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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43762 ***
+
+[Illustration: WHISPERED MALICIOUS TALES INTO HIS EARS]
+
+
+
+
+  The Gnomes of the Saline Mountains
+
+  A FANTASTIC NARRATIVE
+
+
+  By
+
+  ANNA GOLDMARK GROSS
+
+  Author of "The Whim of Fate," and numerous
+  short stories and plays.
+
+
+  [Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+  THE SHAKESPEARE PRESS,
+  114-116 East 28th Street,
+  New York. 1912.
+
+
+
+
+     Copyright, 1912,
+     by
+     ANNA G. GROSS.
+
+
+
+
+     I dedicate this book
+     to the blessed memory
+     of my father. [Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+  ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+  by
+
+  I. T. BALLIN.
+
+
+  Whispered malicious tales in his ears          Frontispiece
+
+  He gazed at the fair form in bridal attire
+  lying upon the floor                                    104
+
+  Here, Miss, I ain't got no money but I'd
+  like to give you them shoes                             117
+
+  Confessing all to the wonder-working
+  Saint                                                   167
+
+
+
+
+     Near Dresden lies a garden,
+     Therein a cherry tree,
+     Beneath whose fragrant shadow,
+     Came happy dreams to me.
+
+     On its bark my love for her,
+     In ardent words I traced;
+     In rapture, then in sorrow,
+     Trembling with nervous haste.
+
+     The moon so bright had risen,
+     Those words glared forth at night.
+     I glanced at them all frightened,
+     Then screened them from my sight.
+
+     *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *
+
+     On zephyr's wave a whisper came,
+     From wicked gnomes to me addressed:
+     "Come here, come here, thou human toy,
+     And find with us thy final rest."
+
+
+
+
+The Gnomes of the Saline Mountains
+
+A FANTASTIC NARRATIVE
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+Though rather early in the morning, the well-known esplanade along
+the beautiful Traunsee at Gmunden, surrounded by green-decked Saline
+Mountains, was already thronged to overflowing with eager-looking
+sightseers, watching excitedly the completion of the grandstands which
+were now being erected for the great event of the day.
+
+Special trains arrived hourly from Ischel, Aussee, Hallstadt, and other
+mountain resorts of prominence, and the excitement seemed to increase
+each moment more and more.
+
+Humdrum life was thrown aside by young and old; everyone looked on
+expectantly, reviewing the grandstands, the tourists, and everything
+new around them.
+
+Fair-browed girls robed in spotless white muslin, garlanded with
+flowers and bright with rosy badges in honor of the occasion, were seen
+here and there, while their eyes sparkled and their lips drank from the
+cup of happiness, enjoying life and the blessing of being young.
+
+The constantly increasing throng of summer visitors and tourists from
+all parts of the globe, speaking different languages and wearing
+outlandish clothes, made up a bewildering picture, while the July sun
+beamed down upon them, and over lake and green-decked mountain-tops.
+
+The much talked of floral regatta of 1910 was not to take place until
+five, but by one o'clock the grandstands near the water, hardly
+completed, began to fill rapidly with the elite of Viennese society.
+These floral festivals, which had been so popular in previous years,
+were to be surpassed in artistic splendor and brilliant originality by
+today's display of picturesque effects, and symbolism of national life.
+
+Members of the highest nobility had consented to take leading parts in
+the regatta, which was under the protectorate of the Archduke Victor.
+Many celebrities of the musical world, living there in their beautiful
+cottages, were seen quietly taking their seats. The great bare mountain
+"Traunstein" seemed to smile down on them from his aerial height in
+friendly approval; they were no strangers to him, these music giants,
+but rather belonged to his enthusiastic admirers.
+
+Every spring they came to him, seeking relaxation for their
+over-strained nerves, and every fall, when his bald head began to be
+covered with a cap of snow, they went home full of elasticity and
+creative power, often bringing along conceptions of masterpieces which
+were later to fill the entire musical world with admiration. No wonder
+then, that the bald-headed old fellow up there so high above his
+neighbors looked down so proudly upon them.
+
+Loud blasts of trumpets in the distance announced to the patiently
+awaiting throng the approach of a long line of richly decorated boats.
+Archduke Victor, leading the procession, sat in the stern of his boat,
+which was gorgeously arrayed to represent a bower of field roses. He
+opened the festival by throwing red carnations into the water as far
+as his hand could reach. Next came the customary exchange of greetings
+among the Austrian nobility, whose elaborately decorated boats were
+stationed on both sides of the lake. At their approach, the orchestra
+on the esplanade burst forth with the National anthem of Austria, and
+the spectators applauded frantically.
+
+Right and left, as far as the eye could see, the shimmering surface of
+the lake, with its little, gently splashing wavelets, was covered with
+brightly colored crafts, every one an unique marvel of its kind.
+
+There came splashing along a huge Easter egg, made up of lilies of the
+valley; here a pagoda of large sunflowers called forth the admiration
+of the delighted sightseers.
+
+From the opposite shore there came floating a half opened Nautilus, out
+of which a green-clad naiad cast coquettishly her golden net, trying to
+catch some inexperienced young fish in her golden meshes. Nearby sailed
+a sleeping beauty (though rather wide awake) embowered enchantingly
+in clusters of American Beauties, looking in all directions for her
+enchanted Prince to appear and make ardent love to her.
+
+Suddenly there came, as if by magic, a gondola from the other side
+of the lake; it was gorgeously decorated, shining brightly in the
+brilliant afternoon sun. This floating work of art was made of lotus
+flowers, over which a canopy of glittering, diaphanous material was
+hanging, presumably as a suitable background for a lady now the
+cynosure of all eyes. She was of such entrancing beauty that all who
+beheld her sat spellbound and actually forgot to applaud, according to
+the customary greeting to newcomers, scarcely knowing which to admire
+first; the magnificent craft, so artistically constructed, or the
+dazzling apparition within.
+
+Amazed and speechless, the distinguished gathering gazed at her. "Who
+is she?" they whispered to each other. Her name was not on the list
+of nobilities. Nobody knew anything about her, but she was gorgeously
+dressed, her costume representing that of Cleopatra, made up of pale
+green crepe de chine, covered with little amorettes of silver pearls,
+which hung loosely in artistic folds about the luxurious outlines of
+her bewitching form. Long flaxen hair, artistically arranged, set off
+with diamond sparks, fell about her, and shone like molten gold in the
+setting sun. It was supposed to be a real reproduction, according to
+ancient pictures, of the flirtatious Queen of Egypt, seen in the art
+galleries of Florence, Genoa and Rome. Her large black eyes held a
+singular fascination in their sparkling depths, which if once looked
+into, fastened themselves upon the imagination of man to be forgotten
+no more.
+
+At the sight of all these splendors amid such exclusive surroundings,
+she looked with a frightened stare into space, as if she were a
+newcomer, a stranger in this atmosphere of wealth and distinction. Her
+features were rigid and white, and she seemed fascinated, dumb with
+admiration at the sight of the splendid surroundings. For this reason,
+she had failed to notice the sensation her beauty had aroused among the
+masculine sightseers.
+
+A slender man, with deep set eyes, and thin and bloodless lips tightly
+pressed together, sat in an unpretentious little boat a short distance
+away, murmuring grimly unintelligible words to himself. She caught
+sight of him and sent him a friendly glance and a smile similar to the
+greeting of well-known friends. He did not lose sight of her for a
+moment, but almost devoured her with his eyes.
+
+With feverish eagerness he followed her every movement, knitting his
+brows threateningly when any boat of the Viennese "Jeunesse doree" came
+with admiring curiosity too near to her's. In his jealous rage he felt
+like driving all of them from the spot.
+
+He began to reproach himself for having yielded to her cajoling
+entreaty to be allowed to take part in the festivity.
+
+"Miserable fops," he murmured contemptuously, as he contemplated the
+admiring men with a scornful sneer. "I loathe the sight of all these
+nobodies," he grumblingly soliloquized.
+
+Many of them, in fact, had nothing to boast about. Many of these
+so-called nobles in addition to a noble name, combined magnificent
+poverty and an abhorrence for honest work; they acquired a heap
+of debts and their inherited estates were often in the hands of
+unscrupulous usurers, or mortgaged to the last cent, while the sneering
+one had money in such abundance that he could have purchased patents of
+nobility for an entire regiment, and still have a reserve revenue from
+his unfathomable gold mine in South Africa. His finances would have
+allowed him the luxury of such a woman--although it must be whispered
+he had a wife in England, divorced some people asserted.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+It was seven o'clock; the great animated festival drew near its end.
+At a given signal from the master of ceremonies, the music on the
+esplanade stopped; a hush fell on the distinguished gathering.
+
+Archduke Victor, in his own exalted person, was to award the stipulated
+prizes to the boats of most artistic and original designs.
+
+The fanfares sounded gayly over land and sea, and all the boats small
+and large ranged themselves in a semi-circle about the illustrious
+judge. The first prize, a silver statuette of the Goddess Hebe, was
+awarded to the fascinating princess of Egypt.
+
+With a flourish of trumpets, and amid shouts of applause from the
+enthusiastic throng, all looked around for the boat of the prize
+winner. But there was no sign of it anywhere, nor was the single boat
+of the slender Englishman to be seen any more.
+
+At a given signal from Mr. Ogden, the artistically constructed little
+boat had quietly turned about, and the two, availing themselves of the
+general excitement over the awarding of prizes, had quietly slipped
+away behind the neighboring piers, where the palatial home of the
+unfortunate Archduke Johann Salvatore is to be seen. He is better known
+to the outer world under the pseudonym "Johann Orth."
+
+His sorrowing mother is still seen by passers-by sitting near the
+window with expectant eyes waiting for the lost son to return.
+
+The brilliant floral festival enacted on the lake was at an end. On the
+esplanade were still seen groups of excited spectators discussing with
+great animation once more, the singular disappearance of the wonderful
+little boat that was fortunate enough to win the first prize and whose
+occupants disappeared without claiming that distinction. Others lost no
+time in entering the brightly illuminated cafes in the vicinity of the
+esplanade to refresh themselves after the excitement of the grand event.
+
+On the eastern horizon a thin, fleecy scarf of clouds was visible and
+the silvery moon with all her sparkling companions had just come out
+to beam upon the scene. The West was a single shrine of beryl, whereon
+ruby flakes of vapor seemed to float through the universe.
+
+Meanwhile the much-admired boat was silently gliding over the surface
+of the gently splashing waves. The half reclining form of the
+fascinating woman seemed in the amber moonlight to resemble that of
+Aphrodite, as if risen from the waves and in a wanton mood, anxious to
+make a trial performance all by herself of her incontestable power over
+the other sex.
+
+"Am I really so fascinating? Did those admiring glances tell the tale
+of my triumph?" she murmured with a happy smile to herself, looking
+askance at the boat alongside her's, where her jealous admirer sat with
+gloomy eyes, consumed by jealousy.
+
+Mr. Ogden, to whom she owed all this splendor, regarded with
+unconcealed displeasure the day's proceedings. He reproached himself
+for having yielded to her entreaty. She had begged and coaxed him so
+much, until he gave his consent, then he ordered the decoration of the
+boat. Her costume was especially ordered from the most expensive tailor
+according to ancient pictures of the Egyptian Queen. Ogden undoubtedly
+wanted her to be the most striking figure on the lake.
+
+And now! Was he really jealous because she was the most admired, the
+most beautiful? "Jealous? Ho! ho!"
+
+She shrugged her white shoulders with a contemptuous smile.
+
+Did he really think that she loved him? "Phew!"
+
+She had only accepted his ardent devotion to learn what riches and
+luxury really meant, for which she had an uncontrollable longing, a
+longing that almost devoured her! Night and day she thought of it, how
+to get rich.
+
+The aggressive poverty in which she had passed her earlier days, was
+too hideous to dwell upon; she could not think of it without a shudder.
+The idea of being poor again took her breath away. How could she ever
+have consented to become the wife of a man who was poor? "Handsome but
+poor! What an anomaly!" she said in an undertone, smiling sarcastically.
+
+With bitter envy and scorn in her painfully contracted heart, she
+saw the rich but most ugly looking women rolling by in their elegant
+automobiles disdainfully glancing at her and her poor outfit. Often
+enough when she was working,--engaged in the performance of her
+household duties in the two small dark rooms of a tenement house,
+without pure air, without light to brighten her beautiful face, she
+cursed everything. This hovel her home! And she had the priceless gift
+of beauty! She made up her mind not to stand it any longer.
+
+The day came when she was seized by such a consuming desire to go
+in pursuit of pleasure, to wear elegant, stylish clothes and feel
+the admiring glances of the other sex resting upon her, that meeting
+Mr. Ogden by accident and dazzled by his wealth, captivated by his
+costly presents, she accepted his proposal to go with him forgetting
+everything, even the sacred duty of a mother.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+The much-admired little boat was now approaching the narrow bay which
+is only two minutes distance from Gmunden. There stood the spick and
+span victoria of Mr. Ogden; the two black horses attached to it struck
+out sparks of fire with their impatient hoofs. The tall Englishman who
+had distanced her, stood there waiting. The moment he caught sight of
+her bewitching face, his eyes sparkled and smiling sweetly at her,
+helped her tenderly out of the boat.
+
+The sun had just gone down behind a fleecy cloud and kindled a volcano,
+from whose silver-rimmed crater fiery rays of scarlet shot up almost to
+the clear zenith. She looked fatigued and closed her eyes for a moment.
+Now she caught sight of him and smiled, allowing him to take her away--
+
+Tenderly kissing her hand, he led her to the carriage, lifted her
+carefully in and wrapped a costly cloak, which was laying there, around
+the enchanting form he so adored.
+
+She did not speak, but sat by his side in silence. He gazed at her
+several times and then gave the order to start. The carriage set off at
+a rapid gait.
+
+The light of day was rapidly failing. Day and night seemed to
+join hands in a twilight mystery; black clouds were now piling up
+threateningly on the western horizon. A heavy gust scattered the thick
+aggressive atmosphere. Flying leaves were lifted up in the air as if by
+magic, and went through the wildest dances to the piping and howling of
+the storm, which now commenced to rage in all its fury, while voices of
+sinister shadows in the air, seemed to hold intercourse with others in
+the distance.
+
+In these high mountainous regions a few moments suffice to turn a
+smiling landscape into a cheerless dripping desert. Claps of thunder
+and flashes of lightning followed each other at brief intervals. The
+rain now fell in torrents and the howling storm whipped the green lake
+whose wavelets had been so gently splashing half an hour ago.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+During the events described in the preceding chapter, a man still in
+the glow of youth was walking through the valley surrounded by lofty
+saline cliffs, in this howling storm, while clouds of shrivelled leaves
+danced above his head. He did not mind the dreary desolation around him.
+
+His face, naturally strong with manly beauty, was now pale and haggard,
+showing unmistakable traces of a great sorrow. His large intelligent
+eyes were now sunk deep in their sockets. A nervous restlessness made
+him shiver, and his pale cheeks gathered only a little color when an
+obstinate cough threatened to rend his suffering breast asunder.
+
+His coat betrayed the elegant cut of the fashionable tailor, but it was
+now old and worn, and hung loosely about his emaciated form. He looked
+like a teacher on whom fortune had persistently turned her back.
+
+He carried in his hands a thick book, carefully wrapped up in a
+handkerchief, which he clasped tightly almost tenderly to his breast,
+as if afraid at any moment it might escape or drop out of his hands.
+This idea made him tremble. It was indeed his only source of income; by
+the aid of this valuable book he had already earned many a gold piece
+in the Tyrolian and Styrian mountains.
+
+His humorous lectures had been received with great approbation in
+different hotels frequented by many foreign tourists. And still, his
+earnings were not sufficient to support him and his motherless child,
+pretty little Marie, whom he had left in the meantime with a family of
+friends in Dresden. Every silver groschen he had earned was for the
+support of his child.
+
+He had come all the way from Hallstadt, and this long walk had
+exhausted his strength considerably; and his heart was sick and heavy.
+Now he felt a frightful nervousness, fearing not to be able to reach in
+time the hotel where he was announced to deliver his humorous lecture.
+
+He walked as quickly as he could to the farther end of the valley,
+where he expected to see a clearing in the forest, and an open road
+to the hotel. But on all sides he met high, unfamiliar cliffs.
+Apprehension fell over him like an icy rain.
+
+"Can I have lost my way?" he murmured, breathing heavily, while great
+beads of perspiration broke out on his forehead.
+
+In an hour's time he was supposed to be at the Mountain View Hotel, and
+now.... He looked helplessly around. Darkness began to fall, contesting
+every inch of ground with retreating daylight. His teeth were
+chattering with a cold chill, when he set out to find another opening.
+
+The continuous excitement of this wandering from one hotel to another,
+the consuming sorrow, the bleeding wound in his heart, had gradually
+undermined his constitution, originally none too strong, and now
+this wearing cough, the insidious fever!... "How upset I feel; it's
+the peculiar atmosphere," he said to himself. At the same time he
+remembered that the entertainment he proposed to offer this evening,
+was not sufficiently furnished with witty epigrams and bons mots. So,
+bowing and smiling to an imaginary audience of cosmopolitan taste, he
+began to rehearse his lecture as he walked on, sharpening the humour
+and adding some popular Austrian witticisms in vogue as trump cards.
+
+Suddenly he looked up and saw a dark cloud threatening down upon
+him. Heavy gusts of wind commenced to bend the tops of the high,
+impenetrable trees. The songs of the mocking birds rang from the cedars
+in the distance in his ear and startled him.
+
+He stopped in alarm and looked distractedly around him. Where was he?
+He could not make out. In the marshy places the fireflies were seen,
+wandering about and looking in the distance like malicious eyes of
+wicked sprites.
+
+There was no longer any doubt, he had taken an entirely wrong direction.
+
+Trembling with excitement, fearing delay, he rushed back to look for
+the right path, while his hot breath grated audibly on his weak lungs.
