What the Swallow Sang Part 6

"Oh, dear! now you are beginning too. I meant to say, will you really go to Dollan?"

"I must do so now, even if I were not obliged to go on account of the picture."

"Why?"

"To restore my faith in mankind, at least the part most important to me, myself," replied Gotthold, with a smile, whose derision did not escape Herr Wollnow.

"I am very much displeased with you," said the latter, as he re-entered the dining-room, after accompanying Gotthold to the door.

"With me?"

"What must the man think of me? What a meddlesome awkward fellow he must consider me. It is a real piece of good fortune that I went no farther."

"But what have I done?"

"Why did you never tell me this famous narrative of your youth, from which it is very evident that he loved and probably still loves your friend Cecilia, as you call her, although I have never seen anything of the friendship."

"Do you really think so?" exclaimed Fran Wollnow, starting up and throwing her arms around her husband; "do you really think so? Did he tell you so?"

In spite of his vexation, Herr Wollnow could not help laughing.

"I should probably be the last person whom he would choose for his confidant, especially now, after I, stupid oaf, have been hammering away upon this subject for the last hour."

"On this subject? I really don't understand you, Emil."

"Don't understand me! Gracious, you clever soul! How difficult it is for women to see their way in matters they proudly condescend to consider their own. Don't understand me? Well, I can a.s.sure you that yonder enthusiast understood you perfectly, and will be on his way to Dollan early to-morrow morning."

"Well, I can't see any particular harm in that," said Frau Wollnow.

"Why should not those two meet again, after so many years, even if they really do still love each other? I will give poor Cecilia the pleasure with all my heart--she needs consolation so much."

"As much as her worthy husband needs money. Day after to-morrow is the last day of grace for his note of five thousand thalers which is deposited with me. Perhaps he will help both: he has the means to do so."

"Oh! Emil, your everlasting prose is unbearable."

"I never promised you that you would find me a poet."

"Heaven knows that."

"It would be better for me if you knew it."

"Emil!"

"I beg your pardon. I am really so much annoyed that I can't help being spiteful. But that conies of meddling with other people's affairs. Let the fools do as they please, and come to bed."

CHAPTER V.

When, after a night of torturing restlessness, Gotthold suddenly awoke from his heavy morning sleep, the sun had already been shining through the white lace curtains of his chamber for several hours. "Thank G.o.d,"

he said aloud, "morning has come, and with the morning everything will doubtless look brighter."

He was soon dressed, and standing at the open window. How familiar the scene was to him. There was the circular s.p.a.ce, with its gra.s.s-grown walks, and the little obelisk in the centre, surrounded by pleasant white houses with pretty gardens; yonder the stately schoolhouse, from whose open windows the singing of the boys rang out so distinctly upon the quiet of the Sabbath morning, that he fancied he could distinguish the words of the hymn. On the right hand, peering between the houses, and rising above their roofs, appeared the dark green foliage of the huge trees in the royal park, and far away on the left, between other dwellings, gleamed a portion of the lake, and the tiny islet--just at this moment sparkling in the sunlight--which lies before the large island. He had seen the beautiful picture hundreds and hundreds of times just as he saw it now, when, after the morning service was over, he stood at the window of the school-house with Curt, his eyes wandering towards the region where beloved Dollan lay; and even as now it allured him from the narrow walls of the room out into the sunny fields, the shady woods, and by the blue lake. These lights, these shadow, this brilliant azure hue had kindled in the boy a pure desire to reproduce, to counterfeit what lay so clearly, though in such complicated lines before him, and so deeply stirred his heart with strange forebodings. They had been his first teachers in the wonderful language of lines and colors; and fluently as he had since learned to speak it, he was still indebted to them for all that he had attained.

Had he not felt yesterday, when he drove through the familiar scenes, heavy as was his heart, that all his toil and labor in beautiful Italy had been more or less vain, and he had always painted only with his eyes and hand, never with his heart; spoken a beautiful, musical, but foreign tongue with difficulty, instead of his native language; and that here, and here only, in his native country, and beneath his native sky, could he become a true artist, who does not utter what others can say as well or better, but what he alone can express, because he is himself what he says.

