Waldfried: A Novel

Annette always wanted to have Martella about her, but Martella had an unconquerable-I cannot say aversion, but, rather, dread of Annette; for Annette had an unpleasant habit of calling attention to every remark of Martella's, and had even quoted several of them in society.

Richard, who, as the representative of the University, had become a member of the Upper Chamber, seemed provoked; not on account of my having brought Martella with me, but because I had allowed myself to be induced to stay at Annette's house.

He hinted that Annette's marked hospitality was not caused by regard for me; and it really seemed as if she desired to see much of Richard at her house, although he had been cold and distant, and, at times, even scornful towards her. Nevertheless, he often visited us and allowed Annette to draw him into all sorts of discussions.

One evening when we three were alone, – Annette had been invited to the house of a friend, – Martella said:

"Richard, do you know what Madame Annette admires most in you?"

"No."

"Your fine teeth. She lets you use your good teeth to crack her hard nuts."

Richard jumped up from his seat embraced Martella, and kissed her.

Martella blushed crimson and called out, "Richard, you are so polite and yet so rude! Is that proper?"

But Richard was quite happy to know that Martella had guessed at what had so often displeased him.

Martella, who never wanted to leave me, one day suddenly expressed a wish to return home. Annette had on the previous evening taken her to the theatre, where a ballet had been produced in addition to the drama. A little child, representing a winged spirit, had descended from above, and Martella had called out in a loud voice, "That hurts!"

All eyes were turned to Annette's box, in which Martella sat with her eyes wide open and looking towards the stage as if oblivious of aught else.

Annette left the theatre with her. Martella could not be induced to utter a single word in explanation of her sudden fright. I was surprised to find how Annette bore this mishap, in which she herself had been subjected to the unkind glances of all the audience. "How strange," said she; "we are all, unconsciously, slaves of ceremony. There seems to be a tacit understanding that every member of a theatre audience or art-gathering must either remain silent or confine himself to one of two childish expressions-clapping the hands and hissing. And here this child is perfectly innocent, and I thank her for having solved another problem for me."

In the morning, Martella wanted to go home. We accompanied her to the depot, and I telegraphed to Rothfuss to meet her at the station.

My active labors for the Fatherland had restored me. In my solitary walks, my mind was now occupied by something besides constant thoughts of myself.

Spring was with us again, and the wondrous power that revives the human soul had its influence on me.

I was often invited to consultations in regard to matters affecting the common weal, and it seemed as if my little world was extending its area, when I made the acquaintance of many brave men, who lived in a neighboring district, and who kept alive their hopes for the future of our Fatherland.

During the summer holidays, Richard paid us a visit. He and Baron Arven had stocked the forest-streams with choice varieties of fish. In some instances they had not succeeded in getting a pure breed; there were pikes among their fish.

He was fortunate enough with several of the streams, but was greatly provoked to find that the farmers of the neighboring villages would not wait until the young brood had grown, and had already begun to catch the fish. He induced the authorities to threaten the farmers with a fine, but on the next day found the notice floating on the stream.

He appointed a forester as watchman, and spent the night in a log cabin hastily built near by. Once they were fortunate enough to catch the thief.

Richard and the forester brought the culprit before the authorities, and he was sentenced to six weeks' imprisonment. While we were seated at table, Richard expressed his satisfaction at the punishment which had been meted out to the offender. This made Martella as angry as I have ever seen her, and she became the more provoked when Richard quickly took down the mirror and held it up to her, saying:

"Here, look at yourself; you are prettiest when you are angry."

"It is nothing to you, how I look!" cried Martella. "Tell such things to your Madame Annette, but not to me."

The color left Richard's cheeks.

Annette had for several weeks been living in the neighborhood, with Baroness Arven, and Martella had hardly finished speaking, when we heard the clatter of horses' hoofs in front of the house. Annette and Baron Arven came riding up the road. The Baron congratulated Richard on having caught the first of the pirates, and Annette was in quite a merry mood.