+A fearful storm was gathering, whispering and sobbing like complaining,
+frightened witches now whirling the leaves into the air vehemently as
+if driven by the furies of Hades.
+
+A cold shudder ran through his fevered frame. He gazed in helpless
+despair up and down, not knowing where to turn, while the rain poured
+down in torrents, soaking him from head to foot, and the centuries
+old tree-tops groaned and moaned like lost souls in Dante's Inferno.
+Now everything began to swim around him. Nature was in an uproar and
+bluster. Every little glowworm seemed to his frightened eyes to grow to
+gigantic proportions dancing wildly about.
+
+Sharp flashes of lightning lit up the Traunstein ever and anon and
+seemed to come nearer and nearer, as if trying to march straight down
+upon him. He wanted to retreat, but could not move; there was a dark
+mist before his eyes. Uttering a piercing cry, he fell to the ground in
+a heap because the big monster kept on advancing.
+
+With a tremendous crash, the great mountain burst apart and a whole
+troop of tiny, little mountain gnomes came out, dancing grotesquely
+like sprites of another world.
+
+They were garbed in white vestments, like fleecy vapors, with brazen
+girdles which seemed to be sunbeams, and a cloudy stuff supposed to
+be mantles hung loosely around their diminutive forms. With bare feet
+they pattered down upon him. As soon as they caught sight of him they
+commenced to giggle, swarming around him in great merriment. And then
+they put their ludicrous little heads together and pointed at him with
+contempt, whispering tales in falsetto tones to each other, which he
+could not understand. But he saw by the glare of their twinkling little
+eyes that they meant him, that they touched on something in his past
+life.
+
+By and by they became bolder and touched his wet clothes; some of the
+older ones bent down to him and whispered malicious tales about his
+wife into his ears. He groaned aloud. "It is a lie! I don't believe
+a word of it!" he screamed, cursing the whole deceitful band. In his
+indignation he tried to rise several times in order to drive them
+away--down into the foaming stream, or back into their mountain riff;
+but he could not move; his feet seemed to be fastened to the very
+ground as if paralyzed or chained to earth. They whispered once more
+the name of his wife with scornful laughter, and passed on over hills
+and valleys dancing merrily.
+
+Suddenly a bright light shone about him, illuminating the marshy
+waters; invisible choirs were singing sweetly, as if angels were
+descending from heaven. His eyes dilated as he saw a procession of tiny
+elves passing him, carrying little lighted tapers in their diminutive
+hands. In their midst he saw his dear mother stretching out her arms
+longingly towards him.
+
+Tears came to his eyes. The dear face! He wanted to run to her, embrace
+her, but could not stir. A cry of horror broke from his trembling lips
+when the fair Siren so fatal to his life stood before him, intervening
+and trying to ensnare him again with the fascination of her glittering
+eyes, her bewitching smile, speaking to him of love and devotion which
+he believed again.
+
+He listened to her; and a ray of happiness and delight filled his
+love-sick heart. She comes back to him! She loves only him! And
+unheeding the beseeching beckoning of his anxious mother, whose
+tortured heart writhed and bled for her suffering son, he hastened on
+with the enticing Siren,--where to, he did not know.
+
+Suddenly they stood before a deep precipice; darkness surrounded them,
+and the old trees commenced to sigh and moan and bend down upon them.
+Six shadowy forms with blazing torches appeared upon the scene carrying
+a coffin. Just in front of him the lid opened and the pale waxen face
+of his dead mother met his frightened eyes. He screamed aloud with
+horror. He had broken that noble heart, he had killed the best of
+mothers, because he had followed this evil spirit of his life.
+
+With a loud cry he threw himself upon the lifeless form and wept, while
+the fair siren by his side laughed and laughed. Beside himself with
+indignation he panted, trying to strike her and hurl words of hatred in
+her face; but his hands fell helpless by his side; they had no power to
+execute his will. He seemed rooted to the ground.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+
+"Get up from this wet ground, you fellow! How did you ever come here
+in this beastly weather?" He heard a deep sympathetic voice by his
+side. Awakened from his swoon, soon he looked amazed around him. What
+had happened? He did not know at all. His limbs were helpless and he
+lay on the ground where he must have fallen. His treasured source
+of income, his precious book, containing all his humorous lectures,
+lay rain-soaked near his side. How long he had been lying there
+unconscious, he did not know himself. A slim well-dressed man stood
+before him, doing his best to help him get up and trying to comfort him
+as much as he could, shaking his head wonderingly, and inquiring how he
+ever happened to be lost in such a place.
+
+The lecturer looked about him with great relief. He did not see the
+gnomes anywhere. So it was not true what they told him, what they
+sneered at--
+
+His heart rejoiced. It was only a hallucination, nothing else. All he
+had seen and heard must have been a stupid fancy of his tired brain.
+The best proof was, that he found himself lying helplessly on the
+ground, just awakening from a swoon.
+
+Yes, the condition of his brain was at fault; that was as clear as
+daylight. "Thank God!" he exclaimed, while a feeling of unspeakable joy
+surged through his heart, now gladdened with thankfulness.
+
+"I came near believing all that stupid nonsense of those wicked gnomes
+about my----"
+
+"Hey! listen to me, poor fellow! What in Heaven's name, are you doing
+here on that wet ground?"
+
+It was not until the stranger by his side had repeated his question
+that he could pull himself together and answer in a stammering voice,
+while a cold shiver shook his emaciated frame.
+
+He looked at the stranger with dilated eyes. "Beg pardon sir. I--I must
+have lost my way. I was to give a humorous lecture at a neighboring
+hotel, and--and fell down," he said helplessly, picking up his
+rain-soaked book, which he had discovered within reach.
+
+"Why, you are wet through and through, my man. What can I do for you?"
+asked the stranger with deep sympathy.
+
+A strange look of wonder illuminated the face of the downfallen man.
+He stammered: "If you would have the great kindness to help bring me
+to the Mountain View Hotel. You see, I am expected there. I've got to
+earn some money tonight yet." He paused to cough; his voice seemed
+sepulchral.
+
+"I have a motherless child to support." His head was bent to hide his
+emotion. "My girlie must have all she needs. I--I couldn't stand it if
+they were to let her go hungry. God!" Again a vehement cough shook his
+wasted frame.
+
+"Well, well, this turns out all right. I'll bring you there as we are
+staying in the same hotel."
+
+"He's got fever, sir--better let's get him on the box," he heard the
+coachman say who stood by his side looking with obvious pity at the man
+before him.
+
+A few paces away, a closed carriage was standing with two lighted
+lanterns in front of it.
+
+The storm had relented for a while, and mysterious silence fell upon
+the scene.
+
+"Ogden!" now called out an excited woman's voice from within the
+carriage. "To miss the table d'hote on account of that wretched
+beggar. Why it's just unpardonable!"
+
+"That voice!... God have mercy!"
+
+The man on the ground stammered as if struck by lightning. His eyes
+dilated, starting out of their sockets and staring horrified at the
+carriage.
+
+"That voice," he repeated. "Could it be possible? Could she be there?
+Am I still under the influence of that horrible hallucination?" he
+moaned piteously. He could not and would not believe a word of all they
+told him.
+
+Again he seemed to hear the revolting chuckle of the insolent gnomes,
+from the Traunstein, repeating their malignant tales of the outrageous
+conduct of his--
+
+"Up with you quickly, for we'll have more rain within a short time!"
+said Mr. Ogden, now in a sympathetic voice, and at the same time
+heeding the woman's command in the carriage, which he would not have
+ignored for any consideration.
+
+The coachman assisted the stranger to his seat on the box, and then Mr.
+Ogden entered the carriage, closing the door carefully.
+
+Then the splendid team of horses set off like the wind. "God have pity
+on me! that voice!"
+
+He could never forget the voice of that alluring siren who had goaded
+him on, until he saw nothing but her seductive face, listened to
+nothing but her deceitful declarations of love, without thinking of his
+mother's grief and her death!
+
+Could it be possible? She here in that closed carriage with another
+man? No, no! It was another hallucination of his feverish brain.
+
+How could she ever have attained such wealth? "Nonsense!" he murmured
+smilingly to himself, drawing a long breath of relief. Ah! how he had
+adored that faithless woman!
+
+The smiling expression died out of his face, and a mournful compassion
+for his deserted child stole into his troubled countenance. Why did she
+bring so much misery into his life? Every fibre of his noble heart had
+been throbbing with uncontrollable love for her! And now----the light
+of life, the hope of future years, was blotted out, clouds of despair
+and a grim night of an unbroken desolation fell like a pall on his
+heart and brain. Nothing to look forward to but misery!
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+
+He had wandered about like a soul condemned and lost to eternity. But
+the one hope to meet her again possessed him, kept him alive. And
+then--she'll come back to him--he was convinced of that; to his lonely
+little Mary. And after all she might be touched by his devoted love
+that knows how to pardon and overlook certain occurrences in the life
+of a giddy-headed woman!
+
+Unfortunately the cold, calculating coquette had never felt a tinge
+of anything like love, and had only an observing eye for the monthly
+allowances he received from his well-to-do parents.
+
+He had come to Dresden a young, inexperienced student to pursue a
+course in literature and jurisprudence. The handsome, dashing woman,
+somewhere in the twenties, soon allured him with her well tried
+arts. Within a short time he was her devoted slave and did not see
+nor hear anything else but her alluring voice, and after six months'
+acquaintance he led her to the altar without the knowledge of his
+parents.
+
+When they found it out, through a friend living in Dresden, they were
+in despair, in their helpless anger. His mother never recovered from
+the rude shock her ambition had received. She did not know the woman,
+but when she heard that she belonged to a different faith, she was
+crushed, although the noble catholicity of spirit that distinguished
+her character did not allow her to show it. Her proudest hope to see
+that beloved son some day a respected citizen and lawyer in that little
+provincial town where his cradle stood, was gone forever!
+
+Years of wrestling with life's sorrows had set upon her noble,
+benignant countenance, almost a seal of holiness, and shed over her
+placid features the mild, sweet life of a pure heart. Her white hair,
+the snowy mass prematurely white, wonderfully softened the outlines of
+her face.
+
+Now deep lines commenced to furrow her sweet, indulgent features, and
+she grieved so deeply over the disgrace that she began to lose her
+health. Silently, without a word to her husband she performed her
+household duties, until one day her enfeebled constitution gave way and
+she died, praying for the only child she had ever had.
+
+Her husband, Mr. Burge, under the double stress of the sorrow, refused
+to hear anything of the ungrateful son, for whom he had slaved and
+worked all his life, and whose grievous mistake in marrying an
+adventuress, had cost the mother's life.
+
+He had a large estate to look after, but he was alone now. He needed
+the son, but what could he do? He was ashamed of the daughter-in-law!
+"No, not a cent of my money can she have," he murmured constantly to
+himself with a flushed face and dry lips, looking at his imposing
+estate, where the beautiful Rhine rushed by and the tumbled down
+castles of long-forgotten races were seen in the distance.
+
+The irate father dissolved all connection with the son and stopped all
+payments, denying him any assistance whatsoever in the future.
+
+After the regular allowance from home had entirely ceased, it was
+necessary for the young husband to go and seek some profitable
+employment to support his expensive wife.
+
+He had never earned a cent, and racked his brain now how to get money.
+The tantalizing condition pressed upon him that he might not be able
+to support his family. Finally, he got a position with a meagre salary
+in a newspaper office, but he was scarcely able to provide the barest
+necessaries of life.
+
+He commenced to write short stories. Although he had no ambition
+to climb to such a lofty niche in the temple of fame, he thought
+he might at least earn a modest income. Short stories and humorous
+lectures--that must make a hit. Everybody said that he had a humorous
+vein. Now the time had come to show his mettle, but the short stories
+were generally returned. The irate father had ceased to send money and
+no other help was discoverable. And then--after all that--she, his
+loving wife, dropped her mask and showed herself in her true colors.
+
+"I have had enough of this," she said with a disgusted shrug of her
+white shoulders to her horrified husband. "I don't intend to starve
+here."
+
+In vain he begged her to have a little patience for the sake of their
+child. The last short story must turn out to be a great success; he
+felt it and was really convinced of it.
+
+"Convinced," she sneered contemptuously and turned away. No use of
+losing any breath about it, she thought. I am through with him anyway.
+Oh! How she longed to be rich, wear stylish clothes and be admired.
+
+The beautiful coquette became restless in her little home; she looked
+about sick at heart, unable to tolerate it any longer, only wishing to
+get the opportunity to leave it forever. Her eyes were full of scorn
+when looking at her husband, who could not supply her with all that she
+longed for just now, and for which she would have pledged the salvation
+of her very soul. She commenced to frequent public places in the
+absence of her husband.
+
+How she loathed poverty! "Anything but that," she murmured to herself,
+her face white with disgust as she walked on, gazing in all directions
+to see one of her former acquaintances, with a strange unrest in her
+large eyes. Her opportunity would come; she was sure of that, and it
+came in meeting one day the rich Englishman who was introduced to her
+by one of her former friends and boon companions.
+
+Shortly after this encounter, she received a letter from the Englishman
+telling her of the deep and lasting impression she had made on him and
+how he longed to see her again. Her face flushed with pleasure as she
+read all these, and then perused an invitation to take an automobile
+ride through the beautiful mountains.
+
+For some time she sat dazzled, and then she looked at the poorly
+furnished rooms; at her own wretched outfit, and her eyes flashed
+indignantly.
+
+"I am through with all this. Here is the opportunity I was longing
+for," she said with a contemptuous smile. "I'll show him--the young
+inexperienced fool I have married--that beauty counts for a whole lot
+and ... boldness even more."
+
+She stopped at the window and looked down at the Englishman's
+automobile before her door.
+
+"The opportunity--my opportunity has come." These words rang
+ceaselessly in her ears and filled her being with a strange endeavor
+to avenge herself on the man who could not supply her with all the
+luxuries she craved for, and according to her ethics, was entitled to.
+
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+
+It was on Christmas eve, her husband had come home with a radiant face.
+His short story had been accepted, and the money was in his pocket. Now
+he could buy a fitting present for his wife. Of course it could not
+be too expensive, but she certainly would enjoy it all the same; he
+was sure of that, feeling that the opening of a successful career was
+inaugurated.
+
+On his way home he had also bought a little fir tree to set up for
+the first Christmas celebration in his own home. The recollections of
+similar holidays in the house of his parents stirred him to the depths.
+How his heart quivered when he thought of his dear mother he loved so
+dearly. If she only were alive how different everything would be! He,
+who was brought up in luxury, mother's pet, and now--
+
+With deep emotion he entered the house. With a brisk step he opened the
+door, looked around and found it empty, the wife and all her belongings
+gone!
+
+The horror of that night was something he could never forget as long
+as he lived. Holding his ten months' old child in his trembling arms,
+he wept burning tears for her, the mother of his child. Could it be
+possible? A mother deserting her child on this holiest of evenings? He
+could not believe his eyes, but all she possessed went with her. No,
+no, she was giddy-headed, but not cruel. Motherhood must assert itself
+and surely would. How he loved her, how he longed to take her in his
+arms and feed his poor, famished heart with a touch of her lips!
+
+He sat there in the dark listening and waiting for her to come back, to
+see the presents he had bought for her, and the money he wanted to give
+her. But one hour after another passed and nobody came. In the streets
+a joyous throng of merry makers pushed and jostled about wishing
+each other a merry Christmas. His heart was shaken to its depths by
+maddening grief; by bitter disappointment.
+
+The room was icy cold, there was no fire in the stove, and the child
+half starved, screamed weakly in his arms. In wild desperation he
+trampled on the little Christmas tree he had brought along to celebrate
+his first Christmas in his own home! He could see nothing but falsehood
+and treachery in this world. What meaning was there for him in this
+life-redeeming symbol?
+
+Sick of everything he longed for death to come and take him and his
+little child away. Throughout that dreary night of agony he lay in bed
+holding the child in his arms, pressing his lips against her tender
+little hands, without being able to close an eye.
+
+The bell in the neighboring churches rang out in the ears of the
+deserted man, sounding dismally through his lonely house. But they
+brought back pictures to his mind of his childhood's happy days, when
+he went to church on similar Christmas eves with his parents. One tear
+after another stole into his desperate eyes.
+
+"God have mercy on me and my child," he murmured stammeringly. "I must,
+I will live for her sake. I cannot leave her altogether an orphan,"
+though the gaping wound in his own heart kept on bleeding, bleeding
+incessantly.
+
+
+
+
+VIII.
+
+
+"There! Here we are at last, no weather for a dog to be out," growled
+the angry coachman sulkily, jumping down from the box and opening the
+carriage door with a respectful bow, hat in hand.
+
+Mr. Ogden staggered quickly out and lifted tenderly and carefully a
+woman's form to the wet ground. Young Burge, the deserted husband, had
+just come down with the help of the coachman who growled something he
+could not understand.
+
+He looked at the woman in the darkness and a mist swam before his eyes;
+he leaned against the coach and his knees shook so that he could not
+make a single step. The night was black and the wind sobbed down the
+street, while the rain still fell in torrents.
+
+He could not see clearly--but that voice--that voice! God! "Could they
+have been right--these wicked, malicious gnomes? Did they know all
+about her and now, how?" he asked himself while his hands clutched the
+book convulsively in his helpless agony.
+
+He thought he heard them again whispering, with a derisive chuckle, the
+whole story of her downfall into his terrified ears.
+
+"How could she ever come to such magnificent clothes?" he thought.
+"Nonsense! It is simply a hallucination of a morbid, disordered
+brain. I am sick and miserable and see things where there is nothing
+to see." This he murmured half aloud to himself, gazing at the
+retreating form of the woman incredulously. He could not distinguish
+her features and he made up his mind forcibly, in order to quiet down
+his excited nerves, that it was nothing else but a foolish trick of
+his imagination, and the fever which shook him now again was the
+obvious cause of it all. "Anyway, how could she have obtained all this
+luxurious outfit? His wife wealthy? Nonsense!"
