A Noble Name; or, Dönninghausen

CHAPTER XXIV

DR. URBAN WOLF

Johanna had thought that the worst was over when she took her departure from Dönninghausen; and, indeed, the first days and nights that she spent by her sister's bedside were occupied wholly with care and anxiety for the little one. The child lay in the delirium of fever, – raved in terror of a little black pony, – declared, screaming, that she never would dance again, never would appear in the circus; while Helena, with tears, confessed that Lisbeth's illness was the result of a fall she had while at a rehearsal.

Johanna's presence seemed to soothe the child, and, forgetting herself, she was always beside her bed; but then came the letters from the home she had left, and they recalled all the old pain and conflict.

Involuntarily she looked first for Otto's letter. Her heart had not yet forgotten to beat faster at the sight of his handwriting. But the more she read of it, the more it dulled her, and at its conclusion she laid it aside with a sensation of disgust. Did he think to lure her back thus? Did he know her so little? Had he so entirely lost all feeling of self-respect? One honest word from him, and all might have been well. Without implicating Magelone, he might have said to the Freiherr, 'I have wronged Johanna; forgive me if she forgives.' Had she hoped for this? Had she for an instant thought this solution possible? No, oh, no! Had she not written both to him and to Aunt Thekla – had she not repeated – did she not feel with every throb of her heart – that all was over between Otto and herself?

And this must be written to her grandfather. Otto had with great skill used her hint as to making her relations with these people the reason for their separation. Half the work was done; why should she delay to do the rest?

At first she found an explanation for this in her exertions as a nurse, which were unremitting. But when, at her earnest entreaty, Lisbeth was removed from the first story of the noisy hotel, where Batti had established himself, to a quiet back room in the third story, she daily grew better, and Johanna could no longer make her care the pretext for delay.

And, like all who earnestly strive after it, she, too, found 'the bitter word of liberating truth.' She pitilessly insisted to herself upon the fact that in his cool attempt at a reconciliation Otto's aim had been the preservation of friendly relations between himself and his grandfather, and that she should contribute more to his happiness by vanishing from Dönninghausen for his sake than by paving the way for her justification, and she determined to sacrifice herself. She would not – she could not love him any longer. She persuaded herself that she did not. But she might, without loss of self-respect, take upon herself the consequences of his fault. In this conviction she wrote to her grandfather.

When her letter was despatched she sank into a dull apathy. Slowly, monotonously, hour after hour, day after day passed by. Her solitude was but rarely invaded. There was little to be done at present for the child. Helena, who had talked at first about taking her share of the nursing, was soon weary, and Batti was satisfied with asking every morning what kind of a night Lisbeth had passed, and how she was at present. After receiving the usual answer, 'About the same!' and then standing for a while beside the bed looking down at the poor little figure lying motionless with half-closed eyes, he became, Helena declared, so depressed that it needed half a day's distraction to wear off the impression produced upon him by his visit to the sick-room.

"We have two patients, dear Johanna," said Helena; "and I really believe that my task as Carlo's nurse is harder than yours. Fancy the self-control it costs me to conceal from poor Carlo the anguish of my heart; to dress, to receive visits, to walk and drive, and to preside at the little suppers to which Carlo has accustomed himself as well as his friends. It is not enough to give artistic performances; the artist must maintain his position in society; and, since Batti needs my aid in this, I must not refuse it."

After talk of this kind she would kiss her 'poor little sick angel,' embrace Johanna, call her her comfort and support, and then return to her usual mode of life without a thought as to the amount of Johanna's self-denial.

Johanna had no sense of exercising any, but the confinement and the bald desolation of her surroundings added to her weight of misery. The room to which Lisbeth had been removed was low-ceiled and scarcely ten paces square, the walls were covered with a gaudy paper, the child's bed stood at one end, with an old sofa, upon which Johanna slept; against one wall stood a couple of common tables and chairs, and curtains of doubtful cleanliness were hanging before the little window, which looked out upon a narrow side-street. Helena declared that she herself could not exist four-and-twenty hours in such a 'hole;' but it never occurred to her to try to make it more comfortable. Why should she trouble herself? By foolishly breaking off her engagement Johanna had relinquished all claim to especial respect, and must be glad to find an asylum with her quasi-step-father. Unfortunately, she was quite as haughty as formerly. In vain did Helena try to discover the cause of her break with her lover. "I cannot speak of it," Johanna always repeated; and then Batti in his violent way would order his wife not to 'torment the poor thing.' "I am glad," he would say, "that it has happened as it has; now she will no longer refuse to accede to my plans. In a year she will be the queen of my circus."

