"You torture me, uncle!" cried Ernestine, as she threw several books into a chest at her side. "You will not believe that I am really much weaker than I have ever been before. It is of my own free will that I am going away--why should I not hasten as much as I can?"
Her uncle looked askance at her with a smile. "You are mistaken, my child. It is not your will that is acting,--it is only a whim that thus urges you on. And a whim is the child of circ.u.mstances, and can be controlled by them."
"I do not know what circ.u.mstances could control this "whim," as you are pleased to call it. Nothing can happen to-day or to-morrow to change my determination. What delay can you apprehend? No one knows of my departure, so that it cannot be impeded by remonstrances from any quarter. I have not even told good old Leonhardt that I am going, and Willmers heard it only this morning. Could I do more to prove to you that I am in earnest?"
Leuthold looked at her again with his sarcastic smile. He knew well that Ernestine had preserved this strict silence concerning her departure only because she did not feel strong enough to withstand any friendly remonstrances. Therefore he trembled lest some unforeseen accident might yet divulge her plans. His very existence depended upon her staying or going. During the four weeks that had elapsed since Ernestine"s return from town, Leuthold"s entire influence had been exerted to remove Ernestine from this part of the country, and, if possible, from Germany. She must never again see the man who had evidently made such an impression upon her. Now less than ever could she be allowed to form any attachment, for, if she were now to marry, and require her property at his hands, he was lost! He had cautiously managed to secure an appointment, through an American agent, in a large chemical manufactory in New York. To Ernestine he had opened the brilliant prospect of delivering a course of scientific lectures there.
The fact that she had received the prize from a German university for one of her papers would surely suffice to make her reputation in America,--and Leuthold had honestly done his best to have her fame as an intellectual phenomenon noised abroad. In his present embarra.s.sed circ.u.mstances, it was of the greatest importance to him that she should be placed in a position to support herself, that she might not be a burden to him. If the lectures did not succeed, she would have to earn her living as a "female physician." But upon this point he prudently forbore to enlighten her. He fired her imagination with the enormous advantages, pecuniary and other, that must accrue from her lectures.
The means that he employed to win her to his purpose were to an ambitious woman irresistible. She saw before her a future such as no woman had hitherto enjoyed. She saw herself in one of the vast halls of New York, lecturing to a crowd of men who were all listening attentively to--a girl! She saw herself regarded as the miracle of her s.e.x. The most secret dreams of her pride were to be realized,--the seeds of her quiet diligence were to spring up and bud forth in the sight of all,---the world should ring with the fame of what a woman could do. And yet it was hard to decide; it was weeks before she could bring herself to sign the simple letters of her name to the acceptance of these proposals; no labour of her life--nothing whereon she had expended days and nights of study--ever cost her as much as this single signature.
Mollner"s grave, earnest face had scared her back from clutching these new honours, as Banquo"s ghost frightened the usurper from the royal chair. It seemed to her that she was guilty of a crime towards him,--and at last, in a torment of doubt, she secretly wrote to him.
She told him everything, and begged for his counsel and advice. She did not conceal from him that she could not take so decisive a step without his blessing. Why this letter never reached Mollner, no one knew besides Leuthold, except Kathchen and her parents.
Day after day pa.s.sed, and of course Ernestine waited in vain for an answer. She waited as if for a decree of life or death. Sleep refused to visit her burning eyelids. She took barely sufficient nourishment to support life. She pined with desire for only one word--one single word--from Mollner,--and it did not come. She was no longer worth a stroke of his pen. Since her refusal of his suit, he would none of her.
He had conquered himself,--had given her up,--and in how short a time!
And the more she had longed for a letter or a visit from him, the greater was her bitterness of mind,--the offence to her pride,--when she received neither. As often as she approached her writing-table, her eyes were greeted by the large capitals of the flattering proposal she had received, with all its alluring promises. What was there now to wait for? Why should she hesitate now? And so she signed her acceptance.
And now nothing should cause her to waver in her pride of purpose. She would have the revenge of being irrevocably lost to him, she would vanish without one word of farewell, that from a distant quarter of the globe the fame of her greatness might reach his ears.
She did not even confide in Willmers, for she dreaded her garrulity.
Only on the very last day the housekeeper received orders to dispose of Ernestine"s movables as quickly as possible, and then to follow her, for Leuthold wished, before sailing, to take leave of Gretchen, whom he purposed to leave in Germany for the present. But Ernestine was to accompany him. He would not,--he dared not now,--lose sight of her for a moment.