+
+He tried to laugh cheerfully about this foolishness, but suddenly he
+felt as though a knife were plunged into his heart. "The gnomes! the
+gnomes! If that which they had said were true!" He moaned to himself,
+leaning against the wall in a faint condition. "Oh, anything but that
+... anything but that!" His whole frame shook as from palsy. That voice
+haunted him. He knew he had to go and look at her in order to convince
+himself, otherwise he could not find any rest.
+
+
+
+
+IX.
+
+
+"Come, come! You must not lose your courage, my good fellow," said
+Mr. Ogden good-naturedly, coming out of the house at the same time.
+"But before you do anything else, you should go inside and get those
+wet clothes off; yes, that you must do, my man, you look pale enough
+indeed, and...."
+
+"The deuce! If that is not our expected entertainer, the humorous
+lecturer from Ishle!" cried the stout, dignified hotelier, with a laugh
+as he caught sight of the dripping form of the poor, dazed lecturer.
+
+"Lord, what a state he is in! Why he isn't able to lecture!"
+
+"Never mind, a hot grog, some dry clothes from my wardrobe, and the
+rest will soon be managed," said Mr. Ogden good-naturedly with a
+sign to his valet, greatly gratified in being able to help the poor,
+miserable looking man with the pallor of death on his emaciated face.
+
+"And as for your entertainment being a great success, well--leave that
+to me, my dear fellow and don't worry; it will be all right," he went
+on, clapping the dazed humorist on the shoulder with an encouraging
+smile.
+
+He bowed, without being able to utter a word of thanks; he bit his
+trembling lips and followed the valet with stumbling, shivering feet.
+
+"Who could this benevolent stranger be? And what was he to that woman?
+Was he mistaken or not? If, after all she should be his--his--"
+
+A hot wave flushed his face, distorted with shame as he thought of the
+possibility; his sorely tried heart was hammering mightily within him.
+
+He could not get rid of this thought. "If she should really be the
+mother of his poor child ... what, in the name of Heaven, was she
+then to this man? God have mercy on me and come to my aid!" he cried
+aloud, in great misery, his teeth once more chattering audibly in a
+fresh attack. "No, no! I can't and won't believe it! She can't be so
+shameless as to disgrace me and her innocent child!"
+
+"Come, come quickly, sir," urged the valet impatiently, "I'll help you
+as much as I can."
+
+After he had provided him with all the necessary clothes from the
+elaborately assorted wardrobe of the rich Englishman, who was about
+the same size, he made as careful a toilet as possible, under the
+prevailing circumstances and under the careful inspection of the
+helpful valet.
+
+
+
+
+X.
+
+
+The supper bell now rang through the vast corridors of the Mountain
+View Hotel, crowded with tourists from all parts of the continent.
+Ladies, gorgeously dressed, commenced to take their seats at the supper
+tables in the dining room, escorted by elegantly garbed gentlemen;
+some of them in full evening dress, others again in black cutaway. The
+clatter of knives and forks had already begun. The spacious dining room
+was brightly illuminated. At the further end a carpet-covered platform
+was visible, whose edges were a bank of flowers. Everything was
+tastefully arranged. A pianist was already hammering away at a waltz
+of one of the latest operatic successes, with frightful execution, as
+an introduction to the interesting program of the evening, anxiously
+awaited by the patrons of the house.
+
+The clatter, the bustling noise, had suddenly stopped and all eyes were
+riveted expectantly on the man who had just entered. Our humorist,
+suffering in mind and body alike, pale and haggard, with restless eyes,
+made his appearance in the borrowed clothes which hung loosely about
+his emaciated form, tossing back his long locks with his right hand,
+while holding the cherished book tightly in the other, he came down to
+the very edge of the platform and smiled and bowed in all directions.
+
+He looked exhausted and weary, as he was. But the room was crowded and
+he had to go on, whether he wanted or not, so he commenced: "Ladies and
+gentlemen."
+
+He got no further. A mist swam suddenly before his eyes. A shiver shook
+his emaciated frame, his face became flushed and bloated and he stared
+and stared.
+
+A side door had been opened a few minutes before and Mr. Ogden entered
+with the much admired Cleopatra on his arm.
+
+They passed through the crowded dining room, close to the speaker's
+platform. She had changed her dazzling costume for a simpler, but an
+extremely stylish dress of blue silk. She still wore some of the lilies
+in the marvelous golden hair, which was now fastened with a gold comb
+into a plain Greek knot. She was all aglow with excitement. The triumph
+of the afternoon was still lingering on her handsome face. She felt
+like shouting it out to everybody. Such conquest does not come often to
+a woman in the ordinary walks of life.
+
+She walked proudly, with a queenly step to her seat, nodding to some
+casual acquaintances with a charming smile. And then she took her
+seat and turned a glance of curiosity upon the famished face of the
+entertainer. Their eyes met--and for a few seconds sank into each
+others' like sharp daggers. A red tinge covered her startled face, then
+she turned away, whiter than the lilies on her breast. She trembled
+visibly and looked frightened, casting down her eyes.
+
+Mr. Ogden did not seem to have noticed any change in her appearance and
+gazed with a shocked countenance and great pity at the reduced exterior
+of the poor humorist. Suddenly a great excitement was noticeable among
+all the guests sitting around the small tables. Several gentlemen had
+left their seats, rushed towards the place where the poor entertainer
+had collapsed after recognizing his faithless wife garbed in that
+splendor, so shamefully acquired, of which the wicked gnomes were
+whispering so constantly into his ears.
+
+He still believed in her then; but now--the dark, threatening
+expression in his livid face was frightful to behold. He murmured
+something about the gnomes that nobody could understand, staring with
+hatred in his dilated eyes in the direction where she sat--she, the
+mother of his innocent child, now disgraced forever!
+
+"God! What have I done to deserve such a punishment?" he murmured
+once more, pressing his bloodless lips tightly together as a cold
+perspiration broke out on his deathlike face.
+
+A vision of his mother's warning and sorrows was presented to his
+benighted intelligence and made him cry with terror and shame.
+The conflicting emotions were too much for the sadly undermined
+constitution.
+
+"The wicked gnomes!" he whispered with audible scorn and contempt in
+his blazing eyes, as if sudden madness had seized on him, and then
+tried to curse her, but not another word escaped his tightly closed
+lips, though the blood began to gush from them.
+
+The truth, so cruelly thrust upon him, ended his life's drama; his eyes
+closed, he fell in a heap to the floor.
+
+The pitying guests stood helplessly around him and did not know what to
+do. Mr. Ogden was the first one who had presence of mind to send to the
+nearest village in search of a doctor.
+
+The beautiful Cleopatra sat there as pale as a ghost and was afraid
+to go near the prostrate form of her unhappy husband, fearing that
+someone might lift the veil and show the audience the ugliness of her
+real self. A feeling of restlessness rushed upon her as if the shameful
+story were being written on her flushed face. She could not endure it
+any longer and left the dining room.
+
+Mr. Ogden did not notice her departure, and busied himself around the
+dying man, asking what he could do for him. The poor man pointed to a
+letter in his side pocket where the addresses of his friends in Dresden
+were written down.
+
+"The gnomes!... the gnomes!" he stammered once more as the shadow of
+death began to close in upon him. The blood streamed out incessantly,
+and before the aid of a doctor could be secured, he was a corpse.
+
+
+
+
+XI.
+
+
+Mr. Ogden, deeply moved, went to his rooms.
+
+She, the cause of it all, sat at the window with a book in her hands
+without reading it. There was a look in the woman's face that amazed
+him, a hard, cold look, that he had never seen there before while the
+sunbeams fell on her bewitching features and on the green leaves still
+in her hair.
+
+"I want to leave the place at once," she said without looking at him.
+
+"That poor man's face seems to haunt you, dear tender-hearted girlie,"
+he replied with an outburst of tenderness, taking her in his arms and
+kissing the handsome face he loved so dearly.
+
+It was a fortunate thing that he was blissfully ignorant of her
+relation to the dead man.
+
+Gathering up courage--seeing that no suspicion had entered his
+mind--she raised her beautiful eyes to his languidly.
+
+"Yes, you are right, dear, I cannot stand such horrible things ... it
+shocks me," she answered with her accustomed dissimulation in tone and
+action.
+
+Although she was a great adept in the art of hypocrisy and
+dissimulation, she could not altogether hide the uneasiness which had
+taken possession of her. A strange expression came into her eyes, an
+expression he had never seen there. He looked at her and was puzzled.
+What was it? What brought the change about? He could not tell.
+
+She turned suddenly and looked out of the window with a stony face, in
+order to hide, to subdue,--what? Did she conjure up a sinful vision
+of her own life? No, she would not give in, but she was startled to
+perceive something within her she did not reckon with: a voice wanted
+to be heard, no matter how hard she tried to subdue it. It was the
+voice of motherhood--that feeling seemed to be not quite dead in the
+heart of the shameless woman. It was Nature's revenge! She had to
+listen to the voice of Nature, or was it conscience, slowly awakening
+to life?
+
+Ah! Who would or could fathom the heart of an unscrupulous coquette?
+
+"Had he any family?" she asked, indifferently, avoiding his inquisitive
+gaze.
+
+"Yes, I think he has a child, here is the address," he replied. "I
+think it must be with someone he knew, poor unfortunate man. And
+he gave me this in order to look up his orphan child." A mournful
+compassion soon stole into his eyes.
+
+"He could not speak any more, but the pitiful glance of the dying man's
+face told me as much, and I am going to Dresden and see whether I can
+do anything for his child," he added, looking deeply moved out of the
+window. She gazed at him with puzzled eyes. "God! if he had an inkling
+whose child that is!" she thought, remorsefully recoiling a step with
+downcast eyes and tightened lips.
+
+Finally summoning up courage enough, she said, hesitatingly, as if
+fearing any comment:
+
+"Yes, ... let us stop there on our way to Switzerland."
+
+He wanted to stay until the funeral of the poor lecturer was over, but
+she would not hear of it. She looked at him with frightened eyes when
+he made the suggestion.
+
+"I cannot stand such scenes," she replied with quivering lips.
+
+"Well, well! Then we'll go, my sensitive little girlie. That accident
+seemed to have upset your nervous system," he said with a smile,
+kissing her tenderly and gazing fondly at her troubled face.
+
+On the following morning they took their departure for Dresden, leaving
+some money for the funeral expenses in the hands of the hotel keeper.
+
+Instinctively he felt like doing something for the man he had robbed of
+his happiness without knowing it.
+
+But the unscrupulous coquette loved nobody but herself, knew it, felt
+it, though without any remorse, that she had betrayed his deep devotion
+and undying love so shamefully, fearing, in her deceitfulness, only one
+thing--detection.
+
+The following day a simple hearse, containing the corpse of the poor
+humorist whose life ended so tragically, went up a lonely hill where
+the grave diggers had just finished their gloomy work. The coffin was
+lowered and the grave covered with mother earth. No mourners stood
+around shedding tears.
+
+The song of a mocking-bird rang from the downy cradle of myrtle
+blossoms--as a funeral dirge--and a whip-poor-will answered from a
+cedar in the neighboring woods.
+
+When the night train going to Dresden, rushed by, the little white
+cross indicating his resting place, looked like a bleached hand of a
+skeleton shining out with a ghostly radiance across the silent, gloomy
+plain.
+
+Through the fleecy vapors floating around the lonely hill one with
+clairvoyant eye may see at midnights the vacillating horde of the tiny
+gnomes from the Traunstein with downcast torches repeating whisperingly
+the sad tale, and pointing at the grave, in which the body of the dead
+humorist, betrayed of his life's happiness, crumbles to dust.
+
+
+
+
+THE ARTIST
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+The eye of the attentive observer who wanders through Fifth Avenue,
+and the streets which run into it from right and left, is especially
+attracted by the houses, built here in the Colonial, there in the
+Renaissance style. Some of these imposing edifices (often the only
+reminder of long-vanished fortunes), with their rich facades, afford a
+striking criterion of the tastes of their builders and of their former
+inhabitants.
+
+In one of these houses, rearing their proud height to the sky, a
+small lap-dog, bedecked with silken ribbons, sat in a parlor window.
+He stretched his snowy paws with great satisfaction on the cushioned
+window-seat, warming himself in the April sun. The luxurious room
+behind him was quite empty, and the enforced solitude was not at all
+to the taste of the spoiled pet. It was probably for this reason that
+he did not find it worth his while to bark in a superior manner at the
+pedestrians who appeared on the street, but a look of silent contempt
+told very plainly that he had made up his mind to consider as extremely
+unpleasing the movements of a limping street-cleaner who was at the
+moment just in front of the house.
+
+In fact, the lame man did not look as if he could pretend being favored
+with a condescending glance by a lap-dog living amidst such sumptuous
+surroundings.
+
+He looked, too, as if he had had no great practice at his wretched
+calling--as if he were a novice at it. Although his sickly, sunken
+features were surrounded by an unkempt grey beard, and his clothing
+hung loosely about his wasted form, he somehow gave the impression
+of being an intelligent man of some education, upon whom undeserved
+misfortune pressed heavily.
+
+The well-fed pet in the parlor window, however, had no conception of
+undeserved misery, and was about casting to the winds the carefully
+drilled manners of an educated dog when, fortunately, a well-appointed
+carriage drew up just as the lame man was preparing to go on his way.
+
+A delicate-looking lady with a kindly face alighted from the carriage,
+and nodded smilingly to the little dog. The lame street-cleaner had no
+sooner glanced at the benevolent face of the richly-dressed woman than
+his emaciated form began to tremble. His face, so pale before, became
+red, as with humiliation, and in a state of marked agitation he was on
+the point of dropping his broom and stealing quietly away.
+
+The lady, Mrs. Denison, who had just come from a charitable gathering,
+and was still under the influence of her charitable mood, felt
+hurriedly in her purse for a silver-piece, which she instructed her
+servant to give the lame man as she ascended the broad steps and
+disappeared into the house.
+
+"I am no beggar!" stammered the street-cleaner in broken English,
+waving off the proffered alms with a trembling hand.
+
+Within the mansion Mr. Denison, in a faultless evening costume, turned
+the diamond sleeve-links in the cuffs he was adjusting as he awaited
+his wife.
+
+Mrs. Denison laid aside her hat and cloak and hastened upstairs to
+greet him, beginning at once to give him a rather feverish account of
+the doings of the association of which she was president.
+
+Presently another turn was given to the conversation by the entrance of
+a tall young man with light blue eyes and a rather inexpressive face.
+
+"I am done with racing for the present!" he cried eagerly, holding out
+his hand.
+
+"Thank heaven!" answered Mrs. Denison, fervently.
+
+"Eh, for once, George," said Mr. Denison thoughtfully.
+
+"And do you know why? My favorite won first place--only think how
+lucky!" The young man's excitement was perceptible in his panting
+breath.
+
+"And how delighted Lucy will be! Here she comes now," said Mrs.
+Denison, turning to kiss the white forehead of her daughter as she
+entered the room.
+
+Lucy, a pale, thoughtful girl, with large, meditative eyes shaded by
+gold-rimmed glasses, held out her finely-shaped hand to George Elmore
+with a forced smile. There was, indeed, very little of the delight of
+which her mother had spoken to be seen in her face, although the young
+man scarcely seemed to notice its absence. Various sports occupied him
+to such an extent that he never had time to make a study of the girl
+to whom he was engaged. In addition to his penchant for amusements of
+the most superficial kind, the gift of observation was entirely lacking
+in his inflated brain. It was generally supposed that he was very much
+in love with her, but it was a question whether his affection for his
+riding-horse was not of a similar nature.
+
+Any one who did observe the pale face of the young girl more closely,
+however, could not have failed to notice the light quivering of her
+finely-chiselled nostrils, the nervous motion of her red lips.
+
+In spite of the assumed appearance of calm, which proved the power of
+her will, it was possible to perceive the existence within her of some
+deep emotion.
+
+She was standing by the window, the involuntary witness of the alms
+giving when it had occurred. The lame man in the street was no stranger
+to her; she knew his domestic circumstances only too well, and during
+his stay in the hospital had helped to support his family without
+confiding the circumstance to her parents. Whether she had omitted to
+mention it for fear of making herself ridiculous, or from some deeper
+motive, perhaps she, herself, could not at the present moment have
+determined.
+
+Lucy breathed a sigh of relief when the dinner was announced, and her
+_fiance_ went away to carry his pleasant news to other friends and
+acquaintances.
+
+Meanwhile the poor cripple hobbled off to his miserable dwelling.
+With failing breath he dragged himself over the great distance which
+lay between him and the lower part of the city, without once raising
+his eyes from the pavement, suffering and devastating mental torture
+showing in the feverish glow of his sunken eyes.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+Martin, the lame man, had been brought from Lyons by Mr. Denison, the
+silk manufacturer, apparently under the most favorable conditions. In
+the silk factory in New Jersey he had proven himself a most skillful
+dyer. The Denison wares came to be noted for their likeness to the
+Lyonese goods, and in a short time, through their similarity to the
+imported ones, surpassed all that had hitherto been made on this side
+of the ocean. For this reason the goddess, Fortune, added continually
+to the Denison stock of worldly treasures.
+
+But the continued pressure of the long workdays began to call forth
+loud remonstrances from the workmen in the Denison factory. Martin,
+generally looked upon as being responsible for the improvement in the
+product, was, consequently, hated as being the indirect cause of that
+pressure.
+
+"I'll be damned if I work a day longer for such beggarly wages!" cried
+a red-headed Irishman one day, bringing his fist down on the dye-tub
+with an angry look.
+
+"I can't blame him; he's in the right of it!" answered a second workman.
+
+"A twelve-hour day, and such hard work at that!" cried a third one,
+leaving his work-bench.
+
+"Right you are!" exclaimed all the others, rolling up their sleeves
+aggressively.
+
+"If the boss doesn't give us an eight-hour day and higher wages, we
+quit tomorrow, eh, boys?" cried the angry Irishman, his nose turning
+from red to purple in his excitement.
