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The Son of His Mother

by Clara Viebig · English · Gutenberg #30732 · 585,729 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The Son of His Mother

Author: Clara Viebig

Translator: H. Raahauge


        
Release date: December 22, 2009 [eBook #30732]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30732

Credits: E-text prepared by Charles Bowen from page images generously made available by Internet Archive/American Libraries (http://www.archive.org/details/americana)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SON OF HIS MOTHER ***


E-text prepared by Charles Bowen from page images generously made
available by Internet Archive/American Libraries
(http://www.archive.org/details/americana)



Note: Images of the original pages are available through
      Internet Archive/American Libraries. See
      http://www.archive.org/details/sonofhismother00viebiala





THE SON OF HIS MOTHER

by

CLARA VIEBIG

Authorised Translation by H. Raahauge







London: John Lane The Bodley Head
New York:  John  Lane  Company
Toronto: Bell & Cockburn  MCMXIII

The Anchor Press, Ltd., Tiptree Essex






BOOK I



THE SON OF HIS MOTHER



CHAPTER I

The husband and wife were of a literary turn of mind, and as they
had the money to cultivate their artistic tastes he wrote a little and
she painted. They also played and sang duets together, at least they
had done so when they were first married; now they went to concerts and
the opera more frequently instead. They were liked wherever they went,
they had friends, they were called "charming people," and still
something was wanting to complete their happiness--they had no
children.

And they would probably not have any now, as they had been married
for some time, and the likelihood of children being born to them was
very remote.

No doubt he sighed and knit his brow in unguarded moments when he
sat at his desk in his office, but especially when he passed through
the villages in the Brandenburg March on the rides he took in the more
distant environs of Berlin--partly for his health, partly because he
still retained the liking for riding from the time he was in the
cavalry--and saw swarms of little flaxen-haired children romping on the
sandy roads. However, he did not let his wife perceive that he missed
something, for he loved her.

But she could not control herself in the same manner. The longer she
was married the more nervous she became. At times she felt irritated
with her husband for no reason. She persistently turned her eyes away
from the announcement of births in the newspapers with a certain
shrinking, and, if her glance happened once in a way to fall on one in
which happy parents notified the birth of a son, she put the paper
aside hastily.

In former years Käte Schlieben had knitted, crocheted, embroidered
and sewn all sorts of pretty little children's garments--she used to be
quite famous for the daintiness of her little baby jackets trimmed with
blue and pink ribbons, all her newly married acquaintances would ask
her for the wonderful little things--but now she had finally given up
that sort of work. She had given up hope. What good did it do her to
put her forefingers into the tiny sleeves of a baby's first jacket,
and, holding it out in front of her, gaze at it a long, long time with
dreamy eyes? It only tortured her.

And she felt the torture twice as much in those grey days that
suddenly put in an appearance without any reason, that creep in
silently even in the midst of sunshine. On those occasions she would
lie on the couch in her room that was furnished with such exquisite
taste--really artistically--and close her eyes tightly. And then all at
once a shout, clear, shrill, triumphant, like the cry of a swallow on
the wing, would ascend from the street, from the promenade under the
chestnut-trees. She stopped her ears when she heard that cry, which
penetrated further than any other tone, which soared up into the ether
as swiftly as an arrow, and cradled itself up there blissfully. She
could not bear to hear anything like that--she was becoming morbid.

Alas, when she and her husband grew old, with minds no longer so
receptive and too weary to seek incitement in the world, who would
bring it to them in their home? Who would bring them anything of what
was going on outside? What youth with his freshness, with the
joyousness that envelops those of twenty like a dainty garment,
that beams from smooth brows like warmth and sunshine, would give them
back a breath of their youth, which had already disappeared in
accordance with the laws of Time? Who would wax enthusiastic at the
things that had once made them enthusiastic, and which they would enjoy
once more as though they were new for them too? Who would fill the
house and garden with his laughter, with that careless laughter that is
so infectious? Who would kiss them with warm lips, and make them happy
by his tenderness? Who would carry them on his wings with him, so that
they did not feel they were weary?

Alas, there is no second youth for those who are childless. Nobody
would come into the inheritance of delight in what was beautiful, of
taste for what was beautiful, of enthusiasm for art and artists which
they would leave behind them. Nobody would guard reverently all those
hundreds of things and nicknacks she had gathered together so
tastefully in her house with the delight of a collector. And nobody
would, alas, hold the hand that was fast growing cold with loving
hands, in that last difficult hour which all dread, and cry: "Father,
Mother, don't go! Not yet!" Oh, God, such loving hands would not close
their eyes----

When Paul Schlieben used to come home from his office in those days
he was co-partner in a large business that his grandfather had founded
and his father raised to a high position--he often found his wife's
sweet face stained with tears, her delicate complexion marred by
constant weeping. And her mouth only forced itself to smile, and in her
beautiful brown eyes there lurked a certain melancholy.

The doctor shrugged his shoulders. The lady was suffering from
nerves, that was what was the matter with her. She had too much
time for brooding, she was left to herself too much.

In order to alter this, her anxious husband withdrew from the
business for an indefinite period. His partners could get on just as
well without him. The doctor was right, he must devote himself more to
his wife; they were both so lonely, so entirely dependent on each
other.

It was decided they should travel; there was no reason whatever why
they should remain at home. The beautiful house was given up, their
furniture, all their costly things were stored. If they cared to do so
they could remain away for years, get impressions, amuse themselves.
Käte would paint landscapes in beautiful countries, and he--well, he
could easily find compensation in writing, should he miss his usual
work.

They went to Italy and Corsica--still further, to Egypt and Greece.
They saw the Highlands, Sweden and Norway, very many beautiful
places.

Käte pressed her husband's hand gratefully. Her susceptible mind
waxed enthusiastic, and her talent for painting, which was by no means
insignificant, felt powerfully stimulated all at once. How splendid to
be able to paint, to keep hold of all that glow of colour, that
wonderful effect of tone that revealed itself to her delighted eyes on
her canvas.

She was so eager that she went out with her painting materials in
the morning, whether it was at Capri, on the shores of the blue
Bosphorus, in the yellow sand of the desert, facing the precipitous
pinnacles in the Fjords, or in the rose gardens of the Riviera. Her
delicate face got sunburnt; she no longer even paid any attention to
her hands, which she used to take such care of. The ardent longing to
manifest herself had seized hold of her. Thank God, she could
create something now. The miserable feeling of a useless life did not
exist any longer, nor the torturing knowledge: your life ceases the
moment your eyes close, there is nothing of you that will survive you.
Now she would at least leave something behind that she had produced,
even if it were only a picture. Her paintings increased in number;
quite a quantity of rolls of canvas were dragged about now wherever
they went.

At first Paul Schlieben was very pleased to see his wife so
enthusiastic. He politely carried her camp-stool and easel for her, and
never lost patience when he remained for hours and hours near her
whilst she worked. He lay in the scanty shadow of a palm-tree, and used
to follow the movements of her brush over the top of his book. How
fortunate that her art gave her so much satisfaction. Even though it
was a little fatiguing for him to lie about doing nothing he must not
say anything, no, he must not, for he had nothing to offer her as a
compensation, nothing whatever. And he sighed. It was the same sigh
that had escaped him when the numerous flaxen-haired little children
were playing about on the sandy roads in the Brandenburg March, the
same sigh which Sundays drew from him, when he used to see all
the proletariat of the town--man and wife and children, children,
children--wandering to the Zoo. Yes, he was right--he passed his hand a
little nervously across his forehead--that writer was right--now, who
could it be?--who had once said somewhere: "Why does a man marry? Only
to have children, heirs of his body, of his blood. Children to whom he
can pass on the wishes and hopes that are in him and also the
achievements; children who are descended from him like shoots from a
tree, children who enable a man to live eternally." That was the only
way in which life after death could be understood--life eternal.
The resurrection of the body, which the Church promises, was to be
interpreted as the renewal of one's own personality in the coming
generations. Oh, there was something great, something indescribably
comforting in such a survival.

"Are you speculating about something?" asked his wife. She had
looked up from her easel for a moment.

"Eh? What? Did you say anything, darling?" The man started up in a
fright, as one who has been straying along forbidden paths.

She laughed at his absent-mindedness; it was getting worse and
worse. But what was he thinking of? Business?--surely not. But perhaps
he wanted to write a novel, a tale? Why should he not try his hand at
that for once in a way? That was something quite different from sending
short chatty accounts of one's journey to one of the papers. And of
course he would be able to do it. People who had not half the
education, not half the knowledge, not half the aesthetic refinement of
feeling he had wrote quite readable books.

She talked brightly and persuasively to him, but he shook his head
with a certain resignation: nonsense, neither novels nor any other kind
of writing. And he thought to himself: it is always said that a piece
of work is like a child--that is to say, only a truly great piece of
work, of course. Was the work he and his wife created work in that
sense? Work that would exist eternally? He suddenly found things to
censure severely in her picture, which he had politely admired only the
day before.

She got quite frightened about it. Why was he so irritable to-day?
Was he going to develop nerves at the finish? Yes, it was evident, the
warm air of the south did not suit him, he had lost his briskness,
looked so tired. There was nothing for it, her husband was more
to her than her picture, she would leave off her painting at once.

And that was what happened. They went away, travelled from one place
to another, from one hotel to another, along the lakes, over the
frontier, until they made a somewhat longer stay high up among the Alps
in Switzerland.

Instead of lying under a palm-tree he lay in the shadow of a
fir--now his wife was painting--and followed the movements of her brush
with his eyes over the top of his open book.

She was busily painting, for she had discovered a delightful
subject. That green alpine meadow, with its wealth of flowers as
variegated as they could possibly be and the backs of the brown cows
with the sun shining on them, was as full of charm as the Garden of
Eden on the first day of creation. In her eagerness to see she had
pushed her broad-brimmed hat back, and the warm summer sun was burning
little golden spots on her delicate cheeks and the narrow bridge of her
finely shaped nose. She held the brush that she had dipped into the
green on her palette up against the green of the meadow in order to
compare the two, and blinked with half-closed eyes to see if she had
got the colour right.

At that moment a sound made her start--it was half a growl of
displeasure at the disturbance, half a murmur of approval. Her husband
had risen and was looking at a couple of children who had approached
them noiselessly. They were offering rhododendrons for sale, the girl
had a small basket full of them, the boy was carrying his nosegay in
his hand.

What exceedingly pretty creatures they were, the girl so blue-eyed
and gentle, the boy a regular little scamp. The woman's heart swelled.
She bought all the rhododendrons from them, even gave them more
than they asked for them.

That was a stroke of great luck for the little Swiss boy and
girl--just think, to get more than they had asked for. They blushed
with happiness, and when the strange lady asked them questions in a
kind voice, they commenced to chatter ingenuously.

She would have to paint _those_ children, they were really too
delightful, they were a thousand times more beautiful than the most
beautiful landscape.

Paul Schlieben looked on with a strange uneasiness whilst his wife
painted the children, first the big girl and then the small boy. How
intently she gazed at the boy's round face. Her eyes were brilliant,
she never seemed to be tired, and only paused when the children grew
impatient. All her thoughts turned on the painting. Would the children
come again that day? Was the light good? Surely there would not be a
storm to prevent the children from coming? Nothing else was of any
interest to her. She displayed great zeal. And still the pictures
turned out bad; the features were like theirs, but there was no trace
of the child-mind in them. He saw it clearly: those who are childless
cannot paint children.

Poor woman! He looked on at her efforts with a feeling of deep
compassion. Was not her face becoming soft like a mother's, lovely and
round when she bent down to the children? The Madonna type--and still
this woman had been denied children.

No, he could not look on at it any longer, it made him ill. The man
bade the children go home in a gruff voice. The pictures were ready,
what was the good of touching them up any more? That did not make them
any better, on the contrary.

That evening Käte cried as she used to cry at home. And she
was angry with her husband. Why did he not let her have that pleasure?
Why did he all at once say they were to leave? She did not understand
him. Were the children not sweet, delightful? Was it because they
disturbed him?

"Yes," was all he said. There was a hard dry sound in his voice--a
"yes" that came with such difficulty--and she raised her head from the
handkerchief in which she had buried it and looked across at him. He
was standing at the window in the carpeted room of the hotel, his hands
resting on the window-ledge, his forehead pressed against the pane. He
was gazing silently at the vast landscape before him, in which the
mountaintops covered with snow that glowed in the radiance of the
setting sun spoke to him of immortality. How he pressed his lips
together, how nervously his moustache trembled.

She crept up to him and laid her head on his shoulder. "What is the
matter with you?" she asked him softly. "Do you miss your work--yes,
it's your work, isn't it? I was afraid of that. You are getting tired
of this, you must be doing something again. I promise you I'll be
reasonable--never complain any more--only stop here a little longer,
only three weeks longer--two weeks."

He remained silent.

"Only ten--eight--six days more. Not even that?" she said, bitterly
disappointed, for he had shaken his head. She wound her arms round his
neck. "Only five more--four--three days, please. Why not? Those few
days, please only three days more." She positively haggled for each
day. "Oh, then at least two days more."

She sobbed aloud, her arms fell from his neck--he must allow her two
days.

Her voice cut him to the heart. He had never heard her beg
like that before, but he made a stand against the feeling of yielding
that was creeping over him. Only no sentimentality. It was better to go
away from there quickly, much better for her.

"We're going away to-morrow."

And as she looked at him with wide-open horror-struck eyes and
pallid cheeks, the words escaped from his lips although he had not
intended saying them, drawn from him by a bitterness that he could not
master any longer:

"They are not yours!"





CHAPTER II


And they went away.

But it seemed to the woman as though every joy had disappeared with
the emerald green meadow in the Alps, in which she had painted the
lovely children. There was the same old nervous twitch in her face, the
corners of her mouth drooped slightly and she cried very easily. Paul
Schlieben watched his wife with positive dismay. Oh dear, had it all
been in vain, the giving up of his work, all this travelling about
without making any plans that was so fatiguing? Had the old melancholy
frame of mind taken possession of her again?

When he saw her sitting there so disinclined to exert herself, her
hands lying idle in her lap, a feeling akin to fury came over him. Why
did she not do something? Why did she not paint? That confounded meadow
in the Alps was surely not the only place where she could work. Was it
not beautiful here as well?

They had settled down in the Black Forest. But it was in vain that
he hoped from day to day that one of the quiet green wooded valleys or
one of the nut-brown maidens of the Black Forest with her cherry-red
hat and enormous red umbrella, as Vautier has painted them, would tempt
her to bring out her painting materials. She felt no inclination--nay,
she had positively a kind of dread of touching her brushes again.

He reproached himself bitterly in secret. Would it not have been
better to have left her that pleasure and not have interfered?
Still--the thing would have had to end some time, and the longer it had
lasted the more difficult the separation would have been. But he had
made up his mind about one thing, they would return to Berlin again
late in the autumn. With the best will in the world he would not be
able to stand it any longer. He was heartily tired of this wandering
from hotel to hotel, this lounging about the world with nothing to show
for it but an occasional short article for the papers, a chatty account
of a journey to some corner of the earth of which people knew but
little. He longed for a home of his own again, and felt a great desire
to return to his business, which he had often looked upon as a fetter
and so prosaic whilst he was in it. But Käte! When he thought of her
again spending many hours alone at home, with no interests beyond
herself and her reading for in her state of hypersensitiveness she
found little pleasure in associating with other women--a feeling of
hopelessness came over him. Then there would be the same sad eyes
again, the same melancholy smile, the old irritable moods from which
the whole house used to suffer, herself the most.

And he subjected himself to an examination as though blaming himself
for it. He passed his whole life in review: had he committed any crime
that no son had been given to him, no daughter? Ah, if only Käte had a
child everything would be right. Then she would have quite enough to
do, would be entirely taken up with the little creature round which the
love of parents, full of hope and entitled to hope, revolves in an
ever-renewed circle.

Both husband and wife were torturing themselves, for the woman's
thoughts especially always ended at that one point. Now that
she had been separated from those dear children, from the, alas, much
too short happiness she had experienced that summer, it seemed to have
become quite clear to her what she missed--for had it not only weighed
on her like a painful suspicion before? But now, now the terrible
unvarnished truth was there: everything people otherwise call
"happiness" in this world is nothing compared to a child's kiss, to its
smile, to its nestling in its mother's lap.

She had always given the children in the meadow a tender kiss when
they came and went, now she longed for those kisses. Her husband's kiss
did not replace them; she would soon have been married fifteen years,
_his_ kiss was no longer a sensation, it had become a habit. But a kiss
from a child's lips, that are so fresh, so untouched, so timid and yet
so confiding, was something quite new to her, something, exceedingly
sweet. A feeling of happiness had flowed through her soul on those
occasions as well as the quite physical pleasure of being able to bury
her mouth in those delicately soft and yet so firm cheeks, which health
and youth had covered with a soft down like that on the cheeks of a
peach. Her thoughts always wandered back to that meadow in the Alps,
full of longing. And this longing of hers that was never stilled
magnified what had happened, and surrounded the figures that had
appeared in her life for so short a time with the whole halo of tender
memories. Her idle thoughts spun long threads. As she longed for those
little ones so they would also be longing for her, they would wander
across the meadow weeping, and the large present of money she had left
behind for each of them with the proprietor of the hotel--she had been
obliged to leave without saying good-bye to them--would not console
them; they would stand outside the door and cast their eyes up
to the windows from which their friend so often had waved to them. No,
she could not forgive Paul for showing so little comprehension of her
feelings.

The stay in the Black Forest, whose velvety slopes reminded them too
much of the Swiss meadows and from whose points of view you could look
over to the Alps on a clear day, became a torture to both the man and
woman. They felt they must get away; the dark firs, the immense green
forest became too monotonous for them. Should they not try some seaside
resort for once? The sea is ever new. And it was also just the season
for the seaside. The wind blew already over the stubble in the fields,
as they drove down to the plain.

They chose a Belgian watering-place, one in which the visitors dress
a great deal, and in which quite a cosmopolitan set of people offer
something new to the eye every day. They both felt it, they had
remained much too long in mountain solitudes.

During the first days the gay doings amused them, but then Paul and
his wife, between whom something like a barrier had tried to push
itself lately, both agreed all at once: this sauntering up and down of
men who looked like fools, of women who if they did not belong to the
demi-monde successfully imitated it, was not for them. Let them only
get away.

The man proposed they should give up travelling entirely and return
to Berlin a little earlier, but Käte would not listen to it. She had a
secret dread of Berlin--oh, would she have to go back to her old
life again? So far she had never asked herself what she had really
expected from these long months of travel; but she had hoped for
something--certainly. What?

Oh dear, now she would be so much alone again, and there was
nothing, nothing that really filled her life entirely.

No, she was not able to return to Berlin yet. She told her husband
that she felt she had not quite recovered yet--she was certainly
anæmic, she was suffering from poorness of blood. She ought to have
gone to Schwalbach, Franzensbad or some other iron springs long
ago--who knows, perhaps many things would be different then.

He was not impatient--at least he did not show it--for he was moved
with a deep compassion for her. Of course she should go to some iron
springs; they ought to have tried them long ago, have made a point of
it.

The Belgian doctor sent them to the well-known baths at Spa.

They arrived there full of hope. In her the hope was quite genuine.
"You will see," she said to her husband in a brighter voice, "this will
do me good. I have a vague feeling--no, I really feel quite sure that
something good will happen to us here."

And he hoped so too. He forced himself to hope in order to please
her. Oh, it would be enough, quite enough if the characteristics of the
landscape won so much interest from her that she took up her painting
again, which she had neglected entirely. How pleased he would be at
even that. If her former zeal for art showed itself again, that was a
thousand times more health-bringing than the strongest iron springs at
Spa.

The heather was in bloom, the whole plateau was red, the purple sun
set in a mass of purple.

It happened as he had hoped, that is to say, she did not begin to
paint, but she made expeditions into the Ardennes and the Eifel with
him on foot and in a carriage, and enjoyed them. The Venn had bewitched
her. In her light-coloured dress she stood like a small speck
of light in the immense seriousness of the landscape, protected her
eyes with her hand from the view of the sun, which is so open there, so
unobstructed either by tree or mountain, and took deep breaths of the
sharp clear air that has not yet been vitiated by any smoke from human
dwellings, hardly by human breath. Around her the Venn blossomed like a
carpet of one colour, dark, calm, refreshing and beneficial to the eye;
it was only here and there that the blue gentian and the white
quivering flock of the cotton-grass were seen to raise their heads
among the heather.

