A Hero of the Pen
by E. Werner · English · Gutenberg #35154 · 410,131 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: A Hero of the Pen
Author: E. Werner
Translator: Frances A. Shaw
Release date: February 3, 2011 [eBook #35154]
Most recently updated: January 7, 2021
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35154
Credits: Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by Google books
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A HERO OF THE PEN ***
Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by Google books
Transcriber's Note:
1. Page scan source:
http://books.google.com/books?id=IG8PAAAAYAAJ&dq
2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe].
A
HERO OF THE PEN.
BY
E. WERNER,
AUTHOR OF "GOOD LUCK," "BROKEN CHAINS," ETC.
TRANSLATED BY
FRANCES A. SHAW.
NEW YORK:
R. WORTHINGTON, 750 Broadway.
1880.
Copyright
WILLIAM F. GILL & CO.
1875.
Trow's
Printing and Bookbinding Company,
205-213 _East 12th St_.,
NEW YORK.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
Love and Death
CHAPTER II.
A Strange Cavalier
CHAPTER III.
Was it Sickness or----?
CHAPTER IV.
The Hero of the Pen
CHAPTER V.
Face to Face
CHAPTER VI.
A Strange Presentment
CHAPTER VII.
Lovers, yet Strangers
CHAPTER VIII.
The Heiress at Bay
CHAPTER IX.
On The Scent
CHAPTER X.
For Value Received
CHAPTER XI.
The Dawn Of War
CHAPTER XII.
A Rocket in the Camp
CHAPTER XIII.
The Triumph of Pride
CHAPTER XIV.
Farewell
CHAPTER XV.
Following the Clue
CHAPTER XVI.
An Agonizing Doubt
CHAPTER XVII.
The Pen and the Sword
CHAPTER XVIII.
The Rival Lovers
CHAPTER XIX.
The Lover's Accusation
CHAPTER XX.
The Fateful Hour
CHAPTER XXI.
A Desperate Resolve
CHAPTER XXII.
A Fearful Alternative
CHAPTER XXIII.
The Vengeance of Passion
CHAPTER XXIV.
The Shadow of Doom
CHAPTER XXV.
To the Rescue
CHAPTER XXVI.
A Mortal Agony
CHAPTER XXVII.
Treason
CHAPTER XXVIII.
The Sacrifice of Blood
CHAPTER XXIX.
The Murderer and the Attack
CHAPTER XXX.
Waiting
CHAPTER XXXI.
The Balance Of Power
CHAPTER XXXII.
The Brand from the Burning
CHAPTER XXXIII.
An Unexpected Meeting
CHAPTER XXXIV.
The Riddle Solved
A HERO OF THE PEN
CHAPTER I.
Love And Death.
The scene of our story is a town on the Mississippi, about midway in
its course from Lake Itasca to the Gulf; the time is a cloudless
January day of the year 1871. A score of years ago, this town consisted
of only a dozen or so roughly built wooden houses; but emulating the
marvellous growth of American cities, it has expanded into a populous,
thriving business centre.
The dazzling, midday sunbeams enter the windows of a large, suburban
mansion, situated upon a hill commanding an unequalled prospect. The
elegance of its surroundings, the exquisite taste and richness of its
appointments, its artistic and expensive construction, distinguish this
residence of the millionaire, Forest, from all others far and near.
In the magnificent parlor, giving evidence of that superfluity of
expensive comfort and luxury which to wealthy Americans seems an
absolute necessity of life, sits a young lady, in an elaborate and
costly home dress. She is a girl of some twenty summers, and sitting
near the open fire, whose shifting gleams light up her face and form,
with her head resting thoughtfully in her hand, she listens to the
conversation of the man opposite her. The face a perfect oval, of a
clear, colorless, brunette complexion, with large, brown eyes and
perfectly regular features, is set in a frame of dark, luxuriant hair,
and possesses undeniable claims to beauty. And yet there is something
wanting in this exquisite face. It is that joyous, artless expression
which so seldom fails in youth; that breath of timidity we look for in
young maidenhood, and that look of gentleness a woman's face seldom
entirely lacks, and never to its advantage. There is a chilling gravity
in this young girl's whole appearance, a confident repose, an
undeniable self-consciousness; and yet it does not seem as if heavy
life-storms or premature sorrows can have brought to her the sad
experiences of later years. For this her brow is all too smooth--her
eyes too bright. Either inborn or inbred must be that seriousness
through which her beauty gains so much in expression, although it loses
infinitely in the tender grace and charm of both.
In a low arm chair, on the other side of the fireplace, sits a young
man in faultless society-dress. There is marked similarity between
these two. It lies not alone in hair and eyes of the same color, in the
same clear, pale complexion. It is more in that expression of cold,
dignified repose, and self-conscious pride peculiar to both. In the
young girl this expression assumes the most decided form; in the young
man it is partially hidden by a conventional polish and formality,
which much detract from the manly beauty of his face, and the manly
dignity of his bearing. He has for some time been engaged in an
animated conversation with the young lady, and now continues a recital
already begun:--
"My father thinks this European journey necessary for the completion of
my mercantile education, and I readily yield to his wishes, as it
promises so much of interest to me. I shall first pass a few months in
New York, where the business affairs of our house demand my personal
supervision, and from there I shall sail for Europe in March. A year
will suffice me to gain some acquaintance with England, France and
Germany, and for a short tour through Switzerland and Italy. The next
spring I hope to return home."
The young lady had listened with evident approval to the plan of the
proposed journey; now she raised her head and looked at the speaker.
"A rich, profitable year lies before you, Mr. Alison! My father will
regret that his illness renders it impossible to see you before your
departure."
"I also regret that Mr. Forest is too ill to receive my adieux,
personally. May I beg you, Miss, to present them to him in my name?"
She bowed slightly. "Certainly! And meantime, accept my best wishes for
a prosperous journey and a happy return."
With quiet friendliness she rose and reached him her hand. He took the
cold, beautiful hand, and held it fast; but an unwonted expression
flashed from the young man's eyes.
"Miss Forest, may I ask you a question?"
A momentary flush passed over the young girl's face, as she replied:
"Speak, Mr. Alison!"
He rose hastily, and still holding the hand fast, he stepped closer to
her side.
"Perhaps the time for a declaration is ill-chosen; but I only too well
know that Miss Forest is the object of so many solicitations that
absence might be dangerous to my hopes. Therefore, pardon me, Miss
Jane, if I at this moment venture to speak of an affection which,
perhaps, is no secret to you. May I hope that my wishes may find
fulfilment, and that, upon my return, I may be allowed to clasp this
hand anew, and hold it fast for life?"
He had begun in a calm, almost business sort of way, but his voice grew
warm, as if beneath this outward calm there lay an almost violently
repressed emotion; and now, in consuming anxiety, his eyes hung upon
hers, as if there he would read her answer.
Miss Forest had listened in silence. No flush of surprise, or maidenly
embarrassment, not the slightest change in her features betrayed
whether this proposal was welcome or unwelcome to her; the immobility
of her face offered a striking contrast to his, and the reply came firm
and distinct, without the least hesitation or concealment.
"My answer shall be frank as your question, Mr. Alison. I am aware of
your affection for me; I reciprocate it, and upon your return, with the
fullest confidence I will place my hand in yours for a united future."
A beam of joy broke through the icy repose of Alison's features, but
the usual calmness at once came back, and he seemed almost ashamed of
the momentary emotion.
"Miss Jane, you make me very happy," he said. "Can I not now speak with
your father?"
"No, I would prefer to tell him myself," she replied hastily. "I have
one condition to impose, and you must yield to it, Mr. Alison; I cannot
become your betrothed at my father's death-bed; I cannot and will not
deprive him of one of those hours the new relation might demand.
Therefore let the words you have just spoken to me remain secret, at
least to all but those immediately concerned. Until you return, demand
from me none of the rights my answer gives you; I cannot and will not
now grant them."
There lay little of a betrothed bride's submission in this decided, "_I
will not!_" at the first moment of acceptance. Alison must have felt
this, for a slight cloud shadowed his forehead.
"This is a hard condition, Jane! You will permit me to delay my
departure, and remain by your side, if, as I fear, the inevitable
stroke is close at hand?"
She shook her head. "I thank you, but I need no support. What is before
me"--here for the first time during the interview the young girl's lips
quivered--"I shall know how to bear, and I can bear it best alone. I
would not have you delay your departure one hour, or hasten your return
one week. In a year we shall meet again; until then my promise must
content you, as yours does me."
She had risen, and now stood opposite him, with an air of such full
determination that Alison at once saw the impossibility of opposing her
will; he saw that indeed she needed no support, and he yielded
unresistingly to the necessity imposed upon him.
"I will prove to you, Jane, that I know how to honor your wishes, even
though it is difficult for me to do so. But if I may claim none of the
rights of your betrothed husband, you at least will not deny me the
first, and for the present, the only boon I ask."
Jane did not answer, but she made no resistance as Alison took her in
his arms, and kissed her lips. There was again an impassioned gleam in
his eyes, and for a moment he pressed her close to his heart; but as
more ardently, more warmly, he sought to repeat the caress, she broke
from him with a sudden movement.
"Enough Henry! We make parting unnecessarily difficult. In a year you
will find your bride; until then--silence."
He stepped back somewhat offended at this hasty repulsion, and his
features again assumed the cold, proud expression, which had not left
hers for a moment. Mr. Alison evidently was not the man to beg for
caresses which were not freely granted him.
An approaching step in the anteroom demanded that both should
immediately resume their company manners; the young lady as before, sat
in the arm chair, and Alison opposite her, when the person who had thus
announced his coming, entered the parlor. He was a small, elderly man
with gray hair and sharp, penetrating eyes from which gleamed an
inconcealable irony, as he saw the young couple sitting there so much
like strangers.
"The physician is about to drive away, Miss Jane. You wished to speak
with him," he said.
Jane rose hastily. "Excuse me, Mr. Alison, I must go to my father. I
will tell him of your visit, this evening."
She reached him her hand. A significant pressure, a glance of deep,
calm, mutual understanding, then they parted with a hasty adieu, and
Jane left the room.
As the door of the ante-room closed behind her, the last comer stepped
up to Alison, and laid a hand upon his shoulder,
"I congratulate you!"
The young man turned quickly around. "For what?" he asked sharply.
"For your betrothal."
Alison frowned. "It appears, Mr. Atkins, that you have chosen to play
the spy."
Atkins took this reproach very unconcernedly.
"Possibly! But you ought to know, Henry, that I do not belong to those
disinterested persons from whom the affair is to be kept secret."
The young man's forehead cleared somewhat. "You certainly are an
exception, and so--"
"And so, you accept my congratulations without further hesitation,"
added Atkins. "But you two got through the affair quickly enough. 'Will
you have me? I will have you,'--all right. 'The wedding shall be a year
from now!'--all short, smooth, clear, without much eloquence or
sentimentalism, quite to Miss Jane's taste. But our deceased Mrs.
Forest would have thought quite differently of such a betrothal."
Alison's lips curled in scorn. "If Miss Alison had resembled her
mother, I should scarcely have sought her hand," he said.
"There you are right!" replied Atkins dryly. "She was not to my taste
either, always ill, always inclined to tears and scenes, full of
sentimentality and extravagances,--a real German woman, she died of
homesickness at last. Happily the daughter has inherited none of this
nonsense. She is just like her father."
"I know it! And no one will accuse Mr. Forest of an excess of
sentimentality."
"No!" said Atkins gravely, "and yet it seems to me that he too, once
possessed his proper share of such emotions; but fortunately, he was
sensible enough to leave all sentiment and whatever else could not be
of use to him here, over yonder. When Mr. Forest landed here twenty
years ago, sentimentality would have been sadly out of place, for he
brought with him a very healthy hatred against Germany and all
connected with it. With a sort of morose energy, he flung from him
every remembrance of the fatherland, and even Americanized his name--it
was Forster there, you know--and when our colony grew, and the German
settlers naturally clung together, he kept aloof from them and
fraternized with the Americans. But this his wife could not endure; she
could not accustom herself to the new life; there were endless quarrels
and hard feelings between them, and as the child grew up, matters
became still worse. The father wanted to educate her as an American,
and he carried his point, as Miss Jane very soon most decidedly placed
herself on his side. This quite broke the mother's heart. We had scenes
enough, I tell you; there was no peace until Mrs. Forest died of
homesickness at last. As things now stand, I fear the husband will not
long survive her."
The voice of the speaker, at these last words, had involuntarily
changed from a mocking to a serious tone; Alison, who had listened in
silence, now took his hat from the table.
"You have heard all; I am not to delay my departure; in fact, urgent
business calls me to New York. If the event happens, which we must soon
expect, stand by Miss Forest's side. But if"--here Alison busied
himself with buttoning his gloves--"if there should be difficulties in
relation to the arrangement of the property, my father will stand ready
to aid you to the full influence of his business knowledge and
connections. It would seem especially desirable that the interests of
his future daughter should not remain foreign to him, as my journey
will prevent my becoming acquainted with them."
The old irony again gleamed from Atkins' eyes, as he sarcastically
replied; "I thank you kindly for the proposal, but the property remains
by testament in my hands, and consequently all will be found in perfect
order. You and your father must wait patiently for a year until Miss
Jane herself brings her dowry into your house. Meantime, I can give you
this one satisfaction; Mr. Forest is very rich; richer indeed than
generally supposed, of this the glance you desire into our business
affairs would at once convince you."
Alison made a passionate gesture. "Mr. Atkins, you are sometimes most
horribly inconsiderate," he said.
"Why so?" asked Atkins phlegmatically. "Do you mean this as a reproach?
Or do you suppose I could seriously think you would commit the folly of
marrying a young lady without fortune, now, when the immense
development of your business house and the relations you will establish
in Europe make capital doubly necessary to you? No, Henry, I cherish
too high an opinion of you to think you capable of any such unpractical
romance."
Alison turned and looked searchingly into Atkins face, "I have
certainly, as partner and future chief of our house, been circumspect
even in my choice of a wife, but I give you my word that if Miss
Forest's fortune falls far short of my expectations, I still prefer her
to any richer heiress."
Atkins laughed. "I believe that of you without oath, Henry! You are a
great deal in love, and I wonder whether you will inspire a like
sentiment in our beautiful, cold Miss Forest. Well, that will happen in
time; in any event it is fortunate if the merchant and the lover do not
come in conflict, and here each is quite sufficient to itself. Once
more I congratulate you!"
After leaving these two, Jane had hastily passed through several rooms,
and now entered a half-darkened, but richly and tastefully furnished
sleeping-chamber. Gliding softly over the carpet, she approached the
bed, and flung back its heavy curtains.
Now it was evident whence the young girl derived that strange
expression of face which made her so unlike other girls of her own age,
intense seriousness, cool determination, energetic pride; all these,
unobliterated, unsoftened by the traces of illness, were repeated in
the face of the man who lay here upon the pillow. He slowly turned his
head towards the daughter who bent over him, saying:--
"They have just told me of the physician's visit. He was alone with
you, and I wished to be present. Was this your command, my father?"
"Yes, my child! I wanted to hear an opinion from him which it would
have been difficult to give freely in your presence. I now know that I
have but a few days to live."
Jane had sunk on her knees at the bedside, and pressed her head into
the pillows. She did not answer, but her whole form shook with the
tearless sobs she energetically suppressed. The sick man gazed down
upon her.
"Be calm, Jane, this opinion can surprise you as little as it does me,
although we have both, perhaps, expected a longer respite. It must be,
and you will not make the necessity of the separation more bitter
through your tears."
"No!" She suddenly drew herself up, and gazed down upon her father; her
sorrow was suppressed by the most absolute self-mastery; her lips
scarce quivered. The sick man smiled, but there lay a sort of
bitterness in that smile; perhaps he would rather have seen her not
obey him so readily.
"I have to speak with you, my child, and I do not know how many quiet,
painless hours may be granted me. Come nearer to me, and listen."
Jane took her place by her father's bedside, and waited silently.
"I can calmly leave you, for I know that despite your youth, you need
no stay and no guardian. In outward emergencies, you have Atkins at
your side; his sarcastic, eternally mocking nature has never been
agreeable to me; but in an association of almost twenty years, I have
proved his integrity and devotion. You know that he long since amassed
a fortune of his own, but he preferred to let it remain in our house.
He will be at your side, until you confide yourself to the protection
of a husband, which will perhaps happen soon."
"Father," interrupted Jane, "I have something to tell you. You know
that Mr. Alison has been here; he has asked for my hand."
The sick man drew himself up with an expression of lively interest.
"And you?"
"I have given him my promise."
"Ah?" Forest sank back upon his pillow, and was silent.
Jane bent over him in astonishment. "And are you not willing? I felt
certain of your consent in advance."
"You know Jane, that I will neither restrict nor control you in your
choice of a husband. It is your own future for which you have to
decide, and I am convinced that you have not decided without serious
deliberation."
"No; the proposal did not come unexpectedly to me. I have implicit
confidence in Mr. Alison's character, and in his future; his family is
one of the first in our city, his position is brilliant, and I am
certain that his mercantile genius will in after years secure him an
important place in the business world. Does this not appear sufficient
to you, my father?"
"To _me_? certainly, if it is enough for _you_!"
With an expression of surprise, Jane fixed her dark eyes upon her
father. "What more could be demanded from a marriage?" Forest again
smiled with the same bitterness as before.
"You are right, Jane, quite right! I was only thinking of my own
wooing, and of your mother's promise. But it is just as well. Mr.
Alison indeed possesses all the advantages you have named, and in these
respect you are more than his equal; you will be very content with each
other."
"I hope so!" said Jane, and now began to tell her father the conditions
she had imposed upon her betrothed, and the delay upon which she had
insisted. Forest listened with eager attention.
"I like that! Without knowing it you met my wishes in this decision,
for I, too, have a condition to impose upon you. What would you say if
I demanded that you should pass this year of freedom in Germany with
our relatives?"
With a movement of the most painful surprise, the young girl rose from
her chair.--"In Germany? _I_?"
"Yes, do you not love Germany?"
"No," replied Jane coldly, "as little as you, my father. I do not love
the country that blighted your youth, embittered your life, and at last
thrust you out like a malefactor. I could not forgive my mother, that
with a consciousness of all you had suffered there, she always clung to
the fatherland, and made you and herself inexpressibly unhappy with
that incurable homesickness."
"Be silent, Jane!" interrupted Forest passionately. "There are things
which you do not understand, will never learn to understand! I met no
consideration in your mother, that I confess; she indeed made me
unhappy; and still, she gave me hours of happiness, such as you will
never give your husband--_never_, Jane! But then Mr. Alison will have
no need of them."
Jane was silent. She had become accustomed to find her father very
irritable in his sickness, sometimes quite incomprehensible. With the
consideration one gives the sick, she now bore this passionate
outbreak, and quietly resumed her place at his bedside.
A few minutes after, Forest again turned to her. "Forgive me, child!"
he said mildly, "I was unjust. You have become what I educated you to
be, what I would have you be, and I do not now regret having given you
this direction. You will better endure the life-conflict than your
weak, sensitive mother. Let this rest; it was something different you
were to hear from me. Do you know that you have a brother?"
Jane started up in terror, and in questioning expectation, fixed her
eyes upon her father.
"As a child I sometimes heard a hint of this; but lately no one has
ever spoken of him to me. Is he dead?"
A deep sigh rent Forest's breast. "Perhaps he is dead, perhaps not. We
have never been able to learn with certainty. I at last forbade all
mention of his name, because his remembrance threatened to kill your
mother; but the silence was of little avail; she never forgot him for a
single hour."
With eager intentness Jane bent down yet closer to her father. He took
her hand and held it fast in his.
"You are not unacquainted with the recent history of your native
country, my daughter; you are aware of the glowing enthusiasm which in
the thirtieth year of the present century took possession of all
Germany, and especially of its high schools. I was a student at that
time, and, a youth of eighteen years, I was animated like so many of my
comrades with visions of the freedom and greatness that might come to
my fatherland under a new and more liberal order of things. We sought
to carry out these revolutionary ideas, and for that crime the
government repaid us with imprisonment, in many cases with sentence of
death. I was doomed to die, but by especial favor, my sentence was
commuted to thirty years' imprisonment. Seven of these years I endured;
but as you have often enough heard the story, I will not repeat it now.
