"But Susanna made no answer; she stopped sobbing, turned her head away from Anna Maria, and lay still as a mouse; but in the quick rising and falling of her bosom one could see how excited she was.
"'Be calm, Susanna,' repeated Anna Maria; 'and where you are, I have to speak with you concerning the explanation of a great mistake.'
"She turned quietly from the invalid, and observing the glasses beside the bed, asked Isabella if Susanna liked lemonade, and went away. She had given me only a hasty greeting; now she came back, and we stood together in the hall, and I held her hand in mine.
"That words of consolation were not to be thought of in dealing with a nature like Anna Maria's, I knew well; yet I could not help tears coming into my eyes as I looked at her. She looked at me for a moment, her face quivered as with a passionate pain, and the sobbing sound came from her breast. But she composed herself by an effort, and pointing to Susanna's door, said: 'There is the worst thing—my poor Klaus!' She pressed my hand, and then went about her household duties as usual. It is not every one that would have done as she did!
"When I entered Susanna's room again I found her sitting up in bed, wringing her clasped hands. 'Nobody has asked me about it!' she repeated, amid streaming tears; 'my wish is of no account; they have pushed me away where they wanted me to go! And now, now—' She murmured something to herself, which I did not understand, and stopped weeping, only to begin anew with the passionate cry: 'No one loves me, no one!'
"'Do not listen to her,' Isabella implored me; 'she really does not know what she is doing; leave me alone with her! 'The little creature was in a thousand terrors. She ran from the bed to the window, and then back to the bed; she called the weeping girl all sorts of pet names, she besought her by heaven and earth to be quiet—it was in vain. Susanna wept herself into a state of agitation that made us fear the worst; she struck at Isa, and then wrung her hands again, like a person in perfect desperation. I stood by, helpless; as long as the girl was in this state of excitement I could not step up to her, and say: 'Susanna, what have you done? You have given your word to a man of honor, and you love another! You have made mischief in the house which was so hospitably opened to you; you have made three human hearts miserable! Is that your gratitude for all this kindness?'
"And then her cry, 'No one asked me; they pushed me away where they wanted me to be, and I had not the power to defend myself!' sank deeply into my heart, and my thoughts went back to that evening when she had run away in the storm and rain, and how Klaus had brought her back, and called her 'his!' Had he asked if she loved him? No; he had not even thought of the possibility that such might not be the case; he had gone away with firm confidence in her love. And then Anna Maria had pressed her to her heart one day, and called her 'sister,' and Klaus had come, and had put the engagement ring on her hand. She had not dared to send him away, and had gone on, in her light manner, trifling with that engagement ring, while becoming deeper and deeper involved in the passion for another. Her lover was away, he did not hear her. Now Stürmer was going into the wide world, a fresh thorn in her heart. Susanna was shaken out of her dreams, and near despair. And Anna Maria, and Klaus—what was to become of them?
"Then Brockelmann brought me a letter from Stürmer. I went into my room and read it; it was written from Dambitz, and ran as follows:
"'Honored Fräulein:—I do not like to go away from you without a word of explanation, or without thanking you for your letter, which kept me from taking a step which would have been painfully hard for me in more than one respect. You have, with delicate tact indeed, rightly discerned that Susanna Mattoni is not an object of indifference to me, and you wanted to save me from a disappointment. My dear Fräulein Rosamond, why should I deny it? I love Susanna very much, and I intended yesterday to beg for your mediation in my suit. I had to suppose that she returned my love.
"'I have no luck in your house—a second time I have been bitterly undeceived. Now I have come to consider myself one of the most arrogant men the world contains. Anna Maria does not love me. I required years to get over that first disappointment; it was not easy, for I believed myself perfectly sure of her reciprocal love. Well, I succeeded at last; I will even assert that Anna Maria was right. We were ill-suited to each other; perhaps she would have been unhappy with a man of such entirely different inclinations. Then I see Susanna and—love the betrothed of my best friend!
"'What remains to me? Again I turn my back on my home and seek to forget.
"'In Bütze everything will remain as of old, and I—go. But I do not like to leave you, who have suspected it, in darkness. Pardon me if have caused you anxiety; I did so unconsciously. Think of me kindly! When I come home again some day, Susanna will be the wife of my friend, and I—a calm man, who will have forgotten all the dreams of youth. I kiss your dear hands, and beg you to let what I have said here remain our secret. Susanna will be most likely of all to suspect why I went—she will secretly mourn for me, but only soon to forget me in her young happiness.
"'Farewell, with most heartfelt respect,
"'Your most devoted
"'Edwin von Stürmer.'
"The sheet trembled in my hands, and every instant tears hindered my reading.