A Noble Name; or, Dönninghausen

CHAPTER XII

CELA N'ENGAGE À RIEN

The first days of March had come. The Freiherr wished to ride to the saw-mill, and asked Johanna to go with him; but, just as they had mounted their horses, a farmer arrived to speak with the Freiherr, who never allowed a working-man to wait. So he gave Johanna directions, and she started off for the saw-mill in the clear morning, escorted by Leo.

The long frost had been followed by a rain, and now the sun was shining. An east wind blew fresh over hill and dale, here and there only on the edges of the meadows narrow strips of snow still lingered, while the fields at the foot of the mountains showed the tender green of the winter wheat. The brook, freed from its icy fetters, foamed along between high banks, and from every bush by the roadside finches, thrushes, and redbreasts proclaimed that winter no longer held sway.

Johanna, too, felt the happy influence of the 'blind motions of the spring.' Latterly she had been greatly depressed, – anxiety on Ludwig's account, she said to herself. He had written that his principal object in going to India was to study climatic fevers; but what really troubled her, although she did not acknowledge it to herself, was Otto's silence. More than five weeks had passed since she had written to him, and she had received no reply. Magelone asked nearly every day, "No letter from Otto yet? I call it very discourteous." And Johanna could not bring herself to confess that the cold tone of her letter was probably the cause of his silence. She could not herself understand how, after their last conversation, she could have brought herself to write so. She repeatedly told herself that Otto could not possibly reply, and yet she looked for some word from him, eagerly and anxiously, as each post came in.

To-day she had felt especially melancholy, but the airs of spring swept away all trouble from her mind. As she looked around her she forgot herself, and felt only the refreshing renewal of life everywhere abroad.

She had followed the travelled road upwards, – the saw-mill was at the upper end of the valley, – through the village, over the bridge, and across the meadows on the right bank of the stream. But whilst stopping at the mill to deliver her grandfather's message, she looked longingly over to the steep left bank. In spite of the miller's remonstrances, she rode her horse over the wooden bridge; he clambered up the rocky ascent, and away went steed and rider along the narrow path on the edge of the forest. She felt as though she had wings.

Suddenly at a turn of the valley she perceived two horse-men coming up the stream on the right bank, and, recognizing her grandfather and old Martin, the groom, she remembered that the Freiherr had called after her, "If I can, I will come to meet you."

He, too, saw her now. He stopped, beckoned, shouted to her something that she could not understand, and then turned his horse. But she had already turned hers. She gave the spirited creature a slight cut with her whip, and as she shook her bridle-rein it leaped from the high bank directly across the foaming stream. For an instant Johanna felt stunned as she found herself on the right bank. Leo ran to and fro on the other side, barking in great distress.

The Freiherr rode towards her. "Are you mad, child?" he called out to her from afar, whilst old Martin observed, with a grin, "There's no denyin' that our Fräulein rides equal to any dragoon."

And her grandfather, too, made but a poor feint of displeasure. When he found both horse and rider unharmed, he added, "Thunder and lightning! that was a leap that I should have been proud of myself when I was a young fellow. How did you come to take it, my girl?"

She laughed. "I hardly know myself," she said. "I did not take time to think; I had to do it."

"Just like me!" exclaimed the Freiherr. "Yes, yes, you are my own flesh and blood, a genuine Dönninghausen, and a rare one." He frowned, and for a while they rode along in silence. Then he said, "It is nonsense to leave you out of the family, and a stop must be put to it. I had intended to surprise you at the New Year's dinner with the intelligence that I am going to adopt you and give you my name, that there may be no longer any disagreeable memory between us. Johann Leopold's accident prevented it. I tell you to-day as a reward for your feat of horsemanship."

Johanna was startled. At another time she might not have ventured any remonstrance; now the exhilarating effect of her 'feat of horsemanship' had not yet passed off, and she replied, in a low, firm voice, "Thank you, my dear grandfather; I know how kindly you mean this, but I cannot accept your offer."

"Johanna!" he growled, interrupting her; but she was not to be intimidated.

"No, I cannot!" she repeated. "You pride yourself upon your forbears, and I am as proud of my father and the distinguished name he bequeathed to me. Grandpapa, I thank you from my very soul, but to repudiate this name would be a transgression of the fifth commandment."

At first her grandfather's eyes had flashed angrily, but the longer she spoke the gentler became his looks and his air. Johanna never had pleased him so well as at this moment, with her glowing cheeks and sparkling eyes. However she might cling in her childish delusion to the plebeian name, she showed race, Dönninghausen race, and, moreover, her bold, fearless opposition did him good. To every despotic nature there come moments of weariness of a rule over slaves. And the allusion to the fifth commandment had its effect.

