Part 44 (1/2)

Just at that moment the door opened and Freyer entered. All that was stirring the mother's heart instantly became clear to him, as he saw her thus broken down beside the boy's bed.

”Calm yourself--what will the child think!” he said, bending down and raising her.

”Don't cry, Mamma!” said the boy, stroking the soft hair on the grief-bowed head. He did not know why he now suddenly called her ”mamma”--perhaps it was a prospect of the heaven where she would be his mother, and he said it in advance.

”Oh, Freyer, kill me--I am worthy of nothing better--cut short the battle of a wasted life! An animal which cannot recover is killed out of pity, why not a human being, who feels suffering doubly?”

”Magdalena--Countess--I do not know you in this mood.”

”Nor do I know myself! What am I? What is a mother who is no mother--a wife who cannot declare herself a wife? A fish that cannot swim, a bird that cannot fly! We kill such poor crippled creatures out of sheer compa.s.sion. What kind of existence is mine? An egotist who nevertheless feels the pain of those whom she renders unhappy; an aristocrat who cannot exist outside of her own sphere and yet pines for the eternal verity of human nature; a coquette who trifles with hearts and yet would _die_ for a genuine feeling--these are my traits of character!

Can there be anything more contradictory, more full of wretchedness?”

”Let us go out of doors, Countess, such conversation is not fit for the child to hear.”

”Oh, he does not understand it.”

”He understands more than you believe, you do not know what questions he often asks--ah, you deprive yourself of the n.o.blest joys by being unable to watch the remarkable development of this child.”

She nodded silently, absorbed in gazing at the boy.

”Come, Countess, the sun has risen--the cool morning air will do you good, I will ring for Josepha to take the boy,” he said quietly, touching the bell.

The little fellow sat up in bed, his breathing was hurried and anxious, his large eyes were fixed imploringly on the countess: ”Oh, mamma--dear mamma in Heaven--stay--don't go away.”

”Ah, if only I could--my child--how gladly I would stay here always.

But I will come back again presently, I will only walk in the suns.h.i.+ne for half-an-hour.”

”Oh, I would like to go in the suns.h.i.+ne, too. Can't I go with you, and run about a little while?”

”Not to-day, not until your cough is cured, my poor little boy! But I'll promise to talk and think of nothing but you until I return!

Meanwhile Josepha shall wash and dress you, I don't understand that--Josepha can do it better.”

”Oh! yes, I'm good enough for that!” thought the girl, who heard the last words just as she entered.

”My beautiful mamma has been crying, because she is a bird and can't fly--” said the child to Josepha with sorrowful sympathy. ”But you can't fly either--nor I till we are angels--then we can!” He spread out his little arms like wings as if he longed to soar upward and away, but an attack of coughing made him sink back upon his pillows.

The husband and wife looked at each other with the same sorrowful anxiety.

The countess bent over the little bed as if she would fain stifle with kisses the cough that racked the little chest.

”Mamma, it doesn't hurt--you must not cry,” said the boy, consolingly.

”There is a spider inside of my breast which tickles me--so I have to cough. But it will spin a big, big net of silver threads like those on the Christmas tree which will reach to Heaven, then I'll climb up on it!”

The countess could scarcely control her emotion. Freyer drew her hand through his arm and led her out into the dewy morning.

”You are so anxious about our secret and yet, if _I_ were not conscientious enough to help you guard it, you would betray yourself every moment, you are imprudent with the child, it is not for my own interest, but yours that I warn you. Do not allow your newly awakened maternal love to destroy your self-control in the boy's presence. Do not let him call you 'Mamma.' Poor mother--indeed I understand how this wounds you--but--it must be one thing or the other. If you cannot--or _will_ not be a mother to the child--you _must_ renounce this name.”

She bowed her head. ”You are as cruel as ever, though you are right!

How can I maintain my self-control, when I hear such words from the child? What a child he is! Whenever I come, I marvel at his intellectual progress! If only it is natural, if only it is not the omen of an early death!”