Johanna never suspected this. Batti begged her kindly to accept for the present the shelter of his 'nomad-tent,' and she accepted gratefully what was cordially offered. She scarcely thought of the future, – the present, with its dull, paralyzing pain, so weighed upon her soul.

At last she was roused by a letter from Dönninghausen. Aunt Thekla had addressed the envelope. It contained a communication from her grandfather. Johanna kissed the handwriting, as she had so often kissed the withered hand that had traced it, and then read the letter, feeling as she did so the angry glance of his large eyes, and hearing the muttered thunder of his voice. He wrote, —

"So much time elapsed between my letter and your answer, that there can have been no inconsiderate haste on your part. You have reflected upon all that required reflection, and therefore there is scarcely any need of my express declaration that with the breaking of your troth to Otto every tie between yourself and myself and every member of my family, is severed forever. How you justify yourself in casting a doubt upon Otto's affection for you I cannot tell; at all events, you cannot doubt his honour. A Dönninghausen keeps his word. And Otto still feels himself bound, as he has repeatedly told me. I thought you, too, a genuine child of my house; but you are only the child of your mother, the first, the only Dönninghausen who ever deviated from the paths of duty and honour. Otto will write to you. If he succeeds in convincing and persuading you, you shall still find me inclined to forgive; but decide quickly, or this is the last word you will receive from your grandfather,

"Johann Freiherr von Dönninghausen."

This was too much! Johanna folded the letter again with trembling hands. Her mother, the patient sufferer, and she herself, who surely had never 'sought her own,' were disgraced and exiled, while Otto was looked upon as the genuine Dönninghausen who keeps his word, and Magelone as one of the blameless ones who have never strayed from the true path. Anger and pride for a moment thrust pain into the background. She would be final also, as her grandfather had been, – would prove to herself thus that she was of his blood.

She went to the open window and looked out. On the other side of the wall that bounded the little street lay a garden with fruit-trees and beds of vegetables. It was late in the afternoon, and raining. From the low clouds came the 'sound of vernal showers' filling the air and rustling low among the tree-tops; a mingled fragrance of herbs, flowers, and wet earth ascended to the window, and under the influence of the murmuring sound and the scent-laden air her tormenting reflections faded into dreamy revery. From the misty veil of the rain came trooping, at first vaguely, but in ever-increasing distinctness, forms and pictures, – the past and the present, the real and the unreal, blending together. When the light was brought, Johanna awoke as from a deep sleep.

And as she awoke she found herself back again in the midst of the old life. Each throb of her heart brought with it a dull pain, a constant grief. She saw with pitiless distinctness what she had lost. Anxiety for Lisbeth oppressed her. And yet everything was changed! The spell that had fettered her since that unhappy morning in the forest was broken, and she looked beyond herself out into the eternal beauty of life, which is independent of all individual happiness or misery.

As formerly in Dönninghausen, she now tried to fix and confirm in writing the shadowy images that rose before her; but she did not do it as then, only from a desire to liberate her soul. An impulse towards artistic creation had awakened within her, – an inheritance from her father, as she joyfully reflected, – and she began to group and arrange as a whole that which her fancy showed her phantom-like and confused.

Hour after hour she sat at the improvised desk which she had placed at the window of the sick-room. A new home was here given her in place of the beautiful, beloved one she had lost. Or was it not rather a home-coming, a recovery of the dear old haunts of memory? Banished from Dönninghausen, she fled to Lindenbad. Amid the green valleys and hills of the Thüringian forest she laid the scene of her story, and a profusion of melodious echoes from the days of her early girlhood lent it a brightness that refreshed Johanna herself.

Weeks passed; Johanna buried herself in her task with passionate intensity. The hours of daylight often did not suffice her; and even when her lamp was extinguished, darkness brought no repose. The phantoms of her fancy crowded about her and kept her awake. And many were her struggles with an imperfect, undeveloped power of expression, with an uncertain hand, and an untrained eye.

That she should suffer physically under this constant nervous strain was but natural. Several times the physician called Helena's attention to the fact that her step-daughter needed exercise in the open air. At last, when he found his warnings unheeded, he went to Batti and informed him that unless some attention were paid to Fräulein Johanna's health they should soon have two nervous-fever patients in the house.

Batti rushed into his wife's room. "Helena, why have you so neglected Johanna?" he shouted. "She will have nervous fever, and will die, all through our fault. Curse me if I ever shall forgive myself! Come, come, we must beg her to forgive us!"

