It was terribly sultry, and Bella felt as if she should suffocate. Then a fresh current of air streamed over the height, a thunderstorm unexpectedly came up, and Bella had hardly reached the house before there came thunder, lightning, and a driving rain.
Bella stood at the window and stared out into the distance, and then up at an old ash-tree, whose branches were dashing about in every direction, and whose trunk was bending from the gale. The tree inclined itself towards the house, as if it must there get help. Bella thought to herself,—For years and years this tree has been rooting itself here and thriving, and no tempest can wrench it away and lop off its boughs. Does it know that this storm will pass over, and serve only to give it new strength? I am such a tree also, and I stand firm. Come tempest, come lightning and thunder, come beating rain, neither shall you uproot me, nor lop off my boughs!
"Eric!" she suddenly exclaimed aloud to herself. Clodwig now entered, saying,—
"Dear wife, I have been looking for you."
Bella's soul was deeply moved when she heard him call her "dear wife." Clodwig showed her a letter that he had been writing to the Professor's widow, inviting her, according to Bella's expressed desire, to make a visit of several weeks at Wolfsgarten.
"Don't send the letter," said she abruptly, "let us again be quietly by ourselves; I would rather not be disturbed now by the Dournay family."
Clodwig expressed his opinion that the noble lady, so far from interfering with their quiet, would be an additional element of beautiful companionship, and would be the means of their seeing Eric in a pleasant way.
The storm had ceased, and when Bella opened the window, a refreshing breeze drew in. She held the letter in her hand; it had been tempest, lightning, rain, and thunder that raged to-day in her soul, and now there was refreshing life. She agreed with her husband; she said to herself, that intercourse with the noble woman would restore her to herself; and for a moment the thought occurred to her that she would confess all to the mother, and be governed by her. Then came the thought that this was not necessary; it would be very natural for Eric to come to Wolfsgarten, and her intercourse with him would fall back into the old peaceful channels.
Bella wrote a short postscript to the letter of her husband; and the Doctor also, who came in just as they were closing the letter, added a few words.