Quisisana; or, Rest at Last

by Friedrich Spielhagen

And as though he would force Fate to grant him all, because he was staking his all upon it, he looked on with a happy smile, whilst the fire of his great love burned up with increasing vehemence with every day, with every hour, spreading around and engulfing his entire being. He was proud that he could no longer feel anything else, think of anything else, but always her, and her alone. If she was away, how empty, how barren did the whole world seem! With what painful impatience did he await the moment when he should behold her again; and when he beheld her again, it seemed as though he had never beheld her before--as though the Creator had but just uttered the command: "Let there be light!" and as though the world lay before him in all the dewy freshness and brightness of the morn of creation.

Then, when the torment of delight became overpowering, he fled from her, to dream, often for hours, in the solitude of the forest, in lone, rocky caves, or on sunny summits--to listen in the deep silence around for the echoing of her sweet voice within his heart, to whisper her loved name to the discreet herbs and trees; to hear that name in the murmur of the brooks, in the rustling of the breezes, in every note of the birds' songs; to see her fair image smiling down upon him from among the dainty white cloudlets that flecked the deep-blue sky, or gazing at him with musing gravity from the dusky shadows of the towering trees, gazing with those great, still, potent, godlike orbs.

That those orbs were now smiling more rarely, that they were fuller of gravest thought, often gazing with a certain sweet fixity of intensest concentration, he had not failed to observe, and he had not interpreted it as a symptom unfavourable to himself; how should, how could it be otherwise, if there fell into her young soul even the faintest reflex of the bright radiancy that was filling his own to its deepest depths?

But he had not failed to observe either, and this he knew not how to explain, that this musing gravity from which his own love in its hopefulness drew sweetest sustenance--like a bee from the chalice of a budding blossom--was turning to a gloomy indignation, which not only was for ever veiling the beloved eyes, but was not unfrequently enfolding the fair face with its fine, energetic features in darkest night, luridly illumined by wrathful flashes.

This startling change had occurred quite suddenly, coincident, strangely enough, with the day, almost with the hour, of Agatha's arrival.

XII.

On the occasion of former visits at Rinstedt Bertram had repeatedly seen Agatha, and had always been on the best of terms with the ever equally pleasant, amiable child. Now, of course she had, like Erna, developed during the last few years into a maiden, though one could not say that she had gained by the process of metamorphosis. The blonde hair now was almost red, freckles abounded unpleasantly on brow and cheek, and an awkward tendency to one side had become an undoubted lurch; so that, taking all these things together, one might indeed be tempted to take the nickname "Granny," which Erna had bestowed upon her cousin and bosom friend, not in its moral meaning alone. But the bright blue eyes had faithfully preserved the old, dear expression; nay, even more openly than of old, there spoke out of them a heart full of kindliest goodwill to all men, desirous of riving in peace and friendship with all men, and seeming not so much to loathe as simply not to comprehend the evil emotions and passions of the human heart.

So gentle a creature, made but for sympathy in joy or in sorrow, could scarcely have found the requisite courage to destroy even the commonplace illusions of a commonplace heart, and would most likely have recoiled from the mere attempt to lay violent hands upon a heart like Erna's, deviating as it did so greatly from the humdrum, everyday pattern. And, again, Bertram had to drop the suspicion which at first had come to him in his perplexity; to wit, that Agatha had, whether in carelessness or intentionally, blabbed about something confided to her by Erna. Such a thing would have been in downright contradiction to the character of the girl, who was as clever as she was good; and, lastly, that he himself should have betrayed his feelings to the rest--that was absolutely impossible. He was only too painfully conscious of having from the very first moment put a most careful guard on his conduct, of having weighed his every word, controlled his every smile and look: of course he had! Why, he recoiled in horror from the very thought that Erna might discover his great secret; it was certain that she had not discovered it, and how could others have done so?

But why should they, again, not have seen, and seen in envy, uncharitableness, and terror, what it was the utmost delight to him to see? Though he, in the full consciousness of his love, in the anxious doubt as to whether that love was not a folly, a crime even, had put the utmost restraint upon himself, yet Erna had assuredly not been equally careful in expressing her feelings, whose real significance she might guess at, though most assuredly she could not measure it. Why, the most harmless and innocent things in the attentions she was spoiling him with, the many kindly little offices which she did for him without any fuss, en passant, as it were--all these things might have been malevolently criticised and viciously explained, suspicion being once aroused one way or the other!

And that such must be the case he could scarcely doubt any longer, when he submitted the demeanour of the others towards him during the last few days to a subsequent examination. Thus, in the light of newly-won knowledge, sundry things stood out in a very marked way, which, under other circumstances, he would either not have heeded, or anyhow have interpreted differently. His beautiful hostess, who used to avail herself of every tête-à-tête with him to turn their talk to Erna and the Baron, had not resumed her favourite topic of conversation; and, on the other hand, Lydia now manifested infinite interest in Erna, and never wearied of starting contemplative talks in reference to the qualities of her former pupil, wondering how one should represent to oneself the future of such a singular being as likely to develop itself. The Baron had still, on each Occasion when Bertram and he had met, overflowed with civility, but had yet tormented him less often with challenges to billiard-matches and to contests in pistol-shooting, but had on the other hand undertaken more frequent solitary shooting expeditions--neither Bertram nor Otto, their host, cared for shooting, as it happened--and had extended them farther too. Otto himself had certainly and most clearly avoided him. At first he had thought that Otto did it to avoid new and painful discussions in reference to his financial position, but Bertram now assumed that it was done lest Otto should distinctly show that he was angry with his friend for Erna's sake, or, what--with his natural weak readiness to yield--came virtually to the same thing, that he had been bidden by the ruling spirit to be angry with Bertram.