Countess Erika's Apprenticeship Part 45

He shook his head: "And you would have me believe that the tears you have just shed are for that poor creature? It is hardly worth the trouble. Countess Erika, I have followed you to speak with you undisturbed for the last time, to thank you, and to entreat your forgiveness. Be frank with me, as I shall be with you. Let us have the consolation of knowing that, when we parted, the heart of each was laid bare to the other: it will be but poor comfort, after all."

He uttered the words with so decided a casting aside of all disguise that Erika's pride availed her nothing. In vain did she seek for words in which to reply. She looked in his face, and was startled to see it so wan and haggard.

"You see," he said, perceiving her dismay, "that in this case your wounded pride may be entirely satisfied; you can easily dispense with it. Compared with the torture I have endured since the day before yesterday evening, your pain is mere child's play. Oh, I pray you,"--he spoke in somewhat of his old impatient tone, the tone of a man whose wishes are usually complied with gladly,--"sit down for a moment: this is our last opportunity for speaking with each other. I owe you an explanation. You have a right to ask me how I came to conceal from you that I was married. To that I can only reply that I never speak of my marriage. I am not proud of my wife; I never take her into society with me; few of the friends whom I have here are aware that I am married, although I do not intentionally make a secret of it. I frequently travel alone, and last autumn the relations between my wife and myself, from causes unnecessary to relate, became of so strained a nature that we agreed to separate for a time. I avoided, when I could, even the thought of her. In spite of all this, I ought not to have refrained from acquainting you with my circ.u.mstances; nor should I have done so if I had dreamed---- You shrink, but we have agreed that for once in our lives, entirely casting aside pretence, we will tell each other the truth. In this case there is nothing in it that can offend your pride.

I had conceived an enthusiasm for you when you were a very little girl.

Shall I say that I loved you from the first moment that I saw you? No!

you excited my curiosity, my wonder; I could not help thinking of you.

A veritable angel with wings would not have been more wonderful to me than such a being as yourself. I did not wish to believe in you. At times I called you too high-strung, at times I said to myself that yours was simply a cold nature. You know how I avoided you,--avoided you when I could not take my eyes off you; and then--then--you have no idea of how my heart beat when I went to you to beg to be allowed to paint your portrait. From that time all speculation with regard to you was at an end: I blissfully and gratefully accepted the miracle revealed to me; nay, I ceased to regard you as a miracle; you were for me the key to a pure, n.o.ble life, of which I had hitherto never dreamed. And I began to long for this life: the disgust I had hitherto felt for the whole world I now felt for myself; and then all was over with me. I had no longer any thought save of you; my whole soul was filled with eager antic.i.p.ation of the short time I could pa.s.s with you; when you were gone I used to sit for hours in my studio, recalling in memory your every look and word. The budding freshness of your being, which needed only a little suns.h.i.+ne to blossom forth gloriously, your profound capacity for enthusiasm, the wealth of affection concealed beneath a coldness of manner, and withal the proud, unsullied purity of your heart, mind, and soul--oh, G.o.d! how lovely it all was! But you were so far removed from me; a universe separated us. Never, no, never for one moment did I dream of your bestowing one thought of love upon me. Then, when, conscious that the joy which had come to be my life was so soon to end, I went to you in most melancholy mood, the day before yesterday evening, your look, the tone of your voice, set my brain on fire. I left you and wandered about the streets like one possessed.

When at last I went home, I shut myself up in the studio and began to dream. I pictured what my life might have been had I been free to clasp in my arms the bliss that might have been mine. I seemed to feel your presence, so pure, so holy, and yet so tender and loving. The life at which I had always sneered--a home-life--seemed to me the only one worth living, if lived with you. I dreamed it in every detail; I thought how my art could be enn.o.bled and purified through you,--my art, which until now had been little more than the cry of a tortured soul.

My former life lay far behind me, like some foul swamp from which you had rescued me. How I adored you! how tenderly and truly I reverenced you! Then on a sudden I awoke to the consciousness of how impossible it all was. I crept out into the garden, where in the early dawn all looked pale and fading like my dying dream. I forced myself to think: it pained me so to think!--but I forced myself to do so, to draw conclusions. Whichever way my thoughts turned, they led to despair,--to separation from you. I could not resist the conviction that it was my duty to end all intercourse with you as quickly as possible. What next occurred you know yourself. But you never can dream of what I endured from the time when you entered my studio yesterday morning until the moment when you followed me into the garden and there among the roses held out your hands to me, your eyes filled with light, everything about you so chaste, so grave, so tender; no, that agony you never can imagine! Not to be able to fall at your feet, to take you in my arms and say, 'My heaven, my queen, my every thought, my life, my art, shall all be one prayer of grat.i.tude to you!' To live a joyless life when joy is all unknown is nothing,--a matter of course. But when an angel opens wide the gates of Paradise for one, and one must say, 'No, I dare not!'

it is horrible! one cannot believe it possible to survive it!" He ceased.

