Kitabı oku: «Edelweiss: A Story», sayfa 17

"I reached home.

"The mountains seemed to be rising and running to meet me, as I entered the valley.

"I drove through the different villages. There was where such and such a one lived; I could not think of the names till I had passed. The road was broader and more convenient than it used to be, and followed the valley instead of going over the Woltending mountain. I was in a strange land and yet at home. Mountains that used to be thickly wooded were now as bare as a Turk's head. There had been a terrible sacrifice of trees. I entered the village on a beautiful summer evening at haying-time, just as the bells were ringing. They seemed voices not of this world. I had heard many bells in the forty-two years I was abroad, but none like these. Involuntarily I took off my hat; it was so good, so heavenly to feel my native air blowing about my head! I know not what echo it woke within me. The gray hairs on my head seemed growing young again. Most of the persons I met on the way were strangers to me. You, doctor, I recognized from your resemblance to your father. No one knew me. I drew up at the 'Golden Lion' and inquired if Lorenz Lenz of the Morgenhalde was at home. At home? He had been dead these seven years. A thunderbolt falling at my feet could not have more confounded me. Fortunately I recovered myself before my agitation was observed.

"I went up to my room, and late at night walked through the village, meeting many familiar objects that convinced me I was once more at home. All was still about my parents' house. The pine trees at the back of it, that were hardly twice as tall as I when I left home, were now giants, ready to be cut down. I half resolved to depart before day. What should I do here? It would be easy to go, for no one had recognized me.

"But I did not depart.

"Persons came to me from all quarters, and offered me their hands-to be filled. But, doctor, I once to kill time fed the sparrows on my window-sill, and from that day the importunate beggars are possessed to come here every morning, and distract me with their noise; there is no frightening them away. It is easy to acquire habits, but hard to break them up. I stopped asking about anybody, for I heard of nothing but death and disaster, and a hundred times a day got a stab at my heart. Whoever came in my way was very well; who did not, was gone. All came to see me except my sister-in-law and her prince. 'My brother-in-law knows where his parents' house is,' she said. 'It is not for us to run after him.' The very first time I saw young Lenz, I conceived a dislike to him. He looked like none of us, but took after his mother's family. When I look round upon the village now, and the whole district, in fact, I am ready to tear my old hair out for having come home. Everything is stunted and lazy and spoiled. Where is the old light-heartedness, the old high spirit? Gone. The youths are good for nothing. Don't I have to pick the cherries before they are ripe to prevent the young trees from being broken? My musical nephew there cossets himself up in his room, while I, at his age, was out making my way in the world. I mind nothing; but he turns pale and sick at every rough wind and every rough word. There was a time when I hoped something from him, and thought he might still make my life happy. If he had married your daughter Amanda, the young people should have come to me, or I would have gone to them. My property would have come into your family, as it is right it should; for I am indebted to your father for the beginning of my good fortune, if good fortune it is. That cursed Pilgrim guessed my thoughts, and tried to make me a go-between. I would have nothing to do with it. I never give advice nor take it. Every man must work out his life in his own way. And this is the point I want to come at: that I won't give a red cent; rather would I throw my money into the fire. Now I have talked enough. I have made myself quite hot."

"How did the water of the spring by the church taste, that you had longed for so much?" asked the doctor.

"Bad; very bad. It is too cold and too hard. I cannot bear it."

With this for a text, the doctor undertook to reason Petrovitsch into a better way of thinking. He tried to convince him that the world had not changed for the worse any more than the spring of water; only his eyes and thoughts, as well as his palate, had lost their youth. He explained to him, that while he was perfectly right in strengthening his mental and bodily powers by contact with the outside world, yet domestic industry and economy required that many should stay at home, and be screwed, like their own vice, to the work-bench. He laid special stress on the delicacy, amounting almost to morbid sensitiveness, that accompanies a talent for music; at the same time pointing out to the old man the same soft-heartedness in himself that he censured in his nephew. He strongly urged upon him the necessity of extending a helping hand. But Petrovitsch had relapsed into his old obstinacy, and silenced the doctor by saying: "I keep to what I said before. I neither give advice nor take it. I shall take no steps in the matter. If you say another word, doctor, I will not answer for the consequences."

