“And, after all, who knows that there mayn’t be some sort of connection? Come, now, don’t look like that! I only want you to look on me as your good friend, and to come to me if ever there’s anything I can do. We needn’t live in each other’s pockets, of course, when other people are by—but we must take in Klaus Brock along with us, don’t you think?”
Peer felt a strong impulse to run away. Did the other know everything? If so, why didn’t he speak straight out?
As the two walked home in the clear light of the spring evening, Ferdinand took his companion’s arm, and said: “I don’t know if you’ve heard that I’m not on good terms with my people at home. But the very first time I saw you, I had a sort of feeling that we two belonged together. Somehow you seemed to remind me so of—well, to tell the truth, of my father. And he, let me tell you, was a gallant gentleman—”
Peer did not answer, and the matter went no farther then.
But the next few days were an exciting time for Peer. He could not quite make out how much Ferdinand knew, and nothing on earth would have induced him to say anything more himself. And the other asked no questions, but was just a first-rate comrade, behaving as if they had been friends for years. He did not even ask Peer any more about his childhood, and never again referred to his own family. Peer was always reminding himself to be on his guard, but could not help feeling glad all the same whenever they were to meet.
He was invited one evening, with Klaus, to a wine-party at Ferdinand’s lodging, and found himself in a handsomely furnished room, with pictures on the walls, and photographs of his host’s parents. There was one of his father as a young man, in uniform; another of his grandfather, who had been a Judge of the Supreme Court. “It’s very good of you to be so interested in my people,” said Ferdinand with a smile. Klaus Brock looked from one to the other, wondering to himself how things really stood between the two.
The summer vacation came round, and the students prepared to break up and go their various ways. Klaus was to go home. And one day Ferdinand came to Peer and said: “Look here, old man. I want you to do me a great favour. I’d arranged to go to the seaside this summer, but I’ve a chance of going up to the hills, too. Well, I can’t be in two places at once—couldn’t you take on one of them for me? Of course I’d pay all expenses.” “No, thank you!” said Peer, with a laugh. But when Klaus Brock came just before leaving and said: “See here, Peer. Don’t you think you and I might club together and put a marble slab over—Louise’s grave?”, Peer was touched, and clapped him on the shoulder. “What a good old fellow you are, Klaus,” he said.
Later in the summer Peer set out alone on a tramp through the country, and whenever he saw a chance, he would go up to one of the farms and say: “Would you like to have a good map of the farm? It’ll cost ten crowns and my lodging while I’m at it.” It made a very pleasant holiday for him, and he came home with a little money in his pocket to boot.
His second year at the school was much like the first. He plodded along at his work. And now and then his two friends would come and drag him off for an evening’s jollification. But after he had been racketing about with the others, singing and shouting through the sleeping town—and at last was alone and in his bed in the darkness, another and a very different life began for him, face to face with his innermost self. Where are you heading for, Peer? What are you aiming at in all your labours? And he would try to answer devoutly, as at evening prayers: Where? Why, of course, I am going to be a great engineer. And then? I will be one of the Sons of Prometheus, that head the revolt against the tyranny of Heaven. And then? I will help to raise the great ladder on which men can climb aloft—higher and higher, up towards the light, and the spirit, and mastery over nature. And then? Live happily, marry and have children, and a rich and beautiful home. And then? Oh, well, one fine day, of course, one must grow old and die. And then? And then? Aye, what then?
At these times he found a shadowy comfort in taking refuge in the world where Louise stood—playing, as he always saw her—and cradling himself on the smooth red billows of her music. But why was it that here most of all he felt that hunger for—for something more?