Kitabı oku: «Edelweiss: A Story», sayfa 9

CHAPTER XVIII.
UNSPOKEN LOVE AND A BETROTHAL

Lenz was gone, Pilgrim sat long alone, gazing at the light and twirling his sandy beard. He was angry with himself. He had said everything, – too much, in fact, – and defeated his own ends. There was nothing to take back, all was true; but of what use had it been? He walked restlessly up and down his room, then sat down again and stared at the light. How strange life is! How few men work out the fate they were meant for! The young will not believe it. They scold their elders for grumbling, and then make botchery of their own lives. The world is all right; only we must not expect to have everything our own way.

There was a deep, hidden life in Pilgrim. Ten years ago he had gone abroad with a courage ready to conquer the world, and a silent happiness in his heart that needed the assurance of no pledge or spoken word. He loved Amanda, and the doctor's beautiful daughter had inclined to him like a princess; like a goddess she had stooped to him. During his holidays she let him help her in her garden work by copying the names of her foreign plants in his neatest hand from a book on the little wooden tallies which together they stuck into the ground to mark the different specimens. She was an angel of mercy to the poor forsaken boy, and even when he grew towards manhood he was frequently allowed to assist her. Always the same gentleness he found in her. Her every look was a blessing. When he passed the garden for the last time, on setting out upon his lonely journey, she shook hands with him over the garden fence, and said, "I have a whole album to remember you by in the little slips you wrote the foreign names on. If, where you are going, you find these foreign plants in their native soil, you must let them remind you of our garden and the household that is so fond of you. Good by, and come safe back!"

"Good by, and come safe back!" those words followed him over mountain and valley, over seas and through distant lands. The name of Amanda was shouted exultantly through many a foreign clime, and many an echo repeated "Amanda."

Pilgrim wanted to grow rich, to become a great artist, and win Amanda. He came home poor and in tatters. Many received him with cheap taunts, but she said, – she had grown taller and stronger, and her brown eyes beamed, – "Pilgrim, be thankful that you are at least strong and well, and never lose your cheerful courage." And he did keep his happy temper. He learned to love her as he loved the beautiful linden in his neighbor's garden or the stars in heaven. Not even to Amanda was his heart revealed by a word or a sign. Like those precious stones that are said to shine in the darkness like the sun did Pilgrim's secret love for Amanda illumine his life. Often he did not see her for weeks, and, when they met, his bearing was as calm as with a stranger. But he often wondered who would be her husband. For himself he would leave the world without her suspecting what she was to him, but she must be happy. Lenz was the only one whom he could have marry her. He would not grudge her to him, they were so worthy of each other. He would hold their children in his arms, and lavish all his store of songs and jests for their amusement. Now all that was changed, and Lenz stood, as he firmly believed, on the edge of an abyss.

Thus he sat long, gazing at the light. At last he extinguished it, saying, with a sigh and a sad shake of the head, "I could not help myself, neither can I help others."

Lenz, meanwhile, was on his way home. He walked slowly. He was so weary he had to sit awhile on a heap of stones by the roadside. All was dark when he came to the Lion inn. No star was to be seen. The heaven was overcast with clouds. He stood by the inn till the whole building seemed about to fall upon him.

When he reached home, Franzl was asleep. He waked her, that he might have some one to rejoice with him. Pilgrim had strewn all his joy with ashes.

Franzl was enchanted at the news he brought her, and made him smile by repeating for the hundredth time, in order to prove that she also knew but too well what love was, the story of her own "blighted love," as she called it. She always began with tears and ended with complaints, for both of which she had ample reason.

"How pleasant it was then at home, up there in the valley! He was our neighbor's son, good, and industrious, and handsome, – oh, far handsomer than any one nowadays, begging your pardon. But he-I hardly need mention his name, for every one knows it was Anton Striegler-he was bent upon going abroad, and he went abroad on business. There at the brook we said good by. 'Franzl,' he said, 'as long as that brook runs, my heart will be true to you. Keep yours true to me.' He had beautiful ways of talking, and he could write beautifully too. It is always so with those false men. I could not have believed it. I received seventeen letters from him during the first four years, – from France, from England, and from Spain. The letter from England cost in all a crown-piece; for Napoleon would allow no tea or coffee to come into our country, and so the letter, as our curate said, had to go by way of Constantinople through Austria, and, by the time it reached me, cost a whole crown-piece. Since that no letter has come. I waited fourteen years, and then learned that he had married a black woman in Spain. I would have nothing more to do with the base man, – the basest man that ever lived, – and I burned the beautiful letters, the lying letters that he had written me. My love went up the chimney in the smoke."

