O. T., A Danish Romance Part 35

"Yes, can you doubt it?" inquired Louise.

"She knows me not as you know me; and if she did?"--He pressed his hands before his eyes and burst into tears. "You know all: you know more than I could tell her," sighed he. "I am more unfortunate than you can believe. Never can I forget her--never!"

"For Heaven's sake compose yourself!" said Louise rising. "Some one might come, and you would not be able to conceal your emotion. All may yet be well! Confide only in G.o.d in heaven!"

"Do not tell your sister that which I have told you. Do not tell any one. I have revealed to you every secret which my soul contains."

"I will be to you a good sister," said Louise, and pressed his hand.

They silently walked down the avenue.

The sisters slept in the same room.

At night, after Sophie had been an hour in bed, Louise entered the chamber.

"Thou art become a spirit of the night," said Sophie. "Where hast thou been? Thou art not going up into the loft again to-night, thou strange girl? Had it been Wilhelm, Thostrup, or myself who had undertaken such a thing, it would have been quite natural; but thou"--

"Am I, then, so very different to you all?" inquired Louise. "I should resemble my sister less than even Mr. Thostrup resembles her. You two are so very different!"

"In our views, in our impulses, we very much resemble each other!" said Sophie.

"He is certainly not happy," exclaimed Louise. "We can read it in his eyes."

"Yes, but it is precisely that which makes him interesting!" said Sophie; "he is thus a handsome shadow-piece in everyday life."

"Thou speakest about it so calmly," said Louise, and bent over her sister, "I would almost believe that it was love."

"Love!" exclaimed Sophie, raising herself up in bed, for now Louise's words had become interesting to her; "whom dost thou think that he loves?"

"Thyself," replied Louise, and seized her sister's hand.

"Perhaps?" returned Sophie. "I also made fun of him! It certainly went on better when our cousin was here. Poor Thostrup!"

"And thou, Sophie," inquired Louise, "dost thou return his love?"

"It is a regular confession that thou desirest," replied she. "He is in love--that all young men are. Our cousin, I can tell thee, said many pretty things to me. Even the Kammerjunker flatters as well as he can, the good soul! I have now resolved with myself to be a reasonable girl.

Believe me, however, Thostrup is in an ill humor!"

"If the Kammerjunker were to pay his addresses to you, would you accept him?" asked Louise, and seated herself upon her sister's bed.

"What can make you think of such a thing?" inquired she. "Hast thou heard anything?--Thou makest me anxious! O Louise! I joke, I talk a deal; but for all that, believe me, I am not happy!"

They talked about the Kammerjunker, about Otto, and about the French cousin. It was late in the night. Large tears stood in Sophie's eyes, but she laughed for all that, and ended with a quotation from Jean Paul.

Half an hour afterward she slept and dreamed; her round white arm lay upon the coverlet, and her lips moved with these words:

"With a smile as if an angel Had just then kissed her mouth." [Note: Christian Winther.]

Louise pressed her countenance on the soft pillow, and wept.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX

"A swarm of colors, noise and screaming, Music and sights, past any dreaming, The rattle of wheels going late and early,-- All draw the looker-on into the hurly-burly."

TH. OVERSKOU.

A few days pa.s.sed on. Otto heard nothing of German Heinrich or of his sister. Peter Cripple seemed not to be in their confidence. All that he knew was, that the letter which he had conveyed to Otto was to be unknown to any one beside. As regarded German Heinrich, he believed that he was now in another part of tire country; but that at St. Knud's fair, in Odense, he would certainly find him.

In Otto's soul there was an extraordinary combating. Louise's words, that he had been deceived, gave birth to hopes, which, insignificant as the grain of mustard-seed, shot forth green leaves.

"May not," thought he, "German Heinrich, to further his own plans, have made use of my fear? I must speak with him; he shall swear to me the truth."

He compared in thought the unpleasing, coa.r.s.e features of Sidsel, with the image which his memory faintly retained of his little sister.

She seemed to him as a delicate creature with large eyes. He had not forgotten that the people about them had spoken of her as of "a kitten that they could hardly keep alive." How then could she now be this square-built, singularly plain being, with the eyebrows growing together? "I must speak with Heinrich," resolved he; "she cannot be my sister! so heavily as that G.o.d will not try me."

By such thoughts as these his mind became much calmer. There were moments when the star of love mirrored itself in his life's sea.

His love for Sophie was no longer a caged bird within his breast; its wings were at liberty; Louise saw its release; it was about to fly to its goal.

St. Knud's fair was at hand, and on that account the family was about to set out for Odense. Eva was the only one who was to remain at home. It was her wish to do so.

"Odense is not worth the trouble of thy going to see," said Sophie; "but in this way thou wilt never increase thy geographical knowledge. In the mean time, however, I shall bring thee a fairing--a husband of honey cake, ornamented with almonds."

Wilhelm thought that she should enjoy the pa.s.sing pleasure, and go with them; but Eva prayed to stay, and she had her will.

"There is a deal of pleasure in the world," said Wilhelm, "if people will only enjoy it. If one day in Paris is a brilliant flower, a day at Odense fair is also a flower. It is a merry, charming world that we live in! I am almost ready to say with King Valdemar, that if I might keep--yes, I will say, the earth, then our Lord might willingly for me keep heaven: there it is much better than we deserve; and G.o.d knows whether we may not, in the other world, have longings after the old world down here!"

"After Odense fair?" asked Sophie ironically.

Otto stood wrapped in his own thoughts. This day, he felt, would be one of the most remarkable in his life. German Heinrich must give him an explanation. Sophie must do so likewise Could he indeed meet with success from them both? Would not sorrow and pain be his fairings?

The carriage rolled away.

From the various cross-roads came driving up the carriages of the gentry and the peasants; the one drove past the other; and as the French and English Channel collects ships from the Atlantic Ocean, so did the King's Road those who drove in carriages, those who rode on horseback, and those who went on foot.

Behind most of the peasant-vehicles were tied a few horses, that went trotting on with them. Mamsells from the farms sat with large gloves on their red arms and hands. They held their umbrellas before their faces on account of the dust and the sun.

"The Kammerjunker's people must have set off earlier than we," said Sophie, "otherwise they would have called for us."

Otto looked inquiringly at her. She thought on the Kammerjunker!

"We shall draw up by Faugde church," said Sophie. "Mr. Thostrup can see Kingo's [Author's Note: The Bishop of Funen, who died in 1703.]

grave--can see where the sacred poet lies. Some true trumpeting angels, in whom one can rightly see how heavy the marble is, fly with the Bishop's staff and hat within the chapel."

Otto smiled, and she thought also about giving him pleasure.

The church was seen, the grave visited, and they rapidly rolled along the King's Road toward Odense, the lofty tower of whose cathedral had hailed them at some miles' distance.