With calculating cunning he had plotted and schemed to get her into his power. But when at last he thought he had quelled and broken her pride, she suddenly reared her head more haughtily than ever, and thrust him from her.--He had not believed such audacity possible!
And now the woman whom he had thought to tread beneath his feet stood at so unattainable a height above him, that his treachery was of no avail as a weapon against her. How his heart had been consumed by futile rage! Only the day before yesterday she had dared to send him word by Zoë Melkweyser that she did not remember him.
"But it is my turn now," he thought, "this duel has forced an explanation between herself and Oswald,--she has had to humble herself before her child!" A fiendish exultation thrilled him to his very finger-tips. "At last they must bow before me," he said to himself.--"Mother and son, the two haughtiest of the whole haughty crowd!"
It never occurred to him that this explanation which he had forced so relentlessly upon the mother and son could have results other than those which he contemplated. Absolutely content, for the first time in his life, he leaned back among the cushions slowly puffing forth big clouds of smoke into the fresh morning air, as the carriage approached the old monastery of St. Elizabeth.
It was a large building blackened by time, standing quite isolated at about half a league from Tornow upon fallow land. Formerly a monastery, afterwards a hospital, and then a poor-house, it was now one of those melancholy ruins that only await the pickaxe of demolition. The walls were dirty, the windows black, with half the panes broken and patched up with paper.--Two grape-vines trailed over the grass where once had been a garden, and a couple of knotty mulberry-trees grew close to the ruinous walls.
Leaning against one of these walls stood an ancient black, wooden crucifix; the nail that had held fast the right hand of The Crucified had fallen out and the arm hung loose, lending to the rudely-carved image a strange reality. It looked as if the Saviour in the death struggle had torn away his bleeding hand from the cross to bless mankind with it once more.
Beneath the figure of Christ was a tablet with an inscription, the gilt letters of which, much faded by time, still glistened in the morning sunlight.
The atmosphere was unusually clear, the skies cloudless. Oswald, Georges, and old Doctor Swoboda arrived before Capriani; whilst Georges and Doctor Swoboda walked about the old building discussing various parts of it to keep themselves cool, Oswald leaned against the doorway of the old cloister, and gazed silently into the distance. Not a trace was perceptible of the irritability which Georges had observed on the previous day. His was the repose of one who sees the goal where the terrible burden with which destiny has laden him can be cast off.--His soul was filled with anguish, but was conscious of the remedy at hand.--Release went hand in hand with duty.
Dear old memories arose upon his mind,--vaguely as if obscured by thick vapour. His mother's image hovered before him; he clasped his hands tightly, stood erect, threw back his head and looked upwards as desperate men always do before final exhaustion. His glance fell upon the Christ; the tablet at His feet attracted his attention, he approached it.
"What have you found there?" asked Georges, with forced carelessness.