The Serapion Brethren Volume I Part 16

"Yon know, dear reader, that we should all of us--had we been in Traugott's place--have had to go through the essential stages of the condition. No escape from that. After the despair comes a benumbed, heavy brooding, in which the 'crisis' takes place; and then the condition pa.s.ses into a gentle sorrow, in which Nature knows how to apply her remedies efficaciously.

"In this stage of heavy, but beneficent sorrow, Traugott was sitting some days afterwards on the Karlsberg, gazing once more at the waves as they beat upon the sh.o.r.e, and the grey mists that lay over Hela. But not, this time, was he trying to read the future. All that he had hoped and antic.i.p.ated was past.

"'Ah!' he sighed, 'my calling for art was a bitter deception. Felizitas was the phantom which lured me to believe in what never existed save in the insane dreams of a fever-sick fool. It is all over. I fight no more! Back to my prison! So let it be, and have done with it!'

"Traugott worked in the office again, and the marriage-day with Christina was fixed once more. The day before it, Traugott was standing in the Artus Hof, looking, not without inward heart-breaking sorrow, at the fateful forms of the burgomaster and his page, when he noticed the broker to whom Berklinger had been trying to sell his paper. Almost involuntarily, without thinking what he was doing, he went up to him and asked him:

"'Did you know a strange old man with a black, curly beard, who used to come here some time ago, with a handsome lad?'

"'Of course I did,' said the broker: G.o.dfried Berklinger, the mad painter.'

"'Then have you any idea what's become of him?--where he's living now?'

"'Certainly I have,' answered the broker; 'he's been quietly settled down at Sorrento for a good while, with his daughter?'

"'With his daughter Felizitas?' cried Traugott, so vehemently that all the people looked round at him.

"'Well, yes,' answered the broker quietly; 'that was the nice-looking lad that used to go about with the old man. Half Dantzic knew it was a girl, though the old gentleman thought n.o.body would ever find it out.

It had been prophesied to him that if his daughter ever got into any love-affair he would die a horrible death, and that was why he didn't want anybody to know about her, and gave out that she was his son.'

"Traugott stood as if petrified. Then he set off running through the streets, out at the town-gate to the open country, and on into the woods, loudly lamenting.

"'Miserable wretch that I am!' he cried. 'It was she!--it was herself!

I have sate beside her thousands of times; inhaled her breath, pressed her delicate hands, looked into her beautiful eyes, listened to her sweet accents! and now she is lost! Ah, no!--lost she is not! After her to the land of art! The hint of destiny is clear. Away!--away to Sorrento!' He rushed home. Elias Roos chanced to come in his way. He seized him, and dragged him into his room.

"'I'll never marry Christina!' he shouted; 'she's like the Voluptas, and the Luxuries, and has hair like the Ira, in the picture in the Artus Hof. Felizitas! beautiful, beloved being! how you stretch out your longing arms to me! I am coming! I am coming! and I give you fair warning, Elias,' he continued, once more clutching that man of business, whose face was as white as a sheet, 'that you'll never see me in that d.a.m.ned office of yours any more! What the devil do I care for your infernal ledgers and day-books? I'm a painter--and a good painter too: Berklinger is my master, my father, my everything; and you are nothing--and less than nothing!'

"With this he gave Elias a good shaking, who shouted at the top of his lungs, 'Help! help, you fellows! Come here! the son-in-law's gone off his head! My partner's raving! Help! help!'

"The clerks all came rus.h.i.+ng out of the office; Traugott had left Elias go, and was lying exhausted in a chair. They all came round him; but on his jumping up suddenly, with a wild look, and crying, 'What the devil do you want?' they ran jostling out at the door in a heap, with Herr Elias in the centre. Presently there was a rustling, as of a silk dress, outside, and a voice inquired:

"Are you really gone out of your senses, Mr. Traugott, or are you only joking?'

"It was Christina.

"'I'm not a bit wrong in my head, my clear child,' Traugott answered, 'and I'm not joking in the slightest degree. But there'll be no wedding to-morrow, as far as I am concerned. As to that, my mind's completely made up. It's impossible that ever I can marry you at all.'

"'Oh, very well,' said Christina, without the smallest excitement; 'I haven't been caring so much about you for some time as I used, and there are people who would think themselves very well off to marry me if they got the chance. So, adieu.'

"With which she went rustling out.

"'She means the book-keeper,' thought Traugott. As he was calm, now, he betook himself to Herr Roos, to whom he demonstrated circ.u.mstantially that there could not possibly be any further question of him as a son-in-law, or as a partner either. Herr Elias agreed to everything, and a.s.severated, times without number, in the office, with gladness of heart, that he thanked G.o.d he was well rid of the crack-brained Traugott, when the latter was far away from Dantzic.

