CHAPTER V.

As Elizabeth opened her eyes the next morning, the tall clock in the room below was striking eight, and she started up with the provoking consciousness that she had overslept herself; and it was all owing to a vivid and terrible dream. The golden atmosphere of poetry, which had yesterday hovered around Sabina's narrative, had become a gloomy cloud in the night, the shadow of which embittered and burdened the first moments of her awakening. She had been flying in deadly terror through the spacious, dreary halls of the old castle, always pursued by Jost. Thick curls were waving wildly above his pale forehead, beneath which his black eyes gleamed upon her, and she had just stretched out her arms in greater terror than she had ever experienced in her life before, to defend herself from him, when she awoke. Her heart was still beating violently, and she thought with a shudder of the wretched girl upon the castle wall, who, pursued, perhaps, as she had been, had sought relief in death, when she was again captured by her tormentor.

She sprang up and bathed her face in cold water; then she opened her window and looked out into the courtyard. There sat Sabina under a pear tree, busy with her churn. All the feathered crowd of the place stood around, looking impatiently for the crumbs that she threw to them from time to time from a bowl upon the table by her side, while she improved the occasion to rebuke the arrogant and greedy, and to console the oppressed and down-trodden.

When she saw the young girl, she nodded kindly, and called up to her to say that every one in the lodge had been busy up there in the old castle since six o'clock. When Elizabeth reproached her for letting her sleep so long, she assured her that she had done so by the express desire of her mother, who thought that her daughter had overtasked her strength in the last few weeks of excitement and exertion.

Sabina's kind, placid face, and the fresh air of the morning soothed Elizabeth's nerves at once, and brought back her thoughts to the world of reality which was just now opening so brightly before her. She took herself seriously to task that, despite her uncle's fatherly admonition, she had leaned out of the open window until midnight upon the previous night, gazing across the moonlit meadow into the silent forest. But common sense often plays a poor part when opposed to excited fancy. Where it should conduct a rigid examination and discriminate wisely, it suddenly finds itself deserted in the judgment-seat, and must retire in confusion, while the varied and motley spectacle which fancy conjures up proceeds without interruption. Thus Elizabeth's self-reproaches soon vanished before the picture which presented itself to her memory, and still threw around her all the magic of a moonlit night in the forest.

As soon as she had dressed, and drank a tumbler of fresh milk, she hastened up to the castle. The sky was overcast, but only with those light, thin clouds which foretell a fresh although not a sunny, spring day. Therefore the birds' morning concert was of longer duration than usual, and the dew-drops lay as large and full in the cups of the flowers as if their existence for the day were not threatened.

As Elizabeth entered the large gate of the castle, which stood wide open, a huge green mound, piled up by the fountain, met her eye. It was formed of thistle stalks, ferns, and bramble bushes, which had been torn from their home in the garden, and were here bidding farewell to their long, merry life. The path through the arched gateway of the second court-yard to the grating was strewn with green boughs and leaves, as though a joyous marriage train had been passing through the old ruins; and even on the sill of a high window, that showed the remains of coloured glass in the lacework of the stone rosette of its pointed arch, some boughs had been caught as they were carried past, and the trailing end of a wild vine was coiling its living green lovingly around the stone trefoil of the Holy Trinity, which betrayed unmistakably that the dark, dreary hall within had once been the chapel of the castle.

The garden, where it had yesterday been impossible to take two steps, seemed to Elizabeth entirely changed. A considerable part of it had been cleared, and showed distinct traces of having been tastefully laid out. She could easily proceed along a partially cleared path, across which timid hares and squirrels ran fleetly now and then, until she reached the green rampart which had only been seen from a distance yesterday. At each end of the long, grassy embankment, broad, worn, stone steps led up to a low breastwork, over which one could look out into the forest, and there, where the trees were somewhat thin, through a green vista down into the valley, where the forest lodge, with the white doves dotting its blue-slated roof, was nestling cosily. At the foot of the embankment, just where the broad path terminated, was a little stone basin, into which a strong stream of crystal water flowed through the mouth of a mossy little marble gnome. Two lindens arched their boughs above this gurgling brook, and threw their grateful shade upon the tender forget-me-nots, which grew here in masses in the damp earth and wreathed the little basin with their heavenly blue.

Directly opposite the embankment lay her future habitation, which, with its window-shutters thrown back and the large door on the ground-floor wide open, looked so bright and hospitable to-day that Elizabeth welcomed with joy the thought that she was looking upon her home. Her gaze wandered over the garden, and she thought upon those moments of her childhood when, her little heart full of unconquerable longing, she had lingered behind her parents during some pleasant walk, and, with her face pressed close against the iron grating, had gazed into some strange garden. There she had seen happy children playing carelessly upon the greensward; they could bend down the lovely roses that hung in such clusters, and inhale their fragrance as long as they liked. And what a pleasure it must be to creep under the flower-laden boughs and sit there in the green, just like grown-up people in an arbour! But there was nothing for her then but the look and the longing. No one had ever opened the barred door to the child with the wistful eyes, who would have been only too happy if they would have thrust a few flowers through the grating into her little hands.

