The Daltons: Three Roads In Life. Charles James Lever
her face covered with her hands.
“Zum Fenster hinaus,” repeated he, slowly; “and then, Fraulein? and then?”
“Tell him, Nelly; tell him what follows.”
“Nach ihm nur schau' ich
Zum Fenster hinaus;
Nach ihm nur geh' ich
Aus dem Haus!”
repeated she.
“Ja, ja!” cried Hans, delightedly,
“Nach ihm nur geh' ich
Aus dem Haus!”
“What does that mean?” said Dalton, with impatience. “It's Gretchen's song, papa,” said Nelly.
“His figure I gaze on,
O'er and o'er;
His step I follow
From the door.”
“I hope it isn't in love the creature is,” said Dalton; and he laughed heartily at the conceit, turning at the same time his look from the dwarf, to bestow a most complacent glance at the remains of his own once handsome stature. “Oh dear! oh dear!” sighed he; “isn't it wonderful, but there isn't a creth or a cripple that walks the earth that hasn't a sweetheart!”
A cough, purposely loud enough to announce his presence, here came from the courier in the antechamber, and Dalton remembered that the letter had not yet been despatched.
“Give it to him, Nelly,” said he, curtly.
She took the letter in her hand, but stood for a second or two, as if powerless to move.
“Must it be so, dearest papa?” said she, and the words almost choked her utterance.
Dalton snatched the letter from her fingers, and left the room. His voice was heard for an instant in conversation with the courier, and the moment after the door banged heavily, and all was still.
“It is done, Kate!” said she, throwing her arms around her sister's neck. “Let us now speak of the future; we have much to say, and short time to say it; and first let us help poor Hans downstairs.”
The dwarf, clutching up the wooden image, suffered himself to be aided with all the submissiveness of a patient child, and, with one at either side of him, slowly crept down the stairs to his own chamber. Disengaging himself by a gentle effort as he gained his door, Hans removed his cap from his head and made a low and deep obeisance to each of the girls separately, while he bade them a good-night.
“Leb wohl, Hanserl, Leb wohl!” said Kate, taking his hand affectionately. “Be ever the true friend that thou hast proved hitherto, and let me think of thee, when far away, with gratitude.”
“Why this? How so, Fraulein?” said Hans, anxiously; “why farewell? Why sayest thou 'Leb wohl,' when it is but 'good-night'?”
“Kate is about to leave us for a short space,” said Nelly, affecting to appear at ease and calm. “She is going to Italy, Hanserl.”
“Das schone Land! that lovely land!” muttered he, over and over. “Dahin, dahin,” cried he, pointing with his finger to the southward, “where the gold orange blooms. There would I wander too.”
“You'll not forget me, Hanserl?” said the young girl, kindly.
“Over the great Alps and away!” said Hans, still talking to himself; “over the high snow-peaks which cast their shadows on our cold land, but have terraces for the vine and olive-garden, yonder! Thou 'It leave us, then, Fraulein?”
“But for a little while, Hans, to come back afterwards and tell thee all I have seen.”
“They come not back from the sunshine to the shade,” said Hans, solemnly. “Thou 'It leave not the palace for the peasant's hut; but think of us, Fraulein; think sometimes, when the soft sirocco is playing through thy glossy hair; when sounds of music steal over thy senses among the orange groves, and near the shadows of old temples, think of this simple Fatherland and its green valleys. Think of them with whom thou wert so happy, too! Splendor thou mayst have it is thy beauty's right; but be not proud, Fraulein. Remember what Chamisso tells us, 'Das Noth lehrt beten,' 'Want teaches Prayer,' and to that must thou come, however high thy fortune.”
“Kate will be our own wherever she be,” said Nelly, clasping her sister affectionately to her side.
“Bethink thee well, Fraulein, in thy wanderings, that the great and the beautiful are brethren of the good and the simple. The cataract and the dewdrop are kindred. Think of all that teaches thee to think of home; and remember well, that when thou losest the love of this humble hearth thou art in peril. If to any of thy childish toys thou sayest 'Ich Hebe dich nicht mehr,' then art thou changed indeed.” Hans sat down upon his little bed as he spoke, and covered his face with his hands.
Nelly watched him silently for a few seconds, and then with a gentle hand closed the door and led Kate away.
CHAPTER XVIII. CARES AND CROSSES
THE lamp in Kate Dalton's chamber was still burning when the morning dawned, and by its uncertain flicker might be seen the two sisters, who, clasped in each other's arms, sat upon the low settle-bed. Nelly, pale and motionless, supported Kate, as, overcome by watching and emotion, she had fallen into a heavy slumber. Not venturing to stir, lest she should awaken her, Nelly had leaned against the wall for support, and, in her unmoved features and deathly pallor, seemed like some monumental figure of sorrow.
It was not alone the grief of an approaching separation that oppressed her. Sad as it was to part from one to whom she had been mother and sister too, her affliction was tinged with a deeper coloring in her fears for the future. Loving Kate dearer than anything in the world, she was alive to all the weak traits of her character: her credulity, her trustfulness, her fondness for approbation, even from those whose judgments she held lightly, her passion for admiration even in trifles, were well known to her; and while, perhaps, these very failings, like traits of childish temperament, had actually endeared her the more to Nelly, she could not but dread their effect when they came to be exercised in the world of strangers.
Not that Nelly could form the very vaguest conception of what that world was like. Its measures and its perils, its engagements and hazards, were all unknown to her. It had never been even the dream-land of her imagination. Too humble in spirit, too lowly by nature, to feel companionship with the great and titled, she had associated all her thoughts with those whose life is labor; with them were all her sympathies. There was a simple beauty in the unchanging fortune of the peasant's life such as she had seen in the Schwarzwald, for instance that captivated her. That peaceful domesticity was the very nearest approach to happiness, to her thinking, and she longed for the day when her father might consent to the obscurity and solitude of some nameless “Dorf” in the dark recesses of that old forest. With Frank and Kate, such a lot would have been a paradise. But one was already gone, and she was now to lose the other too. “Strange turn of fortune,” as she said, “that prosperity should be more cruel than adversity. In our days of friendless want and necessity we held together; it is only when the promise of brighter destinies is dawning that we separate. It is but selfishness after all,” thought she, “to wish for an existence like this; such humble and lowly fortunes might naturally enough become 'lame Nelly,' but Frank, the high-hearted, daring youth, with ambitious hopes and soaring aspirations, demands another and a different sphere of action; and Kate, whose attractions would grace a court, might well sorrow over a lot of such ignoble obscurity. What would not my sorrow and self-reproach be if I saw that, in submitting to the same monotony of this quietude, they should have become wearied and careless, neither taking pleasure in the simple pastimes of the people, nor stooping to their companionship! And thus all may be for the best,” said she, half aloud, “if I could but feel courage to think so. We may each of us be but following his true road