Chapter XVIII: Act V (1)

_The_ FORESTER'S _House. Night. For a short time the stage remains empty_.

SCENE I

SOPHY (_alone, comes in with a lamp, looks into_ MARY'S _room, puts the lamp upon the table, goes to the window, opens the shutter through which the reflection of the sheet-lightning is visible, looks out; then she closes shutter and window, takes the lamp again, and looks once more into_ MARY'S _room. At intervals she listens and betrays great anxiety_.)

Not yet! What if he's encountered her! What if he's met them together! She ought to be back by this time. Oh, why did I let her go? And Andrew does not come, either! And then this sultry, stormy night!

[_Listens_.]

Surely, that was she? At last! God be praised!

[_Looks into the room_.]

No. It is not she. The wind blew open the half-closed shutter.

SCENE II

WILLIAM, _in his shirt-sleeves_; SOPHY.

WILLIAM.

Are the soldiers there, mother?

[_At the door of_ MARY'S _room_.]

Mother, where is father?

[SOPHY _is startled, and quickly closes the door_.]

WILLIAM.

And Mary? She is not in her room?

SOPHY.

What ideas you get into your head!

WILLIAM.

Her bed is still as if it had just been made.

SOPHY (_listens, frightened_).

Is that your father? William, say nothing about this before your father!

WILLIAM.

I'm the fellow to play the informer! But you must tell me where Mary is. SOPHY.

Gone to the Dell to ask Robert--

WILLIAM.

Mother, we beg at nobody's door. I am going to fetch her.

SOPHY.

In this storm?

WILLIAM (_puts on his jacket_).

He would be a fine hunter's boy who is afraid of a little bit of lightning. Only tell me which way Mary went. The one below along the brook? All right. She is not like the others, but she is only a girl. And they are afraid.

[_Exit_.]

SCENE III

SOPHY (_alone; after him_).

William! William! [_Comes back_.]

He is gone! And the storm is getting worse. A fog below, and the thunderstorm above coming nearer. And another one is coming on from the Brandsberg. And Ulrich outside, and none of the children at home. And I all alone in this solitary hunter's house in the midst of the forest, and at such an hour of the night!

[_A door is heard slamming; she starts up_.]

Merciful God! It is he! If he should look into the room and should not see Mary! Or--

SCENE IV

_Enter the_ FORESTER _in haste; pale and distracted_; SOPHY.

SOPHY (_going to meet him_).

Back already?--[_Correcting herself_] at last?

FORESTER (_looking shyly about_).

Did anybody ask for me?

SOPHY.

No. Are they pursuing you?

FORESTER.

Who?

SOPHY.

Godfrey--

FORESTER.

Why?

SOPHY.

Because you come in as if you were being hunted.

FORESTER.

I meant the soldiers.--Why do I see Mary everywhere! In the Dell--

SOPHY (_is frightened_).

In the Dell!

[_Aside_.]

Good Heavens!

FORESTER.

And all the way back I heard her walking behind me.

SOPHY.

On your way back--

FORESTER.

Whenever I walked, I heard her behind me; whenever I stood still, she also stood still, but I did not look around.

SOPHY (_relieved_).

You did not look around?

FORESTER.

Why, I knew it was nothing. I have a feeling as though even now she were still standing behind me.

SOPHY (_wishes to divert him from the subject_).

Did you shoot anything? Is it outside?

FORESTER (_shuddering involuntarily_).

Outside?

SOPHY.

Before the door. What a strange look you give me! What is that on your clothes?

FORESTER (_turns away involuntarily_).

What is it?

SOPHY.

A spot--

FORESTER.

What you see--

SOPHY.

Why will you not let me see it?

FORESTER.

It is nothing.

[_Turns to the table at the right, takes down his gun_.]

Is the soup warm? My tongue is glued to the roof of my mouth.

SOPHY (_takes a plate and spoon from the closet, goes to the stove where she pours out the soup_).

If he should look into the room! What I ask, I ask only in anxiety to have him forget about Mary.

[_She puts the soup before the_ FORESTER _on the table to the right; listens_.]

Isn't there a noise in the room?

[_Walks about the_ FORESTER'S _chair, so as to distract him_.]

Ulrich, don't you think that Robert could still restore the old friendly relations?

[FORESTER _makes a movement_.]

SOPHY.

Why do you start so?

FORESTER.

Don't wake up Mary! Wasn't there some one at the window?

SOPHY.

That is the old rose-bush outside, which is always nodding so anxiously and knocking at the window, as if it had to prevent a catastrophe, and nobody paid any attention to it.

[_Pause; aside_.]

It is so still. I must keep on talking, otherwise he can hear me breathing, and will notice my anxiety--and also that he may not hear Mary when she climbs in at the window.

[_Listening repeatedly_.]

The whole evening I have been thinking about it. Only yesterday Robert said to me--

FORESTER.

Always Robert--

SOPHY (_has seated herself by his side_).

We were walking along the willows, where the pine-thicket is, under the rock, in the Dell--

FORESTER (_violently_).

Don't mention that--

SOPHY.

How you start! It was at sunset; and as I looked around, something was coming out from under the pines--so red. I--frightened--For God's sake, I say, why, that is blood!

[FORESTER _throws down his spoon and rises_.]

SOPHY.

Then the evening glow was reflected in the water.--But what is the matter with you?

