CHAPTER V.
It was now noon-day; Beata and Donatus took a short rest to eat their bread. The forest waved high above their heads, and close to them the noisy Wildbach tumbled down the cliff, and the girl fetched some of the cool water for their frugal meal.
"I cannot hear you, Beata, are you there?" asked the blind man.
"Certainly, my good master, quite close to you!"
"Why are you so quiet?" he asked.
"I have been thinking of a little song that says in rhyme just what you asked me to-day. Would you like to hear it?"
"Of course; are you skilled in such things?"
"A little," and in a low voice she sang as follows.
"The blind man to the maiden said:
'O thou of hearts the truest,
Thy countenance is hid from me;
Let not my questions anger thee!
Speak, though in words the fewest!
"'Tell me what kind of eyes are thine?
Dark eyes, or light ones rather?'
'My eyes are a decided brown
So much, at least--by looking down--
From the brook's glass I gather.'
"'And is it red--thy little mouth?
That too the blind must care for!'
'Ah, I would tell that soon to thee,
Only--none yet has told it me.
I cannot answer, therefore!'
"'But dost thou ask what heart I have
There hesitate I never!
In thine own breast 'tis borne, and so
'Tis thine in weal and thine in woe,
For life, for death,--thine ever!'"[[4]]
"Beata, who taught you that song?" cried Donatus, starting up from the soft moss. The tender words had gone to his head and heart like sweet wine. He passed his hand across his brow as if to wipe away the spell which had been lightly woven over him.
"Who taught you that song?" he asked again.
"No one, who should? No one could have heard what we were talking of to-day."
"But who taught you to say what you felt in that sweet fashion?"
"My father," said the child, and a deep melancholy rang through the words.
"You have never told me about him, Beata, how is that?
"Because I never can help crying when I speak of him, and that will not make you happy."
"Beata," said Donatus gravely, "you share my sorrows, and shall I not share yours? Tell me who was the wonderful man that taught a wild wood-bird to sing with such sweet art?"
"He was a troubadour; it was his profession to turn thoughts into artistic verse, and so he taught me. Poor father! The song of his lips was most sweet, and whoever heard him and his beautiful lute-playing, was made thankful and merry of heart. And yet he had to wander from place to place like me, and hide his handsome face under hideous disguises. For he was an exile and an outcast, and every man's hand was against him."
"And what crime had he committed?" asked Donatus.
"I never knew--my mother said I was guilty of it all. It was because I had come into the world that things went so hardly with him--oh!--and how could I help it!" she hid her head in her hands and wept bitterly.
Donatus drew her hands away and took them consolingly in his own. "My child, my dear child!"
"That is just what my father always used to say when he came to see us and took me in his arms. You know he never could stay with us; he was obliged to go into the towns and sing to people for his daily bread. And when he did come it was by stealth, and only when we were at Finstermünz, or the valleys of the Inn or the Lech, where no one from these parts was likely to see him. He used to bring us as much food and money as he could spare, and would stay a few weeks with us in the forest. There he taught me a number of little proverbs and sayings and pretty tunes, and the arts of rhyming as far as I could learn them, but I was still quite young when he died--I could not count more than twelve trees that I had marked."
"How did he die?" asked her companion.
The child's hand trembled as she answered.
"They fell upon him like a wild deer--some people out hunting who recognised him--and he dragged himself to us almost bleeding to death. We nursed him as best we could, but it was too late to be of any use. Oh! and he was so patient and gentle even when he was dying; he laid his hand upon my head and blessed me, and said, 'May God never visit the guilt of your parents on your head--expiate in faithfulness their sin against faithfulness.'"
Donatus took her hand solemnly in his. "Yes, you will be faithful and expiate the guilt of your parents whatever their sin was--a strange divination tells me this, and my soul is possessed with a deep sadness for your sake. What dark secret hangs over your birth, poor child--Who may you be? Did you never ask your mother Berntrudis?"
"No--why should I? What good could it do me? I am a poor, useless creature, I come and pass away like a wild heath-flower, no one asking whence came you or why do you bloom?"
