Volume 27 — LOTTKA. (continued 2)

He had not proceeded far when a singular spectacle caught his eye. Before a booth of cheap toys stood a lady in an elegant fur-trimmed polonaise, such as were then worn, a square Polish hat on her head, and a thick veil drawn over her face to protect her from the snow, so that there was no seeing her features. She had put down her large muff on the counter before her, and with tiny hands in daintiest gloves was busy picking out various toys, and dividing them amongst a number of street-children who crowded closely about her, and struggled for these unexpected gifts in a very tumult of delight. A few expressive words on the part of the seller in the booth reduced them to something like order, and at length they all dispersed, their treasures tightly clutched in their little fists, but it was only a minority that said "thank you" to the giver.

"And now what have I to pay you for them all?" said the lady.

Her voice ran like an electric shock through the youth, who had approached unobserved.

"Lottka," he said in a whisper.

The lady turned round quickly, and her first impulse was to draw her veil closer about her face. Then, however, by the light of the booth lamps and the glare from the snow, she was able to recognize the figure that only stood two paces off. She hurriedly paid the sum required, turned to Sebastian, and held out her hand.

"It is you," she said, without showing any special excitement. "I had not expected ever to see you again. But I am only the more glad of it. Have you any engagement? Are you expected anywhere this evening? No? Then give me your arm. I too am free--quite free," she added with a singular expression. "It is so pleasant to walk about in the snow, and see so many happy faces. It seems to me sometimes as though it could not be necessary to take any great pains to be happy since so many are so, and so cheaply too. Do you not agree with me?"

He did not reply. The utterly unexpected meeting had positively stupefied him, and the quick way in which she spoke and moved was perplexing. She had at once hung upon his arm, whereas formerly she carefully avoided every touch, and now she walked on beside him, daintily putting down her little feet in the snow, her head bent, with a bright thoughtful expression, as though planning some mysterious surprise. He only dared to steal glances at her now and then. She had evidently grown, her features were rather more marked, but that added to her beauty, and her fur cap was wonderfully becoming.

"Fräulein Lottka," said he at length, "that I should find you here! You do not know--you would not believe how I have sought for you--how ever since--"

"Why should I not believe it?" she hastily replied. "Do you suppose I have not known that you were the only human being in the world who ever really loved me? That was the very reason why I was obliged to part from you. Your love and goodness deserved something better than to be made unhappy for my sake. It is enough that one wretched life should be destroyed, and even that is not very intelligible when one thinks that there is a Providence--but why should we talk of such melancholy subjects? Tell me what you have been doing all this while. Do you know that you are much better looking than you were? Your beard becomes you so well, and with it you have the same innocent eyes that would better suit a girl's face, and yet they can look brave and resolute enough too when they flash out at a villain.

"Forgive me," she went on, "for being so talkative, but you cannot guess how long I have been silent--almost always, since we parted. I had too much to think about. But now I have arranged it all, and since then I am quite happy. It is not very long ago that I have done so. Last night even I had quite too horrible thoughts; they actually pierced my brain like needles of ice. So I said to myself, 'there must be an end to this.' Neither man nor God can require any one to live on with thoughts like these. And after becoming quite clear about that, my spirits returned, and even my tongue is loosed again. But you are all the more silent. What is the matter with you? Are not you a little tiny bit glad that we can wander about together so confidentially, and feel the snow on our faces, and see so many poor men enjoying their Christmas Eve? I too wanted to make a festival for myself, and so I spent my last two dollars in an improvised Christmas gift. But it did not answer so very well either: unless one loves the person one gives to, there is not much pleasure in giving. Now I am sorry that I have no more money. You and I might so well have made presents to each other."

"O Lottka," said he, "now that I have found you again--that you are so kind to me--that you know how I love you--"

"Hush!" interposed she, "this may be felt, but not spoken of. For to-day everything is as sad as it ever was, and as utterly hopeless."

