for an instant on her cousin, who had seated himself on the edge of the bed and talked eagerly to Lotty. Scarcely was the sledge gone than she said—

"There, that will do for to-day; I will walk home. We will come again in a few days, till then you have provision."

And so speaking she walked out of the house, regardless of her cousin's remonstrances.

Next day all looked bright and cheerful in the little room, but grief and pain had entered the palace. Cara had fallen on the ice while skating, and lay in bed maimed in all her limbs, and suffering keenly. Her snow-white hands lay quiescent beside her plaits upon the coverlet. Her father patted them, and the tears ran down his cheeks. Then Cara smiled, but her eyes looked out dim and deep from their hollows, and round her lips there quivered a suppressed sigh. Wearily she dragged on her life for weeks and weeks; but if any one asked Cara how she was, she would always answer kindly—

"I think I am much better."

But pain had pinched her face and emaciated her body, and her hands and feet remained paralyzed. Her only recreation were Albert's visits. He told her all manner of things, and sang her merry songs. Doris grew pale and thin with continued nursing, so that at last her mother had to force her to go out. She bethought her of Lotty, and went to call on her. How amazed was she to find the little house transformed, and Lotty changed more than all! Graceful, rounded in all her limbs, she stepped towards her, and the slight limp that remained from her illness only gave her an added grace. Her eyes had learned to laugh, and her whole being had gained something attractive and bright.

"But, Lotty, how well you look! I was afraid you would think we had forgotten you."

"How could I think that," said Lotty, "when your brother always came to see us!"

"He is not my brother," Doris said shortly, and grew scarlet.

Then ensued an awkward silence, interrupted by Doris, who asked to see the children's school-books, which, superintended by Lotty, bore inspection well. They had gained good instruction in the time that had passed.

A few days after Albert went away on a journey. It was a hard parting for the two girls. At the last he kissed Doris's hand, and looked at her earnestly, deep down into her eyes. They filled with large tears. She wanted to say something more, but could not bring forth a sound.

"I shall come back in the summer," he said, and was gone.

Lotty was soon so well that she could walk and call on Cara, who was so pleased to see her that she did not want to let her go. So she was engaged as companion and nurse for Cara, and soon grew indispensable to her.

In the spring the family moved to their castle in the country, where the poor invalid could lie all day under tall trees. Albert soon came there too, and Doris took long rides with him through the park, or they sat for hours chatting with Cara. Yet he always found time and opportunity to see Lotty alone. At first she was distant with him, but with his heart-winning ways he soon recovered the empire he had had in the little house in the town; and she was happy when he said that the parents insisted on marrying Doris to him, but that he did not think of it for she did not please him at all. Cara noticed that there was something amiss with her Lotty, but she never dreamed what a fight the girl was fighting with her heart, that impetuously demanded love and happiness, and her conscience that recalled to her her duties and strove to calm her.

Doris guessed nothing. She was entirely absorbed in the joy of having her adored Albert beside her.

Albert really loved Lotty, but he did not want to lose the rich marriage with Doris; so he was full of little delicate attentions to her, which in quiet hours were counted up and talked over with Cara. Lotty knew herself to be beloved, therefore her jealousy of Doris knew no bounds. Every kind look, every unconscious little joke of Doris's was gall and wormwood to her. She had to help Doris adorn herself, and see how she looked into the glass with beaming eyes, certain of victory, full of hope. She had to suffer that her adored Cara did all to make her sister appear in the best light to Albert. Many an evening in the park there ensued angry scenes in which Lotty broke forth into wild reproaches, and Albert made passionate love protestations. Lotty was proud; she would be his wife, and at last he promised her that he would marry her as soon as he had found a post that insured enough for them both. He was soon to go abroad to join an embassy.

Lotty demanded that he should say openly at the house that he meant to marry her, but this she could not attain.

Once more Lotty thought—

"If only I were rich, like the others."