"If this is the way you take it, I must give up my plan," he said. "I enjoin upon no one any transgression of duty, any sin against God's commands. But you take a wrong view of it. When you marry – " He broke off suddenly, and his face grew dark again. Who in his own sphere would marry the actor's daughter, since she spurned in foolish arrogance the bridge which kind hands would have built for her? But ingratitude was always the reward of kindness. Otto, too, was deaf to his grandfather's well-meant admonitions, and Johann Leopold looked upon all his plans for his future with indifference, if not with aversion. This must not be!

The Freiherr returned to the castle in gloomy mood, and had scarcely reached his room when Johann Leopold made his appearance with his letters for the post.

"Stay here; I have something to say to you," the Freiherr ordered, as he turned to leave the room. Johann Leopold changed colour; the Freiherr noticed it, and the veins in his forehead began to swell. "Why do you turn so pale?" he asked, angrily. "Do me the favour to sit down, or I shall have you fainting away shortly. You are ill, nervous, and must be treated cautiously, Thekla says. Deuce take it! Brace yourself, my lad, and cheer up! The heir of Dönninghausen must not go lagging about like an hysterical girl!"

The old Herr folded his arms across his broad chest and went to the window. Johann Leopold, who, in obedience to his grandfather, had taken a seat at the table in the centre of the room, said, with an evident effort, "You are right; the present condition of affairs is intolerable; nevertheless, I hope to be able to prove to you that I have worked hard to alter it. If I have been silent hitherto, it has been, in great part at least, out of regard for you."

The Freiherr turned round. "Worked hard – been silent – regard for me!" he growled. "What does all this mean? Collect yourself. Nothing extraordinary is required of you. Only some little sympathy with my task, the administration of the property which will, heaven only knows how soon, be your own; and your betrothal with Magelone."

Johann Leopold clutched the arms of his chair, his pale face grew ashen, and without looking up he said, almost with a gasp, "Dear grandfather, I can neither be the heir nor marry Magelone. I have inherited my mother's disease, and have resolved not to bequeath it further."

"Johann Leopold!" the Freiherr almost shouted, and in two strides he stood beside him. "Diseases can be cured," he added, after a pause.

The young man shook his head. "Not this one," he said, sadly. "When my father wooed the heiress of Moorgarten, her parents informed him that the terrible curse had been inherited in their family for generations; but he said, as you do, 'Diseases can be cured.' He loved the pale, grave girl, and in spite of her illness they were very happy during their brief married life, – so happy that my poor mother did not long survive her husband's death. Long enough, however, to know that the curse of her race had been bequeathed to me."

The Freiherr stopped pacing to and fro and stood still before the young man. "Impossible!" he said, – "impossible! You imagine all this; you are a hypochondriac. We, Thekla and I, would have known of it."

"Old Christian knows it," the other rejoined. "My mother delivered me into his care, and like a mother he has guarded me and my sad secret. The attacks are rare, but very sudden. My fall on the Thalrode railway platform was in consequence of one of them."

Again the Freiherr began his walk; but his step, usually so firm, was now uncertain, and his head, usually so proudly carried, was bowed. After a while he went up to Johann Leopold, who sat buried in thought. "It is a trial, – a terrible trial," he said, laying his hand on the young man's shoulder; "but I think it will be easier for you, my poor boy, if we all help you to bear it. Magelone, too, will help, – she loves you – "

"No, sir," Johann Leopold interrupted him. "Magelone consented only to marry the heir; but to love him – !" He smiled bitterly. "And, even if she did, I never would consent to bind her fresh young life to mine. I love her too well for that. Apart, indeed, from all personal considerations, how could I consent to taint the pure blood of the Dönninghausens with the poison of epilepsy?"

"The pure blood of the Dönninghausens." The most powerful chord in the old Freiherr's soul vibrated to these words; at the same time they made the grandson, whose thoughts were so after his own heart, doubly dear to him and the desire to help him all the more fervent. He sat down beside him and took his hand.

"Diseases can be cured," he said again. "What is the lauded advance of science, if it can be of no service here? Did you speak of this to Dr. Werner?"

"Yes; his verdict is 'incurable,'" the other replied.

The Freiherr sprang to his feet. "Nonsense! How can he know that?" he cried, angrily. "Dr. Werner is young, inexperienced. We must consult distinguished authorities. I will go with you to Paris, to London, to Vienna, – wherever you choose."