While Elizabeth was standing upon the embankment, the forester appeared at one of the upper windows of the dwelling. When he saw her graceful figure leaning against the low breastwork, as, with her beautiful head half turned towards the garden, she seemed sunk in a reverie, his features were illumined by an expression of pleasure and quiet delight.

And Elsie soon found him out, and nodding to him gaily, bounded down the steps towards the house. Little Ernst ran to her in the hall, and she took him up in her arms.

The assistance which the little boy had afforded had been, according to his own enthusiastic account, invaluable indeed. He had carried bricks for the mason who had been mending the hearth, had helped his mother to shake out the beds, and declared with pride that the lords and ladies upon the woollen hangings looked far handsomer since he had brushed off their dusty faces. He threw his arms around his sister's neck as she carried him up-stairs, assuring her all the way that he liked it a thousand times better here than in B----.

The forester received Elizabeth in the antechamber above. He scarcely gave her time to say good morning to her parents, but conducted her instantly into the gobelin-hung apartment. Ah, what a transformation! The green lattice-work that had obscured the window had vanished. Without, beyond the outer wall, the forest retreated like side-scenes on either side, opening a full view of a distant valley that was to Elizabeth a perfect paradise.

"There is Lindhof," said the forester, pointing to a large building in the Italian style, which lay tolerably near to the foot of the mountain upon which Gnadeck stood. "I have brought you something that will show you every tree upon the mountains over there, and every blade of grass in the meadows of the valley," he continued, as he held an excellent spy-glass before her eyes.

And then the grand, solemn mountain domes seemed to approach, their granite peaks, sometimes crowned by a solitary fir, breaking through the forest here and there. Behind these nearest summits towered countless ranges in the blue misty light, and from a distant, dim valley which separated two giant mountains, arose two slender, shadowy gothic towers. A little river, a highway bordered by poplars, and several gay villages enlivened the background of the valley. In front lay Castle Lindhof, surrounded by a park laid out in princely style. Beneath the windows of the castle extended a closely shaven lawn, beset with small, quaintly-shaped beds glowing with all the colours of the rainbow. Thence Elizabeth's eyes soon wandered, and rested delightedly upon the mysterious gloom of an avenue of magnificent lindens, their heavy foliage interlacing above their brown trunks, while here and there drooping boughs swept the ground beneath with their broad leaves. They bordered a little crystal lake, which just now looked melancholy enough amid all its flowery surroundings, for its depths mirrored a cloudy sky. Now and then a swan stretched its white neck curiously among the low-hanging linden boughs, and sent a shower of feathery spray from its wings to sprinkle their old trunks.

Hitherto Elizabeth had allowed the glass to range restlessly hither and thither, but now she attempted to hold it steadily, for she had made a discovery which excited her interest most powerfully.

Under the last trees of the avenue stood a couch. A young lady lay upon it, her charming head thrown back so that a part of her chestnut curls fell down across the pillow. Beneath the hem of her long white muslin dress, which enveloped her form to the throat, peeped out two tiny feet encased in gold-embroidered satin slippers. She held in her delicate almost transparent hands some auriculas, which she was thoughtlessly twisting and waving to and fro. Her lips alone showed any colouring; the rest of her face was lily-pale; one would almost have doubted its being informed with life had not the blue eyes gleamed so wondrously. But these eyes with their depth of expression were riveted upon the countenance of a man who, sitting opposite, appeared to be reading aloud to her. Elizabeth could not see his face, for his back was turned toward her. He seemed young, tall, and well made, and had a profusion of light-brown hair.

"Is that lovely lady over there the Baroness Lessen?" asked Elizabeth, eagerly.

The forester took the spy-glass. "No," said he, "that is Fraeulein von Walde, the sister of the proprietor of Lindhof. You call her charming, and certainly her head is lovely, but she is a cripple; she walks upon crutches."

At this moment Frau Ferber joined them. She too looked through the glass, and thought the countenance of the young lady most beautiful. She was particularly struck with the expression of gentle kindness which, as she said, "transfigured the features."

"Yes," said the forester, "she is kind and benevolent. When I first came here the whole country around was full of her praises. But matters are changed indeed, since the Baroness Lessen has had the control of affairs over there. No more alms are distributed among the poor, unless they are earned by hypocrisy. Woe to the wretch who asks any assistance there! He will be turned away without a penny, if he ventures to hint that he would rather listen to the pastor in the village church on Sundays than go to the castle chapel, where the chaplain of the baroness every week calls down fire and brimstone, and every imaginable pain of hell, upon the heads of the ungodly."