Many a long night she tossed about her black locks on the pillow, and next day her eyes glowed like coals, so that Albert grew almost afraid, and feared she might make things uncomfortable for him. He hurried forward his parting preparations. On the last evening he was in the park with Doris, and began to speak to her of his future, and that he should come back a made man. Then he would woo her, and he hoped he should not be refused. At the last he put a bracelet round her wrist, encircled her with his arm and pressed a kiss on her lips. Doris flushed all over, ran off to Cara, fell on her knees beside the bed, kissed her hands, her hair, her eyes, and was so wildly happy that it grew almost too much for the poor invalid. When Albert wanted to leave the park Lotty stood before him and looked at him so sphinx-like that he grew afraid. He hoped she had heard nothing, and took a step forward. But she struck him in the face with her fist. Then she vanished. She ran as fast as she could into her room, and raved all night long, bit her pillow, and thought to die of rage and despair.

Albert, who slept little, could not see Lotty again and extort from her a promise of silence. Twice he knocked at her door, but she kept quiet till he had gone and then she muttered curses after him. Next morning he departed without having seen her. Doris waved her hand after him long, long after he was out of sight, and wept blissful tears. But Cara was alarmed when she saw Lotty. A complete alteration had come to her face; it was as though something had snapped. She had to endure hearing Albert talked of incessantly. Towards Doris she felt a veritable hatred.

At first there came letters from Albert, but they grew rarer and briefer. After a year there came none. Doris had been radiantly happy some time and developed to rare beauty. At her side Hope stood shimmering, rosy, like peach blossoms. By Cara's bed sat Mother Patience, invisible to all, and transfigured the pale face with her calm presence. Beside Lotty strode Envy and Hate, and tugged at her with all their might night and day. In the second year Hope vanished from beside Doris; in the third, the girl crept wearily through the house as though each step were leaden. Lotty revived; yes, Doris even noted that when Lotty combed her hair she could see in the glass how her black eyes sparkled maliciously, and seemed to search her weary face. Doris's parents grew old and gray during these years of waiting. Albert's name was never breathed, it was as though he was blotted out of all their memories, and yet all thought only of him.

One morning Doris was sitting at breakfast with her parents. Cara was still in bed, she was never carried down till later in the day. The father read out of his paper, his wife rested her chin on her slender fingers. Countless fine lines had become graven into her face, Care was her daily guest; yet she looked kindly from under her gray hairs and her elegant cap. Secretly her glance sought the face of her daughter, who had leaned back wearily in her chair, toying with a flower and gazing out vacantly into space.

Sometimes she would look out of the window, and watch with heavy eyelids the falling of the faded autumn leaves, which sank to earth in the thick mist. A fire burnt in the chimney; it was the only lively thing in the room. Then a letter was brought in and given to Doris's father. He twirled it between his fingers and looked at the address and seal. Doris had glanced up indifferently. Suddenly every muscle of her face trembled, and she rested large, flashing eyes upon her father, her nostrils quivered, and her breath came short and fast.

"Oh, father, read, read quickly!"

He read long, long, without speaking one word. At last he folded up the letter. Doris's torture was at an end, she was near to faint.

"Albert is coming," he said gravely, and would have gone on speaking, but from Doris's breast there came a cry of mingled joy and sobbing. She sprang up, embraced her mother and rushed out of the room and up the stairs to Cara.

"Cara, he is coming, is coming," she cried, and covered her sister with kisses.

Lotty rushed to the bedside; it was as though a fallen angel looked at the happy girl. At last harshly and roughly she muttered—

"Who knows what he has become."

Doris felt the poisoned dart, but before she could answer her mother called her down. As she entered the room she saw her father pacing up and down restlessly. He did not notice her. Her mother sat in a little armchair beside the fire, staring into the embers. Doris noticed every thing at a glance. It was as though something heavy and cold fell upon her heart.

"Come here, dear child," said her mother; "kneel down here, I have something to say to you. You have always trusted us, have you not, my child? You always believed that we have felt your sufferings too, and have felt them the more that we could not help you?"

