"Is it true that they write you letters full of gallantries, and that you answer them in the same strain?"
"Yes."
"And in spite of all that--Felicitas?"
"In spite of all that--Leo."
He felt once more as if his fury would overmaster him. He was almost suffocated by it, and he had to put restraint on himself not to fly at her as she stood there, in her defenceless beauty, smiling up at him.
"My G.o.d, speak!" he thundered.
"You have questioned me, and I have answered. What more do you wish me to do?"
"To justify yourself."
"I can"t justify myself. If you would like to kill me, do it; here I am at your mercy. My wretchedness is unspeakable; death would be joy in comparison."
And still she smiled. If it was all hypocrisy she would cry, not smile, he reasoned.
"But I"ll tell you everything," she continued. "Confess to you as one criminal confesses to another, who is bound with him on the galleys.
For so you are bound to me, Leo--in unexpiated sin--in guilt, and in tears."
She stood before him with raised arms, like a perfect statue of the repenting Magdalene.
A thrill, alike of horror and admiration, ran through him. He knew that it was the language of the novelette in which she spoke. Nevertheless her phrases so moved and touched him, that his brain began to whirl.
She had come a step nearer to him, and stood confronting him with a face as white as a sheet, her breast heaving, and her lips trembling.
"When I became his wife," she began, "when I lay in his arms the first time, I had convulsions of fear. I thought I saw _you_, Leo, standing by the bed, with c.o.c.ked pistol pointed at my forehead. And this vision didn"t leave me till I was alone. So you can imagine there has not been much joy in our union. He is as unhappy as I am. But his unhappiness seems to me bliss compared with the torments that I have had to endure--helpless, alone, like a fish out of water, struggling on the sand, and slowly expiring. Till then, Leo, I had preserved my love for you in my heart as something sacred. But after that it began to yield to a constant gnawing anxiety--fear of you--fear of him--fear of Johanna--fear of the whole world. Even when I was engaged, I had an attack of it. I thought that my letters to you----"
"I know," he interrupted, "Johanna told me."
She bowed her beautiful head with a gesture of pain.
"Oh, now I see who it is has hounded you on to me," she whispered. "But she is right. I am every bit as bad, every bit as corrupt as her hate makes me out."
He, on his side, interpreted all these pa.s.sionate self-accusations into the one reproach, that his sister had prophesied--the reproach, "It is your fault."
"Don"t exaggerate," he said, trying at the same time to rea.s.sure himself. "It"s not so bad as that."
She gave a deep sigh of exhaustion, and leaned her head comfortably against the foot of the white figure of the youth that stood nearest her on the pedestal.
"Thank you for that little word of consolation," she said, speaking low, as if in a dream. "It is the first that I have heard for years.
For whom had I to go to in my distress, fright, and remorse? Even the d.a.m.ned in h.e.l.l have companions. I had none. And now you want to know how I could, in the midst of my misery, have the heart to plunge into a whirl of frivolous gaieties, and encourage strange men? I answer you that I sought to deaden my trouble by distractions. The panacea seemed so handy, and to offer such a convenient mask. I daren"t lie to you.
You see, Leo, that when the last spark of my love for you had burnt away--extinguished by fear and remorse--my last, my sole restraint was gone--I despaired of there being any good in me, and a voice cried daily and hourly in my ears, "Now you may slide downhill. You can"t escape your fate." And so when people talked of love to me, I forced myself to smile, though a shudder ran through my limbs. By night, I cried; by day, I laughed. The only thing worth living for was to gratify my whims. So I was goaded more and more into despising myself.
Often when I noticed Ulrich"s eyes resting on me sorrowfully, I longed to throw myself at his feet, and implore him to save me. But immediately the ghost of my guilt--_our_ guilt, Leo--stood behind me like a gigantic monster, and hissed in my ear, "If you sacrifice yourself, you must not betray your a.s.sociate." Thus I have dragged on, weighed down by the burden--the awful burden of silence. It is a wonder that my body has been faithful to my marriage vows, so that I do not stand before you, to-day, an abandoned woman--so easily might I have been hurled over the precipice through despair in myself."