He stopped suddenly and looked full at her. "Hopeless," he groaned. "But are you aware that I know everything, and no more heed it than if it were some story going on in the moon. That I have no one in the world to consult but myself, and if my own father and my own mother--"

"For God's sake do not go on," she cried, with a look of distress, and placing her hand on his lips. "You do not know what you are saying, how horrible it is, and how you would one day repent it. You have a mother whom you can love and revere, and who loves nothing on earth better than you, and who is proud of you, and you would bring sorrow and shame on her? If you had rightly considered what that means--but we will say no more about it. Come--I will confess to you that I am hungry; since yesterday evening I have eaten nothing out of sheer disgust. I thought, indeed, I should never have a pure taste in my mouth any more, but since I have chatted so pleasantly with you, I feel much better. Take me where there is something to eat. And then we can still go on chatting away for a couple of hours, and you really must treat me, for as I said I have spent the last money I had in those toys."

At once he turned off into a side street, and rapidly led her to a small eating-house that he knew, which was generally empty at this hour. They were both lost in thought, and he was wondering, half in terror, half in rapture, at the way things had come about, and asking himself what turn they would take now. For although her dark allusions made him very anxious, yet on the other hand he found comfort in her free and frank manner towards him, and her clear recognition of his feelings for her.

"Here," said he, throwing open a small door over which a blue lamp was burning.

They entered a bright comfortable dining-room in which was only an elderly waiter with a green apron of the good old fashion, sitting half-asleep in a corner. He looked at the pair with some surprise, and then hastened off to bring what Sebastian had ordered.

"He takes us for brother and sister," whispered the young girl.

"Or for a newly-married pair on their travels. Ah, Lottka!" and he seized one of her little hands which she had just ungloved.

She heartily but without any embarrassment returned his passionate pressure. "It is charming here," said she, beginning to free herself from her warm wraps. "I do so rejoice to be for once with you thus before I--" She stopped short.

"What are you thinking of?" he enquired in great agitation. "This is not really to be the last time--"

"Do not ask me," said she. "I am provided for, you need have no anxiety for me. When I wrote you that little note I really did not know what would become of me. It was only at first that I was safe. While you and perhaps others were looking everywhere for me, I sat up in the attic of an old friend not far from that shop--the only friend I had, an asthmatic sempstress who used often to buy cough-lozenges from me, and got fond of me because I would put in a stitch for her now and then. The poor thing when at her worst was unable for weeks together to earn anything. It was at her door that I knocked in the night, and actually I remained a couple of months hidden there, for no one concerned himself about her, and I used to help her with her sewing, and to cook our frugal meals; but at last I could no longer endure life in such a cage. I had saved a little money, and meant to cross over into France, where no one would have known me. But I was stopped on the way, there was something wrong in my passport, and so I was of course transported back like a vagrant; and here in Berlin--but we will say nothing about it. I already feel that nausea coming back, and here is our supper, and I must not let that be spoiled."

He poured out for her a glass of the wine the waiter had brought, and pledged her. "Thou and I," he whispered gently.

"No, thou alone," she replied, and sipped at the glass.

"Is the Rhine wine too strong for thee?" asked he. "Shall I order Champagne?"

She shook her head vehemently. "I could not touch a drop of it. I drank it too early, and in too bad company. But you must eat with me if I am to enjoy my supper."

He put something on his plate, though he could not get a morsel down, and kept watching her while she did full justice to their simple meal. Her hair was cut as short as ever, her dress was quite as plain, her form so full and so supple that each movement she made was enchanting to contemplate. Every now and then she apologized for her appetite.

"It is only," she said, "because I am for once happy, and everything is so good, and we are so delightfully alone--you and I. There"--and she put a bit of game from her plate on to his--"you must positively eat that, or I shall believe you have a horror of eating from the same dish even as I. If things had been different, and we could really have travelled off together through the world--that would have been beautiful! But it cannot be, and some day you will be happy with some one else, and she with you; lots are very unequally divided, and one must put up with one's own till it gets too bad. But do pour me out some wine--I drank that last glass off unconsciously. Thanks--and now--to thy mother's health! And that shall be the last."

She emptied the glass, and as she put it down again, he noticed that she shuddered as if some ice-cold hand had suddenly grasped hold of her.

"Let us go," she said.

He paid the bill and again offered her his arm. When they got out they found that the large soft flakes had changed into a driving snow-storm, that met them full in the face.

"Where shall we go now?" asked he.

"It is all the same to me. I have no longer any home. I thought indeed--but it is quite too boisterous and wretched to take leave of each other in the open air. Are we far from your lodgings?"

"I am in the old quarters still. Over the bridge, and then only a hundred yards. Come."

"That is--" said she, holding him back as if considering. "What will the people you lodge with think if you suddenly bring a girl back with you?"