"Poor heath-flower--lonely and sweet, how sacred you are to me. The perfume refreshes the weary pilgrim, and the dreaming spirit, like the dainty bee, gathers golden honey from the blossom of your lips. You grow firmly rooted in the dry rock, and humbly bend your head to the wind as it sweeps over the desert spot--and yet you stand firm and live on through sunshine and rain, through the fury of wind and weather! Oh! heath-flower--I will not ask whence you came--I only rest my weary head in your shade and bless you!" And he threw himself on his knees before her, and bent his brow on her hands. Thus he rested for some time in silence; not a breath, not a sound roused him from his dreams.
In such a moment of exquisite rapture the girl almost held her breath--feeling herself like a holy vessel into whom the Lord was pouring out his mercies.
But suddenly he started up. "Great God!" exclaimed he, "time is flying and I am delaying and dreaming. Come, Beata, 'of hearts the truest,' lead me onward."
And on they went again, on and on, these two who might not rest; but was it the intoxicating perfume of the heath-flower, or his rising fever that made his steps uncertain? He knew not which; but he felt that his strength was failing.
"Hold Thou me up, O Lord!--for this day only hold Thou me up, till I have brought succour to my brethren!" so he prayed fervently, as he put his arm round the girl's shoulders for a firmer support.
"Am I too heavy for you?"
"Oh no--never!" cried the child, though she could hardly hold herself up under the beloved burden, for her long walk through the night had by degrees crippled even her young limbs and made them feel like lead. But she would rather have died than he should know it.
"Poor little one, how much rather would I carry you!" he said, and he involuntarily dropped his head on to hers which reached just to his shoulder. He felt her silky hair like a soft pillow under his cheek, and the breath of her lips came up to him like incense. Then he whispered softly--and the words sounded like a sad caress--
"Is it your heart that I have to carry in my breast that is so heavy that my feet totter under the weight of it?"
"If love and truth can be weighed in an earthly scale, then, indeed, dear master, you could hardly carry it."
"I could almost believe that you are a witch, and that your little heart was an incubus that weighed on mine!"
"What you too! you say so?" cried Beata pitifully. "Then it must be true."
Suddenly they heard a distant rush through the wood on each side of them, like the tramp of hoofs, and the startled creatures of the wood scampered through the brushwood, or whirled across their path in hasty flight.
"God help us! it is the mounted soldiers!" exclaimed Beata. "But collect yourself--your dress disguises you perfectly. Do not betray yourself." And she hastily snatched the bandage from his eyes and hid it in her bosom; then she pulled the hat low over his brow so that his eyes might not be seen under its broad brim.
"Do not say that you are blind," she whispered.
By this time the riders broke through the bushes; they were the followers of Count Reichenberg and the lord of Ramüss. They were heated and angry.
"Have you met a Benedictine?" said one of them, in a tone of authority.
"A Benedictine! what was he like?" asked Beata.
"We had taken him prisoner and he has vanished--his name is Porphyrius, he was tall and stout, and had blue eyes," said the man.
"That does not matter," interrupted his companion. "We will take every Benedictine we find, whether his eyes are blue or green. Our master Reichenberg gives a ducat for every cowl."
Beata turned pale, but she preserved her presence of mind.
"This morning I saw one at Saint Mary's in Münsterthal; he was resting there, and meant to go on again at noon," she said with prudent forethought.
"Where to?"
"To the Engadine, I believe. If you make haste, you may easily overtake him."
"Good, forward then to Saint Mary's," cried the first speaker.
"You had better come with us," cried his companion to the two wayfarers. "So stout a lad can surely fight, and so pretty a wench can surely kiss. We will take you on horseback, and when we have caught the shaveling we will make merry together out of the ducat. Come, little one, I will lift you into the saddle."
"Get away with you, we are not for the like of you; my brother is ill, I must get him home."
"Your brother is it? Then all the more you belong to me!" said the rider with a laugh.
"Do not come near me, I am a witch!" screamed Beata.
The man spurred his horse forward, and tried to snatch at her from his saddle. But she had quickly drawn a knife from the folds of her dress, and she plunged it into the horse's flank, so that he started aside with a leap.
"Good God, she really is a witch!" cried the others. "Let us be off or she will bewitch our horses."