Franzl always concluded her story with the selfsame words. To-day she had had a good listener, – the best of listeners. He had but one fault, that of not hearing a word she said. His eyes were fixed on her and his thoughts on Annele. Out of gratitude Franzl came at last to speak of her. "I will tell Annele what you are. No one knows you as well as I do. In all your life you never harmed a child; and how good you have always been to me! Don't look so sorrowful. Be merry! I know, – ah, too well I know! – when so great happiness comes to us, we feel crushed under it. But, thank God! you are in earnest; you will stay quietly at home together and bid each other good morning and good night every day that God gives you. And now I must say good night, for it is late."

It was past midnight before Lenz went to bed, and then with a "Good night, Annele! good night, dear heart!" he fell asleep.

He awoke the next morning with a strange weight on his heart. He remembered he had dreamed, and in his dream he stood upon the high mountain ridge behind his house with one foot raised to step off into space.

"I never let a dream trouble me before," he said, and tried to forget it in admiration of his yesterday's gold coin, and of the still greater treasure he possessed in Annele's little shoes and first frock. They were holy relics, to be carefully preserved with those he had received from his mother.

A message came from the landlady that he was to be at the Lion at eleven o'clock. He put on his Sunday clothes and hastened to his uncle Petrovitsch's. After pulling the bell several times he was admitted and received by his uncle in no very amiable mood.

"What do you want so early?"

"Uncle, you are my father's brother-"

"To be sure I am, and when I went abroad I left everything to your father. All I now have I earned for myself."

"I have not come for money, but to ask you to fulfil the office of a father for me."

"How? What?"

"Uncle, Annele of the Lion and I love one another. Her mother knows it and sanctions it. Now I am to ask her of her father, according to the custom, and I want you to go with me as my father's brother."

"So?" said Petrovitsch, putting a lump of white sugar in his mouth and walking up and down the carpeted room.

"So?" he repeated as he faced about. "You will have an energetic wife, and I must say you have good courage. I should not have given you credit for having the courage to take such a wife."

"Courage! What do you mean by that?"

"No harm; but I would not have believed you had the presumption to take such a wife."

"Presumption? What presumption is there in it?"

Petrovitsch smiled, and made no answer.

"You know her, uncle. She is frugal and orderly and comes of an honest house."

"That is not my meaning. It is presumption in you to think that in your solitary house on the Morgenhalde you can make up to a girl who has spent the twenty-two years of her life in an inn for a room full of flattering guests. It is presumption to want to keep to yourself a woman who can manage a whole hotel full. A wise man does not choose a wife who would consume half his life were he to live as she would have him. It is no trifle to govern such a wife. You had better try to manage four wild horses from the coach-box."

"I do not want to govern her."

"I believe you. But you must either govern or be governed. I will do her the justice to say she is good-natured, – only, however, to those who flatter her or submit to her. She is the sole good one in the house. As for the two old people, they are hypocrites, each in his own way; the woman with much talking, the husband with little. When he speaks he gives it to be understood that every one of his words weighs a pound. You can weigh it if you like. You will find it exact, no atom short. When he puts his foot down to the ground, every step says, 'Here comes a man of honor.' When he takes a fork in his hand, 'So eats a man of honor,' it says. When he looks out of the window, he expects God in heaven to call down to him, 'Good morning, thou man of honor!' And for all that I would bet my head he is in debt for the fork in his hand and the creaking boots on his feet."

"I did not come to hear that, uncle."

"I suppose not."

"I only came to ask you, in all respect, if you would act as my father's representative, and go with me to urge my suit."

"I don't know why I should. You are of age. You did not seek my advice beforehand."

"Excuse me for having asked you."

"Certainly. Stop," he cried, as Lenz turned to go, "a word more." For the first time in his life he laid his hand on his nephew's shoulder. The touch sent a strange thrill through the young man, and still more did the words which Petrovitsch spoke in a voice of deep emotion: "I would not have lived in vain for my own flesh and blood. I will give you that which many a man would have laid down his life to have had before it was too late. Lenz, a man must not drink when he is heated; – he might drink his death. Whoever should strike the glass from his hand at such a moment would be doing him good service. But a man may be heated in other ways, and then he should drink nothing-should do nothing, I mean-which will affect his whole life. He might contract a disease which would be a lingering death to him. You ought not to decide on any marriage yet, even if it were not with Annele. You are heated, excited. Let your present fever pass off, and six months from now think of this matter again. I will make your excuses to the landlord. He and all of them may abuse me as much as they please; it won't hurt me. Will you follow my advice, and give the thing up? You are drinking in a malady that no doctor can cure."

"I am betrothed. There is no use in further words," answered Lenz.

The cold sweat stood upon his brow as he left his uncle's house.

