VII.
He returned home downhearted. He felt the cheerlessness of his home-coming. The very excessive tenderness of his mother, the over-affectionate embrace of his sister, accentuated his failure. He felt the kindliness accorded the afflicted, the solace given to people in trouble. And although there was defiance in his bearing he felt keenly the disappointment on the faces of his family.
Nobody spoke of his future. Even his father—always full of plans—only cleared his throat, passed his hand lightly over his fine beard, and murmured “We’ll see”, whenever his wife broached the subject.
So Albert drifted. In his present state of mental confusion he postponed calling on Hedwiga from day to day. He stayed at home and read, walked the streets and mused, lay stretched on the river bank and pondered all sorts of things. He also spent much time writing, chiefly verses, which he clandestinely sent to editors who would not have them.
He wandered about the streets, along the river bank, like a liberated prisoner. No, he was not thinking of the Judengasse, of its tragedy, of its quaint traditions; he would not sing of the glory, and the tragedy, of Israel. He was emancipated, a true son of the Rhineland. He would sing of the shattered ruins on the banks of the Rhine peopled with golden legends, of beautiful Hedwiga, of fair Katherine, of pretty Gertrude. No, no, he was no descendant of Miram and David, he was no compatriot of Isaiah and Yehudah H’Levi, no fellow-sufferer of the dwellers of the Ghetto. The cradle of his forefathers had stood in Greece, her Gods were his Gods, the great unconquered world his world. And it was summer again. The sun was cooling its burning rays in the liquid silver of the gently flowing Rhine, a thousand echoes shouted greetings from the vine-clad shores, the mossy boulders called and beckoned to him to lie down and dream of things eternal!
All his slumbering romantic sentiments reawakened and with them came his longing for Hedwiga, his Lorelei.
On the morning he went to see her the sun was blazing in the skies and the road was dusty. His heart was pounding with joy as he left the narrow little streets of the town and struck out in the road that led to the Free House. No serious thought intruded upon his mind at present; he was carefree. The image of the slender girl with the golden locks was dancing before his eyes. He strode along jauntily, joyously, expectantly. The hut loomed up in the distance. He first caught sight of the large elm tree, and there was a fluttering in his breast.
Hedwiga! He saw her clinging skirt, her great black eyes, her bare feet, her beautiful throat.
What was this? A cart at the door! The two little windows of the hut wide open, and likewise the door; people moving about inside—a hearse! It must be the Witch. There was a pang of sorrow in his heart, but then she was old, and the old must die.
He entered the hut. Only three old women and a man; the women with hanging heads stood round a wooden box and the man held a board in his hands.
Where was Hedwiga?
The man waved the board in the direction of the box.
The morning sun cast a strange pallor over the dead face in the coffin. Albert trembled from head to foot and a flood of tears rolled down his wan cheeks.
The man looked at the youth without sadness. The three women, too, glanced at him puzzled.
Yes, the Witch had died two weeks before and now her niece was dead. They did not know what the girl died of—how could anyone tell what a person died of! The soul left the body and all was ended. There was a grimacing smile on the face of the woman who answered Albert’s questions. Maybe it was the evil spirits—who could tell?
He bent over the coffin for some silent moments. He stared blankly at the white shroud, at the waxen face, at the closed eyes . . .
Then the man and the three women carried the coffin to the cart outside, and the cart started and moved away slowly, the wheels creaking, crunching the clods of the dry mud . . .