Yes, the Witch had died two weeks before and now her niece was dead. They did not know what the girl died of—how could anyone tell what a person died of! The soul left the body and all was ended. There was a grimacing smile on the face of the woman who answered Albert’s questions. Maybe it was the evil spirits—who could tell?
He bent over the coffin for some silent moments. He stared blankly at the white shroud, at the waxen face, at the closed eyes . . .
Then the man and the three women carried the coffin to the cart outside, and the cart started and moved away slowly, the wheels creaking, crunching the clods of the dry mud . . .
A NIGHTINGALE IN A CROW’S NEST.
I.
“Es küsst sich so süsse der Busen der Zweiten
Als kaum sich der Busen der Ersten geküsst.”
Goethe.
What youth, what poetic youth, could not say this with equal truth if he would, had he the candor of the great bard of Weimar? Albert Zorn had more than candor; the public was his priest to whom he confessed more than he sinned. He never concealed the fact that to him woman was an antidote to woman. And love was such a wonderful inspiration for melodious verses! At times he could not tell which he loved most, the melodious verses or the woman who inspired them.
Had he already forgotten Hedwiga with that waxen face and white shroud? Indeed not; he sang of her in the most tragic refrains and dedicated to her memory a dream picture—ein Traumbild—and when he read it over and over, again and again, his heart almost broke and burning tears bedewed his flushed cheeks. But even as he wept for Hedwiga he yearned for some other pretty maiden to take her place in his heart.