"Oh, how beautiful!" She said it with deep feeling. The melancholy
of the landscape flattered her mood. There was no gaudy tone there that
disturbed her, no medley of colours. Even the sun, which sets there in
greater beauty than anywhere else--blushing so deeply that the whole
sky blushes with it, that the winding Venn rivulet hedged in by
cushions of moss, that every pool, every peat-hole full of water
reflects its beams ruddy-gold, and the sad Venn itself wears a mantle
of glowing splendour--even this sun brought no glaringly bright light
with it. It displayed its mighty disc in a grand dignified manner, a
serious victor after a serious struggle.

Käte looked into this marvellous sun with large eyes bathed in
tears, until the last beam, the last rosy streak in the grey mass of
clouds had vanished. Now it had gone--the heavens were dead--but
in the morning it would be there again, an eternal, imperishable,
never-conquered hope. Then should not, ought not the human heart to
beat again too, revived anew, always full of hope?

Clouds of mist sped across the moor, veiled, indescribable, vague
shapes. There was a whispering before the coming of the wind, a
lisping through the heather and the cotton-grass--it seemed to Käte as
though the Venn had something to tell her. What was it saying? Ah, it
must be for some reason that she had come there, that she felt she was
being held fast as though by a strong and still kind hand.

She walked on with quicker, more elastic steps, as though she were
searching for something.

Her husband was delighted that his wife was so pleased with the
neighbourhood. True, the landscape had no special attraction for
him--was it not very desolate, monotonous and unfertile there? But the
characteristic scenery was certainly harmonious, very harmonious--well,
if she found pleasure in it, it was better than a paradise to him.

They often drove up to Baraque Michel, that lonely inn on the
borders between Belgium and Prussia, in which the douaniers drank their
drams of gin when on the look-out for smugglers, and where the
peat-cutters dry their smocks that the mist has wetted and their
saturated boots at the fire that is always burning on the hearth.

So many crosses in the Venn, so many human beings who have met with
a fatal accident. Käte listened to the men's stories with a secret
shudder--could the Venn be so terrible? and she questioned them again
and again. Was it possible that the man from Xhoffraix, who had driven
off to get peat litter, had been swallowed up there so close to the
road with cart and horse, and that they had never, never seen anything
of him again? And that cross there, so weather-beaten and black, how
had that come into the middle of the marsh? Why had that travelling
journeyman, whose intention it was to go along the high road from
Malmedy to Eupen, gone so far astray? Had it been dark or had there
been a heavy fall of snow so that he could not see, or was it
the cold, that terrible cold, in which a weary man can freeze to death?
Nothing of the kind; only a mist, a sudden mist, which confuses a man
so, that he no longer knows which is forward or which is backward,
which is left or which is right, that he loses all idea of where he is
going, gets away from the road and runs round in a circle like a poor,
mad, terrified animal. And all the mists that rise in the Venn when
daylight disappears, are they the souls of those who have never been
buried, and who in garments that are falling to pieces rise every night
from their graves, which have neither been consecrated by a benediction
nor by holy water and in which they cannot find rest?

That was a fairy tale. But was not everything there as in the fairy
tale? So quite different to everywhere else in the world, in reality
ugly and yet not ugly, in reality not beautiful and yet so exceedingly
beautiful? And she herself, was she not quite a different being there?
Did she not wander about full of hope, in blissful dreams, like one to
whom something wonderful is to happen?

It was in the sixth week of their stay at Spa. The nights were
already as cold as in winter, but the days were still sunny. It was
always a long journey up to the inn even for the strong Ardennes
horses, but Paul and his wife were there again to-day. Would they have
to leave soon? Alas, yes. Käte had to confess it to herself with
sorrow. Everything was very autumnal, the heather had finished
flowering, the air was raw; the grass that had already been frozen
during the night rustled under her feet. They could have found use for
their winter clothes.

"Ugh, how cold," said the man shivering, and he turned up the collar
of his overcoat. He wanted to twist a shawl round his wife's neck, but
she resisted: "No, no!" She ran on in front of him through the
rustling heather with quick steps. "Just look."

It was a wide view that presented itself to their eyes there on the
highest point in the Venn, that is adorned with a rickety wooden tower.
The whole large plateau covered with heather lay before them, with here
and there a group of dark firs that only showed spreading branches on
the side away from the storm. These firs that cowered so timidly were
trees that had been planted there; they were hardly higher than the
heather, and only recognisable on account of their different colour.
And, here and there, there was a stray grey boulder and a cross that
the wind had carried to the side of it. And a calm lay over the whole
in the pale midday autumn light as though it were God's acre.

When they had climbed up the tower they saw still more. From the
plateau they looked down into the valley: a blue expanse around them,
blue from the darkness of the forests and from autumn vapours, and in
the beautiful blue outstretched villages the white houses half hidden
behind tall hedges. And here, looking down on Belgium, with its grey
fumes hanging like a cloud in the clear transparent autumn air, lay the
large town of Verviers with its church-towers and factory chimneys
towering above it.

Käte heaved a sigh and shuddered involuntarily: oh, was the workaday
world so near? Was grey life already approaching nearer and nearer to
her wonderful fairy world?

Her husband gave a slight cough; he found it very cold up there.
They went down from the tower, but when he wanted to take her back to
the inn she resisted: "No, not yet, not yet. That's only the midday
bell."

The bell was ringing in Fischbach Chapel, that ancient little church
with its slated roof, in whose tower the great red lantern was
formerly hoisted to point out the safe harbour to the wanderer swimming
in the wild sea of mists, and the bell rung unceasingly to save the man
who had lost his way through his ear should his eye fail him. The bell
rang out clear and penetrating in the solitude, the only sound in the
vast stillness.

"How touching that sound is." Käte stood with folded hands and
looked into the wide expanse, her eyes swimming in tears. What a charm
there was in this Venn. It encircled the soul as the tough underwood of
the heather and the creeping tendrils of the club moss entangled the
foot. When she thought of how soon she would have to leave it, to go
away from that immense stillness that seemed to be concealing a secret,
to be cherishing something marvellous in its deep lap, her heart
contracted in sudden fear. What would happen to her, what would become
of her? Her seeking soul stood like a child on the threshold of
fairyland asking for something--was there to be no gift for her?

"What was that?" All at once she seized hold of her husband's arm
with a low cry of terror. "Didn't you hear it as well?"

She had grown quite pale; she stood there with dilated eyes, raising
herself on her toes with an involuntary movement and craning her neck
forward.

"There it is again. Do you hear it?" Something like a child's soft
whimpering had penetrated to her ear.

No, he had not heard anything. "I suppose there are some people in
the neighbourhood. How you do frighten a body, Käte." He shook his head
a little angrily. "You know very well that all the women and children
have left their villages in the Venn to gather cranberries. That's all
the harvest they have, you see. Look, the berries are quite ripe."
Stooping down he took up a plant.

The small cluster of berries of a deep coral in colour formed a
beautiful contrast to the glossy dark green of the small oval leaf. But
there were also some flowers on the plant, small pure white
flowers.

"Like myrtle, just like the flower on a myrtle," she said, taking
the plant out of his hand. "And the leaves are also exactly like myrtle
leaves." Twisting the stalk round between her finger and thumb she
gazed at it thoughtfully. "The Venn myrtle." And, raising the little
flower to her mouth, she kissed it, full of delight.

"Do you still remember--that time--on the evening of our
wedding-day, do you still remember? You kissed the myrtle that had been
in my wreath and I kissed it too, and then we kissed each other.
Then--then--oh, how happy we were then." She said it very softly, as
though lost in sweet memories.

He smiled, and as she swayed towards him, with a dreamy look in her
eyes that were fixed the whole time on the little green plant, he drew
her closer and laid his arm round her. "And are we not--not"--he wanted
to say "not just as happy," but all he said was: "not happy to-day,
too?"

She did not answer, she remained silent. But then, hurling the plant
with its glossy leaves away with a sudden movement, she turned and ran
away from him blindly into the Venn, without noticing where she was
going.

"What's the matter, Käte?" He hurried after her, terrified. She ran
so quickly that he could not overtake her at once. "Käte, you'll fall.
Wait, I say. Käte, what is the matter with you?"

No answer. But he saw from the convulsive movements of her shoulders
that she was weeping violently. Oh dear, what was the matter now? He
looked troubled as he ran after her across the desolate Venn. Was she
never to get any better? It was really enough to make a fellow
lose all pleasure in life. How stupid it had been to bring her to the
Venn--real madness. There was no brightness to be found there. A
hopelessness lurked in that unlimited expanse, a terrible hardness in
that sharp aromatic air, an unbearable melancholy in that vast
stillness.

The man only heard his own quickened breathing. He ran more and more
quickly, all at once he became very anxious about his wife. Now he had
almost reached her--he had already stretched out his hand to seize hold
of her fluttering dress--then she turned round, threw herself into his
arms and sobbed: "Oh, here's both, blossom and fruit. But our myrtle
has faded and not borne fruit--not fruit--we poor people."

So that was it--the same thing again? Confound it. He who as a rule
was so temperate stamped his foot violently. Anger, shame, and a
certain feeling of pain drove the blood to his head. There he stood now
in that lonely place with his wife in his arms weeping most pitifully,
whilst he himself was deserving of much pity in his own opinion.

"Don't be angry, don't be angry," she implored, clinging
more closely to him. "You see, I had hoped--oh, hoped for
certain--expected--I don't know myself what, but still I had expected
something here--and today--just now everything has become clear. All,
all was in vain. Let me cry."

And she wept as one in whom all hope is dead.

What was he to say to her? How console her? He did not venture to
say a word, only stroked her hot face softly whilst he, too, became
conscious of a certain feeling, that feeling that he had not always the
strength to push aside.

They stood like that for a long time without saying a word,
until he, pulling himself together, said in a voice that he tried to
make calm and indifferent: "We shall have to return, we have got quite
into the wilds. Come, take my arm. You are overtired, and when we--"

"Hush," she said, interrupting him, letting go of his arm quickly.
"The same as before. Somebody is in trouble."

Now he heard it as well. They both listened. Was it an animal? Or a
child's voice, the voice of quite a small child?

"My God!" Käte said nothing more, but making up her mind quickly,
she turned to the right and ran down into a small hollow, without
heeding that she stumbled several times among the bushes, through which
it was impossible for her to force a passage.

Her quick ear had led her right. There was the child lying on the
ground. It had no pillow, no covering, and was miserably wrapt up in a
woman's old torn skirt. The little head with its dark hair lay in the
heather that was covered with hoar-frost; the child was gazing fixedly
into the luminous space between the heavens and the Venn with its large
clear eyes.

There was no veil, nothing to protect it; no mother either--only the
Venn.

Nevertheless they had deceived themselves. It was not crying, it was
only talking to itself as quiet contented children generally do. It had
stretched out its little hands, which were not wrapped up like the rest
of its body, and had seized hold of some of the red berries and
squashed them. Then its little fists had wandered up to the hungry
mouth; there were drops of the juice from the berries on its baby
lips.

"Quite alone?" Käte had sunk down on her knees, her hands trembled
as they embraced the bundle. "Oh, the poor child. How sweet it is.
Look, Paul. How has it come here? It will die of cold, of
hunger. Do call out, Paul. The poor little mite. If its mother came now
I would give her a piece of my mind it's disgraceful to let the
helpless little mite lie like this. Call--loud--louder."

He called, he shouted: "Heigh! Hallo! Is nobody there?"

No voice answered, nobody came. The whole Venn was as quiet as
though it were an extinct, long-forgotten world.

"Nobody is coming," whispered Käte quite softly, and there was an
expression of fear and at the same time trembling exultation in her
voice. "Its mother does not trouble--who knows where the woman is? I
wonder if she's coming?" She looked round searchingly, turned her head
in all directions, and then stooped over the child again with a sigh of
contentment.

What unpardonable thoughtlessness--no, what unspeakable barbarity
to abandon such a mite in that place. If they had come only a few
hours--only an hour later. It might already have been bitten by a snake
then, might even have been torn to pieces by a wolf.

Then her husband had to laugh, although the sight of her
over-excitement had slightly annoyed him. "No, my child, there are no
poisonous snakes here and no more wolves either, so you can be at rest
about that. But when the mists begin to rise, they would have done for
him."

"Oh!" Käte pressed the foundling to her bosom. She was sitting on
her heels holding the child in her lap; she stroked its rosy cheeks,
its little downy head, and showered caresses and flattering words on
it, but the child continued to gaze into the luminous space with its
large, dark, and yet so clear eyes. It did not smile, but it did not
cry either; it took no notice whatever of the strangers.

"Do you think it has been left here intentionally?" asked Käte
suddenly, opening her eyes wide. The blood flew to her head in a hot
wave. "Oh then--then"--she drew a trembling breath and pressed the
child to her bosom, as though she did not want to let it go again.

"It will all be cleared up somehow," said the man evasively. "The
mother will be sure to come."

"Do you see her--do you see her?" she inquired almost anxiously.

"No."

"No." She repeated it in a relieved tone of voice, and then she
laughed. After that her eyes and ears belonged entirely to the helpless
little creature. "Where's baby--where is he then? Laugh a little, do.
Look at me once with those big, staring eyes. Oh, you little darling,
oh, you sweet child." She played with it and pressed kisses on its
hands without noticing that they were dirty.

"What are we to do now?" said the man, perplexed.

"We can't leave it here. We shall have to take it with us, of
course." There was something very energetic about the delicate-looking
woman all at once. "Do you think I would forsake the child?" Her cheeks
glowed, her eyes gleamed.

Paul Schlieben looked at his wife with a certain awe. How beautiful
she was at that moment. Beautiful, healthy, happy. He had not seen her
like that for a long time. Not since he had folded her in his arms as a
happy bride. Her bosom rose and fell quickly with every trembling
breath she took, and the child lay on her breast and the Venn myrtle
bloomed at her feet.

A strange emotion came over him; but he turned away: what had that
strange child to do with them? Still he admitted in a hesitating voice:
"We certainly can't leave it here. But do you know what we can do?
We'll take it with us to the inn. Give it to me, I'll carry it."

But she wanted to carry it herself, she only let him help her up.
"There--there--come, my sweet little babe." She raised her foot
cautiously to take the first step--then a shout tied her to the
spot.

"Hallo!"

A rough voice had shouted it. And now a woman came up to them; the
figure in the fluttering skirt was outlined big and clear against the
rarefied ether that flowed around it.

Where had she come from so suddenly? From there, from behind the
mound of earth that had been thrown up near the peat pit. She had been
creeping on all fours plucking berries; a pail that was almost ft 11
hung on her arm, and in her right hand she carried the wooden measure
and the large bone curry-comb with which she stripped off the
berries.

That was the mother! Käte got a terrible fright; she turned
pale.

Her husband was taken by surprise too. But then he gave a sigh of
relief: that was decidedly the best way out of it. Of course, they
might have known it at once, how should the child have come into the
desolate Venn all alone? The mother had been looking for berries, and
had put it down there meanwhile.

But the woman did not seem to take it kindly that they had looked so
carefully after the child during her absence. The strong bony arms took
it away from the lady somewhat roughly. The woman's eyes examined the
strangers suspiciously.

"Is it your child?" asked Paul. He need not have asked the question;
it had exactly the same dark eyes as the woman, only the
child's were brighter, not dulled as yet by life's dust as the mother's
were.

The woman made no answer. It was only when the man asked once more,
"Are you the mother?" and put his hand into his pocket at the same
time, that she found it worth while to give a curt nod:

"C'est l' mi'n."[A] Her face retained its gloomy expression; there
was no movement of pride or joy.



[Footnote A: C'est le mien.]



Käte noticed it with a certain angry surprise. How indifferent the
woman was. Was she not holding the child as though it were a useless
burden? She was filled with envy, torturing envy, and at the same time
with hot anger. That woman certainly did not deserve the child. She
would have liked to have torn it out of her arms. How rough she looked,
what coarse features she had, what a hard expression. She might really
frighten anybody terribly with her black looks. But now--now her
expression brightened; ah, she had seen the piece of money Paul had
taken out of his purse.

Ugh, what a greedy expression she had now.

The fruit-picker stretched out her hand--there was a large shining
silver coin--and when it was given to her, when she held it in her hand
she drew a deep breath; her brown fingers closed round it tightly.

"Merci." A smile passed quickly across the sullen face in which the
corners of the mouth drooped morosely, her blunted expression grew
animated for a moment or two. And then she prepared to trudge away, the
shapeless bundle containing the child on one arm, the heavy pail on the
other.

They now saw for the first time how poor her skirt was; it had
patches of all colours and sizes. Dried heather and fir-needles stuck
to her matted and untidy plaits, as they hung out from the gaudily
spotted cotton handkerchief; she had an old pair of men's
hobnailed shoes on her feet. They did not know whether she was old or
young; her stout body and hanging breasts disfigured her, but that her
face had not been ugly once upon a time could still be seen. The little
one resembled her.

"You've got a pretty child," said Paul. To please his wife he
started a conversation again with this woman who was so inaccessible.
"How old is the boy?"

The fruit-picker shook her head and looked past the questioner
apathetically. There was no getting anything out of the woman, how
terribly stupid she was. The man wanted to let her go, but Käte pressed
up against him and whispered: "Ask her where she lives. Where she
lives--do you hear?"

"Heigh, where do you live, my good woman?"

She shook her head once more without saying a word.

"Where do you come from, I mean? From what village?"

"Je ne co'pr nay,"[A] she said curtly. But then, becoming more
approachable--perhaps she hoped for a second gift of money--she began
in a whining, plaintive voice: "Ne n'ava nay de pan et tat d's
e'fa'ts."[B]

"You're a Walloon, aren't you?"

"Ay[C]--Longfaye." And she raised her arm and pointed in a direction
in which nothing was to be seen but the heavens and the Venn.

Longfaye was a very poor village in the Venn. Paul Schlieben knew
that, and was about to put his hand into his pocket again, but Käte
held him back, "No, not her--not the woman--you must hand it over to
the vestryman for the child, the poor child."



[Footnote A: Je ne comprends pas.]

[Footnote B: Nous n'avons pas de pain et tant d'enfants.]

[Footnote C: Yes.]



She whispered softly and very quickly in her excitement.

It was impossible for the woman to have understood anything, but her
black eyes flew as quick as lightning from the gentleman to the lady,
and remained fixed on the fine lady from the town full of suspicion: if
she would not give her anything, why should she let them ask her any
more questions? What did they want with her? With the curtest of nods
and a brusque "adieu" the Walloon turned away. She walked away across
the marsh calmly but with long strides; she got on quickly, her figure
became smaller and smaller, and soon the faded colour of her miserable
skirt was no longer recognisable in the colourless Venn.

The sun had disappeared with the child; suddenly everything became
grey.

Käte stood motionless looking in the direction of Longfaye. She
stood until she shivered with cold, and then hung heavily on her
husband's arm; she went along to the inn with dragging feet, as though
she had grown tired all at once.

The mist began to conceal the bright midday. Cold damp air, which
wets more than rain, made their clothes clammy. The stinging flies from
the swamps flew in big swarms through the door and windows of the inn;
a smouldering peat-fire was burning within, fanned to a bright flame
by means of dry fir twigs, and the flies clung to the wall near the
fire-place and to the ceiling--no, they would not die yet.

Autumn had come, sun and warmth had disappeared from the Venn, it
was wise to flee now.

But outside, in the depths of the wilds above the highest point in
the Venn, a lonely buzzard was moving round and round in a circle,
uttering the piercing triumphant cry of a wild bird. He was happy there
in summer as in winter. He did not want to leave.




CHAPTER III


The vestryman of the small village in the Venn felt somewhat surprised
and embarrassed when such a fine lady and gentleman drove up to his
house and wished to speak to him. He went out to them, walking through
the filthy water in his yard that splashed up to his knees. He did not
know where he should take them to, as the little pigs and the calf were
in the house and the old sow was wallowing in front of the door.

So they walked up and down the quiet village street from which the
few farms lay somewhat back, whilst the carriage jolted slowly along in
the deep ruts behind them.

Käte was pale, you could see from her eyes that she had only had
very little sleep. But she was smiling, and a happy excitement full of
expectation was written on her features, spoke in her gait; she was
always a little ahead of the others.

