CHAPTER IX.
Six months had passed, the winter had come in all its severity, and the approach of Christmas was heralded by a heavy fall of snow. The mid-day bells chimed from the village church tower, a sound welcome everywhere, and joyfully greeted in the pastor's house as the crowd of merry children came hurrying from the garden, (where they had been engaged in a hot snow-ball contest), with greatly increased appetites. Five fresh little faces, rosy with the cold, ranged themselves round the dinner table, and began to attack with great interest and zeal the dishes set before them.
The pastor, a man already past middle age, with a kind, gentle face, seemed to-day unusually grave and reflective. He divided his attention between the children and their governess, who sat opposite to him, the two youngest children on either side. There was a loving care, as well as a quiet firmness in the way which she quieted and kept in order the little company, and the children seemed to be tenderly attached to her. Fräulein Walter was hardly able to rescue herself from all the histories and relations which one little chattering mouth poured out after the other. At last the dinner was at an end, and the little wild troop, after receiving permission, stormed out again to occupy the hour of play still left to them, with a more peaceful occupation, namely, the building of a snow man.
Gertrud had taken up her key basket, and was on the point of leaving the room, when the pastor detained her with the request that she would follow him into his study for a few minutes, as he had something important to speak to her about.
She willingly put down her basket and complied with his request. This important matter was not difficult to guess at; Christmas was near, and five little tables had to be planned for. But the introduction to this harmless subject seemed to cost the Herr Pastor some difficulty, he cleared his throat several times in an embarrassed manner, and at last began with visible hesitation--
"First, Fräulein Walter, accept my heartfelt thanks for all that you have been to me and my children."
Gertrud looked surprised, the introduction sounded almost solemn.
"I only did my duty," replied she, quietly.
"Oh, no, you have done much, much more!"
The man's former embarrassment now gave place to warm heartiness.
"You merely undertook the duty of instructing the children, and you have been the most loving guardian to them, the most faithful support to my orphaned household. Only since you came have I once more known that I possess a home, a happy domestic circle."
Gertrud was perfectly calm and unsuspecting.
"I have done what I could. But of course a stranger cannot ever fill the mother's place."
"Ah, that was just what I wanted to speak to you about," interrupted the pastor, hastily. "In spite of all your goodness, I cannot deny to myself that my children need a mother, and my house the superintendence of a lady, whilst I--" He suddenly stopped, for Gertrud had shrunk back with an involuntary movement of fright. "Do you wish me to be silent?"
She had become pale, but she shook her head gently.
"Please go on."
He got up and seized her hand.
"Since the five months that you have been here I have often been on the point of speaking to you, and have as often stopped myself. There was something in you which--let me be sincere--that oppressed me, and kept me at a distance. However kind and obliging I saw you in the house, and everything thriving under your hands, I could not, nevertheless, banish the thought that you were intended for quite a different sphere of life. But I must speak out at last. You are young, beautiful, and richly gifted in every respect, I am already an elderly man, and have nothing to offer you but a simple house, modest circumstances, and the participation in the care of five children. Can the love of these children, the gratitude of a man, who honours and admires you with all his heart, atone for the sacrifice you will make by your consent--if so--then you will make me very happy."
Gertrud had listened silently with downcast eyes, her face had become very pale, but her voice was calm.
"Your offer honours me, Herr Pastor, but you do me wrong if you think that a simple life and duties are irksome to me. For the first time in your house I have once more known what it is to be surrounded with loving kindness; I--"
She raised her hand, and, as if struck by a sudden pain, laid it--not in that of the pastor, but upon her breast!
"Is anything the matter?" asked he anxiously.
She forced herself to smile.
"Oh, no, it is nothing. I only wished to ask you for a short time for consideration. You shall have my answer in a few hours."
The pastor seemed hardly to have expected his offer to have met with so favourable a reception. A short time for consideration is usually only a form of propriety, ending with an answer in the affirmative. With glad thankfulness he seized both her hands.
