CHAPTER XI.
SMOKE AND DESOLATION AT THE VILLA.
Sonnenkamp sat alone. He seemed to hear in his solitude a crackling, a low, almost inaudible gnawing, like a tongue of flame lapping the beams and joists, devouring more and more, and increasing as it devoured its prey. Such a low crackling, and such a lapping, he believed that he heard in his solitude.
He was mistaken, and yet he was well aware that there was a spark kindled, and it was burning noiselessly; it ran along the floor of the room, it reached the walls; the chairs, the closets, the books, are all on fire; the painted faces on the canvas are grotesquely distorted, and blaze up; and the flames spread on and on, creeping through all the apartments, enveloping at last the roof and the whole house, and flaring up into the sky.
Suppose that one should burn it all up, and every thing in it? No, there is another, a better means of deliverance, an energetic deed, a splendid, grand—here came a knock. It must be Bella coming to explain why she was not there when he returned from the trial to the seed-room. He opened the door quickly, and Weidmann, not Bella, entered.
"Have you any thing to ask me in private?" asked Sonnenkamp angrily.
"I have only a favor to beg of you."
"A favor? you?"
"Yes. Give me your son"—
"My son?" cried Sonnenkamp in astonishment.
"Will you be so good as to let me finish my sentence. Let your son come into my family for days, weeks, months, as long as you please; only let it be long enough for him to get a new hold in a different sphere. He needs an energetic and free activity. When your son passed a short time with me before this thing happened, I perceived with satisfaction that he had very little personal vanity with all his beauty. He takes pleasure in looking at others rather than at himself. This would be of help; and I would like to aid him still further. As your son will not become a soldier, perhaps it will be well for him to be instructed in husbandry."
"Is this a plan which you have agreed upon with Herr Dournay?"
"Yes, it is his wish; and it seems to me a very good plan."
"Indeed?" said Sonnenkamp. "Perhaps Roland has already been informed of this wish, and of how well it suits?"
"I cannot blame you for this bitter feeling, I can very well understand it; for it is no trifling matter to be placed in a situation where others undertake to dispose of us and ours."
"I thank you, I thank you very kindly.'"
"If you decline, then no one knows any thing about it, except Herr Dournay and myself."
"Have I said that I was going to decline? You will yet receive one proof how much confidence I place in you: I have made you one of my executors."
"I am much older than you." Sonnenkamp made no reply to this remark, and Weidmann continued,—
"What conclusion have you come to about my request concerning your son?"
"If he will go with you, he has my consent. Allow me one question. Is this the expiation you would exact of me, or a part of it?"
Weidmann said it was not.
The carriage in which the Professorin, Roland, and Manna returned, now entered the court-yard. Weidmann welcomed the Professorin very cordially, having known her a long time ago. He saw now for the first time, as a matron, the once blooming beauty. The three brought from Mattenheim a fresh strength for all that lay before them.
As they were sitting together in the green cottage, a messenger on horseback came from Clodwig to summon Eric to his side.
Weidmann now renewed the proposal for Roland to go with him to Mattenheim. Roland was advised by them all to go. Declaring that he needed no inducement, he readily assented, and drove away with Weidmann, Prince Valerian, and Knopf. He was protected and sheltered by such a number of good men.
Mattenheim was situated on the other bank of the Rhine; and, while the carriage was being ferried across, Roland stood at the stern of the boat, and gazed in silence for a long time at the parental home. Tears came into his eyes; but he restrained them.
A tornado swept through the park, eddying around the house; and the fires just kindled in it were extinguished. The many fire-places were of no avail, the whole house was full of smoke; and a whirling gust of wind seemed to tear all the inmates of Villa Eden away from each other. Roland was gone, Pranken was seen there no more, Manna lived with the Professorin in the green cottage, and Eric had ridden away. Only Sonnenkamp and Frau Ceres were there. Fräulein Perini came, and informed Sonnenkamp that his wife desired to speak with him instantly: she was in a state wholly beyond her control.
Sonnenkamp hurried to Frau Ceres' apartment; but she was not there. The maid said that as soon as Fräulein Perini had left the room, she had hurried through the house into the park. They went after her immediately, calling her by name. They found her, at last, sitting on the river bank, in the midst of the storm, splendidly dressed, with a coronet on her head, thick rows of pearls on her bare neck, heavy bracelets on her arms, and a girdle of glittering emeralds around her waist. She looked at Sonnenkamp with a strange smile, and then said,—
"You have given me rich and beautiful ornaments."
She seemed to grow taller: she threw back her black hair.
"Look, here is the dagger! I wanted to kill myself with it; but I hurl it away from me."
The hilt of precious stones and pearls sparkled through the air, plunged into the water, and sank.
"What are you doing? What does this mean?"
"Come back with me!" she cried, "or, look, I will throw myself into the river, and take with me these ornaments, the half of your riches."
"You are a deluded child," said Sonnenkamp contemptuously. "You think, do you, that these are genuine stones? I have never given into your keeping, you simple child, any but imitation jewels: the genuine ones, in a like setting and case, I have fast enough in my own possession, in the burglar-proof safe."
"So! You are shrewd," replied Frau Ceres.
"And you, my wild child, you are not crazy."
"No, I am not, if I'm not made so. I shall remain with you, and never leave you for a single instant. Oh! I know you—Oh! I know you, you will forsake me."
Sonnenkamp shuddered.
What does this mean? How does it come to pass that this simple-minded creature has called out his slumbering thoughts, and brought them up from the depths of his soul? He addressed the kindest words to Frau Ceres, and, bringing her back to the house, kissed her. She became quieter; but the determination was fixed in him to become free. There was only one thing to be won, and then away into the wide, wide world! But first of all, he must go to the capital, and shoot down Professor Crutius. He struggled and wrestled with the thought, and at last he was obliged to give it up. But the other thing must be. In confirmation of this hidden impression of his soul, there came a messenger from Eric, with the tidings that he could not leave Wolfsgarten, for Count Clodwig was at the point of death.