"Certainly such violent measures are poorly fitted to win souls to heaven and inspire people with Christian love," said Frau Ferber.

"They destroy all good, and foster hypocrisy, I tell you!" cried the forester, angrily. "Do they not set an example of it themselves? They are always reading in the Bible of Christian humility, yet every day they grow haughtier and more supercilious. Why, they would actually persuade us that their high-born bodies are moulded of a different clay from those of their poor brothers in Christ. It stands written, 'When thou doest thine alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth;' but no hen ever makes more to-do over her newly-laid egg than these people over their charities. There are perpetual collections, fairs, and lotteries for the poor, and the whole neighbourhood is black-mailed, but when it comes to taking the money from, where it is plentiest, their own purses,--oh, that's carrying the joke too far, as the saying goes. I know people who have been for twenty years collecting subscriptions from others to found a poor-house. These very people have a yearly income of six thousand thalers, but of course it never occurs to them to add one penny from their own store in aid of their charitable project. They must purchase a reputation for benevolence and Christian self-sacrifice more cheaply than that. Zounds! how it enrages me to see people wearing their piety so pinned upon their sleeves! Over there in the castle a bell is set ringing just so many times a day, that every one in the country around may say, when they hear it, 'They are having prayers at the castle.' The closet, where God has commanded us to shut to the door and kneel in prayer, is altogether too small to suit their taste. And it is not only this trumpet-blowing that outrages me. I hold it to be actually wicked to make such a mere everyday form of the worship of the Holiest. Do you suppose that the maid-servant, with a hot smoothing-iron in her hand, or the cook, who is just putting her roast to the fire, can rejoice in the sound of that bell?"

"It is most certainly a dubious kind of piety," said Frau Ferber, smiling.

"Or even the gracious ladies themselves, who are busy with the last novel or a piquante bit of court scandal--for an interest in all such things is quite consistent with the loftiest piety--do you suppose they are able to divert their thoughts in one instant from worldly affairs and turn them all heavenwards? But these people run in and out of the kingdom of heaven without any thought or preparation, and congratulate themselves upon the honour that they are doing to the Creator."

"And does Herr von Walde sympathize with these reforms of the baroness?" asked Frau Ferber.

"From everything that I can gather from the villagers, I should judge not; but how does that mend the matter? He is probably at this moment prying into the pyramids that he may throw light upon antiquity; how should he know that his cousin here is zealously doing her best to blow out the advancing light of the present? Besides, I dare say he has a crack in his own brain. The prince of L----, who knows him well, wished some years ago to make a match between him and a young person of quality at court, but, as I hear, my gentleman refused the alliance because the fair one's pedigree was not sufficiently long."

"Why, perhaps then he may install as mistress of Lindhof some fair daughter of a fellah, whose ancestors lie among the mummies at Memphis," said Elizabeth, laughing.

"I don't believe he will marry at all," rejoined the forester. "He is no longer young, is too fond of a wandering life, and has never shown any love for women's society. I'll wager my little finger that that fellow there with the book in his hand thinks just as I do, and already in his inmost soul regards Lindhof and all the other charming estates in Saxony, and God only knows where else, as his own."

"Has he any claims to them?" asked Frau Ferber.

"Most certainly. He is the son of the Baroness Lessen, whose family is the only one in the world related to the brother and sister von Walde. The baroness was first married to a certain Herr von Hollfeld; that young man is the fruit of that marriage, and by the death of his father he came into possession of Odenberg, a large estate on the other side of L----. The fair widow was fully conscious that her freedom must be made available to assist her up at least one step in the ladder of human happiness and perfection, and naturally this could only be attained by a marriage with high rank, wherefore Frau von Hollfeld one day became Baroness Lessen. 'Tis true the baron's name had been made somewhat notorious by several acts on his part which people of common, low-born ideas might call dishonourable; but what matter for that? Was he not a lord chamberlain, and did not the keys of his office unlock many a door for him where St. Peter's would have availed nothing, in spite of the power given to them? However, the baron died after two years of marriage, leaving his widow a little daughter and an enormous amount of debts. I have no doubt she is glad enough to queen it at Lindhof, for I hear that she has no part or parcel in her son's property."

Here a maid from the lodge interrupted them with bucket and broom, giving unmistakable signs that she was about to begin the duties of her office in this apartment. The spy-glass was hastily closed, and while the forester went into the garden to renew his labours there in clearing away the luxuriant green from the lower window-sills, Frau Ferber and Elizabeth busied themselves with dust-cloths and brushes in restoring the furniture of the room to something of its original appearance.