Edelweiss Part 30

"That is my name."

"What is to be the end of this?"

"G.o.d knows."

"Annele! Is it true that we were once so happy together?"

"I suppose it must be."

"And can we never be again?"

"I do not know."

"Why do you answer me so?"

"Because you ask me such questions."

Lenz buried his face in his hands, and remained in that att.i.tude through almost the entire night.

He tried to make out how and why things had come to this extremity; why to his other misfortunes this so horrible one was added. He could not explain it. He lived over every moment from the first day to this night, and still could not explain it. "I cannot make it out! I cannot make it out!" he cried. "If a voice would but come down from heaven and tell me!" But there came no voice from heaven. All was still save the monotonous ticking of the clocks.

He stood at the window, gazing out. The night was still; no living thing stirred. Only snow-clouds were chasing each other across the sky.

All night long, a lamp burned at the blacksmith's on the neighboring mountain. The smith had died that day. "Why was he allowed to die and not I? I would so gladly be dead." Life and death drove in wild confusion through his brain; the living were not alive; the dead were not dead; life is but one great horror; no bird ever sang; no human being ever made melody. The whole world is waste and void as it was before the creation. All is chaos....

His forehead dropped upon the window-sill; the blow scared him from his horrible waking dreams; he tried to find rest and forgetfulness in sleep.

Annele had long been asleep. If he could but read her dreams! he thought, as he watched her. If he could but find some help for her and for himself!

CHAPTER XXVIII.

A BEGGAR'S HAT, AND AN OLD MAN'S EARNINGS.

In this part of the country the frost, when it has once set in, holds on unrelentingly for many months. The Morgenhalde alone makes a happy exception to the rule. There the sun has sufficient power to make a dripping from the roof, when all elsewhere is hung with heavy icicles.

But this winter even the sun in heaven failed to treat the Morgenhalde with its wonted friendliness. There was no thawing outside the house nor in.

Not only was the cold greater than it used to be,--that was easily accounted for by the cutting down of the forest, whose tall trunks lay scattered about, waiting for the spring floods to carry them down into the valley,--but a weight as of frost lay heavy on the hearts of the dwellers upon the Morgenhalde. Annele seemed to have lost the power of rousing herself to life. Something had frozen up within her, which no warm breath could have melted, had any such breath reached her.

Annele, the only child who had remained near her parents, felt herself now the most cruelly deserted by their removal. The secret mortification of being the only poor one of the whole family of sisters seemed more than she could bear. She could do nothing to help her father and mother; nay, might even be reduced to asking charity of her sisters, to begging their children's cast-off clothes for her own little ones.

She moved silently about her work, her love of talking all gone, answering whatever question might be put to her, but nothing beyond.

She scarce ever left the house. Her former restlessness seemed to have pa.s.sed into Lenz. He so wholly despaired of accomplishing anything by his old quiet industry that the chair on which he sat and the tools he held in his hand seemed coals of fire to him. Petty creditors whom he was unable to pay, and was obliged to put off with fair words, were constantly annoying him. He, the Lenz who had only needed to say, "Thus and thus it is," to command instant confidence, now had to make solemn promises to this man and that, that his money should be paid him. The greater was his anxiety lest he should be unable to redeem his word, and the more did he exaggerate the danger that threatened his honor.

The thought of the various persons here and there who were waiting for the receipt of their money haunted his sleeping and waking hours and increased his restlessness. He had always been considered a man who could be perfectly depended upon; now he frequently disappointed hopes that he had raised, and even failed to keep his engagements. He had trusted that the mere knowledge of his distress would be a sufficient protection against outside annoyances; he soon learned that men accept no excuses in lieu of their ready money. The ring of that is better than the echo of any good name; the best have too often proved a poor dependence.

Annele saw that Lenz was tormenting himself unreasonably. She was often tempted to turn his importunate creditors out of doors, and bid him not yield so meekly to their cruel exactions. It was the way of the world, as she knew, to trample upon those who cringed to it. But she kept her thoughts to herself. His distress should drive him to adopt her cherished plan of buying a hotel. Then, and not till then, would matters a.s.sume a different aspect.

In his anxiety and despair Lenz felt keenly the desolation at his heart, and his sidelong glance at Annele often said, as plainly as words could have done: You are right. You have often reproved me for being shiftless and good-for-nothing. Your words are coming true; I am good-for-nothing. My heart is consumed with anxieties, and this unloving life is wearing me away. I am like a candle that is kept burning at both ends. May it soon be burned out!