"That is the way with these old bachelors. Their hearts have turned to stone. Pilgrim and my uncle, they are just alike. Much they know about it! Here Pilgrim says no one of them is good for anything except the father, and my uncle says no one is good for anything but Annele. A third will come presently and say no one is good for anything but the landlady. They may say what they like. We need no witness. I am man enough to act for myself. It is time to put an end to this meddling of outsiders in my affairs. One hour more and I shall be firmly established in a good old family."

The hour was not over before he was so established. Neither the warnings of Pilgrim nor his uncle had moved him. One effect they did have. As he so confidently, with so much pride and firmness, laid his suit before Annele's father, something within him said, "She will understand and thank me for giving way to no opposition." It was not a noble thought.

During the betrothal Annele held her apron to her eyes with one hand, and with the other kept tight hold of Lenz. The landlord walked up and down the room in his creaking new boots. The landlady wept, actually shed tears, as she cried: "O dear Heaven! to have to give up our last child! When I lie down and when I rise up what shall I do without my Annele? I insist, at least, that she shall not be married for a year. Need we tell you that we love you, Lenz, after giving you our last child? If your mother had but lived to see this day! But she will rejoice in heaven above, and will intercede for you at the throne of God."

Lenz could not keep back his tears. If the landlord's boots had creaked displeasure at his wife's words, they creaked still harder now. At length the sound of them ceased, and his voice began: "Enough of this. We are men. Lenz, control yourself and look up! so, that is well. What do you expect for a dowry with your wife?"

"I have never thought about the dowry. Annele is your child; you will not stint her."

"Quite right. We stand by the old proverb, 'So many mouths, so many pounds,'" replied the landlord, and said no more. He had no need to use many words.

Lenz continued: "I am not rich. My art is my chief possession. But, thanks to my parents, all wants are provided for. Nothing is lacking. We have our honest bread, and a little butter with it."

"That is well said, to the point. I like that. Now how about the marriage contract?"

"Nothing about it; the laws of the land provide for that."

"Yes, but a special contract can be made, if desired. You know a widow receives only half the property. She will need to have her portion helped out. If you should die before your wife, and leave no heirs-"

"Father," cried Annele, "if you are going to talk so, you must let me leave the room. I cannot stay and hear you."

Even Lenz changed color. But the landlord went on ruthlessly: "Don't be so silly. That is the way with you women; you can't hear anything said about money. O dear me! – no, not a word! You squirm as if a frog had hopped on your foot. But if there is no money forthcoming, you can clamor for it finely. You have never experienced the want of it, your life long, and I don't mean you ever shall; therefore, in case of life or death-"

"I will hear no more. Is this the joy of a betrothal that I have heard so much of?" remonstrated Annele.

"Your father is right," urged the mother; "be reasonable. It will soon be over, and then you will feel all the merrier."

"Annele is right," said Lenz, with unwonted decision. "We will be married according to the laws of the land, and there is no more to be said about it. Life and death, indeed! It is all life for us now. Your pardon, father and mother; we understand each other perfectly. Every moment now is worth a million? Do you remember the song, Annele? -

 
"Honor lies not in a golden store,
Shame lies not in poverty;
And so would I had a thousand dollars more,
And had my own true love by me."
 

Thus singing he was about to dance with Annele out of the room, when her father laid his hand on the young man's shoulder, and in a solemn voice said, "Stop; one word more."

Lenz stood in as much amazement as if a dagger had been put to his lips, instead of the expected kiss. "We have pledged our troth. There is no need of anything further!" cried Annele, remonstratingly.

"We men have still some matters to settle," replied the landlord, decisively. "Yes, let your father speak," said Lenz.

Mine host took off his velvet cap, looked into it, put it on his head again, and began: "Your intentions have been true and honest. If you are laughed at behind your back, you need not mind; and if you are ruined, you are responsible to none but yourself." Here he made a long pause. Lenz looked at him like a man in a dream, and finally asked what he had done, or what he meant to do, that was so dreadful.

"As I say, your intentions are honest and good; that I have always maintained," returned the oracle. "You and Pröbler have made a standard regulator together, – is that what you call it? I don't pay much attention to such things; some work for the common good. You understand, of course, that you can have no further partnership with Pröbler. The name of my son-in-law and that of Pröbler must not be coupled together; so that is settled and done with. Now we come to the main point. You are thinking about establishing an association, – is that what you call it? Whatever you call it, that too must be settled and done with." Here the landlady wanted to interpose, but her husband stamped his foot angrily, and went on: "Let me finish, wife! Lenz, I tell you, this thing must never enter your mind again. You will not think I speak thus from regard to my own interest. I fear no union or association whatever. Even if I did, my interest is now yours. But you will get neither praise nor thanks for it. I know mankind better than you do. If this plan were ever put into execution, your whole property would be sacrificed, and you reduced to beggary. Give me your hand upon it, that from this hour you lay aside all thoughts of this association."