FORESTER.

Always with your Dell. What do you care about the Dell?

SOPHY.

Did something happen to you there? People say the place is haunted. Robert said so to me yesterday. They say that there is an accursed spot! There some one committed a murd--

FORESTER (_seizes his gun_).

What do you know?

SOPHY (_recoiling in terror_).

Ulrich!--

FORESTER.

Will you keep quiet?

SOPHY (_stops before him, shuddering, filled with a presentiment_).

Ulrich! What have you done?

FORESTER (_has recovered his self-possession_).

Stuff and nonsense! Is this a night for such stories?

[_Lost in thought_.]

SOPHY.

Go ahead. Whether an hour sooner, or an hour later. You have me on your conscience.

[_Sinks down upon a chair to the left_.]

FORESTER (_pause; then he walks slowly up and down, and gradually comes near her, hesitating_).

I must tell you something, Sophy--if you do not already know it; it will not let me rest. I am in the right; but--and then I cannot tell--is it true or is it only an oppressive dream?--a dream in which one cannot do what one wishes--and exhausts oneself--because one must always do what one does not wish. Come here! Do you hear? Place your hand on the Bible.

SOPHY.

Great God! What can be the meaning of this!

FORESTER.

It would be horrible if I had been obliged to kill her, and after all everything were only--and then I should have in vain--Sophy!

[_Quite close to her; softly_.]

There is a report that a corpse is lying in the Dell!

SOPHY.

You are drunk or mad!

FORESTER.

I am in my right mind. Look at me, woman! Do you believe in a God in Heaven? Very well, Very well! Then place your hand upon the Bible, right here. There my right is written. Now say after me: "As truly as I hope to be saved--"

SOPHY (_faintly_).

As truly as I hope to be saved--

FORESTER.

"So truly shall it remain a secret what I am now about to hear."

SOPHY.

So truly shall it remain a secret what I am now about to hear.

[_Is obliged to sit down_.]

FORESTER.

And now give heed.--It is short--no But and no If about it--it is clear as the right--and right must remain right--else we need no God in Heaven! [_After he has made several attempts to begin, in a dejected and low voice, while he leads her to the footlights_.] Do not be frightened. Robert shot our Andrew, and I--I have executed judgment upon him.

SOPHY.

Oh, God! [_She can scarcely keep herself on her feet; wants to go to the chair. He supports her_.]

FORESTER.

I have judged him. As it is written there--"Eye for eye, tooth for tooth." I have judged him, because the courts no longer judge right. They have two kinds of law, and here it is written: "Ye shall have one manner of law." I have not murdered him, I have executed judgment upon him. [_He walks up and down, then loses himself in thought at the place where he believes_ SOPHY _still to be, who totters to the chair_.] But I do not know whether it did happen--what has happened. My brain is so wild and confused--[_Recollects with difficulty_] but I suppose it really did happen--what has happened--and as it was about to happen--what has happened--I saw Mary before my eyes, as if she put herself in front of him and made a sign to me to stop, and cried: "It is"--well, you know who! It was a delusion; it was only in my imagination. After I have had wine, I always am in a state that I see things which do not exist. And if it should have been she--the bullet then was no longer under any control.

SOPHY.

Almighty God!

[_She drags herself with difficulty into_ MARY'S _room_.]

FORESTER (_does not notice it and, staring before him, continues as if she were still standing beside him_).

It was not she. How could Mary have come there? It is nothing but the effect of the wine, that today I see her everywhere. But nevertheless I was frightened until I saw it had only been the smoke from the gun. Everything was turning around before my eyes. But when the smoke had cleared away--that was only a moment--then I saw him--still standing as before, but only for a moment--then he collapsed--then had happened what did happen. Then I folded my hands over my gun, and said: "You have been judged according to your desert." And I prayed: "God have mercy on his poor soul." Then a swarm of owls flew up and screeched. That sounded as though they said Amen. Then I stood again erect on my feet. For God and Earth and Heaven and every creature demand justice.

[_He loses himself in a brown study_.]

SCENE V

_The_ FORESTER, _lost in thought, alone. Then_ STEIN _and the_ PASTOR, _at first only heard behind the scenes_.

STEIN (_still outside_).

Ulrich!

FORESTER (_awaking, mechanically_).

Stein!

STEIN (_as above_).

Do you hear?

FORESTER (_the connection of the events suddenly flashes upon him_).

It did happen!

[_Makes a movement as if to seize his gun; but controls himself_.]

No! Not an iota more than my right!

STEIN (_entering, the_ PASTOR _behind him_).

Where is your Andrew, Ulrich?

FORESTER.

What do you want with my Andrew?

STEIN.

To demand my Robert from him.

FORESTER.

Your Robert?--From my Andrew?--Look here!

[_Shows the muffler_.]

PASTOR.

For Heaven's sake!--There is blood on the muffler!

STEIN.

What is that?

FORESTER.

That is my Andrew's blood, and your Robert spilled it. And you sent your Möller for the soldiers! And you made me a scoundrel before the world--with your two kinds of right--so that you may twist it as you like! But here--[_striking his breast_] there still is a right! That neither you nor your lawyers can twist.

SCENE VI

ANDREW, _still without_. STEIN, FORESTER, PASTOR.

ANDREW (_outside, in a low voice_).