+
+Martin had been endeavoring, with ever-increasing earnestness, to calm
+the excited minds of the workmen, but all that he had been able to say
+to this end had been laughed to scorn. The next morning he was the only
+one who appeared at the factory.
+
+At ten o'clock came a deputation of the employees to the office of the
+manufacturer. Mr. Denison was perfectly willing to agree to a raise
+in wages, but he would hear nothing of an eight-hour workday, even
+at the risk of having to stop work for an indefinite period. Orders
+were coming in day by day. The busy season had just opened and the
+shutting down of the works would have meant a considerable loss to the
+manufacturer.
+
+Accordingly, Martin received orders to engage new workmen at once and
+set them going at their different tasks. The strikers no sooner became
+aware of this than they began to cast angry glances at Martin.
+
+"Our places to be taken by others?" cried the red-headed Irishman to
+Martin, in a voice choked with rage, as the latter, weary and worn,
+prepared to take his way homeward.
+
+"The dog of a foreigner is to blame for it all!" said another with
+threatening gestures.
+
+This was the beginning. The whole of the brutal crew fell upon Martin,
+and soon left him lying senseless on the ground. In this state he was
+carried home. His wife, an intelligent woman, the daughter of a doctor
+in Basle, and his four children, wept loudly, as the beloved father was
+carried unconscious into the house. The help of a physician was soon at
+hand and after a thorough examination a fracture was discovered in the
+upper part of the right thigh.
+
+The poor wife tended her unfortunate husband with the entire
+self-sacrifice of a true woman, keeping up the house as long as
+possible with what little money she could painfully scrape together.
+
+The eldest son, a youth of twenty-four, who, having regard to
+his manifest talent, had educated himself to be a painter, was
+unfortunately unable to find employment just at this time, in spite
+of his diligent and anxious search for it. To the serious financial
+situation was added the bitter recognition of the fact that the
+condition of the beloved sufferer was daily growing worse.
+
+Despair seized the unhappy family. The head of the firm was the only
+person from whom they might expect help. Accordingly Mrs. Martin
+decided to go to him as soon as possible, since the factory was to be
+closed for an indefinite time.
+
+Shyly and hesitatingly she entered the office. The thought of having to
+confess her dire poverty brought a flood of red to her thin face. No
+one was in the office but a clerk. To the question as to whether she
+could see Mr. Denison he answered with a contemptuous laugh that Mr.
+Denison had more important business on hand that day, and was visible
+to no one. Her urgent entreaty to be allowed to see him if only for a
+moment was in vain. The clerk rudely showed her the door.
+
+During this conversation, Lucy, the recently betrothed daughter of
+the manufacturer, sat listening in an adjoining room. The continued
+disturbances at the factory had caused her so much anxiety that she
+had insisted upon accompanying her father to the works, which she had
+scarcely visited before since her return from Germany. She had studied
+for two years at a school in Leipzig, and through the intellectual
+treasures of German literature and art she had become conversant with
+nobler pleasures than those which proved so attractive to Mr. Elmore,
+her _fiance_. Her aspirations for high and beautiful ideals found rich
+satisfaction in the finer and more artistic pursuits.
+
+She was sitting thoughtfully by the window, looking out at the grey
+clouds that chased each other across the sky like a troop of headless
+ghosts. Her profile was, perhaps, lacking in the classic lines which
+esthetic laws prescribe for beauty; but a rich spiritual life gave an
+indescribable charm to her pale countenance.
+
+Her large, meditative eyes seemed shadowed today by a deep melancholy.
+However she tried to fix her thoughts on George Elmore, the companion
+of her childhood, to whom, at her parents' wish she had engaged
+herself, today she found it impossible. Always there arose from the
+depths of her memory the face of a shy, gentle youth with light,
+curling hair and deep searching eyes, and the vision made her tremble.
+
+Chance had made them acquainted at the Art School. She had been trying,
+unsuccessfully, to reproduce the luminous expression of a saint. Her
+neighbor, watching her conflict with her difficult task, showed, in
+his shy fashion, his willingness to be of use to her. With a few
+strokes of his brush he succeeded in catching the desired expression,
+and at the same time gave her in a hesitating voice an explanation of
+the picture, and its purpose. He spoke of the light effects which he
+considered an erroneous conception on the part of the painter, while
+the next picture, belonging in part to the school of Rembrandt, reached
+a happier effect from the depths of the shadows in one place and the
+heightening of the light in another.
+
+From that time on they worked for hours side by side, he explaining the
+lights and shadows of each picture with such fullness of comprehension,
+such a thorough knowledge of history, literature, and art, as to make a
+deep impression on her mind. Her two years' sojourn in Germany had not
+been able to efface these art-school recollections. She did not know
+his name, to say nothing of his social position and still--she could
+not forget--even now she thought of him--even now his picture thrust
+itself between her and her _fiance_.
+
+Involuntarily she sprang to her feet to escape those torturing
+thoughts. Her attention was caught by the sound of low sobbing. She
+was able to observe through a crack in the partition the distress
+of poor Mrs. Martin, as the clerk refused her admittance into the
+manufacturer's private office.
+
+Broken with discouragement and suffering, Mrs. Martin had scarcely
+closed the door behind her when Lucy entered the office.
+
+"Who is that sobbing woman?" she asked hastily of the clerk.
+
+"That woman? She is the wife of the former foreman, whom--the
+strikers--handled somewhat roughly," he answered, hesitatingly,
+dropping his malicious eyes.
+
+"She wished to speak to papa, didn't she? Why didn't you let her in?"
+she demanded, frowning.
+
+"Because I had strict orders not to let anyone in today," he replied
+shortly, suppressing his rebellious feelings.
+
+"Then I must hurry after the poor woman and ask her if there is
+anything I can do for her," murmured Lucy with quick decision, taking
+up her hat and cape from an adjoining room.
+
+"I suppose the distinguished Mr. Martin's last dollar's gone," sneered
+the clerk after her in an Irish accent.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+Lucy hastened after Mrs. Martin, who was still visible in the distance.
+As the deeply tried woman closed the door of her modest dwelling, a
+light step made her turn and open it again. She gazed with surprise
+into the face of the elegantly-gowned girl with the gold-rimmed glasses.
+
+"Does Mr. Martin live here?" the girl inquired in a doubtful voice.
+
+"Yes. Will you be so good as to walk in?" answered the astonished
+woman. And then with a glance into the room--"Eugene, a lady!" she
+called to her son.
+
+An inner door opened and Eugene Martin appeared. They stood speechless,
+gazing in confusion at each other, while white and red chased each
+other over both of their faces. It was perfectly obvious that they
+were not strangers to each other; indeed, they had often painted side
+by side at the Art School. It was the same shy, gentle youth with the
+dark speaking eyes who had occupied more of her thoughts than would
+have been considered advisable for an engaged girl. Nevertheless she
+struggled to conceal her excitement, and to appear calmly in the
+character of the purpose which had brought her. But how could she
+offer alms to this family? No, it would no longer be possible; her
+sensibilities revolted at this thought, and for the moment she wished
+even to conceal her name from them.
+
+"I wished to have a picture of my--" she was about to say, "of my
+_fiance_," without really thinking of him in the least, but a flame of
+red overspread her face and the word died upon her lips. "--of myself,"
+she substituted. "And I wish it done in oils," she went on in a firmer
+tone.
+
+Eugene conducted the visitor to the scrupulously clean, though modest,
+little parlor. In order to reach it they were obliged to pass through
+the room where his father lay ill, the wild fancies of fever playing
+antics in his brain. Lucy threw a glance of deep sympathy at the
+sufferer, visibly moved at the sight of his hollow, ashen face.
+
+The great interest she displayed and the anxious inquiries she made
+about his father's illness, filled Eugene's heart with gratitude. He
+could have knelt before this being from another sphere, to whom he had
+scarcely dared to raise his eyes, and thank her in that humble way of
+his for the warm sympathy she bestowed on his sick father.
+
+"I have seen some of your paintings, and--I am quite sure that my
+portrait will be a success--" began Lucy, stammering again, as she
+looked at the sketches displayed about the room.
+
+"I should, of course, do my best--to--keep your good opinion of my
+capability," answered Eugene, with downcast eyes and a hesitating
+tongue.
+
+Lucy had taken up a portfolio and was turning over its contents, simply
+to avoid having to meet his glances. She was afraid he might read what
+was passing in her mind.
+
+"But whether I should be able to satisfy a lady who has so much
+artistic knowledge--I hardly know," he admitted modestly, "for of late
+I have not been able to do much except this landscape."
+
+He indicated a picture which hung at the other end of the room,
+wondering at the flush which had overspread Lucy's face as she bent
+over the portfolio, her blood tingling to her finger's ends.
+
+She put down the treacherous portfolio hastily. The exposition of
+the secret hidden within its covers made her tremble. One of her own
+drawings, which she had probably thrown away, suddenly met her eyes. It
+had been enriched by a border of blue forget-me-nots, and as she drew
+it forth from one of the side pockets she saw, underneath it, written
+in Eugene's hand, the single word: "Unforgetable."
+
+Her heart beat loudly; still she retained self-command enough to ask in
+an indifferent tone, when he would be ready to begin the sketch for the
+portrait, at the same time examining the picture to which he had drawn
+her attention.
+
+"I should like to know, also, what your price is to be for the
+execution of the picture," she said, raising her eyes timidly.
+
+He would have been glad to avoid any mentioning of the question of
+money, but when she insisted, in a hesitating voice, he named a small
+amount.
+
+"I believe it is customary to pay half in advance," Lucy went on with
+an embarrassed smile, handing a fifty-dollar note to the confused
+Eugene, in spite of his shy protest that he was not in the least hurry
+about it.
+
+After the day and hour had been fixed for the first sketch of the
+portrait, Lucy returned to the factory deeply gratified that she
+had found a way to help the poor woman in her distress. Her father,
+immersed in business, had scarcely noticed her absence. She would have
+liked to tell him something of the poverty and illness of his old
+foreman, but an indefinable feeling of shyness kept her silent. The
+factory was closed on the same day.
+
+Poor Martin's condition grew visibly worse. On the doctor's
+recommendation, he was transferred to the neighboring hospital, and the
+afflicted family reconciled themselves to the inevitable. Although the
+poor wife had tended him day and night with never-varying devotion, she
+could not but admit that she was not in a position to give him all that
+was required by the physician's directions.
+
+Eugene, now the only support of the family, was obliged, in default
+of anything better, to take to retouching pictures for photographers.
+This ill-paid mechanical labor was beginning to have an injurious
+effect upon his imagination. The day-dreams which had filled his whole
+soul, anticipating his going to the Eternal City, to receive there the
+artist's consecration by studying the great masterpieces, he now saw
+vanishing into comfortless vacuity, replaced by nothing better than the
+dreamy monotony of earning his daily bread by hard and uninteresting
+work.
+
+Lucy's meteoric appearance, however, had filled the darkened spirit
+of the young man with a cheering light. With fiery eagerness he began
+sketching the dear face which he had never been able to forget. The
+laboring mechanic disappeared, and the artist, once more awakened, felt
+his genius glow again with the desire to create. This girl, the very
+sight of whom made him tremble with joy, must not be allowed to lose
+her faith in his talent--his artistic capacity. In her eyes he wished
+to be that, which his dreams had promised he should be--a real artist,
+even if he were obliged to strain his powers to the very limit of the
+unattainable.
+
+At the appointed hours Lucy came, bringing, like Schiller's 'Maiden
+from a foreign shore,' valuable gifts for his mother, with fruits and
+toys for the children. To Eugene, however, she brought the most fatal
+gift--a ray of that unsurpassable bitter-sweet pain which men call
+love, and which often ends only with life. After she had left the house
+all trace of her vanished; none of them knew whence she came or whither
+she went.
+
+With each sitting Eugene grew into a condition of more blissful
+intoxication, although Lucy, in her refined unapproachableness, gave
+him not the slightest excuse for such a feeling. Only once he felt her
+thoughtful eyes resting upon him with an expression which sent the
+blood coursing madly through his veins.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+One day when the picture was almost completed he received the following
+lines from her:
+
+
+     "I am going with my mother to Palm Beach, where we expect to spend
+     a month or two. If my portrait is done before I come back, kindly
+     send it to No. -- Fifth Avenue. Remember me to your dear ones.
+
+     LUCY."
+
+
+A check was enclosed for the balance of the stipulated price.
+
+Eugene felt an icy breath sweep over the glowing love which filled his
+heart, like the freezing north wind which brings death and destruction
+in its train, blowing over land and sea and carrying all before it. His
+artistic powers to strive for the heights of ideals seemed broken; he
+had no energy left. All was dark and gloomy within him.
+
+"She is rich and I--oh, so poor!" was the thought incessantly in his
+mind.
+
+In his present position as sole support of his family he could not long
+give himself up to such unfruitful emotions; he must work in order to
+provide bread for his mother and the children. And so he tried by hard,
+incessant labor, by constant occupation, to forget the sweet dream of
+his brief, imaginary happiness. A bitter feeling of depression rose
+in him at the thought that the richly-dressed lady must consider him
+a fool, puffed up with artistic pride; that she thought of him, if at
+all, with a pitying smile at his presumption.
+
+Thanks to the skillful medical care which Martin shared at the
+hospital, he was soon on the road to recovery.
+
+"You will have to get used to the idea of having a lame husband the
+rest of your life," he would say smilingly to his wife, who visited him
+daily.
+
+"If only your love isn't lame, we shall be all right again," she
+answered him with simple affection. He wiped away an unobserved tear,
+and pressed her hand with emotion.
+
+Eugene grew pale and nervous. Seeking forgetfulness in his work he
+labored day and night with unwearying diligence, allowing himself no
+time for rest. In the brief pauses he was obliged to make it obvious,
+however, that he had not entirely succeeded. Something of pain, of
+untold suffering, would then steal over his weary face. The nervous
+strain, continued for weeks, together with the hardly repressed mental
+conflict, began, little by little, to undermine his constitution, never
+of the strongest.
+
+It was just a week after his father had left the hospital (with one leg
+shorter than the other but otherwise in good health) that Eugene fell
+fainting at his work. In a day or two a severe nervous fever developed.
+His parents, horribly frightened, did all in their power to aid his
+recovery.
+
+Martin, though still weak, made haste to hobble to the factory, which,
+on the termination of the strike had opened as usual, to try for his
+former position.
+
+"Is Mr. Denison here?" he asked of the book-keeper, who was a stranger
+to him.
+
+"Mr. Denison has gone to Florida--the date of his return is uncertain,"
+answered the book-keeper, returning to his interrupted occupation
+without paying any more attention to the white-faced cripple who stood
+leaning against the desk.
+
+"My name is Martin, and I used to be in charge of the dyeing department
+here," persisted the anxious applicant, resolved not to be dismissed so
+easily.
+
+"Every place is filled now, and well filled," said the book-keeper with
+a trace of irritation, not looking up from his big ledger; "and anyhow,
+you may be quite sure there will be no change in the staff as long as
+the boss is away."
+
+Crushed and despairing, Martin tottered out of the office. But full
+of confidence in his ability as a dyer, he decided to go to another
+factory and offer his services.
+
+His sad, depressed appearance, however, was no good introduction
+in a place where only strong hands were looked for, so nothing but
+disappointment awaited him at the other places.
+
+"The strike has ruined business," said one of the manufacturers, while
+another laid the blame on over-production. "Come in some other day,"
+said a third.
+
+During all these unsuccessful attempts to provide the means of
+subsistence one week after another slipped away. Now the lack of the
+barest necessities stared them in the face--bitter need, upon whose
+hideous features they had not before been forced to look.
+
+And Eugene, in the delirium of his fever, was always talking of the
+inaccessible maiden from another sphere. His clear-sighted mother began
+to grasp the meaning of all this with anxious foreboding.
+
+"What's to be done? What's to be done?" the poor cripple asked himself,
+wringing his hands, when he was notified that unless he paid his back
+rent within twenty-four hours, he and his family would be put into the
+street.
+
+With despair in his heart he hastened out, and sold everything of any
+value that was yet left to him in order to avoid this disgrace.
+
+"And then we'll get out of this unlucky street!" cried the mother,
+sobbing and wiping the hot tears from her eyes.
+
+After a short family council it was decided to move over to New York.
+
+"No one knows me there; I can get any kind of employment in New
+York--and work is easier to find there than it is here," said Martin to
+comfort his sobbing wife.
+
+A week later found the sorely-tried family in one of the great
+barracks of tenements in the lower part of the city. As a whole, the
+neighborhood could not be surpassed for lack of comfort, and little
+more appeared in the three bare rooms tenanted by the Martin family.
+
+Eugene's condition had improved, although he was still confined to his
+bed; but the poor father's mind was even more tormented by the fearful
+spectre of poverty, and yet--in busy, populous New York, surely, there
+was work to be found!
+
+He was going upstairs one day when he was stopped by a woman who was a
+stranger to him. She opened an adjoining door, and asked him to step
+into the room. Her husband was lying there sick in bed and groaning
+with pain.
+
+"Excuse me," began the woman, "my husband is a street-cleaner--he
+sweeps Fifth Avenue," she added, with a proud intonation. "For
+twenty-five years--mind that--he had done his duty; and now the
+commissioners send for him today and here he is, sick in bed and can't
+sweep his Fifth Avenue!" She went on with great loquacity, without
+paying any heed to the embarrassed face of her new neighbor.
+
+"If you will take his place I will give you his whole day's wages!" she
+shouted, handing him the money together with the broom.
+
+Martin was unable to resist the fascination of coins so badly needed.
+The other street-cleaners were waiting down stairs. After the robust
+woman had communicated the whole affair to them through the window they
+took Martin into their ranks without any waste of words and marched on
+before he had time to realize where he was going. Pressing his hat over
+his eyes he hobbled along with them as well as he could, while actual
+tears rolled down into his grey beard.
+
+But the thought of coming home at night with the money he had earned
+soothed him to some extent. His family need never know, and he was not
+acquainted with another soul in the great city.