With these words he rushed away again. Helena followed him, and found him in the room up-stairs, confronting the astounded girl, clasping her hand in his, while he overwhelmed her with entreaties, proposals, and self-accusations. Helena must in future do her share of nursing. Johanna must refresh herself, distract her mind; go to the circus, make acquaintances. The end of it all was that he prevailed upon her to put on her riding-habit. He would accompany her on her ride, and she should try his Miss Jane, a mare positively made for her.

At first she felt embarrassed. Batti was not only a well-known character in the sporting world, – there was no end of bows and nods from riders and gay occupants of carriages, – he was also a great favourite with the general populace. "There goes Batti! Batti!" the street-boys shouted after him; and he threw trifling coins among the rabble, and laughed at the scramble thus caused. But at last streets and promenades lay behind them, and away they galloped through the open country. Miss Jane, a delicate, high-bred creature, ran races with Batti's gray. After long days of rain, field and forest lay basking in the sunshine. The breeze was at once fresh and warm; to inhale the delicious air of which she had so long been deprived was like a revivifying draught for Johanna. She returned to the house refreshed and rejuvenated.

"By Jove, how well you look!" cried Batti, as he helped her to dismount. "Pray glance at your mirror and then deny that you are a born horsewoman."

This declaration, with a hundred variations of the same, was the theme of all Carlo Batti's conversation with Johanna, and she saw him now more frequently than formerly. Lisbeth's condition had suddenly improved: she regained her consciousness; the fever left her; she slept, and her appetite returned. She soon began to sit up for hours at a time. Batti required, with a determination that admitted of no opposition, that Johanna should indemnify herself for her long seclusion. And when Helena declared that it would be very improper for her step-daughter to appear without her at the circus, at the table-d'hôte, and at Batti's little suppers, he insisted that the maid should watch beside Lisbeth while her mother and sister were absent. Johanna must learn to love the life for which Batti destined her.

And she really enjoyed seeing the circus. The fine horses, the splendour of the costumes, Batti's performances in riding and training his animals, two beautiful blonde sisters, who were really fine performers in their way, the numerous well-disciplined troupe, the brilliant lights, the loud music, the enthusiastic applause of a large audience, all contributed to produce upon Johanna an agreeably exciting impression.

But she felt exceedingly uncomfortable in the circle in which she found herself soon afterwards, at one of Batti's suppers. Men only were invited, – partly members of the aristocracy, partly belonging to the literary class. The tone which they adopted towards Batti hovered between condescension and rude familiarity. When excited by wine he began to brag. They drew him on without his perceiving it. Helena was loaded by them with coarse flattery, which her insatiate vanity led her to accept, well pleased.

Johanna, who was taken to table by a young and rather silent lieutenant, looked on in silence. The place on her other side was empty. At last a young man appeared, who, when greeted by Batti with reproaches for his tardiness, excused himself on the plea of urgent work for his newspaper. Batti signed to him to take the vacant seat beside Johanna, and presented him to her as Dr. Edgar Stein.

"At last, Fräulein!" he said. "You have been invisible for so long, while our friend Batti has been unwearied in his wondrous tales of you, that I began to regard you as a mythical being 'veiled in lovely legend.'"

Johanna mutely inclined her head. The round, red face of the man, with its bold blue eyes and cynical smile, made a most disagreeable impression upon her.

Helena, who sat opposite, laughed in a constrained manner. "What has Batti been saying?" she asked. "We must certainly find out, Johanna."

"Why, he described the Fräulein half as one of the bold horsewomen, – Wodan's daughters, – half as a Saint Elizabeth, – cheering the sad, healing the sick, and so forth; then half as an aristocratic lady, half as an artiste. And from what I see I believe it all." Whereupon Dr. Stein bowed, and laughed as if in derision of his own words.

"Johanna, you ought to be proud!" cried Helena. "Dr. Stein1 is usually quite what his name signifies towards women."

"But not towards you, fairest dame!" he replied. "You never deigned to notice me, poor, pale moon among the stars that circle about your sunlike majesty."

As he spoke, his glance seemed to ridicule all present. Helena smiled contented; Johanna felt more and more disgusted. And although the young man, strong in his armour of self-conceit, never suspected the sensation he inspired, he could not but perceive that he was far from producing upon Johanna the impression he had intended, and he was not the man to forgive this.

The talk grew louder and freer. Even in her father's house this had sometimes occurred; but Johanna had never felt disturbed by the conversation there, where the refinement of the host had always restrained the mirth and frivolity of his guests within certain limits. But who was there to do that here? At last she could bear it no longer, and, while a toast was being drunk standing, she contrived to withdraw unperceived; and the next morning she explained that she could not leave Lisbeth so late at night again. The child had discovered the absence of her beloved nurse, had cried bitterly, and had not slept until some time after Johanna's return. Henceforth Batti was obliged to content himself with the daily ride which the physician ordered for the young girl, and which she herself would have been sorry to omit.