Even these bitter years resulted in good to me; they ended for all time
my youthful ideals and youthful illusions. When the amnesty at last
came, under the iron pressure of the prison, in endless humiliations,
in glowing hatred, had been ripened a man, who better than the twenty
years' old dreamer knew how to bravely assume and patiently endure the
struggle with life and misery."
Forest was silent for a moment, but the hard, savage bitterness which
now lay in his features, and which was even more grimly reflected in
Jane's face, showed that these remembrances were not foreign to her,
and that the daughter had always been her father's confidant.
After a short pause the father continued: "Scarce was I free, when I
committed the folly of marrying. It was madness in my position, but
already, while at the university, I had become betrothed to your
mother. She had waited long years for me, for my sake had renounced a
brilliant position in life, and she now stood alone and forsaken, an
orphan, dependent upon the favor and cold charity of _relatives_. This
I could not bear; rather would I venture all. We were married, and a
year after, your brother was born. He was not like you, Jane."--As he
said these words, a lingering, almost painful glance swept the
beautiful face of his daughter. "He was blonde and blue-eyed like his
mother, but his possession was not unalloyed happiness to me. The first
eight years of my marriage were the darkest of my life; more terrible,
even, than those days in prison. There I suffered alone; here it was
with wife and child that I must endure the conflict against misery and
utter destitution which with all its horrors threatened them. My career
was naturally ruined, my connections severed. Whatever I began,
whatever I undertook, to the demagogue every door was closed; every
means of support withdrawn. At that time I put forth my best strength,
and did my utmost in a struggle for daily bread; and still, my most
unremitting efforts did not always suffice to keep my family from want.
"We might perhaps have perished, but the year 1848 came, and showed
that the old dreamer had not yet fully learned to renounce his ideals.
He allowed himself again to be enticed; for the second time, he
listened to the syren's song, only to be dashed anew against the
rocks.--I took my wife and child to a secure place among relatives, and
threw myself headlong into the tide of revolution. You know how it
ended! Our parliament was dissolved, the conflict in Baden broke out. I
was one of the leaders of the revolutionary army; we were beaten,
annihilated. For the first time a propitious destiny protected me from
the worst. Now I was free.
"I would not again, and this time perhaps forever, be shut up in
prison; I would not give up my family to irretrievable ruin; therefore
I decided upon flight to America. My brother-in-law offered me the
necessary passage-money; perhaps from kindness of heart, but more
probably it was to be rid of the accursed demagogue, the disgrace of
the family. Great circumspection was needed, for from one end of
Germany to the other, the minions of the law were already let loose
upon our track.
"In disguise, and under an assumed name, I reached Hamburg, where my
wife and children were awaiting me. You had been born during these last
months. Poor child! It was in an evil hour I first pressed you to my
heart. With the first kiss of your father, tears of glowing hatred, of
bitter despair fell upon your infant face. I fear they have thrown a
shadow over your life; I have never seen you carelessly merry like
other children.
"On our way to the ship we separated so as not to attract attention.
Your mother carried you in her arms, I followed at some distance,
leading my boy by the hand. When half way up the ship's stairs, I
recognized a face of evil omen. It was that of a spy. I knew him, he
knew me; if he saw me, I was lost. Hastily forming my decision, I told
the boy to follow his mother; he was old enough to understand, and she
stood there in sight. I flung myself into the thickest of the throng at
the harbor. An hour later, the spy had vanished, and I reached the ship
unremarked. My wife, who had been prepared for possible delay on my
part, hastened to meet me; her first inquiry was for the child. After a
few words of terrible import, we understood the situation. He had not
joined his mother; he must be on shore. In mortal apprehension, I
rushed back regardless of the imminent danger to myself. I searched the
whole harbor up and down, asking tidings of my boy of all I met. No one
had seen him; none could give me information.
"The signal for departure was given. If I remained on shore I was lost,
and my wife and child would sail, forsaken and friendless, on the wide
ocean to a strange continent. The choice was a fearful one, but I was
forced to make it. When I trod the ship's deck without my child; when I
saw receding from me the shores where he was left alone, a prey to
every danger,--that moment--when I broke loose from home and country
forever, the persecutions and bitternesses of a whole lifetime all came
back; that moment set the seal to our separation, and darkened every
remembrance of the past to me.
"The first hour of our landing in New York, I wrote to my wife's
brother; but weeks passed before he received my letter. Doctor Stephen,
my brother-in-law, pursued the search with the warmest ardor and the
fullest sympathy. He went to Hamburg himself, he did everything in his
power; but it was all in vain. He did not find the slightest trace of
your brother. The boy had vanished utterly; he remains so to this day."
Forest was silent. His breathing became difficult, but Jane bending
forward, eager and intent, had not thought of preventing an excitement
which might prove dangerous, perhaps fatal to him; such regardful
tenderness did not lie in the relations between this father and
daughter. She had a secret to hear, a last legacy to receive, and if he
died in the effort, he must speak the words necessity demanded, and she
must listen. After a short space for rest he began anew:
"With this last sacrifice, the evil fates that had pursued me were
propitiated, our misfortunes ended. Success attended me from the first
step I took on American soil. In New York, I met Atkins, who was there
gaining a precarious livelihood from a secretaryship. He rescued me and
my little all from a band of swindlers who already had me, the
inexperienced foreigner, half in their net. Out of gratitude, I
proposed that he should accompany me to the West. He had nothing to
lose, and came with me to this place, then a vast, unpeopled solitude.
Our plough was first to break up the prairie sod; the board cabin we
reared with our own hands was the first dwelling erected here. Perhaps
you remember when, in your earliest childhood, your father himself went
out to the field with scythe or spade, while your mother did the work
of a maid-servant in the house. But this did not last long.
"Our settlement made rapid strides. The soil, the location, were in the
highest degree favorable; a town arose, a levee was built--lands
which I had bought for a song rose to a hundred-fold their original
value. Undertakings, to which I pledged myself with others, had an
undreamed-of success. Participation in public life, and the position
for which I had once so ardently longed, with social importance and
consideration past my most sanguine hopes, became mine; and now, my
daughter, I leave you in a position and in pecuniary circumstances,
which make even our exclusive Mr. Alison consider it an honor to win
your hand."
"I know it, my father!" The self-importance of Jane's manner at this
moment was more noticeable even than before; but it did not seem like
her usual haughtiness; her pride was evidently rooted in the
consciousness of being her father's daughter.
With an effort so violent as to show that his strength was failing,
Forest hastened to the end of his recital:
"I need not tell you, Jane, that I have never abandoned the search for
your brother; that I have renewed it again and again, and that since
means have been at my command, I have spared no outlay of money or of
effort. The result has been only disappointment. Latterly, I have lost
hope, and have found solace in you; but your mother's anguish at the
loss of her child, was never assuaged. To the hour of her death, she
clung to the hope that he was living, that he would sometime appear.
This hope I had long since relinquished, and yet upon her death-bed she
exacted from me a promise to go myself to Europe and make one last
search in person. I promised this, as the last amnesty had lifted the
bar which had hitherto prevented my visiting my native land; and I was
just making preparations for a long absence, when illness prostrated
me. But the last, ardent wish of your mother ought not to remain
unfulfilled. Not that I have the slightest hope that a trace, which for
twenty long years has eluded the most vigilant search, can now be
found.
"You are simply to fulfil a pious duty in keeping the promise I have no
power to keep; you are to go through a form to assure yourself, before
my entire fortune falls into your hands, that you are in reality the
only heir; and for these reasons solely, I send you to the Rhine. In
the business steps to be taken, your uncle will stand at your side; you
are only to add to your proceedings, that energy of which he is
incapable. It will not appear strange to our social circle if you pass
the year of mourning for your father among his relatives, in his former
home. If Alison wishes, at the end of his European travels, he can
receive your hand there, and return with you; but I leave this matter
to you alone. I place only one duty in your hands, Jane; you will
fulfil it."
Jane arose and stood erect before her father with all her energies
aroused for action.
"If a trace of my brother is to be found, I shall find it, father! I
shall yield only to impossibilities; I give you my hand upon that!"
Forest clasped her hand in his, and now the peculiar gravity of the
relation between this father and daughter was evident, there were no
kisses, no caresses, a pressure of the hand as among men, sealed the
given and the accepted promise. For a few moments deep silence reigned;
then the dying man said suddenly and in a subdued voice:
"And now, draw back the curtains; I can no longer endure the darkness.
Let in the light."
She obeyed. She drew back the heavy, green damask curtain, and through
a large corner window, streamed into the room the full dazzling glow of
the midday sun. The dying man raised himself upright, and gazed
intently out upon the broad prospect offered to his view. There
lay the city, with its streets and squares, its sea of houses, the
river-landing with its boats; there lay the lordly Mississippi dotted
with its fairy isles, among which glided in and out the countless
skiffs and steamers. Scattered near and far, were suburban homes
surrounded by broad cultivated acres, and smiling in peace and plenty,
while away to the horizon's utmost verge stretched the illimitable
prairies, green, billowy seas of verdure, relieved here and there by
groves of oak and stretches of uplands.
Forest fixed his glance upon the magnificent panorama. Perhaps he was
thinking of the time, when no human foot-fall had profaned this
primeval solitude, when poor and friendless, he had come here to wrest
from nature her as yet unappropriated wealth; perhaps he was gazing
with pride upon the city which owed its birth and expansion to him;
perhaps he was sad at the thought of leaving all this beauty and
grandeur and prosperity. Convulsed with emotion, he sank back on his
pillow. Jane bent anxiously over him. But this was no sudden access of
bodily illness, no regretful feeling for the new home and the new-found
riches he was to leave for ever. It was a sudden, overmastering feeling
long repressed, which now compelled utterance.
"When you arrive in Germany, my daughter, greet the old home and the
old home-river for me! Do you hear, Jane? Salute Germany for me! Salute
our Rhine!"
The words came painfully subdued, almost inaudible from his lips. Jane
gazed at him in mingled surprise and terror.
"Have you then loved Germany so much, father? You have almost taught me
to hate it."
Forest was silent for a brief space; his lips quivered, and tears,
seemingly wrung from a terrible inward conflict, rolled down his
cheeks.
"The home-land had only misery for me," he said in a voice trembling
with emotion. "It persecuted, degraded me, cast me out; it denied even
bread to me and mine. America gave me freedom, gave me riches and
honor; and now, Jane, I would renounce them all--all, could I only die
upon the Rhine!"
There lay such harrowing anguish in this final utterance of a long
repressed sorrow, that Jane recoiled in terror before it. This fatal
homesickness! Her mother, the sensitive, delicate woman, after long
years of suffering, had died of it at last; and her father, that proud,
energetic man who had so entirely broken away from home and its
remembrances, who had united heart and soul with the land of his
adoption, and had seemed petrified into hatred against his fatherland,
he too had buried this agonized longing deep in his heart, only to
acknowledge it in his dying hour!
Jane stood dumb and bewildered before this discovery, but she felt that
here, just here, that strange something lay, which, despite all
misunderstanding, had yet made her father and mother one; which must
keep her eternally remote from both. She gazed intently at her father,
he now lay quiet, with closed eyes and compressed lips. She knew that
in such moments as this she must not disturb him. Softly gliding to the
window, she let down the curtain, and the usual subdued twilight again
ruled in the sick chamber.
CHAPTER II.
A Strange Cavalier.
"Well, Miss Jane, a most promising introduction this much bepraised
Rhine gives us, to that fatherland of yours! In six-and-thirty hours, I
have become mortally weary of the whole country. We landed in such a
fog that we couldn't see the shore until we set foot on it; that day we
passed in Hamburg there was such a rain that I really thought a second
deluge had broken out, and here upon the Rhine, we find a pretty state
of things, don't we? I cannot understand how you remain so calm through
it all!"
It was indeed no enviable situation, this, which so aroused Mr. Atkins'
ire. In a dense fog, in the midst of a drizzling but incessant rain,
the heavy post-chaise lay half upset in the middle of the suburban
road. The horses already loosed from harness stood near with bowed
heads, as if fully comprehending the unfortunate state of affairs, and
in a gully by the road side near the broken hind-wheel, sat the
postilion, his head bound up with a handkerchief, and groaning as he
held his injured foot in both hands. Jane, who with an air of
resignation stood by him, paid no heed to Atkins' complaints. She only
gave a slight shrug of her shoulders, and persisted in an obstinate
silence.
"We cannot possibly remain here longer in the rain!" continued Atkins
in renewed vexation; "You certainly cannot. So far as I can determine,
our postilion's injuries are not dangerous, and he declares that B. is
only an hour's distance at the furthest. Our best course is to hasten
on there and send him the needed help."
"No," interrupted Jane, gently but decidedly. "His wound is still
bleeding, and he is liable to faint at any moment. We could not
possibly leave him helpless and alone; you at least, must remain with
him, while I try to reach the nearest house."
"Alone? In a strange country? In this fog which would be very likely to
lead you right into that accursed Rhine, that we hear raging down
yonder, without seeing a glimpse of it? No, I shall consent to no such
thing."
"I am not at all afraid," declared Jane, with a positiveness which
showed that she did not allow Atkins to have the least influence or
control over her movements, "and if I follow the main road it will be
impossible for me to lose my way. In any event, it is the only thing
that remains for us to do."
"But Miss Jane, consider!--If some human being would only make his
appearance!--Hold! there comes some one!--A word with you, Sir, if you
will allow it."
These last words, although spoken in German, must, through their strong
English accent, have betrayed the foreigner, for a low but musical
voice, asked in the purest English; "What is the matter, Sir?"
"God be praised, it is a gentleman; he speaks English!" said Mr.
Atkins, with a sigh of relief, and quickly approaching the stranger,
who until now had been only half visible through the fog, he continued
excitedly:
"We have had a mishap with our carriage. It is broken, the postilion is
injured, and we are entire strangers here. May I ask if you would,
perhaps, show us the way to B.?"
"Certainly!"
"And I also beg you to send us out the first carriage you can find. And
one thing more! You will, perhaps, have the kindness to take a young
lady to B. under your protection."
The stranger, who had bowed a polite assent to the first request, at
the last stepped back, and there was something like a tone of horror in
his voice as he replied.
"A young lady--am I--"
"You are to conduct her to the city and to the house which she
designates to you. Miss Jane, may I implore you to confide yourself to
this gentleman's care? You cannot possibly stand here longer in the
rain."
Jane, who had taken no part in the conversation, now turned to the
stranger. She glanced at his pale, delicate face, into a pair of blue,
dreamy eyes which at this moment had an expression of mingled terror
and embarrassment.
"I am exceedingly obliged to you," said Mr. Atkins, without waiting in
the least for the gentleman's assent. "And now may I beg you to hasten,
for the young lady's sake as well as my own? Good-by, Miss Jane. Have
no anxiety in regard to the injured man; he remains in my care. I hope
to meet you soon in a dryer atmosphere."
All these arrangements had been made so hastily, with such dictatorial
politeness, and in such an incontrovertible tone of command, that no
evasion seemed possible. The stranger made no effort at resistance; in
dumb consternation, he allowed all this to pass over him, and followed
mechanically the directions given him. With a silent bow, he asked the
young lady to accompany him; the next moment they were already on the
way, and a winding in the road hid them from the eyes of Atkins and the
coachman.
Whether the stranger was more surprised at the free, American manner in
which the lady confided herself to the care of the first man she had
met upon the highway, or frightened at the duty of gallantry imposed
upon him, was difficult to decide. But his embarrassment was evident,
and kept him from all attempts at conversation. Miss Forest did not
understand this strange behavior. She was accustomed every where to be
an object of great attention, and now this man, in appearance and
language a gentleman, showed himself so little susceptible to the honor
of accompanying a lady, that he did not even deem it worth his while to
address a word to her. Jane measured her companion with a glance of
anger, compressed her lips, and decided not to speak a word to him
during the entire way.
For almost ten minutes they had walked on in silence, side by side,
when the gentleman suddenly paused, and in the same low, musical voice
as before, said; "The highway makes a broad winding here. May I conduct
you by the nearer path in which I am wont to go?"
"I have confided myself to your guidance," answered Jane, shortly and
coldly, and with another silent bow, he turned from the public road and
took a path to the left.
The designated path might certainly be nearer, and for a man passable
in a case of necessity; but it was not at all suitable for a lady. It
led over a swampy soil; through wet meadows, through dripping hedges,
through fields and bushes, not only to the injury, but to the ruin of
Jane's elegant mourning clothes, which had been designed for
travelling, but for travelling in an extra post-chaise. The light cloak
was as slight a protection as the thin boots; her dress became wet
through and through, while her companion, enveloped in a thick woollen
plaid, scarce felt any inconvenience from the weather, and did not
think to offer her its protection. But he seemed to take very literally
Mr. Atkins' injunction to hasten, for he hurried on in such strides
that Jane could keep up with him only through the greatest effort.
Any other woman would have declared that such a path and such a pace
were beyond her strength. But Miss Forest had determined to reach the
town as soon as possible so as to send aid to those she had left
behind, and lamentation and delay were not her business. She therefore,
more and more resolutely, drew her shoes from the mud which seemed
inclined to hold them fast, set her feet energetically into the tall,
moist grass, and kept tearing her veil loose from the hedges to which
it caught. But her manner grew more and more morose, and after a
quarter of an hour passed in this way, she halted suddenly.
"I must beg you to wait. I need a moment's rest."
These words, spoken in the sharpest tone, seemed to awaken--in her
companion a sense of his thoughtlessness. He paused, and gazed in
terror upon his protegee, who, exhausted and quite breathless, stood at
the edge of a dense hedge of willows.
"I beg your pardon, Miss; I had quite forgotten--I"--he paused, and
then added apologetically "I really am not accustomed to association
with ladies."
Jane bowed as if she would say: "I have learned that!"
The gentleman now, for the first time, seemed to be aware of the state
of the young lady's toilet. "Good heavens, you are quite wet through!"
he cried anxiously, and then glancing upward, he added in evident
bewilderment: "I believe it rains!"
"I _believe_ so!" said Jane, with an irony which happily escaped the
stranger; for he gazed searchingly around. They were both standing by
the willow-hedge, which rising from a wall of earth, after a rain of
several hours, offered no especially inviting resting place; and yet,
the gentleman seemed to regard it as such. With a hasty movement, he
tore the plaid from his shoulders, spread it carefully on the wet
ground, and with a gesture of the hand, invited his companion to take
her seat upon it.
Jane remained standing, and looked up to him. It really surpassed all
comprehension. For a whole half hour this man, with the most
indifferent air in the world, had seen her getting soaked through and
through, and now unhesitatingly, just to afford her a resting place for
two minutes, he threw into the mud the shawl which might all this while
have protected her. Anything more laughable or impracticable had never
before met her observation, and still, in this proceeding there lay
such painful anxiety, so timid an apology for former thoughtlessness,
that Jane almost involuntarily accepted the invitation, and
hesitatingly sat down.
For the first time, she now gazed attentively at her companion, who
stood close to her. As if heated by the rapid walk, he had thrown off
his hat, and stroked the rain-soaked hair from his high forehead. He
had noble, delicate features, intellectual in the highest degree, but a
transparent, sickly pallor lay upon them, and the large, blue eyes,
with their strange, dreamy expression, looked as if they had nothing at
all to do with the world and the present; as if they were gazing far
out into the illimitable distance. This young lady, with the cold,
beautiful features, and the proud, energetic glance, with an interest
peculiar and almost indefinable to herself, gazed into the face so
infinitely unlike her own.
Over all brooded the fog, and wove its gray veil around the trees and
shrubs, which, dim and shadowy, gleamed through it; softly pattered
down the rain, the first mild spring rain, which appeared to revive the
whole earth with its warm, aromatic breath; lightly murmured through
the air those strange voices, those whisperings and echoes peculiar to
the rainy landscape, and amid these mist-voices, far away and
mysterious, toned the ebbing and flowing of the still invisible river.
The whole situation had something strange, something oppressive, and
Jane, to whom these emotions were entirely new, suddenly broke loose
from their spell.
"Is that the river, down yonder?" she asked pointing out into the fog.
"The Rhine! We are on its banks."
Again there was a pause. Miss Forest impatiently broke a twig from the
willow-hedge, for a moment gazed absently at the opening buds, from
which the first green was just bursting forth, and then carelessly
threw it on the ground. Her companion bent, and lifted up the twig; she
glanced at him in surprise.
