Part 8 (2/2)
”It was late in the evening. I had carried the poor sufferer, who was specially excited on that day, and anxiously yearned after air and light, in my own arms from the fisherman's cottage which we occupied, to the edge of the black basaltic rocks which here hang over the sea.
She was resting on a couch formed of cus.h.i.+ons. The sun was setting in resplendent magnificence, and just sinking into the sea. Not a breath stirred the smooth surface of the waters, and the emerald and golden lights which shone in the sky were purely and calmly reflected below, as in a mirror. Upon the pale face of the patient also fell an enchanting sheen--a rosy lie--the lie with which the sun and life scoff at the night and at death. And in that hour Leonora took leave of the sun and of life. She told me that she had always loved me, even at that moment when vanity and folly had blinded her; that her whole life since that day had been but a continuous effort to drown her remorse. She did not desire to live, even if it were possible that I should ever love her again. She felt herself to be unworthy of being my slave, much more so of being my wife. She was shuddering at the mere thought. 'Oh never, never more,' she continued, and her beautiful eyes shone with a supernatural fire, 'never upon this earth, where I have so tearfully sinned against you. But when this desecrated body has crumbled into dust, and the soul has been freed from the fetters that bound it to the dust, then I will hover around you, I will wait for you; and when you come, your soul will kiss my soul, and by that kiss I shall know that all has been atoned for, that all is forgotten and forgiven.'
”I told her that I had long since forgiven her fully, and that I now loved her with a purer and holier love than in the days of our happiness.
”I kissed, weeping, her white hands and her pale lips.
”'This is our wedding-day,' she whispered--'poor, poor man.' She sank back upon the cus.h.i.+ons.
”I carried her, quite exhausted, back to the cottage and to her bed.
”It was the last time.
”That night Leonora died.”
Berger had risen, and Oswald had followed his example. The former was entirely filled with the recollections which had just pa.s.sed before his mind's eye, clothed by his powerful imagination with all the accuracy and clearness of reality; the latter thought of nothing but what he had just heard; and thus both hardly noticed the road which led them gradually higher and higher through the dark pine forests.
Thus they found themselves suddenly upon the bare top of the mountain, which the people of the neighborhood call the Lookout, and which is by far the highest all around among all the brothers and sisters.
The sun had set, but the western sky was still glowing in all the splendor of the evening glory, and a faint reflex gave even to the eastern horizon a faint, rosy tinge. Here and there one of the higher mountain-tops, steeped in purple, looked after the parting light of the day; but the larger valleys were already filled with gray shadows of the evening, and whitish mists floated in the narrower glens. The pine-trees, whose heads rose from below to a level with the travellers'
feet, stood calm and rigid, like a breathless mult.i.tude in anxious expectation.
Berger gazed into the glow of the setting sun, resting on his stick, and watching it as every instant some tinge vanished and another turned pale. Oswald's eye hung upon his features, which seemed every moment to become more and more spiritual. Was it the effect of the ghastly light, or merely the expression of what was going on within? Suddenly Berger dropped his cane, spread out his hands as if in prayer, and said: ”Mother Night, all-powerful original Night, from whose bosom the creature tears itself away in mad desire to live, only in order to return after long wanderings, penitent and humiliated, to your faithful maternal heart, I hail you, even in this faint, earthly image! Yon bottomless bourn of oblivion, yon sweet cradle of unbroken rest, how I long for you with my whole heart! Oh, take it from me, this intolerable burden of life; spare me the daily returning grief to open these weary eyes to a light which they hate; take from me this remnant of dust, which weighs me down with its sinfulness, and which becomes only the more painful as it daily dwindles away! Let it, oh, let it quickly be consumed! I know I could quickly come to you if I but took a single step beyond the edge of this rock; but even if my bones were broken into atoms below, my soul would find no rest, for it has still a few drops left in the cup of life; perhaps--who can tell?--the very bitterest of them all. No! no! get thee away from me, Satan, who allurest me down into the abyss! The abyss is not death; life in all its splendor, is true death. I know thy old tricks; thou didst try them with the carpenter's son of Nazareth! But he rebuked thee and thy temptations--honor, power, and the favor of women--all he rejected, in order to hunger, to thirst, and not to have where he might lay his head, to wash off the last remnant of earthly life in the b.l.o.o.d.y sweat of the night on the Mount of Olives, and in order to die the death of a murderer on the cross at Golgotha! Oh that I could go forth into all the world, to preach the word, the sacred word, that frees us now and forever--the word that leads us back again to our good, mild, dear Mother Night, whom we have left in order to suffer infernal punishment in the bright sun-glow of life, while our tongue is parched and our temples are beating! The word, the holy, mysterious word, which has become a mere mummery, a derision, and a mockery, in the vain show with which they fancy they serve their G.o.d. Forgive them, oh Mother, for they know not what they do; they would willingly come to you if they had but ears to hear your sweet voice, and eyes to see your mild beauty. I can see your holy face; its smile fills me with hope and comfort. I can hear your voice; it whispers, 'wait, wait but a little while, and you shall sink back into my faithful arms, back to eternal peace.'”
The rosy hues had vanished from the sky; gray twilight was spreading over the valleys, and the evening breeze began to whisper and to murmur in the tops of the pine-trees.
Oswald was seized with vague terror. He felt as if that mystical Night, which Berger had invoked in his strange prayer, was chilling him already with a breath from the grave--as if the sun had set never to rise again But this fear was not without a strange admixture of delight. The narcotic fragrance of thoughts of death which had been borne to him on Berger's ecstatic words, filled his heart, together with the perfume of the heather and the aroma of the pines.
He thought of Helen and of Melitta, but not with the restless anxiety of the morning, but in calm melancholy, as we think of the departed whom we have loved. He thought of the troubles and blunders of his gay drama in the chateau of Grenwitz, but it looked to him like a puppet-show for children. He thought of the future, but it had no longer any charms for him; it filled him neither with hope nor with fear; it was as if his whole life were withdrawing from without, as if the world were not worthy of so much love or so much hatred.
Thus he sat, resting his head on his hands, upon a large rock, and looked out into the evening, which was spreading its dark wings wider and wider over the heavens.
A hand was laid on his shoulder.
”Come!” said Berger, ”let us return to the dead!”
They descended from the summit and plunged into the damp darkness of the forest. Berger seemed to know every path and every stone in the mountains. He went on, supporting himself every now and then with his stout cane, at a pace which made it difficult for Oswald to follow him, though he was considered a good pedestrian.
Thus they had reached a meadow lying in the very heart of the forest.
As they followed the edge of the wood they suddenly saw a light glimmering on the opposite side. It came from the flame of a pile of briars which had just been kindled. Within the bright circle of the flames two persons were visible--a woman, as it seemed, and a child.
Oswald's sharp eyes confirmed him in a suspicion which had entered his heart at the first glance.
They were Xen.o.bia and Czika.
He hastened as fast as he could across the meadow towards the fire, but he had hardly accomplished half the distance when he sank up to his ankles into the mora.s.s. He saw that he could not go any further. He cried as loud as he could: ”Xen.o.bia! Czika! it is I! Oswald!”
But his call had scarcely broken the peace of the silent forest when the fire vanished, and with the fire the two forms he had seen.
<script>