"Have you not your veil on!"

"I? I do not care about myself. To-morrow I shall be--who knows how far away, where I can defy all comments. But it might get told to your mother, and give you trouble hereafter."

"Have no fear," he said, pressing the hand that rested on his arm. "My room has a private entrance, and the people of the house burn no light on the stairs. We shall not meet any one."

With rapidly beating heart, he led her along the now deserted streets, and often they were obliged to stand still and lean against each other, while the icy blast swept by. Once when he turned his back to the storm and drew her closer to his breast, he bent down and hurriedly kissed her through her veil. She made no resistance--only said, "I think the worst is now over, we may go on." After that they did not speak another word till they reached the house.

The steep staircase was--as he had said it would be--quite dark, and as they went up it, on tip-toe, he first, holding her hand so that she might not miss a step, no one came across them. Only they heard children's voices through the door, and saw a light shine through the key-hole of the room in the upper story, telling of a Christmas tree there.

He carefully closed his door, and let her precede him into the small dark room, which was only lit by the glow in the stove, and the reflection of the snow. He then bolted both doors. "The kitchen is next to us," he said, "but there is no one there now. We need not talk in a whisper. But the landlady may just come back once to enquire whether I want anything."

She answered nothing; she had placed herself on a chair in the window, and was looking out at the whirls of snow.

When he had lit his small student's lamp with its green shade he noticed a box on the table. "Look," said he, "that is my Christmas box from home, we can put that in a corner for the present. Will you not take off some of your wraps, and seat yourself here on the sofa? You must be too warm in your furs."

"I shall soon be going," said she. "But thou art right, the stove does burn well." And she began to draw off her polonaise, and put away her fur cap and gloves--he helping her.

"But now shall we not begin to unpack?" said she, shaking back her hair. "I should much like to know what is in the box."

"I am in no hurry," he laughingly replied. "I have just been unpacking something far more precious to me."

"You ought to be ashamed of yourself," returned she, suddenly assuming a colder tone (she had been saying thou). "You do not deserve that people should be planning how to give you pleasure. I--if a mother had sent me such a Christmas box from a distance--give it me--I will undo the string."

She hastily began cutting open the cover with a little knife of hers, and he gazed in carefully suppressed emotion at every movement of her exquisite hands.

"Lottka," said he; "if you and I were both together in America, and this box had come over the sea--"

She shook her head. "No box would have come then."

"And why not, Lottka? If my mother knew thee as I know thee, dost thou suppose she would hold thee guilty for circumstances over which thou art powerless. Naturally she has her prejudices--like all good mothers. But I know that she loves me more than any of her prejudices."

The girl left off her unpacking, and with her little knife cut all sorts of patterns on the lid of the box.

"Do you call that a prejudice?" said she, without looking at him. "Could you eat an apple that you had found lying in the dirt of the streets? You might wash it ten times over, the repugnance would be all the same. And who knows what foot might have trodden on it, who knows that some slime might not have penetrated the rind, even though it should still be sound at the core? No, no, no! It is so once for all, bad enough that so it should be--but it must not be made even worse."

He wound his arm about her, but rather like a brother than one passionately in love. "Lottka," he said, "it is impossible that this can go on. You cannot waste your life in unavailing regrets." He stopped short--he could not find words that expressed his meaning without fearing to pain her.

"In regrets," she repeated, looking at him firmly and sorrowfully. "Oh no! Who is thinking of it? I have already told you that you may be quite easy about my future. I am provided for. I am not so forsaken as I appear, provided my courage does not desert me--my courage and my disgust. And why must every one be married? If I chose I might be so, and very well too. All possible pains have been taken to make me fall in love, and I have had a choice of very desirable wooers, rich, young, and handsome, and some were really willing regularly to marry me in a regular church, with a regular clergyman in gown and bands. There was only one hitch."

"What was that?" he eagerly asked.

"It is unnecessary to mention it. But no--I will tell it to you straight out, that you may never judge me wrongly. Do you know what has given me a horror of all men except perhaps yourself! I will whisper it in your ear. It is because I did not know whether the proposed bridegroom might not have stood too high in the mother's favour before he concerned himself about the daughter."

She turned away and went hastily to the window.

After a time she again felt his arm around her. "What you must have had to endure, dear heart!" he faintly whispered.