Many persons brought him articles to be repaired, and obliged him to work off part of his debt in that way. Now, now when bread was needed for to-day, and there was no provision for the future, it was hard to have to work for the past.

Some sat by him while he did their little jobs, keeping him thus a prisoner in his own house; others with complaints and revilings took away again the commissions he had failed to execute.

Such an existence was not to be endured. He must find some remedy, some lasting remedy. His present state was neither living nor dying. "It is intolerable to hang thus suspended by the hair of my head. I am resolved once more to have solid ground under my feet," he said to Annele. She vouchsafed a scarce perceptible nod of a.s.sent, but the mere exercise of his will gave him new strength.

Early the next morning he set off across the mountain to visit his mother's relations in the next valley. He had always been a favorite with them, and felt sure they would not look on and see him perish.

The stars were just fading in the light of approaching day, when he reached the top of the mountain-ridge. He looked abroad over the snow-covered world. Nowhere a sign of life; why must he be living?

A phrase that had haunted him in one of his sleepless nights came now into his mind: "The white sleep," this was it.

An icy wind from the mountains blew against his fevered checks, and rudely recalled him to his senses by tearing the hat from his head and whirling it down the abyss on whose brink he stood. His first impulse was to rush after it; but a look showed him that it would be rushing to certain death. One instant the thought flashed through his brain that a happy accident might thus end his life forever; the next he had put the cowardly suggestion behind him.

The blinding snow drifted ceaselessly across the ridge. The very raven scarce was able to guide his flight, but, with fluttering wings, was driven now high aloft, now deep into the abyss.

Lenz plodded painfully through snow and wind, till at last his eyes were greeted by the sight of human habitations. The smoke, beaten down by the wind, was spread in light clouds above the roofs of the houses.

Chimneys were almost unknown in this part of the country.

Lenz sought shelter at the first farm-house. "Welcome, welcome, Lenz! I am glad you have not forgotten me," exclaimed a tall, handsome woman standing by the hearth, with the pieces of a stout bough she had just broken still in her hand.

"What have you done with your hat?"

"I did not recognize you at first. You are Katharine, are you not? How strong you have grown. Katharine, I am come begging."

"Not so bad as that, I hope, Lenz."

"Yes, but it is though," said Lenz, with a bitter smile. He felt this was no subject for joking. "You must lend or give me an old hat; mine has been blown away by the wind."

"Come into the sitting-room. My husband will be sorry not to have been at home to see you. He is carting wood in the forest."

The bailiff's daughter opened the sitting-room door, and politely invited Lenz to precede her into the warm, cosey parlor.

He told her frankly when they were seated together that he had had no intention of coming to see her; that in fact he did not even know where she lived; but was glad that chance had led him to her door. She took the confession in good part, saying, "You always were a true, honest fellow, and I am glad you keep so." She brought out an old gray hat and a soldier's cap of her husband's for him to take his choice between, recommending the cap, as the hat was really too shabby to wear. It was very much crushed and wanted a ribbon besides. He chose the hat, however, and Katharine, finding he could not be induced to change his mind, cut off one of the broad black ribbons from her Sunday hood, and made it serve as a hatband, talking all the while of the people and things in her old home,--everything connected with which she held in fond remembrance.

"Do you remember throwing your hat up into the air one night as we were coming home from the musical festival at Constance, and my running down to the meadow to pick it up for you?"

"To be sure I do. I don't throw my hat up into the air nowadays; the wind blows it up."

"The summer is sure to follow the winter," said Katharine, comfortingly.

Lenz looked in wonder at the handsome woman so ready to help with hand and tongue. She soon had a cup of coffee ready which she insisted upon his drinking, sitting by him while he did so and talking over old days and old acquaintances. "Franzl often comes to see us," she said; "we are still the best of friends."

"I can see that life has prospered with you," said Lenz.

"Thank G.o.d, I have nothing to complain of. I have good health, money enough for myself, and something to spare for others. My husband is honest and industrious. It is not quite so merry here as it used to be at home, for we have no singing. I would not mind that, if only I had a child. My husband and I have agreed that, if we still have none of our own on the fifth anniversary of our marriage, we will adopt one. Faller must let us have one of his. You will try to persuade him, will you not?"

"Gladly."