Gotthold walked slowly back to the spot where he had left Cecilia, and saw her still sitting in the same thoughtful attitude. Would she speak to-day, or would she keep silence as she had done hitherto--let him go in silence?
He went up and took the hand that hung by her side. "Cecilia?"
She slowly raised her dark lashes, and looked at him with an expression of touching entreaty.
"I am not to bid you speak, I am to leave you in silence, Cecilia! And yet it must be uttered; so let me say it for you. You could tell the secret only to a woman, and to a woman you would not need to do so; she would understand you without words. Was it not so? Should love be less clear-sighted than the eyes of a sympathizing friend? I do not know, I can only tell you what I read in your heart. And it is this, Cecilia: you love me, but dare not yield to your feelings; nay, you shrink from the thought of becoming my wife, as if it were a sin--against whom? It sounds cruel, Cecilia, and yet I must say it: against your pride. That is what you fear--yourself, not me. You know as well as that the sun is setting yonder to rise again to-morrow, that no day, no hour will come when I shall reproach you by word or look for having been--so unhappy, so unspeakably wretched; you know that I--as I think--have nothing to forgive you. But you, Cecilia, think you can never forgive yourself; you think, because when you were an inexperienced girl of sixteen you made a mistake, repentance and shame must follow you all your future life; repentance and shame would frighten you from my arms if you ever obeyed the impulse of your heart and threw yourself into them."
"And should I not do right to think, to feel so?" cried Cecilia, while the tears streamed down her burning cheeks; "could I ever forgive myself for having become the wife of this man? An inexperienced girl of sixteen, do you say? I was not so very inexperienced; I was worldly--wise enough to understand that life in the beautiful castle and shady park of Dahlitz would be more brilliant than in a gloomy country parsonage. And so I trod the poor student's heart under foot, although a voice which, since that hour, has never been silenced, whispered, he is the better man. Should I forgive myself for that, and for letting him go away with an almost broken heart, without a word of sympathy, of consolation, glad that his honest eyes no longer rested upon me, no longer read my vain soul? And now, when my arrogant dream has produced its natural result, now that I am as utterly wretched as I deserve to be, and he returns and stands before me, a pure, noble man, who can look with just pride upon his honest, industrious past, and with joyful composure towards his future, which must develop still more gloriously--is he now to stay his victorious step to raise one so deeply fallen;--nay, what am I saying? Is she to chain him to herself for all the future, bind the strong industrious hands, constrain the proud mind, which ought always to be occupied with the highest things, to perpetual consideration, daily, hourly sympathy for a wretched, self-marred fate? Did you say pride prevented my doing that? Be it so! But it was pride for you, in you! Ah! Gotthold, I do not feel this pride to-day for the first time. I was proud of you when, with sparkling eyes, you could talk so brilliantly of gods and heroes, and say the heroic man might boldly compare himself with the gods themselves; and when I heard, years after, you had forced your way through obstacles, by which others would have been crushed a thousand times, and, with a speed that seemed wonderful to those who did not know your strength and talent, raised yourself to the highest rank in your art, and the name of the young painter was mentioned only among the best artists--yes, Gotthold, I was proud then, so proud and thankful--for I thought, now I can bear everything easier, since my crime was not visited on you, since I alone had to atone for the sin I alone had committed."
They had left the fields, over which scattered threads of gossamer floated in the red light of the setting sun, and entered the dark, silent forest. No sound was heard except the rustling of the withered leaves at their feet, and, as Cecilia paused, the mournful song of a solitary bird.
But Gotthold heard no interruption; it seemed to him as if the piteous notes of the bird only prolonged the wail of the human voice.
"Alone, alone," he said, "always alone, and so you wish to remain, poor love! Can a human being be alone? And are you quite alone? Granted that I am--which I am not--the strong hero who can by constant labor struggle along his solitary path to the golden table of the father, is there not your child, from whom you must shut out the bright, sunny world? You, who turn away from life with veiled head in mute despair! what virtues will you teach it when you are yourself so wholly destitute of the cheerfulness, in which alone the virtues thrive; nay, when you no longer believe in that which is the best and highest of all, which makes us what we are, makes us human beings--love? Who pities yonder little bird, which, concealed amid the autumnal foliage, perhaps wounded and maimed, is left behind to perish miserably? None of its brothers and sisters, its husband or its children; they have all flown away, unheeding, and left it behind--alone, alone! They obey the immutable law that governs their coming and going, their life and death, and so they do not, cannot sin; but we can and do, if we do not obey the law that governs us, if we do not obey love. It is the all-powerful tie that has bound and will bind together all races of men, from the beginning to the end; the all-powerful sun beneath whose pure light spring must return to the darkest, saddest hearts: and so with my love I will hold you, dearest, however you may struggle; will open your heart, however you may try to close it against me: for I am more powerful than you, can lend you my strength, and yet have enough for myself, and you, and your child--our child, Cecilia!"
She had paused, trembling in every limb; pale as death, and with her dark eyes dim with tears, she extended her hands imploringly.
"Have mercy, Gotthold, have mercy! I can bear no more; I can bear no more."