+
+How sorely he was hurt by the knowledge that his former employer's wife
+had seen him at this undignified occupation is already known to the
+reader.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+
+On the evening in question Lucy was unusually quiet and absorbed. She
+had scarcely seemed to understand the loving words whispered in her
+ear by her lover who sat beside her; she was obliged to force herself,
+even, to return monosyllabic answers to his questions. Her thoughts
+were elsewhere. She had only been back from Palm Beach a little
+while, and had heard nothing from the family in which she was so much
+interested. But her busy imagination depicted the well-known room which
+contained the portfolio which had played such a part in her life; and
+Eugene's fair, curly head, and glowing, longing glances. Then once
+more, she saw his father with the broom--the almsgiving scene. Her
+thoughts were incessantly occupied with the son of a street-cleaner!
+
+A burning flush of shame overspread her pale face, which George Elmore
+accepted as the answer to his tenderly whispered entreaties that she
+should become his wife at once, and kissed her hand repeatedly.
+
+The son of a street-cleaner to thrust himself between her and George!
+Being what she was--a proud woman and an heiress, she was startled.
+
+"How could I so far forget myself!" she reflected. "Heavens! if George
+were to suspect!"
+
+She tried her best to drive away the embarrassing--nay, the dishonoring
+thought. The idea struck her as ludicrous--horribly ludicrous, and that
+disturbed her even more.
+
+Obviously there was but one way out of this labyrinth of tormenting
+thoughts--to marry as soon as possible. She had a mind to say the
+decisive word this very evening and appoint, finally the day for the
+wedding. As George's wife she would find rest and healing for her
+stubborn heart in the fulfilment of her duty, and be able to realize
+how foolish it was to allow it unlimited play outside the bounds of
+reason. In the meantime the poor family must be helped. In spite of the
+foundations of reason which she had just laid, she felt an interest in
+them.
+
+"Nonsense! It is nothing but sympathy for those unfortunates," she
+tried to persuade herself. Tomorrow she would have a talk with her
+father with a view to having Martin restored to his old place in the
+factory. She would pretend to have gained her knowledge of their
+circumstances from a friend who had employed their son for a short time.
+
+She could not, however, entirely suppress the pricks of conscience
+which told her that her silence to her father had delayed this
+restoration, and had thus been responsible for the complete destitution
+of these worthy people.
+
+Three days later Martin received orders through a workman in the
+factory who knew his address to report there with a view to resuming
+his former position. Accordingly great joy prevailed in the Martin
+family. Eugene was the only one now, weak and ill as he still was, to
+remain gloomy and self-absorbed.
+
+A gleam of happier feeling overspread his pale face when he brought out
+Lucy's picture, now almost completed, and heightened the attractiveness
+of the cheeks, or made the thoughtful eyes yet more speaking. And
+then he thought how, when it was all done, he would seek her out and
+himself deliver it to her, and once more he resolved to allow the full
+fascination of her dear presence to work its will upon him.
+
+"And after that, I must avoid her--flee from her! We must be as two
+stars which cannot tear themselves from their own destined spheres,
+but are forced to wander each in its own appointed orbit," he murmured
+to himself with bitter pain, gazing at the picture with unspeakable
+dejection.
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+
+The delicious month of May had now come round once more. Nature,
+awakening to life, put on its wondrous robe of many colors, and the
+sun in proud consciousness of its power to tempt with the alluring
+warmth, the flowers concealed in the mystic bosom of Mother Earth,
+shone with ever increasing fervency. In Central Park Nature's feathered
+choir poured forth its gay song into the lovely spring air, while the
+perfumed lilacs lavished their scent upon all who came, caring not
+whether the dweller in tenements breathed it in greedily, or whether
+the superior residents of Fifth Avenue ignored it contemptuously.
+
+In the house of the rich manufacturer the perfume of the lilacs was
+not missed; the most _recherche_ hot-house plants supplanting them
+in fragrance were artistically grouped on both sides of the great
+staircase down to the front door, filling all the room with a perfume
+that bewildered the senses. Servants in livery hastened busily, but
+noiselessly, about, putting the last touches to the decorations of
+the parlor for the wedding ceremony to be performed on this day. In
+the adjoining room a beautiful altar was visible, decked with superb
+flowers from which festoons of myrtle ran up to a hanging bell of red
+and white roses.
+
+Carriage after carriage rolled to the door, from which descended fair
+guests, arrayed in splendid Worth and Felix gowns, while faultlessly
+dressed gentlemen helped them to alight.
+
+In her room upstairs stood Lucy, in a white dress and gold-embroidered
+veil, with orange blossoms upon her bosom. Although apparently calm,
+she was deathly pale, and her heart, whose feelings had been suppressed
+with so much difficulty, betrayed itself by violent beating. A nameless
+uneasiness was upon her, almost suffocating her at times. Eugene's fair
+head and disquieting eyes were before her mind vividly--now--when in an
+hour's time she would be the bride of another. More than once she was
+obliged to have recourse to the smelling-bottle which stood upon the
+dressing-table, in order not to give way--to be strong enough to bear
+the torture of the ceremony with dignified calmness.
+
+"The shock to my parents--the society in which I move--no, no, there is
+no retreat for me!" she murmured with decision in answer to her heart's
+loud insistence. She was marrying George in fulfillment of her parents'
+wishes and also to escape from her tormenting self. That in making this
+decision she had buried the ideals of her youth--her life's happiness,
+no one should ever guess. It was time now to steer boldly forth into
+the deep sea of matrimony, deprived forever of her life's compass.
+
+Mrs. Denison, in a costly dress, had repeatedly opened the window and
+gazed with anxious impatience at all the carriages that came from the
+lower part of the city, but she saw no sign of their own carriage so
+impatiently awaited. Mr. Denison had gone down town in the morning,
+promising to be back before noon, and now it was four o'clock.
+
+Disquieting rumors had already begun to circulate to the effect that
+the great banking house with which their whole fortune was deposited
+was on an unstable footing, owing to a rapid fall in the stock market.
+
+Mr. Denison had said nothing of this to his wife, although a horrible
+agitation had taken possession of him, when, upon leaving the house he
+had told the coachman to drive at full speed to the banking house.
+
+The guests were all assembled. The clergyman was waiting, but still
+there was no sign of Mr. Denison. An uneasy whisper, an ever-increasing
+impatience, could be noticed. Mrs. Denison's thin face took on a
+feverish red. Elmore's father was just about to telephone down town,
+when, at last the carriage rolled up to the door. The coachman, excited
+with overdriving, leaped from his seat and opened the carriage door;
+but he had no sooner cast a glance into the carriage than he uttered a
+loud cry, and with unsteady footsteps, hastened to Mrs. Denison.
+
+"Don't be alarmed, Mrs. Denison, please don't be alarmed--" he
+panted in a trembling voice, "The big banking house down town failed
+this morning--and--it seems--Mr. Denison was so fearfully upset--so
+fearfully--when he came out of the bank his face was all red--and I
+heard him say in a low voice that he would have to fail too! Yes--and
+now--please don't be frightened--he's lying dead in the carriage!"
+
+With a loud shriek, wringing her hands and moaning, Mrs. Denison
+hastened to the carriage. The gentlemen guests carried Mr. Denison's
+body, still warm, into the house. "Heart failure," said one to another.
+The women gathered around Mrs. Denison, who was loudly weeping, and
+tried to console her. Then one by one they stole away, since it was
+quite obvious that there would be no more thought of the marriage that
+day.
+
+Lucy, worn out by weeks of mental agitation, was overcome by the
+sudden shock of this sad news, and fell back without a word upon the
+sofa, gliding gently from it to the floor. A beneficent unconsciousness
+clouded her perceptions. No one had time to care for her; all the
+servants had been sent right and left to bring medical aid for Mr.
+Denison. All means of restoration were tried, but failed to bring him
+back to life. "Apoplexy," said the physicians, and silently left the
+house.
+
+Meanwhile Lucy lay on the soft carpet without a word or motion. In her
+dazzling white dress, with the gold-embroidered veil, with the marble
+paleness on her face, she looked like a sculptured goddess who had
+fallen from her pedestal.
+
+The last wedding guests, those who had helped to carry Mr. Denison up
+to his room, had just driven away, sighing and shaking their heads as
+they discussed the sad event. The stillness of death settled over the
+house. Suddenly a sound was heard as of soft footsteps drawing near.
+Then the door of Lucy's boudoir, which had been left ajar, was gently
+opened. A curly-headed young man with a disturbed countenance appeared
+upon the threshold, looking right and left with admiring wonder. The
+front door was still standing open--no one had found time to close it.
+
+Eugene, bringing Lucy's portrait, had thus been able to penetrate
+unperceived, to the upper story. Hardly able to believe his eyes, he
+gazed at the fair form in bridal attire lying upon the floor.
+
+Startled and trembling in all his limbs, he was about to close the door
+he had just opened, when he caught sight of Lucy's face, pale as death,
+through the veil. Hastily putting down the portrait, he darted to her
+side, and trembling with intense excitement, caught her cold hands to
+his heart.
+
+[Illustration: HE GAZED AT THE FAIR FACE IN BRIDAL ATTIRE LYING UPON
+THE FLOOR]
+
+"Miss Lucy! Miss Lucy!" he cried, at first in a low voice, then louder
+and more anxiously--but she still lay there, cold and apparently
+lifeless.
+
+Distracted, he looked about for help. He caught sight of the smelling
+bottle which Lucy had already used so often. He seized it quickly,
+pushed aside her veil, and held it to her nostrils.
+
+A slight tremor passed through the beautiful limbs. Lucy moved her
+hand, but let it fall again. Eugene sprang up joyfully. As if she
+had been a feather he lifted the girl, now stirring a little. In
+blissful intoxication, he clasped his heart's ideal for one moment in
+his arms. Her breath played over his face, making him tremble with
+delight--carrying him out of himself, so that he pressed his lips to
+her's, not knowing what he did. "How has this bright creature filled
+my lonely life with sunshine!" he murmured sadly to himself, as with a
+deep sigh he laid Lucy on the sofa.
+
+And then,--he felt the soft arms suddenly thrown about his neck. Lucy,
+still dazed and dreaming, had forgotten all about her wedding day,
+and knew nothing of her father's death. Eugene's words of love had
+roused her from her death-like stupor; she was conscious only of his
+nearness--of the intoxication of his kiss.
+
+"Oh, Eugene," she whispered, "what a lovely dream!" She still lay with
+closed eyes. Eugene, speechless with delight, pressed her passionately
+to his beating heart. Lucy, startled, opened her eyes.
+
+Suddenly George Elmore, his eyes blazing, stood before her, looking
+down upon her haughtily.
+
+Without losing his self-command in the least he said with cutting
+scorn, "Oh, I am interrupting a tete-a-tete! We have a lover, have
+we? Just as well I have found it out in time! Ha, ha! I wish you much
+happiness--especially as in my own case my family would have to decline
+the honor of an alliance with a bankrupt's daughter!" Then he bowed
+coldly and went out.
+
+Lucy, realizing the situation, uttered a cry and attempted to rise,
+but once again overcome with weakness, fell back with the same marble
+paleness upon her brow.
+
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+
+Mr. Denison's funeral had already taken place some weeks. Nearly every
+day Lucy had been seen dressed in deep mourning, crossing to New
+Jersey. In her firm serious face decision showed itself as, hour after
+hour she bent over big ledgers, separating debts from assets, while the
+book-keeper stood by her side to offer her any assistance in his power.
+
+After a long and searching examination, it became evident that the firm
+need not absolutely declare itself insolvent, since the great banking
+house in Wall Street whose reported failure had brought the catastrophe
+to the Denison household, had recovered itself, thanks to a favorable
+turn in the stock-market, and promised to reimburse all its creditors.
+
+The Martin family, after all the severe trials it had undergone in New
+York, had moved back to New Jersey. Through the proved usefulness of
+old Martin, who now labored with redoubled eagerness to produce new and
+unheard of combinations of color, the prestige of the factory, which
+had sunk low in the silk market, now began to rise again to its former
+height.
+
+Lucy and her mother, selling their fine house on Fifth Avenue, had also
+moved to New Jersey, in the vicinity of the works, since Lucy insisted
+upon superintending everything herself. She trembled with impatience
+and joy when Eugene's fair curly head was seen approaching the house.
+
+On the expiration of her year of mourning she gave her hand to the man
+to whom her heart has long been given.
+
+The happy couple spent their honeymoon in Italy. The high ideals which
+had once inflamed the young painter's heart, and later had threatened
+to die out in comfortless annihilation, were destined at last to take
+shape, and to stand before his enchanted eyes in all their beautiful
+reality. At last he was able, hand in hand with his beloved, to admire
+the art treasures of Rome, the Vatican, with its immortal paintings by
+Raphael, Michael Angelo and Paul Veronese. All that they had long known
+through copies and engravings were now before them in the original, and
+filled them with delight.
+
+Eugene availed himself of the permission given to artists three days
+in the week to make copies in the Vatican galleries. Standing at their
+easels, Eugene and Lucy painted side by side, as they had once done at
+the Art School, with unbounded happiness beaming in their eyes. Among
+the masterpieces which represented the highest ideals of art, Lucy
+realized more and more with a palpitating heart, the omnipotence of
+true love.
+
+
+
+
+THE STREET SINGER
+
+A VIENNESE STORY
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+Winter, hard and merciless as a tax collector, stalked threateningly
+before the dilapidated doors of Vienna's poor.
+
+Back of the white Tanneries, not far from the magnificently built Franz
+Josef's bridge, where misery and dire poverty had made their dreary
+home for many decades, winter seemed harder and colder than elsewhere;
+for with the poor wretched creatures who dwell near these Tanneries,
+there is--as everybody knows--but little sympathy.
+
+A sweet-looking girl, hardly fourteen years of age, came shivering with
+bent head, out of one of the poorest and dirtiest homesteads of the
+poverty-stricken district.
+
+Her thin, threadbare gingham dress, torn in many places, exposed here
+and there the trembling little form beneath. Over it she wore an old,
+shabby-looking plaid shawl--apparently her mother's--which blown
+back now and again by the unceremonious wind, exposed to view an old
+violin. She held it as tight as if it were the only earthly treasure
+she possessed. A ribbon, that had once been blue, held up her knotted
+hair, and gave her the appearance of a gipsy. And as for her shoes, it
+would seem that only the upper part had preserved a right to the name;
+for her stiff-frozen little toes were almost on the ground.
+
+She walked on and on, greatly oppressed, giving no heed to the cruel
+wind that played havoc with her fluttering curls. Her large black eyes,
+which held a singular fascination in their sparkling depths, were now
+filled with burning tears.
+
+She was barely on the threshold of girlhood, but life in its
+unfathomable savagery, had already thrown its challenging gauntlet in
+her frightened, childish face. She felt instinctively that poor little
+outcast as she was, she must not shrink from battle, but struggle on as
+best she could either with cruel wind and weather or with bitter cold
+and want.
+
+She had struggled bravely, never minding how fruitless her little
+efforts seemed. But the one thing to which she had never accustomed
+herself, and which made a storm of tears rain down her pale face, was
+the frightful apparition of the hollow-eyed skeleton, hunger--that
+hunger which now held sway over her sick mother's house.
+
+A heavy, shuddering sigh broke from her lips. The utter need and
+helplessness of her mother and four smaller sisters, for days deprived
+of all necessaries of life, even of bread to satisfy their hunger, had
+driven her from the house, their cries and lamentations still ringing
+in her ears.
+
+"Poor and friendless, with no one to care for us, and poor, dear mother
+lying ill," she moaned in a suffocating voice, wiping tears of agony
+from her white face. "It wrings my heart to see her and the little ones
+so hungry," she said to herself, sobbing aloud.
+
+Near the Franz Josef's bridge she saw a little tavern. She timidly
+opened the door and entered, quickly producing the old violin. The
+instrument was the only bequest of her dear father, who had been a
+musician, and who had instructed her in this art, detecting at an early
+age her ardent love of study and thirst for a musical education.
+
+Standing near the open door, she first played an obligato which she
+executed in masterly fashion, and then commenced to sing an old German
+song, so touchingly--knowing what was at stake--that the people in
+the tavern, and many passers-by who stopped in amazement at the door,
+gazed with wondering eyes at the ragged little dark-eyed girl hardly
+grown out of her baby shoes; and many of them, moved by deep pity,
+though poor themselves, tossed one, and some of them two coins into her
+apron. More they could not afford to give, lest their liberality might
+eventually expose them to the same plight.
+
+Christine beamed with happiness. When her song was finished, she
+quickly took out of her apron her gathered treasure, counting it with
+shining eyes. Twenty kreutzers--she counted them again and again. Her
+stiff little fingers could not hold all at once, but her eyes, wet with
+happy emotion, were fastened on each of them, and her heart leaped
+within her at the sight. So many she had never before earned.
+
+She folded her hands as if in fervent prayer, and lifted her dark
+eyes to Heaven in gratitude, thinking of the joy she would bring to
+her mother and half-starved sisters when she returned home with an
+apron-full of fresh baked rolls.
+
+"Say,--Miss--won't ye let me carry yer--fiddle?"
+
+The whisper sank into her ear. She turned hastily around, and saw a
+poorly-dressed shoemaker's apprentice standing near, gazing at her with
+his large blue eyes. In his hands he held an old pair of shoes.
+
+He stood, quite silent, with enthusiasm for Christine's exquisite
+singing beaming from every feature. Presently, with a timid grin, he
+held out the pair of shoes.
+
+"Here, Miss. I ain't got no money, but I'd like badly ter give you
+them shoes--er--ter show you that I like good singing. Yes, I do, an'
+ye sing mighty well," he said, looking admiringly at her and getting
+as red in the face as an over-ripe apple. "I'll surely get a good cuff
+or two from master for giving them away, but a shoemaker's boy is used
+to that, and doesn't care a rap if once in a while he takes a good
+piff, paff, pouff!" With this exclamation of Meyerbeerian bravado,
+he demonstrated the operatic knowledge of an up-to-date Viennese
+apprentice.