She wrote a fervent, heartfelt farewell letter to Leonhardt, and begged him to keep her books and apparatus until she should claim them again.
As she did not know yet where her future home would be, she could not make use of them herself. Walter might find them useful. Thus delicately she bestowed upon Walter the costly gift of the instruments for the further pursuit of his studies.
After their departure, her uncle was to be informed of her disposal of the physiological works and apparatus, which he had ordered Willmers to sell. He would never have consented to it, for Ernestine had often, to her surprise, noticed how desirous he was of ready money.
She bound Willmers by a solemn promise not to deliver the letter to Herr Leonhardt until the writer had departed, and thus everything was provided for,--everything was thought of,--everything except Ernestine"s physical condition. The inflexible girl had been accustomed to take so little care of her health that she had given no heed to her increasing exhaustion,--the natural consequence of the superhuman efforts of the last few weeks. But to-day she could hardly stand, and the thought of undertaking so long a journey began to alarm her.
She sat there before her uncle the picture of weariness. He regarded her dubiously. Could he succeed in getting her on board of the steamer?
Then, if she were taken ill, it would of course be ascribed to seasickness, which scarcely any one escapes. And if she died? Then all would be well with her. He would bury her under the billows of the ocean, and all his hatred, his alarm, and his crimes would sink with her beneath the waves, which, as they swathed her dead body, would wash away from him all disgrace and guilt. This thought was as boundless in comfort as the ocean that was beginning to open upon his horizon.
"Uncle, do not gaze so strangely at nothing," said Ernestine. "You look as if you were devising no good."
Leuthold smiled. "You are nervous indeed, my child. Since when has my face looked strange to you?"
Ernestine did not reply. She went on wrapping a book in paper, to pack it in the chest.
"Is that old fairy-book to go too?" asked Leuthold ironically.
"Yes," was the curt, decided reply.
"Well! well! Have you not a doll somewhere that I can pack with it?"
Ernestine started up. "Uncle, I told you once before that I will not endure that tone!"
"Beg pardon, but such folly provokes a jest. Or perhaps the book has a deeper value for you? You need not blush,--I can guess. It is a remembrance of the knight of the oak,--Mollner! Ah, then indeed we must certainly take it with us."
"Uncle," cried Ernestine, taking the book from him as he was about to put it in with some others, "you know how to depreciate with your sneering speeches everything that I have held dear. Let the book alone; I will give it to little Kathchen."
"And when Professor Mollner visits her, and finds it there, it will touch his heart, that the friend whom he has forsaken has guarded his memory so faithfully until now. If he turns over its leaves, he will doubtless find the oak leaf that you have pressed among them. Perhaps he will think it a mute farewell, and bestow upon you a tear of compa.s.sion. How gratifying it will be!"
"Uncle, if I thought that, I would rather burn the book!"
"And that would, at all events, be the best thing to do with it. That self-conceited fellow is not worth the remembrance that you cherish of him. I would efface it, as I would every impression that is unworthy of you. Indeed, I have long been indignant, although I never spoke of it to you, at his so easily forgetting you. Such a woman as you are is not to be resigned like an article of merchandise about which buyer and seller cannot agree. He never loved you, or he would never have dreamed of making conditions in his proposal to you, as if you were to deem it a great honour that he should condescend to you. Trust me, I know the world and mankind thoroughly. He was in the greatest embarra.s.sment, for he felt himself morally obliged to offer you his hand."
Ernestine started.
Leuthold continued, "I do not know how you conducted yourself towards him, but, with your inexperience and the preference that you entertain for him,--do not deny it,--it is reasonable to suppose that you must have made advances."
Ernestine bit her lip, and looked down.
"The one fact that you accompanied him to his house alone, without any intimate acquaintance with him,--without an invitation from his mother,--must have led him to fancy that you were desperately in love with him, and he was conscientious enough to wish to efface the stain that you had thus unwittingly cast upon your honour, by asking you to be his wife. I do not question for a moment that his intentions towards you from the very beginning were honourable and kind, but his feelings seem to me to have been those of simple friendship, until your advances forced him, as it were, to a declaration. Probably he is now congratulating himself in silence upon his fortunate escape. But you sigh and languish like a love-sick girl over his memory, and would carry the only gift that you have ever received from him, bestowed upon you out of sheer compa.s.sion when you were a fright of a child, across the ocean with you as a relic! Ernestine, what is the matter with you?