Doris could not speak, she kissed her mother's hand and looked at her again with large, glowing eyes.

"If, then, I tell you that Albert is not worthy of you, my child will believe it, will she not? He has not kept good; it is said he has gambled away his fortune, and we should not like him to ask the hand of our daughter merely in order to pay his debts. I know you will be proud and meet him as it becomes your maidenly dignity. You will let him see nothing of your soul's combat and woe, but meet him as he deserves."

"When will he come?" said Doris, curtly. Her voice was hard.

"In a few days; we cannot forbid him the house for his mother's sake. I count on you, my child."

Doris's eyes flashed. She raised herself and stood her full height; she seemed to have grown, and looked defiant, ready for fight. Without a word she went outside into the mist. She paced the park for hours, heedless of the paths and ways; she painted to her mind that meeting, how cold and proud she would be. She snapped off the twigs as she passed, and crunched them with her white teeth. It seemed to her as though she never could go home, as though she must thus rove the wood for ever. When she came back to the house at last, her hair, dress, and eyebrows were covered with glistening drops. She looked into the glass that reflected her hard-drawn face.

"The wood," she said, "has had pity on me; those are its tears."

She could not make up her mind to go in to Cara; she felt as though she could not bear her affection. Cara wept in her father's arms. He dried the tears she was shedding for her sister, and spoke to her tenderly. Lotty clenched her fists.

"She shall not have him as long as I live."

Henceforward Doris went often into the wood, especially along the path beside the old willow-trees. The sun still shone warmly there, and that did good to Doris, who could not get rid of a feeling of cold. Once she leaned exhausted against a mighty trunk; she had laid her hand upon her aching heart, and closed her eyes. Suddenly she heard a voice close by her, whose tone made her shrink together as a flower does in spring rain—

"Doris."

And there stood Albert, with the same lovely eyes, the same charm of movement, and yet how changed. He held out his hand towards her. She laid her icy fingertips into his; but when she wanted to draw back her hand he retained it.

"Am I to be condemned unheard?" he asked gently, and smiled so sweetly that Doris could not be as distant and cold as she had resolved.

He did not wait for an answer, but spoke eagerly and earnestly, accused and defended himself at the same time, reminded her of their sweet love that could not possibly be vanished and fled; ay, he read it in her face that she had thought of him, while poor Doris, now red, now pale, could merely look at him. When he turned to go to the house and greet his aunt, she remained outside, for an awkward friend, Conscience, told her that she had not been all that her parents expected.

They did not repeat their injunction, and the meetings in the park grew more and more frequent; a correspondence even ensued that was intrusted to a hollow willow. Doris's mother noticed a strange, wild look in the girl's eyes, but she put this down to the struggle her child was undergoing.

Often Doris would have opened her lips to confess, but always closed them again. Daily she grew more irritable, spoke in hollow tones, and laughed at every thing. Lotty knew exactly all that went on. She bided her time, ready to spring like a cat whenever the hour should be ripe. One day Doris could not get out, and so begged Lotty, in a seemingly indifferent tone, to carry a letter to the tree. Lotty held the letter between her fingers and looked now at it, now at Doris.

"Well," said Doris, sharply, but without looking up, "is it inconvenient to you?"

"No," said Lotty, carelessly, went towards the door, and then came back beside Doris.

"I shall only carry that letter," she said, "after I have told you what manner of man your lover is."

Lotty looked so fierce that Doris shuddered.

"He loved me, me, long before he loved you: me he has kissed many hundred times in this very park ere ever he gave you the one that made you so happy; me he promised to wed. It is me he called his dear heart, his love, all the soft names he has called you; and on the evening you were betrothed to him, I hit him in his face, and now he is so vile that no decent girl would wish to have him; and you, you carry on a secret love affair with him."

Doris grew giddy; but before she had taken in the full sense of these words, Lotty had left the room and did not re-appear.

The following evening, when Lotty had just got into bed, Doris stood before her like a ghost. She shook her arms and said—

"Come!"