Father--

PASTOR.

Who calls?

STEIN.

Is not that Andrew's voice?

FORESTER (_continuing_).

Here it is written: "Ye shall have one manner of law." And the law has judged you. "And he that killeth any man he--"

ANDREW.

Father!

FORESTER (_trembling, staring at the door, with smothered voice, mechanically_).

"He--he--shall--surely--be--put to death"--

_Enter_ ANDREW.

STEIN (_going toward him_).

God be thanked! Andrew, you live!

FORESTER (_makes a great effort_).

It is not true. He is dead. He must be dead.

ANDREW.

Father!

FORESTER (_stretching out his hand, as if warding him off_).

Who are you?

ANDREW (_more and more alarmed_).

Do you not know your Andrew any more?

FORESTER.

_My_ Andrew is dead. If you lie slain in the Dell--then you shall be my Andrew--then everything is well--then we will rejoice--then we will sing: Lord God, we praise Thee!

PASTOR.

He is demented!

STEIN.

Andrew, my Robert--

ANDREW.

You have my muffler which Lindenschmied stole from me before he killed Godfrey?

STEIN.

Lindenschmied killed Godfrey? And my Robert--

ANDREW.

Robert was pursuing him. He compelled Robert to shoot him.

FORESTER.

He? He had your gun?

ANDREW.

Stolen it with my muffler.

FORESTER.

And Robert did--

ANDREW.

Lindenschmied was not mortally wounded. I had his wound dressed in the mill, and had him removed before the magistrate--

FORESTER (_gradually collapsing_).

I am in the wrong!

[_Sinks down upon a chair_.]

ANDREW.

That is the reason why I am so late.

FORESTER (_rises; goes to_ STEIN _with his gun in his hand_).

Stein, do to me according to my desert.

STEIN.

What do you mean?

FORESTER.

"Eye for eye, tooth for tooth"--

STEIN (_looking at the_ PASTOR).

What does he mean by that again?

FORESTER.

Weiler thought that Lindenschmied with the gun was my Andrew. Your Robert wounded Lindenschmied, and I--killed your Robert for this!

PASTOR.

Almighty God!

ANDREW (_at the same time_).

Robert!

FORESTER (_almost simultaneously_).

Shoot me!

STEIN (_has seized the gun_).

You murderer!

[_The_ PASTOR _arrests his arm_.]

ANDREW.

You shot Robert, father? Robert lives!

STEIN.

He lives?

PASTOR.

He lives?

FORESTER.

He lives?

ANDREW.

He lives, as surely as I live!

FORESTER.

It was only a dream? Can it be that I am not a murderer? That I am an honorable man?

PASTOR.

That you are, Ulrich. Drive away that unfortunate delusion.

STEIN.

Man alive, to what might you have provoked me!

[_Puts away the gun_.]

FORESTER.

You saw him? When did you see him, Andrew? Now, Andrew? Just now, Andrew?

ANDREW.

Just now, as I was coming home, I met two men from the mill with a stretcher. Robert had just called them out of their beds; they were going to the Dell; Robert had gone ahead of them.

FORESTER.

To the Dell?

PASTOR.

With a stretcher?

STEIN.

What can be behind all this?

FORESTER (_has gone to the door of_ MARY'S _room; releases the latch_).

Thanks be to God!

[_Listening_.]

I hear her breathing. Oh, she sleeps a peaceful sleep. I am oppressed with a world of cares, and she takes them from my heart with her breath. Do you hear, Pastor, do you hear?

STEIN.

The unfortunate man! His delusion is returning.

PASTOR (_after an anxious pause, during which the_ FORESTER _has not taken his eyes from the_ PASTOR'S _face_).

I hear nothing. That is your own heavy breathing that you hear.

FORESTER (_begins to collapse again_).

My own heavy breathing that I hear--

[_Summons up courage, opens the door_.]

My eyes deceive me? Where she is not, there I see her; and where she is, there I do not see her. Pastor, for God's sake, tell me: "There lives Mary."

[_He has convulsively clutched the_ PASTOR'S _arm_.]

PASTOR.

I do not see her. The bed there is untouched, the windows open--your wife--

FORESTER (_rushes into the room_).

Woman! Woman! Poor, poor woman!

SCENE VII

SOPHY, _like a ghost; can hardly stand or speak; dragged in forcibly by the_ FORESTER.

FORESTER.

Where is my child?

ANDREW.

Mother, what ails you?

[_He supports her on one side, the_ PASTOR _on the other_.]

SOPHY.

Andrew! At least one!

FORESTER (_shakes her_).

My child! My child! Where is my child?

SOPHY (_with repulsion, but faintly_).

Leave me, you--

FORESTER.

My Mary!

SOPHY.

To the Dell--you--

FORESTER.

Creature, you lie!

SOPHY.

To Robert--

FORESTER.

Yes, she met me--in the fog--as I was coming--

SOPHY.

That was William.

FORESTER.

It was Mary, woman; Mary!

PASTOR.

She cannot answer any more. She has fainted.

STEIN.

Take her away from the madman!

FORESTER.

You mean to say that I--my own child--

ANDREW.

Mother! Mother!

[_He and the_ PASTOR _are busy about her, at the table to the right_.]

STEIN (_who in the meantime is trying to keep the_ FORESTER _away from her_).

