"Gretchen, don"t be angry," pleaded Ernestine.
"But here is all the food spoiled that was so hardly earned, and we have not a single groschen in the house, and shall not have, until my money is paid me to-morrow." And tears of vexation came into Gretchen"s eyes. "I care more about you than about myself. I am strong, and do not need meat; but you,--indeed you ought to think of yourself, if not of me!"
Ernestine, in her confusion, looked from the saucepan to Gretchen, and from Gretchen to the saucepan, in dismay. "You are right," she said,--"it is unpardonable not to take care that you, poor child, should have something hot and good when you come home wearied from your work. Indeed I am a useless creature!"
Gretchen was instantly appeased. She laughed, and threw her arms around Ernestine. "Ah! my beautiful, grand, intellectual sister, it is too bad to scold you! Just hear my queenly Ernestine sue for pardon, like some poor Cinderella, and all for a piece of burnt meat! Don"t mind it, dear. You can"t think how touching your humility is. Why, I could kneel at your feet, if you would let me." She kissed her sister"s lips. "Oh, what a poor distressed face! Don"t you know, dearest Ernestine, that the sight of that face is more to me than all the dinners in the world?" And she laughed as merrily as a child.
Ernestine returned her embrace. "There, you forgive me," she said tenderly.
"Oh, no, I beg your pardon," said Gretchen, "I will educate you. But enough of this. We must proceed to business at once. I must go back to school at two o"clock, and we cannot starve. We must give up the meat for to-day. There is no help for it. We must indulge ourselves in the luxury of an omelet."
"Let me make it," Ernestine begged. "Sit down and rest yourself, you are tired."
"What! let you make it?" asked Gretchen. "That would be wise indeed.
Suppose you spoiled it, what should we do then?" And she took out a basket containing eggs. "We have just eggs enough for one omelet, and no more.
"Entrann" er jetzo kraftlos meinen Handen, Ich habe keinen zweiten zu versenden,"
as Schiller makes Tell say when he had no second string to his bow."
"Indeed, Gretchen," pleaded Ernestine, "I will not spoil it. I should be so glad to recover your good opinion,--only let me try."
"Dearest, darling Ernestine," said Gretchen, "trust me, we cannot indulge in experiments any longer. While we had a little money, it did not make much difference if we had a spoiled dish now and then, but now we must save every groschen.--there is no help for it." And she began to beat the eggs, while Ernestine put more wood in the stove.
"Never mind that!" cried Gretchen. "If you want to do something, dress the salad. But make haste, the omelet will be ready in an instant."
Ernestine made all the haste she could,--she was so anxious to do something.
Suddenly Gretchen, who was busy at the fire, heard a low exclamation, and, turning, she saw Ernestine standing with a face of despair before, the salad-bowl, with the oil-bottle in her hand. "What have you done?"
cried Gretchen, hastening to her side. "Not got hold of the wrong bottle, I hope?" But one sniff at the salad was enough. "Bless me!
she has put petroleum into it! Now we must sit in the dark this evening,--our week"s supply is exhausted. Such nice salad and such good petroleum, each so valuable by itself and so worthless mixed! Now, dear Ernestine, you cannot ask me to permit you to stay in the kitchen a moment longer. This is one of your unlucky days." And, with a comical air of pathos, she untied and took off her sister"s ap.r.o.n. "Herewith I solemnly depose you from your responsible office. You have to-day shown yourself entirely unworthy to wear this ornament. Now go into the next room, and wait quietly until I bring the omelet in to you." And she opened the door and led Ernestine from the room.
When she went to her, shortly afterwards, she found her sitting sewing, her eyes red with weeping. "Darling," she said to her, "I do believe you are crying about that trifle! I must be a little strict with you, you see, or you will never learn to economize and take care of things.
Ernestine dear, you are not vexed with me for scolding you? I was only in jest."
"How could I be vexed with you? I am crying because I am of no earthly use in the world! If it were not for you, you angel, what would become of me? There is no child eight years old more clumsy and awkward than I. Who would bear with me as you do? Do you think I am not humiliated by these thoughts? For these last two months, ever since my money was exhausted, you have supported me by your hard work at that school, and I could do nothing for you but prepare our frugal noonday meal while you are away, and now I cannot even do that! It is shameful! Have I made the most complicated chemical combinations, and yet can I not make decent soup? Have I overcome the greatest difficulties, and yet are these simple tasks beyond me? This cannot go on. I promise you I will take myself in hand, and you shall not have to fast again when you come from school."