Erika had listened to him with bowed head. Every word that he had uttered had been balm to her wounded pride, and at the same time had excited that which was most easily stirred within her, the tenderest, warmest emotion of her heart,--her compa.s.sion. She had, it is true, a vague consciousness that it was not right that she should listen to such words from a married man, but she stifled it with the excuse that it was their last interview.

His eyes sought hers: apparently he expected her to speak; but her lips refused to frame a sentence, although there was a question which she longed to ask.

He leaned towards her. "There is something you would fain ask," he whispered. "Tell me what it is."

"I--I"--at last she managed to say,--"I cannot comprehend what induced you to marry that woman."

He shrugged his shoulders: "No, nor can I, now, myself. How can I make you understand that in the world in' which I lived there were no women who inspired me with respect? it was made up of my fellow-students, and of women in no wise superior to the one of whom we are speaking. I was convinced that all her s.e.x were either like her, or were harsh old maids, like my aunt Illona. Ten years older than I, she controlled my thoughts and my actions; I could not do without her, and at last I married her for fear lest some one of my fellow-students should take her from me." He paused.

Erika drew her breath painfully.

"Shortly afterwards came fame," he began anew, "suddenly,--over-night, as it were,--and all doors were flung wide for me. I do not want to represent myself to you as a better man than I am: I do not deny that all went smoothly in the beginning. I did not suffer from the burden with which I had laden my life. Dozens of my fellows lived just as I did. She relieved me of every petty care, she removed every obstacle from my path, she undertook all my transactions with the picture-dealers, she was everything that I was not,--practical, cautious, energetic. I went into society without her,--she was content that it should be so,--and I enjoyed in intercourse with other women that charm which was lacking in my home. I felt no disgust then at my own want of all true perception. The fas.h.i.+onable circles which I frequented were in no wise in advance, so far as a lofty standard of morality was concerned, of those in which I had lived hitherto. Whence does a young artist nowadays derive his knowledge of so-called refined society? From a few exaggerated women who befriend him half the time because they are wearying for a new toy. We poor fellows have but little opportunity to sound the depths of a true, pure womanly nature, least of all in the beginning of our career. It never occurred to me to think what my life might have been under other influences, until---- Oh, Erika, Erika, why did you so transform me? Why did you drag me from the mire which was my element, to leave me to perish?"

She put both hands to her temples. "What can I do?" she murmured, hoa.r.s.ely. "What can I do?"

There she stood, pale and still, trembling with sympathy and compa.s.sion, needing help and helpless, more beautiful than ever, with cheeks flushed and eyes bright with fever.

On a sudden the cannon from San Giorgio announced the hour of noon, and instantly all the bells in Venice began to swing their brazen tongues.

Erika awaked as from a dream. "I must go," she said. "My grandmother is expecting me."

"This is farewell forever," he murmured.

He bowed his head and turned away. She could not endure the sight of his agony. Approaching him, and laying her hand upon his arm, she began, "Do you really believe that you owe no duty to your wife?"

"None!" He could not understand why she should ask the question.

"Then--then----" she stammered, "why not obtain a divorce?"

He gazed at her for an instant. "And you could then consent to be my wife? You, the beautiful, idolized Countess Erika Lenzdorff, the wife of a poor, divorced artist?"

"Yes," she replied, firmly. Then, offering him her hand, and once more lifting to his her clear, pure eyes, she left the church. In an inspired frenzy of self-sacrifice, as it were, she crossed the Piazza, where the gra.s.s grew between the uneven stones of the pavement, and above which the gray clouds were floating.

She was as if borne aloft by an inspiration that elevated her whole being. Suddenly she became aware of a discord in her sensations. On her ear there fell, sung to the tinkling accompaniment of a guitar,--the words,--

"Tu m'hai bagnato il seno mio di lagrime, T'amo d'immenso amor."

Looking up, she perceived the same repulsive musicians that had so shocked her awhile ago on the Piazza San Stefano.