Her husband's face was very grave. Was he not committing a great
imprudence, acting in an extremely hasty manner for the sake of his
wife? If it did not turn out all right?

They had had a bad night. He had brought Käte home from the inn the
day before in a strangely silent and absent-minded mood. She had eaten
nothing, and, feigning extreme fatigue, had gone early to bed.
But when he retired to rest a few hours later he found her still awake.
She was sitting up in bed with her beautiful hair hanging down her back
in two long plaits, which gave her quite a youthful appearance. Her
bewildered eyes gazed at him full of a strange longing, and then she
threw both arms round his neck and drew his head down to her.

Her manner had been so strange, so gentle and yet so impetuous, that
he asked her anxiously whether there was anything the matter with her.
But she had only shaken her head and held him close in a silent
embrace.

At last he thought she had fallen asleep--and she was asleep, but
only for quite a short time. Then she woke again with a loud cry. She
had dreamt, dreamt so vividly--oh, if he knew what she had been
dreaming. Dreaming--dreaming--she sighed and tossed about, and then
laughed softly to herself.

He noticed that she had something on her mind, which she would like
to tell him but which she had hardly the courage to say. So he asked
her.

Then she had confessed it to him, hesitatingly, shyly, and yet with
so much passion that it terrified him. It was the child of which she
had been thinking the whole time, of which she always must think--oh,
if only she had it. She would have it, must have it. The woman had so
many other children, and she--she had none. And she would be so happy
with it, so unspeakably happy.

She had become more and more agitated in the darkness of the night,
uninterrupted by a single word from him, by any movement--he had lain
quite quietly, almost as though the surprise had paralysed him,
although it could not really be called a surprise any more. What was
her whole life? she had said. A constant longing. All the love
he showered on her could not replace the one thing: a child, a
child.

"My dear, good husband, don't refuse it. Make me happy. No other
mother on earth will be so happy--my darling husband, give me the
child." Her tears were falling, her arms clasped him, her kisses rained
down on his face.

"But why just _that_ child? And why decide so quickly? It's no
trifle--we must think it over very carefully first."

He had made objections, excuses, but she had pertinent answers ready
for all. What was to be thought over very carefully? They would not
come to any other result. And how could he think for a moment that the
woman would perhaps not give them the child? If she did not love it,
she would be glad to give it, and if she did love it, then all the more
reason for her to be glad to give it, and to thank God that she knew it
was so well taken care of.

"But the father, the father. Who knows whether he will agree to
it?"

"Oh, the father. If the mother gives it, the father is sure to
agree. One bread-eater less is always a good thing for such poor
people. The poor child, perhaps it will die for want of food, and it
would be so well"--she broke off--"isn't it like a dispensation of
Providence that just we should come to the Venn, that just we should
find it?"

He felt that she was persuading him, and he strove against it in his
heart. No, if she allowed herself to be carried away by her feelings in
such a manner--she was only a woman--then he, as a man, must
subordinate his feelings to common sense.

And he enumerated all the difficulties to her again and again, and
finally said to her: "You can't guess what troubles you may be
preparing for yourself. If the affection you now think you feel for the
child should not last? If he is not congenial to you when he grows
older? Bear in mind, he is and will always be the child you have
adopted."

But then she had almost flown into a passion. "How can you say such
things? Do you think I am narrow-minded? Whether it is my own child or
a child I have adopted is quite immaterial, as it becomes mine through
its training. I will train it in my own way. That it is of your own
flesh and blood has nothing to do with it. Am I only to love a child
because I have borne it? Oh no. I love the child because--because it is
so small, so innocent, because it must be so extremely sweet when such
a helpless little creature stretches out its arms to you." And she
spread out her arms and then folded them across her breast, as though
she was already holding a child to her heart. "You're a man, you do not
understand it. But you are so anxious to make me happy make me happy
now. Dear, darling husband, you will very soon forget that it is not
our own child, you will soon not remember it any more. It will say
'Father,' 'Mother' to us--and we will be its father and mother."

If she were right! He was silent, thrilled by a strange emotion. And
why should she not be right? A child that one trains according to one's
own method from its first year, that is removed entirely from the
surroundings in which it was born, that does not know but what it is
the child of its present parents, that learns to think with their
thoughts and feel with their feelings, cannot have anything strange
about it any more. It will become part of oneself, will be as dear, as
beloved as though one had begotten it oneself.

Pictures arose before his mind's eye which he no longer
expected to see, no longer ventured to hope for. He saw his smiling
wife with a smiling child on her lap; he saw himself smile, and felt a
pride he had never known when he heard its soft childish voice lisp:
"Fa-ther." Yes, Käte was right, all the other things that go by the
name of happiness are nothing compared to this happiness. Only a
father, a mother, knows what joy is.

He kissed his wife, and this kiss already meant half consent; she
felt that.

"Let us drive there to-morrow, the first thing to-morrow morning,"
she implored, in a tone of suppressed rapture.

He endeavoured to remain calm: after they had maturely considered
the matter, they would first have to talk it over with their lawyer in
Berlin, and other intimate friends.

Then she lost her temper. She pouted, and then she laughed at him:
was this a business matter? What had the lawyer and other people to do
with such a very important, quite personal and private matter? Nobody
was to be asked about it, nobody was to interfere with it. Not a single
person must suspect where the child came from or who were its parents.
They, he and she, were its parents, they were responsible for it, its
life had begun when they took it, and they vouched for its future. This
child was their work, their work entirely.

"We'll fetch it the first thing to-morrow. The sooner it gets out of
that dirt and misery the better--don't you agree with me, Paul?" She
did not give him a chance of saying anything more, she overwhelmed him
with plans and proposals, in her sparkling vivacity; and her exuberant
spirits overcame his scruples.

One can have too many scruples, be too cautious, and thus embitter
every pleasure in life, he said to himself. There was surely
nothing extraordinary in what they were doing? They only picked up
something that had been laid at their feet; in that way they were
obeying a hint given them by Fate. And there were really no
difficulties in connection with it. If they did not betray it
themselves nobody would find out about the child's antecedents, and
there would not be any questions asked in the village either as to what
had become of it. It was a nameless, homeless little creature they were
going to take away with them, of which they would make what they liked.
Later on when the little one was old enough they would formally adopt
it, and thus confirm also in writing what their hearts had already
approved of long ago. Now the only thing left to do was to get hold of
the vestryman at Longfaye, and make arrangements with the parents for
the surrender of the child with his assistance.

When Paul Schlieben had come to this decision, he was troubled with
the same restlessness as his wife. Oh, if only it were morning, she
groaned. If anybody should steal a march on them now, if the child
should no longer be there next morning? She tossed about in her
impatience and fear. But her husband also turned from side to side
without sleeping. How could they know whether the child was healthy?
For a moment he weighed anxiously in his mind whether it would not be
advisable to confide in the doctor at the baths at Spa--he might drive
with them and examine the child first of all--but then he rejected the
thought again. The child looked so strong. He recalled its sturdy
fists, the clear look in its bright eyes--it had lain on the bare
ground in the cold and wind without any protection--it must have a
strong constitution. They need not trouble about that.

It was very early in the morning when husband and wife
rose--weary as though all their limbs were bruised, but driven on by a
kind of joyful determination.

Käte ran about the room at the hotel, so busy, so happy and excited,
as though she were expecting a dear guest. She felt so sure they would
bring the child back with them straightway. At all events she would
commence packing the trunks, for when they had got it they would want
to get home, home as quickly as possible. "The hotel is no place for
such a little darling. It must have its nursery, a bright room with
flowered curtains--but dark ones besides to draw in front of the
windows so as to subdue the light when it goes to sleep--otherwise
everything must be bright, light, airy. And there must be a baby's
chest-of-drawers there with all the many bottles and basins, and its
little bath, its bed with the white muslin curtains behind which you
can see it lying with red cheeks, its little fist near its head,
slumbering soundly."

She was so young-looking, so lovely in her joyful expectation, that
her husband was charmed with her. Did not the sunshine seem to be
coming now for which he had been waiting so long in vain? It preceded
the child, fell on its path, making it clear and bright.

Both husband and wife were full of excitement as they drove to
Longfaye. They had taken a comfortable landau that could be closed that
day, instead of the light carriage for two in which they generally made
their excursions. It might be too cold for the child on the way back.
Rugs and cloaks and shawls were packed in it, quite a large choice.

Paul Schlieben had taken his papers with him. They would hardly be
likely to want any proof of his identity, but he stuck them into his
pocket as a precaution, so as to provide against any delay that might
be caused by their absence. He had been told that the vestryman
was quite a sensible man, so everything would be settled smoothly.

As the rowan trees on both sides of the road bowed their tops under
their autumn load of red berries, so the heads of both husband and wife
were bowed under a flood of thoughts full of promise. The trees flew
quickly past the carriage as it rolled along, and so did their lives'
different stages past their agitated minds. Fifteen years of married
life--long years when one is expecting something first with confidence,
then with patience, then with faint-heartedness, then with longing,
with a longing that is kept more and more secret as the years go by,
and that becomes more and more burning on account of the secrecy. Now
the fulfilment was at hand--a fulfilment certainly different from what
husbands and wives who love each other picture to themselves, but still
a fulfilment.

That old sentence in the Bible came into the woman's mind and would
not be banished: _But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent
forth His Son._ Oh, this child from a strange, from an unknown land,
from a land that had neither fields nor fruits, and was not blessed
with rich harvests, this child was a gift from God, given by His
goodness. She bowed her head full of gratitude, as though she had
received a blessing.

And the man pressed his wife's hand gently, and she returned the
pressure. They remained sitting hand in hand. His glance sought hers
and she blushed. She loved him again as in the first year of her
marriage--no, she loved him much more now, for now, now he gave her the
happiness of her life, the child.

Her eyes that were full of bliss swept over the poor Venn district,
which looked brown and desolate, and which was still a fairyland full
of the most glorious wonders.

"Didn't I know it?" she murmured triumphantly, although trembling
with an agitation that was almost superstitious. "I felt
it--here--here."

She could hardly wait until they reached the village hi the Venn,
oh, how far away from the world it lay, so quite forgotten. And so
poor. But the poverty did not terrify her, nor the dirt--the result of
the poverty; she was going to take the child away with her now, to take
him where there was culture and prosperity, and he would never know
that he had lain on the bare ground instead of in a soft bed. She
thought of Moses. As he had been found in the bulrushes on the banks of
the Nile, so she had found him on the grass in the Venn--would he
become a great man like him? Desires, prayers, hopes, and a hundred
feelings she had not known before agitated her mind.

Paul Schlieben had some difficulty in making the vestryman
understand him. It was not because the man was a Walloon who hardly
understood German, for Nikolas Rocherath of "Good Hope"--his house
having received that name because it could be seen a good distance off
in the Venn, it being the largest in the village--was a German, but
because he could not understand what the gentleman meant.

What did he want with Lisa Solheid's Jean-Pierre? Adopt him? He
looked quite puzzled at first, and then he got offended. No, even if he
was nothing but a simple peasant, he would not let the gentleman make a
fool of him.

It was only by degrees that Schlieben could convince him that his
intentions were serious. But the old man still continued to rub his
stubbly chin doubtfully and cast suspicious glances at the lady and
gentleman, who had broken in on his solitude so unexpectedly. It was
only when Käte, wearied and tortured by the long explanation,
seized hold of his arm impatiently, and looking into his face cried
impetuously, almost angrily, "For goodness' sake do understand. We have
no child, but we want a child--now do you understand it?"--that he
understood.

No child--oh dear! No child! Then people do not know what they are
living for. Now he nodded comprehendingly, and, casting a compassionate
look at the lady who was so rich, so finely dressed and still had no
children, he became much more approachable. So they were so pleased
with Lisa Solheid's Jean-Pierre that they wanted to take him to Berlin
with them? How lucky the boy was. Lisa would not be able to believe it.
But nobody would begrudge her it. Nobody in Longfaye was as poor as
she; many a day she did not know how to get sufficient food for herself
and her five. Formerly, whilst her husband was alive----

What, her husband was not alive? She was a widow? Paul Schlieben
interrupted the vestryman, and drew a long breath as though of relief.
Although he had never spoken of it, he had always had a secret fear of
the father: if he turned out to be a drunkard or a ne'er-do-well? A
load fell from his mind now--he was dead, he could not do any more
harm. Or had he died of an illness after all, of a wasting disease that
is handed down to children and children's children? He had been told
that the mists on the Venn and the sudden changes in the temperature
may easily be injurious to the lungs and throat--added to that hard
work and bad food--surely the young man had not died of consumption? He
asked the question anxiously.

But Nikolas Rocherath laughed. No, Michel Solheid had never known a
day's illness all his life, and had not died of any illness. He had
worked at the machine factory at Verviers, covered with black soot and
naked to the waist. Cold and heat had had no effect on him. And
he used to come over from Verviers every Saturday and spend Sunday with
his family. And it had been the Saturday before the festival of St.
Peter and St. Paul somewhat over a year ago now, and Michel had bought
his wife a side of bacon and one or two pounds of coffee for the money
he had earned for overtime.

"You must know, sir, everything is much too dear for us here, and it
is much cheaper on the other side of the frontier," said the old man in
a troubled voice; then, raising his fist slowly, he shook it at the
Venn that lay there so peaceful and remote from the world. "But they
were soon on his tracks. They came after him from the Baraque--the
accursed douaniers. Three, four of them. Now you must know that Michel
could run as well as any of them. If he had thrown his parcel behind a
bush and run, they would never have caught him. But no, he would not,
he would have felt ashamed of himself if he had done so. So in order
not to let them know where he was going, he ran to the left through the
Walloon Venn in the direction of Hill instead of to the right. Then on
through Clefay and Neckel,[A] and so on in all directions, and in this
manner he got away from the neighbourhood he knew as well as he knew
his own pocket. They were close at his heels above the Pannensterz. And
they ran after him calling out 'Stop!'



[Footnote A: Wooded districts in the High Venn.]



"Look you, sir, if he had run into the Great Haard then and hidden
in the thicket there, they would never have found him without a dog.
But he lost his head, and ran out of the bushes straight across the
Venn.

"'Halt!--Stop!'--and a third time 'Halt!' But he bounded along like
a stag. Then one of them pulled his trigger and--Jesus Christ have
mercy upon us, now and at the hour of our death!"--the vestryman
devoutly made the sign of the cross and then wiped his nose with the
back of his hand--"the shot pierced the side of bacon and went into his
back, in from behind, out at the front. Then Solheid turned a
somersault. It was a shame. Such a fine fellow, for a side of bacon.

"He still lived for over an hour. He told them that he was Solheid
from Longfaye, and that they should fetch his wife.

"I was just cutting my hedge that day, when somebody came running
up. And I started off with Lisa, who was six months gone with
Jean-Pierre at the time. But when we came there it was already too
late.

"They had left him lying not far from the large cross. They had
wanted to carry him to a house at Ruitzhof, but he had said 'Leave me.
I'll die here.' And he gazed at the sun.

"Sir, it was as large and red in the sky that day--as large--as it
will be on the Day of Judgment. Sir, he was bathed in sweat and
blood--they had chased him for hours--but he still enjoyed gazing at
the sun.

"Sir, the fellow who had shot him was almost out of his mind; he
held him on his knees and wept. Sir, no,"--the vestryman gave himself a
shake and his gestures expressed the aversion he felt--"I would not
like to be a douanier!"

The old man's voice had grown deeper and hoarser--it was a sign of
the sympathy he felt--now it got its former even-tempered ring again.
"If it's agreeable to you, ma'am, we'll go now."

"Oh, the child, the poor child," whispered Käte, quite shaken.

"Do you think the widow will part with her youngest child?" asked
Paul Schlieben, seized with a sudden fear. This child that had
been born after its father's death--was it possible?

"Oh!" the old man rocked his head to and fro and chuckled. "If you
give a good sum for it. She has enough of them."

Nikolas Rocherath was quite the peasant again now; it was no longer
the same man who had spoken of the sun in the Venn and Solheid's death.
The point now was to get as much out of these people as possible, to
fleece a stranger and a townsman into the bargain to the best of his
ability.

"Hundred thalers would not be too much to ask," he said, blinking
sideways at the gentleman's grave face. What a lot of money he must
have, why, not a muscle of his face had moved.

The old peasant had been used to haggling all his life when trading
in cattle, now he gazed at the strange gentleman full of admiration for
such wealth. He led the way to Solheid's cottage with alacrity.




CHAPTER IV


Like all the houses in the village, the Solheids' cottage stood quite
alone behind a hedge that reached as high as the gable. But the hedge,
which was to protect it against the storms that raged in the Venn and
the heavy snowdrifts, was not thick any longer; you could see that
there was no man's hand there to take care of it. The hornbeams had
shot up irregularly; dead branches lashed by the wind from the Venn
stretched themselves in the air like accusing fingers.

Ugh, it must be icy cold there in the winter. Käte involuntarily
drew her cloak of soft cloth lined with silk more tightly round her.
And it must be doubly dark there on dark days. Hardly any light found
its way through the tiny windows owing to the protecting hedge, and the
roof hung low over the entrance. There were no steps, you walked
straight into the room.

The vestryman rattled the iron knocker on the door, which had once
been painted green but had no colour left now. The sound reverberated
through the building, but the door did not open when they tried it. The
woman was probably among the berries, and the children with her. The
hungry screams of the youngest one was all that was heard inside the
locked cottage.

The poor child--oh, she had left it alone again. Käte trembled with
excitement, its screams sounded to her like a call for help.

The vestryman sat down calmly on the chopping-block in front of the
door and drew his pipe out of the pocket of his blue linen smock, which
he had hastily drawn over his working coat in honour of the lady and
the gentleman. Now they would have to wait.

The husband and wife looked at each other much disappointed. Wait?
Käte had refused the seat on the chopping-block, which the old man had
offered her with a certain gallantry. She could not rest, she walked
restlessly up and down in front of the little window, trying in vain to
look through the dark pane.

The child inside screamed more and more loudly. Old Rocherath
laughed: what a roar that was to be sure, Jean-Pierre had powerful
lungs.

Käte could not listen to the screams any longer, they tortured her
both bodily and mentally. Oh, how they made her ears tingle. She
covered them with her hands. And her heart trembled with compassion and
anger: how could its mother remain away so long?

Her brow was wet with perspiration. She stared at the Venn, at the
bare, treeless, tortuous path with burning impatient eyes. At last she
saw some figures--at last!--and yet her breath stopped all at once, her
heart ceased to beat and then suddenly went hammering on at a furious
pace as if mad. There came the child's mother!

Lisa Solheid was carrying a bundle of fagots on her back, which was
fastened round her shoulders with a rope The load was so heavy that it
quite weighed her down, bending her head forward. Three children--their
small feet in clumsy shoes with big nails in them--stamped along in
front of their mother, whilst a fourth was clinging to her skirt. It
had also been looking for cranberries, and its little hands were
coloured red like those of its older sister and brothers, who were
carrying pails, measure and comb.

Pretty children, all four of them. They had the same dark eyes as
little Jean-Pierre, and they stared with them half boldly, half timidly
at the strange lady who was smiling at them.

The woman did not recognise the lady and gentleman again who had
given her a present in the Venn the day before--or did she only pretend
not to?

The rope which had kept the bundle together had cut deep into her
shoulders and bosom, now she undid it and threw off the burden with a
powerful jerk; and then, seizing hold of the axe lying near the
chopping-block, she began to chop up a couple of big branches with
powerful strokes.

"Hallo, Lisa," said the vestryman, "when you have chopped sufficient
wood to cook the cranberries, just wait a bit."

She looked up at him for a moment. The strange lady and gentleman
had gone a little aside--without previous arrangement. Let the
vestryman tell her first. It was not so simple a matter as they had
imagined. She was not very approachable.

Not a feature changed in the woman's reserved face; she went on with
her work in silence, her lips compressed. The wood was split up by
means of her powerful blows, and the pieces flew around her. Was she
listening at all to what the man was saying to her?

Yes--the spectators exchanged a hasty glance--and now she was
answering too in a more lively manner than they would have supposed,
judging from her sullen appearance.

Lisa Solheid raised her arm and pointed to the cottage in which the
little one was still screaming. Her speech--an almost barbaric
dialect--sounded rough, they understood nothing of it except a French
word here and there. The vestryman spoke Walloon too. Both of them
became excited, raised their voices and spoke to each other in a
loud voice; it sounded almost like quarrelling.