"My dear Ernestine, I do not believe you can ever learn these things.
They are too far beneath you."
"My superiority is truly deplorable," replied Ernestine. "It does not help me to discharge the smallest duty. Difficulties always incite me, and, now that I see how difficult these trifles are, I am determined to master them."
Gretchen handed her a piece of the omelet. "Now put away your work, or your dinner will be quite cold."
Ernestine laid aside the skirt upon which she was working. "I shall never get it together again. I wish I had not ripped it apart!"
"Why, you could never have worn it, with the front breadth so scorched.
But I will help you this evening. It is my fault that you scorched it,--I should not have let you make the fire,--so it is no more than reasonable that I should help you to repair the injury. But, Ernestine dear, you do not eat."
"I have had enough. If you would have allowed me, I could have made two omelets out of those eggs."
Gretchen laughed merrily. "Hear her say how much better she could have made it! Well, only wait, day after to-morrow is Sunday, and I shall be at home, and then you may cook as much as you please, under my direction. That will be a real holiday for you."
"Ah, Gretchen, how often I think of the Staatsrathin, when she wanted to teach me to prepare the beans for cooking, and I felt it an occupation so far beneath my dignity! I did not understand her then, but I have learned to do so now." She sat lost in sad reflections.
Gretchen looked at Ernestine"s plate, and shook her head. "What shall I get for you that you can eat? If you would only let me accept something now and then from my guardian. He would be so glad to a.s.sist us."
"Gretchen, I have nothing to do with what he gives you," said Ernestine gravely, "but no morsel that he might send us should pa.s.s my lips, any more than I would accept one of the two dresses he sent to you. I know I am severe, for I force you to starve with me, but, G.o.d willing,"--and she uttered the name of G.o.d with more reverence than is usually shown by those who have it constantly on their lips,--"it will not last much longer. I must surely obtain a situation soon, and then you, you dear, faithful child, will be free to return to the Mollners, or whithersoever you choose, and begin to enjoy your young life. I will confess to you, Gretchen, that I wrote again, the day before yesterday, to the agent in Frankfort, begging him to do all that he could for me.
There must be a place for me somewhere in this wide world."
She threaded her needle with difficulty, and began to sew again. Two large tears fell upon her work, but she brushed them hastily away, that Gretchen might not see them.
"Dear Ernestine," Gretchen said, when she had carried away the plates, "I must go now, for half-past one has struck. Do not sew too long, and pray forget your sad thoughts. Some place for you is sure to offer. It would, to be sure, have been better if we could have lived in Frankfort, instead of coming out here to Rothelheim. Then you would have been able to see the people yourself. But the living there was really too expensive, and I was certain of employment here. Oh, if people only knew you, they would seize upon you instantly. If I could only induce my good directress to see you, she never could withstand you! Now good-by, dearest and best,--all good spirits protect you in the dark,--you know we have no light this evening!"
"Never mind that, Gretchen. I will think of father Leonhardt, who is always in the dark, while for us the sun will surely rise again."
"Yes indeed, Ernestine, always remember that,--"The sun will surely rise for us," Gretchen called back into the room from the doorway.
"In that sense? Who can tell?" Ernestine thought sadly.
She looked for a moment irresolutely at the little spider-legged table that served as dining- and writing-table. She would so like to write to Walter. It was now over a week since she had heard from him, and her scientific correspondence with this young friend was her sole self-indulgence,--the only tie that still connected her with her former pursuits. In all his letters he told her of his progress, asked her opinion upon many points, and glowed with enthusiasm for her genius.
She could scarcely withstand the temptation to devote the time while it was yet light to writing. Her heart was still full of the wonderful dreams of the morning.
But she looked down at the skirt upon which she was working, and which she really stood in need of, and thought, "No, I was thoughtless this morning, and dreamed away the time, instead of cooking. I will be conscientious this afternoon, and work."