+
+[Illustration: "HERE, MISS, I AIN'T GOT NO MONEY, BUT I'D LIKE TER GIV
+YER THEM SHOES."]
+
+Christine looked at him with shining eyes. She understood only one
+thing--that he wanted to give her a pair of shoes, which, in her
+estimation seemed almost new. She beamed at him so gratefully with her
+large, dark eyes, that the embarrassed apprentice, who was about two
+years older than she, felt a hot wave running down his spine. Never had
+a lovelier face or sweeter eyes smiled so kindly at the bewildered boy.
+
+"They're yourn, an'--ye'd better try 'em on--an' see if they'll fit,"
+he stammered bashfully. This strange, heavenly shyness was a new
+sensation for the rough apprentice lad. Until this moment he had never
+known that there existed such an organ as a palpitating heart within
+his body.
+
+And before Christine knew how, the new shoes were on her feet. Shoes
+without holes! Goodness! how could it have happened? And without holes!
+
+"I hope I am not dreaming," she murmured to herself, her face aglow.
+
+"Will ye let me go with ye?" asked the simple-hearted boy, his eyes
+downcast.
+
+"No--not now; but--on Sunday you can come."
+
+"To yer house? My name is Peter," he replied, greatly bewildered, as he
+could not think--to save his soul--of anything more important than his
+name.
+
+"Yes, to my house; and then you can go with me and carry the violin,"
+Christine answered with a sweet smile. But suddenly, ashamed of her
+boldness, she stopped and counted her kreutzers again.
+
+Peter, however, looked at her with such admiration in his big blue
+eyes, that something like an electric spark shot through her. Such a
+happy sensation she had never felt; for no one had ever spoken such
+kind, encouraging words to her. A tinge of red leaped into her pale
+cheeks; there was a trembling pant in her voice, when, with averted
+face, she told him the street and number. Tucking her violin under her
+arm, she ran quickly up the street.
+
+At the nearest bakery she stopped in order to buy the coveted rolls.
+But Peter, still under the charm of her large, expressive eyes, stood
+as if rooted to the ground, gazing after her and listening to the
+receding tap-tap of the little shoes on her feet, which he now realized
+belonged to some one else. He began to dread the expected punishment,
+which he knew would be meted out, not so much in curtain lectures as
+in striking actions, and for some time he stood stock still, racking
+his brain for an excuse to make their singular disappearance plausible.
+But his natural light-heartedness soon got the better of him. Shrugging
+his shoulders, and singing "Piff, paff, pouff, brennet sie," he rushed
+away, ready to meet his inexorable fate.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+"Goodness! you haven't eaten anything all day long, and I bet you're
+feeble," cried Mrs. Langohr, the next-door neighbor of Christine's
+mother, throwing the door of her miserable two-room apartment wide
+open, so that all the neighbors should hear, and praise her charitable
+inclinations. "O, my God, have mercy on them poor little worms! I must
+go and make a little farina soup for 'em. See, that's what I am getting
+out of the Bible! Be good to yer neighbor," she said in a loud tone,
+apparently for the benefit of the poorly-clad and shy-looking women at
+the windows.
+
+"O, holy Father in Heaven! Just look here," she screamed, amazed when
+Christine suddenly appeared with twenty hot rolls in her apron, showing
+them triumphantly to the neighbors. And rushing into the apartment,
+she, with a gladdened heart, distributed them among the starving
+children.
+
+The feeble mother with eyes full of tears, glancing thankfully toward
+Heaven, listened to Christine's wonderful story about the shoes and the
+twenty kreutzers. It seemed incredible. So much happiness in one day!
+And Christine's beautiful smile seemed to fill the squalid room with
+radiance when she thought of Sunday and the expected arrival of the
+shoemaker's bashful boy.
+
+Her happiness increased day by day; for every Sunday Peter punctually
+arrived, always bringing some unusual delicacies with him, and
+accepting gladly Christine's consent to carry the violin. In fact, he
+carried it with such dignity and pride, that, standing behind her, it
+often happened that he bowed his acknowledgment to the audience at
+the end of each morceau, quite as if he were her partner and one of
+the performing artists. Then he would take his old cap and gather the
+contributions, always returning them faithfully to Christine. Every
+piece of wood that he could deftly worm out of his mistress' household,
+he carried to Mrs. Miller, Christine's mother, to warm the chilled
+little limbs of her starving children.
+
+His mistress, the shoemaker's wife, often wondered that the cooked
+potatoes disappeared from the dinner table as suddenly as if the
+earth had swallowed them up. She certainly could not imagine that
+they invariably disappeared into Peter's side-pockets although his
+occasional grimaces and the red spots on his sensitive skin bore open
+testimony.
+
+"Now, now, goodness! what's the matter with you, rascal?" the surprised
+mistress would cry, viewing amazedly his distorted face. And one day,
+in spite of his Spartan heroism, Peter could not stand it any longer.
+
+"I am sick--stomach-ache--" he stammered, vainly trying to compose
+himself, and even forcing a sickly smile to his pale lips.
+
+"You grown-up earthworm, you! The idea of having stomach-ache every
+day at this time!" she responded angrily, adding a few choice words
+out of her voluminous vocabulary. But being not bad at heart, sympathy
+soon gained the upper hand, and she said in a milder tone, giving him a
+small coin with a gesture indicative of large liberality--"Here, you
+stupid nuisance, you! Go and get a penny's worth of English bitters."
+
+Peter did not require a second command to leave the room. He took the
+hint and the penny and went straight to Christine's house. But once
+outside, and in respectable distance from his mistress' observing eyes,
+he quickly removed the red-hot potatoes from his pant's pockets.
+
+Peter had always been accustomed to save the tips that he received
+from his master's patrons when he carried home their shoes--chiefly
+for Sunday nights, that he might enjoy a seat in the last gallery at
+the theatre. And my! hadn't he been proud and happy when sitting there
+in his best well-worn suit, and hearing those wonderful songs, "Belle
+Helene," in Offenbach's toneful operetta, and others which he could not
+get out of his head for months.
+
+Sometimes, if he had any money left, he would indulge in such luxuries
+as a half herring and a glass of Pilsner, being a great gourmand. But
+since he had come to know Christine, everything seemed to have changed.
+He no longer went to the theatre, but saved all his tips, and went
+about as if a secret were hidden in his breast.
+
+"Oh, Mrs. Langohr," cried Christine's mother, one cold morning to her
+next-door neighbor. "Don't laugh, for it is true. Peter has bought a
+dress for Christine, a winter dress, just imagine!"
+
+Mrs. Langohr held up her hands in amazement. But it was really true.
+Peter had bought Christine, with his savings, a warm dress, at a
+second-hand store. Christine was beside herself with joy; she had never
+known in these days what it was to have a warm rag on her back, and her
+gratitude welled up and overflowed in her sparkling eyes.
+
+As Christmas-time gradually approached, Mrs. Miller, feeling much
+better in health, commenced to perform her household duties. But
+Christine's earnings from her singing and violin diminished as the
+holidays drew near, and the simple little income seemed about to vanish
+altogether. Even Peter's pour-boire money threatened to cease, causing
+him restless nights and much down-heartedness. This discouraging
+condition of things took all his former desire for playing pranks out
+of the formerly gay-spirited shoemaker's boy.
+
+And when pious processions of tired pilgrims passed through the streets
+of Vienna, singing and praying on their way to church, he no longer
+played any of his old mischievous tricks on them, but took off his hat
+devoutly, and marched along, praying with folded hands and wet eyes.
+
+"Blessed Virgin--be good to her--I pray to thee--but not for
+myself--no; only for Christine--she lives under the white
+Tanneries--only for her I pray!"
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+A chilling north wind whistled through the deserted streets of the
+Austrian metropolis, and the snow, towering mountain high, driven by
+the gale, whirled blindingly around the muffled, shivering pedestrians,
+hastening hurriedly to their respective homes.
+
+The Franzenering, where the Viennese aristocrats are accustomed to meet
+in the afternoon hours, to drink tea, consume little cakes and indulge
+in gay conversations, today was totally empty. No one, it seemed, had
+ventured to brave the storm, in spite of the attractive display in
+the show-windows of elegantly designed gowns and hats. And these same
+show windows were certainly remarkable, for all adornments dear to the
+feminine heart, wonderful achievements of unusual millinery effects,
+dazzled the eyes of both young and old.
+
+Christine, holding her violin with stiffened little fingers, stood pale
+and trembling before one of the most magnificent windows, speechless
+with wonder, gazing as if in a trance at this modern splendor of
+feminine attire, the like of which she had never conceived even in her
+wildest, most fantastic dreams.
+
+Her heart contracted painfully. She thought of her mother and little
+sisters, freezing, half-starved, hopelessly expectant of Christmas,
+and her glorious eyes blurred with tears, as she remembered that she,
+as the bread-winner of the family, was not able to buy them anything
+for Christmas, not even bread enough to satisfy their hunger. For the
+first time in her life, she could not think of God and Heaven without
+bitterness for it seemed that he had indeed forsaken her and her family.
+
+"O God, I thought I was doing my best," she stammered with burning
+tears running down her blanched face. "What have we done, that we of
+all others, should die of hunger?" The future stretched before her
+inner vision, a weary blank, lit by no ray of hope. Convulsively, she
+clutched the old violin, and wandered away, farther and farther into
+the raging storm, drifting wherever the wind blew, without aim and
+without purpose or hope.
+
+The north wind in its increasing fury, commenced to batter tin roofs,
+chimney-tops, blinds, awnings, flag-poles, as if a giant hand were at
+work, while odds and ends of debris fell crashing into the streets to
+bury themselves in the drifts. Those unfortunates who were compelled to
+brave the elements, fought their way onward like wild beasts, cursing,
+shouting and screaming aloud.
+
+Half-frozen, nearly blinded by the storm and the hail that cut her
+delicate face like a knife, Christine suddenly found herself before
+the open portal of a palatial house. Driven by a momentary impulse
+for shelter from the cold, penetrating blast, she entered. At once a
+ray of hope illumined her desolate face. Now, if she were to try once
+more, and sing for these rich people, warm and comfortable behind those
+windows!
+
+Quickly she withdrew her violin from its battered case, and began
+in quivering tones to sing the Lorelei her father had taught her,
+before anyone was aware of her presence. The wonderful tones of her
+high soprano rang through the stately mansion, vibrating clear and
+penetrating all the rooms.
+
+"Here, here, the impertinence!" cried the irritated porter, jumping
+out of his porter's lodge, pale with anger, and pointing to a sign
+conspicuously hanging in the entrance of the spacious porte-cochere.
+"How dare you, mean little baggage, you! Can't you see that beggers and
+organ-grinders are not allowed to enter here? Heh! screaming at the top
+of her voice in such weather! Get out! get out! quick! march!" His tone
+was sneering, and his lips curled contemptuously as he waved his hand
+disdainfully for her to leave the courtyard.
+
+Greatly frightened and trembling in all her frozen little limbs,
+Christine was about to obey, and covered her violin, timidly looking at
+the porter's ugly red face, when suddenly a window on the first floor
+was flung open. The elegant form of a middle-aged man, with gold-rimmed
+eye-glasses, leaning out of the window, gave the porter so imperious a
+command to withdraw at once, that the startled man, hardly daring to
+lift his eyes to this illustrious personage, retired with many a bob
+and scrape to his porter's lodge.
+
+Christine, greatly encouraged by this incident, and anxious to use
+the opportunity, began to sing anew; for she thought that if she won
+the favor of the man at the window, it must surely mean help for her
+sorely-tried family. So she sang the Lorelei again--sang overpoweringly
+those lovely, mystic notes--"Das hat mit threm singen die Lorelei
+gethan."
+
+The superb sound burst forth from the little shivering form, rocked
+here and there by the raging storm, and seemed to breathe the longings
+and distress of a pure childish soul. This piteous appeal for help
+through the medium of Listz's greatest legendary love-song, was not
+without effect.
+
+"Superb--a phenomenon--a star!" murmured the man at the window in
+amazement. He leaned out into the storm, gazing intently at the young
+singer, for he was no less a personage than Duke Hohenlohe, the
+greatest musical critic and enthusiast in all Vienna. He withdrew from
+the window, closing it with a snap.
+
+Christine was speechless with joy, and her dark, glowing eyes flashed
+in excited bewilderment when a richly liveried butler came down the
+stairs into the courtyard, handing her five gulden and demanding
+her address. She stood there--her face flushed with wonder, and her
+childish lips parted as if hearing the magic music of another world.
+Cyclones of wind, thundering waves of ice and snow were forgotten. Hope
+had entered her heart, and with the five gulden clasped tightly to her
+breast, she made her way out of the courtyard, past the porter's lodge
+into the street. She hurried along as best she could, her heart singing
+a holy song of gratitude, and her lips smiling at the thought of the
+happiness she was bringing to those at home. The last part of the way
+she ran and burst into the room where the family were huddled over a
+few half dead coals, like a childish almoner of plenty, stammering out
+her tale.
+
+"It must have been the Lord holy, Jesus Christ, who had mercy on me
+and my children," cried the invalid mother, trembling with excitement,
+and folding her thin hands devoutly. "O Lord," she continued, "most
+mighty and most merciful Saviour of all the widows and orphans, accept
+the lowly thanks of a poor invalid." She looked up to Heaven with a
+gladdened heart as she saw her children happy, and for once, well-fed.
+
+But Christine sat in a corner of the poorly furnished room as if in a
+dream. A vague, confused remembrance of all that had happened in the
+courtyard filled her with bewilderment. The only thing she really saw
+plainly was the joyous faces around her, the result of her gift--the
+five gulden she had received.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+The whole neighborhood was in an uproar. A score of tongues were
+wagging, ears were cocked to hear the news, and gesticulations and
+cries were everywhere. Even the invalids of the white Tanneries with
+their ridiculous looking caps, stretched their shaky heads out of the
+windows in order to listen to the great news related by Mrs. Langohr,
+the wandering gossip-monger of this poverty-stricken district.
+
+"A real Count has heard her on Christmas Eve, you say?"
+
+"A Count! Naw! Something higher up, smarty," snapped the gossip-monger,
+raising her voice to a shrill pitch and throwing herself into the
+proper attitude of importance. "It was a Duke if you want to know it.
+Yes, he heard her, and yesterday sent his carriage for her."
+
+"His carriage!" echoed the crowd, and fell back amazed, unwilling to
+trust their own ears.
+
+"With four white horses attached to it," added Mrs. Langohr with a
+triumphant laugh. "A girl from our suburb, imagine!"
+
+"Hump! that's a greater miracle than the stories of the returning
+Pilgrims from Rome," sniffed an old, wrinkled woman, shaking her
+ludicrously shaped head with a certain vehemence and "soit disant"
+dignity which eminently befitted one enjoying the reputation of the
+female Socrates of the suburb.
+
+The nightcaps at the windows commenced to shake visibly, and a heated
+argument of possible reasons for this exciting event followed.
+
+"What will he do with her?" asked the female Socrates with solemnity,
+wiping each wrinkle separately with a dubious-looking red handkerchief,
+a sign that she intended to cross-examine everybody rigidly.
+
+"What he--the Duke will do? He will make a great singer out of her,
+smarty," sneered the next-door neighbor, disappearing quickly indoors,
+to the great disappointment of the neighbors who had gathered for the
+purpose of hearing the great news at first hand with all the details.
+
+"A great singer?" asked the shaky nightcaps at the windows, with
+dubious smiles, ignorant of what had gone before, and looking in blank
+amazement at each other. "Who--who is he?"
+
+But so it had actually happened.
+
+Christine had attracted first the attention, then the interest of Duke
+Hohenlohe, and had been placed in the Vienna Conservatory of Music.
+Here, as a protege of one of its principal patrons, she was being
+carefully instructed by the most prominent singing teachers of the
+institution, and making extraordinary progress.
+
+But poor Peter! He had become so downcast at the loss of his little
+friend, that he cared nothing for even the merriest of his former
+pranks, and spent his time in counting the days until he could see
+her again. He had promised Christine before she had gone to the
+Conservatory, to help her family in every way he could, and what Peter
+promised, he kept faithfully. But, oh! how dear Christine had become to
+him--how necessary to his very existence! He gladly deprived himself of
+even the barest necessities of life in order to be of service to her
+and the mother and sisters she loved.
+
+Now--in the few months that she had been living near the Conservatory,
+how tall and beautiful she had grown, and what depths of expression lay
+in her dark, speaking eyes! Goodness! the simple-hearted shoemaker's
+boy felt his heart leap and tremble, when he dared to look into their
+sparkling wells of light, they followed him whether he waked or slept.
+
+He saw them in his grimy little shop, talked to them when he was sewing
+on buttons, or knocking vigorously at the hard, unresponsive leather,
+and smiled happily at the visionary picture always before his mind's
+eye, to the great astonishment of his observing mistress.
+
+So five years sped by--five years which seemed five eternities to
+Peter's love-sick heart. But these five years had developed the pretty,
+sad-eyed girl into a beautiful, graceful woman, with a clever vigorous
+intellect, and an ambition to reach the highest eminence within the
+grasp of true womanhood and constant endeavor in the world of song.
+
+So there was but little time to give poor Peter, as her approaching
+debut was near, and Christine studied night and day, with tireless
+energy, the important roles which she would be expected to portray.
+
+In the meantime, dark clouds were gathering on the horizon of the
+Austrian monarchy. Rebellion after rebellion broke out on the southern
+frontier of its vast dominions, and Peter, now of age, was enlisted as
+a soldier, and sent away to the centre of the insurgent provinces. He
+had to march with his regiment in the darkness of the night without
+even being able to see Christine to utter a few parting words. He was
+heart-broken, though what he wanted to tell her was not known even
+to himself. All he knew was that he loved her dearly, and that his
+tortured, love-sick heart was writhing and bleeding at the thought that
+months and months would pass before he could again set eyes on her
+slender, graceful figure, and lovely smiling face.
