Part 29 (1/2)
”Certainly, my good master, quite close to you!”
”Why are you so quiet?” he asked.
”I have been thinking of a little song that says in rhyme just what you asked me to-day. Would you like to hear it?”
”Of course; are you skilled in such things?”
”A little,” and in a low voice she sang as follows.
”The blind man to the maiden said: 'O thou of hearts the truest, Thy countenance is hid from me; Let not my questions anger thee!
Speak, though in words the fewest!
”'Tell me what kind of eyes are thine?
Dark eyes, or light ones rather?'
'My eyes are a decided brown So much, at least--by looking down-- From the brook's gla.s.s I gather.'
”'And is it red--thy little mouth?
That too the blind must care for!'
'Ah, I would tell that soon to thee, Only--none yet has told it me.
I cannot answer, therefore!'
”'But dost thou ask what heart I have There hesitate I never!
In thine own breast 'tis borne, and so 'Tis thine in weal and thine in woe, For life, for death,--thine ever!'”[4]
”Beata, who taught you that song?” cried Donatus, starting up from the soft moss. The tender words had gone to his head and heart like sweet wine. He pa.s.sed his hand across his brow as if to wipe away the spell which had been lightly woven over him.
”Who taught you that song?” he asked again.
”No one, who should? No one could have heard what we were talking of to-day.”
”But who taught you to say what you felt in that sweet fas.h.i.+on?”
”My father,” said the child, and a deep melancholy rang through the words.
”You have never told me about him, Beata, how is that?
”Because I never can help crying when I speak of him, and that will not make you happy.”
”Beata,” said Donatus gravely, ”you share my sorrows, and shall I not share yours? Tell me who was the wonderful man that taught a wild wood-bird to sing with such sweet art?”
”He was a troubadour; it was his profession to turn thoughts into artistic verse, and so he taught me. Poor father! The song of his lips was most sweet, and whoever heard him and his beautiful lute-playing, was made thankful and merry of heart. And yet he had to wander from place to place like me, and hide his handsome face under hideous disguises. For he was an exile and an outcast, and every man's hand was against him.”
”And what crime had he committed?” asked Donatus.
”I never knew--my mother said I was guilty of it all. It was because I had come into the world that things went so hardly with him--oh!--and how could I help it!” she hid her head in her hands and wept bitterly.
Donatus drew her hands away and took them consolingly in his own. ”My child, my dear child!”