CHAPTER IV.
Nevertheless, the creative instinct was too powerful in him to let his depression at the interference of this eternal waverer affect him long, or sap his strength. In the very midst of his upbraiding, after he had angrily thrown the first sheet into a corner, he took a second frame of card-board, and began to sketch the scene where the homeless beauty, with her naked boy, is standing at the gate of the convent, surrounded by the staring nuns, whose looks and attitudes express doubt and suspicion. Felix threw himself on his couch again, and lay smoking, rarely throwing in a word, as he watched every movement of the other's hand. The proximity of this man, who was self-reliant, so humble, and yet so constantly striving at some lofty aim, exercised a singularly soothing influence upon Felix's restless soul. He confessed this, when Kohle began to express surprise that any one should leave the town, head over heels in this way, and rush into the country, in order, when he arrived there, to shut himself up in a sunless garret room, and look on while a man painfully trundled his barrow over a hard road, toward a goal of art which is generally supposed to have long since been left behind.
"My dear Kohle," he said, "only let me stay here. I should like very much to learn something from you which would be of more benefit to me than a walk or a bath in the lake--namely, your art of knowing just what you want, and of wanting nothing which you cannot have. Was this art born in you, or have you gradually acquired it, and paid your instruction-fee for it, as for other arts?'
"The best part of it is inborn," answered Kohle, quietly going on with his sketching. "You must know that I came into this world as poor as a church-mouse, and endowed with so small a proportion of all the goods and gifts that fall to the share of so-called fortunate mortals, the first-born and favorite children of Mother Nature, that, in my boyhood, I had little pleasure in life, and would have parted with it very cheaply. But then I discovered that I possessed something which out-weighed all the glittering treasures in the world--such as beauty, wealth, wit, or great intellect. I mean the ability to dream with my eyes wide open, and to interpret my dreams for myself. The actual world, with its joys and splendors, was as good as closed against a poor devil like myself. How could such a wretched creature as this Philip Emanuel Kohle, this lean, yellow ragamuffin in poor clothes, who stumbled awkwardly through the world, and who could neither fascinate women nor impress men, have the impudence to take his place at the bounteous table at which the children of fortune felt at home? So I held myself aloof, and earnestly and zealously set to work to evolve a second world from my dreams--one which belonged to me, and from which no one could bid me depart--a world which was far more beautiful, sublime, and perfect, than the actual world about me. And as I wasted no time or strength on anything else--neither in wretched money-getting, nor in foolish ambition, nor even in hopeless love affairs--my nature grew up straight and true, and in the greatest development of which it was capable, which is by no means the case with every one; and I could not help laughing in my sleeve, when I noticed that I passed among my friends for a simpleton and a narrow-minded fool. The truth is, my simpleness was the very thing that contributed most to my secret contentment, when I saw how seldom the manifold desires and restless striving of others led to happiness. 'Chi troppo abbraccia, nulla stringe,' say the wise Italians. I embrace nothing but my art; but I embrace it the more passionately because it exists for me alone. There you have the whole secret. There is a juster apportionment of good and evil in this world than we are willing to admit in our hours of depression."
Felix was silent. It was on the tip of his tongue to say that he envied him. Yet he felt at once how thoroughly right this quiet man was in his last assertion. He felt that he would not, for all the peace in the world, have given up his own miserable condition; for, at the same time that it gave him the keenest anguish, it brought with it the certainty that so charming a creature as his lost love was still in the world, and had been brought so painfully near to him again.
When noon came, they were called down into the garden by the white-haired old woman, who, in her sober moments, was a most excellent and active servant. The table was laid in a shady arbor near the house. Rosenbusch and the actor had returned from their different expeditions; the latter with a basket full of excellent trout, and the other with a face which showed plainly enough that he too had not come back unsuccessfully but had gained all he had promised himself from his morning walk. He was in full gala-dress, consisting of his violet-colored velvet coat, a white waistcoat, and a gigantic Panama hat, beneath which his hair and his red beard, which had been shorn to so little purpose, had already begun to sprout again. His honest, merry, handsome face was radiant with good-humor; and as Elfinger did his best to be entertaining, and Felix to make up for the alarm he had occasioned on the previous day, the meal was enlivened by all sorts of jollity and good stories.
Nor was there, for that matter, any lack of more substantial dainties; and Kohle, who had voluntarily taken upon himself the office of butler, ran out every few minutes to fetch up another dusty bottle; for Rossel, who was a light drinker himself, had a sort of passion for collecting the rarest brands of wine in his cellar, if only a small supply of each. It was not long before the programme which had been prepared for the afternoon leaked out. They proposed to row over to Starnberg in Rossel's pretty little boat, to land there, and then, while strolling along the shore, to encounter, as if by pure accident, the two sisters, who were to go out with their aunt, under the pretext of taking a walk. Then, upon a polite invitation, they were all to get into the boat again together, and be rowed out upon the lake, in whichever direction circumstances and the mood of the moment might suggest.
Rossel pronounced this plan to be very wisely conceived, but flatly refused to take part in it. He had an aversion, founded on principle, to all pic-nics, especially where there were ladies whom one was obliged to treat with politeness and consideration, relinquishing to them the most comfortable places and the daintiest morsels. For lovers this was no sacrifice, since they could indemnify themselves in other ways. But such a restraint could not be imposed upon free and independent natures without great injustice. He would, therefore, remain at home until the day grew cooler, and study Regis's translation of Rabelais, which he had long had in mind to illustrate. Toward evening he would stroll into the wood in order to take a look at his mushroom-bed; for he had made it his especial task to forward the culture of the mushroom in the woods about Starnberg, as well as the general improvement and introduction of all edible fungi. Then, when they came home late at night, intoxicated with sour beer and sweet words, a supper should await them that would be "worth the toil of princes."
Felix, too, would gladly have remained behind. But there was no way for him to do this without betraying his secret. And, besides, what else could he do to quiet his secret yearning--since it was impossible for him to approach her by daylight? He secretly consoled himself by the thought that, when they returned, late in the evening, he would creep to the garden-fence again, and watch the bright room leading off the balcony.
Philip Emanuel Kohle's feeble attempt to excuse himself, because of his bashfulness in ladies' society, was clamorously voted down. As he was, moreover, the only one of the party who carried a chart of the lake in his head, he could not find it in his heart to desert his friends.
There was a thunder-storm in the air, but it looked as though it had come to a halt in the west, and would pass off harmlessly. The sky was dark and lowering, and the lake was as smooth as a mirror, when the light but roomy boat shot out of the little bay. Rossel stood on the shore, waving his handkerchief and fez. Kohle sat at the tiller, Elfinger rowed, and Rosenbusch, as they glided along past the green banks, took advantage of the permit Rossel had given him, to play upon his flute some of his most pastoral melodies--doubly melting this time, for he was on his way to his sweetheart's side, and to Heaven knows what romantic adventures.