She hastened her steps; but the sound long pursued her, 'T'amo d'immenso amor!' until it died away with a last 'amor.'

She frowned. She was indignant, that the wondrous, sacred word should be thus profaned.

There was no brightness in the future to which Erika looked forward. Of this she was fully aware. They must go forth into the world, he and she, with none to wish them G.o.d-speed, none to bless them. And yet the melancholy which shrouded their love made it doubly dear to her. The craving for suffering which for some time past had thrilled her excited nerves now stirred within her. Had she not been seeking it lately everywhere,--in poetry, in music, in art?

She pa.s.sed the day in this state of enthusiastic exaltation. At night she slept better than she had for long, but shortly after she awaked she was a.s.sailed by a distracting, feverish agitation. No arrangement had been made as to how she should get the intelligence from Lozoncyi with regard to his wife's consent to a divorce. Would he bring the information himself? would he send her a note? Ten o'clock struck,--half-past ten,--eleven,--and no message came. Her hands, her lips, her brow, burned with fever; she drew her breath with difficulty.

About eleven o'clock the old Countess went to take her forenoon walk.

She had been gone but a short time when Ludecke announced Herr von Lozoncyi.

Erika had him shown up, and the first glance which she cast at his face told her that for him there was no possibility of a release.

Without a word she held out her hand to him. His hand was icy cold and trembled in her clasp; he looked pale and wretched,--the picture of misery.

Possessed absolutely by the pity that had filled her soul, she saw in his face only torturing despair at not being able to rid his life of what so degraded it. What could she do for him now? What sacrifice could she make?

"Sit down," she said, awkwardly, after a pause.

"It is not worth while," he rejoined, in the dull tone of a man crushed to the earth beneath a heavy burden. "I have been waiting for an hour to see you alone, that I might tell you that which must be told. I have spoken with--my wife. She will not consent to a divorce, and without her consent no divorce is possible. She has never given me any legal cause for a separation,--no, never, strange as it may seem in a woman of her cla.s.s. Yesterday evening I spoke to her, and there was a terrible scene; and now,"--his voice grew fainter,--"now all is over."

He laid his hand upon the back of a chair, as if to support himself, and paused for a moment, then resumed: "I ought to have written to you,--it would have been far better,--far,--but I could not deny myself one more sight of you. Farewell. Now all is over."

She stood as if rooted to the spot, pale, mute, searching feverishly for some consolation for him. What more could she offer him? There was a gulf as of death between them. She sought some path that would lead across it,--in vain. She felt faint and giddy.

"Farewell," he murmured. "Thanks--thanks for all--the joy--for all the sorrow---- Good G.o.d! how dear it has been!" His voice broke; he turned away, holding out to her, for the last time, a slender, trembling hand.

Why at sight of that hand did memory recall so vividly the half-starved artist lad after whom as a tiny girl she had run to relieve his misery?

And now she could do nothing for him,--nothing! Really nothing?

Suddenly it flashed upon her.

She had but to hold out her arms, to forget herself, and his anguish would be transformed to bliss. Compa.s.sion grew within her and took possession of her like insanity; her soul was shaken as by an earthquake; what had been above was now beneath, and from the chaos one thought emerged, at first formless as a dream, then waxing clearer, until it took shape as a command, gradually obtaining absolute masters.h.i.+p of her.

She raised her head, proud, resolved. "Have you the courage to break with all your present life, and to begin a new one with me?" she asked.

"A new life?" he murmured, and, vaguely, uncertainly, as if unable to trust his senses and fearing to lend words to what was monstrous and impossible, he added, "With you?"

"Yes."

He recoiled a step, and looked her full in the face, speechless, breathless.

A burning blush rose to her cheeks. "You have not the courage," she said, sternly. "Well, then----" With an imperious gesture she turned away.

But he detained her. "Not the courage?" he cried, seizing her hand and carrying it to his lips. "Offer a cup of pure water to a man peris.h.i.+ng of thirst, and ask him if he has the courage to drink! The question is not of me, but of you. Have you the faintest idea of the meaning of what you have said?"

She shook her head: "I have learned to look life in the face; I know what I am doing. I know what the consequences of my act will be; I know that I resign all intercourse with my fellow-beings, saving only with yourself; that my only refuge on earth will be at your side; I know that I shall be a lost creature in the eyes of the world; and yet, if I may cherish the conviction that thereby I can redeem your shattered existence, that I can purify and enn.o.ble your life, I am ready."