The World's Greatest Books - Volume 1 Part 14

"Rather! If it were not broad daylight, and if it were not superst.i.tion, I should think it was the mermaid, herself."

The boat at last touched the sh.o.r.e. Walpurga was the first to jump out.

She hurried to the reed-bank, away from her people, and there, behind the willows, the apparition fell on her neck and broke down.

_IV.--The Countess Irma's Atonement_

Dr. Gunther received the first telegraphic news of his friend, Count Eberhard, having lost the power of speech through a stroke of paralysis.

He was to break the news to Irma. For some time she had felt, through the physician's reserve and sympathetic kindness, that he could read her secret. And now she realised that sudden knowledge of her disgrace alone could have struck down her father, whose vigorous const.i.tution had always kept illness at arm's length.

They arrived at the manor house before midnight, and were shown into the sufferer's room. Count Eberhard's eyelids moved quickly when he recognised Dr. Gunther's voice, and he tried to extend his hand towards his friend, but it fell heavily on the coverlet. Dr. Gunther seized it and held it in a firm grasp. Irma knelt down before the bed, and her father's trembling hand felt over her face, and was wetted by her tears.

Then he quickly withdrew it, as though he had touched a poisonous animal; he turned away his face and pressed his forehead against the wall. Now he turned round again, and with a gentle movement indicated that he wished her to leave the room.

She was with him again next day. He tried painfully to say something to her, to make her understand by signs--she could not understand. He bit upon his lips and tried to sit up. His face was changed--it a.s.sumed a strange colour, a strange expression. Irma saw with a shudder what was happening. She knelt down and laid her cheek upon his hand. He withdrew the hand. With supreme effort he wrote a word, a short word, with his finger upon her forhead. She saw, she heard, she read it--in the air, on her forehead, on her brain, in her soul--she gave a scream, and fell senseless to the ground. Dr. Gunther entered quickly, stepped over Irma, closed his friend's eyes, and all was silence.

For many hours Irma was in her room, shut in with her despair, her remorse. No one could gain admission. She thought furiously, she raved, and then fell into a troubled sleep. When she awake her resolution was made. She asked for light and writing material, and wrote: "My queen,-- With death I atone for my guilt. Forgive and forget! IRMA." On the envelope she wrote: "To be handed to the queen herself by Dr. Gunther."

Then she took another sheet, and wrote:

"My friend,--For the last time I speak to you. We have gone astray--terribly. The atonement is mine. You belong to her and to the people. Your atonement is in life; mine in death. Be calm, be one with the law that ties you to her and to the people. You have denied both and I have aided you. Be true again to yourself! This is my dying word, and I die willingly, if you but listen. Listen to this voice, and do not forget it! But forget her who speaks to you. I will not be remembered."

She sealed the letters, left them in her writing-case, and asked for her horse to be saddled. She rode out, followed by a groom, whom, some distance from home, she sent back on some pretext. When he was out of sight, she galloped off at full speed, dismounted, struck her horse with the whip to make it run away, and lost herself in the wood in the direction of the lake.

_V.--A Court Scandal_

Irma's torn boots were found on a rock by the lake, her hat floating on the waters. Although her body could not be recovered, there was no doubt that the countess had committed suicide. Her father's death must have bereft her of reason.

When the news was first brought to the king he trembled violently, and had to seize the back of a chair for support. Then he requested to be left alone, and with dim eyes he read Irma's farewell message. On the impulse of the moment, he wanted to send the queen the last words of his friend; he wanted to write under them, to pour out his whole heart, his whole repentance. He decided not to act hastily. Even the heaviest task must be fulfilled without loss of dignity. A chase had been arranged for the morning. The hunting-party were waiting in the courtyard. With an effort he pulled himself together, descended with firm step, and entered his carriage, returning smilingly the salutations of his guests.

The queen was scarcely less shaken by the terrible news, which was gently broken to her by Dr. Gunther. Her heart was filled with profound pity for the unfortunate child, and she gave vent to her grief in sobs and touching lamentations. Dr. Gunther tried to comfort her. "She is not gone without farewell. She has left this letter for your majesty--surely a letter that will bring balm in this terrible hour. Even to the last she proved her loving nature."

The queen seized the letter, read it, and turned deathly pale, then burning red. When she found words, she exclaimed: "And she has kissed my child, and he has kissed his child! They talk of the sublime, and their words do not cut their tongues! Everything is soiled! And he dared say to me: A prince has no private actions. His doings and his neglects set the example! Fie! Everything is soiled, everything filthy! Everything!"

She became unconscious. Dr. Gunther sprinkled her forehead with eau-de-cologne, and had her taken to bed. He sat by the bedside for some time, until she opened her eyes, thanked him, and expressed her desire to sleep. He spoke some soothing words, and retired, leaving instructions with the lady of the bed-chamber in the ante-room.

Some days pa.s.sed before the king sought his wife's forgiveness. The interview was brief and decisive. The king spoke n.o.bly, manly and sincerely; the queen was bitter, sharp and irreconcilable. Her duty as a queen demanded that the rift should not appear in public; her injured pride as a woman refused to admit more. He demanded to know whether her friend and adviser, Dr. Gunther, knew of her decision. She replied he was too n.o.ble to let thoughts of anger or revenge enter his great heart.

"This great being can be made small!"

"You will not rob me of my only friend?"

"Your only friend? I do not know this t.i.tle. To my knowledge there is no such office at court. Be what you will! Be alone and seek for support in yourself."