"They are the first spring buds," he said softly. "I would not see them
perish in the mud."
Jane's lips curled mockingly. How sentimental! But, indeed, she was now
in Germany! Annoyed and almost angry at this indirect reproach, the
young lady rose suddenly, and declared herself quite rested.
The gentleman was ready to go at once. Jane threw a hasty glance upon
the plaid still lying in the mud, but as he seemed to have quite
forgotten it, she did not think it worth her while to remind him of it.
They walked on silent as before, but the guide now moderated his steps,
and often looked anxiously around to see if she could follow. Another
quarter of an hour had passed, when the outlines of houses and turrets
loomed up through the fog, and the stranger turned to his companion.
"We are in B. May I ask Miss, where I shall conduct you?"
"To the house of Dr. Stephen."
He paused in surprise. "Doctor Stephen?"
"Yes! do you know him?"
"Certainly. I live in his house, and indeed"--he passed his hand
thoughtfully over his forehead--"I faintly remember having heard that
some one was expected there, a young relative, I believe."
"I was certainly expected," said Jane impatiently, "and you will oblige
me if you would shorten the waiting of my relatives as much as
possible."
"I am at your command, Miss! May I beg you to turn to the right so that
I can conduct you through the garden by the shortest path?"
Jane followed, but she soon found reason enough to execrate this
shortest path; for the hedge-way leading through the garden was worse
than the deep mud and difficulties of the path they had just gone over.
Her companion appeared to realize this himself, for after a while he
paused suddenly, and said in evident embarrassment:--
"I forgot that the path was not suitable for a lady. Shall we turn
around?"
"I think we are already half through it," answered Jane in a somewhat
exasperated tone. "The end cannot be far distant."
"It is there behind the latticed gate."
"Well, then, let us go forward."
They had advanced a hundred steps or more, when a new obstacle loomed
up. The deepest portions of the path were quite overflowed by the rain,
which here formed a real lake, that, enclosing the whole breadth of the
passage, was not to be avoided. The unhappy guide halted in utter
confusion.
"You cannot possibly pass through here," he said anxiously.
"I will try!" answered Jane resignedly, and placed the tip of her foot
in the water; but he excitedly held her back.
"Impossible! The water is a foot deep. If you only--if you would allow
me to carry you over."
The question was very timidly uttered, and with a half sympathetic,
half derisive glance, Jane's eyes swept the tall but very slender and
delicate form with its bowed shoulders.
"I thank you!" she returned with unconcealed irony. "The burden might
be too heavy for you."
The irony had a peculiar effect upon the hitherto timid stranger. A
scarlet flush suddenly shot over the pale face; with a single effort,
he drew himself up, lifted the young lady in his arms, and rushed with
her into the midst of the water. All this passed so suddenly, that
Jane, surprised and confounded, had no time for resistance, but now she
made a hasty movement, resolved to wade through the deep water, rather
than permit a liberty taken without her consent. All at once, she met
his eyes. Was it the dumb, almost plaintive entreaty that lay in them,
or was there something quite other--something strange in this glance?
Jane's eyes fell slowly, the former oppressive feeling returned with
redoubled might, and she remained motionless, while with a strength
none would have dreamed that those arms possessed, he carried her all
the way over.
"I beg your pardon," he said in a low voice, as, timidly and
respectfully, he set down his burden at the garden gate.
"I thank you," replied Jane, curtly and coldly, as she herself thrust
open the gate, and entered.
She had only taken a few steps in the garden, when a tall, almost
gigantic, figure loomed up before her.
"Herr Professor, in Heaven's name, what tempted you to go out in such
weather," he said. "And without an umbrella too! You may have taken a
cold, a fever, your death--and the plaid! Herr Professor, where then
have you left your plaid?"
Vexed and almost offended, the professor turned away from the anxious
servant, who, armed with an immense umbrella, sought to protect him in
such an obtrusive way.
"But Frederic! Do you not see the lady?" He pointed to Jane whom in his
great excitement Frederic had not remarked. This new event, the
appearance of a lady by his master's side, seemed to entirely transcend
the servant's powers of comprehension; he let the umbrella fall, and
stared at both with wide-open mouth, and in such boundless astonishment
that it was very evident such a thing had never happened before.
The professor made a hasty end to his speechless consternation. "It is
the young lady who was expected at Doctor Stephen's," he said. "Go,
now, and tell the doctor--"
He had time to say no more; for scarce had Frederic caught the first
words, when, with an unintelligible exclamation, he turned suddenly,
and shot away in mighty strides. Jane remained motionless, gazing at
the professor; her manner plainly betrayed what she began to think of
her German countrymen, and after this meeting with these two first
specimens, she began to have serious doubts as to their sanity. The
master as well as the servant was ridiculous in her eyes.
Meantime, in the house, Frederic's cry of announcement had caused a
positive uproar. Doors were opened and shut violently, stairs creaked
under light and heavy footfalls; they seemed to be in eager haste to
improvise some new reception ceremonies, or to place in order those
already begun; and when, at last, Jane, accompanied by the professor,
approached the front door, a new surprise awaited her. Rich garlands of
flowers surrounded doors and pillars, a giant "_Welcome_" was displayed
over the former; flowers were strewn upon floors and stairways, and at
the foot of the staircase stood the tall Frederic, with an immense
bouquet in his hand, which, with a proud smile on his broad face, he
held in rather an awkward manner, right before the young girl's nose.
Such a reception was evidently not to Miss Forest's taste. In her
father's house, all such superfluous sentimentality had been suppressed
in the same measure as all undue familiarity with servants had been
avoided. Jane's brows contracted, she scanned the servant from head to
foot, and as he, abashed at this ungracious stare, stepped to one side,
with a haughty wave of the hand in which there lay small thanks, but a
great deal of cold repulsion, she swept past him up the stairs, without
deigning a glance at the festal adornments in her honor, and arrived at
their head, where Doctor Stephen and his wife stood to meet her.
The professor, as if spell-bound, stood below, and gazed at her through
the door, which remained open for a moment. He saw how the young lady
at this very peculiar first meeting with her relatives, before whom she
appeared unexpectedly, drenched with rain, through the garden gate and
in the company of an entire stranger, did not for a moment lose her
self-possession. She stepped up to her uncle, with cool politeness,
reached him her hand, and with exactly the same expression, offered her
cheek to be kissed by her aunt. She then drew herself up, and stood
before them both, resolute, majestic, and self-conscious, as if at that
very first moment of meeting, she would protest against any future
guardianship or dictation from them.
The door closed, and as if awaking from a dream, the professor started
up, and glanced around at Frederic. The poor fellow still stood at the
foot of the stairs; the flowers had fallen from his hands, and he
stared motionless after the proud, beautiful apparition, that had so
rudely repelled him. His master laid a hand upon his shoulder.
"Come up with me, Frederic?"
At these words, some life entered the poor fellow's face, which
gradually assumed an expression of deep mortification. He passed his
hand through his ash-blonde hair, and with his clear blue eyes, in
which stood some tears, he gazed at his master.
"But what have I done so much out of the way?" he asked in a pathetic
tone.
"Never mind, Frederic," said the professor kindly. "The young lady is
evidently not acquainted with our German manners of reception. Come,
now!"
Frederic obeyed. He bent down and picked up his bouquet, but at sight
of it, the former mortification seemed to give place to resentment.
With an expression of rage, he hurled the bouquet far out into the
garden.
"Frederic!" The exclamation and the grave tone of his master brought
the servant at once to reflection.
"I am coming, Herr Professor!" he replied humbly, and wiping away the
tears with his hand, with bowed head, he softly followed his master up
the stairs.
* * *
More than six weeks had already passed since the arrival of the young
American, and she still remained a stranger in the house of her
relatives. It was not their fault; they had from the first treated her
with the warmest cordiality. Doctor Stephen and his wife belonged to
those good, harmless people, whose highest endeavor it is to live in
peace with all the world, and not to allow themselves to be disturbed
in the even tenor of their way. The deceased Forest had judged his
brother-in-law righteously, when he declared that he had defrayed the
expenses of himself and wife and children to America, partly out of a
good heart, but in a great measure, to be rid of the demagogue, who
threatened to bring his otherwise loyal family into constant annoyance
and suspicion.
The doctor had very much regretted that his sister's destiny was united
to that of this unfortunate man, who in his pride and obstinacy, would
let his family starve rather than accept the slightest assistance from
relatives; and he had been most firm in his conviction, that this
dreamy, eccentric radical would go to ruin in matter-of-fact America.
It had happened otherwise, and here, as elsewhere, success had won its
homage. Although Doctor Stephen and his wife had once anxiously shunned
all mention of their Forest relatives, they had of late years, gladly
and often, spoken of their brother-in-law, the millionaire across the
ocean, and the prospective visit of his daughter had thrown them into
no small excitement. If the orphan niece had come to them poor and
helpless, she would have been greeted with open arms; but the young
heiress was received with the most profound respect, and this was what
Jane especially demanded. From the first, she resisted every attempt at
outside control, and the relatives soon found that they must in no way
interfere with the young lady's independence.
In consideration of her wealth, they could cheerfully have forgiven
every whim and every fault; but they could not forgive this persistent
coldness and reticence, through which no beam of warmth ever
penetrated, and which made confidence impossible as disagreement.
Never, by word or glance, did Jane betray the slightest dissatisfaction
with the house in which she was a guest. But the pitying contempt with
which this young lady, reared in the bosom of American luxury, yielded
to their simple, plebeian way of life, was deeply felt, and wounded
none the less. After a few days' acquaintance with their niece, the
doctor and his wife came to the conclusion that she was the haughtiest,
most heartless creature in the world.
In one respect, Jane did herself wrong; her haughtiness was not founded
on the possession of riches or personal advantages; but upon that
intellectual superiority through which she ruled all around her, and
which she, ere long, began to make evident in a wider circle. Reared in
the freedom of American life, she thought the respect here paid to
leading personages slavish, the exclusiveness of certain circles
ridiculous, and the interminable titles and ceremonies of German
society called forth her bitterest irony. Her relatives, in mortal
terror, frequently heard her intrude these opinions in the presence of
strangers; but they need have given themselves no uneasiness. Miss
Forest was an American and a reputed millionaire, two peculiarities
which gave her entire freedom to do and say what would not have been
allowed to another; and this so much the more as her betrothal remained
a secret. There was scarcely a family of position in the city who did
not cherish some hopes of future relationship with this eligible young
heiress; and so, upon her entrance into society, Jane found herself
courted and nattered, a state of things not at all new to her. All the
world was enraptured with her beauty, which was in such striking
contrast to the serene, blooming freshness of the Rhineland maidens;
they flattered her pride which so often wounded; they admired the
intellect which she hardly thought it worth her while to display in
these stupid circles. The young students who, without exception,
admired and wondered at this foreign meteor which had made so sudden an
appearance among them, left no opportunity unemployed to approach and
give expression to their homage. But none succeeded even for a moment,
in penetrating the icy indifference and chill decorum of this young
lady. True to the traditions of her father, she had, upon her first
arrival in Germany, girt herself about with this icy dignity and
haughtiness, almost as with a coat of mail.
Doctor Stephen owned a pretty house in the handsomest part of B. His
family occupied only its lower story; the upper was rented to Professor
Fernow, who, called to the university almost three years ago, had since
had his lodgings here. A scientific work which had made a profound
sensation in the learned world, had won for the young man this
professorship in B. He had come here, an entire stranger, without
recommendations or acquaintances, and attended only by his servant; but
at his very first lectures, he had enforced marked attention from his
colleagues, and excited the liveliest interest among the students. With
this success he had been content; the professor was not a man to assert
himself, or claim any especial place in society. He anxiously avoided
all intercourse not indispensable to his calling; he made no visits and
received none; he shunned all acquaintanceship, declined every
invitation, and lived in the solitude of his studies. His delicate
health always served him as an excuse. At first the people of B. had
been unwilling to accept this apology, and had sought to ascribe his
strange exclusiveness to Heaven knows what mysterious and dangerous
motives; but now they were convinced that the professor was the
gentlest, most harmless man in the world, whom only his passion for
study, combined with his really impaired health, had led into such a
way of life.
Several of his colleagues, who had approached nearer to him in the way
of official relations, spoke with wondering admiration of his
astonishing knowledge and his astonishing modesty, which really shunned
all recognition, all emerging from retirement; but from their full
hearts they were content with this, for they best knew how dangerous
such a man might become to their authority, if, with this fulness of
knowledge, was united an obtrusive personality and an energetic
character. So, without opposition, they let him go on in his silent
way; his learning was esteemed without envy, his lectures were
numerously attended; but he played as unimportant a role in the
university as in society, and lived like a veritable hermit in the
midst of B.
Doctor Stephen found no occasion of complaint against his quiet tenant,
who brought neither noise nor disturbance into the house; who
punctually paid his rent, and who, when upon rare occasions he became
visible, gave a polite greeting but shunned any longer conversation.
The doctor was almost the only one who, at the professor's frequent
attacks of illness, entered his rooms, or came into any closer
relations with him; but the doctor's wife, who would gladly have taken
the sick man under her motherly wing, had not succeeded in her efforts,
and must content herself with bringing the servant under her domestic
sway instead of his master.
Frederic was not gifted with surpassing intelligence nor with especial
strength of comprehension; his intellectual abilities were small, but
in their stead, Nature had given him a giant body, and replaced his
other defects by a boundless good nature and a really touching devotion
to his master. But quite in contrast to him, he had a most decided
inclination to associate with others, and was delighted to employ for
others, the abundant leisure which the professor allowed him; and so he
helped the doctor's wife in the house, and the doctor in the garden. In
this way he had gradually become a sort of factotum for both, without
whose help nothing could be done, and it had been he who, through hours
of exertion, and an expenditure of all his powers of invention, had
prepared that unsuccessful welcome for the young American. Since that
scene he always avoided her, half-timidly, half-resentfully.
CHAPTER III.
Was it Sickness or----?
June, with its oppressively hot days, was at an end. In Professor
Fernow's lodgings it was as silent as a church on a week-day; nothing
moved here, not a sound broke the profound stillness that reigned in
these apartments. One room was like another; book-case succeeded
book-case, and upon each stood volumes in endless rows. The curtains
were let down, a dim twilight prevailed. The genius and the science of
centuries were heaped together here, but not a single fresh breath of
air intruded into this solemn seclusion.
In this study, which differed from the other rooms in nothing but
perhaps a still greater mass of books, sat the professor before his
writing table, but he was not at work; pen and paper lay unused before
him; his head thrown back against the upholstery of his easy chair, his
arms crossed, he gazed fixedly at the ceiling. Perhaps it was the green
window curtains that made his face appear so strangely pale and ill,
but his bearing also expressed an infinite weariness, as if both mind
and body were wrought to their utmost tension, and his eyes betrayed
nothing of that intensity of thought--which is perhaps just about to
solve some scientific problem; there lay in them only that melancholy,
purposeless reverie which so often absorbs the poet, so seldom the man
of science.
The door opened, and softly as this had happened, the professor
trembled with that susceptibility peculiar to very nervous persons;
Doctor Stephen appeared on the threshold, and behind him the anxious,
care-worn face of Frederic was visible.
"Good evening," said the doctor entering the room. "I have come to give
you another lecture. You are not so well to-day, are you?"
The professor glanced at him in surprise, "You are mistaken, doctor! I
find myself quite well. There must be a misunderstanding, I did not
send for you?"
"I know that," said the doctor, coolly. "You would not send for me
unless it were a matter of life or death, but this Frederic here has
declared to me that all is not quite right with you."
"And indeed it is not," said Frederic, who, as he saw the displeased
glance of his master, had taken refuge behind the doctor, and placed
himself under that gentleman's valiant protection. "He has not been
well for a long time, and I know now just when it began; it was that
day when the Herr Professor went out in the rain without his umbrella
and came back with that American Miss and without his shawl"--
"Silence, Frederic!" interrupted the professor suddenly, and with such
a vehemence, that Frederic started back affrighted before that unwonted
tone. "You would do better to attend to your own affairs, than to
meddle with things you know nothing about. Go now, and leave us alone!"
Confounded at the unwonted severity of his usually indulgent master,
Frederic obeyed reluctantly, but the doctor, without paying the least
attention to the professor's glance, which plainly enough betrayed a
wish for his withdrawal, drew up a chair and sat down in it.
"You have been at your studies again? Of course! This magnificent
summer's-day, when all the world hastens out into the open air, you sit
here from morning to night, or rather until far into the night, at your
writing desk. Tell me, for God's sake, how long do you think this can
go on, and you bear up under it?"
The professor, although not without evident reluctance, had resumed his
former seat, and appeared not yet to have become master of his
excitement. "I must have taken cold," he said, evasively.
"No, it is not cold," interrupted the doctor, "it all comes from so
much study, which has now become a mania with you, and will bring you
to your grave if you do not allow yourself some recreation. How often I
have preached this to you! But what can one do with a patient who
always listens gently and patiently, always says 'yes,' and always does
just the contrary to what he is ordered to do!"
The professor had indeed listened with great patience. "I have always
followed your directions," he affirmed in a low voice.
"Oh yes, literally! If, for example, I sent you to bed, you lay down
obediently, but had lamp and books brought to the bedside, and studied
until four o'clock in the morning instead of until two. You must
possess a good constitution to enable you to do all this; until now it
was only your nerves that were ruined. If you go on in this way a year
longer, you will have the consumption; I give you my word for that!"
The professor rested his head on his hand, and gazed straight before
him. "So much the better!" he said resignedly.
The doctor sprang up impatiently, and noisily shoved back his chair.
"There we have it! You really long for death! There is nothing healthy
in your learning. Consumption of mind and body; that is the end of it
all."
Fernow had risen at the same time. He smiled sadly. "Give me up,
doctor; I repay your care only with ingratitude! My health is entirely
undermined, I myself am best conscious of this, and with all your good
will and all your medicines you cannot help me."
"With medicines--no," said the doctor gravely. "Only a radical cure can
save you; but I fear it is quite useless to advise you."
"And what would your advice be?" asked the professor abstractedly,
fastening his glance again upon his books.
"For a year--for a whole year long, you ought not to touch a pen, not
even to look into a book, and above all, not to think of a syllable of
science. Instead of this you must take constant physical exercise, and
if you can obtain it in no other way, work with hoe and spade in the
garden and keep at it until you grow hungry and thirsty, and can defy
every change of weather. Don't look at me in such astonishment, as if I
were pointing you out the direct way to the other world; such an
entirely shattered nervous system as yours, only the most powerful
remedies can avail. It is my firm conviction, that such treatment,
energetically begun, and persistently carried through, will save you in
spite of all these premonitions of death."
The professor shook his head incredulously. "Then I certainly must
despair of cure; you must yourself know that to carry on the work of a
day laborer in my position is impossible."
"I know it to my sorrow! And you are the last who yield to such
requirements. Well then, study on in Heaven's name, and prepare
yourself for the consumption. I have preached and warned
enough.--Adieu!"
With these words, spoken in great exasperation, the good natured, but
somewhat choleric Doctor Stephen took his hat and went out at the
door; but in the ante-room, the giant figure of Frederic had posted
itself,--there was a dumb, questioning look upon his anxious
face.--The doctor shook his head.
"Nothing is to be done with your master, Frederic!" he said. "Give him
his usual medicine, it is the old complaint that has again"--
"Oh no, it is not that!" interrupted Frederic with great positiveness,
"it is something entirely new, this time, and since that day when the
American Miss"--
The doctor laughed aloud. "I hope you will not make the arrival of my
niece answerable for your professor's illness," he said, greatly
diverted at this juxtaposition of things.
Frederic lapsed into an embarrassed silence. This certainly had not
been his intention; he only knew that both these incidents occurred
together.
"Well, and how is it really with your master this time?" asked the
doctor.
Frederic, greatly embarrassed, kept twirling his hat in his hands; a
literal description of the circumstances that had so impressed him, was
beyond his power of language. "I do not know--but he is entirely unlike
himself," he persisted, obstinately.
"Nonsense," said the doctor curtly. "I must know that better. You give
him the usual medicines, and then above all see that you get him away
from his writing desk today, and out into the open air; but take care
that for his especial recreation he does not pack a folio along with
him. Do you hear?"
