The Freiherr had bought Tannhagen, and had acceded to Otto's entreaty that the marriage might take place at the end of May. There was much to do before then to make the 'old barracks,' as the Freiherr called the farm-house, habitable. There was no end of consultations with builders and workmen. Hangings and carpets were ordered. Löbel Wolf, who had been taken into favour again, ransacked the country round for old furniture to suit Johanna's taste; Aunt Thekla contributed chests full of linen, and Otto was perpetually going to and fro urging the workmen at Tannhagen to greater speed and keeping his grandfather informed of all that was doing.
The Freiherr seemed to grow younger and more cheerful every day amid these constant calls upon his interest. They helped him to forego the usual Christmas gathering this year, and to bear the absence of Johann Leopold. Hedwig could not, of course, travel with her new-born baby, and Hildegard's children had the measles,—very fortunately for their mother, who was reluctant to witness the happiness of the betrothed pair. Magelone also was away. She had developed a tender affection for Hedwig's boys, and begged her grandfather to allow her to spend her Christmas with them.
It was a great pleasure, shortly before Christmas-day, to receive a letter from Johann Leopold. It was plain, however, from its contents that a previous packet, containing a letter from Ludwig Werner in answer to the announcement of Johanna's betrothal, had been lost. This time only Johann Leopold wrote. Ludwig had been absent from him for a while upon an expedition to the interior, which the writer did not feel strong enough to join. He said nothing special about his health, but from several of his expressions it seemed plain that the hopes he had entertained as to the effect of his travels had not been confirmed, and, in spite of the pleasure and interest they had afforded him, there might be read between the lines of his letter a certain desire for home, the longing of an invalid to be once more living quiet days amid familiar scenes. Still, he did not seem inclined to hasten his return. He wrote that the work of the expedition to which Ludwig Werner belonged would hardly be finished before the end of the summer, so that he could not expect to see Dönninghausen again before the autumn. He was, of course, all the more anxious for a detailed account of all that passed there, and asked particularly concerning the plans of the betrothed pair, whom he cordially begged to rely upon his brotherly aid whenever they might require it. Sympathy with their happiness, he added, should cheer his own life of renunciation.
"Poor Magelone!" thought Otto, when he heard this portion of the letter. "How can she depend for future happiness upon such a shadow of a man?" But the old Freiherr declared that it was all hypochondriacal nonsense, and that when the bustle of the outfit and the wedding were over at Tannhagen, the same thing should be begun at Dönninghausen.
"You will see, Thekla," he said to his sister, "when it comes to seriously building his nest, Johann Leopold will be just as sensible as Otto has become. I never should have believed that the lad could be so practical and industrious. It gives me the greatest pleasure to see it."
Even Johanna was surprised at Otto's unwearied zeal, but she could not help thinking that in his care for outward circumstances, the frame of life, he was overlooking the life itself, and his ardent tenderness could not indemnify her for the want of that congeniality of mind and thought which she had hoped for from her lover, and for which she longed daily. Otto declared that there would be time enough for philosophizing when they were settled in their Tannhagen solitude; at present it seemed to him best to discuss the alterations in the house, the laying out of the garden, the carpets, and the furniture. And since Johanna's taste differed widely from his own, which was all for the modern, the elegant, and the graceful, while she would have had her furniture in artistic harmony with her house, there was no end to discussions upon household matters, which left Otto no time for what interested Johanna more deeply.
She would not admit to herself that he lacked interest in everything save what was superficial, and after he had left her in the evening she made every effort to banish the feeling of discontent that assailed her. She sought refuge more and more continually at her writing-table. The impression produced upon her imagination by Tannhagen at her first visit had not faded. She still in fancy saw the old house peopled with shapes upon whom, involuntarily, she bestowed the very life of her life, whom she caused to ask and answer, to love, to suffer, to hope, and to grieve, according to her own mood. And each of these phantoms had an individual existence, to which she felt forced—she knew not why—to give expression in words. She did it with mingled delight and pain. Form and colour would sometimes elude her, or the shape which she had thought stable would fade and vanish, while at other times, without the slightest effort on her part, her brain would be crowded with clear and lovely images, whose very being she could understand and interpret. What would come of all this she never asked herself. She believed that in writing she was but obeying an impulse to reveal herself absolutely to Otto. She called these outpourings of her very self 'apocryphal love-letters,' and she wrote herself to rest, as some sing themselves to sleep.
Thus the winter passed. It was unusually stormy and severe, even for these mountains. All the more welcome to Johanna were the first spring breezes, the coming of the first birds of passage, and the bursting of the sheaths of the first blossoms. Her rides and walks with her grandfather were not long enough. Elinor was saddled for her in the early morning, and it was sometimes hard to turn back in time for breakfast.
One morning she had started earlier than usual. The eager March air and the sunshine blended harmoniously. A lark poured his 'full heart' 'from heaven or near it.' With Leo barking about her, she turned her mare into the woodland path leading to the 'Forest Hermitage.'