"Life dawned upon Traugott with a fresh and glorious brightness when he found himself in the longed-for land. The German artists in Rome admitted him into the circle of their studies, and thus it happened that he made a longer stay there than his eagerness to see Felizitas, which had urged him on restlessly till then, wholly justified. But this longing had become less urgent. It had taken more the form of a blissful dream whose perfumed s.h.i.+mmer pervaded all his being, so that he looked upon it, and the exercise of his art, as matters belonging wholly to the high and holy, super-earthly realm of blissful presage and antic.i.p.ation. Every female figure which he painted with his skilful artist's hand had the face of the beautiful Felizitas. The young artists were much struck by the beauty of this face, of which they could not come across the original in Rome; and they besieged Traugott with questions as to where he had seen her. But he felt a certain shyness about telling them his strange adventure at Dantzic; till at length an old friend of his, Matuszewski by name (who, like himself, had devoted himself to painting in Rome), joyfully announced that he had seen the girl whom Traugott introduced in all his pictures.

Traugott's joy may be imagined; he no longer made any secret of what it was that had drawn him so strongly to art and brought him to Italy, and the artists thought his Dantzic adventure so curious and interesting that they all undertook to search eagerly for his lost love.

Matuszewski was the most successful; he soon found out where the girl lived, and learnt, besides, that she really was the daughter of a poor old painter, who was at that time tinting the walls in the church of Trinita dell' Monte. Traugott went to that church with Matuszewski, and thought he actually recognized old Berklinger in the painter, who was up upon a lofty scaffold. From thence the friends, whom the old man had not noticed, hurried to where he lived.

"'It is she!' cried Traugott when he saw the painter's daughter on the balcony, busy about some woman's work. "With a loud cry of 'Felizitas!

Felizitas!' he burst into the room. The girl looked at him quite terrified. She had the features of Felizitas, and was excessively like her, but was not she. This bitter disappointment pierced Traugott's heart as with a thousand daggers. Matuszewski explained to the girl how the matter stood, in a few words. She was very lovely in her shyness, with blus.h.i.+ng cheeks and downcast eyes; and Traugott, who at first wanted to be off immediately, remained where he was (after giving just another sorrowful look at the pretty young creature), fettered by gentle bands. Matuszewski managed to say polite and pleasant things to rea.s.sure the pretty Dorina, who soon lifted the dark fringed curtains of her eyes, and looked at the strangers with smiling glances, saying her father would soon be home and that he would be delighted to see German artists, of whom his opinion was high. Traugott could not but admit that, except Felizitas, no woman had ever made such an impression on him as Dorina. She was, in fact, almost Felizitas herself, only her features were a little more strongly marked, and her hair a trifle darker. It was the same portrait painted by Raphael and by Rubens. The father came in ere long, and Traugott at once saw that the height of the scaffold on which he had seen him had deceived him as to his appearance. Instead of the vigorous Berklinger, this was a little lean, timid creature, oppressed by poverty. A deceptive cross shadow in the church had given to his smooth-shaven chin the effect of Berklinger's black curly beard. He showed great practical knowledge in talking of his art, and Traugott determined to cultivate an acquaintance which, painfully as it had commenced, was becoming pleasanter every moment.

Dorina, all sweetness and childlike candour, allowed her liking for the young German painter to be clearly seen. Traugott returned it heartily, and soon got so accustomed to be with her that he spent entire days with the little household, moved his studio to a large empty room near their house, and at last went and lodged with them altogether. In this way he greatly improved their slender scale of housekeeping, and the old man could not think otherwise than that Traugott was going to marry Dorina. He told him so, one day, plump and plain. Traugott was not a little alarmed: for he only then began to ask himself what had become of the object of his journey. Felizitas stood once more vividly before his memory, and yet he did not feel able to quit Dorina. In some mysterious way he could not think of ever possessing his vanished love as a wife. Felizitas seemed a spiritual image, never either to be won, or lost--eternally present to the spirit--never to be physically gained and possessed. But Dorina often came to his thoughts as his dear wife.

Sweet thrills permeated him, a gentle glow streamed through his veins.

And yet it seemed a treason to his first love to allow himself to be bound with new, indissoluble ties. Thus did the most contradictory feelings strive in his heart. He could not come to a decision. He avoided the old man carefully, who was under the impression that Traugott was going to trick him out of his daughter, and took care to talk everywhere of Traugott's marriage as a settled thing, saying that otherwise he never would have allowed his daughter to contract an intimacy so dangerous to her fair fame. One day his Italian blood fired up, and he told Traugott distinctly that he must either marry Dorina, or be off about his business, as he could not allow their intimacy to go on, on its present footing, for another hour. Traugott was vexed and indignant, and that not with the old man only. His own conduct struck him as contemptible. It seemed a sin and an abomination to have ever thought of another than Felizitas. It tore his heart to part from Dorina, but he broke the tender ties by a mighty effort, and set off as fast as possible to Naples--to Sorrento.

"He spent a year in the most careful efforts to discover Berklinger and Felizitas--in vain; n.o.body knew anything about them. All that he traced was a faint sort of surmise--based upon what seemed little more than a legend--that there had once been an old German painter in Sorrento, several years before. Driven to and fro as if upon a stormy ocean, Traugott ended by settling down for some time in Naples; and, as he worked more diligently at his painting again, the longing for Felizitas grew gentler and milder in his heart. But he never saw a woman at all resembling her in figure, walk, or bearing, without feeling the loss of the dear, sweet child most painfully. When painting, he never thought of Dorina, but always of Felizitas, who was his constant ideal.