They did not seem to agree. Käte listened in suppressed terror.
Would she give it? Would he get it from her?

She pulled her husband's sleeve when nobody was looking. "Offer
more, give her some more, a hundred thalers is much too little." And he
must also promise the peasant something for his trouble. A hundred, two
hundred, three hundred, a hundred times a hundred would not be too
much. Oh, how the poor child was screaming. She could hardly bear to
stand outside the door doing nothing any longer.

Little Jean-Pierre's sister and brothers--a beautiful girl with
untidy hair and three younger brothers--stood with their fingers in
their mouths, their dirty noses unwiped, and did not move from the
spot.

Their mother spoke to them angrily, "Off with you!" And they darted
off, one almost tumbling over another. They scraped the key out of the
little hole under the door, and the biggest of them thrust it into the
rusty lock, and, standing on her toes, turned it with all the strength
of her small hands.

Then the woman turned to the strange lady and gentleman; she made a
gesture of invitation with her thin right hand: "Entrez."

They stepped in. It was so low inside that Paul Schlieben had to
bend his head so as not to knock against the beams in the ceiling, and
so dark that it took a considerable time before they could distinguish
anything at all. It could not have been poorer anywhere--one single
room in all. The hearth was formed of unhewn stones roughly put
together, above it hung the kettle in an iron chain that was made fast
to the blackened beam; the smoke from the smouldering peat ascended
into the wide sooty chimney. A couple of earthenware plates in the
plate-rack--cracked but with gay-coloured flowers on them--a couple of
dented pewter vessels, a milk-pail, a wooden tub, a long bench behind
the table, on the table half a loaf of bread and a knife, a few clothes
on some nails, the double bed built half into the wall, in which the
widow no doubt slept with the children now, and little Jean-Pierre's
clumsy wooden cradle in front of it--that was all.

Really all? Käte looked round, shivering a little in the cold dark
room that was as damp as a cellar. Oh, how poor and comfortless. There
were no ornaments, nothing to decorate it. Oh yes, there was a
glaringly gaudy picture of the Virgin Mary--a coarse colour-print on
thin paper--a vessel for holy water made of white china beneath it, and
there on the other wall close to the window so that the sparse light
fell on it the picture of a soldier. A framed and glazed picture in
three divisions; the same foot-soldier taken three times. To the
left, shouldering his arms, on guard before the black and white
sentry-box--to the right, ready to march with knapsack and cooking
utensils strapped on his back, bread-bag and field-flask at his
side, gun at his feet--in the centre, in full dress uniform as a
lance-corporal, with his hand to his helmet saluting.

That was no doubt the man, Michel Solheid as a soldier. Käte cast a
timid glance at the picture--that man had been shot in the Venn whilst
smuggling. How terrible! She heard the old man tell the story once
more, saw the bleeding man lying in the heather, and the horror of his
tragic end made her shudder. Her glance fell on the picture again and
again, the usual picture of a soldier which told nothing whatever in
its stereotyped inanity, and then on little Jean-Pierre's cradle. Did
he resemble his father much?

Paul Schlieben had expected his wife to speak--she would of course
know best what to say to the other woman--but she was silent. And the
vestryman did not say anything either; as he had started the
negotiations he considered it polite to let the gentleman speak now.
And Lisa Solheid was also silent. All she did was to drive away the
children, who wanted to fall upon the hard bread on the table with
ravenous appetites, with a silent gesture. Then she stood quietly
beside the cradle, her right hand, which still held the axe with which
she had cut the wood, hanging loosely by her side. Her face was gloomy,
forbidding, and still a struggle was reflected on it.

Paul Schlieben cleared his throat. He would have preferred some
other person to have settled the matter for him, but, as this other
person was not there and the vestryman only looked at him expectantly,
he was compelled to speak. With an affability which might have been
taken for condescension but which was nothing but embarrassment he
said: "Frau Solheid, the vestryman will have told you what has brought
us to you--do you understand me, my good woman?"

She nodded.

"It's our intention to take your youngest child away with us"--he
hesitated, for she had made a movement as though she wanted to deny
it--"as our own, to adopt it. Do you understand?"

She did not answer, but he continued with as much haste as if she
had said yes. "We will treat it as if it really were our own. We shall
be able to do more for it than you would, of course, and we----"

"Oh, and we'll love it so," his wife broke in.

The black-eyed woman turned her head slowly to the side where the
fair-haired lady was standing. It was a peculiar look with which she
scanned the stranger, who had now approached the cradle. Was it
a scrutinising look or a forbidding one? A friendly or unfriendly
one?

Käte looked at the child with longing eyes. It was no longer crying,
it even smiled, and now--now it stretched out its little arms. Oh, it
was already so intelligent, it was looking at her, it noticed already
that she was fond of it. It tried to get up--oh, it wanted to go to
her, to her!

Her face flushed with joy. She had already stretched out her hands
to take the child, when its mother pushed herself in front of the
cradle like a wall.

"Neni,"[A] she said in Walloon, in a hard voice. She raised her
empty left hand to ward Käte off. And then she made the sign of the
cross on the child's forehead and then on its breast.



[Footnote A: Non.]



But why, why would she not give it all at once? Käte trembled with
dismay. She cast an imploring look at her husband, as much as to say:
"Help me. I must have the child."

And then her husband said what he wanted to say before when his wife
had cut him short: "We will secure your child's future. Do you know
what that means, my good woman? It will never have to trouble about its
daily bread--never have to hunger. Never have to work to prolong its
life--only work for the pleasure of working. Do you understand?"

Work--for the pleasure of working? The woman shook her head, she did
not understand him. But then the words came into her mind: never
hunger!--and a light shone in her dull eyes. Never hunger--ah, the
woman understood that; and still she shook her head again: "Neni!"

She pointed to herself and the other children, and then to the great
Venn outside with a comprehensive gesture:

"Nos avans tortos faim."[A] She shrugged her shoulders with the
equanimity of one who is accustomed to it, and it even looked as though
she wanted to smile; the corners of her sullen mouth did not droop
quite so much, her lips that were generally tightly closed showed her
strong healthy teeth.

The vestryman stepped in now: "'Pon my word, Lisa, to hunger is
surely no pleasure. Good heavens, how can you be so foolish! The child
will be taken from hell to heaven. Remember what I've told you, the
lady and gentleman are rich, very rich, and they are mad on the
child--quick, give it to them, you still have four."

Still four! She nodded reflectively, but then she threw her head
back, and a look--now it was plain, something like hatred flickered in
it--flew to the others standing there so rich, so fine, with rings on
their ringers, and at whom her Jean-Pierre was peeping. "Neni!" She
repeated it once more and still more curtly and more obstinately than
before.

But the vestryman was tenacious, he knew the people he had to deal
with. "You must think it over," he said persuasively. "And they'll give
you a good sum, I tell you--won't you?" he asked, turning to the
gentleman. "Haven't you said you weren't particular to a coin or two
in the case of such a poor woman?"

"No, certainly not," assured Paul. And Käte was too precipitate
again. "It does not matter at all to us--we will gladly give what she
asks--oh, the dear child!"

"Dju n' vous nin,"[B] muttered the woman.



[Footnote A: Nous avons tous faim.]

[Footnote B: Je ne veux pas.]



"You won't? Oh, nonsense." The old peasant almost laughed at her.
"You are just like my Mayflower when she won't stand, and kicks the
milk-pail with her hind foot. Don't offend the people. What advantage
will it be to you if they grow impatient and go away? None at
all. Then you will have five who call out for bread, and the winter is
near at hand. Do you want to have such a winter as you had last
year? Didn't Jean-Pierre almost die of cold? The four others are
already older, it's easier to rear them. And you can get a cow for
yourself--just think of that, a cow. And you could have a better roof
put on the house, which won't let the rain and the snow come through,
and could have enough cranberries as well. It would certainly be a good
stroke of business, Lisa."

Käte wanted to add something more--oh, what a lot of good she would
do the woman, if she would only give the child to her!--but the old man
cleared his throat and winked at her covertly to warn her that she was
to be silent.

"Kubin m'e dinroz--ve?"[A] inquired the woman all at once.



[Footnote A: Combien me donnerez-vous donc?]



She had been standing undecided for a long time with her head bowed,
and a deep silence had reigned around her. The strange lady and
gentleman had not moved, nor had the vestryman; no wind had whistled in
the chimney, no fire crackled. A silent expectation weighed on them
all. Now she raised her head, and her gloomy eyes glanced at the
miserable room, the small quantity of bread on the table and then at
the hungry four, as though examining everything. She no longer looked
at the fifth child. She had grown pale, the deep sunburn on her face
had turned a greyish colour.

"What's he going to give you? Well, what will you give her?" said the
peasant encouragingly. "I think you'll see that two hundred is too
little. The woman is very much attached to the child, it will not be
easy for her to give it up." He watched Paul Schlieben out of the
corner of his eye, and called out as they call out at an auction: "Two
hundred, two hundred and fifty, three hundred. 'Pon my word, it
isn't too much. Jean-Pierre is a fine boy--just look at his fists. And
his thighs. A splendid fellow." He noticed the longing expression in
Käte's eyes--"Three hundred thalers is not worth talking about for the
boy, is it, ma'am?"

Käte had tears in her eyes and was very pale. The air in the cottage
oppressed her, it was all very repugnant to her--let them only get away
quickly from there. But not without the child. "Four hundred--five
hundred," she jerked out, and she gazed imploringly at her husband as
though to say: "Do settle it quickly."

"Five hundred, willingly." Paul Schlieben drew out his pocket-book.

The peasant craned his neck forward the better to see. His eyes were
quite stiff in his head, he had never seen anybody pay so willingly
before. The children, too, stared with wide-open eyes.

The woman cast a hasty glance at the notes the gentleman spread on
the table near the bread; but the covetous light that flashed in her
eyes disappeared suddenly again. "Neni," she said sullenly.

"Offer her some more--more," whispered the old man.

And Schlieben laid another couple of notes on the table beside the
others; his fingers trembled a little as he did it, the whole thing was
so unspeakably repugnant to him. He had never thought of haggling; they
should have what they wanted, only let them get done with it.

Nikolas Rocherath could not contain himself any longer at the sight
of such generosity--so much money on the table, and that woman could
still hesitate? He rushed up to her and shook her by the shoulders:
"Are you quite mad? Six hundred thalers on the table and you don't take
them? What man here can say he has six hundred thalers in cash? What
money, what a sum of money!" His emaciated face, which had grown very
haggard from years of toil and a life lived in wind and storm
and which was as sharply outlined as though cut out of hard wood,
twitched. His fingers moved convulsively: how was it possible that
anybody could still hesitate?

The axe which the woman still held fell out of her hand with a loud
noise. Without raising her head, without looking at the table or at the
cradle she said in a loud voice--but there was no ring in the voice:
"Allons bon. Djhan-Pire est da vosse."[A]



[Footnote A: Eh bien. Jean-Pierre est à vous.]



And she turned away, walked to the hearth with a heavy tread and
raked up the smouldering peat.

What indifference! This woman certainly did not deserve to be a
mother. Käte's gentle eyes began to blaze. Schlieben was angry too; no,
they need not have any scruples about taking the child away from there.
He was filled with disgust.

The woman behaved now as though the whole affair did not concern her
any longer. She busied herself at the hearth whilst the vestryman
counted the notes--licking his fingers repeatedly and examining both
sides of each one--and then put them carefully into the envelope which
the gentleman had given him.

"There they are, Lisa, put them into your pocket."

She tore them out of his hand with a violent gesture, and, lifting
up her dress to a good height, she slipped them into her miserable
ragged petticoat.

The last thing had still to be settled. Even if Paul Schlieben felt
certain that nobody there would inquire about the child any more,
the formalities had to be observed. Loosening his pencil from his
watch-chain--for where was ink to come from there?--he drew up the
mother's deed of surrender on a leaf from his pocketbook. The vestryman
signed it as witness. Then the woman put her three crosses
below; she had learnt to write once, but had forgotten it again.

"There!" Paul Schlieben rose from the hard bench on which he had sat
whilst writing with a sigh of relief. Thank goodness, now everything
was settled, now the vestryman had only to procure him the birth and
baptismal certificates and send them to him. "Here--this is my address.
And here--this is for any outlay." He covertly pressed a couple of gold
coins into the old man's hand, who smiled when he felt them there.

Well, now they would take the boy with them at once? he
supposed.

Käte, who had been standing motionless staring at the mother with
big eyes as though she could not understand what she saw, woke up. Of
course they would take the child with them at once, she would not leave
it a single hour longer there. And she took it quickly out of the
cradle, pressed it caressingly to her bosom and wrapped it up in the
warm wide cloak she was wearing. Now it was her child that she had
fought such a hard battle for, had snatched from thousands of dangers,
her darling, her sweet little one.

Little Jean-Pierre's sister and brothers stood there in silence with
eyes wide open. Had they understood that their brother was going away,
going for ever? No, they could not have understood it, otherwise they
would have shown how grieved they were. Their big eyes were only
interested in the bread on the table.

Paul Schlieben pitied the little ones greatly--they would remain
there in their wretchedness, their hunger, their poverty. He stuck a
present into the hands of all four. None of the four thanked him for
it, but their small fingers clasped the money tightly.

The woman did not thank him either. When the strange lady took
Jean-Pierre out of the cradle--she had seen it without looking
in that direction--she had started. But now she stood motionless near
the empty cradle, on the spot where the axe had fallen out of her right
hand before with a loud noise, looking on in silence whilst Jean-Pierre
was being wrapped up in the soft cloak. She had nothing to give
him.

Paul Schlieben had feared there would be a scene at the very last in
spite of the mother's indifference--she surely could not remain so
totally void of feeling, when they carried her youngest child away
with them?--but the woman remained calm. She stood there motionless,
her left hand pressed against the place in her skirt where she
felt the pocket. Did not that money in her pocket--Paul felt very
disturbed--give the lie to all the traditions about a mother's love?
And still--the woman was so demoralised by her great poverty, half
brutalised in the hard struggle for her daily bread, that even the
feeling she had for the child she had borne had vanished. Oh, what a
different mother Käte would be to the child now. And he pushed his
wife, who had the little one in her arms, towards the door, in his
tender anxiety for her.

Let them only get away, it was not a nice place to be in.

They hastened away. Käte turned her head once more when she reached
the threshold. She would have to cast a glance at the woman who
remained behind so stiff and silent. Even if she were incomprehensible
to her, a compassionate glance was her due.

Then ... a short cry, but loud, penetrating, terrible in its
brevity, a cry that went through nerve and bone. One single
inarticulate cry that agony and hatred had wrung from her.

The woman had stooped down. She had snatched up the axe with which
she had chopped the wood. She raised her arm as though to throw
something--the sharp edge flashed past the lady's head as she hurried
away, and buried itself in the door-post with a crash.




CHAPTER V


They had hastened away with the child as though they were running away.
They had bundled it into the carriage--quick, quick--the coachman had
whipped up the horses, the wheels had turned round with a creaking
noise. The village in the Venn remained behind them, buried like a bad
dream one wants to forget.

A dull grey lay over the Venn. The sun, which had been shining in
the morning, had quite disappeared, as though not a single beam had
ever been seen there. The Venn mist, which rises so suddenly, was there
covering everything. There was a wall now where there had been a wide
outlook before. A wall not of stone and not of bricks, but much
stronger. It did not crack, it did not burst, it did not totter, it did
not give way before the hammer wielded by the strongest hand. It shaped
itself out of the morasses, powerful and impenetrable, and stretched
from the moor up to the clouds--or was it the clouds that had lowered
themselves to the earth?

The heavens and the Venn, both alike. Nothing but grey, a tough,
damp, cold, liquid and still firm, unfathomable, mysterious, awful
grey. A grey from which those who lose themselves on the moor never
find their way out. The mist is too tenacious. It has arms that grip,
that embrace so tightly, that one can neither see forward nor backward
any more, neither to the left nor to the right, that the cry
that wants to escape from a throat that is well-nigh choked with terror
is drowned, and that the eye becomes blind to every road, every
footprint.

The driver cursed and beat his horses. There was nothing more to be
seen of the road, nothing whatever, no ditch at the side of it, no
telegraph poles, no small rowan trees. The broad road that had been
made with such difficulty had disappeared in the grey that enfolded the
Venn. It was fortunate that the horses had not lost their way as yet.
They followed their noses, shook their long tails, neighed shrilly and
trotted courageously into the sea of mist.

Käte shuddered as she wrapped herself and the child up more tightly;
they required all the warm covering now which they had taken with them
so providently. Her husband packed her up still more securely, and then
laid his arm round her as though to protect her. It was a terrible
journey.

They had had the carriage closed, but the cold grey forced its way
in notwithstanding. It penetrated through all the crevices, through the
window-panes, filled the space inside so that their faces swam in the
damp twilight like pale spots, and laid itself heavily, obstructively
on their breath.

Käte coughed and then trembled. There was no joy in her heart now,
all she felt was terror, terror on account of the possession she had
had to fight so hard to obtain. If the mother were to come after them
now--oh, that terrible woman with the glittering axe. She closed
her eyes tightly, full of a horror she had never felt the like to
before--oh, she could not see it again! And still she opened her eyes
wide once more, and felt the cold perspiration on her brow and her
heart trembling--alas, that sight would pursue her even in her dreams.
She would not get rid of it until her last hour--never, never
again--she would always see that woman with the glittering axe.

It had whizzed close past her head--the draught of air caused by it
had made the hair on her temples tremble. It had done nothing to her,
it had only buried itself in the door-post with a loud noise, splitting
it. And still she had come to harm. Käte pressed both her hands to her
temples in horror: she would never, never get rid of that fear.

Her heart was filled with an almost superstitious dread, a dread as
though of a ghost that haunted the place. Let them only get away from
there, never to return. Let them only destroy every trace as they went
along. That woman must never know where they had gone. She knew
it was to Berlin--they had unfortunately given the vestryman their
address--but Berlin was so far away, the woman from the Venn would
never come there.

And the Venn itself? Ugh! Käte looked out into the grey mist,
trembling with horror. Thank God, that would remain behind, that would
soon be forgotten again. How could she ever have considered this
desolate Venn beautiful? She could not understand it. What charm was
there about these inhospitable plains, on which nothing could grow
except the coarse grass and tough heather? On which no corn waved its
spikes, no singing-bird piped its little song, no happy people lived
sociably; where there was, in short, no brightness, no loud tones, only
the silence of the dead and crosses along the road. It was awful
there.

"Paul, let us leave to-day--as quickly as possible," she jerked out,
full of terror, whilst her eyes sought in vain for a glimpse of
light.

He was quite willing. He felt ill at ease too. If this woman, this
fury, had hit his wife in her sudden outburst of rage? But he
could not help blaming himself: who had bade him have anything to do
with such people? They were not a match for such barbarous folk.

And he was seized with a feeling of aversion for the child sleeping
so peacefully on his wife's arm. He looked gloomily at the little face;
would he ever be able to love it? Would not the memory of its
antecedents always deter him from liking it? Yes, he had been too
precipitate. How much better it would have been if he had dissuaded his
wife from her wish, if he had energetically opposed her romantic idea
of adopting this child, this particular child.

He frowned as he looked out of the window, whilst the grey mist
clung to the pane and ran down it in large drops.

The wind howled outside; it had risen all at once. And it howled
still louder the nearer they approached the top of the high Venn,
whined round their carriage like an angry dog and hurled itself against
the horses' chests. The horses had to fight against it, to slacken
their trot; the carriage only advanced with difficulty.

The child must never, never know from whence it came, as
otherwise--the new father was wrapped in thought as he stared into the
Venn, whose wall of mist was now and then torn asunder by a furious
gust of wind--as otherwise--what was he going to say? He passed his
hand over his brow and drew his breath heavily. Something like fear
crept over him, but he did not know why.

As he cast a look at his wife, he saw that she was quite absorbed in
the contemplation of the sleeping child, which did not lessen his ill
humour. He drew away her right hand, with which she was supporting its
head that had fallen back: "Don't do that, don't tire yourself like
that. It will sleep on even without that." And as she gave an anxious
"Hush!" terrified at the thought that the little sleeper might
have been disturbed, he said emphatically, "I must tell you one thing,
my child, and must warn you against it, don't give him your whole heart
at once--wait a little first."