"As you will, liebes Fräulein, as long as you like. I do not wish to attribute your consent to a hasty decision. Consult your own heart undisturbed, and then tell me candidly what you have decided."
An hour had passed, Gertrud sat in her high storied room, lost in deep reflection. As before, she involuntarily pressed her hand on her heart. There was something there which still obstinately refused to bow to the outward calmness of her nature. It had sprung up in burning, trembling pain, when she had stood on the point of giving her consent, and had it not seemed to tear her back with warning fear as if from a precipice, and stopped the "Yes," which already trembled on her lips with a loud "No, no"? And yet this weakness must be overcome! If not quite forgotten, she had at least imagined that it was overcome, and had not guessed that she should have to probe herself with anxious, painful self-enquiries. Hermann had made no attempt to try and find her, or even send her a last word of farewell. He had fully recognised the earnestness of her decision, the truth of her words, and bowed firmly and strongly to the unavoidable, but--it tore the girl's heart that he could be so firm and strong. Then he had his future to make up for what was lost--for which he had surrendered her--and she?
She had made up her mind to accept the pastor's hand. What could she, the solitary, homeless one, do better, than to take the home and hearth offered to her, the love of an honourable man, and the perhaps heavy, but still blessed cares connected with his children. Truly, he had been right, there was an element in Gertrud's nature which strove against this future in the isolation of the little village, and monotonous round of household duties, so far from the busy world with its many centres of interest--but Gertrud was tired of ever moving aimlessly and with no settled future, from one place of dependence to another; she longed for some sure, calm haven, though she knew that it would be the grave of all that she called life.
The snow storm had begun once more, Gertrud opened the windows and looked out, without regarding the cold--was it not the last free hour of her life--the next would bind it for ever. Over there on the distant country road, the sound of a post horn came through the falling snow. Noiselessly and thickly fell the soft flakes from the grey winter sky upon the hard earth. Everything around, the fields and valleys, the boughs of the trees, and the roofs of the houses bore the cold, shapeless garment of snow, and still and solitary lay the village, like death, covered with a white robe.
But this calm was suddenly broken by an unusual event, the post horn did not die away as usual in the distance, it came nearer and nearer, loud and merry, and was presently joined by the rattle of wheels. Drawn by four steaming horses, a post chaise worked itself with difficulty through the snow, till it stopped before the pastor's door. A gentleman, wrapped in furs, sprang out, and with a cry, half consternation, half joy, Gertrud flew from the window.
"Hermann!"
Meanwhile this unexpected event, the arrival of a guest in an extra post chaise with four horses, had alarmed the whole household below. The flock of children rushed into the hall, the pastor's study-door was hurriedly opened, voices were heard on all sides, till finally, a firm voice, making itself heard above all the tumult, said--
"Do not trouble yourself, Herr Pastor. Fräulein Walter will excuse me if I present myself without being formally announced. I have important news for her."
Steps were heard on the stairs, the door flew open, and Count Arnau stood upon the threshold.
Gertrud could not utter a word of greeting; trembling in every limb, she still stood on the same spot. He closed the door and approached her.
"So you have flown from me to this distant, isolated village? Gertrud, did you really think I should not find you?"
His eyes rested gravely and reproachfully on her face.
She made an attempt to regain her self-command.
"Herr Graf, I do not know, indeed, what your sudden appearance means after--"
"After my long silence? What, Gertrud, did not you know me better? You thought I was weak and cowardly enough to accept your generous sacrifice unconditionally?"
She dropped her eyes; a "No" to this answer would have been--a lie. He came close to her and took her hand.
"I knew you well enough to know that your declaration was made in all earnestness, and that every attempt to dissuade you would meet with a renewed refusal, and it is contrary to my nature to indulge in useless complaints and assurances. I preferred to be silent till I could act."
"Act?"
She looked at him questioningly, doubtingly.