It was clear there was nothing further to be hoped for, and, as a message arrived at this moment from Ibrahim, Petrovitsch and the doctor left the house together. The doctor was obliged to draw his cloak close about him as he went up the Morgenhalde. It was blowing fiercely, though the wind was strangely warm.

CHAPTER XXXI.
ANNELE THAWS AND FREEZES AGAIN

While Lenz, in his great distress, was wandering about the world, Annele was visited at home. She was alone, wholly alone; for her husband had left no parting word behind. He had gone away moody and silent, without opening his lips. Pooh! Two words would have brought him back, she thought, and yet a strange fear oppressed her heart, and flushed her cheeks. She had never been used to the company of her own thoughts. In the constant bustle and stir in which her life had been spent, she had never sat down quietly to think. Now it was forced upon her. No matter what she turned her hand to, or how persistently she went about her household work, something was always following her, pulling at her gown, and whispering, "Hearken to me!"

Little William was sitting by the servant-maid, winding the yarn as fast as it was spun. The baby had been put to sleep, and as Annele sat by the child's bed an invisible power held her in her chair, and forced her to listen to the voice of her own thoughts: Annele, what change has come over you? The gay, handsome Annele, whom all loved and flattered, sitting here in a darkened chamber of a lonely house, having to delve and to save! – I would not mind that; I would do it gladly, if I were but honored in the household. But nothing I do or say suits him. What do I do that is wrong? Am I not frugal and industrious, willing to work even more than I do? But this place is like a grave. -

She started, trembling, from her seat. A dream she had had in the night came vividly to mind, – not a dream, this time, of merry parties or flattering guests, but of her own open grave. She had stood beside it, and distinctly seen the little clods of earth rolling down into the pit that had been dug for her. She screamed aloud and stood as one paralyzed.

With an effort she recovered herself; all the life within her cried: "I will not die, not yet; for I have not yet lived, either at home or here."

She wept in deep compassion with herself as her thoughts travelled back over the years that were gone. She had imagined life would be so happy alone with the man she loved, far away from the world; from the publicity that had grown irksome to her, and the undefined feeling of insecurity that had begun to poison her enjoyment of the profusion about her. It was her husband's fault that she longed now for a wider field in which to use her wasted powers. He was like his own clocks, that play their little tunes, but hear nothing beyond. The comparison made her laugh in the midst of her wretchedness.

She would gladly have yielded obedience to one who showed himself a master among men, but not to a miserable sticker of pins.

Yet you knew who and what he was, whispered something in her heart.

Yes, but not like this, not like this, she answered.

Has he not a good heart?

Towards every one but me. No one who has not lived with him knows his many whims, his frightful bursts of passion. This clock-making is fatal; we must try another mode of life.

This was the point to which Annele's thoughts always reverted. If she could only be a landlady at the head of the first establishment in the country; could only be earning some money and have some communication with the world, happy days would come again.

She went to the glass and rearranged her dress. She could never go about in any slatternly fashion; no slippers for her, though Lenz often did not draw on his boots from one Sunday to another. For the first time for many months she dressed her hair in its triple crown of braids, and her proud glance as she stood before her glass said plainly: I am Annele of the Lion; I have no idea of pining away for any man. I have harnessed afresh, and he must drive with me. Our two strongest horses are put to the carriage. She snapped with her tongue, and raised her right hand as if brandishing a whip over the horses' heads.

"Is your mistress at home?" asked a voice without.

"Yes."

There was a knock, and, to Annele's great surprise, the minister entered.

"Welcome, sir," said Annele, courtesying; "did you wish to see me or my husband?"

"I came to see you, knowing your husband was absent. I have not seen you in the village since your parents' misfortune, and thought I might perhaps be of some service to you in your trial."

Annele breathed more freely. She had feared her visitor might have been sent by Lenz, or had come to speak with her about Lenz.

She spoke with sorrow of the fate of her parents; her mother, she feared, would not long survive the shock.

The minister talked with her kindly and seriously, urging her to be resigned to what had happened, whether merited or unmerited, and not to let distress and anger tempt her to shut herself from the world. He reminded her of the one honor that he had spoken of at her marriage; he spoke pleasantly of her father, whose misfortune was due to a miscalculation on his part, not to any intentional dishonesty.

"I have not forgotten your wedding day," pursued the minister, giving a slight turn to the conversation, "and wished to bid you good morning on this fifth anniversary of it."