"I thank you," the young man rejoined. "Your sympathy and kindness do me good; but I entreat you to spare yourself and me the pain of any such consultations. Quiet – ease of mind, as Werner says – is the only preservative against the attacks, and this I can find, not in any medical advice, but in absence, – in separation from Magelone."

The Freiherr was silent for a while, and then said, "Have you any plan of travel?"

"Yes; I should like to join Werner and go to India with him."

The Freiherr turned short upon him again: "To India? In your condition the fatigue of the journey, the influence of the climate – "

"All better for me than staying here," Johann Leopold interrupted him, and his pale face flushed for an instant. After a pause he went on more calmly: "I have been corresponding with Dr. Werner about it. He made at first the same objections that you make; but he finally acknowledged that my morbid desire for just this journey is perhaps a true instinct, – a suggestion of nature."

The Freiherr breathed more freely. "There, you see, – a suggestion of nature. Then Dr. Werner thinks your recovery possible. And it is so; you must be well. Yes, my lad, go, – go as soon as you choose; and if I can be of any service to you, rely upon me."

"If you would have an eye upon Moorgarten and Elgerode I should be greatly obliged to you."

"Certainly I will; refer your people to me," said the Freiherr. "But I have one condition to make: we will explain that you are ill, and are to travel in search of health. What your illness is must remain our secret. If you come back well, it need never be known."

Johann Leopold passed his hand across his brow and eyes with his own peculiar gesture of weariness. "Magelone must be told."

"Least of all Magelone!" cried his grandfather. "If she cannot be spared it always – well, then she must endure it; but let her hope as long as she can. She deserves it at your hands. She loves you. I saw that plainly while you were ill."

The young man smiled bitterly again, arose, and went to the window. Before him lay the park, with its lindens of a hundred years, which had shaded his childish games; beyond it soared the mountain-peaks, – Eichberg, Klettberg, and Elbenhöhe, – with their magnificent forests and hunting-grounds, which he had been taught from infancy to regard as his inheritance, and for the care of which he felt himself responsible, as well as for the villagers nestling in the valley under the protection of the ancient castle of Dönninghausen.

To resign it all voluntarily was hard; and yet how much harder was it to resign his claim – superficial although it were – upon Magelone! He had long been convinced that it must be done, but he had always shrank and hesitated. Ludwig's words – 'Never delay where the knife is necessary' – occurred to him. He would not any longer keep himself and others in useless suspense.

"Grandfather," he said, in a tone of forced composure, "it would be best to put a speedy end to it all, – to give me up as a forlorn hope. Let the heirship devolve upon Otto; and Magelone – "

"The heirship to Otto!" the Freiherr interposed, in a voice of thunder. "Never, so long as I have a voice in the matter! That would be certain ruin for Dönninghausen. Remember. Scarcely two years ago Otto made away with everything he had inherited from his mother, and think of the debts I have paid for him since!"

"That is over, sir," said Johann Leopold. "Since Otto promised you he would never play again, he has never – my information comes from a trustworthy source – touched a card."

The Freiherr, who was again pacing to and fro, waved his hand in sign of disapproval. "I do not trust the fellow," he murmured; and then went on aloud, "Why discuss matters which are quite out of the question? You are the heir, and the heir you will remain, even although" – he hesitated a moment – "even although you should decide not to marry. I can transfer to you the work of my life in full confidence that you will continue it after my own fashion. I rely upon you to do so, difficult as you may find it, and even although the task requires you to resign one or another of your own inclinations. A lofty position in this world entails upon us certain duties. Men of our rank, my dear boy, cannot choose a sphere of action. We are born into it, and it is our duty – we owe it to ourselves – to shape ourselves to it to the best of our ability."

Johann Leopold looked down; he breathed heavily, and his lips were tightly compressed. He had laboured hard for months to form a resolution, and when it was formed to carry it out, and now he perceived, with a kind of terror, that his grandfather's words had shaken his decision. Was it not as the Freiherr said? Was it not a cowardly desertion of the post which fate had accorded him to resign the inheritance of his ancestors, and to break with the duties and traditions of his rank and family? But besides his grandfather's voice others were speaking aloud within him, requiring as urgently that he should abide by what he thought right. When the Freiherr paused before him, saying, "I trust, Johann Leopold, that I may rely upon you," he looked up; he was not yet clear in his mind, and in every way strength failed him for a final decision. "I will try to get well," he replied, although he did not believe in the possibility of recovery.