The Baron also brought us a piece of news that he had just received from his brother, the forester-in-chief, to the effect that my grandson Julius had been appointed assistant forester, and that the next official gazette would announce the appointment.

We sent for Joseph. We were all very happy at the news, and Martella exclaimed, "That is the position Ernst wished for. But I congratulate Miss Martha with all my heart she will make a handsome young wife for the town forester."

We had always avoided alluding to this connection, but now that it had been openly mentioned, we made no concealment of our joy.

CHAPTER III

Richard and the Baron rode over to the Wild Lake which they had intended to stock. Annette accompanied them.

It was already night, but Richard had not returned; I was seated alone at the table, and waiting for him. It had always been his habit to tell us when he intended to remain out longer than the usual time.

Martella entered. Her cheeks were flushed, and she said, "Father, send me away-wherever it be. I cannot remain here. It shall not be my fault if any one is bad."

Trembling, and covering her face with her hands, she declared that Richard had told her that Ernst was unworthy of her, even if he were yet living, and that he would never return again. And after that he said-it was some time before she would tell what it was, and at last she exclaimed: "that he loves me with all his heart, and wanted to make me his wife! He! His brother! I would rather he should tie a stone about my neck, and throw me into the lake where his young fishes are! I could hardly believe at first, that he had said it, and answered him: 'That is a poor joke: just think of how your mother would feel if she knew that you would joke in this way!' and then he swore that mother had said Ernst was untrue to me, and had for that very reason gone out into the wide world. Can mother have said that? My eyes would start from their sockets, before Ernst would forsake me. But let me never see Richard again. Never! Let me go away. You can send me away, but Richard cannot cease to be your son. Nor can I cease to be your child, but I can go away."

It is impossible to find words for all that bubbled forth from Martella's soul. I pacified her, and she promised to remain until the next day.

I sat up alone to await Richard's return. He did not come until near midnight.

He wanted to bid me a short "good-night," but I detained him. He sat down and told me that the Baron and Annette had met Rautenkron down by the lake, and that he had ridiculed their undertaking. He had said, and rightly too: "Where there are no frogs, there is no stork; where there are no flies and worms, there are no birds or fishes. In what was called 'all-bountiful nature' one beast used the other for its blessed meal; and, besides that, the lake was entirely frozen over every winter, and had no outlet that was open through the whole year. If fishes were in it, they would become suffocated for want of air."

Rautenkron had displayed much knowledge in the matter, but he would not consent to assist them. He was delighted, moreover, that nature contained much that was egotistic and was of no use to mankind. Thus spoke Richard.

I was indignant. I could hardly conceive how Richard could talk about such subjects, and not make the slightest allusion to what had happened between him and Martella. I thought of Ernst's letter that I had received on the day of my wife's death. No one had seen it but I; for why should I have cared to spread the knowledge of Ernst's wickedness in offering his betrothed to another? Could it be that an open rupture with Annette had urged Richard to this unheard-of deed?

I endeavored to stifle my indignation, and said, "You talk of the Wild Lake-Wild Lake, indeed; you have an unfathomable one in yourself."

He looked at me with surprise.

"What do you mean, father?"

"How can you ask? You dare to touch that which should be holy in your eyes-the betrothed of your brother!"

"Father, did she tell you herself?" he said hesitatingly.

And I replied:

"What matters that? Until now, I had always thought that you were even a better man than I was at your age; do not undeceive me."

I said nothing more, and that was enough.

On the following morning, Richard announced that he was about to depart, and it cost me a great effort to induce Martella to permit him to take leave of her. At last she came, on condition that I would remain present while Richard bade her farewell.

Richard said:

"Martella, you have a right to be angry with me, but I am angrier at myself than you can possibly be. I make no protestations, no oaths; but I pledge my honor as a man, that you will nevermore hear a wrong word or receive a wrong glance from me. Farewell."

Thus, this trouble was arranged; but it seemed as if there could be nothing perfect in this world.