So saying, the physician went down the stairs, and when he had arrived
there, asked for his niece.
"She has gone out," replied Frau Stephen in a very ill humor. "She went
at four, and, as usual, alone. Speak with her, doctor, I implore you,
once again, and represent to her the impropriety and adventuresomeness
of these long, solitary walks."
"I?" said the doctor; "no, my dear, that is your business, you must
expostulate, with her yourself."
"Expostulate!" cried the old lady, angrily; "as if anyone could succeed
in that with Jane; whenever I venture a slight hint as to this or any
other of her independent proceedings, I receive this invariable reply:
'Dear aunt, please leave all such matters to my discretion;' and not
another word am I allowed to say."
The doctor shrugged his shoulders. "And do you really believe I should
succeed any better?" he asked.
"But half the city is already talking about the freedom of this girl"
cried the Frau Doctor, excitedly, "Everybody thinks us accountable for
it all, and everybody is wondering why we allow her to go on as she
does."
"Is that really so?" returned the doctor with stoical calmness. "Well,
then, I only wish that all these people who are criticising us, could
have Jane Forest in their houses a single week just to test their own
authority. They would soon get tired enough of trying to control her.
Jane, with her bluntless, and our professor up there with his
gentleness, are two obstinate mortals, with whom all B. can do nothing.
And so the only thing you and I can do about it, wife, is just let them
both have their own way."
CHAPTER IV.
The Hero of the Pen.
The doctor was right. Miss Forest troubled herself very little as to
whether the people of B. thought her solitary wandering proper or not.
Not that she had any especial inclination for solitary dreamy roamings,
but she wished to become acquainted with the environs of the town; and
as, after Atkin's departure, she found no one she thought worthy to
accompany her, she went alone.
One day, after a longer walk than usual, which took her some hours'
distance from B., she ascended the Ruenberg, from whose summit there
was a view of an ancient castle. Wearied with the long walk, she sat
down upon a relic of the old wall, and leaning against the rock, gazed
far out into the landscape. The misty veil which, on the day of her
arrival, had so densely enveloped all, had now lifted, and the beauties
then hidden from her view, now bathed in golden sunlight, lay outspread
at her feet.
She leaned farther back into the shadow of the wall. This German
landscape had an unwonted effect upon her; around it hovered a
something which at sight of the grandest natural scenery she had never
experienced, a breath of melancholy, of longing, of home-sickness.
Home-sickness! She had never understood the word, not even when she had
seen her mother die of the malady,--not even when it had so overpowered
her father in his dying hour. Now, when she trod the soil, to which
she, a stranger in all else, still belonged by the sacred right of
birth, there rose within her soul, dimly and mysteriously, as it were a
distant, half sunken remembrance of that early childhood, when her
father had not watched over her education, but had confided it entirely
to her mother, who, with old songs and legends, had awakened in the
child that longing which later the father's influence had so entirely
obliterated or changed into bitterness.
It was a strange, almost uncanny feeling for Jane; and she knew the
very moment when it began. Not at sight of a magnificent prospect like
this, not at the rich landscape-pictures of a tour up the Rhine, which
she had a little while before made with her uncle and Atkins, had this
feeling first awakened. No, it was amid the swaying mists of that
country road, at the edge of that willow hedge, from whose buds the
first green of spring burst forth, when that gray veil enveloped all
around, and only the murmur of the river broke through the silence;
then it had for the first time awakened, and, in an unaccountable
manner, it always attached itself to the form of the man who had at
that time stood near her. Jane thought only seldom, and always with a
sort of aversion, of that meeting. In spite of the ludicrousness
of the hero, there lay in it something of that romance, which the
matter-of-fact daughter of Forest so much despised; and now, just as
she was about to repel the intrusive and ever-recurring remembrance,
this became impossible;--she caught the sound of an advancing footstep,
and Professor Fernow himself came around the angle of the wall.
For a moment, Jane almost lost her presence of mind at the sudden
apparition which so peculiarly responded to her thoughts; but the
professor seemed really frightened at so unexpected a sight of her. He
started back, and made a movement to turn around, but all at once, the
impoliteness of such a step seemed to dawn upon him; after a moment's
hesitation, he bowed silently, and walked to the other side of the
wall, where he took his stand as far as possible from the young lady;
and still, from the narrowness of the space, they were none too far
apart.
It was the first time since their meeting upon the suburban highway,
that they had found themselves alone together. Their casual and
unavoidable meetings in the house and garden had always been signalized
by the professor with a shy bow, which Jane had coolly returned; they
had both shunned all conversation, and it seemed that they would
preserve the usual silence to-day. The professor had arrived,
exhausted, and out of breath; neither the weariness of the long
pathway, nor the exertion of climbing, which he had so conscientiously
undertaken in response to his physician's order for moderate exercise
in the open air, had sufficed to redden his cheeks, upon which lay the
same ashy pallor they had worn that afternoon; and the deep lines on
the young man's forehead, the dark rings around the eyes,--all these
only too well confirmed what Jane had often heard from her uncle, that
the professor was working himself to death, that his days were
numbered.
And still,--her thoughts must keep reverting to that moment when he had
stood with her before the flooded pathway. Those had not been the arms
of a consumptive which had so vigorously lifted her, so easily and
safely carried her; and that quick flush of excitement at her question
of his strength, had been anything but an indication of illness. She
could not resolve the contradiction between that moment and the usually
delicate appearance of the young man, which today was more plainly than
ever revealed to her eyes.
"Do you often climb the Ruenberg, Mr. Fernow?" began the young lady at
last, for the obstinate silence of the professor left her no choice but
to open the conversation, and she had heard enough of this eccentric
man to be aware that nothing offensive lay in his silence.
At the sound of her voice he turned hastily around, and it seemed as if
he made an effort to retain in her presence, his usual dreamy, absent
manner.
"It is the most beautiful place in the environs of B. I visit it as
often as my time permits."
"And that is perhaps very seldom?"
"It is so, and especially this summer, when I must dedicate all my
strength to an arduous work."
"Are you writing another learned work?" asked Jane in a slightly
ironical tone.
"A scientific one," returned the professor with an emphasis that
equalled the irony.
Jane's lips curled in derision.
"You think perhaps, Miss Forest, that this is both a thankless and
fruitless effort," he said, with some bitterness.
She shrugged her shoulders. "I must confess that I have none too great
reverence for book-learning, and that I cannot at all comprehend how
one can lay his whole life, a free-will offering upon the altar of
science, and write books which, like yours, Professor Fernow, are of
interest only to the learned, and which to the rest of mankind, must
always remain dead, fruitless and valueless."
This was another specimen of Jane's horrible frankness, which had so
often thrown her uncle into despair; but the professor seemed neither
surprised nor wounded. He fixed his large melancholy eyes on the young
lady's face. She already half regretted having begun the conversation,
for if she could better hold her ground before these eyes than at that
first interview, they still called forth that torturing, anxious
sensation she could not control.
"And who tells you, Miss Forest, that I do it of my own free will?" he
asked in a peculiarly emphatic tone.
"Well, one does not allow himself to be forced into such a direction,"
replied Jane.
"But supposing a homeless, orphaned child, thrown out upon life alone,
falls into the hands of a learned man who knows and loves nothing in
the wide world but science?--As a boy I was chained to the book-table,
as a youth I was restlessly impelled onward, to exert my capabilities
to the utmost, until at last the goal was reached. Whatever I in youth
possessed of health or poetry, was irretrievably lost in this process,
but he whom this useless book-learning has cost such sacrifices, is
bound to it by indissoluble ties for the rest of his life. For this, I
have sacrificed every other longing, and every hope."
There lay a sort of despairing resignation in these words, and the
melancholy glance into Jane's face which accompanied them, awoke in her
a feeling of resentment against the professor, and against herself. Why
could she not remain calm under this glance? Surely if anything could
have lowered this man in her eyes it was the confession he had just
made. And so, not even from conviction or from inspiration, but from
habit, from a vague sentiment of duty, he was working himself to death!
To Jane's energetic nature, this passive endurance and persistence in a
half-enforced calling, appeared supremely pitiable. The man who did not
possess the strength and courage to rise to his proper place in life,
might just as well sink into nothingness as a bookworm!
With a hasty excited movement, the professor had turned away from her,
and Jane too soon found herself gazing upon the landscape now all aglow
with the last beams of the setting sun. The roseate halo transfigured
earth and sky; the blue mountains in their clear, transparent outlines
caught a new lustre from the rosy light which enwrapt all the towns and
villages lying at the mountain's base; which flashed and flamed in the
green and golden waters of the Rhine as they flowed on calm and
majestic, far out into the illuminated plain, where against the western
horizon, distant and scarce discernible, like a giant mist-picture, the
mighty dome towered upward, the pride and crown of the old Rhenish
stream.
The reflection of this same fiery glow lay upon the gray,
weather-beaten stones of the old castle, upon the dark ivy which had
woven around it its thick green meshes, while the wild, luxuriant vines
hanging over the abyss, fluttered to and fro in the evening wind; and
it lay also upon the faces of the two up yonder.
Jane was for some minutes so lost in gazing at the wonderful
illumination, that she had not remarked the professor standing close by
her side, and now, she was almost frightened at the sound of his voice.
"Can our Rhine also win a moment's admiration from you?" he asked in a
tone of peculiar satisfaction.
"From me?" The thought suddenly occurred to Jane that he might have
divined something of the weakness of which she had been guilty in this
respect. She had certainly always retained a mastery over her features,
it could be only supposition; but the supposition vexed her.
"_From me?_" she repeated, in an icy tone. "You may be partly right,
Professor Fernow, I find some very charming features in this landscape,
although upon the whole, it seems to me rather narrow and poor."
"Narrow! poor!" repeated the professor as if he had not rightly
understood, while his glance, incredulous and questioning, rested upon
her face.
"Yes, I certainly call it so!" declared Jane with a tone of haughty
superiority and a touch of vexation. "To one who, like me, has lived
upon the shores of the great Mississippi, who has seen the magnificence
of Niagara, who knows the majesty of vast prairies and primeval
forests, this German landscape can appear but narrow and poor."
The professor's face flushed--a sign that he was beginning to be angry.
"If you measure a landscape by space, you are right, Miss Forest. We
are apt to employ other standards, which might perhaps seem petty to
you; but I assure you that your landscapes would appear to us supremely
empty and desolate; that we should think them tame or dead."
"Ah! Do you know them so intimately?"
"I do."
"I really wonder, Professor Fernow," said Jane with cutting irony,
"that, without having seen our landscapes, you are able to give so
positive a verdict in regard to them. You appear to think our
Mississippi region a desert, but you should at least know from your
books, that the life which rules there is infinitely richer and grander
than by your Rhine."
"An every-day life!" cried the professor growing still more excited; "a
hive of bees in a restless struggle for success, a life directed but to
the present moment! Your giant river, Miss Forest, with its thousand
steamers, with its thriving populous cities and luxuriant shores, can
never give you what the smallest wave of the Rhine brings in enticing
murmurs to us all; the spell of the past, the history of nations, the
poesy of centuries."
"To us"--here the professor suddenly and unconsciously dropped the
English in which he had been speaking, for his native German--"to us,
this chimes and echoes through a thousand songs and legends, it is
wafted to us in every rustle of the forest, it speaks to us in the
voiceless silence of every rocky cliff. From our mountains, from our
castles, the mighty forms of the past descend; in our cities, the old
races rise again in their pristine might and splendor; our cathedrals,
memorials of imperishable magnificence and power, tower heavenward; the
Loreley entices and beckons us down beneath its green waves, in whose
deepest depths, sparkles and glitters the Niebelungen horde,--all this
lives, and enchants us in and around our Rhine, Miss Forest, and this
certainly, no--stranger can understand."
Jane had listened, first in surprise, then in wonder, but at last in
utter consternation. What had all at once come over this man. He stood
before her erect and tall, his face almost transfigured by an inner
light, his eyes glowing with excitement. She listened to the deep,
fervid tones of his voice, she yielded to the spell of his eloquence,
where word crowded upon word, picture upon picture, and it seemed to
her as if here also a misty veil had been riven, and she caught a
glimpse out into infinite space--gleaming with golden light. The
chrysalis had suddenly fallen from the pale, suffering form, which so
long under a ban, now came forth into its true light, and soared to its
true place.
Jane Forest was not woman enough to remain long under such an
infatuation, without exerting all her strength to break from it. Her
whole inner being rose in arms; the whole pride and obstinacy of her
nature arrayed themselves against this power, which for some moments
had held her in willess control, against this influence that had so
oppressed her. She must break the spell, cost what it would, and with
quick determination, she grasped after the first weapon that stood at
her command--remorseless irony.
"I did not know you were a poet, Professor Fernow!" she said,
mockingly.
The professor shuddered, as if a shrill discord had met his ear; the
flush in his face died out, his eyes fell to the ground.
"_A poet?_--_I?_" he said in a half-stifled voice.
"What you have just been saying did not sound at all like prose."
Fernow sighed deeply, and passed his hand over his forehead.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Forest, for having ennuyed you with poetry.
Ascribe it to my ignorance of the rules of society,--whose first
precept is, that one must not speak to a lady of that which she cannot
comprehend."
Jane bit her lips. This "learned pedant," as she had called him this
very morning, was revealing himself in strange ways. Poetic at one
moment, he could be cruelly sarcastic at the next; but she was better
adapted to this tone; here she could meet him as equal meets equal! The
young lady in her vexation, quite overlooked the deep and painful
excitement which had goaded the professor to a bitterness so unusual
with him; and she did not cease her thrusts. She could not deny herself
the dangerous satisfaction of calling forth those lightning-like gleams
of anger from the calm, dreamy, superficial being of this man;--gleams
which betrayed passionate depths perhaps unknown to him. She felt that
only in moments of the highest inspiration or of the highest
exasperation, was he capable of these, and as it was beyond her power
to inspire him, she resolved to exasperate him.
"I wonder so much the more, Professor Fernow, that you have guarded
this susceptibility in so extraordinary a way; but really, in dreaming
and poetizing, the Germans were always in advance of us."
"In two things which stand infinitely low in your esteem!"
"I, at least, am of the opinion that man was created for deeds and not
for dreams! This poetizing is only listless dreaming."
"And consequently you despise it!"
"_Yes!_" Jane was fully conscious of the cruelty with which she uttered
this rough _yes_, but she had been challenged, she resolved to wound;
and it seemed indeed as if she had succeeded. A deep red flush mounted
to Fernow's forehead. Strange--he had taken it so calmly when she
sought to disparage science, but her attack upon poetry he would not
bear.
"You ought to be less prodigal of your contempt, Miss Forest," he said,
"and there are things which deserve it more than our poetry."
"Of which I have no conception."
"For which you _will_ have none, and which will yet assert its right,
like the home-bud at that very moment when you called it poor and
narrow."
Jane was for a moment speechless with pride and anger. What had taught
this man, who in his revenge and absence of mind often forgot the
simplest, most familiar things, to glance so deeply into her soul,
although her features never betrayed what was passing there? What
induced him, with such exasperating clearness, to bring to light
sentiments which she herself would not confess? For the first time that
indefinable oppression she always experienced in his presence, found a
decided reason; she felt dimly that in some way danger threatened her
from this man; that she must at any price hold herself far from him,
even on account of this one provocation.
Miss Forest drew herself up with her utmost dignity, and measured the
professor from head to foot. "I regret, Mr. Fernow," she said, "that
your penetrating glance has so deceived you. I alone am accountable for
my sympathies and antipathies; besides, I assure you that I thoroughly
detest sentimentality and revery in whatever form and that to me
nothing in the whole world is so antagonistic as--a hero of the pen."
The word was spoken, and, as if he had received a wound, the professor
trembled under this irony. The flame again flashed up in his face, and
from his blue eyes darted a lightning glance that would have made any
other than Jane tremble. For an instant a passionate, indignant reply
seemed to quiver on his lips; then he suddenly averted his face, and
placed his hand over his eyes.
Jane stood immovable. Now she had her will. The storm was invoked. She
had made him angry, angry as he had been that day when he had so
hastily lifted and carried her in his arms to disprove her insinuation
of his want of physical strength.
What now?
After a momentary pause, Fernow turned to her. His face was pale but
perfectly calm, and his voice lacked that peculiar vibration it had
possessed during the whole interview.
"You seem to forget, Miss Forest, that even a lady's privileges have
their limit," he said. "If the social circle in which you move, allows
you so free an expression of your opinions, I beg leave to remind you
that I do not belong to that circle, and will not tolerate direct
insults. I should have answered a man otherwise. As for you, I can only
assure you that it will henceforth be my especial care that our paths
do not again cross."
And with a bow just as cold and distant, just as haughty as Miss Forest
herself had at her command for persons not agreeable to her, he turned
away and vanished behind the wall.
Jane remained standing there motionless, in a sort of bewilderment,
which gradually yielded to the consciousness of what this man had
presumed to say to her. He had mortified, chided, repulsed her! Her,
Jane Forest! This pitiable scholar, upon whom until this hour she had
looked with sympathetic contempt! The contempt indeed was over, but who
could have dreamed that this man, so timid, so helpless in every-day
life, could in a moment, when the conventional barriers fell, become so
unmasked! In the midst of her resentment, Jane experienced something
like a deep satisfaction, that he to her and to her alone, had shown
himself in this light; but that did not lessen her exasperation,
neither did the consciousness that she had driven him to extremities,
and that the rebuke was just, in the least console her.
In one thing at least this German professor had succeeded, a success no
one had before achieved; he had broken through the icy coldness with
which the young lady had thus far met all, and had brought to the
surface an ardent glowing passionateless, which rose in arms against
him. She hated this man, who had forced upon her the first humiliation;
hated him with the whole energy of a proud, spoiled nature, which had
deemed itself unapproachable, and now for the first time had found its
master. The costly lace of her handkerchief had to atone; it lay torn
in pieces on the ground; but she did not care. Neither did she care
that the twilight was falling, that she was two hours' distance from B.
and must go back on foot; for nothing did she care after this quarrel.
With a passionate movement, she lifted her hat from the ground, and
scornfully thrust aside with her foot the ivy twigs that came in her
way.
"'It will henceforth be my especial care not to cross your path again!'
Well, Professor Fernow, you may rely upon it that I shall not cross
yours, and so I hope we have parted forever!"
Jane gave her head a toss that indicated her contempt of the whole
world in general and Walter Fernow in particular, and then with rapid
steps she swept along the path leading down into the valley. There,
dense shadows already lay, while thicker and thicker the twilight wove
its gray veil around the ruins of the old castle, around the place
where two human hearts had come so near, and had parted so far asunder.
CHAPTER V.
Face to Face.
A few days later, two gentlemen in elegant travelling dress, were
walking from the railway station, up the street leading to Doctor
Stephen's house.
"Don't be in such a hurry, Alison!" said the elder, somewhat pettishly;
"I cannot keep up with you in this heat, and what will Miss Jane think
if she happens to be at the window and sees you coming along at such a
break-neck pace?"
The warning, superfluous as it might seem, was quite in place here;
Alison moderated his pace as if he had been guilty of some unheard-of
crime, and turned the glance with which he had been impatiently
scanning the houses, to his companion.
"Meeting you was a great surprise," continued Atkins. "We believed you
in London; was it not your plan to go directly from there to Paris?"
"Certainly, but as business called me to the Rhine, and as Miss Forest
had been for some weeks in B., I came out of my way so as to pass a few
days with her. I was very much surprised at your decision to accompany
her to Germany."
"You were surprised because I always derided the country," returned
Atkins indifferently. "I came here mostly on Miss Forest's account, she
is the only practical thing in this sentimental land; I am nominally
Miss Jane's guardian, although she is more than independent in all
things; and I did not think it proper for her to cross the ocean alone.
And, besides, as I know so many Germans in America, I would not deny
myself the satisfaction of admiring them in their own much vaunted
fatherland. I hope you thank me for remaining at the side of your
betrothed."
"Certainly!" replied Alison in a somewhat chilly tone, "I am only
astonished that the requirements of Miss Forest demanded so long an
absence on your part."
The old sarcasm again appeared in its full sharpness on Mr. Atkins'
face, as he cuttingly replied. "Give yourself no uneasiness, Henry.
Your future fortune is in safe hands."
"I did not ask in my own interest," said Alison angrily.
