Part 32 (1/2)
Outside of the building the stars were s.h.i.+ning brightly, the road was distinctly visible. The countess unresistingly accompanied him. He turned toward the village and they walked swiftly through the silent streets. At last the church rose, dark and solemn, before them. He led her in. A holy-water font stood at the entrance, and, pausing, he sprinkled her with the water. Then they entered. The church was dark.
No light illumined it save the trembling rays of the ever-burning lamp and two candles flickering low in their sockets before an image of the Madonna in a remote corner. They were obliged to grope their way forward slowly amid the wavering shadows. At the left of the entrance stood a ”Pieta.” It was a group almost life-size, carved from wood. The crucified Saviour in the Madonna's lap. Mary Magdalene was supporting his left hand, raising it slightly, while John stood at the Saviour's feet. The whole had been created by an artist's hand with touching realism. The expression of anguish in the Saviour's face was very affecting. Before the group stood a priedieu on which lay several withered wreaths.
The countess' heart quivered; he was leading her there! So this was to be the compensation for the living image? Mere dead wood?
Freyer drew her gently down upon the priedieu. ”Here, my child, learn to seek him here, and when you have once found Him, you will never lose Him more. Lay your hands devoutly on the apparently lifeless breast and you will feel the heart within throbbing, as in mine--only try.”
”Alas, I cannot, it will be a falsehood if I do.”
”What, _that_ a falsehood, and I--was _I_ the Christ?”
”I could imagine it!”
”Because I breathed? Ah, the breath of the deity can swell more than a human breast, sister, and you will hear it! Collect your thoughts--and pray!”
His whisper grew fainter, the silence about her more solemn. ”I cannot pray; I never have prayed,” she lamented, ”and surely not to lifeless wood.”
”Only try--for my sake,” he urged gently, as if addressing a restless child, which ought to go to sleep and will not.
”Yes; but stay with me,” she pleaded like a child, clinging to his arm.
”I will stay,” he said, kneeling by her side.
”Teach me to pray as you do,” she entreated, raising her delicate hands to him. He clasped them in his, and she felt as if the world could do her no further harm, that her soul, her life, lay in his firm hands.
The warmth emanating from him became in her a devout fervor. The pulses of ardent piety throbbing in his finger-tips seemed to communicate a wave-like motion to the surrounding air, which imparted to everything which hitherto had been dead and rigid, an undulating movement that lent it a faint, vibrating life.
Something stirred, breathed, murmured before and above her. There was a rustling among the withered leaves of the garlands at the foot of the Pieta, invisible feet glided through the church and ascended the steps of the high altar; high up the vaulted dome rose a murmur which wandered to the folds of the funeral banner, hanging above, pa.s.sing from pillar to pillar, from arch to arch, in ghostly echoes which the listening ear heard with secret terror, the language of the silence.
And the burning eyes beheld the motionless forms begin to stir. The contours of the figures slowly changed in the uncertain, flickering light, the shadows glided and swung to and fro. The Saviour's lips opened, then slowly closed, the kneeling woman touched the rigid limbs and laid her fevered fingers on the wounded breast. The other hand rested in Freyer's. A chain was thus formed between the three, which thrilled and warmed the wood with the circulating stream of the hot blood. It was no longer a foreign substance--it was the heart, the poor pierced heart of their beloved, divine friend. It throbbed, suffered, bled. More and more distinctly the chest rose and fell with the regular breathing. It was the creative breath of the deity, which works in the conscious and unconscious object, animating even soulless matter. The arm supported by Mary Magdalene swayed to and fro, the fingers of the hand moved gently. The poor pierced hand--it seemed as if it were trying to move toward the countess, as if it were pleading, ”Cool my pain.”
Urged by an inexplicable impulse, the countess warmed the stiff, slender fingers in her own. She fancied that it was giving relief.
Higher and higher swelled the tide of feeling in her heart until it overflowed--and--she knew not how, she had risen and pressed a kiss upon the wounds in the poor little hand, a kiss of the sweetest, most sacred piety. She felt as if she were standing by a beloved corpse whose mute lips we seek, though they no longer feel.
She could not help it, and bending down again the rosy lips of the young widow rested on the pale half-parted ones of the statue. But the lips breathed, a cool, pure breath issued from them, and the rigid form grew more pliant beneath the sorrowful caress, as though it felt the reconciling pain of the penitent human soul. But the divine fire which was to purify this soul, blazed far beyond its boundaries in this first ardor. Overpowered by a wild fervor, she flung herself on her knees and adjured the G.o.d whose breath she had drunk in that kiss, to hear her.
The friend praying at her side was forgotten, the world had vanished, every law of reason was annihilated, all knowledge was out of her mind--every hard-won conquest of human empiricism was effaced. From the heights and from the depths it came with rustling pinions, bearing the soul away on the flood-tide of mercy. The _miracle_ was approaching--in unimagined majesty.
Thousands of years vanished, eternity dawned in that _one_ moment. All that was and is, _was_ not and _is_ not--past, present, and future, were blended and melted into a single breath beyond the boundaries of the natural life.
”If it is Thou, if Thou dost live, look at me,” she had cried with ardent aspiration, and, lo!--was it shadow or imagination?--the eyes opened and two large dark pupils were fixed upon her, then the lids closed for an instant to open again The countess gazed more and more earnestly; it was distinct, unmistakable. A shudder ran through her veins as, in a burning fever, the limbs tremble with a sudden chill.
She tried to meet the look, but spite of the tension in every nerve, the effort was futile. It was too overpowering; it was the gaze of a G.o.d. Dread and rapture were contending for the mastery. Doubtless she said to herself, ”It is not _outside_ of you, but within you.” Once more she ventured to glance at the mysterious apparition, but the eyes were fixed steadily upon her. Terror overpowered her. The chord of the possible snapped and she sank half senseless on the steps of the altar, while the miracle closed its golden wings above her.
CHAPTER XV.
THE CROWING OF THE c.o.c.k.
A loud step roused the rapt enthusiast from her visions. The sacristan was pa.s.sing through the church, extinguis.h.i.+ng the candles which, meanwhile, had burned down in their sockets before the Madonna in the distant corner.