She seated herself, sighing heavily, at the window, and sewed on diligently. "Practice makes perfect," she had said in the essay that was to procure her admission to the lecture-room of the University. She never dreamed then how she was one day to prove the truth of the proverb. If she only had that essay now, she thought! She had forgotten to ask Dr. Mollner for it, and he had it still. What had he done with it? Should she reclaim it? No, a.s.suredly not! He had written to her but once since her flight from Hochstetten, and had afterwards sent her the proceeds of the sale of her furniture, without one friendly word,--only transacting her business for her as formally as for a stranger. And what a letter that was after her flight! She took it out to read it once more, although she had read it already again and again:
"I understand you, Ernestine. I expected this. It would have been unjust to our future to put force upon your feelings. G.o.d will one day guide me out of this dilemma. Until then, live in peace, and gratify a pride that I am now convinced nothing can break. Perhaps in time it may consume itself, and perhaps love may overcome it. I will endure, as I have learned to do since I first knew you. There is a strength in you such as I never believed a woman could possess, and with which I know not how to contend. I do not grudge you the triumph that this confession affords you. It is a poor delight in comparison with that which love would yield you, if you did not scorn it. Ah, Ernestine, could I have s.n.a.t.c.hed you from your poverty to my heart and home, my joy would have been beyond that of mortals. A grateful smile from you would have been more than worlds to me. But you do not choose, since you would sacrifice nothing for me, to accept any sacrifice from me.
You choose to be your husband"s equal in all respects,--to owe nothing to any human being. I forgive you your pride in this respect, for it presupposes an exaggerated self-depreciation. As you think so lightly of yourself,--as you do not dream of your wealth of charms, of the power that you possess to bless and enrich,--you cannot believe that you can bestow a treasure to the worth of which the wealth of the world is nothing. Perhaps this is partly my fault. In my desire to deal truthfully with you, I have neglected to impress this fact upon you.
But, Ernestine, it seems to me a true woman does not ask, "How much do I receive, and what can I give in return?" She accepts in love what is offered in love, and is glad to owe everything to him to whom she is everything. She gives him all that she can, and never stints him of the dearest delight that he can have,--that of labouring and toiling for one so dear to him. She willingly wears the fetters of dependence, regarding them only as ties binding her more closely to the loved one.
You cannot feel so, Ernestine. It would be unjust to require it of you, and you were wrong if you feared I should seek to detain you by force.
I only used force to preserve you from a menacing peril. Now you are safe. The world into which you are going will be only a school for you, and you have need of this school. Therefore, choose your own path, and prove the independence, your right to which you insist upon a.s.serting.
I would not exact what would be a blessing only as a free gift. There was no need of your leaving us as you did, without even a farewell to my mother, who had grown so fond of you and nursed you so tenderly. It pained her that you should do so.
"I will not speak of what I suffered upon finding you gone upon my return from town, leaving only those few lines of farewell. You are bent upon maintaining the dignity of your s.e.x, and, in such an important undertaking, it is scarcely worth while to consider the wrecked happiness of one human life.
"Farewell, and, if I can serve you in anything, command me.
Johannes."
When she first received this letter, she had sunk fainting into Gretchen"s arms. Since then Mollner"s name had never pa.s.sed her lips, and almost five months had gone by. She had not allowed a thought of him to enter her mind, except when, as now, some other subject had brought him vividly before her, and then she punished herself by quickly thinking of other things. Whence came the tears that now trickled down her cheeks? Her cold, benumbed hands trembled as she wiped them away. She bravely choked them down, and thought--poor child!--that she was not crying, when she swallowed down the bitter drops that welled up from her heart. Such weeping is the bitterest of all.
The shades of night fell fast, and she could no longer see to sew.
There was an end of a candle on the shelf, and she lighted it, but it scarcely burned half an hour before it died out and she was left in darkness. She began to arrange and open the narrow beds that stood against the wall of the room, and, as she did so, thought of her good Willmers. How kind it was of the Frau Staatsrathin to take the faithful soul into her service! Fie! thinking of him again! What weakness! The little room grew darker and darker. The panes began to be covered with frost, and the light from the neighbour"s room opposite glittered in prismatic colours upon the ice-flowers and trees. They were wealthier over there than Ernestine, for they could afford a light. They had not poured their petroleum on the salad, to be sure, but then they had not been visited by the Snow-queen! Ernestine sat down wearily by her bed, and rested her head on the pillow. She felt better when her body was in entire repose, she thought.
How wearily she had lain upon her soft bed six months ago in Hochstetten! And how anxious she had been to live! Would it have been so terrible to lose such a life as this? Then it seemed as if a strong, tender hand clasped hers, and she felt a quick, anxious breath upon her brow. She knew it well, and the gentle questioning that was sure to follow,--knew that firm, quiet pressure upon her heart to count its pulsations. And if she had only clasped it fast,--that strong, tender hand,--she would not now be sitting here alone in the dark! "Oh, Johannes!" she gasped, and extended her arms. Then there was a noise of some one stumbling upstairs,--that could not be Gretchen. There was a knock at the door. "Who is there?" cried Ernestine, frightened.