+
+The ensuing scenes of war and bloodshed sickened him; but Christine's
+hallowed picture, always with him, gave him strength to withstand all
+horrors. She appeared as the radiant star of his life, and he was
+guided in his loneliness by the single hope of seeing her again.
+Perhaps the ignorant simple lad covered his face and wept--wept tears
+of despair and joy in anticipating that inexpressible happiness which
+the future might hold in store.
+
+
+
+
+V.
+
+
+To the music-loving public of Vienna, first nights and debuts of
+promising students are great events, especially when the aspirants for
+musical honors come from the home conservatory, and more especially
+when a certain student of the conservatory is heralded as a singer with
+a phenomenal voice, which she will display in the famous role of Lucia
+di Lammermoor.
+
+So it was that long before the doors of the imposing opera house were
+opened, eager crowds excitedly discussing the appearance of the new
+singer, stood at the entrance impatiently awaiting the hour. And before
+the portals had been thrown open half an hour, the great house was
+filled to suffocation.
+
+Many of the Austrian nobility sat in their private boxes, and those
+persons belonging to the aristocracy occupied seats in the parterre
+and, in fact, every available place. The people, dangerously crowding
+the galleries, looked in open-eyed wonder at the stage where
+Christine, in the costume of Lucia stood trembling with shy timidity.
+A vague terror overshadowed her lovely features. She was endeavoring
+heroically to enter into her role, but the sight of so many people,
+whom for the first time she saw assembled, and the countless number
+of eager eyes riveted on her, made her dizzy. She lost her courage,
+and stood there helpless and frightened with downcast eyes, unable to
+commence, in spite of the fact that the nervous stage manager in the
+wings had already twice given her the cue.
+
+The director of the conservatory stood in the wings at the opposite
+side of the stage, and nodded encouragingly to her. But as she seemed
+not to see him, he became livid, and wrathfully commenced to revile
+himself for having yielded to the temptation of bestowing this
+difficult role on Duke Hohenlohe's protege, who evidently was not
+sufficiently trained in self-control to appear as an independent star.
+
+Just at the decisive moment, however, Duke Hohenlohe entered the
+proscenium box and smiled kindly at her. Christine's fingers closed
+spasmodically over each other. She perceived at last what was at stake.
+
+With eyes full of tears, she controlled herself by a superb effort,
+and looked up at him as if saying: "You may trust me. I shall be equal
+to the situation," and then she began to sing, at first timidly and
+tremulously, but soon carried away by the grandeur of this passionate
+role, she surpassed herself; her high notes echoed through every part
+of the vast opera house with such dazzling magnificence, that an
+uproarious "Bravo," rang vociferously forth from thousands of voices,
+and thousands of hands applauded wildly.
+
+And when she had rendered the great bravura aria in the second act,
+with rare perfection, a continuous storm of applause greeted her. Duke
+Hohenlohe smiled with gratification. He was indeed proud of his little
+protege, whom he had discovered in the blinding snow storm.
+
+The director of the Conservatory, still standing in the wings, could
+not believe his eyes and ears. Christine was not only a great singer,
+but she had proved herself a great actress. The manner in which she had
+portrayed the mad Lucia was an immense surprise. Flowers and bouquets
+of all sizes and colors flew from all directions upon the young
+debutante. Curtseying timidly, her lovely face flushed and happy beyond
+description, she looked at the corner in the second gallery where Mrs.
+Miller sat praying with folded hands, as if in a trance.
+
+"Mother--dear Mother," she murmured to herself, with profound humility,
+and disappeared.
+
+The Duke Hohenlohe had just entered the imperial box where sat the
+Emperor. With a reverential bow, and a look of great satisfaction on
+his noble face, he said smilingly:
+
+"Your Majesty, it was I who discovered the new star."
+
+"Indeed? Tell me how," responded his Majesty, greatly interested.
+
+"I happened to listen to her singing on Christmas Eve. She stood in my
+courtyard with an old broken violin and shivered with cold; and when
+she sang the Lorelei, the snow circled around her wretched little form.
+It was a pity."
+
+"Duke, you have aroused my curiosity. Can I--?"
+
+"See her? Oh, your Majesty--the great honor--she will be overwhelmed,"
+the Duke replied, bowing deeply as he withdrew from the imperial box.
+
+An instant later, Christine, greatly confused and flattered by the
+request of the Emperor, stood in his presence and received his hearty
+congratulations. As if in a dream she glanced at the second gallery
+where her mother still sat, and wept tears of joy. The Emperor
+cordially extended his royal hand, which she was permitted to kiss
+before retiring. The following day the success of the new star as
+Lucia was heralded over the city. The leading journals contained long
+articles about her magnificent rendering of the difficult role, and
+the beauty of her voice, at the same time, complimenting the committee
+of directors of the Imperial Opera House for this opportunity given
+to native talent, thus making an exception to the general rule that
+prophets are not recognized in their own country.
+
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+
+"Your first appearance was a triumph that will live in the memory
+of Vienna, my dear Christine. In fact, your magnificent rendering
+of a role which only such singers as Patti, Sembrich and Melba have
+attempted, has exceeded all expectations. Candidly, I had commenced to
+blame myself for having yielded to the wishes of Duke Hohenlohe," said
+the director of the Conservatory with a radiant smile, as he entered
+Christine's simple four-room apartment, a day later. "And I am most
+glad to have been commissioned by the Board of Directors to offer you a
+three years' contract with a suitable salary--but, my dear girl, what
+is the matter?"
+
+Christine stood before him pale as a ghost. A slight tremor shook
+her slender frame, her eyes were downcast and red with weeping. She
+stammered a few words which the director could not understand.
+
+He scrutinized her face sharply, being wholly puzzled, as he
+endeavored to fathom the true cause of this state of mind.
+
+"Pardon me, my dear girl, if I express my surprise. I hope you are
+not dissatisfied with your debut. Why, you ought to be singing
+rhapsodies--be filled with ambition and enthusiasm--after being
+received by his Majesty and complimented upon your remarkable success."
+
+Without replying, her lips quivering and dumb, Christine slowly and
+solemnly opened the door of the adjacent room. A mysterious, oppressive
+something seemed to fill the room like the shadow of death.
+
+In the centre was a catafalque, at the end of which stood two lighted
+candles, sputtering lightly like the last feeble shrieks of a departing
+soul. Near the catafalque, on a small pedestal, rested the picture of
+poor Peter, embedded in a mass of roses.
+
+The autumn sun, shining through the lilac and myrtle boughs that
+rustled close to the window, glinted over the pure, pale face of the
+singer. Mournfully, her tearful eyes sought the object of her deep
+devotion. On a black velvet cushion near Peter's picture, stood a
+pair of old shoes surrounded by jasmine and white camelias. A ray of
+sunshine stealing through the myrtle leaves made golden ripples on the
+shoes.
+
+Christine pressed her hand to her heart, as if beholding that scene
+in the tavern of her childhood days. "Not yesterday," she said to the
+director in a trembling voice--"not yesterday, but five years ago I
+made my debut as a singer, when I earned these shoes in recognition of
+my singing--from him--" She pointed to Peter's picture, almost overcome
+by emotion.
+
+"I sympathize most keenly with you, but my dear girl, what are they?"
+
+"They are my only mementoes of my dear friend Peter, who lost his
+life in the service of the Empire--the first victim of the terrible
+rebellion at the Southern frontier." She stopped, unable to continue,
+while her heart contracted painfully, and big tears of sympathy and
+love for the shoemaker's apprentice trickled down her blanched face.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Christine is now one of the greatest opera stars on the horizon, and
+her sisters are following in her footsteps. But every year when the sad
+day of poor Peter's death comes, Christine, clothed all in black, goes
+out to the cemetery with flowers in hand, and sits for hours under the
+pure white marble obelisk where, in gilded letters, these words are
+traced:
+
+_ERECTED IN HONOR OF PETER STARK_,
+
+_By his devoted, sorrowing friend_,
+
+_CHRISTINE_.
+
+
+
+
+CONCETTA
+
+AN ITALIAN NOVELETTE
+
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+Many large and small boats were dancing merrily on the Bay of
+Castellamare, so richly populous with many rare species of fish. The
+mirrorlike blue surface was only ruffled by the small steamers on their
+way to and from Sorrento, carrying throngs of pleasure-seeking tourists
+from all parts of the world.
+
+On the right hand shore, extended on a high promontory receding a
+little from the shore, stands peacefully dreaming and forgotten, by the
+outer world, the little village of Vico Ecquenso.
+
+The innumerable small fishing smacks belonging to the villagers
+("paesani") dot the bay as far as Castellamare, and every morning they
+make their way thither, carrying to market their nightly catches of
+tunny fish, anchovies and other dumb subjects of Neptune.
+
+The valleys, perfumed throughout their length with odorous herbs, palms
+and gigantic cactus in wild profusion, change their character a little
+further away, by taking on the indescribable charm of the picturesquely
+draughted olive trees, which often slope down to the water's edge,
+while on green hillside terraces most magnificent grapes gleam from
+afar, like red glittering rubies to the eyes of the delighted tourist.
+
+On the left side, amid palms and chestnut trees, one catches a glimpse
+of the lifeless unroofed ruins of Pompeii, once a populous city, which
+was overwhelmed by her mighty neighbor, the terrible Vesuvius on the
+22nd of August in the year 79, and remained under ground for about
+eighteen centuries, until Charles the III ordered its excavation on
+the 1st of April, 1748. Amid all these buried treasures of art of long
+perished races, Seneca had spent his youth and Cicero had written his
+biting rhetorical masterpieces, which earned him a sixteen months'
+banishment from the court of the Emperor Claudius, whose gigantic
+statue of Persian marble, in the robe of "Pontifex Maximus" was lately
+excavated at Pesto.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+The high mountains were already casting long shadows through the
+little village of Vico Ecquenso, and the hot evening sun, now about to
+sink into the gently splashing waves, gilded with its last beams the
+weather-beaten, centuries-old convent of Santa Croce, built upon a high
+summit on green hilltops.
+
+The peaceful sound of the old convent bell, inviting those to pious
+meditations and evening prayer, was sounding now with wondrous
+sweetness over land and sea, even as far as the desolate altars of
+the heathen Gods of Pompeii tumbled down from their gilded pedestals,
+and the shrunken mummies in the "theatrum tragico," where the people
+perished without the help of the heathen gods, listened dumb and
+petrified,--the sightless eyes wide open,--to the sounds of the new
+religion calling them again and again morning and evening. The vast
+oppressiveness of the ghostly solitude there, contrasted strangely with
+the uncommon bustle perceptible that evening among the simple minded
+inhabitants of the quaint little village, who usually went so quietly
+about their work.
+
+A joyous excitement sparkled in the eyes of both old and young, who had
+assembled in front of the only village tavern, "Osteria," to witness
+the approach of the festal procession of youth and maidens coming home
+from the vineyards, laden with baskets of grapes and flowers.
+
+The wealthiest man in the place, the farmer Niccolo Gallioti, who had
+just before devoutly lit six immense wax candles in honor of the Holy
+Madonna, was today giving a feast to the young people of the place. The
+ingathered harvest had filled all his granaries to the roofs and so
+surpassed all his expectations that it had to be celebrated with eating
+and drinking, music and dancing. An hour before, he had been seen
+walking up towards the vineyards at the side of his beautiful daughter,
+Concetta, and as yet there was no sign of their return. The expecting
+crowd shuffled up and down impatiently, and craned their necks.
+
+"There! There! Corpo di bacco! they're coming now," cried a small
+bare-footed lazzaroni, greatly excited, running breathlessly to meet
+them, and vainly trying at the same time to hold up the torn, shapeless
+breeches, which actually had no right to that name. They were fastened
+by a cord on the top and reached from the shoulders to his feet.
+
+All the inhabitants of the village seemed to be present, and pressed
+forward in a confused mass, each one anxious to be the first one to
+greet the festal train, principally Galiotti the liberal host and
+dispenser of the best wine.
+
+In the rear, unobserved, stood a man of about twenty-eight years, in an
+elegant summer suit, apparently belonging to a better class, looking
+sneeringly at the great excitement of the "Paesani."
+
+His dark, sparkling eyes, encased in blue-shaded rings, had a
+demoniacal glitter. He was a tall, athletic man, with a constant
+sneer on his red lips. The fairly chiseled lineaments were blotted by
+dissipation, and blackened and distorted by the baleful fire of fierce
+passions. The bushy eyebrows, that nearly met each other, were of the
+kind to exercise an uncanny attraction upon trusting innocent girls by
+looking into their depths.
+
+The distant strains of three gaily-clad musicians with fiddles and
+horns seemed to electrify the crowd. The ragged youth began to dance,
+the old paesani threw their shabby looking caps, in the air, while the
+little barefooted lazzaroni, his face black with dirt, ran ahead of the
+anxiously expected procession, splitting his throat with shrill cries
+of "Evviva," and gesticulating frantically.
+
+Only the tall gentleman, with a constant sneer on his red lips, stood
+apparently unmoved in the same place, gazing at the scene enacted
+before his eyes with great contempt. Observing him at close range one
+could perceive, in his dark sinister eyes, the consuming fire of a
+sinful passion, a volcanic fire it seemed, like that which rose and
+fell on the summit of the neighboring Vesuvius, devastating in its
+destructiveness.
+
+He had seen the fair Concetta at Castellamare for the first time,
+and since then he could not forget her lovely face; day and night it
+haunted him, that merry, mirthful face that spoke of pure maidenliness.
+The sweetness and childlike pureness of the girl's exterior attracted
+him. It was something new in his dissipated life, something he had to
+conquer.
+
+Even at the gaming tables of Nice and Monte Carlo, and at the wild
+orgies carried on there by the dissipated sons of nobility, he seemed
+to see her standing before him, smiling sweetly, while her blue
+innocent-looking eyes shone at him like spotless mirrors.
+
+After a short time he had discovered that she came twice a week to
+Castellamare, on Mondays in her father's fishing boat, while on
+Saturdays in the company of a maid carrying stone pitchers to the
+well, "Stabilimento," where six different healing springs gush out of
+the mountain side. When the flames on top of the Vesuvius burst forth
+vehemently illuminating Naples, Castellamare and all other little
+hamlets far and near the springs are overflowing with boiling water,
+but the moment the flame diminishes, the water grows cold and gradually
+disappears.
+
+The young rogue made good use of these days; as if by chance, he
+always strolled along the same path to the springs. If it rained, he
+was promptly at hand with an umbrella; if, on the other hand, the sun
+shone down oppressively on the overheated Concetta, the same rescuer
+in need was at hand again, gallantly offering his English parasol,
+and always walking a little further with her. The sunny nature of the
+young girl shone out of her splendid blue eyes, bright and beaming as
+a May morning. She trusted every one, and especially this handsome
+gentleman, who treated her always with such exquisite courtesy, as if
+she had been one of the daughters of the Lords of Torre del Greco, whom
+she saw passing on the Corso di Santa Lucia, either on horseback or
+in a luxurious carriage. Who would be likely to have any evil designs
+against her? Old and young loved her in the village, and the poor and
+sick had learned to bless her for three miles round. Having grown up in
+her village home, and blossomed there like a wild rose, she had only
+known one great sorrow in her young life, that of losing her beloved
+mother when she was very young. Her merriment, her happy singing,
+brightened up the dark, lonely house of the gloomy old man.
+
+However, since she had made the acquaintance of the gentleman with
+the ensnaring eyes, she had changed greatly. She was often lost in
+amazement--though not in his company, but when alone in her little
+bed-chamber, where the observing eyes of her anxious father could not
+watch her.
+
+There she sat, her large blue eyes staring out of the window, with a
+feeling of overflowing joy, that filled her heart, a feeling she could
+not explain to herself, especially at his approach, the violent beating
+of something within her that threatened at times to take her breath
+away.
+
+"Mia cara Concetta, I love you madly," had he not long since whispered
+in her ear. He has said _that_ to her, the common-place daughter of the
+"Paesano" Niccolo Gallioti. But his dark, passionate-looking eyes made
+her tremble. She did not know why.
+
+"If he could see me now in my new Sunday dress!" she thought, her
+glance sweeping over the crowd, as she passed along, surrounded by all
+the youths and maidens of the village, in her red petticoat and bodice
+of black silk, with snow white muslin sleeves. "There! Santissima
+Madonna." "He is waiting for me," she whispered happily, while a blush
+brighter than the red silk of her dress overspread her lovely face.
+
+But not for all the bunches of red grapes she was so fond of would she
+have raised her eyes, for fear the youths and maidens might have read
+in them the delight of her heart at seeing the man she loved and was
+loved by such a man!--the violent beating within her increased at this
+thought. "Madonna!" She looked at the soft blue sky and the waving
+cactus plants in the distance. Tears of joy filled her eyes, while the
+golden sunshine filled every nook and corner in Nature's great realm.
+
+Arriving at the house, she found the maid busily engaged in preparing
+the feast. The men were beginning to place large tables in the garden
+under the orange trees. Then they rolled out large casks of the new
+wine from the cellar. Concetta had just put on her apron, busily
+engaged in carrying out a tray full of dishes into the gaily decorated
+garden, when the door burst open. Her father stood at the entrance,
+with his cap in his hand, bowing reverentially to a gentleman, begging
+him to honor his house by entering and participating in the general
+frolic of the day.
+
+A loud crash was heard. Concetta recognized him at once, the gentleman
+with the ensnaring eyes, and, delighted as she was, had dropped the
+large Sunday tray, with all the special dishes which only appeared on
+the Sunday table for special occasions. She was startled and happy at
+the same time, and hardly heard the irate father's words of blame. The
+voice of the little lazzaroni was heard outside singing "Napoli Bella."
+She looked through the window, and San Francesco, on his pedestal,
+smiled at her. She turned about, and met his burning glances. Her
+cheeks crimsoned; she was in a confusion when those dark fascinating
+eyes actually followed her wherever she went.