She nodded slowly and significantly. "More than you would suppose so young a creature could have survived. About seven years ago, when I first understood it all, I still thought I could change my lot. I would not remain another day in the house. I went out to service. I cut off all my beautiful long hair to prevent any one admiring me, and the ugliest clothes were good enough for me so only they would restore my respectability. How little it has availed me thou knowest. Later, when I was taken up as a vagrant, I was brought back to the house, to her who naturally had a legal right over me. I had to bear it. I was powerless against the law. But I at once declared that I would destroy myself if I were not left in peace. And so I have sat nearly a year in my own room, and as soon as any one came near it I bolted the door. But still as I was obliged sometimes to breathe the air, people saw me, and she herself--though I never would speak a word to her--pretended that she loved me very much, and only yesterday--it was to be a Christmas treat--she sent me in a letter; guess from whom?"

"How can I guess?"

"You are right. No mortal ever could suppose it. But you remember the creature with whom you quarrelled on my behalf?"

"Lottka!" he cried beside himself. "Is it possible--"

She nodded. "It was a very affectionate letter, the most beautiful things were promised me in it--the paper smelt of Patchouli: since then I have had that nausea, that loathing which only passed off when you and I met again. But I have but to think of it, and--fie!--there it comes again!"

She wiped her lips, and the same strange shudder passed over her. He seized her hands--they were stiff and damp.

Suddenly she shook her head as if to get rid of some importunate thought. "But we were going to unpack," said she. "Pretty subjects these for Christmas Eve! Come to our box--ours I say. You have bewitched me with your dream about America."

"We will make it come true," he impetuously cried. "I shall remind you on some future day of our first Christmas Eve, and then you will be obliged to confess that I have more courage, and am a better prophet than you."

She made no reply, but cut the last string and opened the box. All sorts of small presents came to view, a pair of woollen gloves that his eldest sister had knitted for him, a watch-chain woven of the fair hair of the younger, with a pretty little gold key hanging to it, home-made gingerbread, and finally a large sealed bottle.

"Have you vineyards?" asked she playfully.

He laughed in spite of all his sadness. "It is elder wine, and the grapes grow in our little garden. As a child I thought it the best of all things, and ever since my good mother believes she cannot please me better than by sending me on every Christmas Eve, and every birthday, a sample at least of her last year's making."

"I hope it tastes better to you than the most costly Rhine wine," said she earnestly, "or you would not deserve it. Look--there are letters."

"Will you look them over? I am too much distracted. I should not know what they were about if I read them."

She had seated herself on the sofa, and taken the letters on her knee; one after the other she read them with most devout attention, as though their contents were wonderful and sublime, yet they were only made up of sisters' chat; little jests, apologies for the insignificance of their offerings; and in the lines written by the mother, there was traceable, together with her pride in having so good a son, her sorrow at being unable to embrace him at such a time, and her anxious fear that it was not so much work that kept him away, but rather the melancholy unsocial mood which even made his letters short.

"Are you still reading them?" he at length asked. "They are simple people, and when they write, the best that is in them does not always get put on paper. Good God! thou art weeping, Lottka!"

She laid the letters on the box, rose hurriedly, and pressed back the tears that still welled from between her long eye-lashes. "I will go now," she faintly said. "I shall be better out of doors."

"Go? now? and where? The storm would blow you down. Remain here for to-night, and if you like--the kitchen is close by--two chairs will do for me--and besides I have not a thought of sleeping."

She shook her head, and looked down. Then she suddenly raised her eyes, and looked full at his with an expression that made his heart beat wildly.

"Not so," she said. "But it is true that the storm without would blow me down, and where too could I go? Is this not Christmas Eve, and the last that we shall ever spend together. And I must give thee something, my presents to the children gave me no real pleasure, and why should I not on this day at least think of myself as well? Am I not right, Sebastian?"

She had never before called him by his name.

"Thou wilt give me something?" enquired he, amazed and uncertain.

"The only thing I still possess--myself," she gasped, and wound her arms about his neck.

When he woke in the dark on the morrow, and half raised himself from bed, still uncertain whether it had been real or only the most wondrous of dreams, the chamber was empty, not a trace remained of the last night's visitor. He felt all round his little sitting-room, called her gently by name, thinking she had perhaps stolen into the kitchen just for a freak, and would soon return. But all was silent. The intense cold overcame him, and with teeth chattering he slipped back into bed, and there, propped by pillows, tried to collect his thoughts.