"But in those of Miss Jane, which in a year's time will be yours. Well,
do not get angry! It is only natural that you should concern yourself
with this matter, and I perhaps owe you some explanation. You know, I
suppose, that the deceased Mr. Forest, during the last years of his
life, converted most of his property into money. The money is safely
deposited, all the other business was settled in two months after his
death; the landed property is in good hands; a fortune entrusted to my
stewardship would not be placed in jeopardy for the sake of a pleasure
tour, Mr. Alison."
In spite of his displeasure, Henry had listened with marked attention
and satisfaction, he now knew the most important thing, and quickly
changing the subject, he asked:
"And how do you like Germany?"
"I find it tedious enough. It is just what I thought, and the life here
in this learned city of B. is perfectly unendurable! I assure you that
by staying here Miss Jane makes a sacrifice to her father's wishes. I
assure you she is thoroughly disgusted with these formalities and
sentimentalities among which she gets so hopelessly entangled, while I
take an unceremonious flight away from them all."
"And was it on this account you went to Hamburg?"
"No, I had business there."
"Do you employ your European travels in business transactions," asked
Alison gravely.
"Not I; I went in Miss Forest's interests. It was to look after an old
debt we have often tried to settle, but in vain."
The young merchant's attention was now fully aroused.
"Is the debt a large one?" he asked, as if incidentally.
"Yes."
"And you hope to secure it?"
"I hope so."
"Then I wish you success," said Alison with animation. "It is always
pleasant for a merchant to cancel old debts."
"Do you think so?" asked Atkins maliciously. "It may cost us half a
million."
Happily, Alison did not hear these last words, which were spoken only
half aloud; for at this moment, his whole attention was directed to the
windows of the house before which they halted. Atkins rang the bell and
the door was opened by Frederic who was expecting his master. His face
grew noticeably long as he saw Mr. Atkins, who, during his stay in B.,
had not laid claim to the doctor's hospitality, but had lodged at a
hotel, daily calling at the house where his ward was staying.
"Is Miss Forest at home?"
"No."
"And Doctor and Mrs. Stephen?"
"They, too, have gone out."
"Are they expected back soon?"
"Every minute."
"Then we shall do better to wait here in the garden than to go back to
the hotel," said Atkins. "Frederic, announce our arrival to the family
immediately upon their return."
Frederic gazed after the retiring gentleman with open displeasure. "And
here is another! This makes the third who has come. These American
guests will at last drive us out of house and home. I wish"--His
further mutterings were lost in the closing of the door which he had
shut with such violence that the window panes rattled.
"What is the matter with the fellow?" asked Alison, as they entered the
garden, "he gave us a very singular reception."
Atkins laughed. "A German bear, gigantic, snappish, awkward, into whose
wooden head a sort of national antipathy against us seems to have
entered. I cannot boast of having seen anything but this bearish manner
in him, although to others he is harmless and good natured, even to
stupidity."
"Is he a servant out of the house?"
"Not exactly, he is in the employ of a--Ah, Professor Fernow!"
exclaimed Atkins suddenly interrupting himself, "I am delighted to see
you!"
The professor, who was just returning from the university, and had, as
usual, taken the path through the garden, returned the salutation and
drew nearer.
"How do you do, Professor Fernow?" asked Atkins patronizingly. "You
look ill; that comes from your learning! Will you permit me to
introduce you to a countryman of mine? Mr. Alison, Mr. Fernow,
professor in the university, and inmate of Doctor Stephen's house."
Countryman! Inmate of the doctor's house! These were two very
indifferent, commonplace designations, upon which Atkins had not laid
the slightest emphasis, and still they appeared to strike both young
men in the same way. Alison's dark glance, with a suddenly awakened
suspicion, fixed itself sharply and searchingly upon the professor's
face, and Fernow's blue eyes flamed up in painful excitement, as he
returned the glance with unwonted spirit. It was as if both in this,
the first moment of their meeting, had a presentiment of hostile
relations hereafter. Each bowed coldly and haughtily, as if an
invisible barrier already lay between them.
CHAPTER VI.
A Strange Presentiment.
Atkins, with his wonted vivacity, sought to introduce a conversation,
but he did not succeed. For all that was said to him, Alison had a
cold, polite assent; and the professor, even more reticent than usual,
seized the first opportunity to take refuge in the house. After a few
minutes, in his timid, courteous way, he took leave of the elderly
American, bowed silently and distantly to his young companion, and left
the two alone.
"Who is this Fernow?" asked Alison when the Professor was out of
hearing.
"I have already told you. Professor in the university here, a shining
light of science, a precious example of a German scholar, who with his
investigations, and thousand-year-old rubbish and hieroglyphics,
devotes himself to the good of humanity, and meantime withers up into a
mummy. A very well conducted, blameless specimen besides, who made
himself supremely comic in the role of knight and protector which he
assumed towards Miss Jane on the day of our arrival."
Alison, who had been gazing after the professor, now turned suddenly
around.
"Towards Miss Forest?" he asked hastily. "But personally not her sole
protector? It is to be hoped that you were present."
"Not at all! Our carriage broke, out on a suburban road; it rained in
torrents, I had to remain behind with injured postilion, and was glad
to consign Jane to the protection of the first gentleman who offered;
in this case it was Professor Fernow, who was passing our tragic group,
and to whom his learning had at last left sense enough to take the lady
entrusted to him safely to B."
"Ah!" said Alison sharply. "And this adventure has naturally led to a
more intimate acquaintanceship between the two, who, being inmates of
the same house, meet and converse daily?"
For a moment, Atkins gazed at him in astonishment, then burst into a
loud laugh.
"Henry, I really believe you are jealous! Jealous of this consumptive
professor! Do you know what it means to be at thirty years invested
with a professorship in a German university, with its horrible
scientific thoroughness?--and he is not yet thirty! It takes a prodigy
of learning for such a place! A man who devotes himself body and soul
to his books, and knows nothing of the clear light of day. Really, you
do the poor professor a cruel wrong if you believe that anything not
bound in calf, exists for him; and as Miss Jane does not enjoy that
enviable distinction, she unfortunately has no claim to his approval."
Alison paid no attention to this irony. "Does Miss Forest often
converse with him?" he asked impatiently.
"Not at all! At least when I am present, they both seem to have lost
the gift of speech, so dumbly do they pass each other by. I implore
you, Henry, not to insult the taste of your betrothed in this way!
Where is your self-esteem? Do you really place yourself on a level with
this bookworm?"
Alison's brow began to clear. "You are right, it would be ridiculous.
At home I had to enter the list with many wooers of Miss Forest, and
there were no despicable rivals among them. But I had no fear at sight
of this consumptive professor, as you call him. I had a sort of
presentiment that he might become dangerous to me."
"A presentiment!" echoed Atkins with a growl. "For Heaven's sake,
Henry, don't begin to have presentiments! This is one of the German
sensations. They never really reckon, they have all sorts of
presentiments. And you, too, are not going to fall into this nonsense?"
Before Alison could reply, they were interrupted; a young servant girl
appeared to announce the arrival of the lady of the house and Miss
Forest, and to invite the gentlemen in.
Jane, with her usual self-importance, had kept her engagement secret
from her relatives, and the betrothed pair met as strangers.
CHAPTER VII.
Lovers, Yet Strangers.
Five months had passed since Alison had seen Jane for the last time, in
the elegant reception-room of her father's house, in an elegant toilet;
now the tall figure came to meet him in a dark mourning dress, in the
centre of the old-fashioned, simply-furnished apartment, which here
served as the reception-room. Was it the contrast or the long
separation? He had never seen her so beautiful.
"Pardon me, Miss Forest, for coming to visit you on my travels. Mr.
Atkins assured me I should meet a kindly reception."
Jane reached him her hand. "A countryman is always welcome." Her glance
met his; there was a wordless greeting; the only one between them;
otherwise no token, not even the slightest, betrayed that here was a
pair of betrothed lovers, who met after a half year's separation. Both
had too much control over their features, were too much accustomed to
conventional barriers, to betray a relation not yet designed for
publicity.
Jane turned to her aunt, and presented "Mr. Alison, a friend of our
family?" Frau Stephen bowed; she could not understand the confidence
and independence with which her niece received and dismissed strange
gentlemen, this girl of twenty years, who, in her opinion, should still
take refuge under her aunt's maternal wing, and at the most, only now
and then venture a timid remark. Jane, had simply transposed matters,
and assigned her aunt the silent rule. This by no means timid old lady
had begun to be wholly controlled by the influence of her niece; she
now remained passive and overwhelmed by a feeling of her entire
inconsequence.
Alison had seated himself opposite the ladies. They spoke of his
travels, of England and France, of the Rhine; but Henry's
conversational powers were not brilliant. He waited from minute to
minute, and with ever increasing impatience, for Atkins to give him an
opportunity to be alone with Jane, but Atkins appeared to feel a lively
satisfaction in his repressed vexation, and opened out the conversation
to seemingly endless limits. The young American was not the man to be
trifled with in this way; as no one came to his aid, he himself seized
the helm, and simply requested Miss Forest to allow him to give over to
her the letters and tidings from home which were designed for her
alone.
Jane arose, and with a hasty apology to her aunt, conducted the young
gentleman into the sitting-room adjoining the reception-parlor, leaving
Mr. Atkins to console the old lady for this new American freedom.
Scarce had the door closed behind them, when Alison stepped up to her,
and with a powerfully repressed, but still impassioned gesture, took
her hand in his.
"Pardon me Jane, for resorting to this awkward device! I could bear the
suspense no longer."
He held closely the beautiful, cold hand which as before lay
unresisting in his, but did not return its pressure.
"You should have chosen some less transparent device, Henry! Mr. Atkins
would, sooner or later, have found an excuse for leaving us alone. It
would of necessity have occurred to my aunt that we would prefer to
speak of home matters by ourselves."
This cool reply somewhat restrained Alison's ardor. "You seem very
much to fear lest Doctor Stephen may gain some knowledge of our mutual
relations."
"I certainly hope that he will not."
"And still it cannot be avoided."
"I believe that remains alone with us, and so much the more so as your
stay in B. is to be limited to a few days."
"Certainly! It does not appear that I have especial reasons for
lengthening my visit."
Jane felt the thrust, and thought best to waive a subject that
threatened to be dangerous.
"You will go to Paris? They are speaking of a possible war with
France."
Alison shrugged his shoulders. "I do not believe in such a possibility,
but should it come to that, I should naturally return to be at your
side and conduct you home, if the French army overflowed the Rhine
country and Germany."
"Do you really think that would happen?"
"Yes! Have you any other idea?"
Jane threw back her head with a defiant gesture. "And yet, I think we
should know how to defend our Rhine!"
"_We_? _Our_ Rhine?" repeated Alison sharply. "I thought, Miss Forest,
that hitherto it had been your pride and your glory to call yourself a
daughter of that country to which you belong in all things--save the
first brief days of your infancy."
Jane bit her lips so passionately, that a slight drop of blood came
from them. Who bade these unwary lips even here repeat a reminiscence
that would not vanish from her memory? '_We_? _Our_ Rhine?' These were
indeed not her own words, and the remembrance of that moment when she
had heard them so glowing, so inspired, from another's mouth,
involuntarily sent a deep flush to her face. She turned hastily away,
and bent over the flowers standing in the window.
Alison regarded her silently, but, intently and persistently. "It seems
that you have already imbibed German sympathies," he said at last.
"I?" With a half-angry movement, Jane turned to him. "You err, Henry! I
feel myself, even here circumscribed, exasperated. My stay here is a
daily and hourly sacrifice! It is scarcely endurable."
In spite of her self-control, there was a peculiar emotion in her
voice, and this did not escape Alison, who had always seen her so cold;
but he interpreted it falsely; his eyes suddenly lighted up with a
deep, inward satisfaction; he stepped close to her and again took her
hand.
"Well then, Jane, it lies in your power to shorten this sacrificial
period. Give me now the right you were to confer upon me after a year's
delay, and you fulfil my highest wish. In a few weeks the necessary
formalities might be arranged, and we could pursue together our
continental travels; or, if you wished, I would at once take you back
to America."
"No, Henry, no! that is impossible!"
Alison let her hand fall, and morosely stepped back, "Impossible!"
repeated he cuttingly.
"And why so?"
Jane might well feel that her almost violent refusal rendered an
explanation necessary.
"I am still in mourning for my father!" she said gently, "and in this
entire matter I simply follow his arrangements and his wishes."
"It was your wish, Jane, not Mr. Forest's, I understood, that, in the
presence of a dying father, you did not wish to be a bride; and it was
my own journey which so long deferred the time fixed upon for our
union. The one reason exists no longer; and destiny, which after months
of separation, has now united us, has done away with the other. If,
during your year of mourning, you do not wish to marry, so be it. I
will not urge you, but I implore, I demand that you no longer veil our
mutual relations in this profound secrecy; that you publicly
acknowledge yourself my betrothed, and give me the right to visit you
as your accepted suitor in the house of your relatives."
CHAPTER VIII.
The Heiress at Bay.
There was such energy in his manner, such determination in his just
demand, that evasion seemed impossible, and any other young lady would
scarce have attempted it; but Alison forgot that Jane--was quite a
match for him, that her energy was quite equal to his, and that this
tone was least of all designed to incline her to obedience. This "_I
demand_," sounded very strange and harsh in the ears of the proud girl.
It called forth all her obstinacy.
"You forget, Mr. Alison, that the time has not yet come for you to
'_demand_,'" she said coldly. "I have imposed upon you a condition which
you promised to fulfil; the reason therefor, now as then, rests solely
in my judgment. I do not release you from your promise. I _will_ not!"
The young lady's entire strength of determination lay in this "_I will
not?_" and it sounded just as defiant and provoking as those other
words from her lips a few days before. Perhaps she wished to drive this
man also to extremities; but here the effect was different.
Alison was for an instant silent. Had Jane been merely beautiful and
not rich, the wounded self-esteem of this man would have perhaps called
forth an answer, which, from the bluntness of both characters, must
have led to an irreparable breach. But the young merchant knew how to
count the cost; he would not give up this valuable possession for a
woman's whim, and he well knew that here he could assert no authority.
He yielded; but there was a portentous cloud on his forehead.
"You are as immovable and hard as a stone, Jane! Well, let it be as you
wish, but"--his voice trembled in suppressed resentment--"but do not
forget that I, too, have received a promise, and that at the appointed
time, I will demand its fulfilment, inexorably as you have demanded
mine."
Jane had become ashy pale, but her eyes met his firmly and undoubtedly.
"My word is as good as my oath; I would break one as soon as the
other," she said.
"And you repeat this oath to me now of your own free will?" His eyes
were fixed searchingly upon her face. She seemed to hesitate for one
moment, only one; then she laid her hand hastily in his. "I repeat
it--of my own free will!"
Alison drew a deep breath, and pressed the hand ardently. "I thank you,
Jane," he said. "In the spring I shall come back to demand my wife;
until then, you are free as you have wished to be." A pause, oppressive
for both, followed; Jane was the first to speak.
"I think we ought not to prolong this interview. It must be time to
return to my aunt and Atkins."
Alison made no reply; he silently opened the door, and followed her
into the next room, where Doctor Stephen had meantime appeared. The
doctor's jovial vivacity which quite equalled Atkins' sarcasm, led the
conversation into more agreeable channels.
"Well, how do you find Miss Jane?" asked Atkins, as half an hour later
he withdrew with his young countryman.
"Greatly changed!" was the short morose answer.
Atkins looked vexed. "Foolishness! It is you who are changed, Henry!
You have caught the spleen in England; it is time that merry Paris
should be curing it."
Alison made no reply, he hastily reached Atkins his hand, and went.
CHAPTER IX.
On the Scent.
Meantime Jane had sought her own room, whither Atkins now followed her.
She advanced to meet him, and hastily, as if she would cut short any
other topic which might be supposed to more nearly concern her, she
asked; "Do you bring me tidings of your journey? I can imagine its
success! It is sheer foolishness, like all else that has thus far been
done!"
"It is not so this time!"
Jane gazed at him as if she did not trust her ears.
"What do you say?"
"We have a trace."
Jane trembled. "Of my brother?"
"Be calm, be calm, Miss Jane," said Atkins, coolly, as he laid a hand
upon her arm. "The matter is in no way decided! A trace which appeared
only to vanish immediately, and which leaves us only a weak prop for
future investigation; that is at present the only result I can impart
to you."
Miss Forest had already regained her self-possession. "Very well! It is
the first sign of life and being. What have you discovered? How did you
discover it?"
Atkins quietly drew her to the sofa, and sat down by her side.
"Moderate your impatience, Miss Jane. I will be brief and clear as
possible; you may learn later the results. You know that as we passed
through Hamburg I took all necessary steps, I notified the police, I
advertised in the public journals; but as usual in such cases, no
answer came. Four weeks after, at your request, I returned to Hamburg
to convince myself personally, of the hopelessness of our efforts. The
first days of my stay, this seemed to be the only result of my journey;
but on the third, a sailor came to see me."
"A sailor?" repeated Jane in astonishment.
"Yes, he had just landed, and had accidentally seen my advertisement.
He came to tell me that twenty years before, some neighbors of his
parents, poor fishermen who lived in a little village on the coast of
the North Sea, coming from Hamburg, where they had been to market, had
brought with them a boy they had found there, had kept him and reared
him with their own son. The man's statement was so positive that it
induced me to pay him the reward offered, and to write at once to the
designated place."
Jane had listened with passionate intentness.
"And you have received an answer?"
"Yes, an answer with the minutest details. You will yourself read the
letter, it has convinced me that this boy was really our young master
Forest. The date, the age, the incidental descriptions, all agree with
my advertisement. The failure of our investigations hitherto is easily
explained. With the usual indiscretion of such people, instead of
notifying the authorities of their discovery of the lost child, these
fishermen calmly waited for some person to claim him sooner or later,
and meantime, adopted him as their own. To that wretched, sandy
fishing-hamlet, shut out from all the world, a newspaper scarce ever
penetrates, this accounts for the failure of Doctor Stephen's efforts
to find the child."
"Well, what about these people?" interrupted Jane, with eager
impatience.
"They are dead! They died a few years after, and as their poor
neighbors could and would not be burdened with the care and support of
the two boys, the fisherman's son was sent to a relative, an artisan in
a small North-German town, and young master Forest was received into
the house of a clergyman in one of the adjoining villages; but years
ago he gave up his parish and left that region. Here ends the letter,
and my investigations for the present."
With a deep sigh, Jane arose. Discouraging as were these last words, it
required only the slightest hint of her brother's possible existence,
to arouse all her energies to action. In one minute she had reviewed
all, had mastered the whole situation with her wonted clear-sightedness
and promptness.
"We must above all things ascertain the abode of this clergyman, and in
order to do this we must make inquiries in his former parish. If he is
not to be found, then we must extend our inquiries to the mechanic who
adopted the other boy; perhaps he still keeps up some sort of
correspondence with his youthful associate. In any event, we must
quickly and decidedly follow the clue we had scarce hoped to find."
"That is my opinion. I only wished to advise with you in regard to the
necessary proceedings. But one thing more! I have at your express wish,
thus far, kept all this from Mr. Alison; he has no suspicion of the
possible existence of a brother-in-law. Is it not time now to confide
it to him?"
"No!" said Jane, almost roughly. "Not until we are sure. We could
expect from him neither assistance nor gratification in efforts which
would possibly deprive him of half the fortune upon which he reckons."
CHAPTER X.
FOR VALUE RECEIVED.
The strange tone of her voice was remarked by Atkins. "What has
occurred between you and Henry? He, too, was out of humor. Have you had
a quarrel?"
"Yes," said Jane with sullen frankness, "I offended him."
"And he?"
"He?" The young girl's lips curled in scorn. "Well, he bore it."
Atkins frowned. "Have a care, Jane!--Alison is not the man to forgive
an insult, least of all from you. He may have borne it for the moment,
but he will never forget it, and you may have to atone for it at some
future day. I know him!"
"And so do I! Have no anxiety, Mr. Atkins, I do not fear this sort of
revenge, neither do I care for it!"
"Avoid that tone, Miss Jane, at least in speaking of him. You might
drive him to break his troth."
"Hardly! Mr. Alison too well knows my value to him."