She followed Doris into her room. The girl shut and locked the door, and pocketed the key.

"Now tell it me all again," she said, speaking with effort.

Lotty no longer felt the satisfaction she had experienced that first moment. She was ashamed of her weakness, and told her tale with hesitation and with reserve. While she did so she had ever to look at Doris, who grew momentarily more haggard, and who bent herself twice, thrice; whether in physical or mental pain Lotty did not know. Suppressing a low moan, she drew a small roll of paper from her pocket, and smiled with trembling lips.

"You have avenged yourself on me; now is your turn with him; you owe me this, for you should have spared me this agony. To-morrow morning you go to town and give him this; you yourself must give it to him; I demand it."

Scarcely had Doris uttered these words than she began to moan piteously, and now followed a night during which Lotty was terrified by the sufferings of her young mistress. Constantly she tried to get the key and call the family; Doris would not let her.

"No," she said; "we two must pass this night alone together."

Only when consciousness began to leave her, Lotty succeeded in wrenching the key from her clenched hands. She called up the parents, who arrived but in time to receive their daughter's last breath. She opened her eyes once again, knew her mother, kissed each of her fingertips and whispered—

"Farewell, mother; farewell, forgive me."

Then a last terrible spasm shook her, and when the sun rose she was a corpse. While the parents were with Cara, trying to break the news gently to the poor invalid, Lotty slipped away into her own room. There she unrolled the paper and read—

"Could I have believed in you, I should have lived.—Doris."

Then she set out for the town and sought out Albert, who was still in bed sleeping restlessly. Lotty looked at him long and severely. Her gaze was so savage that a feeling of fear shot through him and woke him. He started up.

"What is it?" he cried aghast.

Lotty handed him the paper without speaking a word, and before he had unfolded it she had gone.

He threw on his clothes and hurried after her, but he could not find her. He ran about all day: he hovered round the castle, he chased through the park. He looked as though the Furies pursued him. At last he went home, sat down to his desk, and began to turn over a pile of dirty papers. Great drops stood on his brow. In the evening he went to see a friend, and gambled the whole night. In a short time he had won large sums, but then a few days after he lost them all again, those and much more besides. One morning he tottered into his room, loaded a pistol and shot himself.

Lotty got home unnoticed as she had gone out; but as she entered Sorrow stood in front of her, and her eyes were so terrible that Lotty fell down before her on the earth and covered her face with her hands. But when Sorrow began to speak, Lotty was seized with trembling at the stern words that fell upon her like hammer blows; she writhed on the ground like a worm, but Sorrow was inexorable.

"You have done your work well," she said; "you have avenged yourself. But on whom? On those who have done you kindness from the first hour when they raised you out of misery and wretchedness, those to whom you owe all—your life, your health—who have treated you as a child and a sister. They were happy before I brought them to your house, and what are they now? I know you want to throw yourself into the water, but I will not suffer it, for you need a whole long life to make good the thoughts that have poisoned your youth. You must give up your whole strength to poor Cara, beside whose bed you will yet often see me, and take care that you need not tremble before my face, as you must to-day. Cara needs you, for her parents are broken down, and only through boundless self-sacrifice may you dare to hope for forgiveness. As yet I cannot accord it."

Once more it was Christmas Eve. A beautiful tree was alight in the little house. Lotty had brought it there in Cara's name. The children had red cheeks and shouted joyously. The mother too had grown to look younger and smiled often. Only Lotty was pale as death and dark as remorse.

"Here my mother looks at me," she thought; "and thinks Lotty has grown bad; and there Doris's mother looks at me and thinks, 'Had you but called me we could have saved the child.' Oh that I had starved to death!"

In the castle a shaded lamp burnt beside Cara's bed. Her father was reading to her with weary voice, the mother sat by, stroked the girl's hands, and dried the heavy, slow-falling tears that rolled down her child's face with a soft handkerchief. Cara had not spoken all the evening. Only once she asked—

"Is not this Christmas Eve?"

[Pg 187-188]