She was silent, and pressed her forehead against the edge of the pedestal, while her upstretched hands held on to the youth"s foot, as if she had been the guardian angel instead of the evil genius of the friendship to whose symbol she clung.
The sun began to break through the mist. Its rays lay like a shimmering golden sh.e.l.l on the sacrificial stone which rose from the glittering dew like a gigantic pearl. Brilliant-hued b.u.t.terflies flashed by the pillars, and now and again the song of a late-summer bird sounded softly from the bushes. The brook, which sprang out of the earth only a few paces from the temple, made a low clicking noise, then hurried away babbling into the valley, a scornfully laughing witness of this melancholy conversation.
Leo"s eyes continued fastened on his former mistress. He was completely bewildered as to how to act towards her. There could be no further question of rebuke and blame, when help and counsel were needed and might save her. Yet what could he, what dared he do for her, without heaping guilt on guilt and introducing fresh deceit into the house of his unsuspecting friend?
"Lizzie," he said in a gentler voice, "you summoned me here. What do you want?"
"How can you ask, Leo?"
"I ask because I don"t know."
"Why have you avoided me? Why have you made the poor innocent child a pretext for shunning Uhlenfelde? I used to think you had more courage, Leo."
This gave affairs an unexpected turn.
"I did not think further intercourse between us was possible, Lizzie,"
he said, "for both our sakes, as well as for your husband"s and the world"s. For what would the world say if it saw us interchanging courtesies again?"
"How calmly you ask the question," she answered, looking in front of her with her sweet smile.
"I have to think of you in this matter, as well as of myself," he replied. "And certainly I gathered from what Ulrich said that you shuddered at the thought of a meeting. Above all, it was your wish that my harmless meetings with him should cease."
"What else could I do," she said, "after you had expressed yourself so harshly about the child?"
"Harshly? Felicitas, take care what you say. I have considered the child"s good. I would not have him taught to love me, and then learn to hate me--and you too."
"And yet you intended to take him with us to America?" she answered obstinately.
"That would have been quite a different thing, Lizzie. There no one would have known who I was. I should have pa.s.sed as his father. But here, where every servant-girl--but, my G.o.d! why do I waste words? You yourself must have thought of it long ago. Otherwise you wouldn"t have sent him so far away."
"The child is gone," she said in a low tone. "Every night I pray and weep for him; but he is out of your way."
He gave a start of horror. "Then _that is why_, Felicitas," he stammered, "that is why you sent him?"
"If you wish to rebuke me for being a bad mother," she said, "do it....
I won"t defend myself."
She folded her hands in her lap, and looked into the distance with appealing helplessness.
"Ah, it cost me a severe struggle," she continued, as if talking to herself. "Every night my poor boy appeared to me in my dreams, and I became icy cold when I saw how pale and wretched he looked. But, I told myself, he is young; he will fight it through, live and be happy; but I ... well, you see, Leo, that this is my last battle; I know it. The torture of having to keep silence can"t be borne much longer, remorse chokes me. Had I kept the child, I must have given up you, the only person who can help and advise me, and give me any comfort. What could I have done, then, but have thrown myself in the river. For they say in death it is easy to be silent."
Emotion and suspicion fought within him for the mastery. If she was capable of making such a tremendous sacrifice for him, it was nothing more nor less than saying, "I love you.... I love you still."
She guessed his thoughts. "Don"t misunderstand me," she began again, "and think that I am trying to win you by tricks. Look at me, Leo! I am a ma.s.s of lies and deceit. My very face seems given me to dazzle and mislead, but h.e.l.l is in my soul. And as sure as there is a G.o.d in heaven, so sure as Ulrich is sacred to us both----"
"He is to you?" he asked eagerly, drawing a step nearer to her.
"Yes," she raised her fingers voluntarily, as if to take her oath upon it. The expression of her eyes was pure and grave.
"Give me your hand," he said.