"Yes. Your farewell words were true, no one knew that better than myself. In our little capital, where every scandal sleeps unforgotten, to wake again through love of talk, to the ruin of some family--in our own principality, where every important post depends upon favour at Court, and in the midst of a nobility whose prejudices are not yet touched by the faintest breath of advancing opinion, my career would, indeed, have been shattered if Gertrud Brand had become my wife. A union between us under these circumstances would have been impossible."
"And now--?"
"These circumstances had to be altered. I am free."
"Hermann! What have you done?"
His countenance lighted up with that expression which hitherto only she had seen, and under which the hard features seemed so strangely mild. In spite of her consternation there was an unspeakable amount of confession in her words, which he had hitherto not been able to tear from her; it was the first time she had called him by his name.
"I have bidden farewell to the past. Do not be frightened, I have all the future before me. I am not one of those natures who are able to vegetate from one year's end to another in the retirement of an estate, allowing the world to go its own way as it will, and neither are you suited for such a narrow sphere of life. Before the beginning of the year I was asked to enter into the service of the State in another country, but I then refused, because my connection and prospects gave me certain hopes of the first place in our principality. Directly after you left the offer was renewed. There are certainly some steps to mount in order to gain such a position as that I have renounced, and it may cost me more effort than hitherto, but I will rise, be sure of that."
He said all simply and calmly; but Gertrud nevertheless felt deeply what a sacrifice the ambitious man had made; her bosom heaved in joyful pride, she knew now what she was to him.
"All is settled now," continued he, after a moment's pause. "I shall enter upon my new office in B---- next month--but I shall not go there without my wife. Gertrud, will you come with me?"
His arms closed passionately round the no longer resisting girl; she leaned her head upon his shoulder.
"Do you think, Hermann, then, that there we--"
"We are strangers in B----. There no one knows of the crime and the unhappy remembrances connected with it, and if, in the future, anything should be heard--in the bustle and life of that great capital there will be no lasting place for dim, distant reports of a past generation. Besides this, I shall have no connection with the Court there; and if it does not choose to receive my bürgerliche wife, it will be easy for me to avoid it, and we shall find sufficient to make up for that in other circles. I will answer for the Gräfin Arnau's fitting reception and position in these."
A deep flush bathed Gertrud's cheeks at the last words; that name--once so hated, she heard it now for the first time as her future one.
"And your grandmother?" asked she softly.
The Count's brow darkened.
"I had a hard battle with her, for she alone guessed the reason for my determination. She must thank her own hardness and obstinacy if a stranger's hand closes her eyes. We parted without reconciliation."
"O, Hermann, you are giving up all for my sake!"
He gently raised her head, and looked into her eyes.
"And you gave up what was most sacred to you, the only treasure you possessed, to save me. Sacrifice for sacrifice! Gertrud, I am no longer the cold egotist who knows nothing but ambition. You know what had made me hard and bitter, what poisoned my youth, and took away, when I was but a child, my love, my trust in men; give it back to me!"
The full, passionate look of love in her eyes answered him--
"I have one request, Hermann, it is my first. Let the past be buried between us, let us never allude to it, even by a word. We will forget it--for ever."
"For ever!"
Without, the snow still fell noiselessly, and laid itself thick and cold on the hard earth; but here two hearts beat warm against one another, ready to meet the future bravely. The old curse, which had so long darkened the lives of both, and appeared as if it must separate them for ever, had been banished by their own hands.
Not avenged, but expiated was the crime, and both now felt what the old Präsidentin had said, as the last fragment of the fateful paper sank in dust and ashes; "God be thanked! The evil is at an end!"
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1]: Bridegroom.
[Footnote 2]: Belonging to the lower rank, common.
[Footnote 3]: Most gracious--a term used in addressing ladies in Germany.
[Footnote 4]: Gracious Count.
[Footnote 5]: Betrothed, bride. A German lady is always called a bride as soon as she is betrothed.