Hands off, you madman!

FORESTER.

Madman? God grant that I am!

[_A knock is heard; he steps back in horror and stretches out his hands toward the door, as if warding off something_.]

Nonsense! What do you want, the whole lot of you? Why, that is Mary. She is standing outside, and does not dare to come in, because she ran out in the night. She hasn't the courage. I am severe--oh, I am severe! Silly wench!

[_Stands up straight_.]

Come what may!

[_He rushes toward the door; before he reaches it, another knock is heard; he steps back again horrified and powerless_.]

The raging fever has seized me--nothing else. These are the symptoms--chattering of the teeth and chills along the spine. Elderberry-tea--a night or two of perspiration! What has the knocking to do with my fever? Why does not some one open, some one call her in? Why are you all so pale and tongueless? Has some one told a fairy-tale, and are you afraid? My Mary was a living fairy-tale--she is-she is, I mean to say. That Mary could be dead--but she would not give me such pain! She knows that I cannot live without my Mary. Do you hear her giggling outside? Now she will come skipping in and hold her hands over my eyes, as she is accustomed to do, and I must not spoil her fun. Oh, it is--[_Attempts to laugh, but sobs_.]--a--[_Beside himself_.]--After all, it has to be! Come in!

[_Attempts to go to the door, but with eyes closed sinks into a chair on the left_.]

SCENE VIII

ROBERT, WILLIAM, _then two men with a covered stretcher, which they put down. The men go away_.

STEIN.

Robert!

[_Going toward him_.]

Do you see, Ulrich? He lives!

ROBERT (_embracing him, pale and distracted_).

Father! Father!

STEIN.

What has happened to you?

ROBERT.

Would that the murderer had killed me! Father Ulrich, be a man!

FORESTER (_making a supreme effort to collect his energies_).

Go on! I will see whether I am a man.

[ROBERT _removes the covering_.]

STEIN.

Great God!

SOPHY (_who, supported by_ ANDREW _and the_ PASTOR, _has fallen upon her knees by the stretcher_).

Mary!

ANDREW.

Oh, God! It is Mary!

STEIN.

How did this happen? Explain it, Robert.

PASTOR.

It is dreadfully clear to me.

ROBERT (_with difficulty maintaining his self-possession_).

She was praying: "God, let me belong only to my father." I was about to say to her: "Mary, you are going to give me up?" Then she rushed upon me, as if she wished to protect me with her own body, made a sign and called in the direction of the forest. I saw no one; I did not understand her; I was about to ask: "What is the matter, Mary?" when--the report of a gun--she sank down in my arms; I threw myself over her; a bullet had penetrated her heart.

SOPHY.

That was her dream.

STEIN (_holds_ ROBERT _in his embrace, almost simultaneously_).

She died for you!

FORESTER.

She saw me aim at him, and ran purposely into the course of my bullet. I wanted to judge and--have judged myself. Crime and punishment at the same moment! I was praying: "God have mercy on his poor soul!" I prayed for myself, and the owls screeched Amen, and meant me!

ROBERT (_recoils, horrified_).

Almighty God--he himself!--

STEIN.

You did not do it consciously. A fearful madness urged you against your will.

PASTOR.

Do not be so obstinate, man; God does not measure the deed according to a superficial standard. Innocence and crime are at the extreme poles of human nature. But often it is merely a quicker pulse that separates the innocent from the criminal.

FORESTER.

Give me words of life instead of your cobwebs of the brain--no If and no But. Tell me something, so that I must believe it! Your words do not convince me. Why do you offer consolation to my head? Offer consolation to my heart, if you can. Can you with your consolation restore my child to life, so that she will rush into my arms? In that case keep on consoling me. Every word that fails to restore my child to life slays her once more.

STEIN.

Flee to America; I will procure passports for you; all my money is yours. Your wife and your children are mine!

FORESTER.

Do you hear, Andrew, what that man there is saying? He wants to give you money. Buy a hand-organ with it. Go about to the fairs, and sing of the old murderer who shot his child--for no reason, for no reason at all in the world. You need no picture. Take the old woman there along with you. No painter can paint the story as it stands written upon her face. Praise the child. Represent her more beautiful than she was--if you can--as you imagine the most beautiful angel, and then say: "And yet she was a thousand times more beautiful!" And represent the old murderer so that people will shed a waterfall of tears for the child, and that every street-urchin will shake his fist at the old fellow. And he who hears this story and does not give you with chattering teeth his last penny, though he had ten starving children at home, and does not pray to God for the child and curse the old murderer that shot her, must have a heart like the old murderer's who committed the deed. Do not say: "The man was honest throughout his life and avoided evil and believed in a God, and did not permit the least taint upon his honor." If you do, they will not believe you. Say: He looked like a wolf; do not say: His beard was white when he committed the crime. If you do, no one will give you anything; none will believe that one can be so old and yet such an abandoned villain. And on the lower part of your organ have a picture painted--how the old murderer blows out his brains and walks as a ghost during the night--and on the spot where the crime was perpetrated he sits moaning at midnight with his fiery eyes and white beard--and there no breeze wafts coolness, and there no dew falls and no rain--there grow poisonous weeds--the spot is accursed like himself--and the animal that accidentally strays there bellows with fear--and man is shaken as with the ague. And have an angel painted from whose mouth proceeds a scroll on which is written: "There sits he whom God has marked. Abel was a man, and Cain was only his brother; but this was a child, and he that slew her was her father. For Cain, there is still a hope of salvation, but for the old murderer of his child, none--none--none!" Oh! Some comfort! Some comfort! Only a shadow of comfort! For this I would give my salvation, if I had any hope of salvation. I will ask God whether there is any comfort for me!