Lenz stood hesitating, his eyes fixed on the ground. "Yes," cried the landlady, "give him your hand. He means well, he means right, by you; his intentions are those of a father towards you; he is your father"; and she nodded approvingly at her husband.

Lenz drew himself up. His face was crimson. "I will not give my hand," said he, with sharp decision. "Rather be it maimed, and unfit to hold a tool for the rest of my life!"

"Do not swear. You said we must not swear," interposed Annele. She seized his hand, and tried to put it into her father's, but he resisted. "Let be," he said, sharply, "let be! I will not abjure my faith; and it would be abjuring my faith to make such a promise. I will not do it, though you should drive me out of this house, where I had hoped to find a home. Landlord, I believe you mean well by me, but every man must follow his own reason. I have no partnership with Pröbler; but, if I had, I am Lenz; I have a right to associate with whom I please. You force me to say what I would rather not have said. I do not dishonor myself; on the contrary, I confer honor on others, and rejoice that it is so. As for this association, – it is called an association, you are quite right in the name, – I have thought it over night and day for years, and should understand it better than you do. You are right in saying there are plenty of fools and knaves who will laugh at me. I know that. But who, since the world began, tried to do it a service and was not laughed at? That does not disturb me. I thank you for your kind concern lest I should sacrifice my property. But I have carried on our entire business, had the whole house in my hands, for more than ten years. I will show you my books. You shall see for yourself if I have made any unlucky ventures. A man does not necessarily ruin himself by investing in a work for the common good. Once for all, the very morning of the day when I can bring about this union I shall put into it whatever portion of my property I judge best. I speak thus plainly to you, because you have spoken plainly to me. I will not give my hand. I am willing to take good advice, but must know best my own concerns. I will not give my hand in pledge of that which you desire, though my highest happiness upon earth depended on it."

Lenz felt a pressure and a shivering at his heart as he spoke, but he spoke sharply and firmly to the end.

"Unclench your fist. Will you not give me your hand? You are a brave man, my own proud, noble Lenz!" cried Annele, and threw herself on his neck, and wept and laughed convulsively.

"I felt it my duty to caution you. Now I wash my hands of the whole concern," said the landlord, somewhat dejectedly.

"Husband," returned his wife, "you have done a good thing, a very good thing. We never knew before what firmness our Lenz possessed. I confess I should never have suspected it in him, but am all the more rejoiced."

Lenz had as much as he could do to soothe Annele, who lay helpless in his arms. He was obliged to make her drink some wine before she would raise herself.

"Now go together into the garden, and I will set out the wine in the arbor," ordered the landlady. She preceded with a bottle and glasses, followed by the lovers in a close embrace.

"A strange being!" said the landlord to himself, as Lenz left the room. "These musicians have an engine constantly on hand. He bawls like a baby at the mention of his mother, the next minute he will sing like a lark, and wind up with a sermon, like an old Anabaptist. But he is a good fellow, after all; and when I win my Brazilian suit, or draw my prize in the lottery, I will pay him his marriage portion the first thing. He shall have it down in hard gold. No one shall get a copper till he has had his share."

With this comforting resolution mine host returned to the public room, where he refreshed himself after his unwonted exertions, and received with dignity the congratulations of friends and strangers. He spoke little, but gave it to be understood that a man in his position could afford to dispense with great riches in a son-in-law. If the man be but sound and honest, – that was the burden of his remarks, to which all nodded assent. There lay wisdom in a nutshell.

Lenz and Annele meanwhile were sitting in the garden, full of delight, and bestowing on one another the fondest caresses. "I feel as if I had not been at home all this time," said Lenz, "but had been away in foreign countries, and had just returned from a long journey."

"You have been nowhere but at home," answered Annele, "only you have been strongly excited by talking with my father. I cannot tell you how I rejoiced to hear you speak as you did. I wish the whole world could have heard you and learned to honor you. But really you had no need to get into such a heat with my father."

"What do you mean?"

"He was not so much in earnest with his warnings and advice as he seemed. He likes to pretend he can see farther into a millstone than the rest of the world. If he had been in earnest, he would have brought up the matter before the betrothal instead of afterwards. He only wanted to make a show of wisdom before you; but I was glad you proved yourself to be the wiser."

Lenz looked about him at these words as if seeking something half forgotten. As a flock of pigeons in swift flight wheeled at that moment above the heads of the lovers, and threw their transient shadows on the ground; so did a swarm of thoughts that Pilgrim had conjured up pass in still swifter flight, throwing shadows that vanished more swiftly away.

"Others may be wiser, cleverer, and more respected than I, for aught I care," answered Lenz, "but no man in the world shall love his wife more tenderly and truly."