Atkins shook his head. He had never before seen his ward thus. "You
know as well as I, that Alison loves you in spite of all, and would
have loved you without your fortune," he said.
"And would have chosen me?"
He was silent.
"Spare your championship!" said Jane bitterly. "I know to what
considerations I shall alone owe the honor of one day being called Mrs.
Alison!"
Atkins fixed his keen glance upon her for a moment. "And is this
anything new to you?" he asked deliberately. "Did you not know this
just as well as now when, five months ago you promised him your hand?
and this promise which the heir and future head of the house of Alison
and Company then received"--he laid a marked emphasis upon the
words--"would it have been given him if he had, for example, held there
the modest position of clerk?"
The thrust took effect, for a moment, as if conscious of guilt, Jane
lowered her head; the words with which she had announced her betrothal
to her father came back to her remembrance. At that time all this had
appeared simple and natural; now, indeed, five months had come and
gone, five months and--three days!
"You see," continued Atkins cuttingly and relentlessly, "that the
dollar also played its role with you, and why not? Mr. Forest educated
you into sensible conceptions of life and its realities. Love is a
luxury,--which the rich only can allow themselves--and Alison allowed
it in his choice. But one must not fall so deeply in love as to forget
one's reckoning, which is still the main thing in life."
"In America--yes!" said Jane in a hollow voice.
Atkins shrugged his shoulders. "In Germany there certainly may be
extravagantly sentimental heads, that would have no regard at all for a
million, and are in a position to unhesitatingly turn their backs to an
heiress, if they happen to be not quite pleased with her. Will you
reproach Mr. Alison, because he knows better how to estimate such
advantages? Those gentlemen in their exalted manly pride may appear
very magnanimous, but--they will never become millionaires."
"You are right," said Jane hastily, and in a voice of icy coldness.
"_To every one his own_."
Atkins gazed at her as if he did not really know what the answer meant.
She had again become thoroughly Miss Forest in her impenetrable repose,
as she now stood before him, and yet, there had been a tone of irony in
her words. But it was a useless endeavor to seek to solve the enigma
to-day; he gave it up.
Rising at the same time, he took a letter-case from his pocket and
reached it to her. "We have arrived at the main thing," he said. "Here
you find the letter I have mentioned, and all the other notices;
examine them critically. This evening I will consult farther with you;
now, I must leave you."
Jane reached him her hand. "I thank you!" she said, "And as for my
ill-humor to-day"--the apology seemed difficult to her, but she must
have felt its necessity--"think nothing more about it. There are moods
we cannot control. I shall see you again."
When Atkins was outside the door, he paused, and once more shook his
head. "There are moods, ahem! This is wonderful. Henry has
presentiments and she moods!--Things they had better let alone, both of
them. But he is right; she is changed; and if I were to begin to
surmise, then I should say"--here Mr. Atkins hurled a very ungracious
glance over to the watery mirror of the river glittering in the sun,
and which was visible between the trees of the garden--"I should say
there lies a sort of premonition here in this German atmosphere, and
that this accursed Rhine, before we think of it, will be letting loose
something of a tempest about our heads!"
CHAPTER XI.
The Dawn of War.
The American's words proved true, although in another sense than he had
intended. His apprehensions became a political prophecy. There was
indeed something in this German atmosphere, and it was upon the Rhine,
that the first lightnings gleamed, heralding the approaching storm.
France had declared war! The blow came like a thunderbolt from a clear
sky, and as in rolling thunders, from its rocky mountains to the sea,
all Germany echoed the call to arms in thousand-fold reverberations.
Upon the Rhine, every city, village and hamlet was all aglow; here, the
excitement was more fiery, more ardent than elsewhere; for it was the
Rhineland for whose sake the momentous game was to be played, and every
man, down to the poorest peasant, felt himself called upon to defend
his precious inheritance, to avenge his insulted country, and prevent
the intended robbery. In one giant, unbroken procession, Germany threw
its assembled forces upon the imperiled boundaries; mightier and
mightier swelled the advancing tide of armed men, more and more densely
grouped the soldier-masses around the threatened palladium of the
nation. For this, the enemy was not half prepared. Those green waves
already rolled on under secure protection; shoulder to shoulder, stood
the now united Germany, keeping guard on the banks of its Rhine, ready
to protect the sacred, ancient stream or to hurl it, an annihilating
tide, into the enemy's country.
Nowhere did the fires of enthusiasm mount higher than in B. The
students hastened to join the ranks or the sanitary corps; the
professors closed their lectures, and when age and health permitted,
placed themselves at the head of the students; the women exerted all
their powers to send aid and comfort to the soldiers soon to be wounded
in the field. All were impelled onward as by one mighty impulse; all
was feverish activity and excitement; here, in the city, the once
strictly-guarded barriers of class and position were broken down; here,
as throughout the fatherland, the old hostility between North and South
was forgotten; all united in one common sacrifice, one renunciation;
all were borne onward by one common tempest of enthusiasm.
CHAPTER XII.
A Rocket in the Camp.
In the first days of this excitement, upon a lovely July morning, Jane
sat alone in the balcony chamber, whose doors, leading to the garden,
were wide open. Outside, the glowing sunshine lay upon grass and shrub,
upon the waves of the river gliding past; the roses were in their full
splendor; beetles and butterflies flitted merrily past, and the large,
old-fashioned room, with its vine-wreathed windows, its high backed
chairs and sofas, its monotonously ticking wall-clock, looked as
peaceful and comfortable as if no outside alarm of war could disturb
the rest and peace of this house.
But no rest and peace lay upon the face of this young girl; bending low
over a newspaper, she seemed to be reading something which fettered her
whole attention; for in eager intentness, her glance followed the
lines, and she neither heard the advancing step nor saw the form which
stood close before her upon the balcony.
"Are you so much absorbed, Miss Jane?" said Atkins entering the room.
"You seem to have found something very interesting. But what can be the
matter with you?"
Jane had hastily risen, and turned her face to him; the newspaper was
still in her hand. If she had not been accustomed to such strict
self-control, perhaps her features would still more have betrayed the
stormy emotion which thrilled her whole being; now only the glowing
cheeks, the flaming eyes expressed it; but they said enough to give the
lie to her hasty subterfuge.
"It is nothing, nothing at all; only I am suffering from the
intolerable heat, from which I have vainly sought refuge here."
Atkins gazed at her distrustfully, and a sudden thought seemed to occur
to him; there was only one single topic upon which he had ever seen
Jane excited.
"Have you learned anything further of that affair? Have you found a new
trace?"
Jane had already mastered her emotion. She calmly laid down the paper.
"Nothing of that sort; nothing at all! I was hoping, on the contrary,
that you came to bring me new tidings."
He shook his head. "I have received none; I expected none. The
authorities at this moment have neither time nor inclination for
private researches; these would be difficult to them now, when
everything human and otherwise, is so out of place. A journey on our
part would be of no avail; aside from the impossibility of travelling
now, we do not know where to go. Weeks may pass before we receive an
answer to our last letter; we shall be obliged to wait."
"Wait!" echoed Jane, "yes, wait forever! And meantime we lose the clue
we have just found. How sad it was that this fisherman and his wife
must die!"
"It was a very fortunate thing for you and young Mr. Forest," returned
Atkins dryly; "for this alone rescued him from the circle into which
untoward fates had thrown him. We certainly do not know upon what
footing he entered that clergyman's house; let us hope it was as a
foster-son, and that all former neglect was there repaired. In any
other case the much desired re-union might be very painful; or, would
it be a matter of indifference to you, Miss Jane, to find your nearest
blood relation unfitted to move in your own sphere?"
The young lady was silent. She had often thought that she should find
her brother poor,--but low or ill-bred,--the idea had never for a
moment occurred to her; and it now won scarce a moment's power over
her; her whole pride rose against it.
"My brother has the blood of his father in his veins; that tolerates no
lowness! If he lives, he has risen above a sphere unworthy of him. I
know that!"
"Without having learned either to read or write? Ahem! You forget that
education aided your father in all his undertakings. A student who has
received his education in a German high school, is fitted for any
station in life. A fisherboy--well I hope our excellent clergyman has
saved us from that mortification; but this war, which has so suddenly
broken out, plays us a sorry game; it brings all our researches to an
end."
With a sigh of impatience, Jane resumed her seat, while Atkins stepped
to the table and took up the newspaper in which he had found her so
absorbed.
"Have you read the 'Appeal to the German Nation' that stands at the
head of the first column?" asked he.
"Yes," came hesitatingly, and as it were with inward reluctance, from
Jane's lips.
"A strange composition!" said Atkins, half mockingly, and half with a
gravity not usual to him. "I do not comprehend how a man can mix such a
senseless lot of poetry into the prose of a newspaper article. In any
event, the author of this must be some sort of a poet, and certainly
none of the worst. A mere journalist surely has not written it: it has
altogether too much."
"Inspiration!" added Jane, with that rare uplighting of her dark eyes.
"Yes, but that means it is extravagant! Well, this German inspiration
always is! But the article has genius and fire, we must admit that; and
in the present excitement of B., which is already at the boiling point,
it will be like a spark in a powder-keg. Half the city has already lost
its senses over it, every student in the university is frantic; the
words are setting fire to everything, like congreve rockets. I only
wonder how long this brilliant display of fireworks is going to last."
Jane glanced at him somewhat scornfully. "But all this at least gives
you a change," she said not without irony. "You found Germany so dull,
past all endurance."
"Yes, I did find it so!" growled Atkins, "but I would rather endure the
former dulness than be here among a crazy people, whose only
praiseworthy virtues, humility and modesty, are now entirely discarded.
Do you suppose that they now respect us foreigners, that they concern
themselves at all about us? I am horribly neglected at my hotel; every
care and attention is for the German officers. On the streets, at
re-unions, in conversation, I am every hour made to feel how utterly
superfluous a being I am among these Teutonic gentlemen. Your amiable
Herr Frederic thinks it no longer necessary to place the least rein
upon his bearish nature, and seems every day to develope a greater
appetite for devouring me at breakfast. Even the good Frau Stephen
begins to assert herself! Did she not yesterday say something really
malicious to you when you would not allow yourself to be pressed into
her patriotic committee? Would she have dared this a little while ago?
They are rebelling even against you, Jane; you must see it. Heiress!
American! Englishman! All these are nothing to them, now that they have
become a united people. They need none of us any more; they are
Germans."
At the last words, a deep flush mounted to Jane's forehead, but she did
not look up.
"I have declared to my aunt, that as soon as there are suffering and
danger to relieve, I will be in my place; but that I think these
enthusiastic demonstrations, in which the ladies now so much delight,
unnecessary and superfluous."
"And so they are!" replied Atkins, excitedly. "Hold your ground there,
at least! Do not yield a foot's-breadth. And now just hear that uproar
at the doorbell! I would wager, that here is again some newly aroused
patriot, who, a week ago, rang the bell modestly, and now, as a matter
of course, introduces himself with this deafening clamor!"
The malice of the American had this time been directed against his
host. It was Doctor Stephen who now opened the door, and rather
excitedly entered.
"Well, and even this shall--Ah, I beg your pardon, I did not know that
any one was here. But I had to ring three times before the maid stirred
out of her kitchen. When Frederic is not in the house all goes wrong."
"And I, too, missed our distinguished porter!" said Atkins with that
extraordinary politeness which with him always concealed some malice.
"In any event, we must congratulate the Prussian army upon such an
acquisition."
"Yes, Frederic has received marching orders," said the doctor, with a
suppressed sigh. "He rode over to H. yesterday, but is to return. The
professor went at the same time."
"Professor Fernow? And what has he to do in H.?"
"He must submit to the formality of an examination, which in times like
these none can easily avoid. Of course it will be only a form with him,
but we shall have to lose Frederic. We can get along without him; but
how the professor, who he has so petted and spoiled, can content
himself with another servant, Heaven only knows!"
So saying, the doctor stepped over to his niece, who seeming to pay no
heed to the conversation, had again taken up the newspaper. He looked
over her shoulder at the sheet.
"I think you exaggerate Professor Fernow's interest in unlearned and
practical things," said Atkins mockingly. "Behind his writing-table and
his folios, he will as little remark the change of servants, as he
would have remarked anything of the war, if he had not been obliged to
take that journey to H."
The doctor's small gray eyes gleamed with a peculiar malicious pleasure
as he glanced over to the American, "Ah! Do you really think so? Have
you read the 'Appeal to the German nation' which appears in the journal
today?"
"Yes," replied Jane hastily, while with a sudden intentness, she raised
her eyes to her uncle.
"And you too, Mr. Atkins?"
"The congreve rocket which this morning set afire the good city of B.,
and will probably enflame hundreds of other cities? Yes, Doctor
Stephen, we have read it."
"That delights me. The congreve rocket came out of my house--the
article is by Professor Fernow."
Jane trembled, and let the journal fall as if she had all at once taken
a glowing coal into her hand; but Mr. Atkins started from his chair,
stood erect a moment, and then just as suddenly sat down again.
"It is not possible!" said he dryly.
"Well, I have heard that word at least thirty times to-day?" replied
the doctor triumphantly, without feeling in the slightest degree
offended. "All have cried out to me, 'impossible!' I could not have
believed it myself if the awkwardness of Frederic, who was sent to take
the article to the printing office, had not revealed all. I naturally
awaited its effect, and then I gave my secret to the four winds. It
fell like a bomb into the university; it has kindled a fire everywhere.
The professor must make up his mind to a reception when he returns, and
I to a scene with him, for he will be enraged at my indiscretion. Bah!
He did not take me into his confidence, I had no silence to keep. What
do you say to all this, Jane!"
"I? nothing!" said Jane with the severest tone and emphasis that lay at
her command. Then she turned away, went to the window, and pressed her
forehead against the panes.
"And you, Mr. Atkins!"
The gentleman addressed leaned back resignedly in his chair.
"I shall await further developments, Doctor Stephen. You will perhaps
next inform me that the professor has stormed a battery, and that
Frederic has given an archaeological lecture in his place. Do not seek
to spare me in the least; I am prepared for all; I shall never again be
surprised at anything here in Germany."
The Doctor laughed aloud; but his merriment all at once ceased, and he
gazed anxiously out at the window.
"What has happened now? Here is Frederic coming back already, and in
such haste! What is the matter with the fellow? He seems greatly
agitated."
It was surely Frederic hastening at a full run through the garden. He
now burst into the room in such excitement that even the presence of
the much feared American Miss and her more hated companion, did not
affect him in the least.
"What is the matter?" asked the doctor hastily. "Has anything happened,
Frederic?"
"Yes," whispered Frederic, breathlessly. "Something has happened--the
Herr Professor"--
"An accident? Where? Upon the railway or over in H. Speak out quickly!"
urged the doctor, in serious alarm.
"Over in H.!" burst out Frederic despairingly. "The Herr Professor--he,
too, is going with us to the field--we march to-morrow morning!"
The momentary effect of these words was a deathly silence. Jane had
turned around, and was gazing at the unhappy messenger as if she
seriously doubted his sanity; the doctor stood there as if struck by a
thunderbolt; but Mr. Atkins, after an instant's pause, said, half
aloud:--
"Now, nothing is really wanting, now, but Herr Frederic's lecture upon
archaeology!"
"But are my military colleagues fools?" broke out the doctor, in great
exasperation. "Professor Fernow declared capable of bearing arms! My
patient, who I have attended for three years! How in Heaven's name has
this happened?"
"I do not know how it really came about," said Frederic, to whom
anxiety and excitement had lent a wonderful gift of speech; "but it is
my master's own fault. I was standing very near him when one of the
doctors gave him a side glance, shrugged his shoulders, and said: 'Well
you are not fit for military duty; you could scarce carry a musket!'
God only knows why the Herr Professor took this so ill; his whole face
all of a sudden became red as blood; he gave the doctor an angry
glance, drew back a few steps, and then said in a loud voice: 'I beg at
least for an examination!' 'If that is all, you shall have it,'
answered the surgeon-in-chief, and you can yourself decide"--
"Was it the surgeon-in-chief?" interrupted the doctor. "I should have
supposed so! He takes all! even those who, at the very first march,
will have to be left lying in the hospital. Well, go on!"
"He only asked: 'Have you any illness?' 'No!' answered the Herr
Professor, and set his teeth together, for the men were all staring at
him. Then he drew himself up, his face became fire-red even to the
forehead, and he did not look at all sick. The surgeon gave him a
slight examination, and then said: 'Nonsense, colleagues, we cannot now
be so critical; his chest and lungs are sound; this slight weakness
comes from close confinement and study, and will soon pass away. You
are accepted, never fear!' I thought I had received a paralytic stroke,
and the Herr Professor drew a breath deep enough to rend his breast."
CHAPTER XIII.
The Triumph of Pride.
The doctor began to pace excitedly up and down the room; but Atkins now
joined in the conversation.
"Do not take it ill Doctor Stephen; your professor is a genius, and
this is only one of those freaks of genius which borders on madness. A
consumptive professor to come down from his chair, and enroll himself
with the army! A lovely accession!"
"Fernow is not consumptive," said the doctor with great positiveness.
"My colleague knows that as well as I, and his nervous disease might
not be discernible in a moment of excitement;--to learn that would
require longer observation. His position does not fully release the
professor from the service; he is young yet, scarcely as old as
Frederic. If I had only had a suspicion of this proceeding, I would
gladly have prevented it by giving the necessary hint about the nervous
trouble, which God knows I could have done with a good conscience. But
who could have foreseen all this? The matter was not arranged here in
B.--and now it is too late."
"But Herr Doctor"--in mortal anguish Frederic gazed at the
physician,--"the Herr Professor cannot march with the soldiers. You
know he can bear no draughts of air, no heat, not even cold; that
everything has to be cooked for him in a peculiar manner, and that he
gets ill if he even goes out with out his umbrella. Good God! he will
die before the first week is over!"
"Well, don't take it so tragically," said the doctor, "We will see what
can be done. Your master's proceeding cannot be recalled, but perhaps
we can arrange it so that he will be allowed some light service in some
of the bureaus or official departments. I will take the necessary steps
in this direction; but above all things I must speak to him myself. He
came back with you?"
"Yes," said Frederic, with a sigh of relief, "I only ran on ahead."
"Well, go now, and arrange your own affairs. Are you, too, going, Mr.
Atkins?"
"Only for a quarter of an hour--to get cooled off! I feel an urgent
necessity of convincing myself that somewhere there exists in B.
something that is not upside down. Miss Forest seems to have a similar
feeling. May I request your company, Jane!"
"I--am weary!"
The young lady sank into an arm chair, rested her head on her hand, and
thus withdrew her face from further observation.
"Jane is evidently out of sorts to-day!" said the doctor to Atkins,
when they reached the balcony outside, whither he had accompanied his
visitor. "Scarce a word can we get from her! She seems to have changed
very much during the last fortnight. Do you know the reason of this
persistent ill-humor?"
"The reason, at this moment, abides in Paris," thought Atkins, but he
replied aloud, and in an indifferent tone: "I suppose that Mr. Alison,
my young countryman, to whom I introduced you a short time ago, brought
Miss Forest letters and tidings from her intimate acquaintances, which
are the cause of the change in her demeanor. At least, I have received
a hint to that effect."
"Well, that is only natural," said the doctor unsuspectingly. "I feared
there was something in my house or in its surroundings, which had
displeased her."
Jane, meanwhile, remained motionless in her place. The door-bell rang
anew, but this time more gently than before; a step echoed in the hall,
but she did not stir until the door of the balcony-room opened. Then
she started up. Professor Fernow stood before her! They had not met
since that evening upon the Ruenberg; he had indeed, not crossed her
path and the persistence with which he avoided a repetition of those
earlier accidental meetings in the house and garden, was only excelled
by the resoluteness with which Jane shunned every possibility of a
re-union. For a fortnight, they had managed to forego the most casual
glance, the coldest greeting; and now, all at once, they stood face to
face, so near, so entirely alone, that the meeting could not be
ignored.
Jane had sprung from her chair; whatever she might have been thinking a
moment before, all vanished at the sight of this man, whom she could
never forgive for his triumph, and her humiliation. The old, hostile
spirit again raged wildly within her. Why did he now appear so suddenly
in her uncle's apartments which he had never before entered,--here,
where he must apprehend a meeting with her? Was this appearance on her
account? The young lady stood there ready for the fray, determined with
her whole strength to defy a might to which this time certainly she
would not yield.