[_He takes the Bible and reads, at first trembling in every limb, with panting breath_.]

"And he that killeth any--"

PASTOR.

No further, Ulrich. Let me show you words of life, words of humanity: "'As I live,' saith the Lord God, 'I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live.'"

FORESTER (_who keeps a firm hold of the Bible, and breaks away from the_ PASTOR, _almost simultaneously_).

Leave me alone, you inhuman creatures, with your humanity!

[_He continues reading. With every word his manner becomes more calm and certain, the sound of his voice stronger_.]

"And he that killeth any man shall surely be put to death."

[_Lays down the Bible_.]

STEIN.

Does he find solace in these words?

PASTOR.

Let him have such comfort as consoles him.

FORESTER (_takes up the Bible again; his manner assumes an expression of joyousness_).

That is certainty, that is promise, that convinces me--no But and no If. "And he that killeth a man shall surely be put to death." That means: Then it is expiated, then it is wiped out, and he is pure once more.

[_Puts on his hat and buttons his coat_.]

I am going before the magistrate.

[_About to go_.]

STEIN.

And you think they are going to put you to death?

[FORESTER _stops and turns around_.]

PASTOR.

People more guilty than you have been pardoned.

FORESTER.

Pardoned to be imprisoned--hey? Like Leutner? He--Indeed, they don't judge right in those courts, not as it is written here. I know very well--but--never mind!--All right!--

[_Takes his gun_.]

STEIN.

What do you intend to do?

FORESTER.

Nothing, I must take along the rifle with which the deed was done. O, they are particular about that! Farewell, Andrew, William. Take good care of your mother.

[_Shakes hands with everybody_.]

Stein, Pastor, Robert, Sophy--she has fainted. God will soon let her come after me. Bury my child. Have the bells ring; lay her bridal wreath upon her coffin. O, I am an old woman! When we meet again I shall be a murderer no longer.

[_Makes with his hand a sign of farewell_.]

STEIN.

You want--

FORESTER (_turns around at the door_).

My sight--and then--[_Points upward to heaven_.]--to meet my child.

[_Exit. Short pause, during which the others look after him with surprise and emotion_.]

STEIN (_seized with a sudden apprehension_).

If the other barrel is still loaded--quick--after him--

[_Outside the door a shot is heard_.]

Too late! I suspected it!

ANDREW, WILLIAM (_rushing out_).

Father!

ROBERT (_in the open door, rooted to the spot through horror and pain at what he sees_).

He has his right!

STEIN (_also at the door_).

A second time his own judge!

PASTOR (_stepping to the others_).

May God do unto him according to his faith.

[_Exeunt_.]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 7: Translation of the King James version.]

BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH (1856)

By OTTO LUDWIG

TRANSLATED AND CONDENSED BY MURIEL ALMON

The little garden lies between the dwelling-house and the slate shed; whoever goes from one to the other must pass it. As you go from the house to the shed it is on your left; on the right there is a yard with a woodshed and a stable, separated from the neighboring house by a trellis-fence. Every morning the house opens twelve green shutters onto one of the busiest streets of the town, the shed opens a large gray door on a back street; the roses on the bushes that have been trained to grow like trees in the little garden can look out into the lane which connects its two larger sisters. On the other side of the lane stands a tall house which, in elegant seclusion, does not deign to bestow a glance on the smaller one. Its eyes are open only to the doings of the main street; if you look nearer at its closed eyes facing the narrow street, you soon see the reason for its eternal sleep--they are only a sham, painted on the outer wall.

Not all sides of the house that belongs to the little garden look as decorative as the one on the main street. There, a pale rose-colored tint contrasts not too sharply with the green window-shutters and the blue slate roof. The weather side of the house, on the narrow street, looks as if it were clad in an armor of slate from top to toe; the other gable-end joins directly on to the row of houses of which it is the beginning or the end; at the back, however, it is an example of the proverb that everything has its weak point. There, an upstairs piazza has been built onto the house, not unlike half a crown of thorns. Supported by roughly-hewn wooden posts it runs along the upper story and expands toward the left into a little room. There is no direct entrance to it from the upper story of the house. To reach the "gallery chamber" from there one must leave the house by the back door, walk perhaps six steps along the wall, past the dog-kennel, to the wooden stairs, resembling those of a henhouse, and after climbing these must wander the whole length of the piazza to the left.