And thereupon the whole troop rode off; the danger was past.
"All praise to your cunning, Beata, you are as soft as a dove, and as wise as a serpent."
Beata supported herself, breathless, against his shoulder. "Oh, my lord--oh, my angel! If they had carried you off from me, and perhaps killed you--" she burst into convulsive sobs, and threw her arms round him as if even now he might be torn from her.
Donatus stood trembling in her embrace; then he felt that her knees failed her, and that she sank speechless before him.
"Beata, my child!" he said, kneeling down beside her. "What is the matter, what has bereft you of your strength for the first time since we have been together?"
"It is only the fright--it will soon pass off--in a moment--" but her voice died away, and she lost consciousness.
He felt for her drooping head, and laid it on his bosom; he rubbed her forehead and temples; a stream of unutterable feeling ran through him, a sweet compassion, a rapture of anxiety.
"Beata!" he cried, "poor stricken deer, wake up, listen to the voice of your friend. I cannot go to the stream to fetch you water as you did for me. I am blind and unable to return you even the smallest service for all you have done for me. Listen to my voice, sweet soul! wake up."
And she opened her eyes, and found her head resting on the breast of the man who to her was so sacred and dear, and she would fain have closed her eyes again, and have slept on into eternity; but obedient to his call, she collected her strength and answered, "My good master!"
"How are you?" he asked softly.
"I am quite well, I can go on now," she said, though her voice was weak.
He felt, however, that she was still exhausted, and required rest.
"No, my child," said he, "I have already made the most unreasonable demands on your strength. I should have a heart of stone if I could drive my poor lamb any farther. The rest that I would not give myself, I must grant to you," and he took off his cape, and laid it under her head for a pillow.
"There, rest for an hour, and repair the mischief that my negligence has occasioned."
"But you, my lord, what will you do if I go to sleep? For since I have lain down sleep weighs upon my eyelids like lead."
"I will watch over you, and though indeed my eyes are closed, my ear is sharp and will warn me if danger threatens."
"Give me your hand," she said, and as he gave it her she laid her head upon it, and fell asleep. The blind man sat by the sleeping child without moving.
"Now, Angels of Heaven, spread your wings over us," he prayed.
She slept soundly and calmly; exhausted nature drew refreshment from the dark fount of sleep.
He waited patiently for her awaking; he knew not how long a time had passed, he could not see the sun's place in the sky and his mind was so full of wandering thoughts, so steeped in the charm that the breath of the sleeping child cast round him, that he lost all estimate of time. Suddenly he felt a burning ray of sunshine fall on his cheek, as sharp as a bee's sting; a single ray that had pierced between the boughs from the westward. By this he knew that the sun was sinking; the sultriness of noon too had much diminished, and there was more life stirring in the brush-wood and in the air than during the midday heat. He perceived at once, by many vague and yet unmistakeable signs, that evening was drawing on, and he lightly touched the girl's eyelids to feel if they still were closed. "Beata," he whispered, leaning over her, but the call had only a magical attraction; she turned towards him in her sleep, as a flower turns to the light. He felt her lips close to his and a thought flashed through his brain, a thought at once intoxicating and terrible. And yet, no, not a thought, only an involuntary impulse of his lips, as when a draught of water is withheld from a thirsty man. He shrunk in horror of himself; was he still capable of such emotion--he, the blind man, the ascetic, cut off from life and its joys? He drew back far from the tempting lips so that their breath could reach him no more. Why did his heart throb so violently? Was it from anxiety at the long time the child was sleeping? He was sparing the girl, and neglecting to rescue his brethren. Should he awake her? No, she must awake soon of her own accord, and then they will make up for lost time all the quicker. By evening they will reach Trafoy, then he can speak with the Duchess at once and by night ride home again with the armed escort. But Beata! oh God what will become of her? Can he ever find it in his heart to turn her out, a wanderer on the earth?
"Sleep, poor child, that heavy hour will come soon enough," cried his tortured soul.