But her heroism was, just now, quite superfluous; it happened
differently from what she had dreamed. The professor still remained
upon the threshold; his glance slowly swept the room, but it did not
rest upon her.
"I beg your pardon; I seek Doctor Stephen."
"My uncle is in the garden."
"I thank you."
He closed the door behind him, and, without looking at her, walked
through the room to the balcony. Jane's brow flushed deeply; she had
made up her mind to meet an attack, and met, instead, the most entire
disregard; this was more than she could endure; her hand convulsively
grasped the arm of her chair.
Meantime, in the balcony, the professor had run against the doctor, who
was just returning from the garden, and at once engrossed him entirely.
"Well, here you are at last! Professor, in God's name, what kind of a
freak have you been playing? Frederic has thrown the whole house into
an uproar by his ill-starred tidings."
So saying, without further parley, he grasped the professor by the arm,
and drew him back into the house. This seemed to be the last thing the
professor wished; he followed the doctor with evident reluctance, and,
regardless of the invitation to sit down, stood upright by the chair
offered him.
Without a word, Jane rose and left the room. The doctor gazed after her
in surprise and displeasure; the discourtesy of his niece, toward this
inmate of his house, began to surpass all bounds. Fernow's lips
quivered, but no glance betrayed that he had even noticed this
movement.
Miss Forest, meantime, had not gone far; in the next room, morose and
hostile, she leaned against a window. She would not remain in the same
room with the man who allowed himself to ignore her and her resentment,
but--she would hear what he wanted of her uncle, and, through the
half-open door, she caught every syllable of the conversation, which
the doctor opened with an impressive lecture.
"And now, before all things, tell me, has that Frederic lost his wits,
or is it true that you have been declared fit for the military service,
that you yourself urged this declaration, that you have represented
yourself as healthy, while it would only have cost you a word, a mere
silence even, to have proved quite the contrary? Have we heard aright?"
The professor cast down his eyes.
"It was a sudden inspiration," he said, softly; "I was sure of
rejection, but the rather contemptuous sympathy of the examining
physician enraged me beyond measure. To be sent home as a miserable
weakling, when all were hastening to the conflict,--that I could not
bear! It was an act of folly for which I must atone with my life;
but--I would do the same thing again!"
"You seem at times to have very wonderful inspirations," said the
doctor with a glance at the morning journal. "Well, we will speak of
that another time, our first business now is how we shall atone for
this stupidity,--now, don't fly into a passion, I mean the surgeon, not
you--how we shall atone for this fellow's stupidity. I will preach him
a sermon! I shall drive over to H. with you, and he shall use his
influence to have you detailed for duty in some of the bureaus. This is
the only thing we can do, as you cannot now wholly withdraw from the
service."
A dark, portentous glow overspread the professor's face; his brow
contracted, and his voice had a singularly angry tone, as he replied:
"I thank you for your good intentions, doctor, but I must decline all
intermeddling on your part in my affairs, I am called to active
service, and shall follow the call in the sense in which it was given."
The doctor gazed at him in speechless astonishment. He had been
accustomed to absolute authority over his patient, who had always
yielded him the most implicit obedience; and now, all at once, he had
risen in open rebellion against his best and most deliberate
conclusions, this was too much for the doctor; he grew angry.
"Are you mad?" he cried excitedly. "You will enter active service?
_You?_ No, that surpasses all conception."
The professor was silent, but he set his teeth together as Frederic had
before described, a deep flush covered his face, and he gazed at the
doctor with a glance which forced that gentleman to assume another
tone.
"Give me only one reason, one single sensible reason, for this insane
proceeding!" he said, almost imploringly. "Could you not serve the
Fatherland just as well with the pen, if you could only bring your mind
to that? Why will you not enter one of the bureaus? only tell me why."
"I will not!"
"You have an obstinate head!" cried the doctor again becoming angry.
"In this you have a remarkable likeness to my niece. '_I will not!_'
and now the whole world might rise against it; but it must be! Exactly
Jane's manner, exactly her tone; just as if you had learned of her. One
is just like the other; you would make a nice, 'married pair!'"
"Doctor, please spare me this foolish jesting!" broke out the professor
with great violence, at the same time stamping furiously.
For a moment Doctor Stephen stood utterly dumb before this passionate
outbreak of his amiable patient, then he said, in a tone of sincere
astonishment.
"I believe that even _you_ can be rough and violent!"
Fernow frowned and turned away.
"Well it was only a jest!" said the doctor apologetically. "I know that
you and Jane stand half upon a war-footing; but you can become very
angry now, professor! I notice that, for the last two months, you have
not been the same person you used to be!"
Fernow did not defend himself against the reproach with a single word;
he preserved an obstinate silence.
"Well, to go back to the main business," began the Doctor anew--but
this time in a low voice--"you will not accept my proposition?"
"No!"
"You will really march to-morrow with the army?"
"In any event."
"Well then--I cannot compel you, and if it cannot be otherwise,"--here
the doctor's patriotism broke through all resentment; he cordially
extended his hand to his patient--"well then, go in God's name! Who knows?
The surgeon-in-chief, may be cleverer than we all; of one thing at least
he has convinced you, one which you would never believe from me: that
you are not consumptive, that you have no decided illness, and as to your
nerves--do you remember what I prescribed to you four weeks ago?"
The professor slowly raised his eyes.
"Some powerful remedy," he said softly.
"Certainly! A radical cure, at which you were horrified at that time.
You would not take upon yourself the life of a day-laborer; but you now
plunge into the military life, without asking me. Well, I should not
certainly have advised so powerful a remedy as this, for we cannot
cease taking it at will; if the dose is too strong, we must either bend
or break! But if you are determined to venture upon it--good luck to
you!"
The professor smiled sadly. "I have little confidence in this blood and
iron cure," he said calmly. "I shall fall, I feel sure of that, either
in face of the enemy, or in consequence of the unwonted exertion. But
it does not matter; in any case it will be better and more speedily
than to die at my writing desk after a consumption, years in duration.
Do not rob me of this conviction, doctor; it is the best I take with
me; I shall at least be of some use in the world!"
"Do not approach me again with your premonitions of death!" cried the
doctor excitedly. "To die--nonsense! We in B. forbid ourselves that
idea. And so you are of no use in the world! You have written no work
over which the whole learned world is beside itself in admiration, eh?"
The professor's lips quivered, as he said bitterly; "and to the rest of
the world, it will remain mere nonsense,--dead, fruitless, valueless."
"Do you really think so? And your article in this morning's paper, was
that, too, mere nonsense? Yes, be horrified as much as you like,
because I know; the whole city knows, the university also. Professor
since you have written that article, I deem all things possible to you,
I doubt you in nothing more!"
Fernow scarce heard these last words; his glance had followed the
motion of the doctor's hand as he pointed to the morning paper, and his
eyes suddenly flamed up as if in deep, glowing satisfaction--the paper
lay in the arm chair where Jane had just been sitting.
"And you ought to be ashamed of yourself," cried Doctor Stephen growing
more and more excited; "you ought really to be ashamed of yourself, for
having so little self-esteem, when with your pen you can rouse
thousands to the most glowing enthusiasm."
The professor's face again grew dark; a hard, bitter expression lay
upon it.
"With the _pen_," he said slowly. "The pen must always fall into
disrepute when the moment demands deeds. With all my knowledge and
abilities, I stand below Frederick, who, with a pair of vigorous arms,
can fight for the Fatherland. At the highest, I can die for it, and for
this, I must still thank your surgeon-in-chief; he, at least, has
lifted from me the curse of being only _a hero of the pen_!"
The doctor shook his head. "If I only knew how all at once you have
become possessed of such terrible bitterness! This sounds as if some
one had given you a deadly insult in these words. I tell you your whole
nature is changed."
With a deep, repressed sigh, as if he would throw off a heavy burden,
Fernow rose to his full height.
"I entirely forget what brings me to you," he said evasively. "They
leave us little time; we must return to H. this evening, for we are
ordered to march early to-morrow morning. I would request you to take
my rooms and my library under your care. In case of my death, you can
dispose of the former as you think best; the latter must go to the
university; it contains many valuable books, a large share of which I
have inherited."
"Yes, and if a formal testament is to be made," interposed the doctor,
"I beg you give me the address of your relatives, so that I may be
prepared for any emergency. Hitherto, I have made no inquiries
concerning them; you have maintained such a strict secrecy in regard to
your family affairs."
"Secrecy! I had nothing to conceal. I have no relatives."
"What! not a single one?"
"Not one; I stand entirely alone in the world."
There lay a quiet, but deep anguish in these words. The doctor
preserved a sympathetic silence; Fernow reached him his hand.
"I must now bid you farewell. I have much to arrange, but I will see
you again this evening."
He went. Doctor Stephen accompanied him to the door, and they parted
with a cordial pressure of the hand. The professor entered the parlor
through which he must pass in order to reach the hall; his features had
won again the gentle, melancholy expression peculiar to them; but
suddenly he started, and drew back--he caught a glimpse of Miss Forest.
She had not left her place at the window, but she had stepped forward
somewhat, so that he could not avoid seeing her, and her glance met
his. Jane's eyes were capable of no soft, dreamy glance, and even their
fire was always like the glow of Northern Lights over an ice field; but
still, a strange power lay in those shadowing depths, the might of a
proud, unyielding will, which knew not how to entice, but to compel;
and she was in the fullest measure conscious of her power. Seldom as
she had recourse to this power, whenever she did enforce it, the
victory remained with her, and it had been a victory over no common
individuals. The obstinate character of her father had bowed to this
will; it had silenced the ever-ready sarcasm of Atkins; it had brought
the cold, equally rigid nature of Alison under her control. And now it
must also enforce something else; the step which, in spite of all that
had happened, must and should cross her path, the farewell word which
she must once again hear from his lips--for this, these eyes now beamed
in the full radiance of their splendor, and deep below, under all this
ice flamed something warmer than the mere glow of boreal fires.
This mysterious power seemed also to subdue Fernow; as if spellbound,
his glance rested upon her face; he saw that she was waiting, waiting
for a farewell. It would cost him only one step, one single word; here
was involved an absence perhaps without return. Over Jane's features
flashed a triumphant glance--then all at once the professor's face grew
dark, every muscle was strained for an energetic resistance. Slowly, as
if step by step, he would withdraw from the influence of a demoniac
power, he tore his eyes from her face; his lips quivered as he set them
firmly together, to shut in any farewell word; his breast rose and fell
convulsively in an agonizing inward conflict; but the wounded pride of
the man held its ground before temptation. He turned to go; a bow,
cold, distant as that parting one upon the Ruenberg, and the door
closed behind him. He had kept his word!
Jane stood there like a statue; this was too much! She had humiliated
herself by waiting; she had waited all this time, and now she stood
there decided to offer her hand in reconciliation, ready to give and to
receive a last parting word; and this incredible self-mastery of hers
had been thus received! What then did this man wish? Did he demand
entreaties from her?
Entreaty? At the mere word, the whole nature of this young girl was
aroused to resistance and exasperation. To entreat was something she
could not do. Miss Forest, who so clearly tested, so calmly considered
all, never had occasion to lament a momentary enthusiasm nor to atone
for an error, because she never allowed herself to yield to impulse;
even in her childhood entreaty was something that had been impossible
to her. She had borne every punishment, but it was with an obstinacy
which chose to endure for long weeks, rather than allow the word
"forgive" to pass her lips; and Forest had discerned in the child too
much of his own nature to force her to anything he would himself regard
as a humiliation. The thought of entreaty flashed through Jane's soul,
only to be repelled with abhorrence. He wished no farewell; well then
he might go without it, into the field, to death, wherever he would.
And what had driven him to this? She knew now; the bitter satisfaction
with which he had heralded his ceasing to be any longer "a hero of the
pen," had betrayed it to her. That phrase had entered deep into this
man's soul; for weeks long it had tortured him; had become the goad
which had impelled him on to undertake something to which his strength
was not equal; and if he now succumbed, if he perished in the
undertaking, whose was the blame?
Jane began to pace excitedly up and down the room; she strove to repel
this thought, but ever and ever again it would return. She heard only
the words he had spoken in gloomy resignation: "I have no one; I stand
alone in the world!" She pressed her hand against her breast, as if
that agony had found an echo there.--Perhaps she ought now to confess
this to him. The old obstinacy again towered up in all its
uncontrollable might, she stamped violently as if beside herself. "No,
and no! and forever no!"
CHAPTER XIV.
Farewell!
The afternoon passed in hasty preparations for the departure of the two
soldiers; at last all was arranged, and with the early twilight,
Frederic, ready for the journey, betook himself to the doctor and his
wife, to say good-by. The poor fellow looked very melancholy; around
his broad mouth was a quiver of pain: it was with great difficulty he
kept back his tears. Neither the heavy package of money the doctor
handed him nor the promise of the doctor's wife to care for him in the
field, could console him.
"For shame, Frederic!" said Doctor Stephen, chidingly. "Is that the way
to go to war? With such a sorrowful mien, with tearful eyes? I should
have believed you had more courage."
Frederic, deeply wounded, wiped the tears from his eyes, and at length,
comprehending the full meaning of the reproach, he cried excitedly:
"Do you think, Herr Doctor, that I am afraid? It is a real delight to
me to take the musket on my shoulder, and go to war. But my poor
master! This is going to cost him his life, even before he meets the
enemy."
"Well, that is by no means certain," said the doctor, while Frau
Stephen, who was entirely of Frederic's opinion, pressed her
handkerchief to her eyes. "Perhaps he will hold out better than we all
think. I tell you once more, he is not so very ill as you imagine, and
this soldier-life will tear him away from his studies, which, in any
event, is a fortunate thing."
"He will not endure it," persisted Frederic with a mournful shake of
the head; "he certainly will not endure it! At the very first march, he
will lie in the hospital; and if I am not with him to take care of him,
he will surely die. And for all this"--here that fearful, bearish
nature, so deplored by Mr. Atkins, broke forth anew in Frederic,--"and
for all this, those accursed Frenchmen are guilty,--I--I am going to
kill a dozen at least for it!"
"Well, well; wait until you are in France!" cried the doctor,
retreating from the furious pantomime Frederic enacted after these
words. "You certainly will have to wait before you can offer such a
propitiatory sacrifice to the manes of your master. So far as I know,
he has served his year in the volunteer army, and he still remains
alive."
"That was ten years ago," replied Frederic, still more despairingly.
"At that time he was much stronger and more healthy than I, and still
he lay for some time in the hospital. Well, there is no help for it
now! Good-by, Herr Doctor, good-by, Frau Doctorin!" he cordially
stretched out both huge hands, and in spite of his efforts to keep them
back, tears streamed down his cheeks. "You have been very kind to me
during these last three years; when I return I will try to repay you;
if _I_ cannot--may God reward you!"
So saying, he pressed, and shook with a giant's strength, the proffered
hands, accepted another caution and some further words of good advice,
waved his cap, and trotted down the steps after his master, who had
already taken leave of the married pair, and had gone for a few moments
into the garden.
The professor stood at the farther end of the garden, leaning against
the latticed gate, and gazed fixedly and dreamily upon the now dry
portion of the hedge-way which separated it from the river rushing
past. The sun had already set, the last beams of the twilight were
fading away, and the first stars faintly glimmered in the sky. Between
the trees and shrubbery, dusky shadows already lay, and the cool breath
of the night enveloped all. From above came the light rustle and murmur
of the waves, the dear old familiar Rhine voices whispered to him their
parting salutation. Whether it was a parting from home, or from life as
well--it was the last he had to expect.
There was all at once a rustle from another direction, but more
distinct, more violent, as a woman's silk dress crossed the path.
Thrilled by a presentiment, Fernow turned around. Before him stood
Jane, pale as death, her glance fixed upon the ground, her hands firmly
clasped, and with an expression as if, just now, the most terrible
thing in her whole life had happened. Her breast rose and fell
convulsively; her lips quivered; she could not control them, and at
last they opened for these momentous words: "I--I beg your
forgiveness!"
"Miss Forest! Johanna!" cried Fernow, with uncontrollable emotion; but
she had already turned, and like a hunted creature, fled down the path.
He was about to rush after her, when Frederic's loud voice echoed
through the garden.
"Herr Professor, we must go! Herr Professor, where are you? We haven't
a moment to lose."
"Must we go? This very instant!" The new duty was demanding its first
heavy sacrifice; a moment of struggle, and then all was over.
"I am coming!" he replied in a firm voice! He hastened to the house.
Under the vine-wreathed balcony it was growing dark already, but the
outlines of a delicate form were visible, only half concealed by the
foliage. For a moment the professor's feet lingered, only one, and
ardent and deep-toned the parting word at last wrung from him up to
her:
"_Farewell!_"
CHAPTER XV.
Following the Clue.
Weeks and months had passed, since that first call to arms had echoed
through the land, and still the storm of war raged with undiminished
fury; but the arrow had recoiled upon its sender. Upon the Rhine the
vineyards were ripening, the purple grapes gaining richer hues day by
day; golden harvests moved in the fields; over the cities floated the
nation's victorious banner; but yonder in France, the vineyards were
laid waste, the blooming meadows were trodden under the feet of men and
horses, the flames of burning villages rose to heaven. All the horrors
which had been destined for the Rhineland, now fell upon French soil, a
late but fearful punishment for the once so frivolously devastated
Palatinate. Even the victors could no longer restrain their rage: the
ruin, now unfettered, took its course, alike visiting the guilty and
the guiltless, and the trembling land now at last itself experienced
the full, terrible import of those words with which it had often enough
absolved itself from every responsibility--_C'est la guerre!_
Onward, still onward, marched the victorious columns of the German
army, from the Rhine to the Moselle, from the Moselle to the Meuse,
from the Meuse to the Seine, throwing down all that stood in its way.
City after city opened its gates, citadel after citadel yielded after a
shorter or longer resistance. The fiery August sun blazed down upon
seven battlefields, saluting at the same time, countless trophies of
victory; and the first cool breezes of September swept that soil, where
the wavering enemy, surrounded, hemmed in, pressed on every side, had
at last yielded. A whole French corps, the once formidable head of the
army, now indeed held the vaunted entrance to Germany; but without arms
or resources;--and meantime the conquerors pressed on, with restless,
unyielding persistence, to the heart of France--to Paris!
At N., the capital of one of the departments, in spite of the
war-billows that had long since swept over it, reigned an active,
military life. This town was the principal station on the great
military and travelling highway which led from Germany into the
interior of France. Marching regiments, endless provision and munition
trains, here crossed the path of the returning transports of sick and
wounded soldiers, ambulances, and couriers; all the streets were
crammed with men, carriages and horses; all the quarters were
full to overflowing. In this state of things, two travellers,
apparently English or American, who had arrived yesterday, although
they undoubtedly belonged to the richer class, still deemed it
a lucky accident to obtain, at an extravagant price, a pair of
miserably-furnished attic rooms in a hotel of the second grade.
Upon the morning after their arrival, the stronger gentleman sat upon a
sofa, while his young companion stood at an open window and gazed up
the street, where a confused multitude of pedestrians and vehicles
of all sorts blocked the way, while the tumult and excitement, in
ever-increasing murmurs, fell upon her ear.
"I do not comprehend how you can endure those deafening noises down
there, Miss Jane! Are you not at least weary of this eternal hurrying
and surging to and fro?"
"No!" was the curt, somewhat ill-natured answer of the young lady, who,
bending far out of the window, at this moment was gazing intently into
an ambulance full of wounded men. Her glance fixed itself immovably on
the pale wan faces, and she looked after them until the ambulance
vanished around a corner.
"Well, you have better nerves than I," said Atkins resignedly. "I
confess that during these last eight days I have become really morbid.
We were a whole week on this journey to N. which is usually made in
twenty-four hours; we have had our night quarters in the most wretched
villages, such food I never in my life tasted before. For hours and
days, we have had to lie over in half-ruined places on account of
broken bridges and impassable roads, and always in danger lest a battle
might be fought in our immediate vicinity, and we borne onward with the
wave of victory or flight. I should think all this must at last have
convinced you how impossible it is to trace out family relationships
upon the theatre of war."
During this speech, Jane had closed the window; she now turned around.
"Impossible?" she asked calmly. "I thought that in spite of all, we had
arrived in N., and that, in any event, a decision awaited us here."