For Heaven"s sake, control yourself! What nonsense! You have actually contracted a habit of fainting!"
He supported her drooping head and fanned her pale face.
She looked up at him wearily, then thrust him from her with evident aversion, and stood up. Leuthold said nothing more. For the first time she had allowed him to speak of Mollner, and he had seized the opportunity to pour into her soul the surest poison that ever destroyed love,--he was content now to let it work.
Ernestine walked several times to and fro: her step, her bearing, was queenly,--she seemed suddenly to have grown taller. Her uncle might be right,--she hated him for it, but still he might be right. What must Johannes--what must his mother think of her for so throwing herself at him? This was why his mother had treated her so,--this was the cause of the cool conditions proposed to her by the son! She repeated to herself every one of Johannes"s words,--they were almost all words either of grave warning or stern reproof. Even when he had been kind to her, it had been the kindness of a father or a judge. Never, not even when suing for her hand, had he laid aside the proud, measured bearing that was native to him. His pity had been that of a superior being for a soul astray, not of a lover for his beloved. And she! She recalled every cordial word, every kindly glance, that she had bestowed upon Johannes, and she persuaded herself that she had been too fond, that her behaviour, in contrast with her usual cold demeanour, had verged upon impropriety, and must have been construed by him into an advance.
Yes, possibly he despised her for it,--and she had even gone so far as to write to him! All the little merit of not consenting under the proposed conditions to become his wife was annulled by this last act, which must have been regarded by him as a fresh advance, and, as such, silently repulsed. She could have fled from him to the ends of the earth,--the mere thought of him was enough to drive the hot blood to her cheeks. Away, away, across the ocean!--this suddenly became the one desire of her heart. She stood still as she pa.s.sed the fireplace, and said to Leuthold, "Burn the book!" They were the first words that pa.s.sed her lips.
The instant the words were spoken, Leuthold threw the volume into the midst of the flames. Ernestine stood by and watched them curling around the covers, which bent and rolled up in the heat. They were soon destroyed, and with invisible, soft-crackling fingers the fiery draught toyed with the burning book, and, as page after page opened to the glow, the flame--greedy reader--devoured them. Ernestine watched it all. She saw the names which had been so dear to her, flash out and vanish. The cold, glittering snow queen,--the little mermaid in her watery home,--all perished in the red heat!
Now the oak leaf, that she had once s.n.a.t.c.hed from the dear old tree, fell away to ashes,--the whole book dropped apart and blazed up afresh,--the loosened leaves were tossed up and down in the wreathing flames. There,--there was one more name,--the swan. The leaf flew aloft, and the swan, the beautiful swan, was burned to ashes. Never again would it spread its plumage for her,--never arise, a second phoenix, from its funeral pyre. The little fairy world had vanished, and only a few sparks remained, shooting hither and thither, as if in search of the transformed shapes of the creatures of fairy lore.
Ernestine turned away. The fire seemed to have scorched the pinions of her soul. She hung her head, like the G.o.d with the inverted torch, and wept!
Leuthold did not disturb her; he felt that he must spare her now.
Suddenly the door opened, and Frau Willmers said in a tone of great trepidation, "Herr Professor Mollner!"
Leuthold started as if struck by an arrow. Ernestine leaned against the chimney-piece, or she would have fallen.
"How dare you admit any one just at this moment?--how dare you?" he said, transported with rage and terror.
"I cannot help it, Herr Doctor. I could not do otherwise,--the gentleman declared positively that he would not stir from the spot until I had announced him."
"Tell the gentleman that we cannot receive visitors."
Frau Willmers looked hesitatingly at Ernestine, who stood as pale and immovable as ever.
"Well, what are you waiting for?" asked Leuthold, and there was a threat conveyed in his tone and manner.
"I am going,--I will go instantly," replied the woman, and hurried from the room.
Ernestine took one step forward, as if she would have followed her. But she controlled herself. She was a prey to a storm of emotions that almost deprived her of consciousness. He had come, then,--he had not utterly given her up. It almost broke her benumbed heart to send him away. But no,--she rebuked her own weakness,--he had waited long before coming, and perhaps had come at last only because he felt it his duty to obey her summons. She would--she could yield to no further weakness.