"Beata!" he called in her ear. "I abandoned you in life, but in death I will not forsake you, I will die with you."
She still heard, a sigh of rapture answered him as from a happy bride--it was her last--then she bowed her head and slept, softly and peacefully, with a smile on her lips. She was gone like the night-moth whose fate it is never to rejoice in the light of the sun, that is snatched away by the first frosts of winter, without a sound, without a wail--out of darkness into darkness.
Donatus still listened for a while to hear if the stilled heart beat no more--not a breath, not a throb, all was over. Long, long did he lie so, the body clasped to his heart; then he rose, and saying half-aloud as though she still could hear, "Come, my child," he laid the slender form across his shoulders like a dead lamb, and went out into the open air.
Snow was falling, softly and lightly spreading a white coverlet under his feet over which he glided inaudibly, feeling his way by the rocky wall. Whither was he going, what did he seek? He could not answer himself these questions, the time for thought was over; one feeling alone possessed him, and that was love. All seemed light to his blind eyes; a slight form rose out of the darkness, and floated before him with a sad but blissful smile. It was Beata's glorified spirit. She pointed out the way, and signed to him to follow with a look of unutterable love.
"Yes, I am coming, I follow," he cried, and hurried on as fast as he could through the snow--after her. Presently the sweet vision reached a spot where the rock ended precipitously, a perpendicular cliff of more than a thousand fathoms. She stood still and looked round. "Wait, I am coming!" he cried. Once more she beckoned, then she soared up and floated across the abyss up--away. By this time he too had reached the spot, and without a shudder he sprang after her; but his mortal body with its burden weighed him down. He slid into the abyss in a cloud of snow, and the loosened mass came plunging after him, a thundering avalanche that filled the air with an ocean of snow.
But just as the air that clings to a heavy body when it is plunged into the depths of the sea rises to rejoin its parent element in shining globules, the spirit of the engulfed Donatus rose from the deep to its eternal home.
The earth lay dead and dumb as if the sun could never rise again, as if love had perished for ever--and yet it will return, bringing softer airs, under whose quickening breath Heaven and earth shall once more be reconciled.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1]: Himmelsschlüssel--keys of Heaven--is the pretty German name.
[Footnote 2]: The Adige lower down.