"At last he got letters from home, in which his agent told him that Herr Elias Roos had shuffled off this mortal coil, and that his presence was necessary for the settlement of his affairs with the book-keeper, who had married Christina, and was carrying on the business. Traugott hastened back to Dantzic by the quickest route.

"There he stood once more in the Artus Hof, by the granite pillar, opposite to the Burgomaster and the Page. He thought of the strange adventure which had introduced such a painful element into his life; and, in deep and painful sorrow, he gazed at the lad, who seemed to welcome him back with eyes of life, and to whisper in sweet and charming accents, 'You see, you could not leave me, after all!'

"'Can I believe my eyes? Is it really you, sir, back again safe and sound, and quite cured of the troublesome melancholy which used to bother you so?'

"So croaked a voice beside Traugott. It was our old acquaintance the broker.

"'I never found them,' said Traugott involuntarily.

"'Them?' inquired the broker. 'Whom did you never find, sir?'

"'The painter, G.o.dfredus Berklinger, and his daughter Felizitas,'

answered Traugott. 'I searched for them all over Italy; n.o.body knew anything about them in Sorrento.'

"The broker looked at him with eyes of wide amazement, and stammered: 'Where did you look for them, sir? In Italy? at Naples? at Sorrento?'

"'Yes, of course I did,' said Traugott wrathfully.

"The broker struck his hands together time after time, crying 'Oh, my goodness gracious! Oh, my goodness gracious! Oh, Mr. Traugott, sir!'

"'Well! what is there so astonis.h.i.+ng about it?' said Traugott. 'Don't go on like a donkey! For the sake of the woman he loves, a man will go even as far as to Sorrento. Yes, yes! I loved Felizitas, and I went in search of her.'

"But the broker jumped about on one leg, and kept on crying, 'Oh, my goodness gracious!' till Traugott seized him and held him tight; and looking at him with earnest glance said:

"'For G.o.d's sake, man, out with what you see so extraordinary about the affair!'

"'But, Mr. Traugott,' began the broker at last, 'don't you know that Herr Aloysius Brandstetter, the town councillor and Dean of Guild, calls that little villa of his at the bottom of the Karlsberg, in the fir wood near Conrad's Hammer, "Sorrento"? He bought Berklinger's pictures, and took him and his daughter to live in his house, that's to say, in Sorrento. They were there for a year or two, and you might have stood upon the Karlsberg on your own logs, my dear sir, and looked down into the garden, and seen Mademoiselle Felizitas walking about in funny old-fas.h.i.+oned clothes, like those in the pictures there. You needn't have taken the trouble to go to Italy! Afterwards the old man---- But that's a painful story.'

"'Let me hear it,' said Traugott in a hollow voice.

"'Well,' continued the broker, 'young Mr. Brandstetter came back from England and fell in love with Mademoiselle Felizitas; and once when he found her in the garden, he fell romantically on his knees to her and vowed he would marry her, and free her from the tyrannical slavery her father kept her in. The old man was close by, though they didn't see him; and as soon as ever Felizitas said, "I will be yours," he tumbled down, with a hollow cry, as dead as a herring, sir! They say he looked awful, all blue and b.l.o.o.d.y, for he had broken a blood-vessel somehow or other. After that, Mademoiselle Felizitas couldn't endure young Mr.

Brandstetter, so she married Mr. Mathesius, the police magistrate at Marienwerder. You'll go and call upon her, of course, for the sake of old times. Marienwerder isn't quite so far away as Sorrento in Italy.

She's quite well, and very happy, They've got several nice children.'

"Traugott hastened away, silent and benumbed. This outcome of his adventure filled him with awe and terror.

"'Oh no!' he cried. 'This is not she, this is not she--not Felizitas, the angelic creature who kindled that eternal love and longing in my soul! whom I went in search of to a far-off country, always and always seeing her dear image before me like my star of fortune, beaming and glowing in sweet hope! Felizitas! Mrs. Mathesius, wife of Mathesius, the police magistrate. Ha! ha! ha! Mrs. Mathesius!'

"He laughed loud and bitterly in the wildness of his grief; and, as of old, he went out at the Olivaer Gate and up on to the Karlsberg. He looked down into the grounds of Sorrento: the tears rolled down his cheeks. 'Ah!' he cried, 'how deeply, how incurably deeply, thou Eternal Power that rulest all things, does thy bitter scorn and mockery wound the tender hearts of poor humanity! But, no, no; why should the child, who puts his hands into the fire instead of enjoying its warmth and brightness, complain? Destiny was at work with me, visibly; but my feeble eyes could not see; and, in my audacity, I thought that creation of the old master which came so wondrously to life and approached me, was a thing like myself, and that I could drag it down into this wretched earthly existence. No, no, Felizitas! I have not lost you. You are, and shall be, mine for ever, because you are the creative art which lives within me. It is only now that I really know you. What have you, what have I, to do with Mrs. Mathesius, the police magistrate's wife? Nothing, that I can see.'

"'I couldn't quite see what you had to do with her, either, Mr.

Traugott,' a voice fell in.