Villa Eden Part 202

"Indeed? Then you expect still to be believed? Yes, fine, n.o.ble, good, magnanimous man, I possess a great deal, but not what you ask,--faith in you. I had this faith once, it was my last illusion. I don't swear it; but I know that it's my last illusion."

"I entreat Roland's father and Manna's father"--Eric's voice trembled,--"I entreat him, as a child, to be just towards me. You will yet learn that I spoke the truth at that time, and speak it now."

"Truth? Whew, truth! Leave me, I wish to be alone: I must be alone."

Eric and Manna left the room, holding each other by the hand. They waited outside for a long time. Joseph, who had been summoned, now entered Sonnenkamp's room. When he came out, he told Manna that Herr Sonnenkamp had sent to the city for a notary.

Eric and Manna went into the garden. And this is the power of love: in the midst of the most direful pain and suffering, they were inwardly cheerful as if all misery had been removed far away from them.

"You must take it from me," said Manna, after they had walked together for a long time in silence. "I don't know what it signifies; but it will not leave me. At that time, when the Prince visited us, his kind message to you affected me as if he had bestowed a benefit upon myself Do you remember? I delivered the message to you. At that time he said you were to remember that you had been the companion of his boyhood, and that he would like to prove to you that he was not forgetful of the fact. Now, don't you believe that you could do something for us? I don't know what; but I think--well, I don't know what I do think."

"It's the same with me," replied Eric. "I remember it as if it were the present moment; but I have no idea how to begin to avail myself of this gracious favor. O Manna! that was the first time it broke upon me how you felt towards me."

And the lovers lost all idea of their anxieties in recalling the past, how they wanted to avoid each other, and could not. All present sorrow vanished away.

On Manna's face there was a light as of an inextinguishable gleam of suns.h.i.+ne: her large dark-eyes glowed, for a free and strong soul shone through them.

"What are you smiling at now?" she suddenly asked Eric.

"Because an image has occurred to me."

"An image?"

"Yes. I've heard that a precious stone is distinguished from an imitation of one, by the fact that the dimness of l.u.s.tre caused by breathing upon it immediately disappears. You, my Manna, you, are such a genuine pearl."

Whilst the lovers were promenading in the garden, Sonnenkamp sat alone, almost congratulating himself that he had something new to trouble him; and in the midst of his vexation there was a degree of pride, of pleasure, when he thought how courageously his child stood up there before him. She was his daughter, his proud, inflexible child. And his thoughts went further: Your child forsakes you, follows her own inclination, and your duty is done: your duty was to the daughter, for the son will build up an independent life. Frau Ceres--poh!--let them supply her with dresses and ornaments, and lull her to sleep with a pretty story. He went into the garden, into the green-house, where the black mould was lying in a heap. He put on his gray sack, grubbed in the dirt, smelt the fresh earth; but to-day there seemed to be no odor to it. He rent the garment in pieces as he took it off.

"Away forever!" he exclaimed. "Childish folly! It's all over!" He stood for a while before the spot where Eric had taken breakfast on the first morning. So this was the man, and he to be sole master here for the future? He to possess all this,--a schoolmaster?

The Cooper came along the road. Sonnenkamp called out to him, and commended his bringing up the fire-engine, adding, with a zest, that the settlers in the far West found this their best weapon against the savages, spurting hot water upon them; and it was still more effective to put in a trifle of sulphuric acid, and blind every one hit in the face. The cooper stared, with eyes and mouth wide open, at the man who could say these horrible things in such a free and easy way.

Sonnenkamp left him standing there, and, going into the orchard, helped very carefully and tenderly to gather the fruit. He thought of the days when this fruit was growing, of the spring when Roland was convalescent, of the visit of the Prince, the journey to the springs, the days of suns.h.i.+ne until now, the dewy nights; and he thought silently, when will there be another crop of fruit? how will it be with you then? where? perhaps under ground; then you cannot turn over the black mould: then his head swam.

It is a shame that we must die, and a double shame to know that we must.

He stared fixedly as if he were bewildered, for it came over him that on this very spot he had said something like this to Eric, the first morning he had come there. Has this place a peculiar power to awaken thoughts of death? Are you standing over the spot of earth which shall be your grave?

He was called away; for the notary with his two a.s.sistants had arrived just at the dinner hour. He sat down with him at the table, and appeared in as good spirits as if nothing had happened. The notary occupied Pranken's usual seat. After dinner, he transacted business with the notary, being long and busily engaged in writing. The two a.s.sistants signed as witnesses: so that n.o.body except those under oath knew any thing of the contents of the will.