If all the structures are not equally ornamental and if piazza, stable and shed stand out noticeably against the dwelling-house, yet there is nowhere lacking a quality which adorns more than beauty of form and shining ornamentation. Extreme cleanliness smiles at the observer from the most hidden corners. In the little garden it reaches such a pitch that it hardly dares to smile. The garden does not look as if it were cleaned with a hoe and broom; it looks as if it had been brushed. The little beds that stand out so sharply against the yellow gravel of the walks look, not as if they had been dug by a cord, but as if they were drawn on the ground with a ruler and compasses, the box edging has the air of being daily attended to by the most accurate barber in town with comb and razor. And yet the blue coat which, if one stands on the piazza, one may see twice daily stepping into the little garden and every day at exactly the same minute, is still more neatly kept than the garden. When, after doing various pieces of work, the old gentleman leaves the garden again--and every day he goes at the same minute, just as punctually as he comes--the white apron over his blue coat shines with such unblemished whiteness that it is really incomprehensible why the old gentleman should have put it on. When he moves about among the tall rose-bushes which seem to have taken the old gentleman's bearing for a model, each of his steps is like the other, none is longer or fails to keep the regularity of his tempo. If one looks at him closer as he stands thus in the middle of his creation, one sees that he has merely copied externally that of which nature has created the model in himself. The regularity of the different parts of his tall figure seems to have been as accurately measured as the beds of the little garden. When nature formed him, her countenance must have borne the same expression of conscientiousness as the old man's face--an expression which, because of its strength, would appear to be obstinacy if an expression of loving gentleness, indeed almost of dreamy enthusiasm, were not mixed with it. And even now nature seems to watch over him with the same care that his eye shows when it looks over his little garden. His hair, cut short at the back and twisted above his brow into a so-called "corkscrew-curl," is of the same unblemished whiteness that is shown by his neckerchief, waistcoat, collar and the apron over his buttoned-up coat. Here, in his little garden, he completes the finished picture that it presents; away from home his appearance and personality must appear a little odd. His hat still has the high pointed crown, his blue overcoat the narrow collar and padded shoulders of a long vanished fashion. These offer opportunities enough for bad jokes; but no one makes them. It is as if there were an invisible something emanating from the stately figure that prevents the rise of flippant thoughts.

When the older inhabitants of the town, meeting Herr Nettenmair, pause in their conversation to greet him respectfully, it is not alone the magic something that has this effect. They know what it is that they respect in the old gentleman; when he has passed, their eyes follow him as they stand, still in silence, until he has disappeared round the corner; then it may well be that a hand is raised and an extended forefinger tells more eloquently than lips could of a long life adorned with all the virtues of a good citizen and untarnished by a single misdeed. He is never seen in a public place, unless indeed something relating to the common welfare is to be discussed or started. The recreation which he allows himself he seeks in his little garden. At other times he sits over his ledgers or stands in the shed superintending the loading and unloading of the slate which comes from his own quarry and which he sells all over the country and far beyond its borders. A widowed sister-in-law looks after his house for him and her sons manage the business of slating which is connected with the trade in slate and is scarcely inferior to it in size. It is their uncle's spirit, the spirit of orderliness, of conscientiousness to the point of obstinacy, that rests upon the nephews and gains and keeps for them such confidence that they are sent for from far away wherever a slater is needed to roof a new building or to make extensive repairs to an old one.

It is a peculiar life that goes on in the house with the green window-shutters. The sister-in-law, still a beautiful woman, little younger than the master of the house, treats him with a kind of silent respect, or even veneration. And her sons do the same. The old gentleman shows his sister-in-law a respectful consideration, a sort of chivalry that has something touching in its grave reserve; toward his nephews he displays the fondness of a father. Yet even there something lies between them that lends to their whole intercourse something of considerate formality.

The sabbath-like peace that now spreads its wings above the most strenuous activity of the dwellers in the house did not always hover there. There was a time when bitter sorrow that came from stolen happiness, and wild desires divided its inmates, when even the menace of murder cast its shadow into the house; when despair at self-created misery wandered, wringing its hands in the still night, from the back door, up the stairs and along the piazza and down again by the path between the little garden and the stable-yard to the shed, creeping restlessly to the front again and again to the back.

What, at that time, made the hearts in the house swell to the bursting-point, what went on in the shadowed souls and issued from them in part, in the self-forgetfulness of fear, or became a deed, a deed of desperation--all that may pass through the memory of the man with whom we have been occupied. It is thirty-one years today since he returned to his home town from a long absence. So we turn back the thirty-one years and find a young man instead of the old one whom we leave. He is tall, but not so strong; and, like the old man, he wears his brown hair cut short at the back and brushed into a "corkscrew-curl" above his high white forehead. The sternness of the old man does not yet appear in his face, and the scar of mental pain endured has not yet been stamped upon his good-humored expression. Yet he is far from showing the light-hearted carelessness usually belonging to his age and the easy-going manners that are so frequently habitual with the traveling journeyman. The high road still leads him through the dense woods; but from the town, far down below, the sound of St. George's bells rises up to the height, as impossible to restrain as a mother flying to the loved child that comes toward her. Home! How much lies in this one short syllable! What swells within the human heart when the voice of home, the tone of the bells, calls a welcome to him who is returning from abroad, the tone that called the child to church, the boy to his confirmation and his first communion, that spoke to him every hour! In the idea of home, all our good angels embrace one another.