Annele smiled and thanked him; but the thought struck to her heart that Lenz had gone away without bidding her good morning. With a return of her old fluency she expressed her pleasure at the honor her minister paid her; spoke of his great goodness, and of the daily prayers the whole village ought to offer up to Heaven for his life and health. She evidently was bent upon keeping the conversation away from her own affairs. She would allow no approach, on the minister's part, to the subject of her domestic difficulties. Under the influence of that determination she drew in her breath and moistened her lips, as the postilion Gregory might when he was about to blow one of his elaborate pieces on the horn.

The minister understood it all. He began by praising Annele for her many good qualities, – for her neatness and careful management in her parents' house, and her keeping her purity unharmed by the temptations which assailed her there.

"I have long been unaccustomed to praise," answered Annele. "I had almost forgotten I was ever of account in the world."

The minister saw his bait was taking. As a physician wins the confidence of his patient by describing to him all his aches and pains, till the sick man looks up joyfully and says, "the doctor knows my whole case; he will surely help me," so the minister described to Annele all her mental sufferings, and wound up with saying: "You have often seen blood flow from a wound, from a blow or a bruise, and know how the black blood gradually takes on all the seven colors. So it is with the soul's wounds. An injury, an offence, like that black blood gradually takes on all the colors, – hate, contempt, anger, self-pity, pain at the wrong, a desire to return evil for evil, and again to let all go to wreck and ruin."

It seemed to Annele that she was holding her heart in her hand, and showing how it had been bruised and lacerated and beaten to pieces. The good-for-nothing barrelmaker, he would have his full deserts now! "O, help me, sir!" she cried.

"I will; but you must help yourself. You do not need to change your nature. Alas for you, if you did! I am old enough to know how easy that is to say, and how hard to do. You only need to shake off something foreign to yourself that has taken possession of you. There is goodness in you, only you have forgotten it, wilfully forgotten and ridiculed it, and prided yourself on your sharpness of tongue. Have done with all pride and ambition. Where is no oneness of heart is a continual wearing upon each other."

The little man's figure dilated, and his voice gathered strength as he laid bare before Annele her false pride and her hard-heartedness towards Franzl. Annele's eyes flashed at the mention of Franzl.

So the secret was out. It was she, the thievish, hypocritical old woman, who had brought this upon her, and turned all against her. No cat ever mangled a mouse with greater pleasure than Annele now pulled to pieces old Franzl.

"If I could but have her once in my clutches!" she snarled.

The minister waited till her fury had spent itself. "You make yourself out to be wicked and vindictive," he said; "but I still maintain you are not so at heart."

Then Annele cried to think she should be so sadly changed; it was not like her to be so angry. It was all because she had nothing to do; was not allowed to be earning anything. She was not made to keep house for a petty clockmaker; she was made to be a landlady. If the minister would only help her to be landlady, she promised he should never see another spark of anger or cruelty in her.

The minister admitted that she had all the requisite qualities for a landlady, and promised to do everything in his power to make her one; but implored her, as she kissed his hands in gratitude, not to trust for her improvement to any external circumstances.

"You are not yet subdued by your grief and humiliation. Your pride is your sin, the cause of unhappiness to you and yours. God forbid you should need the loss of husband or children to bring you to your better self!"

Annele's seat was opposite the mirror, and as she caught the reflection of her face in the glass there seemed to be a cobweb floating before it. She passed her hand several times across her face.

The minister got up to go, but Annele begged him to sit with her a little longer; she could think better when he was by.

The two sat in silence. No sound was heard except the ticking of the clocks. Annele's lips moved, but no voice came from them. She kissed his hand devoutly when he at last departed, and he said: "If you feel yourself worthy, if your heart is softened, really softened, come to the communion to-morrow. God bless you!"

She wished to accompany him part of the way. "No courtesies now," he said; "be first pure and humble in heart. Judge not, that ye be not judged, says the Saviour. Judge yourself; look into your own heart. Accustom yourself to sit quiet and think."

Annele remained sitting where the minister had left her. She found it hard, for sitting with her hands before her and thinking was not her habit. She forced herself to it now. One sentence of the minister's kept ringing in her ears: "You have often good and pure thoughts, – thoughts of penitence; but they visit you as guests, drink their glass, and are gone. You put the chairs in place again, wipe off the table, and all is as if they had not been."

Annele reflected upon it and acknowledged it was true.