Before long a horrible fear sprung up within him. With burning brow, despite the icy air, he hastily drew on his clothes, and kindled a light. The Christmas gifts of his family were still on the table, and he suddenly discovered a sheet written over in pencil pushed between the letters from his mother and sisters. The characters were uncertain and tremulous, as though written in the dark. The words ran as follows:--"Farewell, my beloved friend, my only friend! It grieves me much that I must grieve you so, must leave you so! But there is no other way. You would never let me go there where I needs must go, unless both are to be made unhappy. I thank thee for thy true love. But all the sweetness in thy soul can never wash away the bitterness from mine. Sleep well--farewell! I kiss thee once more in sleep. I know not whether thou wilt be able to read this. Do not grieve; believe that all is well with me now. Thy own loving one even in death."

The maid who was in the habit of coming about this time to light the kitchen-fire, heard a hollow cry in the next room, and opened the door in her terror. She there saw the young student lying on the sofa as though prostrated by some heavy blow. When she called him by name, he only shook his head as if to say she need not concern herself about him, and then stooped to pick up the paper that had fallen out of his hand.

"What o'clock?" he enquired.

"It has just struck six."

"Give me my cloak and stick. I will--"

He tottered to the door.

"You are going out bare-headed in all this cold? All the shops are closed, there is not a creature in the streets: you know this is a holiday?"

"A holiday," he said, repeating the syllables one by one as though trying to make out their meaning. "Give me--"

"Your cap? Here it is. Will you not first of all have a cup of coffee? The water will soon boil."

He made no further reply, but went out with heavy steps, and stumbled down the dark staircase. The snow crunched under his feet, and thick icicles hung in his beard. Far and near there was not a living creature to be seen in the dim streets; the sentinels in the sentry-boxes looked like stiff snow men. As he passed the bridge he saw that the river had frozen over during the night. He followed its course a long way, his eyes riveted on the ice as though looking for something there. Then he plunged into the neighbouring streets, quite aimlessly, like one walking in his sleep. For he could not expect to find what he was searching for by any pondering or thinking of his own. But the fever of an immeasurable agony drove him restlessly on, until he was utterly exhausted.

He might have been wandering a couple of hours or more, for the streets were beginning to look alive, when he reached the Potsdam Gate. He there saw a cab stopping in front of the small toll-house, coming as it seemed from the park. The toll-keeper came out in his furs, and as he reached out his snuff-box to a policeman who sat by the driver, asked laughingly--

"Anything that pays duty?" pointing to the closed cab windows.

"Not anything that pays duty here," was the reply. "I must give up my contraband to the proper authorities. She has smuggled herself--not into, but out of the world, but she is a rare piece of goods all the same. I was making my first round this morning yonder there by Louise-island, when I saw a well-dressed lady sitting on a bench, her head drooping as though she were asleep. 'My pretty child,' said I, 'look out some warmer place than this to sleep in, in such bitter cold as this.' But there was no waking her. Her hand still held a small bottle--it smelt like laurel leaves. She must have drunk it off, and then tout doucement have fallen to sleep! Good morning. I must make haste to deliver her up!"

The driver cracked his whip. At that very moment they again heard the toll-keeper's voice.

"Stop!" (he called out). "You can take another passenger. A gentleman looked into the cab window--and bang!--there he lies in the snow. Do get down, comrade, he is quite a young man; he must have weak nerves indeed to be knocked down in a second at the sight of a dead woman! How if you put him in beside her? They seem much of a muchness."

"No," returned the policeman, "that is contrary to regulations. Dead and living are not to be shut in together. Wait, we will carry him into the toll-house. If you rub his head with snow, and give him something strong to smell at, he'll come round in five minutes. I am up to these cases."

They bore the unconscious figure into the house: then the cab set out on its way again. But the policeman's prognostics were not fulfilled. Sebastian's consciousness did not return for five weeks instead of five minutes. It was only when the last snow had melted away that the miserable man began to creep about a little with the aid of his stick. Then he went off to his parents, who never knew what a strange fate had desolated his youth, and cast a shadow over his manhood, that was never entirely dispelled. When he died at the age of five-and-thirty he left behind him neither wife nor child.

END OF LOTTKA.