Tears gathered in our young wanderer's serious and yet kindly eyes. If he had not been ashamed he would have sobbed aloud. He felt as if he had only dreamed his sojourn away from home and, now that he was awake, could scarcely remember the dream; as if he had only dreamed that he had grown to be a man while abroad; as if it had always seemed to him in his dreams that he was only dreaming abroad in order, when he should wake up at home, to be able to tell about it. It might have been noticed that, in spite of all this inward agitation of the moment, he did not fail to see the cobweb that the breeze from home laid as a greeting against his coat collar, and that he carefully dried his tears so that they might not fall on his neckerchief, and that he removed the last, tiniest scraps of the silver thread with the most persistent patience before he gave himself up to his feeling for home with his whole soul. And even his attachment to his home was in part only an expression of his obstinate need of cleanliness which made him regard everything alien that threatened to fly against him as dirt; and this need in turn sprang from the warmth of feeling with which he embraced everything that stood in closer relation to his personality. The clothes on his body were a piece of home to him, from which he must ward off everything strange.

Now the road turned; the mountain ridge which had closed it in up to this point was now left behind to one side and the top of a spire appeared above the young growth. It was the top of St. George's steeple. The young wanderer paused. Natural as it was that the highest building of the town should become visible to him before the others, the tender meaning with which his fancy imbued the fact made him forget that it was so. The slate roof of the church and steeple needed repairs. This work had been given to his father; and it was the reason, or at least the pretext, for his father's calling him back home sooner than he had intended. Perhaps tomorrow he would begin his part of the work. There, above the wide arch through which he saw the bells moving, the steeple door had been placed. There the two beams would have to be pushed out to bear the ladder on which he should climb up to the broach-post to fasten to it the rope of the contrivance in which he would make his airy circuit of the roof. And as it was his nature to bind the cords of his heart to the objects with which his work brought him in touch, he saw a greeting in the sudden appearance of the spire and involuntarily reached out toward it as if he would press a hand offered him in friendship. Then the thought of the work quickened his step, till a clearing in the wood and his arrival on the highest slope of the mountain showed him his whole home town lying at his feet.

Again he stopped. There stood his father's house with the slate shed behind it, not far from it the house where she had lived at the time he went away. Now she lived in his father's house, was his father's daughter, his brother's wife; and from now on he was to live in the same house with her and to see her daily as his sister-in-law. His heart beat harder at the thought of her. But it did not allow any of the hopes which had formerly been bound up with her memory to rise. His affection had become that of a brother for a sister, and what moved him now was more like anxiety. He knew that she thought of him with dislike. She was the only one in his father's whole house who looked forward to his coming with displeasure. How had this all come about? Had there not been a time when she seemed to be fond of him, when she had apparently liked to meet him as much as she later avoided him? Down below there, in front of the town, the shooting-house stood surrounded by gardens. How much bigger the trees round the house had grown since he had waved his last greeting to it from this height! Shortly before he had stood there under that acacia--it had been a beautiful spring evening, the most beautiful he thought he had ever known--at the Whitsuntide shooting. Within all the other young people were dancing; he walked happily round outside the house in which he knew her to be dancing. Even now he still felt embarrassed with girls and women and did not know how to talk to them; at that time he had felt even more so. How dearly he would have loved to tell her--how much he had to tell her, when he was alone, and how well he knew how to say it; and if chance ordained that he met her alone (it was wonderful how busy chance seemed to be in arranging such meetings) the thought that now the moment had come drove all the blood to his heart, the words from his tongue back into their hiding-place in the depths of his soul. Thus it had been when, her cheeks still glowing from the dance, she had come out of the house alone. She seemed to be concerned only with getting cool; she fanned herself with her white scarf, but her cheeks only grew the redder. He felt that she had seen him, that she expected him to come nearer; and it was the knowledge that he understood her that dyed her cheeks redder--that drove her, as he hesitated, back again into the hall. Perhaps, too, she had heard a third person coming. His brother came out of another door of the hall. He had seen the two standing silently opposite each other, perhaps had also seen the girl's blush. "Are you looking for Beate?" asked our hero to hide his embarrassment. "No," answered his brother, "she is not at the dance--and it's just as well. Nothing can come of it, after all; I must get another--and until I find one, Bohemian beer is my sweetheart."

There was something wild in his brother's speech. Our hero looked at him amazed and at the same time disturbed. "Why can nothing come of it?" he asked. "And what is the matter with you?"

"Oh, yes, you think I ought to be like you, pious and patient so long as there is no thread on your coat. But I am another kind of fellow, and if anybody upsets my calculations I have to let off steam. Why can nothing come of it? Because the old man in the blue coat won't have it."

"Father called you into the little garden yesterday--"

"Yes, and raised his white eyebrows, which are drawn with a ruler, an inch and a half. 'I thought it was so. You are going with Beate, the collector's daughter. That comes to an end today!'"

"Is it possible? And why?"

"Did you ever know old Blue-coat to give any 'why'? And did you ever ask him 'But why, father?' He didn't say so, but I know why it has to come to an end with me and Beate. I've been expecting it the whole week; whenever he raised his hand I thought he was pointing to the little garden and was ready to follow him like a poor sinner. That is the place where he gives his cabinet orders. The collector is said not to be in very good circumstances. There is some gossip about his spending more than his pay. And--well, you are a quill-driver, too, like old Blue-coat. But what can the girl do? Or I? Well, the affair must stop--but I'm sorry about the girl, and I must see how I can forget her. I must drink or get another one."

Our hero was accustomed to his brother's manner; he knew that the words were not intended to be as wild as they sounded, and his brother was showing his love and respect for their father by the fact of his obedience; still our hero would have liked to see them shown in speech as well as in action. It seemed to Apollonius as if there were something unclean on his brother's soul and involuntarily he stroked the other's coat collar several times with his hand as if he could brush it off him from outside. Dust had collected on the collar during the dance; when he had removed it he felt as if he had really removed what had troubled him.