After this was done, a letter came from Bella. She wrote to Sonnenkamp that she and Clodwig would come to the jury-trial, and he must bring it about that she should be among the twelve. Sonnenkamp smiled, for he had almost forgotten about it: it was all very well. Eric requested Roland and Manna to accompany the Mother, who wanted to make a visit at Mattenheim. They consented, and so the house was now perfectly still, almost entirely deserted.

CHAPTER VII.

PRELIMINARIES.

The days pa.s.sed away quiet and dull. Sonnenkamp sent off many letters, and read the newspapers, without sending them to Frau Ceres, as was his former custom.

The men came who had declared themselves ready to const.i.tute the jury.

Sonnenkamp sent word to them that he would see no one until the time came for appearing before the tribunal. But an exception was made in regard to one person. Lootz was made the confidential agent, and Bella came to Sonnenkamp's room, through the climbing mistaria and the seed-room.

"Just a few words," Sonnenkamp said. "You could not form one of the jury; but I a.s.sure you, because such a being lives with me on the earth, I will live, and will yet show what const.i.tutes a man. Here, in this room, will I speak."

He escorted her back through the seed-room: she knew that the door would be left open.

Bella went restlessly about the Villa, and she saw Lina who had come with her father, and who wanted to keep Manna company at this terrible time; but Lina was at a loss what to do with herself, when she found how the family was scattered.

She entreated Bella to go with her to Aunt Claudine, who was the only one left at home.

Bella said that she would come by and by.

Lina went to Aunt Claudine, and afforded her some real consolation, and even pleasure.

"Oh," asked Lina, "are Africans and negroes the same thing?"

"Most certainly."

"Well, I can't tell you how much I dislike Africans and negroes. I've nothing to say against their being free, why shouldn't they be? But they might have become so before this or afterwards: why, just at this very time? Why must they deprive me of my beautiful season of betrothal? n.o.body is disposed to be merry, n.o.body talks of any thing else, by reason of these negroes. It's the fas.h.i.+on even to wear chains now, called _Chaines d'esclaves_,--Oh, I wanted to ask you something--what was it--yes, I know now. Just tell me what they're going to do when the negroes get to be good people just like everybody else, what they're going to do then with the Devil?"

"What has the Devil to do with it?"

"Why, how are they going to paint the Devil, if he's not to be black any longer?"

Aunt Claudine had to indulge in a most hearty laugh, and she was very much rejoiced to be reminded that, in the midst of this monotonously sombre life, there was some liveliness still left in the world.

She was ready to go with Lina to the Castle, but just as they were leaving the house, Bella came. She begged that Aunt Claudine and Lina would not put off their excursion on her account, and shut herself up in the library, while the Aunt and Lina proceeded to the castle. They remained there until the afternoon, and often looked down to the Villa where "the men were all engaged in such a queer business," as Lina expressed herself.

Bella did not stay long in the library, but quickly returned to the villa, and noiselessly went up the steps overgrown with mistaria.

Sonnenkamp went to his wife, thinking that he must inform her of what was now going on. She tauntingly reminded him of his promise to return to America; she did not want the decision to be in the hands of strangers.

Sonnenkamp's practice was to let Frau Ceres speak just as long and as much as she pleased; for it was a matter of perfect indifference to him what she said.

When he had got through with this, he returned to his room, and sent word to those who arrived, that he would extend a welcome to them when he appeared before the tribunal.

Weidmann came first with the Prince Valerian and Knopf, then Clodwig with the Banker, and the Doctor with the Justice. Professor Einsiedel stopped a while at the dog-house, and talked very earnestly with the field-guard, and was highly delighted at the sound views of the man in dog-training. Once he tapped upon his forehead with the fore and middle fingers, wis.h.i.+ng to impress upon his memory one observation of Claus, which explained to him a pa.s.sage in the eighth book of Pliny, treating of land-animals.

The Major came in full uniform, wearing all his decorations; and when he saw that Clodwig had come in plain citizen's clothes, without a single decoration, he said to himself in vexation,--

"She was right here, too; but I thought as it was a tribunal of honor--well, no matter; it's no harm, anyhow."

Eric had made all the requisite arrangements in the music-saloon; but by Sonnenkamp's order, the chairs, the side-board set out with eatables and drinkables, and every thing else needful, were removed to Sonnenkamp's room. He placed his chair with a table before it near the door leading into the seed-room, to which he then withdrew.