The lady turned round, glared at him with glowing eyes, then sprang up, tore open the garment on his breast, shrieking,—
"My son! give me my son, you—"
Sonnenkamp held his broad hand over her mouth; she tried to bite him, but he kept her mouth closed, and she was still.
Sonnenkamp requested the priest and Fräulein Perini to leave his wife; Fräulein Perini hesitated, but a wave of his hand gave her decided orders to go. She and the Ecclesiastic left the room. Now Sonnenkamp took Frau Ceres up in his arms, as if she were a child; carried her in to her chamber, and laid her upon the bed. Her feet were cold, and he wrapped a cloth around them in such a manner, that they were firmly bound. After a while, Frau Ceres slept, or only pretended to be asleep; it was the same either way. He went out into the balcony-chamber, where the Ecclesiastic, the Major, and Fräulein Perini were sitting together. He urged the priest to betake himself to rest, thanking him very warmly; he said the same to Fräulein Perini, with an odd mingling of courteousness and authoritativeness in his manner; he requested the Major to stay with him.
For an hour he sat with the Major at the open balcony-door, looking up at the starry heaven and listening to the rushing river; then he requested the Major to go to bed; the day would enable them to proceed quietly on sure ground. He himself lay down in the ante-chamber to his wife's room; he went again softly to her bed, shading the light with his hand; she was sleeping quietly, with burning cheeks.
All was still at the villa. Sonnenkamp was waked up when the messenger returned from Wolfsgarten; they knew nothing of Roland there.
"Is Herr von Pranken coming?" asked Sonnenkamp. The messenger did not know.
Sonnenkamp was very weary, and exhausted from want of sleep, but he could not rest; he stood at the balcony and listened to the singing of the birds and the rushing of the river; he saw the sun rise in the heavens, he heard the clocks strike; the whole world, so fresh and beautiful, seemed to him a chaos. His daughter at the convent, and his wife ready, at any moment, to testify the most horrible things against him, and his son disappeared, leaving no trace! Perhaps his corpse is floating yonder in the water! It seemed to Sonnenkamp, for a moment, as if he must throw himself headlong from the balcony, and put an end to his life. Then he stood erect and took a fresh cigar.
He went down into the park; the trees were quivering noiselessly in the early dawn, and their leaves rustled and whispered when the morning sunbeam stirred them into music and motion. The birds were carroling; they had their home and their family, and to them no child was missing-—-
Sonnenkamp wandered hither and thither. This soil is his, these trees are his, everything is green, blooming, breathing a fresh life. Does he still breathe for whom all this had life, for whom it all was to live, for whom it was planted and set in order?