The subject of their conversation changed. They began to speak of the girl who had just been out, fanning herself to get cool; Apollonius certainly did not know that he was responsible for this. Just as the girl was the goal to which all his lines of thought led, so, too, when once he began to speak of her he could not escape from his theme. He forgot his brother so completely that at last he was really talking to himself. His brother now seemed for the first time to perceive all the beautiful and good things in her that the hero lauded with unconscious eloquence. He agreed with more and more enthusiasm until he broke into a wild laugh which roused the hero from his self-forgetfulness and dyed his cheeks as red as those of the girl had been a short time before.

"And so you slink about round the hall where she is dancing with others, and if she shows herself you haven't the heart to draw her into conversation. Wait, I will be your ambassador. From now on she shall dance no turn except with me, so that no one else shall cross your plans. I know how to get on with girls. Let me take your part for you."

Our hero was frightened at the thought that the girl should learn that very day what he felt for her. Besides, he was ashamed of his own embarrassed and awkward behavior to her, and of what she must think of him when she knew that he needed a mediator. He had already raised his hand to stop his brother when the appearance of the girl herself caused everything else to grow dark to him. Quietly and alone, as before, she stepped out of the door. Beneath the scarf with which she had fanned herself she seemed to glance furtively about her. Again he saw her cheeks grow redder. Had she seen him? But she turned her face in the opposite direction. She seemed to be looking for something in the grass in front of her. He saw her pick a little flower, lay it on a bench and, after she had stood for a time as if in doubt whether she should pick it up again or not, with quick decision turn again to the door. A half involuntary movement of her arm seemed to tell him to take it, that it was picked for him. Once more a wave of red rushed up over her face to her dark brown hair, and the haste with which she disappeared in the door seemed intended to prevent a regret which might give rise to anxiety as to how her conduct would be understood.

The brother, who seemed not to have noticed anything of all this, had continued to speak in his lively, vehement fashion; his words were lost; our hero would have had to have had two lives in order to hear them, for all the one he possessed was in his eyes. Now he saw his brother rushing away toward the hall. He thought of detaining him, but it was too late. In vain he hurried after him up to the door. There the flower absorbed him again which the girl had left lying for some finder, for a happy one, if _he_ found it for whom it was intended. And while his lips continued to call softly and mechanically to his brother, who no longer heard him, to keep silence, he was inwardly asking himself: "Was it really I for whom she laid the flower here? Did she lay it here for any one?" His heart answered both questions with a happy "Yes," while at the same time the thing that his brother intended to do troubled him.

If it was a sign of love from her and for him, then it was the last.

Twice he glanced surreptitiously into the hall when the door was opened; he saw her dancing with his brother and then, when they were resting after the dance, he saw his brother talking persuasively to her in his hasty way. "Now he is talking of me," he thought, his whole face burning. He rushed into the shade of the bushes when she left the hall. His brother took her home. He followed them at as great a distance as he thought necessary to prevent her seeing him. When his brother came back from accompanying her he stepped away from the door. He felt naked with shame. His brother had noticed him nevertheless. He said: "She won't hear of you yet; I don't know whether she means it, or whether it is just airs. I shall meet her again. No tree falls at one stroke. But I must confess, you have good taste. I don't know where my eyes have been up to now. She's away ahead of Beate; and that's saying a good deal!"

From then on his brother had danced untiringly with Walter's Christiane and spoken for Apollonius and always, after he had taken her home, he came and gave our hero an account of his efforts on his behalf. For a long time he was uncertain whether it was only affectation, or whether she really looked with disfavor on our hero. He repeated conscientiously what he had said in our hero's praise, and how she had answered his questions and assurances. He still had hope after our hero had already given it up. And her behavior toward the latter would have compelled him to realize that he could expect no return of his affection, even if he had not known what answers she gave his brother. She avoided him wherever she saw him as assiduously as she had formerly seemed to seek him. And had it really been he whom she had sought before, if indeed she had sought any one?

A hundred times his brother urged him to waylay her and press his own suit. He exerted all his inventive power to procure him an opportunity of speaking to her alone. Our hero refused to be urged or to accept his offers. After all, it was useless. All that he might accomplish would be to make her still more angry.

"I can't stand by any longer and see you growing thinner and paler all the time," said his brother one evening, after he had reported how unsuccessfully he had spoken for him again that day. "You must go away from here for a while; that will have good results for you in two ways. When I tell her that it is on her account that you have gone out into the world, perhaps she will turn. Believe me, I know the long-haired tribe, and I know how to treat them. You must write her a touching letter for good-by; I will deliver it, and I'll manage to soften her heart. And if it can't be accomplished, it will do you good to be away from here where everything reminds you of her, for a year--or several years. And finally, strange places will make another man of you, who will know better how to get round the apron-wearers. You must learn to dance; that's already half the battle. And anyway, the old Blue-coat has been asked by his cousin in Cologne to send one of us to him; I read it the other day in a letter that had fallen out of his pocket. Just tell him that you have gathered something of the sort from several things he has said lately and that you are ready to go if he wants you to. Or let me do that. You are too honest."