I do not know whether Johanna had been eavesdropping, or how she happened to find it out; but, at dinner, she spitefully hinted at what had happened, for when we were talking of the imprisoned fish poacher, she said, "People who are without religion are capable of anything, and the irreligious ones who catch a thief are no better than the thief himself. They stretch forth their hands to grasp things that ought to be sacred in their eyes."

During the whole of that winter I saw nothing of Richard, and received but one letter from him, in which he informed me that he had been offered an appointment at a distant university, and that, for many reasons, he would gladly have accepted it, but that the Prince had requested him to remain in the country. He added that he was now again able to say that his only happiness lay in the pursuit of science.

It was a great pleasure to me to have Julius stationed in our neighborhood. He was so pure, so fresh, and so bright, that whenever he came to our house, his presence seemed like the odor of flowers.

I am indebted to Julius for joys which even transcend those my children have given me, and my pride in my eldest grandson was now about to be mingled with that I cherished for my eldest son.

My joy was fully shared by Rothfuss. He counted how many days it would be before Ludwig arrived, and said:

"There are but seven steps yet-right foot, sleep; left foot, get up; or, taking it the other way, the two together make one step."

The last days of waiting seemed long, even to me. Ludwig had particularly requested that I should not go to meet him.

On the night before his arrival, I suddenly felt so oppressed that I thought I should die.

I heard footsteps on the stairs, and, afterward, the breathing of some one in front of my door. Assuredly, he has wished to prevent my worrying-he is here already.

"Who is there?"

"It is I, – Rothfuss. I thought to myself that you would not be able to sleep, and then it suddenly occurred to me that everybody says I am so entertaining that I can put any one to sleep, and so I thought-"

Rothfuss' allusion to this peculiar art made me laugh so heartily that I felt quite well again. After he left the room, I was obliged to laugh again at the thought of what he had said; and then I fell asleep, and did not awake until the bright daylight shone into my room.

CHAPTER IV

May 28, 1870.

"Good-morning, dear Henry," she said to herself, this day forty-six years ago, when she awoke on the last morning she spent in her own chamber.

"Good-morning, Gustava," said I, opening my eyes. It was the anniversary of our wedding-day, and every year while we were together, these were the first accents from her lips and mine-in joy and in sorrow, always the same.

And this very morning, when awakening, I heard her quite distinctly in my dream saying, "Good-morning, Henry." But I am alone. She has been snatched away from me.

On this day our first-born returns from the new world. I am writing these words in the early dawn, as it will be a long while before I again have a chance quietly to set down my recollections. I will now prepare myself to go forth and meet my son.

June, 1870.

Ludwig and Richard have gone to the capital, and I have at last quiet and time to note down his arrival and his presence with us.

I had just finished writing the above lines, on the twenty-eighth of May, when I heard Rothfuss drawing the chaise up from the barn to the front of the house. He then placed the jack-screw under the frame and took off one wheel after the other and greased the axles, singing and whistling while at his work.

He saw me seated at the window, and called out in a joyful voice:

"One waits ever so long for the Kirchweih,4 but it comes at last. Martella is up already, and has been fixing up the beehives with red ribbons; the bees, too, are to know that joy comes to this house to-day. While busy at her work, she called out Ernst's name, as if she could drag him here that way. But to-day we must not let ourselves remember that any one is missing."

There it was again. No cup of joy without its drop of gall.

But the mind has great power, and one can force himself to forget things.

It would be wrong towards my son Ludwig, if I were to mix other feelings with joy at his return; and it is also wrong towards myself not to permit a single pleasure to be without alloy.

My spirits were, however, not a little checked on my being reminded of Ernst. Every nerve in me trembled, so that I began to believe that I would not be able to survive the hour in which I should again see Ludwig. But now the sad thought that had floated across my mental horizon soothed my excited nerves.

Ludwig had sent me his photograph from Paris, in order that I might recognize him at once.

He had placed the pictures of his wife and of his son in the same package.

I read over his last two letters again.