"Why?" Something in his voice struck her and she looked at him in
surprise. "Why do you say that so--so--well, as if you were vexed?"
Then she laughed in happy forgetfulness. "Do you know--yes, it was
horrible, awful in those surroundings--but thank God, now it's over. A
mother forgets all she has suffered at the birth of her child so
quickly--why should I not forget those horrors to-day too? Do
look"--and she stroked little Jean-Pierre's warm rosy cheek carefully
and caressingly as he slept--"how innocent, how lovely. I am so happy.
Come, do be happy too, Paul, you are generally so very kind. And now
let's think about what we are to call the boy"--her voice was very
tender--"our boy."

They no longer heard the wind that had increased to a storm by now.
They had so much to consider. "Jean-Pierre," no, that name should not
be kept in any case. And they would go from Spa to Cologne that
evening, as they would not dare to engage a nurse before they were
there; not a single person there would have any idea about the Venn, of
course. And they would also buy all the things they required for the
child in Cologne as soon as possible.

How were they to get on until then? Paul looked at his wife quite
anxiously: she knew nothing whatever about little children. But she
laughed at him and gave herself airs: when Providence gives you
something to do, it also gives you the necessary understanding. And
this little darling was so good, he had not uttered a sound since they
left. He had slept the whole time as though there was nothing called
hunger or thirst, as though there was nothing but her heart on
which he felt quite at ease.

It gradually became more comfortable in the carriage. It seemed as
though a beneficial warmth streamed forth from the child's body, as it
rested there so quietly. The breath of life ascended from its strong
little chest that rose and fell so regularly; the joy of life glowed in
its cheeks that were growing redder and redder; the blessings of life
dropped from those tiny hands that it had clenched in its sleep. The
woman mused in silence and with bated breath as she gazed at the child
in her lap, and the man, who felt strangely moved, took its tiny fist
in his large hand and examined it, smiling. Yes, now they were
parents.

But outside the carriage the air was full of horrors. It is only in
the wild Venn that there can be such storms in autumn. Summer does not
depart gently and sadly there, winter does not approach with soft,
stealthy steps, there is no mild preparatory transition. The bad
weather sets in noisily there, and the warmth of summer changes
suddenly into the icy cold of winter. The storm whistles so fiercely
across the brown plateau that the low heather bends still lower and the
small juniper trees make themselves still smaller. The wind in the Venn
chases along whistling and shrieking, clamouring and howling, pries
into the quagmires and turf pits, whips up the muddy puddles, throws
itself forcibly into the thickets of fir trees that have just been
replanted, so that they groan and moan and creak as they cower, and
then rages on round the weather-worn crosses.

The blast roars across the moor like the sound of an organ or is it
like the roar of the foaming breakers? No, there is no water there that
rises and falls and washes the beach with its white waves, there is
nothing but the Venn; but it resembles the sea in its wide expanse.
And its air is as strong as the air that blows from the sea, and
the shrill scream of its birds is like the scream of the sea-mew, and
nature plays--here as there--the song of her omnipotence on the organ
of the storm with powerful touch.

The small carriage crept over the top of the high Venn. The winds
wanted to blow it down, as though it were a tiny beetle. They hurled
themselves against it, more and more furiously, yelped and howled as
though they were wolves, whined round its wheels, snuffed round its
sides, made a stand against it in front and tugged at it from behind as
though with greedy teeth: away with it! And away with those sitting
inside it! Those intruders, those thieves, they were taking something
away with them that belonged to the Venn, to the great Venn alone.

It was a struggle. Although the driver lashed away at them the brave
horses shied, then remained standing, snorting with terror. The man was
obliged to jump off and lead them some distance, and still they
continued to tremble.

Something rose out of the pits and beckoned with waving gauzy
garments, and tried to hold fast with moist arms. There was a
snatching, a catching, a reaching, a tearing asunder of mists and a
treacherous rolling together again, a chaos of whirling, twirling,
brewing grey vapours; and plaintive tones from beings that could not be
seen.

Had all those in the graves come to life again? Were those rising
who had slept there, wakened by the snorting of the horses and the
crack of the whip, indignant at being disturbed in their rest? What
were those sounds?

The quiet Venn had become alive. Piercing sounds and whistling
shrill cries and groaning and the flapping of wings and
indignant screams mingled with the dull roar of the organ of the
storm.

A flight of birds swam through the sea of mist. They rowed to the
right, they rowed to the left, looked down uneasily at the strange
carriage, remained poised above it for some moments with wings spread
out ready to strike it to the ground, and then uttered their cry, the
startled, penetrating cry of a wild bird. There was nothing triumphant
about it to-day--it sounded like a lamentation.

And the Venn wept. Large drops fell from the mist. The mist itself
turned into tears, to slowly falling and then to rushing, streaming,
never-ending tears.




CHAPTER VI


The Schliebens had reached Berlin safely. Käte was exhausted when she
got out of the train; her hair was untidy, she did not look quite so
smart as usual. It had been no trifle to make that long journey with
the child. But they had been fortunate hi finding a good nurse so
quickly in Cologne--a widow, fond of children and experienced, a
typical, comfortable-looking nurse; however, the mother had had enough
to see to all the same. Had the child caught cold, or did it not like
its bottle? It had cried with all the strength of its lungs--no
carrying about, rocking, dandling, singing to it had been of any
avail--it had cried with all its might the whole way to Berlin.

But, thank goodness, now they were at home. And everything was
arranged as quickly as if by magic. True, the comfortable house they
had had before was let, but there was villa after villa in the
Grunewald, and, as they required so much more room now, they moved into
one of those. They rented it to begin with. Later on they would no
doubt buy it, as it was quite impossible to take a child like this one
into a town. It would have to have a garden.

They called him Wolfgang. "Wolf" had something so concise, vigorous,
energetic about it, and--Käte gave a slight happy shudder as she
thought of it--it was like a secret memory of the Venn, of that
desolate spot over which they had triumphed, and to which they made
only this slight concession. And did not "Wölfchen"--if they made that
the diminutive of Wolf--sound extremely affectionate?

"Wölfchen"--the young mother said it about a hundred times every
day.

The young mother? Oh yes, Käte felt young. Her child had made her
young again, quite young. Nobody would have taken her for thirty-five,
and she herself least of all. How she could run, how she could fly
upstairs when they said: "The child is awake. It's screaming for its
bottle."

She, who had formerly spent so many hours on the sofa, never found a
moment's time to lie down the whole day; she slept all the more soundly
at night as a result. It was quite true what she had heard other women
say: a little child claims its mother's whole attention. Oh, how empty,
colourless those days had been in which she had only existed. It was
only now that there was meaning, warmth, brilliancy in her life.

She walked every day beside the child's perambulator, which the
nurse pushed, and it was a special pleasure to her to wheel the light
little carriage with its white lacquer, gilt buttons and blue silk
curtains herself now and then. How the people stared and turned round
when they saw the handsome perambulator--no, the beautiful child. Her
heart beat with pleasure, and when her flattered ear caught the cries
of admiration, "What a fine child!" "How beautifully dressed!" "What
splendid eyes!"--it used to beat even more quickly, and a feeling of
blissful pride took possession of her, so that she walked along with
head erect and eyes beaming with happiness. Everybody took her to be
the mother, of course, the young child's young mother, the beautiful
child's beautiful mother. How often strangers had already
spoken to her of the likeness: "The exact image of you, Frau Schlieben,
only its hair is darker than yours." Then she had smiled every time and
blushed deeply. She could not tell the people that it really could not
resemble her at all. She hardly remembered herself now that not a drop
of her blood flowed in Wölfchen's veins.

It looked at her the first thing when it awoke. Its little bed with
its muslin curtains stood near the nurse's, but its first look was for
its mother and also its last, for nobody knew how to sing it to sleep
as well as she did.

           "Sleep sound, sweetest child,
            Yonder wind howls wild.
            Hearken, how the rain makes sprays
            And how neighbour's doggie bays.
            Doggie has gripped the man forlorn
            Has the beggar's tatter torn----"

sounded softly and soothingly in the nursery evening after evening,
and little Wolf fell quietly asleep to the sound of it, to the song of
the wind and the rain round defenceless heads, and of beggars whose
garments the dog had torn.

Paul Schlieben had no longer any cause to complain of his wife's
moods. Everything had changed; her health, too, had become new, as it
were, as though a second life had begun. And he himself? He felt much
more inclination for work now. Now that he had returned to business he
felt a pleasure he had never experienced before when he saw that they
were successful in their new ventures. He had never been enterprising
before--what was the good? He and his wife had ample for all their
requirements. Of course he had always been glad to hear when they had
done a good stroke of business, but he could not say it had ever
pleased him to make money. He had always found more pleasure in
spending it.

His father had been quite different in that respect. He had never
been so easy-going, and as long as he lived he had always reproached
himself for having let his only son serve as a soldier in a cavalry
regiment. Something of a cavalryman's extravagance had clung to him,
which did not exactly agree with the views of the very respectable
well-to-do merchant of the middle class. And his daughter-in-law? Hm,
the old gentleman did not exactly approve of her either in his heart.
She had too much modern stuff in her head, and Paul had followed her
lead entirely. You could be cultured--why not?--and also take an
interest in art without necessarily having so little understanding for
the real things of life.

This honest man, this merchant of the old stamp and true son of
Berlin, had not had the joy of seeing what his partners now saw with
unbounded astonishment. They had no need to shrug their shoulders at
the man's lack of interest in the business any longer, and make pointed
remarks about the wife who took up his attention so entirely; now he
felt the interest they wished him to have. He was pleased to fall in
with their plans now. He himself seemed to want, nay, even found it
necessary to form new connections, to extend the calm routine of their
business right and left, on all sides. He showed a capacity for
business and became practical all at once. And in the middle of his
calculations, whilst sitting absorbed at his desk, he would catch
himself thinking: "that will be of use to the boy in the future." But
at times this thought could irritate him so much that he would throw
down his pen and jump up angrily from his desk: no, he had only adopted
the child to please his wife, he would not love him.

And yet when he came home to dinner on those delightful afternoons,
on which he could smell the pines round his house and the pure
air still more increased the appetite he had got from his strenuous
work, and the boy would toddle up to him patting his little stomach and
cry: "Daddy--eat--taste good," and Käte appear at the window, laughing,
he could not refrain from swinging the hungry little chatterbox high up
into the air, and only put him down on his feet again after he had
given him a friendly slap. He was a splendid little chap, and always
hungry. Well, he would always have sufficient to eat, thank God.

A certain feeling of contentment would come over the man on those
occasions. He felt now what he had never felt before, that one's own
home means happiness. And he felt the benefit of having an assured
income, that allowed him to enrich his life with all sorts of comforts.
The house was pretty. But when he bought it shortly he would certainly
add to it, and buy the piece of ground next to it as well. It would be
extremely disagreeable if anybody settled down just under their
noses.

It had been difficult for Paul to make up his mind to take a house
in the Grunewald at the time, after he had lived in Berlin itself as
long as he could remember. But now he looked upon his wife's idea of
going out there as a very good one. And not only for the child's sake.
One enjoyed one's home in quite a different manner out there; one
realised much more what it meant to have a home. And how much healthier
it was--one's appetite certainly became enormous. In time one would
think of nothing but material comforts. And the man followed the hungry
boy into the house, as he also felt quite ready for his dinner.

Wolfgang Solheid, called Schlieben, received his first trousers. It
was a grand day for the whole house. Käte had him photographed in
secret, as there had never been a boy who looked prettier in
his first trousers. And she placed the picture of the little fellow who
was not yet three years old--white trousers, white pleated tunic, horse
under his arm, whip in his hand--in the middle of her husband's
birthday table, surrounded by a wreath of roses. That was the best she
could give him among all the many presents. How robust Wölfchen was.
They had not noticed it so much before; he was as big as a boy of four.
And how defiant he looked, as bold as a boy of five, who is already
dreaming of fighting other boys.

The woman showed the man the picture full of delight, and there was
such a gleam in her eyes that he felt very happy. He thanked her many
times for the surprise and kissed her: yes, this picture should stand
near hers on his writing-table. And then they both played with the boy,
who romped about on the carpet in his first pair of trousers, which he
still found rather uncomfortable.

Paul Schlieben could not remember ever having spent such a pleasant
birthday as this one. There was so much brightness around him, so much
merriment. And even if Wolf had torn his first pair of trousers by
noon--how and where it had been done was quite incomprehensible to the
dismayed nurse--that did not disturb the birthday; on the contrary, the
laughter became all the gayer. "Tear your trousers, my boy, tear away,"
whispered his mother, smiling to herself as the damage was pointed out
to her, "just you be happy and strong."

There was a party in the evening. The windows of the pretty villa
were lighted up and the garden as well. The air was balmy, the pines
spread their branches motionless under the starry sky, and bright
coloured lanterns glittered in the bushes and along the paths that were
overgrown with trees like large glow-worms.

Wölfchen was asleep on the first floor of the villa, in the
only room that was not brightly lighted up. There was nothing but a
hanging lamp of opal there, and every noise was kept away by thick
curtains and Venetian blinds. But they drank his health downstairs.

The guests had already drunk the health of the master of the house
at the table, and then that of his amiable wife--what greater honour
could they pay their popular host and hostess now than to drink the
health of the boy--their boy?

Dr. Hofmann, the tried doctor and friend of the family for many
years, asked if he might have the privilege of saying a few words.
He, as doctor, as counsellor on many an occasion, was best able
to say what had always been wanting there. Everything had been
there, love and complete understanding and also outward happiness,
everything except--here he paused for a moment and nodded to his
hostess who was sitting opposite to him, in a friendly manner full of
comprehension--except a child's laughter. And now that was there too.

"A child's laughter--oh, what a salvation!" he cried with twinkling
eyes and voice full of emotion, as he thought of his own three, who
were certainly already independent and had chosen their paths in life,
but their laughter still sounded in his heart and ear.

"No child--no happiness. But a child brings happiness, great
happiness. And especially in this case. For I, as a doctor, have hardly
ever feasted my eyes on a more magnificent chest, a more splendidly
developed skull, straighter legs and brighter eyes. All his senses are
sharp; the lad hears like a lynx, sees like a falcon, smells like a
stag, feels--well, I've been told that he is already up in arms against
the slightest corporal punishment. It is only his taste that is not so
finely developed as yet--the boy eats everything. However, this is
again a new proof to me of his very great physical superiority,
for, ladies and gentlemen"--at this point the doctor gave a jovial
wink--"who does not agree with me? a good stomach that can stand
everything is the greatest gift a kind Providence can give us on our
journey through life. The boy is a favourite of fortune. A favourite of
fortune in the two-fold meaning of the word for not only is he
perfectly happy in himself, but his entry on the scene has also brought
happiness to those around him. Our dear hostess, for example, have we
ever seen her like this before? So young with those who are young, so
happy with those who are happy? And our honoured friend here--nobody
could imagine that he had climbed to the middle of the forties--he is
as full of energy, of plans and enterprise as a man of twenty. And at
the same time he has the beautiful calm, the comfortable appearance of
the happy father who has had his desires gratified. And this fortunate
boy is the cause of it all. Therefore thanks be to the hour that gave
him, the wind that brought him here. From whence----?"

The doctor, who had a small vein of malice in his nature, here made
a pause intentionally, cleared his throat and straightened his
waistcoat, for he saw many curious eyes fixed on him full of
expectation. But he also saw the quick perturbed look the husband and
wife exchanged, saw that Frau Schlieben had grown pale and was hanging
anxiously, almost imploringly, on his lips, so he continued hastily
with a good-natured laugh: "From whence, ladies--only have patience.
I'll tell you now: he fell from the skies. Just as the falling star
falls to earth on a summer night. And our dear hostess, who was just
going for a walk, held out her apron and carried him home to her house.
And so he has become the star of this house, and we all and I
especially--even if I have become superfluous here in my capacity
of doctor--are pleased with him without asking from whence he came.
All good gifts come from above--we learnt that already in our
childhood--so here's to the health of the boy who fell down to our
friends from the sky."

The doctor had grown serious, there was a certain solemnity about
him as he raised his champagne glass and emptied it: "God bless him! To
the health of the child, the son of the house. May this fortunate lad
grow, thrive and prosper."

The finely cut glasses gave a clear and melodious sound as they
clinked them. There was a buzzing, laughter and cheering at the table,
so that the little fellow upstairs in his bed began to toss about
restlessly. He murmured impatiently in his sleep, pouted and lowered
his brow.

The chairs were moved downstairs. The guests had risen, and, going
up to the parents, had shaken hands with them as though to congratulate
them. Dr. Hofmann had done that really very nicely, really exceedingly
well. But the little fellow was awfully sweet. All the women present
agreed they had rarely seen such a pretty child.

Käte's heart had beaten a little anxiously when the doctor commenced
to speak--surely he would not betray what had only been confided to him
and the lawyer under the influence of a good glass of wine and a good
dinner?--but it was now full of happiness. Her eyes sought her
husband's, and sent him tender, grateful glances covertly. And then she
went to their old friend, the doctor, and thanked him for all his good,
kind words. "Also in Wölfchen's name," she said in a soft, cordial
voice.

"So you are satisfied with me all the same? Well, I'm glad." He drew
her arm into his and walked up and down with her somewhat apart
from the others. "I saw, my dear lady, that you grew uneasy when I
began about the boy's antecedents. What kind of an opinion can you have
of me? But I did so intentionally, I have been burning to find
an opportunity to say what I did for a long time. Believe me, if
I got a two-shilling bit every time I've been questioned about the
boy's parentage--either openly or in a roundabout way--I should be a
well-to-do man by now. I've often felt annoyed at the questions; what I
said just now was the answer to them all. I trust they have understood
it. They can keep their surmises to themselves in the future."

"Surmises?" Käte knit her brows and pressed the doctor's arm. What
did those people surmise?--did they already know something, did they
guess about the Venn? She was seized with a sudden terror. Pictures
passed before her mental vision with lightning speed--there in that
bright festive room--dark pictures of which she did not want to know
anything more.

"How terrible," she said in a low voice that quivered. If the people
got to know anything, oh, then she did not put her thought into words,
for the sudden dread was almost choking her--then they would not get
rid of the past. Then that woman would come and demand her right, and
could not be shaken off any more. "Do you think," she whispered
hesitatingly, "do you think they--they guess--the truth?"

"Oh no, they're very far off the mark," laughed the doctor, but then
he grew grave again directly. "My dear lady, let us leave those people
and their surmises alone." Oh dear, now he had meddled with a delicate
subject, he felt quite hot--what if she knew that they thought that her
Paul, that most faithful of husbands, had duties of a special kind
towards the child?

"Surmises--oh, what is it they surmise?" She urged him to
tell her, whilst her eyes scrutinised his, full of terror.

"Nonsense," he said curtly. "Why do you want to trouble about that?
But I told you and your husband that at once. If you make such a secret
of the boy's parentage, all kinds of interpretations will be placed on
it. Well, you would not hear of anything else."

"No." Käte closed her eyes and gave a slight shudder. "He's our
child--our child alone," she said with a strange hardness in her voice.
"And nobody else has anything to do with him."

He shook his head and looked at her questioningly, surprised at her
tone.

Then she jerked out: "I'm afraid."

He felt how the hand that was lying on his arm trembled
slightly.

Amid the gaiety of the evening something had fallen on Käte's joy
that paralysed it, as it were. Many questions were asked her about
little Wolf--that was so natural, they showed her their friendly
interest by means of these questions--and they watched her quietly at
the same time: it was marvellous how she behaved. They had hardly
believed the delicate woman capable of such heroism. How much she must
love her husband, that she took his child--for the boy must be his
child, the resemblance was too marked, exactly the same features, the
same dark hair--this child of a weak hour to her heart without showing
any ill-will or jealousy. She, the childless woman, to take another
woman's child. That was grand, almost too grand. They did not
understand it quite.

And Käte felt instinctively that there was something concealed
behind the questions they asked her--was it admiration or compassion,
approval or disapproval?--something one could not get hold of, not even
name, only suspect. And that embarrassed her. So she only gave
reserved answers to their friendly questions about Wölfchen, was
concise in what she told them, cool in her tone, and still she could
not hinder her voice vibrating secretly. That was the tender happiness
she felt, the mother's pride she could not suppress, the warmth of her
feelings, which lent her voice its undertone of emotion. The others
took if for quite a different emotion.