He stripped the wedding-ring from his hand, placed it on the table, and moved towards the door. He hesitated a moment--will she call him back?

She looked after him--will he turn around? The moment pa.s.sed. The door closed.

In the evening a court was held, and the queen appeared, pale, but smiling, on her husband's arm. They spoke confidentially, and n.o.body noticed the missing ring.

Next day the journals announced that the king's physician had tendered his resignation.

And court gossip had it that Walpurga had bought a farm with the gold she had earned as intermediary between the king and the unfortunate Countess Wildenort.

_VI.--Forgiving and Forgiven_

Irma had pa.s.sed four years at Hanse's mountain farm. Her secret had been well kept. Even Hanse, who had promised his wife never to ask any questions about their permanent guest, was in complete ignorance about her ident.i.ty. Irma, who, after having tried her hand at various domestic occupations, had taken up wood-carving with considerable success, enabling her to discharge at least the material part of her debt of grat.i.tude, was generally held to be a half-witted relation of Walpurga's.

Her despair and remorse had gradually given way to resigned sadness.

Self-communion had to make up for lack of intellectual intercourse, and sharpened her perception. In her diary she entered the profound thoughts suggested to her active intelligence by her observation of events in themselves insignificant, and a.n.a.lysed with cool aloofness the working of her mind. She never entertained the thought of finding a refuge in the convent--her atonement was to be wrought, not by compulsion, but by free will. And so the weeks pa.s.sed, and the months, and the years.

They had all helped in the building of a wooden cowherd's hut on the height of the mountain, a few hours' climb from the farm. Now Irma felt the need for more complete solitude, away even from her simple friends.

Up there, on the height, she would find peace and complete her atonement. And so it was decided to let her have her way, and to let her stay in the hut, with Peter and his daughter.

The first two days and nights a cloud lingered around them, forming a veil of dense fog; but on the third day Irma was awakened by the sun and stepped out to see the awakening of nature. The grandeur, the immensity of it all, the pure-scented air, the voices of the birds, filled her heart with gladness. A sunray struck her forehead--the forehead was pure, she felt it.

Irma now gave up her wood-carving; she had to be urged to eat, and only took her food to please the kind old "pitch-mannikin." Immovably she would lie for hours in her favorite meadow, and think and breathe the pure air. Her life was slowly ebbing from her. A sudden vision of the king with his companions of the chase galloping past her in pursuit of a stag gave her the final shock. She cowered on the ground. She bit into the moss, sc.r.a.ped the earth with her hands--she feared to scream aloud.

She staggered back to the hut, shaken by fever, and threw herself upon her bed. Then she asked Peter for some paper. She had heard that Dr.

Gunther was living with his family at the summer resort at the foot of the mountain. She wrote with shaking hand: "Eberhard's daughter calls Dr. Gunther," and sent Peter to speed down with the message.

In the little town all was excitement and commotion owing to the sojourn of the royal court. Dr. Gunther, now in favour again, was with the king when the message arrived. He read the note and was left speechless with amazement. Then he collected his wits, and hurried with Peter to the dying penitent's bedside. Irma was sleeping, and he sat by her side until she awoke. She saw Gunther--pleasure illumined her face, and she held out both hands towards him. He took them, and she pressed her feverish lips upon his hands.

Walpurga, to whom the news of Irma's impending end had been brought, took a quick resolution. She hurried to the little town to seek her queen. The matter was not easy, for suspicion rested heavily upon her; but her determination removed all obstacles, and the queen, profoundly moved by Walpurga's jerky explanation and pa.s.sionate appeal, and stirred to the very depths of her soul by Irma's heroism, demanded to be led at once to her. She was followed in a short while by the king, to whom the whole incident had been reported.

Gunther sat for hours by Irma's bedside, listening to her heavy breathing. The door flew open and the queen appeared.

"At last, you have come!" breathed Irma, raising herself and kneeling in her bed. Then, with a heart-breaking voice, she exclaimed: "Forgive, forgive!"

"Forgive me, Irma, my sister!" sobbed the queen, and took her in her arms and kissed her. A smile spread over Irma's face; then with a cry of pain she fell back dead.

When the king arrived he found his wife kneeling before the bed. He quietly knelt down by her side. The queen arose, placed her hand upon his head. "Kurt," she said, "forgive me, as I have forgiven you." Then she spread a white kerchief over the dead, and they left the hut. They walked hand in hand through the wood, until they reached the road, where carriages were waiting.

During the night the "pitch-mannikin" dug a grave on the spot where Irma had loved to lie in the sun. She was buried there early next morning.

Hanse and Peter and Dr. Gunther carried the corpse, and Walpurga with her child formed the procession.

JANE AUSTEN

Sense and Sensibility

Jane Austen, daughter of the rector of Steventon, in North Hamps.h.i.+re, England, was born there on December 16, 1775, and received her education from her father, a former Fellow of St.

John's College, Oxford. Her life was spent in the country or in country towns, chiefly at the village of Chawton, near Winchester. She died, unmarried, at Winchester on July 18, 1817, and was buried in the cathedral. The novels of Jane Austen may be divided into two groups. The first three--"Sense and Sensibility," "Pride and Prejudice," and "Northanger Abbey"--were all written, in first draft, at any rate, between 1792 and 1798. These are the novels composed during the author's residence at Steventon, which she left in 1801. There succeeded an interval of practically fourteen years (1798-1812), during which time the novelist let her mind lie absolutely fallow. As a natural consequence of the comparatively secluded life which Jane Austen led, the society with which she deals in her novels is a rather restricted one.