In a letter from Paris, dated Sunday, April 24th, he wrote:

"Here I am in the midst of the hubbub in which the 'saviour of the world' is permitting the people to vote. It is truly a demoniac art, this power of counterfeiting the last word of truthfulness. In order that nothing may remain uncorrupted, the ministers declare that the question of the day is to secure tranquillity to the land for the future, so that, both on the throne and in the cottage, the son may peacefully succeed his father. The last lingering traces of modesty and purity are being destroyed; the last remnant of piety is appealed to in order to carry out the deceit.

"How glad I should be, on the other hand, to bathe my soul in the pure waves of great harmonies. The thought that I shall enter my Fatherland in time to assist in celebrating the Centennary of Beethoven's birth is an inspiring and an impressive one to me."

Joseph was at Bonn, awaiting the expected guests. He was again successful in combining high objects with business profits; he concluded a contract to build the festival building out of trees from the Black Forest.

I looked at Ludwig's picture, and it seemed to me, indeed, as if I were looking at my father in his youth. All generations seemed to be combined in one, as if there were no such thing as time.

Martella came into the room, dressed in her Sunday attire.

"Good-morning, father," said she. "To-day you will hear somebody else say, 'Good-morning, father.'"

I could not help wondering how Martella would appear to Ludwig. She seemed new to me. It seemed as if during the four years that she had been with us she had become taller and more slender. She wore the pearl-colored silk dress that had been my wife's, and had about her throat the red coral necklace that Bertha had sent her. Her unmanageable brown hair was arranged in the form of a coronet; and her walk and carriage were full of grace and refinement. Her face seemed lengthened, instead of being as round as it had once been; and her old defiant expression had given way to one of gentleness. Indeed, since the death of Gustava, a certain look of pain seemed to have impressed itself on her features, her large eyes had become more lustrous, and seemed full of unsatisfied longing.

Johanna and her daughter had also arrayed themselves in their best clothes; at least, as far as that was possible with Johanna, for, since the death of her husband, she had always worn mourning.

I rode off in the chaise with Rothfuss; Julius, with Johanna and her daughter, followed us.

Martella remained in the house with Carl; and the schoolmaster's wife had come to assist in baking and cooking.

When we reached the saw-mill, the miller said, "I have heard the news already-this is Ludwig's day."

We drove on, and after a while Rothfuss said, "It seems to me that the trees are stretching and straightening themselves in order to appear at their best when our Ludwig goes by."

When we arrived at the top of the last hill, Gaudens, who was breaking stones on the road, said: "Ludwig will have to own that the roads are not kept better in America than here." It was strange how the news of his return had been noised about.

At the last village before reaching the station, Funk came out of the tavern and called out, "Rothfuss! Stop!"

Rothfuss turned towards me with an inquiring look, and I told him to stop.

Funk now informed me that he had succeeded in inducing the members of Ludwig's party to refrain from receiving him at the railroad station with a festive procession. He did not wish to interfere with the family festivities; but on the following Sunday, the friends of freedom would take the liberty of greeting Ludwig as one who belonged to mankind.

I could only reply that I could decide nothing for my son, – that he was free and would act for himself.

Funk went back into the tavern. We drove on. Rothfuss remarked, "That fellow is like a salamander; when he tries to climb a rock and falls on his back, he turns about and is on his feet again quicker than thought."

We were much too early when we got into town, and I walked about the streets as if I had never been there before, and as if there were nowhere a chair on which one might rest.

It suddenly occurred to me that I ought to have sent my picture to Ludwig, so that he might know me; I had grown a full beard since his departure, and it would grieve me if he did not at once recognize me.

I decided at once. There was yet time enough to have my beard removed; and when I returned, Johanna and Rothfuss were greatly astonished by the change in my appearance. But I did not tell them my reason for removing my beard.

I had a presentiment that Ludwig would bring Ernst with him. I note this down, because we frequently speak of fulfilled presentiments, but never of those which are not fulfilled.

At the depot, there were numbers of emigrants who were about to leave the valley. I knew many of them, and they guessed at my innermost thought; for now one, and then another, would come to me and say, "If I learn anything about Ernst, I will write to you immediately."