But could home really still be home to him after all that had happened, all he had experienced and suffered here? Why not, if he only saw it with the eyes with which he endeavored to see the rest of the world; if he wished to be nothing more than what, in his good hours, he believed himself to be--a true artist, living only in his ideal creations, behind whom everything that fetters other men lies like an unsubstantial vision, and for whom, when in evil plight, there is a G.o.d to whom he can tell what he suffers. Yes, his art, chaste and severe, had been his guiding-star in the labyrinth of his early days, his talisman in the misery and poverty of the years he had spent in Munich, his refuge at all times; and she should and would continue to be so--would cling loyally to him if he was faithful to her, and ever throned her reverently on high as his protectress, his adored G.o.ddess.

The boys' song died away. Gotthold pa.s.sed his hand over his eyes, and turned back into the room just as there was a loud knock at the door.

"What, is it you, Jochen?"

"Yes, Herr Gotthold, it is I," replied Jochen Prebrow, after putting the coffee-tray he had brought in as carefully on the table as if it had been a soap-bubble, which would break at the slightest touch. "Clas Cla.s.sen, from Neuenkirchen, or, as they call him here, Louis, had just gone down cellar when you rang, and I thought the coffee would taste none the worse for my bringing it."

"Certainly not; I am very much obliged to you."

"And besides, I wanted to ask when I should harness the horses."

"I shall remain here a few days," replied Gotthold.

At these words a smile began to overspread Jochen's broad face, but it instantly vanished again as Gotthold continued: "So you must drive on alone, old friend."

"I should like to stay here a few days too," said Jochen.

"And you cannot unless I keep the carriage? Then I will, and, what is of more value to me, you; and we will go on at once to Dollan, which I suppose is what you want. Or do you think the horses ought not to be left so long?"

Jochen had no anxiety on that score. His good friend, Clas Cla.s.sen, whom the people here had the strange custom of calling Louis, would willingly undertake the care of them and see that they had all they needed, but why did Herr Gotthold walk when they had horses and carriage on the spot?

"But I should prefer to walk," said Gotthold.

"Well, what's one man's meat is another man's poison," said Jochen rubbing his thick hair. "But there's still another difficulty in the way: you will find the nest empty."

"What do you mean?"

"They pa.s.sed through here an hour ago, both the gentleman and lady,"

replied Jochen. "I was sitting in the coffee-room and they stopped at the door."

Gotthold stared steadily at Jochen. She had been there, so near him, under the window at which he had just been standing, and he might have seen the pure face again as Jochen saw it, who spoke of it as coolly as if it were a thing that might happen every day.

"And did you speak to her, Jochen?" he said at last hesitatingly.

"The lady remained in the carriage," said Jochen; "but he came in to drink a little rum, and as there was n.o.body else in the room, and I had just got some out of the cupboard for myself, I helped him to it; and then he asked where I came from, and I told him I was here with a gentleman, but I thought we should go on to-day as soon as he was up.

He asked if I knew the gentleman; but of course I didn't; for, thought I, the friendship between those two was never very great, and the less one has to do with Herr Brandow the better. Wasn't I right? Well, and so one word led to another, and he took out his watch and said he was going to Pluggenhof and should probably stay there till to-morrow evening, and then he drank his rum, which he will perhaps pay for when he comes back, and away he went; he had a pair of splendid bays, thorough-breds, especially the saddle-horse. You would have been delighted with them, for you are a judge of horses; I saw that yesterday."

Gotthold's eyes were still fixed steadily upon the floor. She would not even know that he had been here.

Be it so! He had not intended, even for a moment, to cross her path; and now the way was open, perfectly open; he could carry out unhindered, and without any pain, the plan he had formed yesterday when he returned from the Wollnows' through the park to the inn.

An hour afterwards the two men were walking along the road to Dollan, at first upon the highway, then by side paths and short cuts, every foot of which Gotthold knew.