His grandfather grasped his hand. "That's right, my boy! Only try, and you will do it!" he exclaimed, with a joyous hopefulness that, old as he was, always lent him a certain youthful freshness. "Let us have no hypochondriacal complaints, – no morbid self-examinations. It is well for you to go away for a while; it will give you something else to think of. Now for your preparations for your journey, that you may go as soon as possible."

The young man then confessed that, relying upon his grandfather's consent, he had already empowered Dr. Werner to arrange for his journey as far as possible; all that remained to be done he would himself attend to in Vienna, where he wanted to pass a few days.

"It would be best to follow Dr. Werner on the day after to-morrow," he added. "The vessel sails from Trieste on the 14th of this month. Everything here is arranged and attended to."

The Freiherr was surprised; he had not looked for so speedy a departure, but he was ashamed to seem averse to it.

"Well, then, the day after to-morrow," he said; "only bear up, my boy, against the women's tears."

"No one will grieve," Johann Leopold replied, with a melancholy smile.

Indeed, what with bustle and excitement, there was scarcely time for grief; but Aunt Thekla supplied tears and lamentations enough as she superintended the packing of the trunks.

It was bad enough that such a dear good creature as Dr. Werner would insist upon undertaking such a foolish expedition; and then, too, he did it for the love of science. But what a Dönninghausen could find to do in India the old lady could not for the life of her conceive; and still less did she understand how her brother could let the lad, hardly recovered as he was, leave Dönninghausen. But the Freiherr seemed better friends than ever with Johann Leopold. His voice and look when he addressed him were most kind, and sometimes when he thought himself unperceived he would gaze at his grandson with an expression of such anxiety as went to Aunt Thekla's very heart.

To Johanna Johann Leopold had much to say; he commissioned her to install Red Jakob and Christine in the Forest Hermitage; told her where to address her letters to him, and promised to write to her in return. He was as taciturn as ever with Magelone, but his eyes spoke a different language from any she had read in them before. What was the meaning in those deep, grave, melancholy eyes?

The last morning he handed his grandfather a letter. "For Magelone," he said. "Let her give you her answer, and you will write me what it is. Do not urge her, do not influence her; and if she thinks she can find her happiness elsewhere, let no consideration for me prevent her from grasping it."

The letter ran thus:

"Dear Magelone, – You know that considerations of health have determined me to this journey, which will keep me absent for an uncertain period from you and from my home. Only my grandfather and yourself must know that I am very ill, perhaps hopelessly so, and it is with great pain that I add that under these circumstances it seems to me dishonourable to hold you bound by the half betrothal at present existing between us. If I should one day return well, and find you still free, and ready anew to bestow upon me your heart and hand, my most ardent desire will be fulfilled; and perhaps, dear Magelone, I might then be better qualified to win you than now, when illness depresses and embitters me. But your future must not depend upon this perhaps; you must not, upon my account, reject or turn away from what might make you happy. You are free, perfectly free. Show our grandfather this letter, that he may know how we stand with regard to each other. If you can give him a kind word of comfort for me – no promise; I cannot accept any such from you now – I shall be heartily grateful to you. Once more, dear Magelone, you are free, whilst I am now and forever yours,

"Johann Leopold."

As soon as the carriage bearing away the traveller had vanished from the eyes that were watching its departure, the Freiherr handed this letter to Magelone. He pitied 'the warm-hearted little thing,' as he had called her ever since Johann Leopold's accident, all the more since she bore her grief with astonishing fortitude. Not a tear, not a sob, not a fainting-fit, – nothing of all that he so detested. She had extricated herself from Johann Leopold's last embrace like a little heroine, merely pressing her handkerchief once to her eyes. Not one of the women among his vaunted ancestry could have conducted herself better upon the departure of a Dönninghausen for the Holy Land.

"God willing, she shall be the lad's wife yet, and the mistress of this old cradle of our race!" the Freiherr thought, and handed her the letter.

And then the 'little heroine' went to her own room, where she read and reread the strange farewell lines. Oddly enough, although they contained none of the flattering words of love which she had often heard from others, there breathed from them a deep, ardent affection, and while the writer's words declared her free, she felt more than ever how he longed to bind her fast. Had the suspicions she had felt of him and of Johanna been groundless, then? or was he tired of straying and returning to her repentantly? However it might be, she determined to forgive him, since he lay at her feet once more. It was a pity that she must do so from such a distance! It made her laugh to think of it.