Weird Tales, Vol. 2 (of 2)

by E. T. A. Hoffmann

And the youth Jonathan? He sat at the table with Nanni; and she also wrote and drew, of course under his guidance. And yet to sit writing and drawing the whole evening through is a downright tiring piece of business; hence it was no unfrequent occurrence for Jonathan to draw some neatly-bound book out of his pocket and read it to pretty, sensitive Nanni in a low softly-whispering tone.

Through old Eichheimer's influence Jonathan had won the patronage of the minor canon, who designated Master Wacht a real Verrina. The canon, Count von Kösel, a man of genius, lived and revelled in Goethe's and Schiller's works, which were just at that time beginning to rise like bright streaming meteors, overtopping all others, above the horizon of the literary sky. He thought, and rightly, that he discerned a similar tendency in his attorney's young clerk, and took a special delight not only in lending him the works in question, but in reading them in common with him, and so helping him to thoroughly digest them.

But Jonathan won his way to the Count's heart in an especial way, because he expressed a very favourable opinion of the verses which the Count patched together out of high-sounding phrases in the sweat of his own brow, and because he was, to the Count's unspeakable satisfaction, edified and touched by them to the proper pitch. Nevertheless it is a fact that Jonathan's taste in æsthetic matters was really greatly improved by his intercourse with the intellectual, though somewhat euphuistic, Count.

My kind reader now knows what class of books Jonathan used to take out of his pocket and read to pretty Nanni, and can form a just conception of the way in which this kind of writings would inevitably excite a girl mentally organised as Nanni was. "O star of the gloaming eve!" Would not Nanni's tears flow when her attractive writing-master began in this low and solemn fashion?

It is a fact of common experience that young people who are in the habit of singing tender love-duets together very easily put themselves in the places of the fictitious characters of the song, and come to look upon the duets in question as giving both the melody and the text for the whole of life; so also the youth who reads a love romance to a maiden very readily becomes the hero of the story, whilst the girl dreams herself into the role of the heroine. In the case of such fitly adapted spirits as Jonathan and Nanni such incitement as this even was not required to provoke them to love each other. They were one heart and one soul; the maiden and the youth were, so to speak, but one brightly burning flame of love, pure and inextinguishable. Of his daughter's tender passion Father Wacht had not the slightest inkling; but he was soon to learn all.

Through unwearied industry and genuine talent Jonathan succeeded in a brief space of time in completing his legal studies and qualifying for admission to the grade of advocate; and, as a matter of fact, his admission soon followed. He intended one Sunday to surprise Master Wacht with this glad news, which established him upon a secure footing for life. But imagine how he trembled with dismay when Wacht bent his eyes upon him, blazing with anger; he had never seen him look so passionately wrathful. "What!" cried Wacht, in a tone that made the walls ring again, "what! you miserable good-for-nothing fellow! Nature has neglected your body, but richly endowed you with splendid intellectual gifts, and these you are intending to abuse in a shameless way, like a bad crafty knave, and so putting your knife at your own mother's throat? You mean to say you are going to traffic in justice as in some cheap paltry ware in the public market, and weigh it out with false scales to the poor peasants and the oppressed burgher, who in vain utter their plaintive cries before the soft-cushioned seat of the inexorable judge, and going to get yourself paid with blood-stained pence which the poor man hands to you whilst bathed in tears? Will you fill your brains with lying laws of man's contriving, and practise knavish tricks and schemes, and make a lucrative business of it to fatten yourself upon? Is all your father's virtue, tell me, vanished from your heart? Your father--your name is Engelbrecht--no! when I hear you called so I will not believe that it is the name of my comrade, who was a pattern of virtue and honesty, but I must believe that it is Satan, who in the apish mockery of Hell is shouting the name across his grave, and so beguiling men to take the young lying lawyer's cub for the real son of that excellent carpenter Gottfried Engelbrecht. Begone! you are no longer my foster-son! You are a serpent whom I will pluck from my bosom, whom I will disown"----

At this point Nanni rushed in and threw herself at Master Wacht's feet with a piercing heart-rending cry of distress. "Father!" she cried, completely overcome by her incontrollable anguish and unbridled despair, "father, if you disown him, you will disown me also--me, your own favourite daughter; he is mine, my Jonathan; I can never, never part with him in this world."

The poor child fell down in a swoon and struck her head against the closet-door, so that the drops of blood trickled down her delicate white forehead. Barbara and Rettel ran in and carried the insensible girl to the sofa. Jonathan stood like a statue, as if thunderstruck, incapable of the slightest movement. It would be difficult to describe the inner emotions which revealed themselves on Wacht's countenance. His face, instead of being flushed with the redness of anger, was now pale as a corpse's; there only remained a dark fire gleaming in his fixed set eyes; the cold perspiration of death appeared to be standing on his forehead. After gazing unchangeably before him for some minutes without speaking, he relieved his labouring breast by saying in a significant tone, "So that was it!" then he strode slowly towards the door, where he again stood still, and turning half round towards the women, cried, "Dont' spare eau de Cologne, and this foolery will soon be over."

Shortly afterwards the Master was seen to leave the house at a quick pace and bend his steps towards the hills. It may be conceived in what great trouble and distress the family was plunged. Rettel and Barbara could not for the life of them imagine what terrible thing had happened; but when the Master did not return to dinner, but stayed out till late at night--a thing he had never done before--they were greatly agitated with anxiety and fear. At length they heard him coming, heard him open the street-door, bang it violently to, ascend the stairs with strong firm footsteps, and lock himself in his own chamber.

Poor Nanni soon recovered herself again and wept quietly to herself. But Jonathan did not stop short of wild outbreaks of inconsolable despair, and several times spoke of shooting himself. It is a fortunate thing that pistols are articles which do not necessarily belong to the furniture of sentimental young lawyers; or at least, if they are to be found amongst their effects, they generally have no lock or else won't go off.