The Dramatic Works of G. E. Lessing Part 16

I really think I shall have to employ deception with this good child to get her to read the letter.

SARA.

What are you saying to yourself?

WAITWELL.

I was saying to myself that the idea I had hit on to get you to read this letter all the quicker was a very clumsy one.

SARA.

How so?

WAITWELL.

I could not look far enough. Of course you see more deeply into things than such as I. I did not wish to frighten you; the letter is perhaps only too hard; and when I said that it contained nothing but love and forgiveness, I ought to have said that I wished it might not contain anything else.

SARA.

Is that true? Give it me then! I will read it. If one has been unfortunate enough to deserve the anger of one's father, one should at least have enough respect for it to submit to the expression of it on his part. To try to frustrate it means to heap contempt on insult. I shall feel his anger in all its strength. You see I tremble already.

But I must tremble; and I will rather tremble than weep (_opens the letter_). Now it is opened! I sink! But what do I see? (_she reads_) "My only, dearest daughter"--ah, you old deceiver, is that the language of an angry father? Go, I shall read no more----

WAITWELL.

Ah, Miss! You will pardon an old servant! Yes, truly, I believe it is the first time in my life that I have intentionally deceived any one.

He who deceives once, Miss, and deceives for so good a purpose, is surely no old deceiver on that account. That touches me deeply, Miss! I know well that the good intention does not always excuse one; but what else could I do? To return his letter unread to such a good father?

That certainly I cannot do! Sooner will I walk as far as my old legs will carry me, and never again come into his presence.

SARA.

What? You too will leave him?

WAITWELL.

Shall I not be obliged to do so if you do not read the letter? Read it, pray! Do not grudge a good result to the first deceit with which I have to reproach myself. You will forget it the sooner, and I shall the sooner be able to forgive myself. I am a common, simple man, who must not question the reasons why you cannot and will not read the letter.

Whether they are true, I know not, but at any rate they do not appear to me to be natural. I should think thus, Miss: a father, I should think, is after all a father; and a child may err for once, and remain a good child in spite of it. If the father pardons the error, the child may behave again in such a manner that the father may not even think of it any more. For who likes to remember what he would rather had never happened? It seems, Miss, as if you thought only of your error, and believed you atoned sufficiently in exaggerating it in your imagination and tormenting yourself with these exaggerated ideas. But, I should think, you ought also to consider how you could make up for what has happened. And how will you make up for it, if you deprive yourself of every opportunity of doing so. Can it be hard for you to take the second step, when such a good father has already taken the first?

SARA.

What daggers pierce my heart in your simple words! That he has to take the first step is just what I cannot bear. And, besides, is it only the first step which he takes? He must do all! I cannot take a single one to meet him. As far as I have gone from him, so far must he descend to me. If he pardons me, he must pardon the whole crime, and in addition must bear the consequences of it continually before his eyes. Can one demand that from a father?

WAITWELL.

I do not know, Miss, whether I understand this quite right. But it seems to me, you mean to say that he would have to forgive you too much, and as this could not but be very difficult to him, you make a scruple of accepting his forgiveness. If you mean that, tell me, pray, is not forgiving a great happiness to a kind heart? I have not been so fortunate in my life as to have felt this happiness often. But I still remember with pleasure the few instances when I have felt it. I felt something so sweet, something so tranquillising, something so divine, that I could not help thinking of the great insurpa.s.sable blessedness of G.o.d, whose preservation of miserable mankind is a perpetual forgiveness. I wished that I could be forgiving continually, and was ashamed that I had only such trifles to pardon. To forgive real painful insults, deadly offences, I said to myself, must be a bliss in which the whole soul melts. And now, Miss, will you grudge your father such bliss?

SARA.

Ah! Go on, Waitwell, go on!

WAITWELL.

I know well there are people who accept nothing less willingly than forgiveness, and that because they have never learned to grant it. They are proud, unbending people, who will on no account confess that they have done wrong. But you do not belong to this kind, Miss! You have the most loving and tender of hearts that the best of your s.e.x can have.

You confess your fault too. Where then is the difficulty? But pardon me, Miss! I am an old chatterer, and ought to have seen at once that your refusal is only a praiseworthy solicitude, only a virtuous timidity. People who can accept a great benefit immediately without any hesitation are seldom worthy of it. Those who deserve it most have always the greatest mistrust of themselves. Yet mistrust must not be pushed beyond limits!

SARA.

Dear old father! I believe you have persuaded me.

WAITWELL.

If I have been so fortunate as that it must have been a good spirit that has helped me to plead. But no, Miss, my words have done no more than given you time to reflect and to recover from the bewilderment of joy. You will read the letter now, will you not? Oh, read it at once!

SARA.

I will do so, Waitwell! What regrets, what pain shall I feel!

WAITWELL.

Pain, Miss! but pleasant pain.

SARA.

Be silent! (_begins reading to herself_).

WAITWELL (_aside_).

Oh! If he could see her himself!

SARA (_after reading a few moments_).

Ah, Waitwell, what a father! He calls my flight "an absence." How much more culpable it becomes through this gentle word! (_continues reading and interrupts herself again_). Listen! he flatters himself I shall love him still. He flatters himself! He begs me--he begs me? A father begs his daughter? his culpable daughter? And what does he beg then? He begs me to forget his over-hasty severity, and not to punish him any longer with my absence. Over-hasty severity! To punis.h.!.+ More still! Now he thanks me even, and thanks me that I have given him an opportunity of learning the whole extent of paternal love. Unhappy opportunity!

Would that he also said it had shown him at the same time the extent of filial disobedience. No, he does not say it! He does not mention my crime with one single word. (_Continues reading_.) He will come himself and fetch his children. His children, Waitwell! that surpa.s.ses everything! Have I read it rightly? (_reads again to herself_) I am overcome! He says, that he without whom he could not possess a daughter deserves but too well to be his son. Oh that he had never had this unfortunate daughter! Go, Waitwell, leave me alone! He wants an answer, and I will write it at once. Come again in an hour! I thank you meanwhile for your trouble. You are an honest man. Few servants are the friends of their masters!

WAITWELL.

Do not make me blush, Miss! If all masters were like Sir William, servants would be monsters, if they would not give their lives for them. (_Exit_.)

Scene IV.

SARA (_sits down to write_).

If they had told me a year ago that I should have to answer such a letter! And under such circ.u.mstances! Yes, I have the pen in my hand.

But do I know yet what I shall write? What I think; what I feel. And what then does one think when a thousand thoughts cross each other in one moment? And what does one feel, when the heart is in a stupor from a thousand feelings. But I must write! I do not guide the pen for the first time. After a.s.sisting me in so many a little act of politeness and friends.h.i.+p, should its help fail me at the most important office?

(_She pauses, and then writes a few lines_.) It shall commence so? A very cold beginning! And shall I then begin with his love? I must begin with my crime. (_She scratches it out and writes again_.) I must be on my guard not to express myself too leniently. Shame may be in its place anywhere else, but not in the confession of our faults. I need not fear falling into exaggeration, even though I employ the most dreadful terms. Ah, am I to be interrupted now?

Scene V.