The ladies, who took a walk in the garden after the dinner was over,
were chatting confidentially together. The paths that smelt of the
pines and in which the coloured lanterns gave a gentle subdued light
were just suitable for that. They wandered about in twos and threes,
arm in arm, and first of all looked carefully to see if there were any
listeners, for their hostess must on no account hear it. There was
hardly one among the ladies who had not made her observations. How well
she bore up. It was really pathetic to see how resentment and
affection, dislike and warmth struggled to get the mastery as soon as
there was any talk about the child. And how a restless look would steal
into her bright eyes--ah, she must have had and still have much to
contend with, poor thing.

There was only one lady there who said she had known Paul Schlieben
much too long and well not to feel sure that it was ridiculous--nay,
even monstrous--to suppose he would do such a thing. He who was always
such a perfect gentleman, not only in his outward behaviour and
appearance but also in his thoughts, he, the most faithful of husbands,
who even now, after a long married life, was as much in love with his
wife as though they had just been married. The thing was quite
different. They had always wished for children, what was more natural
than that they should adopt one, now that they had finally
given up all hope? Did not other people do the same?

Of course that happened, there was no doubt about it. But then the
particulars were always given as to whether it was an orphan or the
illegitimate offspring of some one moving in the highest circles,
whether it had been offered in the newspaper--"to be given away to
noble-minded people"--or whether it was the child of a girl who had
been left in the lurch or the unwished-for child of parents belonging
to the labouring classes, who had already been too richly blessed with
children, and so on. Something at least was always known about it. But
in this case why was such a secret made of it? Why did they not say
openly: we have got it from there or there, it happened in such and
such a manner?

It was difficult to question Frau Schlieben quite openly about the
little one's parentage. They had already gone to her once with that
intention, but as soon as they had introduced the subject such a
terrified expression had come into the woman's eyes, something so shy
and reserved into her manner, that it would have been more than
tactless to continue the conversation. They were compelled to desist
from questioning her--but it was peculiar, very peculiar.

And the gentlemen in the smoking-room, whom the host had left alone
for a moment, discussed the same theme. The doctor was catechised.

"I say, doctor, your speech was excellent, worthy of a diplomatist,
but you can't deceive us. You don't know anything about the little
chap's antecedents either? Now come!" It especially puzzled both
partners that Schlieben had told them so little. When everything under
the sun was discussed in business, one had also a certain right to know
the man's private affairs too, especially as they had already worked
with the old gentleman. Where would Paul have been now, if they
two had not safeguarded his interests so energetically at the time when
he put everything else before business? Herr Meier, who was already
elderly and very corpulent, and whose good-natured, intelligent face
bore signs of his fondness for a glass of wine, felt really very hurt
at such a want of confidence: "As though we should have placed any
difficulties in the way--absurd! Doctor, just tell us one thing. Did he
get the boy here?"

But the other partner, Herr Bormann, who was somewhat choleric and
had to go to Carlsbad every year, interrupted him sharply. "Well,
really, Meier! And what's it to us? They say they have brought him with
them from their last journey, when they were away so long--good. Where
were they last? They went from Switzerland to the Black Forest and then
to Spa, didn't they?"

"No, to the North Sea," said the doctor quietly. "You can see it as
well, the boy has quite the Frisian type."

"That boy? With his black eyes?" No, there was nothing to be got out
of Hofmann. He looked so innocent that you might have thought he was
speaking seriously instead of joking. Aha, he had taken his stand; he
had made up his mind not to say anything. They would have to let the
subject drop.

The doctor, who had already taxed himself with stupidity in his
heart--oh dear, now he had aroused everybody's curiosity instead of
helping the Schliebens--heard the gentlemen pass on to politics with
great relief.

It was midnight before the last guests left the villa. Their bright
talk and laughter could still be heard distinctly from the end of the
street in the silence of the night, as husband and wife met at the foot
of the stairs leading up to the first floor.

All the windows of the lower rooms were still open, the silver was
still on the table, the costly china stood about--let the servants put
it away for the time being. Käte felt a great longing to see the child.
She had seen so little of him that day--there had been visitors the
whole day. And then what a number of questions she had had to listen
to, what a number of answers she had had to give. Her head was
burning.

As she and her husband met--the man was hurrying out of his room, he
had not even given himself time to lock away the cigars--she had to
laugh: aha, he wanted to go upstairs too. She hung on his arm and they
went up together keeping step.

"To Wölfchen," she said softly, pressing his arm. And he said, as
though excusing himself: "I shall have to see if the noise has not
awakened the boy."

They spoke in an undertone and moved along cautiously like thieves.
They stole into the nursery--there he lay, so quietly. He had thrown
off the covering in his sleep so that his naked rosy little legs were
visible, and a warm, strong and wonderfully fresh smell ascended from
the child's clean healthy body and mingled with the powerful odour of
the pines, that the night sent into the room through the slightly open
window.

Käte could not restrain herself, she bent down and kissed the little
knee that showed dimples in its firm roundness. As she looked up again,
she saw her husband's eyes fixed on the sleeping child with a
thoughtful expression.

She was so used to knowing everything that affected him, that she
asked, "What are you thinking of, Paul? Does anything trouble you?"

He looked at her absently for a few moments and then past her; he
was so lost in thought that he had not heard her question at all. At
last he murmured, "I wonder if it would not be better to be
open about it? Hm." Then he shook his head and thoughtfully stroked his
beard into a point.

"What are you saying? What do you mean? Paul!" She laid her hand on
his.

That aroused him. He smiled at her and said then: "Käte, we must
tell people the truth. Why shouldn't we say where he comes from? Yes,
yes, it's much better, otherwise I fear we shall have a good deal of
unpleasantness. And if the boy does find out in good time that he is
not really our child--I mean our own child--what does it matter?"

"Good gracious!" She threw up her hands as though horrified.
"No--not for the world--no! Never, never!" She sank down on the bed,
spread both her arms over the child's body as though protecting it, and
nestled her head on the warm little breast. "Then he would be lost to
us, Paul."

She took a deep breath and trembled. Her voice expressed such
horror, such a terrible fear and prophetic gravity that it startled the
man.

"I only thought--I mean--I have really long felt it to be my duty,"
he said hesitatingly, as though making a stand against her fear. "I
don't like that the--that people--well, that they talk. Don't be so
funny about it, Käte; why shouldn't we tell?"

"Not tell! You ask why we shouldn't tell? Paul, you know that
yourself. If he gets to know it--oh, that mother! that Venn!"

She clasped the boy even more tightly; but she had raised her head
from his breast. Her face was pale, and her eyes looked quite
bewildered as they stared at her husband. "Have you forgotten her?"

Her tremulous voice grew hard. "No, he must never know it. And I
swear it and you must promise me it as well, promise it
sacredly now, here at his bedside whilst he's sleeping peacefully--and
if I should die, not then either, Paul"--her voice grew louder
and louder in her excitement, and its hard tone became almost a
scream--"we'll never tell him it. And I won't give him up. He's my
child _alone_, our child alone."

Then her voice changed. "Wölfchen, my Wölfchen, surely you'll never
leave your mother?"

Her tears began to stream now, and whilst she wept she kissed the
child so passionately, so fervently that he awoke. But he did not cry
as he generally did when he was disturbed in his sleep.

He smiled and, throwing both his little arms round her neck as she
bent down to him, he said, still heavy with sleep, but yet clearly,
plainly, "Mammy."

She gave a cry of rapture, of triumphant joy. "Do you hear it? He
says 'Mammy.'"

She laughed and cried at the same time in her excessive joy, and
caught hold of her husband's hand and held it fast. "Paul--daddy--come,
give our child a kiss as well."

And the man also bent down. His wife threw her arm round his neck
and drew his head still further down quite close to hers. Then the
child laid the one arm round his neck and the other round hers.

They were all three so close to each other in that calm summer
night, in which all the stars were gleaming and the moonbeams building
silver bridges from the peaceful heavens down to the peaceful
earth.




CHAPTER VII


Those were days of the purest happiness at the Schliebens'. The villa
had been bought now, some rooms had been built on to it, and another
piece of land had been added to the garden as a play-ground. They could
not think of not giving the boy sufficient space to romp about in. Some
sand was brought there, a heap as high as a dune in which to dig. And
when he was big enough to do gymnastics they got him a swing and
horizontal and parallel bars.

But still it was not sufficient. He climbed over all the fences
round the neighbouring villas, over all the walls that were protected
by barbed wire and pieces of glass.

"A splendid lad," said Dr. Hofmann when he spoke _of_ Wolfgang. When
he spoke _to_ him he certainly said: "What a little ruffian you are!
Just you wait till you go to school and they'll soon teach you to sit
still."

Wolf was wild--rather too wild, his mother considered. The boy's
high spirits amused her husband: that was because there was such a
large amount of surplus energy in him. But Käte felt somewhat surprised
at so much wildness--no, she was not really surprised, she knew too
well where all that wildness came from; it frightened her.

She did not scold him when he tore his trousers--oh, they
could be replaced--but when he came home with the first hole in his
head she became incredibly agitated. She scolded him angrily, she
became unjust. She was quite unable to stop the blood--ugh, how it
ran!--she felt as if she were going to have a fit; she dragged herself
into her room with difficulty and remained sitting silently in a
corner, her eyes staring into space.

When her husband reproached her for exaggerating in that manner, she
never answered a word. Then he comforted her: she could feel quite easy
now, the thing was of no moment, the hole was sewn up and the lad as
happy as though it had never happened.

But she shuddered nervously and her cheeks were pale. Oh, if Paul
knew what she had been thinking of, was forced to think of the whole
time! How strange that the same memory did not obtrude itself on him.
Oh, Michel Solheid had laid bleeding on the Venn--blood had dripped on
the ground to-day as on that day. The little boy had not complained,
just as little as his--she fought against using the word even in her
thoughts--as his father, as Michel Solheid had complained. And still
the red blood had gushed out as though it were a spring. How much more
natural it would have been for him to have cried. Did Wolf feel
differently from other children?

Käte went through the list of her acquaintances; there was not a
single child that would not have cried if he had got such a wound, and
he would not have been considered a coward on that account. There was
no doubt about it, Wölfchen was less sensitive. Not only more
insensible to bodily pain, no--and she thought she had noticed it
several times--also more insensible to emotion. Even in the case of
joy. Did not other children show their happiness by clapping their
hands and shouting? Did not they dance round the thing they
wanted--the toy, the doll, the cake--with shouts of delight? He only
held out his hand for it in silence.

He took it because he had been told to do so, without all the
childish chatter, without the rapturous delight that makes it so
attractive and satisfactory to give children gifts.

"As a peasant," her husband used to say. That cut her to the quick
every time he said it. Was Wölfchen really made of such different
material? No, Paul must not say "peasant." Wölfchen was not stupid,
only perhaps a little slow in thinking, and he was shrewd enough. He
had not been born in a large town, that was it; where they lived now
was just like the country.

"You peasant!" The next time his father said it--it was said in
praise and not to blame him, because he was pleased the boy kept his
little garden so well--Käte flew into a passion. Why? Her husband did
not understand the reason for it. Why should he not be pleased? Had not
the boy put a splendid fence round his garden? He had made a palisade
of hazel-sticks into which he had woven flexible willow-twigs, and then
he had covered the whole with pine branches to make it close. And he
had put beans and peas in his garden, which he had begged the cook to
give him; and now he meant to plant potatoes there as well. Had anybody
told him how to do it? No, nobody. The first-rate cook and the
housemaid were both from a town, what did they know about sowing peas
and planting potatoes?

"He's a born farmer," said the father laughing.

But the mother turned away as though in pain. She would much, much
rather have seen her son's garden a mass of weeds than that he should
plant, weed and water so busily.

She had made him a present of some flowers; but they did not
interest him and he was not so successful with them either.
There was only a large sunflower that grew and grew. It was soon as
high as the boy, soon even higher, and he often stood in front of it,
his childish face raised, gazing earnestly into its golden disc for
quite a long time.

When the sunflower's golden petals withered--then its seeds ripened
instead and were examined every day and finally gathered--Wolfgang went
to school. He was already in his seventh year, and was big and strong;
why should he not learn with other children now?

His mother had thought how wonderful it would be to teach him the
rudiments herself, for when she was a young girl with nothing to do at
home and a great wish to continue her studies, she had gone to a
training college and even passed her examination as a teacher with
distinction; but--perhaps that was too long ago, for her strength was
not equal to the task. Especially her patience. He made so little
progress, was so exceedingly slow. Was the boy stupid? No, but dull,
very dull. And it often seemed to her as though she were facing a wall
when she spoke to him.

"You are much too eager," said her husband. But how on earth was she
to make it clear to him that that was an "A" and that an "O," and how
was she to explain to him that if you put one and one together it makes
two without getting eager? She became excited, she took the ball-frame
and counted the blue and red balls that looked like round beads on a
string for the boy. She got hot and red, almost hoarse, and would have
liked to cry with impatience and discouragement, when Wölfchen sat
looking at her with his large eyes without showing any interest, and
still did not know that one bead and one bead more make two beads after
they had worked at it for hours.

She saw to her sorrow that she would have to give up the
lessons. "He'll do better with a master," said her husband,
consolingly. And it was better, although it could not exactly be termed
"good."

Wolfgang was not lazy, but his thoughts were always wandering.
Learning did not interest him. He had other things to think about:
would the last leaves in the garden have fallen when he got home from
school at noon? And would the starling, for whom he had nailed the
little box high up in the pine-tree, come again next spring? It had
picked off all the black berries from the elderberry, and had then gone
away screaming; if it did not find any more elderberries, what would it
eat then? And the boy's heart was heavy with grief--if only he had
given it a little bag of berries when it went away.

Now the pines in the Grunewald were covered with snow. When Wolfgang
had gone to school that morning, his knapsack on his back, the
housemaid at his side, the white layer had crackled and broken under
his boots. It was very cold. And then he had heard a bird's shriek,
that sounded like a hungry croak. The housemaid thought it was an
owl--pooh, what did she know about it? It was a raven, the hungry
beggar in the jet-black coat, like the one in the primer.

And the boy was thinking of it now as he sat on the bench, staring
with big eyes at the blackboard, on which the teacher was writing words
they were to find out. How nice it must be under the pines now. There
flew the raven; brushing the snow off the branches with its black
wings, so that it looked like powder as it fell. Where was he going to
fly to? His thoughts flew far, far away after the raven, as they had
done after the starling. The boy's eyes shone, his chest rose with the
deep breath he drew--at that moment the teacher called to him.

"Wolfgang, are you asleep with your eyes open? What's this?" The boy
gave a start, got red, then pale and knew nothing.

The other boys almost died of laughing--"Are you asleep with your
eyes open?"--that had been too funny.

The teacher did not punish him, but Wolfgang crept home as though he
had been punished. He had hidden from the housemaid, who always came to
fetch him--no, he would not go with her to-day. He had also run away
from his comrades--let them fight without him today, to-morrow he would
throw all the more snowballs at them.

He walked quite alone, turned off from the street and wandered about
aimlessly among the pines. He looked for the raven, but it was far
away, and so he began to run too, run as quickly as he could, and tore
the knapsack off his back with a loud cry, hurling it far from him up
into the broad branches of a pine, so that it hung there and nothing
but snow fell down silently in large lumps. That amused him. He filled
both his hands with snow, made hard balls of it and began to regularly
bombard the pine that kept his knapsack a prisoner. But it did not give
it up, and when he had grown hot and red and tired but very much
cheered, he had to go home without his knapsack.

The housemaid had been back a long time when he arrived. She opened
the door for him with a red face--she had run so hard after him--and an
angry look. "Hm," she said irritably, "you've been kept, I
suppose?"

He pushed her aside. "Hold your tongue!" He could not bear her at
that moment, when coming in from outside where everything had been so
quiet, so free.

His parents were already at table. His father frowned as he
looked at him, his mother asked in a voice of gentle reproach in which
there was also a little anxiety: "Where have you been so long? Lisbeth
has been looking for you everywhere."

"Well?" His father's voice sounded severe.

The boy did not give any answer, it seemed to him all at once as
though his tongue were paralysed. What should he tell those people
sitting indoors about what he had been doing outside?

"He's sure to have been kept at school, ma'am," whispered the
housemaid when she handed the meat. "I'll find it out from the other
boys to-morrow, and tell you about it, ma'am."

"Oh, you!" The boy jumped up; although she had whispered it in a low
voice, he had heard it all the same. His chair fell down behind him
with a crash, and rushing up to the girl with clenched fist he seized
hold of her so roughly that she gave a shrill scream and let the dish
fall out of her hand.

"You goose, you goose!" he howled in a loud voice, and wanted to
strike her. His father only pulled him away with difficulty.

"Wölfchen!" Käte's fork had fallen out of her hand with a clatter,
and she was staring at her boy with dilated eyes.

The maid complained bitterly. He was always like that, he was
unbearable, he had said before to her: "Hold your tongue!" No, she
could not put up with it, she would rather leave. And she ran out of
the room crying.

Paul Schlieben was extremely angry. "You are to be civil to
inferiors. You are to be polite to them, just because they have to
serve. Do you hear?" And he seized hold of the boy with a strong hand,
laid him across his knees and gave him the whipping he so well
deserved.

Wolfgang ground his teeth together and bore the punishment without
uttering a sound and without a tear.

But every stroke fell on his mother's heart. She felt as if she
herself had been beaten and severely bruised. When her husband took his
usual rest after the stormy dinner, smoked, read the paper and took a
little nap between whiles, she crept up to the nursery in which the boy
had been locked. Was he crying?

She turned the key softly--he was kneeling on the chair near the
window, his nose pressed flat against the pane, looking attentively out
at the snow. He did not notice her at all. Then she went away again
cautiously. She went downstairs again, but her mind was not
sufficiently at rest to read in her room; she crept about the house
softly as though she had no peace. Then she heard Lisbeth say to the
cook in the kitchen between the rattling of plates: "I shall certainly
not put up with it. Not from such a rude boy. What has he got to do
here?"

Käte stood rigid, overcome by a terror that paralysed her: what did
she know? She became glowing hot and then icy cold. "Not from such a
rude boy--what has he got to do here?" oh, God, was that the way she
spoke about him?

She ran up to the nursery; Wölfchen was still kneeling at the
window.

No other villa obstructed the view there as yet; from the window one
looked out on a large piece of waste ground, where dandelions and
nettles grew in the sand between hedge mustard in the summer time, but
where the snow lay now, deep and clean, untouched by any footstep. The
short winter evening was already drawing to a close, that white field
was the only thing that still glittered, and it seemed to the mother
that the child's face was very wan in the pale light of the luminous
snow.

"Wölfchen," she called softly. And then "Wölfchen, how could you say
'goose' and 'hold your tongue' to Lisbeth? Oh, for shame! Where did you
get those words from?" Her voice was gentle and sad as she questioned
him.

Then he turned round to her, and she saw how his eyes burned.
Something flickered in them, that looked like a terrified, restless
longing.

She noticed that as well, and quite against all rules of pedagogy
she opened her arms and whispered--after it had escaped from her lips
she did not know herself why she had said it, for he had everything,
everything his heart desired--"You poor child!"

And he ran into her arms.

They held each other tightly, heart beating against heart. They were
both sad, but neither of them knew the reason why, nor why the other
one was sad.

"It's not the whipping," he murmured.

She stroked his straight hair away from his forehead with her soft
hand; she did not ask him any more questions. For--did not something
rise out of that field covered with snow, hover outside the window and
lay its finger on its lips: "Be quiet, do not ask, do not touch
it"?

But she remained with the boy and played with him; she felt as
though she ought not to leave him alone to-day. Yes, she must pay still
more attention to him in the future. All at once the thought fell on
her heart like a heavy weight: she had already left him much too much
to himself. But then she consoled herself again: he was still so young,
his mind was still a piece of quite soft wax, which she could mould as
she liked. He must never again be allowed to stand at the window
staring out at that desolate field with such burning eyes. What was he
longing for? Was not a wealth of love showered on him? And
everything else that delights a child's heart?

She looked round his pretty room. Such a quantity of toys were piled
up in it, trains and steamers, tin soldiers and picture books and all
the newest games.

"Come, we'll play," she said.