The locksmith's widow was there, with her three children. The children had bouquets in their hands, and I begged them to stand aside until the first meeting was over.

A young stone-cutter who lived at a village in our neighborhood, and was employed in the shops at the depot, greeted the locksmith's widow in the most friendly manner. He held her hand in his for some time, and she seemed pleased thereat. How strange that at such moments one can see more than is transpiring about him! It suddenly occurred to me, "Who knows-they may yet be a couple."

The Inspector invited me to his dwelling; I accompanied him. A short time afterward, he returned and told me that the train had been signalled. He led me down the steps and remained at my side. Now we hear the whistle; – now the train is coming round the curve; now it is slacking its speed. No one is beckoning to me from the car windows. Can he have failed to come? Many passengers alight; but I see no sign of my son.

Suddenly a guard calls out to me, "Herr Waldfried, you are to come this way!" He opens the door of the car and I am lifted up into it.

I hear a voice exclaim, "Father!" and I know nothing of what happened for some time afterward.

"Grandfather, give me your hand," says another voice. But, before that, I am embraced by a lovely woman, who sheds tears of joy.

Leading my son with my right hand and my grandson with the left, I walked out as if marching in triumph. My daughter-in-law was escorted by Johanna and her daughter.

Suddenly Ludwig dropped my hand and called out, "You here, Ernst?"

"I am not your brother Ernst; I am Julius, the son of your sister Martina."

"Where is Rothfuss?" inquired Joseph, who had also come on the train with Ludwig.

I had already seen him. He stood aside, lighting one match after another, and seemed to be waiting for Ludwig to come to him to get a light for his cigar.

At last he threw the match away and called out, "Hurrah! Shout till you burst your throats!"

They all shouted "hurrah," and when Ludwig and his son had shaken hands with Rothfuss, and the wife had taken him by the hand, Rothfuss said, "She has a firm hand; you have done this thing well, Ludwig."

A middle-aged man, erect in figure, and with a red mustache, was looking after Ludwig's luggage. Ludwig now called to him, "Willem, just leave those things and come here. Here, Rothfuss, let me recommend to you my servant and friend, Willem. Shake hands with each other, and be good friends."

Rothfuss extended his hand, and asked, with an air of doubt:

"He speaks German, of course-does he not?"

"Yours to command; I know nothing else."

It was on a Saturday, and the Jews of the little town were accustomed on that day to loiter about the station. We were just about to leave, when the Jewish teacher came up to me and said, "Herr Waldfried, the verse in the Bible which tells of Jacob again seeing his son Joseph, applies to you. It says, 'And Israel said unto Joseph, Now let me die, since I have seen thy face, because thou art yet alive.'" The words of the little old man did me much good.

CHAPTER V

Funk had been unable to deny himself the pleasure of being on hand.

When we passed the garden of the "Wild Man" tavern he stood at the fence, surrounded by several of his companions. They lifted their foaming beer-glasses on high, and cried, "Long live Ludwig, the republican!" Ludwig merely nodded his thanks, and then said to me:

"Father, let us get in and ride home."

The carriages were awaiting us.

I wanted my daughter-in-law to sit with me, but she insisted that Ludwig and Wolfgang should do so, while she joined Johanna and the rest of the party.

Rothfuss, who at other times took so great a pleasure in cracking his whip, now sounded it but lightly.

"Rothfuss, how long have you been with us?" asked Ludwig.

"Longer than you have been in this world," was the answer.

My grandson, Wolfgang, laughed out loud, and told us that his father had prophesied that very answer.

As we drove through the village, every one came to the windows to greet us.

We were passing the house of the kreis-director. The family were seated in the garden, and we were obliged to stop with them for a little while. The roses were lovely, and the faces of our friends were bright with kindness.

The husband, the wife, and the daughters welcomed the new-comers most cordially, and the wife handed my daughter-in-law a bouquet of roses.

Their son was also present. He had become a lieutenant, and his countenance seemed to combine the clear, bright expression of the mother, with the sternness of the father.