XIII
Deep in the woods, amid ruins, Stephen Gunderam demanded of Letitia that she decide his fate.
A picnic in very grand style had been arranged; Letitia and Stephen had remained behind here; and thus it had happened.
Around them arose the ancient tree-trunks and the immemorial walls. Above the tree-tops extended the pallid blue of the autumnal sky. His knees upon the dry foliage, a man, using sublime and unmeasured words, asserted his eternal love. Letitia could not withstand the scene and him.
Stephen Gunderam said: “If you refuse me nothing is left me but to put a bullet through my head. I have had it in readiness for long. I swear to you by the life of my father that I speak truly.”
Could a girl as gentle and as easily persuaded as Letitia assume the responsibility for such blood-guiltiness? And she gave her consent. She did not think of any fetter, nor of the finality of such a decision, nor of time nor of its consequences, nor of him to whom her soul was to belong. She thought only of this moment, and that there was one here who had spoken to her these sublime and unmeasured words.
Stephen Gunderam leaped up, folded her in his arms and cried: “From now on you belong to me through all eternity—every breath, every thought, every dream of yours is mine and mine only! Never forget that—never!”
“Let me go, you terrible man!” Letitia said, but with a shiver of delight. She felt herself carried voluptuously upon a wave of romance. Her nerves began to vibrate, her glance shimmered and broke. For the first time she felt the stir of the flesh. With a soft cry she glided from his grasp.
Even on the way home they received congratulations. Crammon slunk quietly away. When Christian came and gave Letitia his hand, there was in her eyes a restless expectation, a fantastic joy that he could not understand at all. He could not fathom what she hid behind this expression. He could not guess that even at this moment she was faithlessly withdrawing herself from him to whom she had just entrusted her life, its every breath and thought and dream, and that in her innocent but foolish way she desired to convey to Christian a sense of this fact.
He loved her. From hour to hour his love grew. He felt it to be almost an inner law that he must love her—a command which said to him: This is she to whom you must turn; a message whose burden was: In her shall you find yourself.
He seemed to be hearing the voice of Eva: Your path was from me to her. I taught you to feel. Now give that feeling to a waiting heart. You can shape it and mould it and yourself. Let it not be extinguished nor flicker out and die.
Thus the inner voice seemed to speak.