A Noble Name; or, Dönninghausen

by Claire von Glümer

Upon leaving Magelone and Otto, Johanna, unconscious whither she was going, plunged into the forest. The birds sang as before; the quivering sunbeams played among the tree-tops; sparkling drops fell from the branches or shimmered in the white anemones that were everywhere pushing forth out of last year's dry leaves. All this Johanna perceived with a strange distinctness, but she felt aloof from it all, confronted with one terrible consciousness which she could neither appreciate nor name.

At last she reached the borders of the forest, and looked around her with sad, dull eyes. Before her lay a deep stretch of moorland; below, in the valley, were the Dönninghausen meadows in their fresh green. Among them wound the road to Klausenburg. She was familiar with it all, but it was no longer what it had been, nor was she herself, nor life, the same. Her heart was so weary and desolate, her tired feet would bear her no farther. She threw herself down on the heather with a sigh. Suddenly the bushes behind her crackled and rustled. She looked round. It was Leo, who rushed out and lay, whining for joy, at her feet. He leaped up upon her, gazing at her wistfully out of his faithful eyes,—his faithful eyes! The spell was broken; all her misery lay clearly revealed to her; the sense of it filled her heart. And, throwing her arms around the dog, who seemed to understand his mistress's woe, she leaned her forehead upon his neck and burst into bitter tears.

She was sitting weeping thus when Red Jakob and Christine, who had followed Leo, emerged from the thicket. Jakob paused, but Christine ran to Johanna and threw herself upon her knees beside her. Johanna raised her head. At sight of her pale face and fixed melancholy eyes Christine's tears also flowed.

"Oh, dear Fräulein," she cried, "please, please do not be angry! Jakob has told me all. It was very wrong; but in deed and in truth he did not mean ill——"

"Never mind, Christine," Johanna interposed, rising and wiping her eyes.

But the young wife held her fast by her skirt and begged all the more fervently: "Please do not be angry with Jakob; please do not!"

He, too, now approached. "Christine, don't go on as if I had committed a crime," he said, his tone and air betraying increasing anger. "I could not look on and see how the pair of them were deceiving our Fruleen. You know that they did not meet for the first time to-day. And did I not see, too, how the fine gentleman behaved to you? Did I not see it?" With these words he raised his clinched fist and shook it.

"Oh, Jakob, you did not mean to speak of that!" Christine said, in her gentle, soothing way. "A gentleman like that doesn't mean anything when he jokes and laughs with one of us——"

"But I mean something, curse him!" shouted Jakob—and the savage sparkle of his eyes gave him more than ever the look of some beast of prey—"I'll kill him like a dog——" He suddenly fell silent before Johanna's sad, reproachful gaze. "Just like a wounded deer when it's dying," he said to himself; and he added aloud, "Indeed, indeed I meant well, if the Fruleen could only believe it!"

Johanna collected herself. "I believe it," she made answer, after a short pause; "and it is because I do so that I am convinced that, for my sake, neither of you will tell any one of what has passed."