Far and wide all was as still as death. A sharp ear could hear the squirrels' little claws scratching against the branches, and the birds twittering in the tree-tops, while on the ground there was not a sound but the light foot of some wild animal or the rustle of a beetle in the grass. Donatus felt the dancing sunbeams that fell here and there between the trunks, he felt the cool breeze that came down from the nearer glaciers. Perhaps they were looking down through some cleared opening in the thicket, those royal, shining forms, and bathing the sleeping child in their broad reflected splendour! "How beautiful it must all be," was his involuntary thought, and he hid his aching brow in his hand. He felt again and again as if, like another Samson, he must break through the dark vault that imprisoned him, for every power and muscle and nerve in his body was in a state of tension; and in the next instant he sank back overwhelmed by the mere thought of the ineffectual effort. For those walls, intangible and incorporate, would yield to no earthly force; no earthly ray might pierce them even if the blind man stood in the very eye of the sun--that was over for ever. Now at this hour, when he was alone for the first time since meeting Beata, now he is conscious that it is the child's presence that has this day kept him upright. For so soon as he is left to himself, despair lifts its dragon head and threatens to darken his soul with madness.
And he had to summon all his self-command to keep himself from crying out aloud, "Beata, wake and save me from myself!" At this moment the girl awoke and opened her eyes, as if she had heard the dumb cry for help that came from his struggling soul. Donatus was sitting motionless, his hands convulsively clasped and his head leaning against the trunk of a tree. She thought that he slept, overcome by fatigue, and she propped her head on her hand and silently contemplated the pale suffering face with the sunken closed eyelids, a still and sublime martyr's face, while her heart overflowed in tears that coursed each other down her cheeks. She folded her hands in worship of him. What were earth and heaven to her, what was God even? All were contained in this one man. He was love, he was patience, he was goodness. In earth and Heaven there was none but he; and she rose to her knees softly, not to wake him as she thought, and prayed to him, the martyr, the blind man who could see no light but from whom all the light of her life proceeded. She gazed at his sunken eyes and unutterable pity came over her; he was fast asleep, he could not know--gradually--irresistibly--it took possession of her. She did not know what she was doing, nor even that she was doing it--her lips breathed a kiss on those closed lids; a soft, deep, tender kiss. He started up and pressed his hands to his eyes. "What has happened, what was that? Beata, you kissed me--on my eyes. Holy Father, what have you done?"
"Forgive me!" cried Beata, sinking into his arms almost distracted. "Or kill me, kill me, my lord, my angel, my deliverer?"
"Oh wonder of wonders! I see again! it is fire, red fire that I am gazing into. Woe is me!--you have opened my eyes, and I see that which I ought not to see. I see you Beata, just as you are, your tawny shining eyes that gaze at me so imploringly, your rosy mouth that kissed me so sweetly. I see your waving hair, I see your whole sweet figure down to your little feet that have followed me so faithfully, I see it all, and I would fain sink in those fathomless eyes, and bury my face in that soft hair and drink death from those sweet lips. What is this feeling that shakes me to the very stronghold and foundation of my being? All-powerful God, this is love--it has come, it has come! I have suffered in vain." And he clasped the tree-trunk against which he was leaning as if to chain himself to it by his own arms, so that he might not snatch the girl to his breast and sink with her in the overwhelming torrent of fire.
The child stood by trembling like a young sapling in a whirlwind; Donatus pressed his face against the bark of the tree and a few blood-stained tears ran down his cheeks. St. Benedict slept on stinging nettles when temptation approached him, and he, what should he do? "Quench, oh quench the fire!" he groaned. "Let it rain, let the brooks overflow, oh God! to cool my fever. Water, Beata, for pity's sake; lead me to the spring or I shall perish." The terrified girl took his robe, as if she dared not touch him again, and led him to the torrent which fell with a sudden leap over the rocks, foaming till it was as white as the glacier snow from whence it came. It had worn a deep channel in the earth into which it fell, and the spray leaped up again in a fountain. The blind man flung himself into the icy glacier water, as if he were pursued by the fire-brands of hell, and the cataract came splashing on to him, throwing him down; the cold waves of the pure and purifying element rushed over him with a deafening roar; the burning pulses of his blood turned to ice under it, his limbs grew rigid, and it penetrated to his very heart like the icy touch of death.