He was quite ready to do so; she was surprised how quickly he had
forgotten his sorrow. Thank God, he was still quite an innocent,
unsuspecting child. But how restlessly he threw the toys about. "That's
stupid," and "that's tiresome"--nothing really absorbed his attention.
She soon felt quite exhausted with all her proposals and her endeavours
to induce him to play this or that game. She did not think she had been
so difficult to satisfy as a child. She had wanted to get up and go
away half a dozen times already--no, she really could not stand it any
longer, she had a frantic headache, it had got on her nerves, it was
certainly much easier to stand at the fire and cook or do housework
than play with a child--but her sense of duty and her love kept her
back every time.

She must not leave him alone, for--she felt it with a gloomy
dread--for then somebody else would come and take him away from
her.

She remained sitting with him, pale and exhausted; he had tormented
her a great deal. At last he found a woolly sheep that had been quite
forgotten in the corner of the toy cupboard, a dilapidated old toy from
his childhood with only three legs left. And he amused himself with
that; that pleased him more than the other costly toys. He sat on the
carpet as though he were quite a little child, held the sheep between
his knees and stroked it.

When he lay in bed at last, she still sat beside him holding his
hand. She sang the song with which she had so often sung him to
sleep:

           "Sleep sound, sweetest child,
            Yonder wind howls wild.
            Hearken, how the rain makes sprays
            And how neighbour's doggie bays.
            Doggie has gripped the man forlorn,
            Has the beggar's tatter torn--"

She sang it more and more softly. At last she thought he had fallen
asleep, but then he tore his hand away impatiently: "Stop that song!
I'm not a baby any longer!"

            *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

It was fortunate that there were no street boys in the Grunewald
colony, as Wölfchen would assuredly have played with them; as it was,
his playfellows were only a hall-porter's children. There was certainly
no want of nicer children to play with; school-fellows whose parents
lived in similar villas to theirs used to invite him; and the families
in Berlin, with whom the Schliebens were on friendly terms and who were
pleased when their children could get out to the Grunewald on their
holidays, often asked him to come and see them too.

All children liked to come to the shady garden, where Auntie Käte
was always so kind to them. There was always plenty of cakes and fruit
and hoops and balls and croquet and tennis, ninepins and gymnastic
appliances. On sunny afternoons gay laughter and shrieks used to ascend
high up into the green tops of the pines, but--Käte noticed it with
surprise--her boy, who was generally so wild, was the quietest of them
all on those occasions. He did not care for those visits. He did not
care for those well-behaved boys in white and blue sailor-suits, with
their fresh faces showing above their dazzling collars; he never felt
really at home with them. He would have preferred to have run away to a
place far away from there, where nobody else went except now and then a
beggar with a large bag, who would turn over every bit of paper
with his wire hook to see whether something of value had not been left
there the Sunday before. He would have liked to help that man. Or fill
the large bag with pine-cones.

But still Wolfgang had some friends. There was Hans Flebbe--his
father was coachman at the banker's, who owned the splendid villa on
the other side of the road and lived in Bellevuestrasse in Berlin in
the winter--and there were also Artur and Frida. But their father was
only porter in a villa that was let out to different families.

As soon as these three came home from school, they would stand
outside the Schliebens' villa. They could not be driven away, they
would wait there patiently until Wolfgang joined them.

"He's like a brother to my Hans," the coachman used to say, and he
would greet him with a specially condescending flick of his whip from
his high seat. And the porter and his wife used to state with much
satisfaction: "Yes, old Schlieben always touches his hat, and she, his
lady, also says 'how do you do?' to us in a very friendly style, but
the little one, oh, he's quite different."

Those were wild games the four comrades played together, and in
which Frida was reckoned to be quite a boy: catch, hide and seek, but
best of all, robbers and policemen. How Wolf's eyes sparkled when he,
as the robber captain, gave the policeman, Hans Flebbe, a kick in the
stomach, so that he fell backwards on the ground and lay for a time
without moving from pain.

"I've shot him," he said to his mother proudly.

Käte, who had been called to the window by the noisy shrieks of the
children who were rushing about wildly in the waste field behind the
villa, had beckoned to her boy to come in. He had come unwillingly; but
he had come. Now he stood breathless before her, and she
stroked the damp hair away from the face that was wet with
perspiration: "What a sight you look! And here--look."

She pointed reproachfully to his white blouse that was covered with
dirt. Where in all the world had he made himself so filthy? there were
no real pools there. And his trousers. The right leg was slit open the
whole way down, the left one had a three-cornered hole in the knee.

Pooh, that was nothing. He wanted to rush away again, he was
trembling with impatience; his playfellows were crouching behind the
bush, they dared not come out before he, their captain, came back to
them. He strove against the hand that was holding him; but his
struggles were of no avail that time, his father came out of the next
room.

"You are to stop here. You ought to feel ashamed of yourself to
resist your mother like that. Off with you, go to your room and prepare
your lessons for tomorrow."

Paul Schlieben spoke sharply. It had made him angry to see how the
boy had striven with hands and feet against his delicate wife.

"You rude boy, I'll teach you how to behave to your mother.
Here"--he seized hold of him by the scruff of his neck and dragged him
up to her--"here, beg her pardon. Kiss your good mother's hand. And
promise not to be so wild again, not to behave like a street-boy. Be
quick--well, are you soon going to do it?"

The veins on the man's forehead began to swell with anger. What a
stubborn fellow he was. There he stood, his blouse torn open at front
so that you could see the rapid rise and fall of his chest that was wet
with perspiration--he was not breathing quietly even now, he
was still panting from the rough game--and looking so wild, so
turbulent, not at all like the child of nice parents. This could not go
on any longer.

"You must not tear about like that any more, do you hear?" said his
father severely. "I forbid it. Play other games. You have your garden,
your gymnastic appliances and a hundred things others would envy you.
And now come here, beg your mother's pardon."

The boy went to his mother. She met him half way, she held out her
hand to him already. He kissed it, he mumbled also, "I won't do it
again," but the man did not hear any repentance in his voice. There was
something in the sullen way he said it that irritated him. And he lost
control of himself a little.

"That wasn't an apology. Ask your mother's pardon again--and
distinctly."

The boy repeated it.

"And now promise that you will not rush about like that again. 'Dear
mother, I promise'--well?"

Not a word, no promise.

"What's the meaning of this?" The man shook the boy, beside himself
with anger. But the boy pressed his lips together. He gave his father
an upward look out of his dark eyes.

The woman caught the look--oh, God, that was the look!--that
look--the woman's look!

She put both her arms round the boy protectingly: "Don't, don't
irritate him." She drew him nearer to her and covered his eyes with her
hands, so that he had to close them, and then she cast an imploring
glance at her husband: "Go, do go."

Paul Schlieben went, but he shook his head angrily.

"You'll see what your training will make of the boy." He raised his
hand menacingly once more: "Boy, I tell you, you'll have to obey." And
then he closed the door behind him--he could not even have his
midday rest undisturbed now.

He heard his wife's voice in the next room. It sounded so gentle and
trembled as though with a secret dread. "Wölfchen, Wölfchen, aren't you
my good boy?"

No answer. Good heavens, had the unfeeling scamp no answer to give
to that question uttered in that tone?

Then again the soft trembling voice: "Won't you be my good boy?"

If the boy did not answer now, then--! The blood surged to his head
as he listened against his will, his fingers twitched, he wanted to
jump up and rush in again and--ah, he must have answered now. It was
probably nothing but a silent nod, but Käte's voice sounded intensely
happy: "There you see, I knew you were my good boy, my darling child,
my--my----"

Hm, it was certainly not necessary for Käte to lavish such endearing
tones on the boy, after he had just been so naughty. And she must have
kissed him, put her arms round him. Her voice had died away in a tender
breath.

Paul Schlieben did not hear anything more now; neither the rustling
of her dress nor any other sound--ah, she was probably whispering to
him now. How she spoiled the scamp.

But now--somebody was weeping softly. Was that Wolf's hard, defiant
voice? Yes, he was actually crying loudly now, and between his sobs he
jerked out pitifully--you could hardly understand what he was saying:
"I had to--to shoot him--he's the policeman, you know."

And now everything was quiet again. The man took up his paper once
more, which he had thrown aside before, and commenced to read. But he
could not fix his attention on it, his thoughts wandered obstinately
again and again to the next room. Had the scamp come to his
senses now? Did he see that he had been naughty? And was not Käte much
too weak? There was nothing to be heard, nothing whatever. But
still--was not that the door that creaked? No, imagination. Everything
was quiet.

After waiting a little longer he went into the next room. It was
indeed very quiet there, for Käte was quite alone. She was sitting at
the window, her hands in her lap, pondering. Her thoughts seemed to be
far away.

"Where's the boy?"

She gave a terrified start, and thrust both hands forward as though
to ward off something.

He saw now that she was pale. The vexation she had had on account of
the child had probably shaken her a good deal--just let him wait until
he got hold of him, he should do twice as many sums to-day as a
punishment.

"Is the boy at his lessons?"

She shook her head and got red. "No."

"No? Why not?" He looked at her in amazement. "Didn't I tell him
that he was to go to his lessons at once?"

"You said so. But I told him to run away. Paul, don't be angry." She
saw that he was about to fly into a passion, and laid her hand on his
arm soothingly. "If you love me, leave him. Oh Paul, believe me, do
believe me when I say he can't help it, he must run about, rush about,
be out of doors--he must."

"You always have some excuse. Just think of the story of the
knapsack when first he went to school--the rascal had thrown it up into
a pine-tree. If a labourer had not found it by accident and brought it
to us, because he read our name on the primer, we might have
looked for it for a long time. You excused that--well, that was nothing
very bad--a fit of wantonness--but now you are excusing something quite
different; and everything." The man, who generally yielded to his wife
in all points, grew angry in his grave anxiety. "I implore you, Käte,
don't be so incredibly weak with the boy. Where will it lead to?"

"It will lead him to you and me." She pointed gravely to him and
herself. And then she laid her hand on her heart with an expression of
deep emotion.

"What do you mean? I don't understand you. Please express yourself a
little more clearly, I'm not in a humour to guess riddles."

"If you can't guess it, you'll not understand it either if I say it
more clearly." She bent her head and then went back to her former seat.
But she was not lost in thought any longer, it seemed to him as if she
were leaning forward to catch the shrill shouts of triumph that rose
high above the roof from the waste field at the back of the house.

"You'll never be able to manage the boy."

"Oh yes, I shall."

"Of course you will, if you let him do exactly what he likes." The
man strode quickly out of the room; his anger was getting the mastery
of him.

Paul Schlieben was seriously angry with his wife, perhaps for the
first time in their married life. How could Käte be so unreasonable?
take so little notice of his orders, as though he had never given
them--nay, even act in direct opposition to him? Oh, the rascal was
cunning enough, he drew his conclusions from it already. And if he did
not do so as yet, still he felt instinctively what a support he had in
his mother. It was simply incredible how weak Käte was.

His wife's soft sensitive nature, which had attracted him to
her in the first instance and which had had the same charm for him
all the years they had been married, now seemed exaggerated all at
once--childish. Yes, this timorousness, this everlasting dread of what
was over and done with was childish. They had not heard anything more
about the boy's mother, why then conjure up her shade on all occasions?
They had the boy's birth and baptismal certificates safely in their
hands, and the Venn was far away--he would never see it--why then this
constant, tremulous anxiety? There was no reason whatever for it. They
lived in such pleasant surroundings, their financial position was so
sound, Wolf possessed everything that fills and gladdens a child's
heart, that it was real madness for Käte to suppose that he had a kind
of longing for his home. How in the world should he have got that
longing? He had no idea that this was not really his home. It was sad
that Käte was so hypersensitive. She could positively make others
nervous as well.

And the man passed his hand over his forehead, as though to drive
disagreeable thoughts away with a movement of his hand. He lighted a
cigar. It was an extra fine one to-day, those he generally left for his
guests; he had the feeling that he must have something to help him over
an unpleasant hour. For the thing was unpleasant, really unpleasant and
difficult, even if he hoped in time to solve the question of how to
train such a child satisfactorily. At any rate not as Käte was doing.
That was clear to him already.

Paul Schlieben sat in the corner of the sofa in his study, blowing
blue rings of smoke into the air. His brows were still knit. He had
come home very tired from the office that day, where there had been all
sorts of complications--quite enough annoyance--he had had to dictate
some hurried letters, had not allowed himself a moment's
repose, and had hoped to have a pleasant rest at home--but in vain.
Strange how one child can alter the whole household, one's whole life.
If the boy had not been there?... Ah, then he would have had a short
peaceful nap by now, stretched out on the divan with the newspaper in
front of his face, and would be going across to Käte's room for a cosy
chat and a cup of coffee, which she prepared herself so gracefully on
the humming Viennese coffee-machine. He had always liked to sit and
watch her slender, well-cared-for hands move about so noiselessly. It
was a pity.

He sighed. But then he conquered the feeling: no, one ought not to
wish he were away because of a momentary annoyance. How many happy
hours little Wölfchen had given them. It had been charming to watch his
first steps, to listen to his first connected words. And had not Käte
been very happy to have him--oh, who said _been_ happy?--she was still
so. Nothing could be compared to the boy. And that the hours of
cloudless happiness they had had through him were not so numerous now
as formerly was quite natural. He was not the same little boy any
longer, who had taken his first bold run from that corner over there to
this sofa, and had clung to his father's legs rejoicing at his own
daring; that was all. He was now beginning to be an independent person,
a person with wishes of his own, no longer with those that had been
inculcated; he showed a will of his very own. Now he wanted this and
now he wanted that, and no longer what his teachers wanted. But was not
that natural? On the whole, when a child begins to go to school, what a
great many changes take place. One would have to make allowances, even
if one did not wish to have one's whole way of living influenced by it
first the parents, then the child.

The man felt how he gradually became calmer. A boy--what a
compound of wildness, roughness, unrestraint, ay, unmannerliness is
included in that word! And all, all who were now men had once been
boys.

His cigar went out; he had forgotten to smoke it. The man thought of
his own boyhood with a strangely gentle feeling not entirely free from
a faint longing. Let him only be honest: had he not also rushed about
and made a terrible noise, dirtied himself, got hot and torn his
trousers and been up to pranks, more than enough pranks?

Strange how he all at once remembered some of the severe lectures he
had had given him and the tears he had forced from his mother's eyes;
he also very clearly remembered the whipping he had once got for
telling a lie. His father had said at the time--all at once he seemed
to hear his voice, which had generally sounded anything but solemn, in
fact very commonplace, but which had then been ennobled by the gravity
of the situation, echo in the room: "Boy, I can forgive you everything
else except lies." Ah, it had been very uncomfortable that day in the
small office, where his father had leant against the high wooden desk
holding the stick behind his back. He had pushed the little cap he wore
on account of his baldness to one side in his agitation, his friendly
blue eyes had looked at him penetratingly, and at the same time
sadly.

"One can forgive everything except lies"--well, had the boy, had
Wolfgang told a lie? Certainly not. He had only been naughty, as the
best children are now and then.

The man felt ashamed of himself: and he, he had been so displeased
with the boy simply because he had been naughty?

He got up from the sofa, threw the remains of his cigar into the
ash-tray and went out to look for Wolfgang.

He came across the four in the height of the game. They had lighted
a small fire on the waste piece of ground close behind the garden
railing, so that the overhanging bushes in the garden formed a kind of
roof over them.

They were crouching close together; they were in camp now. Frida had
some potatoes in her pinafore, which were to be roasted in the ashes;
but the fire would not burn, the twigs only smouldered. Wolfgang lay on
his stomach on the ground, resting on his elbows, and was blowing with
all the strength of his lungs. But it was not enough, the fire would
not burn on any account.

Paul Schlieben had come up softly, the children had not noticed him
at all in their eagerness. "Won't it burn?" he asked.

Wolfgang jerked himself up, and was on his feet in a moment. He had
been red and fresh-looking, but now he grew pale, his frank look fell
timidly, a miserable expression lengthened his round, childish face and
made him look older.

"Have I to go in?" It sounded pitiful.

The man pretended not to hear the question; he had really intended
fetching him in, but all at once he hesitated to say so. It was hard
for the boy to have to go away now before the fire burnt, before the
potatoes were roasted. So he said nothing, but stooped down, and as he
was not far enough down even then he knelt down and blew the fire, that
was faintly crackling, with all the breath he had in his broad chest.
Sparks began to leap out at once, and a small flame shot up and soon
turned into a big one.

There was a shout of glee. Frida hopped about in the circle, her
plaits flying: "It's burning, it's burning!" Artur and Hans chimed in
too; they also hopped from the one foot to the other, clapped their
dirty hands and shouted loudly: "It's burning, it's burning!"

"Be quiet, children." The man was amused at their happiness. "Bring
me some twigs, but very dry ones," he ordered, full of eagerness, too,
to keep alive this still uncertain flame, that now disappeared, now
flared up again. He blew and poked and added more twigs. The wind drove
the smoke into his face so that he had to cough, but he wiped his eyes,
that were full of tears, and did not mind that his trousers got wet
green spots from kneeling on the ground, and that chance passers-by
would be greatly surprised to see Herr Paul Schlieben occupied in that
manner. He, too, found it fun now to keep up a fire for roasting
potatoes under the pale, blue autumn sky, in which the white clouds
were scudding along and the twittering swallows flying. He had never
known such a thing--he had always lived in a town--but it was splendid,
really splendid.

The children brought twigs. Wolfgang took them and broke them across
his knee--crack!--the sticks broke like glass. What a knack the boy had
at it.

The flames flared up, the little fire emitted an agreeable warmth;
one could warm one's hands at it--ah, that was really very nice.

And then the man followed the smoke, which the wind raised from the
field like a light cloud, with his eyes. It seemed grey at first, but
the higher it flew the lighter it became, and the friendly sunshine
shone through it, transforming it. It floated upwards, ever upwards,
ever more immaterial, more intangible, until it flew away entirely--a
puff, a whiff.

Now it was about time to bury the potatoes; Wolfgang busied himself
with it. They had not poked the fire any more, the flame had sunk down,
but the ashes hid all the heat. The children stood round with wide-open
eyes, quite quiet, almost holding their breath and yet trembling with
expectation: when would the first potatoes be done? Oh, did
they not smell nice already? They distended their nostrils so as to
smell them. But Paul Schlieben brushed his trousers now and prepared to
go away--it would take too long before the potatoes were ready. He felt
something that resembled regret. But it really would not do for him to
stand about any longer; what would people think of him?

He was himself again now. "That's enough now," he said, and he went
away, carefully avoiding the impracticable parts of the field where the
puddles were. Then he heard steps close behind him. He turned round.
"Wolf? Well, what do you want?"

The boy looked at him sadly out of his dark eyes.

"Are you going home too?" There was astonishment in the man's
question--he had not said that the boy was to go with him.

The pines emitted a splendid smell, you could breathe the air so
freely, so easily, and that pale blue sky with the fleecy white clouds
had something wonderfully clear about it, something that filled the
eyes with light. White threads floated over the countryside, driven
from the clean east, and hung fast to the green branches of the pines,
shimmering there like a fairy web. And the sun was still agreeably warm
without burning, and an invigorating pungent odour streamed from the
golden-coloured leaves of the bushes that enclosed the gardens at the
back.

The man drew a deep breath; he felt as if he had suddenly grown ten,
twenty--no, thirty years younger. Even more.

"Well, run along," he said.

The boy looked at him as if he had not quite understood him.

"Run," he said once more curtly, smiling at the same time.

Then the boy gave a shout, such a shrill, triumphant shout that his
playfellows, who were crouching round the potato fire, joined in
immediately without knowing why.

There was a gleam in the dark eyes of the boy, who loved freedom,
the free air and to run about free. He did not say his father had made
him happy, but he drew a deep breath as if a load had fallen off his
chest. And the man noticed something in his face, that was now
commencing to grow coarser, to lose the soft contours of childhood and
get the sharp ones of youth, that made it refined and beautiful.

Wolfgang flew back across the field as quick as lightning, as if
shot from a tightly strung bow.

The man went back into his garden. He opened the gate cautiously so
that it should not creak, and closed it again just as quietly--Käte
need not know where he had been. But she was already standing at the
window.

There was something touchingly helpless in her attitude, such an
anxious scrutiny in her eyes--no, she need not look at him like that,
he was not angry with her.