"Or a new deception! This clue misleads us in the most exasperating
ways. Scarce do we think we have it, when it suddenly snaps asunder,
and darts away to some other quarter of the heavens. At present, we are
in France, and I should not wonder if the next thing, we had to direct
our course back to America, only to go from there to the Rhine again,
and so on."
"It is all the same!" declared Jane energetically. "I promised my
father to find my brother if still alive, and to yield only to
impossibilities. I shall keep my word!"
"If it were only a direct clue we are following?" began Atkins again;
"but whom do we seek? A man who by some remote possibility may be able
to give us information of the principal character in this drama."
"And perhaps the only one who can give it! The direct clue is lost;
that clergyman is not to be found, neither in his former parish nor
anywhere else; all our efforts in this direction have failed; but we
have found the artisan who adopted the other boy."
"And from him have received the joyful tidings that his nephew went to
France four years ago, and at this moment may be here in N. For the
theatre of his highly respectable efforts at the planing bench, he has
chosen a place right in the midst of all these accursed military
operations."
Jane's eyes flashed half-angrily. "You forget the most important
thing," she said, "the one which alone leads us here; the assertion of
that man that the former playfellow of this young Erdmann is still
living, that the two, after a separation of years, met again during
their term of military service. Certainly, he could tell us nothing
further; his nephew was at that time on duty far away from him in a
large garrison city; but this much he remembered distinctly, having
heard it from Erdmann's own lips. I have learned that my brother still
lives, that there is some one in the world who knows him, who can tell
me his abode. Does this not seem to you a step gained on the path we
seek? It is more than I had hoped!"
"I do not dispute all this," replied Atkins; "I am only of the opinion
that it would be better to defer our investigations until after the end
of the war."
"Until the end of the war," echoed Jane. "When all present associations
are severed, and the soldiers are scattered here and there! These
tidings have not come too late; I hope not, at least, but we ought not
to delay a moment, to make the best possible use of them, and as an
epistolary correspondence was not to be thought of, there was only one
resource; I must enter personally into the investigation, and follow
the clue. If you suffer from the dangers and deprivations of the
journey, Mr. Atkins, it is your own fault--I could have come alone!"
"Yes, God knows you would have done so!" said Atkins, with a sigh.
"Jane, you are sometimes terrible in your restless energy! I certainly
do not belong to the indolent and the irresolute; but this tireless
rushing onward toward one single goal, has at last quite exhausted me."
"But not _me_!" replied Jane, with cool determination. "I am resolved
to go on, I repeat it, to the utmost limits of the possible!"
"Well, we have one certainty at least," began Atkins after a brief
pause; "the German master with whom young Erdmann was at work when the
war broke out, is still here. You know that yesterday, I went from the
mayoralty, where I received this intelligence, directly to the
designated house. But I found it closed, all its inmates fled to the
just arrived Prussian regiments, among whom they hoped to find
countrymen. This information I obtained from a very peculiar
conversation with an exceedingly talkative neighbor; peculiar, I may
well say, for she understood no English and I no French, and we were
forced to call a very expressive pantomime to our aid, by means of
which I made her comprehend that my visit was designed for Monsieur
Erdmann and his master, that I would return to-day, and that I should
be infinitely obliged to her if she would hand my card to the latter.
Thus far our pantomime brought us, and now I am curious to know what
sort of unavoidable confusion Madame has made out of the slang."
Jane glanced at her watch. "It is now half-past nine, and I think we
ought to get ready to go out."
CHAPTER XVI.
An Agonizing Doubt.
The answer which Atkins was about to give, was interrupted by a
knocking at the door. It was opened, and an old man with white hair,
simply but not poorly clad, and with a modest, friendly manner,
entered, and immediately addressed himself in good French to the two
strangers.
"I beg your pardon, but they showed me up here. I am the master joiner
Vogt, Rue de--. A strange gentleman inquired for me yesterday, and left
a card with his address which I understood as a request for me to call
on him. I trust I have come to the right place?"
Atkins naturally understood nothing of these words. But Jane, who was
perfect mistress of French, translated all he needed to hear, and then
turned to the visitor.
"You are quite right, but the gentleman's visit was not to you, it was
to a young man who, they tell us, works with you. He is in any event, a
German, and a journeyman carpenter, Franz Erdmann. We are in search of
him, and were just about visiting you again on his account."
"Is it Franz you seek?" asked, the old man, now in his mother tongue.
"Good heavens! he has been gone six weeks. Immediately after the
declaration of war he went from us back to Germany. He is now in the
Prussian army."
Jane involuntarily grew pale. Another vain effort! But the
disappointment which, after so confident a hope, would have discouraged
any other, only angered her. She compressed her lips and the toe of her
little boot beat the floor. If this experience lent her no words, it
was evident that in her heart she made a new vow to press forward in
spite of all.
Mr. Atkins did not take the tidings so quietly; his vexation found vent
in loud exclamations.
"In the army; I believe this glorious Prussian host embraces all
mankind! Whatever person we enquire after in the course of our
investigations we always receive the stereotyped answer, _In the army!_
I am convinced that if at last we get upon the direct track of this Mr.
Franz, we shall learn that he too, is in the army. If he is in no other
part of Europe, we shall certainly find him there."
The master-joiner understood none of this English, but he heard the
tone of the words, and saw from the expression of the young lady's
face, what an effect his arrival had produced upon both.
"Yes, and this war comes near enough to us also!" he said sadly. "I
miss Franz everywhere, and my poor girl sits weeping her eyes out the
whole day long; they were to be married in the autumn. But there was no
help for it; he belonged to the first levies, and we would not take
upon ourselves the sin of holding him back."
"_Sin!_" growled Atkins, again in his English, and turned to Jane. "Did
you ever hear of such a thing? This fellow sits safe and concealed here
in France, where no man asks after his military duty. He was to marry
here, settle down here, and the prospect was that he would not during
all his life, return to Germany; and scarce does the war break out when
he runs home, leaves bride, wedding, handicraft, all in the lurch, and
hurries off to let himself be shot dead for the beloved Rhine. The
sentiment of duty with these Germans is really a sort of mania."
Jane scarce heard these words; a ray of hope already flashed before her
eyes here, where Atkins had given up all for lost. She turned hastily
again to the master-joiner. "Young Hartman stood in intimate relations
to your family? He was to be your son-in-law? Well, then, perhaps you
and your daughter know something in regard to his past which may be
very important to us. We hope to gain from him some intelligence as to
a family matter, and shall very cheerfully requite any such service."
"As to his family relations, I know them intimately. He has been more
than two years in my house, and he tell in love with my Marie at the
very first," said Vogt unhesitatingly. "Ask on, Mademoiselle, I think I
can give you information."
Atkins drew back. He saw that Jane wished to take the affair into her
own hands, and he resigned it to her the more readily, as he promised
himself no especial result from the pending examination. Indeed no help
was necessary; Miss Forest propounded her questions so clearly, so
confidently and energetically, that the best criminal lawyer could have
done no better.
"Your future son-in-law was born in the little fishing village of M.,
not far from Hamburg?"
Master Vogt nodded.
"After the death of his parents, he came to relatives in P., who
brought him up, and from thence, after his apprenticeship and military
service were ended, he went over to France to perfect himself in the
joiner's art, and for two years, he has lived at N., in your house?"
"Quite right!" returned the master. "It is really our Franz you
describe. All agrees to a hair!"
"Has he never"--Jane's voice again betrayed the excitement she could
with difficulty restrain--"has he never told you of a brother who grew
up with him in M.!"
"That he has indeed! But he was no real brother, only an adopted child
whom his parents had brought with them from Hamburg, and kept, in their
kindness of heart, as no one claimed him."
Jane sent a triumphant glance over to Atkins. In spite of all, she was
on the track. "And this also is known to you? Later the boys were
separated, but the other also found adoption?"
"Yes, with a learned man."
With an almost convulsive movement, Jane lifted her head. "With--a
learned man!" she repeated slowly; "they told us it was a clergyman,
pastor Hartwigs."
"Yes, you are quite right; he was a very learned old gentleman, with
his head always stuck into books; Franz has told us all about him;
later, he gave up his pastorate--he was not poor--just to live for his
learning."
Jane had all at once become pale as death. A lightning ray had flashed
down and rent the darkness which had so long lain over the destiny of
her brother; for a moment it glowed lurid and threatning, then all was
again night; but its upflowing must have shown something terrible to
the sister, for she shuddered before it.
"Are you ill, Miss Jane?" asked Atkins, anxiously, and made a movement
to approach her.
"No!" Jane summoned all her strength, and motioned him back; her breath
came short and violently, and the hand with which she held for support
to the table, trembled as if in a fever.
"And do you know whether that adopted brother is still alive, whether
he stands in any sort of relationship to your son-in-law?"
"Certainly he is alive," said the master-joiner calmly. "And they have
often written to each other. No longer ago than last Easter, Franz had
a letter from him."
"From what place? Where was it dated?" Fearful excitement pulsed
through Jane's voice; her glance was fixed upon the man as if life or
death for her lay in his answer.
Master Vogt shook his head. "That I cannot tell you. Franz spoke of the
letter, and told us that his brother was doing well, but he always
called him by his given name, Fritz, and neither my daughter nor I saw
the writing. The only thing I know is that he came from the Rhine."
From the Rhine! Jane laid her hand against her moist, icy-cold
forehead. For a moment, it seemed to her as if she must swoon away, and
all else with her; but she kept up, and remained so dumb and
motionless, that both men thought her apathetic.
Atkins glanced over to her in surprise; he waited for her to ask
further questions, waited for a full, minute; but as she was still
silent he began to speak.
"This being the case, we might have spared ourselves a difficult
journey! We have just come from the Rhine, my best Monsieur Vogt. You
can give us neither name nor place? Neither you nor your daughter?"
"Neither."
"Well, then, I must beg you to tell me the exact regiment and company
in which your future son-in-law serves at present. You have received
tidings of him since he left for the war?"
"Only once! We were hoping he would pass through here with the army,
and yesterday, when we learned that the new Prussian regiments were
entering the town, we all ran out and stood before the gates to see if
his was not there."
Atkins still waited for Jane to take part in the conversation; her
entire indifference seemed so strange after the feverish interest she
had shown a few minutes before; but, as she persisted in her
immobility, he drew forth his note book, and jotted down the statement
just given. The master-joiner took his leave of the young lady; she
bowed mechanically, and left it to her companion to dismiss him with
great politeness. The man might perhaps be again needed in this
business, and anyone whom Mr. Atkins thought of making use of always
enjoyed the politest attention from him.
When the man was gone, he turned to Jane. "Did I not tell you so? We
must go to another point of the compass? Now we will direct our steps
back to the Rhine. The only thing which remains to us is to write from
Germany to Herr Erdmann; in any event this is easier than a
correspondence with N., since we have his full address. In case he is
no longer alive, we must repeat our advertisement in the several
Rhenish newspapers. But in any event, I think we should immediately
start upon our return journey."
At these words, Jane started from her stupor.
"And why? We are now in France. Perhaps we may succeed in finding that
regiment!"
"For Heaven's sake, Jane, what are you thinking of? Seek a regiment
upon the march--what an idea!"
"But that matters not, I will now know the truth! And if it was to cost
me my life, and I must rush into the fight, even into the line of
battle,--I must have a certainty!"
Atkins stood almost horrified before this sudden outbreak of a passion
he had never suspected in Jane; and he now for the first time remarked
her deathly pallor.
"Good God, what is the matter with you! Are you ill? I thought you
would have to suffer from the weariness and excitement of this
journey."
He sought to assist her, but she repelled him with a passionate
gesture.
"It will pass over--I need nothing--but I beg you for a glass of
water."
Atkins was in serious anxiety; he knew that Jane was not at all subject
to nervous attacks, and he feared that she was ill. As in the hotel at
present, prompt service was not to be dreamt of, he himself hastened
out to fetch the water.
This was what Jane had expected. She wanted no water, but she needed a
moment of solitude to save her from suffocation. Scarce was he gone,
when she, too, hastened to the door, drew the bolt, and then sinking on
her knees by the sofa, she buried her face in her hands. Jane Forest
would not yield in this way before stranger eyes!
"If one is thrust out into life, without parents and without home, and
then falls into the hands of a learned man who knows and loves nothing
in the wide world but science--" and that letter came from the Rhine!
This had been the lightning stroke which had passed through her; the
presentiment came with all the annihilating power of certainty. That
lightning flash had opened an abyss before her, into which Jane did not
dare to glance; it had brought a secret to light, of which the cold,
proud betrothed of Alison had not before been conscious. But, as now in
mortal anguish she wrung her uplifted hands, it broke forth in one
long-repressed despairing-cry;--
"Almighty God, only not this! My rival, my deadly enemy, if it must be,
I will bear it--only not my brother!"
CHAPTER XVII.
The Pen and the Sword.
The late afternoon sun of a bright September day shone through the
thick-leaved boughs of the ancient gigantic chestnuts which shaded the
avenues and grass-plats of the broad park stretching behind the castle
of S., one of those magnificently situated country seats in which the
interior of France is so rich. This castle, on the western declivity of
a precipitous range of hills, which at this point unfolded all their
widely-romantic beauty, as well as the village in its immediate
vicinity, had just been seized as quarters for the soldiery. A Rhenish
landwehr regiment, after having taken part in all the August battles
had been ordered back here to protect the mountain region from roving
bands of French fusileers, and to keep the passes free. It was a
dangerous and arduous post for the rather small detachment, which, many
miles distant from its comrades, almost daily undertook excursions to
the mountains, thereby placing itself in constant danger of an attack
for which this region was only too favorable. The soldiery lay in the
village, while the officers had quartered themselves close by in the
castle, whose inmates had naturally fled. These gentlemen, for the
moment at least, seemed to have surrendered themselves to an idleness
of late only rarely offered them; from the terrace echoed loud talking
and laughing, blended with the ringing of glasses.
At the entrance of the park, under one of these giant chestnuts, lay a
landwehr officer stretched upon the tall grass, and gazing up into the
thick leafy roof through which the setting sun threw hither and thither
its palpitating rays. The floral treasures of the garden, arranged with
great art and care, and now resplendent with all the summer's
magnificence and luxuriance, appeared to fetter his attention just as
little as the sound of his comrades' merriment coming down to him from
the castle. He raised his head only when an approaching footstep
startled him from his dream.
A man of about thirty years, his uniform and the bands upon his arm
designating him as a surgeon, came up the path as if in search of some
one, and halted before the reclining officer.
"I thought as much! Here you lie dreaming again, while I, by the sweat
of my brow, am winning popularity for you. You really do not concern
yourself about it in the least!"
The man addressed half rose and supported himself on his elbows. "I
have a duty to perform," he said. "I must go down to the village at
four o'clock."
"And for that reason you must make yourself invisible at three? Do not
deny it, Walter, you ran away from us because you remarked that I had
the horrible intention of reading aloud a poem, a copy of which I
forced from you. But flight does not avail you; on your return, you
will be received with general acclamation. Our major swears that he
never heard anything like it his life; the adjutant was just as
enthusiastic in its praise. You know he is a sort of amateur critic,
well versed in aesthetics, and from the very first you wonderfully
impressed him with your learning. He reminds us how highly favored we
are by destiny in being able to call a poet our companion-in-arms, a
poet Germany will one day salute as it greatest genius. Our lieutenant
swears by all the gods of the upper and lower world, that if the French
had possessed a bard who before the battle had inspired them with such
songs, they would have given us more to do; but your poetry has had the
most stupendous effect upon our fat captain; it has made him forget his
dram!"
"Stop this nonsense!" said the young officer half in anger, as he sank
back to his reclining posture.
"_Nonsense!_ I give you my word that I have only repeated literally to
you, what was said. Did you hear the glasses ring? All the officers
were just then solemnly guaranteeing you immortality. I am sent to
seize the flying singer, and bring him back, living or dead. They
clamorously demand your presence."
"Spare me! You know how much I dislike such ovations."
"And again do you refuse to come? Well, it is just like you! We ought
by this time to have learned that we can have Lieutenant Fernow's
company only when some service is required, or some fight is at hand.
You run away from all recognition of your talents, as any other man
would run from punishment. You must cease this, Walter; it really is
not fitting for the future poet of Germany."
Fernow had meantime risen; he had put on the helmet which lay near him
in the grass, and bound his sword more firmly. One who two months ago
had seen the learned professor of the university of B. would certainly
not have recognized him in this young warrior, whose military coat
fitted the slender form excellently, as if he had all his life worn no
other. The sickly pallor and the deep, shadowy rings about the eyes,
had vanished with the bowed form and the unhealthy appearance. The
forehead and cheeks were deeply sunburned, the blood coursed vigorously
through the veins, the blonde hair, little cared for, waved in
luxuriant profusion under the helmet; the once smooth chin wore a heavy
beard; the upright military bearing seemed to cost the present landwehr
lieutenant not the slightest effort, and the once delicate hands, with
a strong grip, now seized the sword. These six weeks in the field had
wrought wonders; it was evident at the first glance--Doctor Stephen's
radical cure had been affected.
"You place too much value on my songs," he said evasively. "The verses,
written upon the inspiration of the moment, inspire only for the
moment, and when the excitement which called them forth is ended, they
will fall into forgetfulness."
"Do you think so?" asked the surgeon gravely. "I may be allowed to
doubt it. In your verses resounds more than a mere battle-cry, although
you may, perhaps, in future, thank the war for having roused your
slumbering talent and for showing you the path to future renown."
"Perhaps!" said Fernow gloomily. "And perhaps, also, a bullet may
to-day or to-morrow make an end of all the promised renown?"
"Can you not throw off this eternal melancholy?" asked the doctor
chidingly. "Walter, I really believe you are bearing an unhappy love
around with you."
"Not at all!" cried Fernow passionately, and turned away. The deep
flush which earlier had suffused his pale face at every violent
excitement, again appeared, although less visible in the bronzed
countenance.
This sudden emotion had escaped the surgeon. He had been a younger
colleague of Doctor Stephen, a private tutor in the university of B. He
and Fernow had known each other sufficiently to exchange a passing
salutation as they met. This had lasted for three years, but the army
life had in a few hours made them acquaintances, and in a few weeks,
friends.
The always merry young doctor laughed aloud at his own comic idea. "I
have really been very curious as to the where and when! Since we have
been in the field, I have scarcely stirred from your side, and in B.
you never so much as looked at a woman, for which reason, the fairer
half of the city, with good reason, declared you outlawed and
proscribed." Fernow made no answer; he busied himself with the hilt of
his sword.
"But Doctor Stephen was right with his diagnosis," continued the
surgeon after a momentary pause, "although I would not believe it when
he came over to H. to commend you to my care, he having heard that I
was assigned to your regiment. I could with a good conscience, promise
to do my best, for I was convinced that you would be the first patient,
to fall into my hands. The first week, I would not have given a penny
for your life, but when the marches and hardships began, when our men
fell in scores beneath the fiery August sun, and you still held out;
when amid all the over exertion and deprivation which sometimes lay low
the strongest, you grew only healthier and more robust then I took off
my hat to the superior discernment of my old colleague. Walter, you
have one of the best constitutions, a really magnificent constitution,
which only needed to renounce the study and the writing-desk, to gain
its full development; and you have found the right, although somewhat
unusual remedy for your nerves. The thunder of the cannon has
thoroughly re-established them! This will be a surprise to everyone
when you return to B."
"When I return?"
"Forever and eternally, these presentiments of death!" cried the
surgeon, with an impatient gesture. "You cling to them with a genuine
passion."
"Because I feel them!"
"Nonsense! If there is a man bullet-proof it is you! Do not take it ill
of me, Walter, but your rushing to the front in all these battles,
borders on insanity. Courage need not become reckless; but where
excitement urges you on, you see and hear nothing. Your comrades all
say this."
"And still there is not one among them, who a little while ago, would
have owned that I possessed any courage at all," returned Fernow, with
some bitterness.
"I know that," said the surgeon, frankly. "But to tell the truth you
used to have little enough of the hero in you. You were entirely a man
of the pen, who wholly absorbed in his books had nothing to do with the
outside world. Now that is all a thing of the past, as well as the
error of your comrades. Since the first battle, none doubt your
courage."
Fernow smiled sadly. His eyes alone had not changed. There lay within
them the old dreaminess and the old
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