She could be hard upon herself as well as upon others. Why have you thus misused your life? she asked herself.

The child woke up and cried. "The minister has no children; it is very well for him to tell me to sit and think, but I must quiet my child."

She took the little girl out of bed and fondled her more tenderly than usual. The child helped to drive away her solitary thoughts.

She suddenly remembered the tune that Lenz had played the first time she was at the house, and she sang her baby to sleep by it now: "Love it is the tender blossom." She still sang on after the child was asleep and lying quiet in her arms, and as she sang the words she thought: Whom have I ever loved? whom? – I wanted to marry the landlord's son and the engineer in order to have a good position; but as for loving any man with my whole heart, I never did. And my husband? I married him because one of the doctor's daughters would have taken him, and because I wanted to get away from home, and because he was good-tempered and everybody spoke well of him.

Annele started as the child turned in her sleep. She quieted her again, but felt uneasy at being thus alone with her thoughts. There seemed ghosts lurking in all the corners, even in broad daylight. If only some one were here to cheer me up! Come, Lenz; come home! Be kind, and all will go well. We need no priest to help us; we can help ourselves. We are helped; I love you.

It was noon, and the sun was shining warm out of doors. Annele wrapped the child carefully up and carried it out in front of the house. Perhaps Lenz was on his way home; she would give him a cordial greeting, bid him the good morning he had forgotten to say, and tell him all should henceforth be peace between them. At this hour, five years ago, they had been married, and now they would be married again.

The figure of a man, still too far off to be recognized, was seen coming up the hill. "Call father!" she said to the child.

"Father! father!" the little thing cried.

The man came nearer. It was not Lenz, but Faller, hurrying up with an extra hat in his hand. "Is Lenz at home yet?"

"No."

"Good Heavens! this is his hat. My brother-in-law picked it up in the gully where he was cutting wood. If Lenz should have done himself any violence!"

Annele's knees shook; she pressed the child to her till it cried. "You are mad, and want to make me mad!" she exclaimed. "What do you mean?"

"Is that not his hat?"

"Good Heavens, it is!" she shrieked, and fell to the ground with the child.

Faller raised them both.

"Has he been found? dead?" asked Annele.

"No, thank Heaven! Come into the house. Let me take the child. Be calm, he has only lost his hat."

Annele staggered into the house, waving her hands before her face to brush away the mist that dimmed her sight. Was it possible? Lenz dead now, – now, when her heart had opened to him? It cannot be, it is not so. "Why should my Lenz kill himself?" she asked as she sank upon a seat. "What do you mean by it?"

Faller made no answer.

"Can you only talk when you are not wanted to?" she asked angrily. "Sit down, sit down, and tell me what has happened."

As if he could punish Annele by not doing her bidding, Faller remained standing, though his knees shook under him. The look he turned upon her was so full of sorrow and bitter upbraidings, that her eyes fell beneath it. "How can I sit in your house?" he said at last. "You have taken the comfort out of every chair."

"I do not need your admonitions. I told you that long ago. If you know anything of my husband, tell it. Has he been found dead? where? Speak, you-"

"No, thank Heaven. God forbid! The shingle-maker from Knuslingen, Franzl's brother, reported him as having been with Franzl, and she lives almost two leagues beyond the place where his hat was picked up."

Annele breathed more freely. "Why did you frighten me so?" she asked again.

"Frighten you? Can you still be frightened?"

Faller told how Lenz had been everywhere, trying to borrow money to pay the security on his house, and added that that need burden him no longer, as Don Bastian had just advanced the required amount.

Annele drew herself up as he spoke. The old spirit of wrath and bitterness rose again within her, mightier, more vengeful than ever. He has deceived you, he has lied to you, her every feature said. He lives, he must live to atone for it. He told you he had withdrawn his security. Come home, you liar, you hypocrite! Annele went into her chamber, and Faller was obliged to depart without seeing her again. Gone was all sorrow, all contrition, all love. Lenz had deceived her, had told her a lie, and he should pay for it. Just like these good-natured milksops who, because they cannot stand up like men for their own rights, must be handled like a soft-shelled egg! Let me alone, and I will let you alone; refuse me nothing, and I will refuse you nothing, though you make me a beggar. Come home, you pitiful milksop!

Annele put no food on the fire, to be ready for her husband's return. A very different kind of cooking was going on.