And he nodded to her.

When the housemaid asked whether the master did not know where the
young gentleman was--she had had the milk warmed three times already
for him and had run up and downstairs with it--he said in a low voice
with an excuse in the tone: "Oh, that does not matter, Lisbeth. Warm it
for a fourth time later on. It is so healthy for him to be out of
doors."





BOOK II



CHAPTER VIII


It was Frida Lämke's birthday. "If you may come we are to have buns
with raisins in, but if you mayn't there'll only be rolls like we have
every day," she said to her friend Wolfgang. "Mind you get them to let
you come." It was of most importance to her that Wolfgang came; no
differences were made on account of Flebbe, although he always said he
was going to marry her.

And Wolfgang teased his mother. "Let me go--why not? I should like
to so much--why mayn't I?"

Yes, why not? He had kept dinning this "why not?" into her ears for
the last twenty-four hours; it had quite worn her out. What should she
say to him? that she disliked Frida? But what had the girl done that
she had taken a dislike to her? Nothing. She always curtseyed politely,
was always tidily dressed, had even plaited the blue ribbon into her
fair hair with a certain taste. The parents were also quite respectable
people, and still--these children always hung about the streets,
always, both summer and winter. You could pass their house whenever you
liked, those Lämkes were always outside their door. Was it the life of
the streets this snub-nosed girl, who was very developed for her age,
reminded her of? No, he must not go to those people's house, go down
into the atmosphere of the porter's room.

"I don't wish you to go there," she said. She had not the heart to
say: "I won't allow it," when he looked at her with those beseeching
eyes.

And the boy saw his advantage. He felt distinctly: she is struggling
with herself; and he followed it up with cruel pertinacity.

"Let me--oh, do let me. I shall be so sorry if I can't. Then I
shan't care to do anything. Why mayn't I? Mammy, I'll love you so, if
you'll only let me go. Do let me--will you? But I will."

She could not escape from him any more, he followed her wherever she
went, he took hold of her dress, and even if she forbade him to ask her
any more, she felt that he only thought of the one thing the whole
time. So he forced her in that way.

Paul Schlieben was not so averse to his accepting the invitation
from the Lämkes. "Why not? They're quite respectable people. It won't
harm the boy to cast a glance at those circles for once in a way. I
also went to our hall-porter's home as a boy. And why not?"

She wanted to say: "But that was something quite different, there
was no danger in your case"--but then she thought better of it and said
nothing. She did not want to bring him her fears, her doubts, her
secret gnawing dread so soon again, as there was no manifest reason for
them, and they could not be explained as every other feeling can be
after all. Something like a depressing mist always hung over her. But
why should she tell him so? She neither wanted to be scolded nor
laughed at for it; she would resent both. He was not the same man he
used to be. Oh--she felt it with a slight bitterness--how he used to
understand her. He had shared every emotion with her, every vibration
of her soul. But he had not the gift of understanding her
thoughts now--or did she perhaps not understand him any longer?

But he was still her dear husband, her good, faithful husband whom
she loved more than anyone else in the world--no, whom she loved as she
loved Wölfchen. The child, oh, the child was the sun round which her
life revolved.

If Paul only had been as he was formerly. She had to cast a covert
glance at him very frequently now, and, with a certain surprise, also
grow accustomed to his outward appearance. Not that his broadening-out
did not suit him; the slight stoutness his slender figure with its
formerly somewhat stiff but always perfect carriage had assumed suited
his years, and the silver threads that commenced to gleam in his beard
and at his temples. It suited also the comfortable velvet coat he
always put on as soon as he came home, suited his whole manner of
being. Strange that anybody could become such a practical person, to
whom everything relating to business had formerly been such a burden,
nay, even most repugnant. He would not have picked up the strange child
from the Venn now, and--Käte gave her husband a long look--he would not
have taken it home with him now as a gift from fairyland.

Had the years also changed her in the same manner? Her looking-glass
did not show her any very great change. There was still the same
girlish figure, which seemed twice as slender beside her husband's
stoutness. Her hair was still fair, and she still blushed like a young
girl to whom a stray look is enough to make the blood, that flows so
easily, invade her delicate cheeks. Yes, she had still remained young
outwardly. But her mind was often weary. Wolf caused her too much
anxiety. A mother, who was ten, fifteen years younger than she, would
not perhaps feel how every nerve becomes strained when dealing
with such a child as she did. Would not such a mother often have
laughed when she felt ready to cry?

Oh, what a boisterous, inexhaustible vital power there was in that
boy! She was amazed, bewildered, exhausted by it. Was he never tired?
Always on his legs, out of bed at six, always out, out. She heard him
tossing about restlessly at daybreak. He slept in the next room to
theirs, and the door between the rooms always stood open, although her
husband scolded her for it. The boy was big enough, did not want
supervising. They need not have that disturbance at night, at any
rate.

But she wanted to watch over his sleep too; she must do so. She
often heard him talk in his dreams, draw his breath so heavily, as
though something were distressing him. Then she would slip out of bed,
softly, softly, so that her husband should not hear her; she did not
light any candle, she groped her way into the other room on bare feet.
And then she would stand at his bedside. He still had the pretty railed
cot from his first boyhood--but how long would it be before it was too
small? How quickly he was growing, how terribly quickly. She passed her
hand cautiously and lightly over the cover, and felt the boy's long
body underneath it. Then he began to toss about, groan, stiffen himself
like one who is struggling with something. What could be the matter
with him? Then he spoke indistinctly. Of what was he dreaming so
vividly? He was wet through with perspiration.

If only she could see him. But she dared not light a candle. What
should she say to her husband if he, awakened by the light, asked her
what she was doing there? And Wölfchen would also wake and ask her what
she wanted.

Yes, what did she really want? She had no answer ready even for
herself. She would only have liked to know what was occupying his mind
in his dream to such an extent that he sighed and struggled. Of what
was he dreaming? Of whom? Where was he in his dream?

She trembled as she stood at his bedside on her bare feet listening.
And then she bent over him so closely that his breath, uneven and hot,
blew into her face, and she breathed on him again--did not they mingle
their breath in that manner? Was she not giving him breath of her
breath in that manner?--and whispered softly and yet so earnestly,
imploringly and at the same time urgently: "Your mother is here, your
mother is near you."

But he threw himself over to the other side with a jerk, turned his
back on her and mumbled something. Nothing but incomprehensible words,
rarely anything that was distinct, but even that was enough; she felt
he was not there, not with her, that he was far away. Did his soul seek
the home he did not know in his dreams? that he could not even know
about, and that still had such a powerful influence that it drew him
there even unconsciously?

Käte stood at Wolfgang's bedside tortured by such an anxiety as she
had never felt before: a mother and still not mother. Alas, she was
only a strange woman at the bedside of a strange child.

She crept back to her bed and buried her throbbing brows deep in the
pillows. She felt her heart beat tumultuously, and she scolded herself
for allowing her thoughts to dwell on such unavailing things. She did
not change anything by it, it only made her weary and sad.

When Käte rose after such a night she felt her husband's eyes
resting on her anxiously, and her hands trembled as she coiled
up her thick hair. It was fortunate that she dropped a hair-pin, then
she could stoop quickly and withdraw her tired face with the dark lines
under the eyes from his scrutinising glance.

"I'm not at all satisfied with my wife's health again," Paul
Schlieben complained to the doctor. "She's in a terribly nervous state
again."

"Really?" Dr. Hofmann's friendly face became energetic. "I'll tell
you one thing, my dear friend, you must take vigorous measures against
it at once."

"That's no use." The man shook his head. "I know my wife. It's the
boy's doing, that confounded boy!"

And he took Wolfgang in hand. "Now listen, you must not always be
worrying your mother like that. If I notice once more that she is
grieving about you because you are naughty, you shall see what I'll do
to you."

Did he worry his mother? Wolfgang looked very blank. And surely it
was not naughty of him to want to go to the Lämkes? It worried him to
have to sit indoors, whilst the wind was whistling outside and playing
about with one's hair in such a jolly manner. And it worried him, too,
that he was not going to the Lämkes that day.

"Well then, go," said Käte. She even drove into Berlin before dinner
and bought a doll, a pretty doll with fair locks, eyes that opened and
shut, and a pink dress. "Take it to Frida for her birthday when you
go," she said in the afternoon, putting it into the boy's hands. "Stop!
Be careful!"

He had seized hold of it impetuously, he was so delighted to be able
to bring Frida something. And in a rare fit of emotion--he was no
friend of caresses--he put up his face in an outburst of gratitude and
let his mother kiss him. He did not want her kiss, but he
submitted to it, she felt that very well, but still she was glad, and
she followed him with her eyes with a smile that lighted up her whole
face.

"But you must be home again before dark," she called out to him at
the last moment. Had he heard her?

How he ran off, as light-footed as a stag. She had never seen any
child run so quickly. He threw up his straight legs that his heels
touched his thighs every time. The wind blew his broad-brimmed sailor
hat back, then he tore it off and ran on bareheaded, he was in such a
hurry.

What was it that drew him so powerfully to those people?

The smile disappeared from Käte's face; she left the window.

Wolfgang was happy. He was sitting with the Lämkes, in the room in
which they also did the cooking when the weather was cold. The parents'
bed was divided off by means of a curtain, Frida slept on the sofa, and
Artur in the little room next to it in which were also kept the shovels
and brooms which Lämke used for cleaning the house and street.

It was not winter yet, still pleasant autumn, but the room was
already warm and cosy. The stronger smell of the coffee, which Frau
Lämke was making in the large enamelled pot, mingled with the delicate
fragrance of the pale monthly rose and carnation, myrtle and geranium,
which had been pushed close to the window that was almost level with
the ground and were all in flower. At home Wolfgang never got coffee,
but he got some there; and he sipped it as he saw the others do, only
he was even more delighted with it than they. And no fine pastry had
ever tasted so good as did that plain bun, that was more like bread
than like a cake. He ate it with his mouth open, and when Mrs.
Lämke pushed a second one to him, the guest of honour, he took it with
radiant eyes.

Frau Lämke felt much flattered at his visit. But she had not made
much of the doll; she had taken it from Frida at once and locked it
into the cupboard: "So that you don't smash it at once. Besides, your
father isn't a gentleman that you can play with dolls every day." But
later on when her husband came down from the lodge, in which he sat in
his leisure hours mending boots and shoes, to drink a cup of coffee and
eat a bun on Frida's birthday, the doll was fetched out again and shown
him.

"Fine, isn't it? She's got it from Wolfgang's mamma. Just look,
Lämke"--the woman lifted the doll's pink dress up and showed the white
petticoat trimmed with a frill edged with narrow lace--"such trimming.
Just like that I sewed round the dress Frida wore at her christening.
She was the first one; bless you, and you think at the time it's
something wonderful. Oh dear!"--she sighed and laid the doll back in
the cupboard in which the clean pillowcases and Frida's and her Sunday
hats were together with all kinds of odds and ends--"how time flies.
Now she's already nine."

"Ten," corrected Frida. "I'm ten to-day, mother."

"Right--dear me, are you already ten?" The woman laughed and shook
her head, surprised at her own forgetfulness. And then she nodded to
her husband: "Do you still remember, Lämke, when she was born?"

"If I remember!" he said, pouring another cup out of the
inexhaustible coffee-pot. "Those were nice carryings-on when she was
born--none of that again, thanks. The girl gave you a lot of trouble.
And me too; I was terribly afraid. But that's ten years since, old
woman--why, it's almost forgotten."

"And if it had happened a hundred years ago I shouldn't have
forgotten it, oh no." The woman put out her hand as though to ward off
something. "I was just going to make myself some coffee about four
o'clock in the afternoon, like to-day, I had got such a longing for it,
and then it started. I just got as far as the passage--do you remember,
you were still working in Stiller's workshop at the time, and we lived
in the Alte Jakob, fifth storey to the left?--and I knocked at
Fritze's, the necktie maker's, whose door was opposite ours, and said:
'Oh, please,' I said, 'send your little one as quickly as you can to
Frau Wadlern, 10, Spittelmarkt, she knows all about it'--oh dear, how
bad I felt. And I fell down on the nearest chair; they had the greatest
difficulty to get me home again. And now it began, I could not control
myself however much I tried; I believe they heard me scream three
houses off. And it lasted, it lasted--evening came on--you came
home--it was midnight--five, six, seven in the morning--then at last at
nine o'clock Frau Wadlern said: 'The child, it'll soon be----'"

"That's enough now, mother," interrupted the man, glancing sideways
at the children, who were sitting very quietly round the table
listening, with wide-open, inquisitive eyes. "All that's over long ago,
the girl's here, and has been a credit to you so far."

"She was born at eleven sharp," said Frau Lämke dreamily, nodding
her head at the same time and then drawing a deep breath as if she had
climbed a high mountain. And then, overwhelmed by the pain and pleasure
of a memory that was still so extremely vivid after the lapse of ten
years, she called her daughter, her first-born, to come to her on this
her tenth birthday.

"Come here, Frida." And she gave her a kiss.

Frida, who was quite abashed at this unexpected caress,
giggled as she cast a glance at her brother Artur and the two other
boys, and then ran to the door: "Can we go and play now?"

"Be off with you."

Then they rushed out of the dark cellar, where the Lämkes lived, in
high spirits.

It was so light in the street, the sun shone brightly, a fresh wind
was blowing and somebody was flying a kite far away across the field.
There were very few people on foot and no carriages. The road belonged
to them, and they rushed to it with a loud hallo. The one who reached
the lamp-post at the corner first was captain.

Wolfgang had never allowed anyone to deprive him of this honour
before, but he had to be policeman to-day, he had been the last. He had
followed the others slowly and silently. He had got something in his
head to think about, which made him dull and hindered him from running;
he had to think about it the whole time. He could not get rid of it
even when he was in the midst of his favourite game; the only time he
forgot it was when he was having a good scuffle with Hans Flebbe. The
latter had scratched him in the face, and so he tore a handful of his
hair out. They gripped hold of each other near the next garden-gate.

Artur, a feeble little creature, had not taken part in the fight,
but he stood with his hands in his pockets giving advice in a
screeching voice to the two who fought in silence.

"Give him it hard, Flebbe. Your fist under his nose--hard."

"On with you, Wolfgang. Settle him. Show him what you can do."

Frida hopped from one leg to the other, laughing, her fair plait
dancing on her back. But all at once her laugh became somewhat
forced and anxious: Hans, who was several years older than Wolfgang,
had got him down on the ground and was hammering him in the face with
his fist.

"Flebbe, you--!" She pulled his blouse, and as that did not help she
nimbly put her foot out. He stumbled over it, and Wolfgang, quickly
taking advantage of it, swung himself up and belaboured his enemy.

It was no game any longer, no ordinary scuffle between two boys.
Wolfgang felt his face burn like fire, he had a scratch on his cheek
that went down to his chin, there were sparks before his eyes. All that
had made him so silent before was forgotten, he felt a wild delight and
gave a loud roar.

"Wolfgang, Wolfgang, no, that's not fair," cried the umpire. "That's
no longer fun." Artur prepared to catch hold of Wolfgang, who was
kneeling on his opponent's chest, by his two legs.

A jerk and off he flew. Wolf now turned against him, trembling with
rage; his black eyes gleamed. This was no longer a well-dressed child
of better-class parents, this was quite an elementary, unbridled,
unconquered force. He snorted, he panted--at that moment somebody
called.

"Wolfgang, Wolfgang."

"Wolfgang," cried Frida warningly, "mother's calling. And your maid
is standing near her beckoning."

Frau Lämke's voice was again heard, coming from the door of her
house: "Wolfgang, Wolfgang." And now Lisbeth's sharp tones were also
heard: "Well, are you soon coming? You're to come home."

Frau Lämke laughed. "Oh, leave them, they were so happy." But she
got a fright all the same when she saw the boy's dirty clothes, and
began to brush them. "My goodness, what a sight your pretty blouse
looks--and the trousers." She turned red, and still redder when
she noticed the fiery scratch on the young gentleman's cheek. "They've
made a nice mess of you, the brats. Just you wait until I get hold of
you." She shook her fist at Hans Flebbe and her own children, but her
threat was not meant seriously. Then she said to Lisbeth in an
undertone and with a twitching smile round the corners of her mouth, as
she stood there motionless with indignation: "Wild brats, aren't they?
Well, it'll always be like that, we were all like that when we were
young." And, turning to Wolfgang again, she passed her gnarled hand
over his fiery scratch: "That was fine fun, eh, Wolfgang?"

"Yes," he said from the bottom of his heart. And when he saw her
looking at him with eyes so friendly and full of comprehension, a great
liking for the woman sprang up in his heart.

It had been a splendid afternoon. But he did not speak of it as he
went home with Lisbeth; she would have been sure to have turned up her
nose at it.

"Hm, the mistress is nice and angry," said Lisbeth--she never said
anything but "the mistress" when speaking to the boy. "Why did you stop
there such an everlasting time? Didn't you hear the mistress say you
were to come home before it was dark?"

He did not answer. Let her chatter, it was not at all true. He
stared past her into the twilight. But when he came into the room on
reaching home, he noticed that his mother had waited for him. She was
certainly not angry, but his evening meal, an egg, a ham sandwich, the
milk in a silver mug, everything neatly prepared, was already there,
and she sat opposite his place with her hands folded on the white table
cloth, frowning impatiently.

The large hanging-lamp, which cast a bright light on the
table and made her bent head gleam like gold, did not brighten up her
face.

His mother was in silk, in light silk, in a dress trimmed with lace,
which only had something that looked like a very transparent veil over
the neck and arms. Oh, now he remembered, she was to meet his father,
who had not come home to dinner that day, in town at eight o'clock, and
go to a party with him. Oh, that was why he had had to come home so
early. As if he could not have got into bed alone.

"You've come so late," she said.

"You could have gone," he said.

"You know, my child, that I'm uneasy if I don't know that you are at
home." She sighed: "How could I have gone?"

He looked at her in surprise: why did she say that? Had somebody
been telling tales about him again? Why was she so funny?

He gazed at her with wide-open eyes, as though she were a perfect
stranger to him in that dress that left her neck and arms so bare. He
put his food into his mouth lost in thought, and munched it slowly. All
at once he had to think a great deal of what he had heard Frau Lämke
tell. His father and mother had never told anything about when _he_ was
born.

And suddenly he stopped eating and launched the question into the
stillness of the room, into the stillness that reigned between him and
her: "When I was born, did it last such a long time too?"

"When what?--who?--you?" She stared at him.

She did not seem to have understood him. So he quickly swallowed the
food he still had in his mouth and said very loudly and distinctly:
"Did it last such a long time when I was born? It lasted very long when
Frida was. Did you scream too, like Frau Lämke?"

"I?--who?--I?" She turned crimson and then very pale. She closed her
eyes for a moment, she felt dizzy; there was a buzzing in her ears. She
jumped up from her chair, she felt she must run away, and still she
could not. She clutched hold of the table with shaking hands, but the
strong oak table had turned into something that shook uncertainly, that
moved up and down, slid about. What--what was the boy saying? O
God!

She bit her lips, drew a deep breath, and was about to say: "Leave
off asking such stupid questions," and yet could not say it. She
struggled with herself. At last she jerked out: "Nonsense. Be quick,
finish eating. Then off to bed at once." Her voice sounded quite
hoarse.

The boy's astonished look fell on her once more. "Why are you all at
once so--so--so horrid? Can't I even ask a question?" And he pushed his
plate aside sulkily and stopped eating.

Why did she not answer him? Why did she not tell him something like
what Frau Lämke had told her Frida? Had he not been born as well? And
had not his mother been pleased, too, when he was born? It was very
nasty of her that she did not tell him anything about it. Could she not
see how much, how awfully much he wanted to know something about
it?

A burning curiosity was aroused in the child all at once. It
tortured him, positively devoured him. He would not be able to sleep
the whole night, he would have to think of it again and again. And he
wanted to sleep, it was tiresome to lie awake--he wanted to know it he
must know it.

Käte saw how gloomy the boy's face had grown. Oh, the poor, poor
boy. If only she had not let him go to those people. What had he been
told there? What did he know? Had they made him suspicious? What
did those people know? Oh, they had made him suspicious, otherwise
why should he have tormented her with such questions?

A burning dread filled her mind, and yet her hands and feet were
growing as cold as ice. But her compassion was even greater than her

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