+
+He sat by her side at the table, calling her, Concetta Gallioti,
+endearing names, and squeezing her hand tenderly whenever the father
+was not looking in their direction. And when she found his eyes
+constantly fastened upon her face, she felt like crying and laughing at
+the same time, though it looked as if she were even too shy for that.
+
+Her innocent face was like the clear water of the Spring at
+Castellamare. He observed her closely, knew the symptoms and smiled
+maliciously, considering it an auspicious omen in his well-tried
+loving-making scheme.
+
+The evening breezes rose and sank solemnly through the little green
+olive trees in the distance. The tables were cleared away, the meal
+was over and the three grotesque musicians, who had been feasting
+convivially, were sounding their instruments with special vigor. The
+dance began. All eyes were turned on Concetta, as she opened the rustic
+ball with the interesting stranger beneath the orange trees.
+
+Her little heart felt as though it would burst with joy in the
+consciousness that he had eyes and ears for none but her, and scarcely
+seemed to see the most renowned beauties of the village. The whole
+evening he danced only with her--and what things he whispered in her
+ear! Her fair cheeks still clothed themselves in red--and the more they
+did so, the more eloquent grew his lips and the more terrifying in its
+passion his burning gaze.
+
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+At Torre del Greco, in his dining-hall with its lofty windows, the
+Baron di Pavichino sat at breakfast. His bushy eyebrows contracted
+darkly when the long-expected visit of his nephew Luigi was announced
+to him.
+
+Luigi di Pavichino, the passionate lover of the fair Concetta, now
+entered the room, pale and weary-eyed. For four days he had not been
+seen in the Palazzo di Pavichino, although not long before he had
+become engaged to his rich cousin. The fear of exposing himself to
+her displeasure now brought him here, after changing his clothes for
+a little more formal attire than that in which he had appeared at the
+peasants' festival, to explain his absence by a plausible story.
+
+"_Per Bacco!_ Lucetta was looking for you in vain yesterday and the
+day before!" began the old Baron sternly, plucking at his gray beard
+in a way that betokened displeasure. "If you are beginning already to
+provide such disappointments for your future wife, my dear Luigi, then
+it would possibly be more sensible to call the engagement off while
+there is yet time."
+
+Luigi trembled at these words of his wealthy uncle. In fact, this
+marriage was his only plank of salvation, to which he clung with
+desperate grasp like a man fighting for life in the waves--to which
+he must cling in order to bring any order into his ruined financial
+position, which he carefully concealed from his suspecting uncle, and
+which had to be retrieved as soon as possible.
+
+The fact that the estate inherited from his father, including farms
+and factories, was mortgaged up to the last cent, would have been
+sufficient to jeopardize his relations to his unattractive but
+richly-dowered cousin. He knew the verdict. A long-drawn sigh was the
+only answer he gave to himself, and besides, there was his incapability
+of meeting his notes indorsed by friends, falling due within a short
+time for considerable amounts contracted at the gaming table. Sums
+which had to be paid because they were debts of honor, for which he
+pledged his "parole d'honneur."
+
+"Forgive me, dear uncle," he began stumblingly, with these reflections
+in mind.
+
+"I went to see the Padre at the Monastery to tell him of my engagement
+and there--the kind monk--the harvest--the new wine--"
+
+The weatherbeaten features of the old nobleman took on a more cheerful
+expression at these words.
+
+"Per bacco!" he began, smacking his lips and winking slyly, "it must
+have been the new Lacrima Christi wine I sent him last week, which has
+made all the mischief. Ho! ho! if that's the case, my dear boy, you
+will soon taste the wine that will be worth the tasting," he added with
+a broad grin, smacking his lips again in a manner attributable to the
+thorough knowledge of an old wine gourmand.
+
+"Yes, my boy, the same Lacrima Christi will be served at your wedding
+next month."
+
+The atmosphere was sultry, but he shivered; and if a mirror could have
+been held before his eyes he would have startled back alarmed from the
+gray stony face so unlike his.
+
+"Next month?" he stammered.
+
+Until now he tried to forget the whole affair; her image was so utterly
+driven from his fickle heart as if it were buried twenty feet under the
+ruins of Herculaneum.
+
+"Yes, my dear Luigi, I shall write at once to Torre Annunziata, and
+then we will celebrate a merry wedding and invite all--Why, what's the
+matter?" he asked greatly bewildered. "What a wry face you are making?"
+
+"It is the pleasure--the unlooked-for surprise,--" stammered Luigi with
+difficulty, while his pale face grew a shade paler. The sweet face of
+Concetta, with the bewitching dimples from which little mocking Cupids
+seemed to peep out, challenging him like a siren to a kiss; her silvery
+laughter, her deep blue eyes like a fairy's--all that came up before
+his interior vision with intoxicating strength, while the thought
+that in four weeks he would be called upon to plight his troth to his
+unlovely cousin made him shudder.
+
+Still he was careful not to drop the veil that hid his real thoughts so
+carefully in the presence of his suspicious uncle.
+
+[Illustration: CONFESSING ALL TO THE WONDER-WORKING SAINT]
+
+"Pleasure? Ho! ho! my dear Luigi, I thought as much. Young men, young
+men! I have not forgotten my own youth yet--a little wild it was." He
+chuckled half to himself, in a low voice.
+
+"Can I--see my _fiancee_ now?" Luigi asked, in a half stifled voice.
+
+"Now? So early? No, dear boy, she is still among her pillows--dreaming
+of you! _Per Dio!_ today, though, is the great festival of Saint
+Cecelia. Our good neighbors from Torre del Greco, Portici, and Torre
+Annunziata will be sure to gather at Castellamare. We must go too. You
+shall go with Lucetta in my victoria with the four fiery Arabs, and I
+will follow the happy pair in a plainer carriage," continued the old
+baron with nods of pleasure.
+
+It was at the same festival, at the chapel of Saint Cecelia, that he
+hoped this very evening to meet Concetta. The room seemed to spin round
+him and grow dark. "By your leave, my dear uncle, I must go at once to
+the club. You know, the joyful news--"
+
+"Of your engagement?"
+
+"Haven't you mentioned it yet to your friends," he cried, a picture of
+wild-eyed amazement.
+
+"To be sure I have, but--the early date of the wedding--" he hastened
+to reply in a dull voice, wiping the cold perspiration from his brow.
+
+Catching up his hat and cane, he took a hasty leave from his Uncle,
+with the promise to come back punctually at four o'clock. He rushed
+away tortured by this dreaded thought in mind; but he had to see the
+small army of creditors and keep them at bay with their insolent
+demands for money, which were becoming intolerable until after the most
+dreaded wedding.
+
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+In Castellamare every year little shrines are erected for the feast
+of St. Cecelia as far as the Hotel di Stabia, which is close to the
+beautiful bay of Naples, known to the tourists of all nations. In these
+shrines, decorated with silken draperies of different colors, immense
+wax tapers are burning, amid which roughly painted images of the
+wonder-working saint are seen shining out mercifully in the brilliant
+afternoon sun.
+
+She looked down with mild eyes, upon the devout multitude, that hung
+up their votive offerings of waxen hands, feet and hearts with tearful
+eyes. Then deep in prayer they besought through her the blessed
+Virgin's help for their various ills and woes; kissing devoutly the
+silken drapery.
+
+Concetta in her new Sunday dress stood there among the praying throng.
+After praying for a while she moved towards the Holy shrine; her eyes
+moistened when she fastened with trembling hands a little waxen heart
+to the drapery looking up imploringly.
+
+She saw her benignant gaze, and knelt down, confessing all to the
+wonder-working saint, and besought her to heal her sick heart. She
+hardly knew what oppressed her so, and what made her so immensely
+happy, at the same time. To her, woods and fields were indeed vocal,
+every flitting bird and gurgling brook, every passing cloud and
+whispering breeze brought messages of love from him. To the mercy of
+God and the love of Christ she now committed her love. Today in the
+boundless reverence and religious enthusiasm she felt the need of his
+presence so much more.
+
+She looked right and left. "Something must have happened," she murmured
+to herself, greatly disappointed, as it was almost twilight, and
+nowhere was to be seen the tall imposing figure of the fascinating man
+so dear to her. The sun had gone down and the shadows of the summer
+evening commenced to gather in the near forest, and climbed, like
+trooping spirits, up the rocky mountain side.
+
+"He was always so punctual," her voice faltered suddenly, and it grew
+dark before her eyes; she trembled so that she was obliged to grasp
+one of the large candle-holders near her in order to keep her from
+falling to the ground.
+
+An elegant carriage with four horses had just dashed by, in which
+she fancied she saw her lover with a richly dressed lady; her heart
+contracted painfully. Sadly, with downcast eyes praying continually,
+she took her way back to the village.
+
+Although with her pure and simple views of life, there was no room for
+doubt in her loving heart, still the disquieting thoughts that he must
+be rich and of high position, she could not keep altogether away. How
+else could he be driving about with a signora apparently of nobility?
+Involuntarily, hot tears trickled down her red cheeks out of the great
+blue eyes, like drops of rain from a patch of blue sky.
+
+When Luigi came to the village on the following day he found Concetta's
+eyes swollen with weeping. She scarcely dared to raise them, still
+heavy with tears, to his face, for fear he should read in them her
+great love for him.
+
+Luigi Pavichino, the young _roue_, who had succeeded quickly enough
+with his flattering words in making her forget the cause of her secret
+grief, now laughed lightly with a merriment that had none too pleasant
+a sound, as if he were well used to such scenes of jealousy. He called
+her his dear little bride, whom he loved and would always love, and
+therewith he kissed her rosy lips passionately, assuring her on his
+honor that he had been driving in no carriage, but had been at the
+monastery with the Padre, and then at five o'clock had come to Saint
+Cecelia's shrine, without seeing her.
+
+The nearer the wedding day approached, the oftener Luigi came to the
+village, assuring her always of the unchangeableness of his love.
+
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+The old cloister of Santa Croce, with its classic columns, had today
+a festive appearance. In front of the garden, sloping down at the
+mountain's side, one gets a glimpse at the river Sarno, where the
+Porta di Stabia once was located, and the image of Minerva in terra
+cotta--the guardian Deity of Pompeii, was excavated intact, now in the
+Museum at Naples.
+
+The old chapel was gayly decorated with rare flowers and tropical
+plants today, and the finest adornments of the ancient cloister, which
+had slumbered peacefully and been forgotten in their cupboards for a
+century, were brought out by the serving brothers, and cleansed and
+dusted of their cobwebs. They whispered excitedly putting their heads
+together, for the marriage of a high-born couple was a rare event
+within these ancient walls.
+
+The fat prior smiled in the triple folds of his chin, on all the
+preparations, with quite unusual benevolence. His little steel-gray
+eyes, keen and shrewd in their glance, fairly sparkled as he thought
+of the rich fee which would come to his cloister on such an occasion
+from a generous noble house.
+
+The cook of the monastery, Brother Salvatore, had some days earlier
+announced the festive event to Concetta's father, who supplied them
+with fish on fast-days. Concetta was quite childishly delighted. A
+noble wedding--the handsome pair--the rich costumes--all that she
+had never seen in her whole life; so she teased her father until he
+promised to take her to the wedding. Her cheeks glowed, her big eyes
+sparkled with pleasure, when she was sitting in the boat in her Sunday
+best and thinking of all the splendors that were going to be exhibited
+before her.
+
+"If I understood aright the look Saint Cecelia gave me, I shall soon be
+standing there too!" she whispered to herself with a happy smile, while
+her father sat opposite her and plied the oars with accustomed hands.
+"Oh, the happiness, the happiness of belonging to him!" she went on
+in her whispered colloquy with herself, both hands clasped before her
+face, blushing with maidenly modesty.
+
+Gloomy clouds began to obscure the sun. The magnificent landscape
+was in a few minutes wrapped, as it were, in a dark veil of mist.
+With shining eyes she sat in the boat watching the sky, and drinking
+draughts of joy with which mingled no drop of sin or selfishness in its
+crystal waves of purity; for she had grown up with nature as ignorant
+as her plants at home, of the roar and strife, the burning hate and
+cunning intrigue of the great world of men and women.
+
+Frequent puffs of wind made the boat now tremble and rock. The fear of
+an approaching storm had laid hold of the animal world as well; the
+terrified sea-gulls flew wildly over Concetta's head, while a hideous
+owl in the neighboring olive-grove uttered its long-drawn, harsh notes,
+which floated out over the river. Concetta saw and heard nothing. Her
+thoughts were with the man to whom she had given herself in almost
+superhuman love, whom she was tempted to adore like the holy image
+of Christ before which she knelt in lowly reverence, imploring His
+blessing on her beloved.
+
+She heard the sound of the great bell, which was only rung on great
+occasions; the nearer she came, the more joyfully beat her heart. A
+gaily-decked steamer lay already at the landing stage, so that they
+had to go a little further in order to land. They had no sooner found
+a place where they could moor their boat than Concetta with impatient
+haste sprang ashore. They then climbed the steep hill as quickly as
+possible. Great raindrops fell again, and began to wet Concetta's
+Sunday dress.
+
+At last they reached the cloister; but they had come near missing
+the ceremony. The solemn tones of the organ were still sounding
+impressively through the chapel. Concetta, with shining eyes and wet
+through and through, was standing near the chapel door, contemplating
+the undreamed-of splendor of costumes of the high-born ladies. The
+bridal pair, surrounded by wedding guests congratulating them heartily,
+were not yet visible.
+
+"Now! now!" there was a general movement towards the outer door of the
+chapel.
+
+"Here they are coming now," whispered Concetta with sparkling eyes
+full of expectation, to her father, whose head was bowed reverently.
+Everybody rushed on in order to have an advantageous place when the
+bridal party passed.
+
+Girls all in white came first, carrying bouquets in their hands,
+and then Luigi--pale and haggard--looking like a bad conscience
+personified; and on his arm came the bride all in white!
+
+Concetta saw and heard no more.
+
+The tortured image of Saint Antoni in the entrance stared ghostly at
+her, dripping drops of blood. The decaying walls of the old cloister
+tottered about her, flames sprang up towards her from yawning abysses;
+lightning shot across her brain, and Beelzebub with his infernal band
+gnashed his teeth at her in a laugh of malicious triumph.
+
+She recoiled, dazed with awe-struck terror without a sound, without a
+cry she moved unobserved by the jostling crowd behind Luigi. Her blue
+eyes wide open never turned from him an instant, as if struck dumb by a
+horror too great for words or cry.
+
+A little keen steel blade was glistening in her hand, and the next
+instant Luigi was stabbed through his treacherous heart. He fell
+senseless at the feet of his newly wedded bride.
+
+The frightened wedding guests, fearing a fainting spell, rushed to
+him, but the blood was now flowing freely from the spot where she had
+stabbed him. Nobody saw her do it. He was quickly carried into the
+monastery, followed by the wedding guests.
+
+Concetta uttered a wild cry, and rushed weeping aloud down the hill
+towards the harbor. It was already dark; the wind was now blowing with
+the vehemence of a hurricane over the foaming waters, and the roar of
+thunder shook the bathing-houses on the left hand side of the harbor.
+Concetta, with a sudden headlong rush, breathless and horrified had
+reached the landing pier. With a loud cry she threw herself into the
+foaming waves and disappeared.
+
+At the same moment her father and brother Salvatore, running after her,
+had reached the water.
+
+Poor Niccolo, trembling in every limb, was at first rendered almost
+helpless with horror; but the despair which began to hold sway over him
+gave him now superhuman strength. With frantic haste he unfastened his
+little boat, and rowed gesticulating wildly to the spot where he had
+seen her sink. He loved his only daughter with a love that was akin to
+idolatry. His grey hair fluttered wildly about his furrowed and heated
+brow; great tears trickled down his dark cheeks, and panting aloud he
+gazed down into the foaming gloomy depths.
+
+"Santissima!" he cried aloud, "Madonna! My greatest treasure--my only
+child! Have mercy!"
+
+A vivid flash of lightning illuminated the stormy surface and then--he
+saw the red dress floating upon the waves. "Cara mia!" he cried, with
+a stammering tongue, wild with joy when he had grasped her and dragged
+the dear form into the boat. Calling her ceaselessly by endearing
+names, he pressed her to his heart as though to bring back warmth and
+life to her young body, and covered her dear face with passionate
+kisses, but the beautiful head fell back pale and lifeless; the great
+blue eyes were closed; she was dead.
+
+With horror in his wide strained eyes, and pallor on his quivering
+lips, he gazed at the prostrate form before him, the lifeless eyes
+staring now blankly at the sky,--the hue of life and exuberant health
+still glowing on the full cheeks adorned with every grace of youth and
+beauty.
+
+"Morte--morte!" stammered the father, frantic with grief, tearing his
+grey hair despairingly. No merry glance, no roguish smile she had any
+more for him.
+
+"Figlia mia morte!" he cried, beating his breast wildly. "You will be
+avenged, none of them will escape!" And holding the dead Concetta in
+his arms, he stood there erect with flaming eyes and panting breath
+swearing the oath of the deadly feud between him and the family,
+clenching his fists threateningly. The mighty grief tore at his heart
+strings and finally, brought bitter tears to his burning eyes, great
+drops streaming down over his grief-stricken face.
+
+On the pier, Brother Salvatore had sunk upon his knees and clasped
+the silver crucifix, which hung at his side by a cord. Holding it out
+towards the boat, he raised his voice, "Benedizione!" he cried aloud. A
+shiver shook his emaciated frame as if the spectacle which he beheld,
+would have burned itself indelibly upon his memory.
+
+The lightning flashes showed from afar the silver cross as it were--a
+symbol of atonement and--forgiveness.
+
+TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
+
+Obvious printer errors have been corrected without comment.
+Inconsistencies in the use of hyphens has been addressed where
+possible. Otherwise the author's non-use of accents, spelling and
+punctuation have been left intact with the following exception:
+
+Page 161: The word "thought" was changed to "though" in the following
+phrase: "though it looked as if she was even too shy for that."
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Gnomes of the Saline Mountains, by 
+Anna Goldmark Gross
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 43762 ***