She heard nothing further from Dönninghausen, although she had entreated Aunt Thekla to write to her. Only a couple of large trunks, containing all her belongings, had arrived. She unpacked them, shaking out every article which they contained, in the hope of finding some scrap of writing. In vain! Only a ring which Aunt Thekla had always worn had been added to Johanna's small store of trinkets. Evidently the Freiherr had, as he had warned her, forbidden all communication with her.

All the greater was her surprise, when one day a card was brought her, upon which beneath the name of 'Dr. Urban Wolf' was written in pencil, 'with a message from Dönninghausen.'

For an instant she hesitated; but the longing to have some tidings of her grandfather and aunt was victorious. As she could not at the time leave Lisbeth, she placed the screen before the bed of the sleeping child, and requested to have the stranger shown up.

"Pardon me for my intrusion," he said. "I ought to have asked an introduction from Batti, but it was necessary that I should speak with you alone."

Johanna was agreeably impressed. There was something in the stranger's deep, full voice that reminded her of some tones of her father's. There, however, the resemblance ended. Dr. Wolf's figure was short and slender, and his pale, delicate face evidently Jewish.

"Pray be seated," she said, motioning him to a chair; and her breath came short and quick as she added, "You bring me tidings of my relatives; do you come from Dönninghausen?"

"No, I do not," he said, without looking up. "My father, Löbel Wolf, the dealer in curiosities, is commissioned by the Freiherr von Dönninghausen to make you a proposition, which I am to lay before you."

He paused, as if awaiting encouragement to proceed. Johanna, however, gave him none, not knowing what to say, and he went on: "I fear I must allude to matters which it is painful to you to – With regard to certain jewels, an heirloom in the family; an inheritance from your mother – "

"I make no claim to them!" Johanna interrupted him, and her voice trembled. Was it possible that her grandfather could think her mercenary?

"Permit me to conclude," the young man continued, and his tone and manner showed how disagreeable he found his task. "The Freiherr wishes to retain the jewels in the Dönninghausen family; but, since they are undeniably yours, he can do so only by obtaining your consent that he should purchase them from you. My father has appraised them; here is his estimate in writing – " And he would have handed Johanna a folded piece of paper. She declined it.

"No, no; this is out of the question!" she exclaimed. "That the jewels are a family heirloom is quite enough to establish the fact that I can have no possible claim upon them. And if I had, one does not sell family jewels, – not even I, although I have no family!"

She arose and went to the window; the stranger must not perceive her emotion.

Dr. Wolf also arose. "I have another commission to fulfil. The old Freifräulein Thekla sent for my father, begged him to come himself to Hanover to transact this affair, to give you her affectionate greetings, and then to let her know how you are. What shall I write to him?"

"That I am well," she said.

"Well!" the young man repeated. "Pardon me, Fräulein, I cannot believe it."

Johanna turned to him. "Herr Doctor," she said, with some haughtiness.

"Pardon me," he said again, looking her sadly in the face. "I have scarcely seen you, but I know that this is no fitting home for you. How long can you endure it? For the present you do so, because you feel that you are needed here, but what will you do when that need no longer exists?"

Johanna blushed crimson. "Herr Doctor," she began, "these are questions – "

"Which you think I have no right to put," he completed her sentence; and then went on, in his gentle, persistent voice, "I knew that I should have to allude to what it would be most painful to you to have mentioned, but it is best to tell you frankly how matters stand. The old Freifräulein confided to my father that the purchase of the jewels is a mere pretence. The Freiherr has parted with you; but he cannot endure to think of you, without means, exposed to the vicissitudes of life. His pride will not allow him openly to offer you a helping hand, and yet he feels it his duty to support you. Meet him half-way."

"Impossible!" Johanna declared.

He was silent for a while. "Pray do not let this be your final decision," he entreated. "Reflect; think how long and sad the life has been that has made your grandfather so hard, and be you all the gentler. The repentance is bitter that comes too late." He stroked back his hair from his forehead, and added, as if in self-reproach, "I pray you to forgive my presumption! You do not know; I may one day, perhaps, be able to explain – There is a certain community of suffering between us. I will call in a few days for your answer to the Freiherr."

And, without waiting for a reply, he took his leave.

CHAPTER XXV

A WAGER AND AN ADVISER

Johanna was much agitated. Again she felt bitterly her separation from Dönninghausen, and she was also suddenly assailed by anxiety with regard to her future. The young man was right. When she should be no longer of use as Lisbeth's nurse she could not remain with her step-mother; and what then?